i was support zilean versus support karma.. and WOW she does so much more dmg than zilean.. heals.. shields.. speed and superior damage that she can double activate.. with a slow effect.
i coudn't touch her or phase her without putting forth 10x more effort.
it's no wonder nobody picks zilean. riot handicapped him
zilean just sucks at anything. i played him mid and EVERYONE was doing way more dmg than me. you can't get close enough to people to drop your bombs without them killing you
on top of that. she has better range.. every time i go in to attack her back she already hit me before i could start to cast my stuff.
Zilean has an aoe stun for double bomb
And his ult "heals"
He is also an amazing support with an assassin heckarin
Hhm Id imagine that it could be a difficult matchup, the best thing you can abuse though is that her damage is solely based on her q (as her w is unreliable and puts her in danger if she uses it). As such just wait on the opposite side of the minions from her wait for her to use her mantra bonus then harass from within the minions as she won't be able to hit you with W).
Finally if all else fails you can just remember that you scale so much better than her and as long as you survive lane without dying you'll win lane (Assuming your Adcs don't have huge disparities in scaling). Also zilean is best when you have at least 1 hyper carry on your team, EX would be a Jinx, Tristan, Vayne, Yi, Tryndamere, Casseopiea, etc.
Real talk, Zilean support sucks in laning phase and only does really well in certain team comps. Building AP on Zilean support just makes him into a crappy poke mage that will be blown up in every fight. It's better to go tanky, max your e, and ask to be camped. He scales really well into late-game if you just focus on utility, forcing engages/locking down opponents with his e, getting stuns off with his double bombs, reviving carries with his ult, and soaking up a lot of damage with all the health in a tanky-support build path. I got a video somewhere of me zooming all over the place as an unkillable tank-zil, annoying the shit out of the enemy team. Rammus is your best friend with this setup...
Karma is the ultimate poke support. She's a lot like blue Ezreal in that 90% of her damage is spamming q. She's extremely dominant in laning phase if you play her well, and you'll need to because she falls off in terms of utility later. If you want to play Zilean as an AP poke support, just play Karma instead.
