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Change LOG

*18/08/2013 Made a few changes on items and fixed some spelling mistakes
*15/12/2013 Made Valid Changes to the New Season's Items
*30/4/2014 Yuhah! Im Back for this guide! It Reached Numero Uno on Leona Guides so Fixed many things! Updated Matches ,Changed the Itemization and made it be worth for its First Place!!

*1/5/2014 Have a good 1st of the May ;), Minor Bug Fixes in Mastery Tree and Added more items on the Reccomended

Hey Guys,I am

Raz3

(it's in fact Raze with "3" instead of "e") and Welcome to my Aggressive Leona All-About Guide! Leona is a support/tank champion who is naturally tanky (with her W) and provides a lot of CC. Leona is a Champion mainly for the support role but can also go to the jungle. I don't think she can be THAT good while jungling because she lacks of damage but her ganks can be GREAT!
Anyways, This is a Support Guide and i will try to give you all the possible builds on playing Leona

I hope you will like my guide and that it helps you.
If you have any suggestions or whatever you want just let me know by leaving a comment below!!


Thanks for Watching!

PROS

*Stuns, Many Stuns, Lot of Stuns, OVER 9000 STUNS!!!
*Very Aggressive and Tanky early game(Easy Kills with the help of ADC)
*Can Carry a Game even though she is a Support

CONS

*Requires a Good ADC that can take advantage of your kit
*Needs Practice to Hit Your Skillshots(Your Ultimate and E)
*No Sustain at all
*Can lead to an Early Death if You Hit a Wrong (E)

Here i'll explain shortly my rune choice

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*I take Glyphs for Magic Resist because i consider them as the best tank runes for bot lane early on. Especially when laning against poking supports like [lulu] or [sona]

*Armor Seals are a Must-Have against an ADC(or Marksman after the new changes :D)

*Magic Penetration Marks because all the damage you deal is magic and this can help A LOT early on

*I take Health Quints in place of Gold Per 5 seconds because you will often find yourself Diving under the enemy turret in many occasions and you will need this extra health for more survivability

OTHER SUITABLE RUNES

Glyph of Scaling Magic Resist can Replace the Flat MR Glyph.
Quints of Gold Per Second Can be Good If you find that you can't make it to buy your essential items!


*Another semi-viable(in my opinion) choice could be Attack Damage Marks for some extra damage early game but currently i am just testing it.

FLASH

Flash is pretty much the BEST summoner spell at the current meta. I wouldnt change it for any other spell in Leona, and in most champions. It helps you engage escape a difficult situation, force an engage or CC the whole enemy team. It's the Spell You Need to fulfill your role as a support.

IGNITE

Ignite is in my opinion the best Spell for Leona!It just Hurt them even more along with your combo securing kills so easily! Can let you deal great damage early on and make your ADC fed!

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OTHER VIABLE CHOICES

Exhaust

Exhaust is another Great spell for supports.It can help you so much in so many different ways. You can escape, chase, kill or stop an enemy etc. Use it wisely and you can take some early kills really fast and without any losses.

Clairvoyance It helps secure objectives and generally provides safety.It can also used to counterganking or provide vision on an unwarded area like baron(after the counterwarding of the enemy)

Heal ,After The Rework it heals the allies the same amount as it heals you. That makes it a Great Support Spell. However i wouldn't change one of my main spells for this but it's up to you

On Leona i focus on building her as tanky as possible while having some strong support items and all of that with the low amount of gold a support can have.Happily, after the preseason 3 patch supports had been granted a great boost of gold income that made them able to buy items worth the while.

Anyway, so let's began.

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STARTING ITEMS

Start #1





I always find myself starting with these items.Be sure to go back asap to buy a bunch of wards!

Start #2




This is another start. I don't choose this over the first but in some cases you may need the extra ward.

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EARLY ITEMS

Targon's BraceTargon's Brace
Targon's Brace is an essential item for early game because it grants your ADC extra gold also it has more health and provides more sustain than Relic Shield.Be aware that in order to have your ADC gain more gold you should proc it's passive as soon as it's ready! When you have stacks on it's passive go out and kill those minions but be care to not push the lane if you are not supposed too.

Sightstone
Sightstone is the greatest item for a support. With this you can carry 3 wards with you(you can only place 2 of them in a time) but it's great because it refreshes when you go back to base.
Also it provides some health which is really cool! (Upgrade it to as soon as possible)




Boots Of Speed
Movement speed on a cc-skillshot reliant support like Leona is ESSENTIAL.Try to buy boots as soon as possible because you will need them to chase enemies, to engage, to escape from a gank, etc. There is no excuse to not buy boots.Don't get fooled and believe that boots are not important. They are. In fact sometimes when my adc is ahead of theirs I buy as first item Boots of Mobility and can really do a lot of things.

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CORE

Mercury's Treads
These are one of the best boots in game if not the best. They have tenacity and +25 Magic Resist! With tenacity you can lower the effects of all the stuns,fears,slows etc affecting you and stun them back easily

Locket of the Iron Solari
I think the best support item for leona at the momment.Has a great aura and gives you a boost on armor, mr ,and health. Also with it's passive you van shield your allies for some damage which can help them a lot especially on mid-game.


Ruby Sightstone
Not much to say, ruby sightstone is the same as the simple sightstone but gives you 2 more wards in your pocket and some extra health. A MUST for any support.

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VIABLE OPTIONS

Face of the MountainFace of the Mountain
Face of the mountain is one of the Must items for Leona.First of all it gives you a sweet health boost.Furthermore the cooldown reduction and the health regen are really great.But what makes this item so vital is it's Active!You can shield an ally for 10% of your maximum health while it consumes 20% of your current health.You can use it in the middle of teamfight when you have less than a half of your health to shield your an ally.The fun fact is that you can shield yourself too.Also 4 seconds after you initiated your active the target explodes dealing 10% of your maximum health as splash damage,isn't it great?


Randuin's Omen
Randuin's Omen is a great item that can counter the enemy AD even more.It has great stats that can help you much with it's bonus armor and health!I like it more than Frozen heart because you don't really need the extra mana and the active slow of Omen is very helpful.


Spirit Visage
Spirit Visage is in my opinion the best magic resistant item.It's stats are great and the passive too.Also it provides nice sustain and the 20% Cooldown reductions is the cherry on the top of the cake.
It's a MUST in my opinion, if they have AP on their team.


Sunfire Cape
I Like this item much especially when we are ahead of score and i need some extra damage+ armor, or when the enemy team is mainly Attack Damage. It's not that supportive but can be a beast item along with Leona's Eclipse.


Randuin's Omen
Randuin's Omen is a great item that can counter the enemy AD even more.It has great stats that can help you much with it's bonus armor and health!I like it more than Frozen heart because you dont really need the mana and the extra slow that Omen provides you is great.


Frozen Heart
This is an exceptional item when you find yourself fighting a strong ad team with champions like Vayne or Varus or Tryndamere.


zeke's heraldZeke's Herald
A great item in many situations. You should obviously buy it if your team has a lot of AS-reliant champions.


Warmog's Armor
Due to her natural tankiness because of her shield. She can be REALLY tanky on teamfights with this item. It gives a great health boost(1000hp) that can make you strong enough to last on teamfights and fulfill your role! But it does not help the team .You can call it a selfish item. I dont usually buy it.


Also there are other viable items you can choose but these are the main you will need for your support role!

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Sunlight is Leona's Passive is one of her greatest spells she got in her awesome kit!What it does is that when you use an ability (whichever one) on your enemies, you mark them with Sunlight. If a friendly unit deals damage to those enemies either with basic attack or ability they trigger the effect of sunlight dealing 20 / 35 / 50 / 65 / 80 / 95 / 110 / 125 / 140 to them. This makes leona EVEN greater in early teamfight!Adding extremely usefull damage to early/mid game trades and mastering her passive could lead to domination of almost every lane!

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Shield of Daybreak is an autoattack modifier which causes Leona's next autoattack within a short duration to deal bonus magic damage and stun the target.
That's extremely usefull because it of course stuns the enemy for 1.5 second(excluding tenacity) but also provides an autoattack reset on leona. That way Leona can first of all help her team via using her stun efficiently but also ,mainly on bot lane, she can take down a ward alone if she is close enough when it comes

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Eclipse :Leona raises her shield to gain bonus armor and magic resistance for 3 seconds. When the effect ends she deals magic damage to nearby enemies. If any enemy was damaged by Eclipse, the defense buff is prolonged for an additional 3 seconds.
This ability gives leona EXTREME tankiness early on and helps her survive ganks,trades or even turretdives. Also while this ability offers a huge bonus armor and mr boost, it can be used to deal splash damage to all the enemies around leona also providing a Sunlight Debuff.

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Zenith Blade is a multiple target pass-through linear skillshot that projects a sword of light in the target direction, dealing magic damage to all enemy units hit. If Zenith Blade strikes an enemy champion(s), once the sword has reached its maximum range the last champion struck will be immobilized for 0.5 seconds, and Leona will dash to a location linearly behind them over this duration.
Why Zenith Blade is SO important? Because this is your main initiation/engage skill. It goes through minions,monsters damaging them and let you dash to an enemy champin stunning them for half a second.This let's you come close to an enemy to perform your full combo!

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Solar Flare is your ultimate. And as your ultimate it maxes your potential. What this ability does? Stuns all enemies around the triggered area and slows the rest a bit outside from the circle. It offers you great potential for ganks,initiation,traps,secure of objectives and pretty much everything you can have from a ranged multistun ulti! However it's a bit difficult to land it in a moving team especially if they aren't stick together and can make you waste it. So you have to be carefull and land it correctly!

Here i will try to explain what ability you level first and your main combos and how you can use your abilities to maximize your engage-kill potential.

The basic ability upgrade order is this > > >

Well, there are some variations. Always upgrade your ultimate(Q) when it is possible on 6,11,16 level. After that i always go for eclipse and i won't change it. But the next two abilities are for you to chose what to upgrade.You can rank either Shield of Daybreak or Zenith Blade because they don't offer more stun time but less cooldown.

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MAIN COMBO

Your Main combo on bot lane is this : W>E>Q or W>E>Q>R when you get 6 level.

Let me explain this a bit. You firstly use your W to shield up and then jump on the enemy stunning them afterwards. The total time of stun on the simple combo (without your ulti) will be like 2 seconds and if your adc is close enough he can deal A LOT damage on this time. Furthermore your shield with erupt and deal a great amount of damage to your enemies too.
Also, if you are 6 level you can use your ultimate to stun him for another 1.5 seconds and take the kill/assist .

Leona can basically work with every ADC that deals a good amount of damage.

Jinx at this momment is one of the strongest Marksmen. And along with leona they make a powerfull combo that can destroy enemies early and vanish then at lvl 6 with combined ultis !

Lucian has the biggest burst dmg in lane and it can combined perfectly with Leona for easy kills

I think Graves is the Numero Uno combo with Leona. He has everything she needs to be effective. Damage, Heavy Damage, Ultra Super Wombo Combo Damage!! He can poke the enemy and he is tanky with his passive..Just play safe till level 6 and then go and kill em.

Vayne is a really powerful Marksman and can work well with Leona because of the additional stun she has.You should be able to win the lane and get fed except if you are opposed to a really poke duo like Caitlyn and Lulu.

Corki after the nerfs is considered Not so viable adc. He isn't that strong but can outdamage champions like Vayne with low range

Varus is another great lanemate for Leona.His poking power can be great and when the enemies are low you can secure kills easily.Furthermore when you both hit lvl 6 you can combo with your ulties for maximum dmg/cc

Another Great combo with Leona. Miss Fortune's damage is really high with her Q+E and when you both hit lvl 6 there are not many things that can stop you.(Leona initiates and Miss Fortune uses ulti)

I really like Ezreal along with Leona.Ezreal has much damage on early levels and you can take the advantage early on if you successfully engage your opponents.

Draven shines on bottom lane with Leona! if you can guard him.His Damage is high and if you keep your enemies busy, or stunned he can secure the kills easily.

I don't really like this combo. In fact Cait and Leona are different kind of champs...Caitlyn have really low damage early game and she can only rely on poking while Leona needs a high damage ADC to do her job.

Tristana has nice burst but she is not the best championt to lane with.

I rarely see skilled twitch on Gold Tier.But when i do we really have much potential as a duo on bottom.He have some nice dmg and after level 6 he is stronger than ever.

Same as Twitch. If you can play Kog Maw really well then you have nothing to be afraid off. He is a natural poker and you must play safe till 6 lvl when you can finally engage them.




This is the list of the most played champions you will find yourself laning with. If you want some extra additions just make sure to ask it on the comment section.

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Rivals

This is a very difficult matchup. Thresh is in my opinion the beast of bot lane. Especially a GOOD Thresh. If you adc is getting caught all the time then there is very few thing you can do and clearly you must not continue the battle after a succseful grab. What i try doing when laning against Thresh is ,i'm trying to catch his adc when there are some minions on our side so he cant have a clear grab to our adc , and when he is about to use his ulti i try to be close to him so i won't get slowed and damaged



She can be really annoying with the heal . You should play passive and wait for a gank in order to fight

Alistar is a strong rival for Leona. If you are not carefull he can push you to his turret when you engage and kill you. What you must do when facing an alistar is to try engaging only after he used his combo or he is far from his Marksman. Otherwise he can disengage by kicking you out of the battle.


Pretty easy to play against. She does have CC, but it's very reliable on skill (skillshots) so if you can dodge her she will be close to useless

Same as Nami.She can't do much if you dodge her Q.Still she has some good shielding and CC but she falls of late game

Here is what i call Skill Matchup. Well Morgana is a really strong Champion at bottom lane. She can harras if she is good at skillshots and she can outpush lane when in need to. He damage is high and what makes her so strong against Leona is her Spell Absorbing Shield!
Well there are many techniques you can use against her but im gonna tell you what i find more usefull and thou what i use.
I always try to make her "burn" her shield on the wrong person. It depeneds of the skill level of the opponent Morgana thou to work. Your cooldown is smaller than her Shield so you can try to engage again shortly and land your combo. Never go full in ,except if you are ahead, when she has the shield on. You might lose all of your stuns. Also you can try making her believe you will engage so she burns her Shield and then you just land your full combo when its over or in the other champ, but this usually works in low elo games.

Leona relies on strong initiations, bold plays, and early game kills in her lane. Janna excels at resetting aggression and escaping danger. Janna makes it impossible for leona to engage, but if leona doesn't engage, then it's basically carry with Janna's shield vs carry with nothing .Furthermore Janna's whirlwind will disrupt leona's only gap closer, whereas leona has nothing to disrupt Janna's slow and knockup. This means Janna's carry can chase or escape much more effectively than leonas.
Generaly Its a Passive Lane and the winner will be the more skilled ADC.
The only thing you can do to engage them pre-6 is to wait janna's Whirlwind and then engage shortly after it.

Early Game

Early in game you have your true power.To be certain,on level 3 you can almost kill every enemy adc or support with a succesfull combo and help of your adc.In this Phase your main role is to ward properly the bot lane and wait till the right oportunity appears .Then you can just jump on your opponent and give the kill to your adc.
Don't Forget to counterward your lane if you are pushed so your jungler can come for a gank. And Always remember to ward the dragon!


Mid Game

Now is when the fun stuff begins. Some turrets have gone down but some lanes are still holding. You must be carefull while on this phase. The safest thing to do is finish off their bottom turret and go roam with your team to secure frags and break the rest of their remaining 1st Line Turrets. By now you should have at least one of your core items plus boots.In this phase of the game your main role is to ward the map properly and jump on unaware enemies. If your team had won the most lanes then you can try teamfighting.
On Teamfights what you do is, INITIATE. You shall try to jump on an enemy carry(ap/ad) and stun him. Then let your team finish him when you stun their rest team with your ultimate. Then The fight will be easy for you.
Also, you should start warding baron and don't forget to use pink's after the 25 minute mark.

Late Game

Your work is similar to the mid game. You are the initiator , in most cases, you should try en grab their enemies squisy targets such as adc and apc and finish the rest of their team. Baron and dragon warding is absolutely Critical! A Lack of Warding and a successfull baron for your enemies can turn the whole game around !!!!!
At this time you should have already own 3 items and your boots.
Never go alone and stick with your team and keep roaming all together ,breaking turrets. If you have champions as or you can let them split push your enemy turrets and you should make their team focus you

This map explains a lot about what you should ward on each phase of the game

Green - Lane-safety wards.
Aqua - General map vision wards.
Yellow - Dragon/Baron control wards.
Red - Counter-jungle wards.
Blue - Buff-defense wards.
Purple - Late-game wards.





Why would I want to ward?
The answer to this question is very easy: Warding wins games!
To know where the enemies are at any given moment is a very important matter throughout all stages of the game. Wards provide the additional map awareness to get that information constantly. Where is the jungler trying to gank? Where are the missing enemies heading to? Having or not having information about the whereabouts of your enemies makes a huge difference. It allows you to tell when to go back, when overextending isn't that risky, when you are getting counter-jungled, when you can gank, if buffs/dragon/baron are still there to name a few. Without wards, you would just play a guessing game which is not only inaccurate most of the time but also very risky for your sole goal in this game: Winning.



Counter Warding
As your team will most likely not be the only ones placing wards, warding itself becomes a competition of information. Cutting off information leaves them more vulnerable overall to ganks, counter jungling and buff stealing.
Counter warding itself has two kinds in LoL. Clearing by walking around using oracle or actual counter warding by placing pink wards at spots where you don't want to have enemy wards. This section will only cover the latter, as clearing with oracle is pretty easy if you can manage to not get caught and know the most common ward spots.

There are only three real spots where you want to get rid of enemy wards that much that it's actually worth it to buy counter wards: Baron, dragon and the bot lane

This is my first in-depth guide. I hope you like it.
Leave comments and suggestions!
AND ADD ME on Nordic-East: Raz3 if you want to play with me!