Xerath is pretty OP as new releases go. Kinda fun too.
9/0/21, standard caster runes. Dorans ring x2, boots of lucidity or merc treads, rylai, rabadon, void staff. QEW, then R>Q>W>E.
His ranges are obscenely long. He's basically a mix between kog'maw, lux and pre-nerf orianna. His autoattack range is long enough to safely farm creeps. When he goes into Locus of Power, his Arcanopulse (Q) goes from roughly the distance of Morganas Dark Binding to the distance of Lux'es Laz0r. His ultimate shoots 3 times, with roughly the range of a lv6 kog'maw living artillery without locus of power to a lv16 kog'maws living artillery with locus active.
Locus of power starts at ~20sec cooldown, but goes down 4 secs every time you rank it up. The magic pen from locus caps at 35% + 15% from masteries. Throw a void staff on top and you're looking at 90% magic penetration. Hence why you can easily skip sorceror's shoes.
So far I'm at a 100% win rate with Xerath. the main mistake I see enemy Xerath's do is staying in locus of power for too long. He needs to be constantly moving, since he's somewhat squishy even with his passive. Once you get a few ranks in it, locus->mage chains->arcanopulse->cancel locus seems to be the way to go. It's almost never worth staying in locus long enough to fire a second arcanopulse.
If you're going for a kill, locus->mage chains->arcane barrage gives you better odds of landing the stun than locus->mage chains->arcanopulse. As soon as you've stunned someone, follow up with arcanopulse and the rest of your charges on arcane barrage. It should easily take a squishy down to 10-15% hp.
I'm still debating which summoner spells to give him. Conventional logic says flash/ignite, but I'm not sold on ignite. Most of the time, you're going to be slinging spells outside of ignite's range, so you are unlikely to be able to tag people with it if they flee. Teleport is a delicious alternative since it allows you to telegank if your team buys wards. Otherwise, there's always cleanse or exhaust to stop the enemy jungler from killing you.
His jokes are also pretty lulzy.
"Power laning, power farming, power kills, so many kills, FOUR HUNDRED KILLS!"
"Lightning bolt, Lightning Bolt, LIGHTNING BOLT, LIIIGHTNING BOLLLT!"
Ulminati?
