What I have come to learn about Ryze

Ryze's single target burst is actually horrifyingly huge, even with only 2 or 3 items.

Ryze's ult is pretty much useless for getting your team into the enemy team (Since they will more than certainly just throw all of their shit at the circle that just appeared and probably get a clean ace off of you not being able to do anything about it), but is an amazing gank tool

Rank 1 of Ryze's ult has extremely poor range compared to rank 2, but if you're under your tower and your jungler ganks, it makes for a great tool to get into the action

Even without his amazing burst, the 2 second root that Ryze brings to the table is an amazing catch tool, and in most circumstances, if you catch somebody with that 2 second root and you have 2 or more of your team near you, they are dead. (Hilarious Synergies include but are not limited to; Lux, Morgana, Jhin, Ashe, Xin Zhao)

Going into Morellonomicon right after tear and then getting Rylai's Crystal scepter feels much better than stopping for the ROA in between. I actually feel useful in the mid game doing so.