I've been testing this quite a bit, and just did the theorycrafting to back up my in-game experience. Bottom line is that a Ryze with max CD reduction is more than twice as effective as a Ryze w/out CD reduction maxed. The basic concept is simple: CD reduction lets you cast about twice as many spells (40% faster). B/C of his passive, that makes your ult (and everything else) come up even faster. Played optimally at max cooldown, Ryze can get out 3 volleys of his main damage spells while his ult is up; realistically, you'll probably get out 2. Played optimally w/out cooldown, Ryze can MAYBE squeeze out 2 volleys of his main damage spells while his ult is up, but will probably only get 1.

But here's the real kicker: played even competently w/max cooldown, Ryze can easily have only 8 seconds w/his ult off before it comes up again. In a perfect world, playing every ability right when it comes up, he can get that down to 6! That means he can have his ult up half the time or more. In contrast, w/out cooldown reduction he has to wait a lot longer between ults.

Practically, these aren't arbitrary periods of time, either. It is likely to be the difference between getting out 2 ulted rounds of his main damage spells during a team engagement (4 rounds of whoopass) or only making 1 ulted round of attacks. It is not hard to imagine scenarios where having no CD actually cuts his capacity to about 1/4 of what it would otherwise be.

Please, I beg you: don't write anymore Ryze guides that don't include him maxing cooldown, or at least coming close...I'll have to play w/the numbers a bit more to find his minimum CD that still allows for 4 cans of whoopass in a team confrontation. There are a lot of good ways to do this, from runes, masteries, items and golem (w/possible monster buff extension mastery). Tell us how you are maxing it, and why. But don't think you are playing this champ to anything like his capacity without a good chunk of cooldown.

Because I'm not level 20 yet, I haven't bought any runes, and I still use cooldown Ryze. The only frustration comes from not killing in the first volley because I exchanged AP for cooldown. I feel like the build is 10 times more useful in team fights though. Rather than throwing down 1 volley and ghosting around until I can do it again, I can basically keep on wrecking.

I'm almost level 20 and I've saved up IP, so convince me to buy cooldown runes.

I'm still a new player and I think I'll keep playing Ryze, I just hope he can be made viable in the highest ELOs

IMHO cooldown runes are a very good investment. They are at least decent on almost any champ, and ideal on quite a few. They are the main blue runes that I've bought, and I use them almost all the time. Unlike many other runes, which only really help early game, CD doesn't "wash out" late game. Who cares if you have 100 extra mana out of a pool of 2000? But having 7 to 10 percent extra cooldown is meaningful throughout.

Get Flat CD Glyphs, for sure. And Flat HP Quints, and Magic Pen Marks.

Seals... you can go a lot of different ways.

^ That

i only get magic pen and ap runes .. its awesome .. for items i get that shoe that penetrate 20 magic resit +15% magic resist from masteries + and magic resist stuff .. for that i got a few triple kills ... .. at lvl 18 with 700+ ap (thanks to items and masteries and runes) ... i can easily kill heroes at their towers and run away save ... its really good when you start out strong in early game .. you scare off other enemies and let your team kill turrets ... then occassionally wait for enemies to approache you and then you snare them and toast them .. then the other enemies will stay away from you =D ... i always get a strong start keeping enemy lvls low... .. but i get owned when there are heavy tanks on the other team ... but usually there is easy feeders where i can 1-2-3-4 ... all attacks on high dps units with low life and low magic resist and kill them with one cast.

I play with no CDR and I carry games.

11% flat CDR from runes + 9/0/21 masteries (9%) + Haunting Guise + Elixir of Brilliance = win.

Solution, I think he can be good (and even carry) w/out it. I just don't think he is anywhere near his potential. Personally, I like Deathfire Grasp (15%) , 7% CD from runes, 9% from masteries and golem buff/elixir to make up the rest. Deathfire Grasp, combined w/the quick cooldown, even makes tanks start to feel squishy.

Appreciate the feedback from everyone. I'm really interested in finding out how to optimize this champ. If anyone can provide feedback in the form of, "When I get X instead of Y, it gives me X extra burst damage, which around Lvl X means I get kills when I otherwise wouldn't." I'm particularly interested in comparisons of deathfire, which gives CD and (I suspect) more burst damage than you'd get from a similar gold expenditure on an item that gives more AP. Or, for example, assuming you are getting Magic pen for red runes, what are the relative advantages of AP runes vs CD runes? Or, for example, is it really important to get AP early/mid to make sure you get your ganks, and better to wait for CD when you really need it in team fights? I know everyone on the forum Pwnfacerollflstomps all of their opponents. That's great. But can you help people optimize the champ?