Hi, I'm endlessnumber and I've been playing Leona as my main champ since season 4. I currently have over 225k mastery points on Leona on NA and would like to get to 1 million someday.

If you are still learning Leona I recommend to read MissMaw's guide instead; it is a more standard guide. This is a guide for experienced Leona players who enjoy being aggressive and who don't like being entirely dependent on their team for damage. I started thinking along these lines for two reasons:

1. In solo queue, very often you will be paired with ADC's who have a bad attitude or low willingness to cooperate. Why waste 40 minutes of your life with a useless team that gets caught out or fails to group to take objectives, when you can get some kills, push lanes, and possibly carry instead?

2. Leona is a durable champ with good initiation, CC, and godly resistance when her W is up. Unfortunately, her biggest problem is that once she gets onto the enemy team and blows her cooldowns, she has zero impact on the ensuing team fight other than her item auras and weak auto attacks, so there is no reason for the enemy team to focus her. The main idea of this guide is to force the enemy team to focus her or pay the price by throwing in one or two damage items.

Don't be afraid to "killsteal." If you did all the setup and the work, it's not stealing.

I don't really play ranked, so I have no idea if this guide is viable at high-ELO or not. Have fun and use it at your own risk.

Mainly the items speak for themselves, see the notes section for a detailed breakdown.
The basic concepts are the following:

1. Leona doesn't have any active sustain abilities, but she has great base health regen at all levels. Take advantage on this and save money on potions in early lane by buying Rejuvenation Beads instead and not getting poked (sometimes this is impossible depending on what duo you are up against).
2. Postpone a Sightstone and survive with one or two pink wards until you get early tier 2 boots and a Tiamat. I prefer resistance boots (Ninja Tabi) so I can worry less about basic attack pokes and minion damage in lane. With Tiamat and Ninja Tabi you also become an effective off-jungler. If you don't have the balls to do it, rush a Sightstone and Face of the Mountain like everyone else.
3. Use your positioning in the midgame to exploit T3 Captain boots and give the movespeed from Dead Man's Plate to your teammates. Your team will rotate faster and be swifter to follow up on your initiations.
4. Use damage from items like Titanic Hydra or Frozen Mallet to punish the enemy squishies.

Side notes: I think Iceborn Gauntlet isn't great on Leona because three of her abilities are already CC and you can get CDR from more useful items. Ruby Sightstone/FOTM is good if it looks like you will build Randuins and Locket anyway.

In lane, your jobs are:

• Absorb damage for your ADC with Bond of Stone and heal them using Spoils of War.
• Psyche out the enemy duo by moving unpredictably and using the brush.
• Maintain brush control. Starting sweeping lens or switching early is nice. If you camp the forward edge of a bush, you can also destroy enemy trinket wards using attack-Q-attack, but make sure your minion wave and ADC are in a strong position. If your ADC is fast, you can each get an attack in followed by your Q on a sightstone ward.
• Watch the map and be your ADC's walkie-talkie, he is too busy farming and looking for reasons to blame you.
• Look for a good engage.

What is a "good engage?" The perfect engage is when you E onto your target and auto attack them, then your ADC auto attacks them proc'ing Sunlight. Then you Q them and auto again while bringing up your shield, and your ADC proc's Sunlight again. Then you continue to attack-move on the enemy target's face so your shield lands on them. If your target doesn't have flash, ignite immediately after Q to suppress any healing and secure the kill.

Post level 6, it is your choice whether you want to initiate with R, chain-CC the enemy with R after Q, or save R to disengage (ordered by increasing safety).

I recommend not shielding with W until after you land the Q as it costs mana and it will telegraph your engage. Even when under an enemy tower, you're better off waiting until after the first tower hit.

If you are hidden and ambushing a recalling enemy, the ult animation can blend in nicely with the recall animation. Abuse this to get a perfect stun.

In teamfights, the enemy team will recognize you are a problem and start to focus you. The key is realizing that this is happening, and when. If your health is dropping and your team hasn't taken out 1 or 2 enemies, you need to be creative in order to disengage. A well placed ult as you fall back can stun a couple enemies and have enough psychological effect to allow your ranged teammates to cover your ***. If the enemy tank is in your team, you can E onto him, Q, and then keep running with W on. In a worst case scenario, flash out (don't waste your flash to initiate).

If you survive a team fight, you should have enough health to clear a jungle camp or a minion wave before you back. Always be sure to do this.

Will update soon
Alistar and Morgana are biggest support counters
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