Okay, i have always wanted to play Viktor because his game play seemed to fit what i wanted out of an ap mage. Problem being that everyone on this forum was always saying that he is soo bad and useless. Now that he is free, i tried him, and owned. i ended up with a score of 21-9(i think, not sure but it was right around there) and almost got a penta, but it was stolen by amumu's red buff. He is in a great position where he is right now and anyone who says he is a waste obviously cant play him, because he is amazing. probably my new main mid. Anyone agree?

He's good, but his late game is extremely mediocre. His early-mid are around where they should be. He also counters a decent number of popular mids due to his really strong early harass and his stun/silence.

There is a reason Viktor is underplayed, and that's his silly item and semi-difficult abilities in comparison to a lot of more played champs.

If you like Viktor, then by all means: play him, do well with him, and enjoy yourself. But being a strange and relatively difficult champ, he'll always be underplayed and therefore regarded as bad because of the people trying him and failing.

the only thing he needs is another upgrade to the hex core for late game...

He's better in twisted treeline as the sole mage due to tight spaces and the counter to whole melee teams.

Viktor's only issues are his low base mana and the imbalance between his augments. We already know his passive is being reworked, so in the future this will hopefully have been largely addressed.

This really isn't true. He has good scaling and his W and R are amazing in teamfights. People make far too big a deal out of his 'losing an item slot' given that he gets great AP out Augment Death and games almost always end before a person would have a full item build anyway.

Teamfighting is what Viktor is about.

Setting a enemy up for the kill every time he uses w. Blasting multiple champs with his laser at same time weakening the opposing team as a whole. Using laser to hit at extreme range so enemy team cant get organized.

I played him twice last night for the first time and owned both games with him. The ability to get a full build by 30 - 40 minutes is incredible. I can see the need for another hex upgrade, but besides that, I think he does just fine.

With a team with good CC, he owns w/ his stun, ult, laser combo. I am going to be buying him shortly after playing these few games with him.

I have never understood why people take Death rod. It only has any value late-game, to the point that even if I were to take it, it would be one of the last items I would select.

Power rod (yellow) for solo is by far the most effective. The health and regen are irrelevant (resistance would probably fit better with the shield anyway), because the speed boost isn't some piddly little boost, it's ghost level 30%.... you basically get permanent ghost. You can stick to almost anybody, very easily dodge and out maneuver abilities, and easily escape from sticky situations. The best part is it allows you to save W for clinch situations, and because of your high maneuverability you can better maximize your W and R placements.

People get Death because not only does it give the best stat bonus for it's cost of the augments, it also improves your base damage and scaling on your main damage tool, which happens to also be your only available poke as well as being your best harassing tool in lane. You're basically choosing to pay ~100g for a 30% increase in the effectiveness of your main damage tool VS ~500g (yes I'm completely ignoring the value of the health regen on account of it being useless) for a conditional speed boost. Death is still useful mid game because it boosts your E's base damage as well as it's scaling, and provides a sizable AP boost on it's own. If you're level 9 and otherwise have two Doran's rings the difference in damage between Death and a Blasting Wand is ~320 with the blasting wand and ~420 with Death. An extra 100 damage is nothing to scoff at, and it only gets better as the match progresses.

You're grossly overstating the value of the Power speed boost. Yes it is a high value and it's tied to a low cooldown ability but it's also completely dependent on the use of said ability which happens to be low range. It doesn't apply out of combat, and is only applied in combat if you're getting closer than is, outside of scenarios where you or a teammate have already CC'd the target, generally wise. You can't use it to save your W because Q isn't safe to use unless a target is already CC'd. as almost any other mid has higher range and most gap closers are equal or greater range. It also doesn't significantly help with the positioning of R because it's already higher range than Q. If you're close enough to benefit from the speed boost then you're already almost where you need to be to ult the enemy team.

Power was meant to work in conjunction with a tanky mage build. A build that isn't viable on Viktor because of his poor base stats and the inefficiency of Augment Power itself. This is similar to why Augment Gravity isn't worthwhile, as it's meant to work in a more supporting role, only Viktor doesn't work as a pure support, and going hybrid support will generally leave your team weak for magic damage unless you've built your team around the strategy.