A Leona Review

[quote=Bryun]Just glancing at your article and seeing a live game-play of [[Leona]] I was convinced most (all) of her skills have a high cool-down without CDR items to cope with that and you could only do one full rotation of her abilities then rely on auto-attacking for the duration of the time. Meh, that's what I think though. May be wrong since I've only seen her in action once.[/quote]

[quote=Lugignaf]Her shortest CD spell is on a ~5 second CD. That's with full CDR mind you.[/quote]

[quote=Bryun][quote=Lugignaf] Her shortest CD spell is on a ~5 second CD. That's with full CDR mind you. [/quote] So I'm basically correct that in a team fight she can only help for so long with her rotation, and by that time her team mates might be dead already.. I personally think she needs a CDR reduction. She's basically like a [[Jarvan IV]] but less viable.. Think about it... Really SIMILAR skills. EDIT: AND A CHANGE IN RATIOS A TAD BIT.[/quote]

[quote=Lugignaf]It's her stun on a 5 sec CD. Her ratios are terrible so she almost has to be built full tank which gives her almost no leniency in items. Her best ratio is 0.8 and that's on her ult. With only [i]one[/i] reliable hard CC, she's not the best tank. She's vary good at initiating though because of an AoE, ranged, stun and her skillshot which jumps her into fights. Plus, she has some decent damage output with the shield and survivability due to that same thing. Putting her with another stunner like Blitzcrank or Alistar works way better than it should. This is all from info off the wiki and playing with one on my team. I bet if I had her, I could formulate a much, much better synopsis of her gameplay.[/quote]

[quote=WayMaker][quote=Bryun] Just glancing at your article and seeing a live game-play of [[Leona]] I was convinced most (all) of her skills have a high cool-down without CDR items to cope with that and you could only do one full rotation of her abilities then rely on auto-attacking for the duration of the time. Meh, that's what I think though. May be wrong since I've only seen her in action once. [/quote] The number of rotations she can pull off is heavily situational based on how the fight is initiated, though this could be said of any champion or battle. With some cooldown reduction, you should be able to pull off your full rotation, then pull off another q and e, then likely w. If you're initating the fight as Leona, it's pretty easy to get into a second round of skills. Most team fights don't end up in a draw. Instead, one side usuaaly has a few runners while the other chases. Leona's e and q stun combo is great for chasing and even without cooldown reduction, it's usually enough to catch anyone who isn't escaping with flash, ghost, or an escape skill of some type. Based on her current core design, she should be able to do her job decently and is pretty fun to play. The balance of her stats are another story though. On paper she seems alright, but it will take more competitive play before we know her current performance capabilities. Regardless, she (like most champions) can be completely viable in lower to mid range ELO's with an item build that works to her strengths. I might do some theorycrafting of my own to see if she can be a fully viable high tier tank (maximizing cooldown reduction, tankyness, and team utilities).[/quote]

[quote=Jebus McAzn]WayMaker, I'd like to point out that I have nothing against your guide at all - simply the statement "you can really tell he spent time with this champ" that the OP made.[/quote]

[quote=theBMB]Quite a few good points made about Leona here, but while her cooldowns are long, that doesn't necessarily mean she can't fulfill her role as a tank. I don't really feel Leona actually needs to pull of a full rotation of her abilities, she activates them as necessary. I mean you will obviously always initiate with your shield up, but you might be able to stun someone without using your blink, which allows you to save the blink for when the champ is running away, and you'll likely have the stun up shortly afterwards. My point is that Leona shouldn't be using all of her abilities to burst down a champion, she's a tank not a caster. You have to pace her abilities out. Pacing her abilities synergizes with her passive as well since you can basically reapply your passive whenever the enemy is hit by a teammate. I do agree that they need to work on her scaling, her AD scales horribly making tanky DPS not very viable, and her AP ratios are terrible, making Tanky caster not viable as well. I'm still going to keep trying various builds with her, but there's not much you can do with her besides straight tank. This might be by design though. I think Leona is fairly balanced right now, she just has to be played right.[/quote]

[quote=BDSaint]I meant to post awhile ago, but Jebus you made some fantastic points. WayMaker covered it all so I won't repeat myself. It's clear that you do know what you're talking about and can back it up. You know very well their are a lot of people that can't.[/quote]

[quote=guiken]Yeah full tank is really where she excels, she can do the tanky dps role but Jarvan & friends are going to do that much better so why chose Leona with that in mind? Late game her cooldowns are perfect, early/mid game she can and will be standing around 8+ seconds doing a laughable amount autoattacking while she waits for cooldowns, she really is ignorable at that stage in the game. A sunfire cloak helps around this time but thats about it.[/quote]