I find Taric to be a very viable top laner. He can put out tons of ealry game damage plus has decent sustain with his heal and is very tanky mid to late game. If your team needs a tank and needs a little ap taric is always a good choicein normals. If your in ranked i would look at their top lane first because taric has small problems vs ap such as elise.

Pros
[*] TANKY!
[*] Huge early game dmg
[*] Gives a huge armor bonus
to the team
[*] does well with support items

Cons
[*] Slightly squishy early game
[*] dmg falls off late game
[*] Mana hungry early game
[*] Not the best farmer

masteries=http://www.mobafire.com/league-of-legends/mastery-tree-planner#&tree1=0-0-4-0-0-4-0-0-0-1-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0&tree2=0-0-4-0-3-1-0-2-1-1-0-1-1-3-0-3-0-0-1&tree3=0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0
I use 9-21-0 because as taric you are going for straight tank. You aren't trying to become a potential ap carry like elise. All you are trying to do is just take hit after hit. With the Legendary Armor mastery you get so much tankier just for 3 points. This and Juggernaut are the 2 best masteries you could take. You get so much health and armor/magic resist almost completely for free.

In my experience I find taking w much better against ad champions. They normally are going to be an easier champion to face against as long as they dont have to much sustain. I will try to take my Dazzle more often and see if it is better. The Shatter passive is normally why i take it first but it very well might be better to take e for the extra early dmg.

I pick these runes mainly because it is what i use. It may not be the best but for now it's what i have. When i get more and try it out i'll change them to my liking. Runes really depend on who you are up against but since I have put up with too much **** in ranked i quit it and now playing mainly normals.

I take ignite and flash. I would say that teleport and exhaust could be a viable option but i prefer the others. Ignite is really helpful against people like nunu who can try and heal in the middle of a fight or to secure a kill. Flash is one of the most versatile summoners to take for many reasons. On taric it is great because you can either flash stun to keep someone in range of your team or you can stun then flash over a wall then just disappear. If they have flash you have over a second to go anywhere out of vision and then they have to find you. If your lane partner doesn't have any quick sustain then you could probably take exhaust. TP is really your opinion.

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