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Choose Champion Build:
- Standard Set up
- Alternative Mastery Set Up to
Spells:
Flash
Ignite
Items
Ability Order
Sunlight (PASSIVE)
Leona Passive Ability
Threats & Synergies
Introduction
Do you want to play a support who can dominate the lane at level 2? Do you want a support who at level 2 is, in Hearthstone's great phrase, "Ready for Action!". Then look no further than Leona. Leona has 2 stuns and a root in her kit. At level 2 you can get an enemy to hold still for about 2 seconds, while taking damage from you and your ADC. This might not sound like a lot, but believe me it is quite brutal. At level 6 you can hold people in place for basically 3 seconds, more than enough time for your teammates to kill someone. Leona is a naturally tanky champion who goes "all in" and can get the ball rolling for your team.
Just beware: if you fall behind with Leona, you are 99% USELESS (Will explain this further down the guide)
However, Solar Flare isn't a perfect primary initiation spell. There are still champions mobile enough to completely escape during this spell's slight delay time and so there are certain people you shouldn't consider this spell as a primary engage method on.
1: Kassadin: Even with the nerfs to Riftwalk, Kassadin will still blink away and you will have wasted your ult. If he is as level 6 and Riftwalks, you basically have 5 seconds to use this spell, so pick your timing well. At level 11 and onward: the cooldown is ridiculously short. At this point no self respecting Kassadin should be caught by your Solar Flare
2: LeBlanc: Take everything I said about Kassadin, except apply this to level 1! This champion has extreme amounts of mobility, one of the most mobile champions at all stages of the game! Only use Solar Flare on her if you are sure she has not only used her Distortion but also her Mimic. Only then will you catch her.
3: Ezreal: Archane Shift can blink Ezreal to safety so quickly that your Solar Flare will not land on him at all. Wait out his Archane Shift and you can grab him.
4: Ahri: You need to keep track of her Spirit Rush. If it is up, she will dodge this spell too easily. Also with Orb of Deception's buff recently, she now has a speed up with can get her out of the blast radius. An extremely annoying champions for Leona to deal with.
5: Corki: Valkyrie: This spell can be used fast enough to escape the blast radius, and then send him far enough away to play safely.
6: Katarina: Kat can Shunpo to almost anything on the map in the blink of an eye, can easily escape this spell.
Also, unlike most engage supports, you will most likely traveling to the middle of the enemy team and staying there. Once you are there you need to get down the rest of your combo and auto attack like crazy to optimize damage. To do this safely, Leona not only needs to build tanky, but she needs "cream of the crop" tank items, which are expensive.
You must commit to this playstyle not just in tanky items, but in tanky runes and masteries.
In the utility tree I take Cullinary Master in order to get increased benefit from health potions. I prefer to take 3 points in Summoner's Insight so that I can flash initiate as often as possible. In order to be able to afford the expensive tank items I take points in Greed and Scavenger . I take a point in Wealth in order to afford one extra health potion, very important in the early game. I take one point in Expanded Mind just to avoid any mana issues. Leona doesn't have a huge mana problem, but I like taking one point in Expanded Mind . I take 1 point in Inspiration just so I level up faster. I don't put points into Bandit and Intelligence as these mastery slots are not optimal on a tank support.
Combo 1: Flash + Ignite. If you want to exert level 2 dominance and get your ADC a kill, look no further than this set up. Leona NEEDS to snowball the lane, this combo simply does that the best.
Combo 2: Flash + Exhaust: While exhaust isn't as good for level 2 kills, this is a better summoner spell during teamfights and can help shutdown a powerful enemy threat. This is the "safer pick", but I personally prefer Ignite.
Next core Purchases: Sightstone + Sweeping Lens + Mobi Boots: Sightstone + S. Lens= Vision control and vision denial, very important for every point in the game. Mobi boots help you traverse the map, and make plays.
Turbo Chemtank: In order to snowball hard you want the ability to engage onto the enemies whenever you want. This item gives you a big ball of health and the speed boost in order to run people down. Since this item was released, I rush this item instead of Face of the Mountain. This item just gives too much engage power to ignore. I recommend building it after your sightstone.
Boots: There are 3 types of boots that work with Leona: Mobility Boots, Ninja Tabi, and Mercury's Treads. My favorite of these is Mobility Boots for early roaming, ward placing, and engaging onto the enemy team. These boots + flash also serve as Leona's bread and butter getting into range tools. Ninja Tabi and Mercury's Treads are excellent tank boots and can be bought up depending on the situation.
Sightstone: Vision control= win games. This item should be the first item you purchase after going back. While Ruby Sightstone is a natural progression in your build path, this should be saved for later in the build as the 800 gold used to make this item can be utilized in better ways early game.
Randuin's Omen: This item makes Leona rock solid and gives her extra CC in her initiation. I almost always rush this item after my Face of the Mountain.
Banshee's Veil: Since I play Leona with the intention of going "behind enemy lines" I need to become rock solid. In my opinion Locket of the Iron Solari isn't strong enough in health or magic resistance to do this. B. Veil on the other hand is one of the strongest tank items in the game.
Thornmail My personal favorite item to top off Leona's tankiness when facing AD damage threats.
Frozen Heart: Leona doesn't have mana problems, unless you are unnecessarily spamming her spells. This item is a great method of dealing with a double AD composition.
Sunfire Aegis: I don't recommend this item under any circumstance. It's not as rock solid as Randuin's Omen and there are better armor items in the game.
Locket of the Iron Solari: I normally don't pick up this item vs a standard team composition, however against a double AP teams I will pick up this item just so I can give my team some extra survivability.
Level 2 All in! Starting at level 2 you have a form of initiation that is extremely easy to pull off and is very deadly. Zenith Blade + Leona auto attack + ADC auto attack + Zenith Blade + Leona auto attack + ADC auto attack + ignite. This combo will either chunk out the enemy ADC or kill him. If played properly, you will establish lane dominance
Level 3 and beyond combos: Now you have Eclipse which can be used as a damage source and tank steroid for your engage. One thing I see in solo que too often is Leonas standing out in the open activate Eclipse before attempting to engage on me. This usually gives me ample time to reposition to mitigate or back off so to completely stop the combo. Please, if you are standing out in the open don't activate Eclipse until you arrive at the enemy using Zenith Blade. You won't take much damage, but more importantly you won't give up the element of surprise.
Level 6 Combo:
Use Solar Flare as needed, when doing this put a squishy carry in the center of the beam. Then use your quick CC spells and with teammate's damage you should be able to kill them. Also in teamfight situations its not as important to micromanage optimal damage, just use your spells in quick succession and lock them down.
Best ADC
1. Jinx: This may seem to contradict my opening statement, but Jinx has a great laning phase, has CC and a small amount of burst to follow up your engages. This is also the only hyper carry that works with Leona, one of my personal favorite ADC's to work with as Leona.
2. Graves: The original ADC burst king, he is still strong and has the damage and spells to backup your engages.
3. Lucian( Graves 2.0), pretty much identical to Graves in terms of burst although Lucian has a stronger mid game powerspike with arguable a weaker late game than Graves.
4. Corki: One of the strongest mid game power spikes in the game, while he is more level 6 reliant than the previous candidates, he still packs a good punch in the pre 5 initiations.
Worst ADC to work with
1. Caitlyn: There is little to NO synergy between these two. Caitlyn hates going "all in" she wants to poke people down little by little. Leona simply forces an engage that Caitlyn isn't best equipped to handle.
2. Kog Maw: This late game god is extremely immobile and not strong enough in the early game to work with your kit.
3. Vayne: Just no, you need an ADC with early strength. Vayne takes too long to power up and Vayne has a terrible laning phase.
Middle of the Pack:
1. Twitch: I personally don't like Twitch + Leona, as Twitch has a weak pre 6, but Twitch does have good level 6 burst.
2. Ezreal: Not a terrible lane, but he isn't optimal with Leona's damage when you compare him to the best ADC. This is even worse if the Ezreal is building Blue Build, than this truly is a waste.
3. Varus: Similar to Caitlyn, however Varus does have level 6 engage and a nice powerspike.
4. Tristana: Nothing terrible about this lane, just not as strong as Best ADC. Definately the strongest ADC on this Middle of the Pack list to use with Leona
1: VISION CONTROL: You have to place defensive wards and deny the enemy team as much vision as possible. You have 3 wards plus a sweeper. Be the front line and start a defensive warding mission by using your wards on one side of the jungle and your team's on the other side. Upgrade your sweeper so you can deny as much enemy vision as possible.
2: NO WILLIE NILLIE ZENITH BLADE: If you use Zenith Blade into the enemy team and you don't have damage to back up your initiation: you just gave the enemy team free gold and set your game further behind. Only use Zenith Blade in a calculated fashion.
3: Use Shield of Daybreak and Solar Flare as kiting tools. This is a sad day if you have to do this, but this may be the best thing you can do to keep your carry alive. Save your Shield of Daybreak for the most threatening target to your ADC. Use Solar Flare for defensive purposes if you are in a really bad position and need to get away, as in if you absolutely can't survive a 5 v 5 then use this and run like hell.
4: Hug your carry: At this point, your carry is the only one who can save you. Stay close to him at all times and use your spells for peel and disengage.
5: Mikael's Blessing: I usually don't build this item as I am usually winning and want hard tank stats to survive: If you are backed against the wall, and enemy CC will kill your carry, you need to keep him alive with this item. Be sparring and smart with this item, it only has one charge so use it wisely, but this is a last resort if you want any chance at getting back in the game.
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