Gems, gems are truly outrageous, they are truly truly truly Outrageous! Taric is one silly guy. But no doubt one of the Greatest lane partners Summoners Fight over! With a hard stun Dazzle, the ability to heal himself and friendly champs Imbue, a crystal aura that increases the armor of all allies Shatter, and an ultimate that increases the attack of his whole team Radiance, Taric is arguably one of the best supports in the game! But when you pick up the support role, you throw your potential to kill right out of the window! This build is focused on auras, a slightly higher AP on the big guy, and a mana pool that refuses to empty! I created this build to give people who are interested in playing support roles a good starting point with an overly understimated champion. But you must remember, The most important aspect of League of Legends is good TEAM coordination! That starts in the champion select phase. Thankfully, most Randies (Solo Queue) want to be the carry, so the support role almost always needs to be filled! Before playing a support, I would recommend you run some normal games with known friends who can play a guaranteed AD dps and AP carry with a tank in the mix, of course! Supports only work if you're team can deal damage and focus who they need to. With that, Let us Begin!!!!

I personally LOVE the Utility Tree in Masteries! I find the extra two points in Expanded Mind make a really effective early game for me. Some find it a waste, but most will agree that 21 points in utility is a must for a support role! I take my remaining points and place them in attack to further lower my cooldowns and get a little more magic pen from Archaic Knowledge . With a little common sense, I'm confident you can find a Mastery setup that works for you!

As far as Runes, I like the Mark of Magic Penetration (For a little more damage), Seal of Health (Survivability), and Glyph of Attack Speed (Attack speed for better Last hits on minions, slightly fater cooldown on Imbue, and a small boost on your passive Gemcraft). If you see Glyph of Magic Resist more viable, by all means Use them! You're rune page represents how you play and the setup that makes you the most survivable is usually the best!

Summoner Spells! Ghost and Clarity, Baby! I'm expecting ALOT of trolling from clarity and its ineffectiveness mid-Late Game. Well take you're flippin' insults to the bank and cash 'em! Every game I have played I have found Clarity to be EXTREMELY viable of a spell in the later phases of the game! My AP carry just emptied his Arsenal of spells twice on two champs and wiped them out, but the rest of their team will not let us take that inhibitor turret. If only he had a little more mana......What's that!? Taric with Clarity, BABY! Taric runs up, fires up his Radiance, pings and whips a Dazzle on a squishy, pops Clarity, continues to eat Turret Barrages (so Delicious) while his AP carry poops on their meager defense! Say goodnight to that inhibitor, BEEEOTCHES! Clarity, ftw! But, if you absolutely HATE Clarity, and have to have Clarvoiyance or Heal or whatevs, just be sure to have an escape (Especially if you're rockin' that Armor of the Fifth Age because for some reason champs seem to believe that a man in pink should be obliterated!).

Three Factors win League of Legends Matches. 1: Mobility (The ability to get your *** where it needs to be, before you need to be there!) 2: Vision (Knowing where the Enemy team is, What they are doing, and what items and builds they are creating AT ALL TIMES IF POSSIBLE!!!!) and finally 3: Good Team Coordination (Meaning a Team that will focus the enemy Champs they are effective against, and a constant attentiveness to the shifts that happen in teamfights)

As the Support role, I'm always stuck with the dirty job of warding up the map, and as you can see from my item build, the role of increasing the odds of vitory in team fights I'm a part of! Meaning, if I see Sh!T 'bout to go down, I pop that Ghost and get the hell up there! A good support will be able to shift the tide in a team fight with his mere presence!

I always buy the Exact same Starting items: Boots, Health Potion, and Sight Ward! I try to get in a Lane with an AD DPS (In other words, I see a summoner pick Xin Zhao, I call dibs on him! He rarely refuses! If he isn't in chat with a Rammus or something), the reason being is my Dazzle and their ability to deal attack damage will come in handy when I reach lvl 6. My Radiance will buff both the dpser and I, so if the champ looks Vulnerable I ping him, whip a Dazzle and pop my Radiance remembering to auto attack him as much as I can! If my partner has the common intelligence found in a Mountain Goat, we will most likely score the kill! personally, I Try to avoid getting it myself, though. I find Assist Gold works really well for Taric! This process allows me to feed that lane partner (Babysitting), and we have that victory in no time! As far as Lane decision, I prefer to go towards the bottom, so I can Help my lane partner kill dragon at lvls 7-10 (Depending on how fed he is). Because I only purchase one healing potion, I try to avoid being too aggresive until I get a few good points in Imbue and Shatter. I rarely put any points in Dazzle after lvl 1 due to the fact that it only increases the Damage output (The Duration of the Stun is NOT affected by leveling it.),and by the end of my build when I have more ability power, the enemey rarely expects my stun to take a Third of their health away! Shatter, on the other hand gives both my teammate and I a signifigant armor boost, and has a nice damage ratio when combined with an AD DPS and my Radiance! Not to mention its excellent ability to farm!

Guess I'll Explain what that mystery 75 gold Vision Ward item is for: WINNING! Vision is where its at, but warding is tricky (Still haven't got it down myself) but Extremely beneficial! Example: Top lane is being harassed and my bottom lane has pushed to the enemy turret. Enemy top champion goes MIA (Most likely with no Mia call and starts heading down to gank us. Thankfully I put that 75 gold sight ward in the river just above Dragon and see him coming. What do I do? Ping that *******, Ghost over there and auto attack! He's thinking, "Wtf this guy in pink doing attacking my ***?" He begins to kinda beat the **** outta me. By the time my ally gets there he realizes he's about to get fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuucked up and he tries to escape, I whip a Dazzle and my teammate gets a kill on the potential ganker! My middle will most likely be on their way, and by then the two kids my lane partner and I have been poooping on at bottom will try to be heroes and probably die as well! All due to Spending 75 gold sight ward! I can stack up to Five in one slot, so any scrap gold I have, I BUY Sight wards!

I rarely leave my lane until I have amassed a good 1600 gold to buy Philosopher's stone, Mobility Boots, and A few Sight Ward. Why mobility instead of Boots of Swiftness or Mercurys Treads? Personal preference, really. I can't count how many times I had the Mobility Boots on and chased a kid to his death due to the last second Dazzle I whipped on him! Taric does suffer from Crowd control, but I have always found popping my Radiance before it hits me combined with a Tear of the Goddess and Mobility Boots with Clarity on backup to keep the ulti going does just fine. I like the ability to boost across map and be where I need to when I need to. Okay, So I got my boots, Now is the best time to watch for potential ganks, especially if my lane is doing well. If middle is being pushed hard, I'll run to the bush and ping. Most times if my ally champ has enough health, we can get an easy kill. If they don't, I'll cover the turret and let them go back for health. I find this a good way to keep my team alive and give me an easy farming lane until mid returns. Once I have Mobility Boots and Philosopher's stone, its time to hold down that Allmighty Tab button, and see what Items the enemy champions have decided to create in their builds! If I see at least 2 with AP, I buy only the Kindlegem of Soul Shroud and Rush the Abyssal Mask Instead! The Sad thing about Taric is his lack of Magic Resistance. I find Abyssal Mask pretty much cures this, on top of making my AP carry a very happy Camper! If there is no Major AP Threat (In other words Katarina being Fed), I try to grab the Soul Shroud (And More Vision Ward ^~^). If there is an AP Brutalizing my teamamtes, I Grab Aegis of the Legion Immediately after! Due to the fact that Taric's Shatter gives so much armor, the only thing he lacks is Health (Hence the Soul Shroud). The cooldowns will also make my teammates and I much more effective. If the AP on their team is still a joke, I go ahead and build towards Will of the Ancients (My Personal FAVORITE ITEM!!!!!!) Now, Spell vamp isn't extremely effective on Taric, but it IS For the AP Caster and Usually the anti-carry as well, allowing me to focus a little less on healing them and more on those who have taken a few more hits! (Melee Dps in particular or tank if he's being a total 'Tard. League of Legends is an Equal opportunity game!) If you aren't familiar with Spell Vamp, It heals a portion of your health when you cast a damaging spell. More Damage=MORE Healing. My AP can regain his health by spamming spells on minions and not worry about mana loss because an Amazing support pops his Clarity when The team needs mana, not just himself.
Once I have Will of the Ancients, the Game Rarely lasts any longer, but if it does, I have definetly made more than enough gold to upgrade Philosopher's Stone, so I go ahead and upgrade it to Eleisia's miracle and buy MOOOORRE Sight Ward (20 a game is a good start).
The rest of the game really relies on good team fights, which I will explain in the next section.

This is where Taric really shines! Now, in a lane I ALWAYS Bust Shatter on weak minions and enemy champs if we are the dominant ones in the lane. In a teamfight, I will only use it if we are two champs ahead of the enemy in kills. It's armor benefits are FAR GREATER than a couple of bars of damage. I Let my AP carry and DPS do their jobs, but maintain their survivability by keeping that finger off of "W". Instead, I will wait for a slightly squishy or an off tank to over extend, ping him, Dazzle and fire up that Radiance and go for auto attacks. Once initiated, the teamfight MUST go on! I keep an eye on my health and mana at the bottom of the screen, but pay attention to my dps' health too. when my mana drops below half, its time to turn my ulti off and focus on Dazzle and Imbue. If we are losing it, I call for them to go back and I become the diversion. Shift 1 to laugh and I run the OPPOSITE direction of my teammates, usually ending in a drawn-out chase death. Blows chunks, I know. But If I have been doing my job properly I won't have alot of kills under my belt making the gold earned only about 300 for all of them, where the Legendary AP or DPS would've been an easy 1k in gold! most of the time I can tell when a teamfight is going south, and I don't Kamikaze, but try to divert the enemy team AWAY from my carries, allowing them to escape. And After I spent half the game ganking them and the Whole game wearing pink armor, throwing in a laugh at them and gunning off in a solo direction leads to a GUARNTEED chase!