Although some people may disagree, support is a vital role if not one of the most important roles in the game. Support players control the flow of the game and a great deal of map control. Supporting may seem like sitting in a bottom brush daydreaming, but it is a lot more than that. In this article I will explain the viability of playing support, as well as tips and tricks to carry your team when playing support.

Why play support?

Supporting is an extremely fun role that allows you to obtain the mindset of aiding your team. If you struggle with being a team player, playing a few support games can really enlighten you on how important supporting your team is. Often people believe that supports can not make a difference in a game but this is far from the truth. Supports control ward coverage and can buy early oracles to clear wards. Also, supports control bot lane and vision on dragon. Dragon gives the team a global 190 gold that can sway the odds of the game in your favor.

Can I carry as support?

The answer to the question is absolutely. Most people that play supports get discouraged when their team feeds and they lose a game and they instantly think "Supports suck. I can't carry with support." I encourage you to step away from this ignorance and take a look at this logically. There is no way to get around feeders. It is just part of the game. Although you can't get around the feeders, playing a good support provides you an extremely good advantage that will cause you to win more games than lose. This, in turn, will raise elo. Pretty good deal right?

Explanation:

Exhaust and Flash are an amazing combination on Taric, they allow you to be very aggressive, but also allow you to escape when necessary.

+ Exhaust can cripple the enemy AD carry, helping you make the most of ganks early game and slowing the opponent so you can cast Dazzle. It also helps late game by weakening dangerous enemies, or slowing a straggler so your team can mop him up

+ Flash is your free getaway card. It lets you jump over walls and towards your tower when things go pear-shaped. It can also let you get into range to drop your Dazzle or your entire combo on an enemy as an effective initiation

Passive: Gemcraft

Taric loves to socket magical gems into all of his weapons, resulting in his melee attacks replenishing his mana for 7.5% of damage dealt.

Explanation:

Taric's passive could not always be used in lane as you can not always attack the minions. However when you are looking to push, the passive always comes in handy to give you back some of your mana.



Q: Imbue

Taric brings forth earthen energy to heal a nearby ally and himself for 100 / 150 / 200 / 250 / 300 (+60% of ability power). If Taric heals only himself, the heal will be 40% more effective. Basic attacks reduce Imbue's cooldown by 1 second, but the reduction increases to 3 seconds when attacking an enemy champion

Cooldown 20/19/18/17/16 seconds
Cost 70 / 85 / 100 / 115 / 130 mana
Range 750

Explanation:


Taric's heal is not the best, however it is very helpful in and outside of lane. Basic attacks also reduce the cooldown of Imbue which synergies well with his passive.


W: Shatter

Passive: Taric's gains 10 / 15 / 20 / 25 / 30 bonus armor and provides an aura that increases the armor of himself and nearby allies by 10 / 15 / 20 / 25 / 30.

Active: Taric deals 60/105/150/195/240 (+60% of ability power) magic damage to nearby enemies and decreases their armor by 10 / 15 / 20 / 25 / 30 for 4 seconds. The passive portion is not in effect during the cooldown.

Cooldown 10 seconds

Cost 50 / 60 / 70 / 80 / 90 mana

Range 400


Explanation:


Shatter is one of Taric's best abilities, it allows you and your team to be tankier or do more damage depending on the situation. While in the laning phase, the bonus armor allows you to take less damage from harass, and do more damage when you try to kill a champion. When you try to kill a champion, make sure you Shatter them as soon as possible to lower their armor and allow you and your team to do more damage to them. However sometimes it could be more useful to keep the armor for yourself from Shatter up longer to allow you to have more armor and survive longer.



E: Dazzle

Taric fires a sphere of prismatic light at an enemy, dealing 40/70/100/130/160 (+40% of ability power) to 80/140/200/260/320 (+80% of ability power) magic damage (lower damage the further the target is), and stunning them for 1.5 seconds.

Cooldown 14 / 13 / 12 / 11 / 10 seconds
Cost 95 mana
Range 625

Explanation:


This is perhaps Taric's most important ability. Dazzle provides a guaranteed ranged stun every time you use it, it is an enormous threat early game, mid game and late game. However it is important that you make sure that when you stun some one, your teammates can follow up and that you can do significant damage. The cool-down and mana cost during the laning phase is not something that you can ignore, and it's important that you make sure that you can get the most out of every stun, because after all, Taric is a support, and you need your teammates to be able to follow up.



R: Radiance

Taric slams the ground dealing 150/250/350 (+70% of ability power) magic damage to nearby enemies. For the next 10 seconds, Taric gains 30/50/70 Attack Damage and Ability Power and grants nearby allies half the bonuses.

Cooldown 60 seconds


Explanation:


Taric's ultimate is very useful at all stages of the game. Combined with all of Taric's abilities Radiance allows you to be able to do enormous damage in lane and be a very scary support to play against. Mid and late game Radiance still does respectable damage but it provides your and your entire team with more damage.

Starting Items: OR

Core Items: philosopher's stone
After the core gold per 10 items, it becomes situational.
In most games I rush a right after I finish my gold per 10 items. It provides your team with insane utility and movement aswell as CDR and HP for yourself. After I finish I usually start to work on my or get an for the team, depending on how team fights are going and the amount of CC the enemy team has...

This is a great item to get if you have multiple AP nukes on your team and the enemy AP Carry is fairly fed. It provides an amazing aura that reduces nearby enemy Magic Resists, allowing your team to kill them easier.

Build this item whenever you have at least 1-2 AP damage dealers on your team and if the enemy team has an AP carry that is somewhat farmed / fed.



This is an amazing item to get early and mid game as it will drastically increase your entire teams' durability during team fights. You basically give them free resistances.

Generally build this item if you know that your team is going to have trouble team fighting and being able to survive during the team fights. This item can drastically turn the outcome of a team fight around.




This is a great item to shut down any farmed / fed AD carry. It will drastically increase your resistance vs physical damage and increase your cdr by 20%.

Generally build this item if you are having troubles with an AD carry that is farmed / fed and your team is lacking the ability to shut him down. This will decrease his attack speed, typically decreasing his damage output.




An amazing item that drastically increases your health, regen, and cdr. This will come in handy when your team is doing fairly well, but lacking the ability to finish off enemies.

Build this when your team can't finish their job of killing enemies and is forced to chase them for the kill. Alternatively, it can also be used to escape certain death if the enemy team is chasing your team down.



This is one of my favorite support items to get. It provides an aura that gives your team more mana regen and cdr, both which come in handy during team fights, pushing, and take dragon / baron. It supplies you with plenty of health, allowing you to stay alive longer in team fights and perhaps lets you tank baron, dragon, towers, etc...

Build this item when you are dying fairly quickly in team fights and when your team lacks the ability to finish off enemies in team fights. Having that 10% cdr for your entire team means more dps in the actual fight!

I used to prefer a 1/22/7 build on all aggressive supports, but recently, I've been using a build that combines the defense from the 1/22/7 build and the utility from the 1/6/23 build with a lot of success. I feel that both builds have their respective ups and downs, But i prefer my 1/14/15 build.

The 1/22/7 build gains more defense oriented masteries, while the 1/6/23 build gains more utility. 1/22/7 is stronger for the early laning, but the utility tree becomes more useful as the game progresses.

Personally, I feel that combining these two builds allows me to have a strong early laning phase when combined with my runes, but still allow me to have the utility and gold late game.

I using

or

Marks:
Armor is the best option for marks. However Armor penatration is another option as it synergies well with the armor reduction from shatter.

Seals:
Armor is the best option for seals, it allows Taric to be tankier early game against physical damage. Gold per 10 seals is a viable option, but leaves you to be much squishier.

Glyphs:
A mixture of flat and scaling magic resistance glyphs will be the best, depending on how much magic damage the opposing lane has. However only flat magic resist or only scaling magic resist are both still viable options.

Quints:
Movement speed is the best option for aggressive Taric, it allows you to be a huge threat as you can cover a large amount of distance very quickly to land your stun, especially when the quints are combined with your boots and masteries. However Gold per 10 is also a viable option for quints on support Taric.

Pros

[+] Short cd stun great for setting up ganks and playing aggressive with
[+] Can pocket heal allies in danger quite well and auto attack to pump out more heals faster
[+] Great "aura" support with his Shatter armor buff and burst to enemy champions with his ultimate it makes him a great support
[+] Naturally tanky and can be played as a offtank / support all in one

Cons

[-] Doesn't offer much in terms of damage
[-] Have to be in melee range for a lot of his abilities to work so it can be dangerous to be in a team fight
[-] Have to auto attack to trigger his heal cooldown and his built in passive

A lot of Taric's early game depends on the lane match up, however Taric himself is a very strong laner and it is important to abuse that. Taric's stun is a very important spell during the laning phase, and every time your lane partner can follow up on a stun you should use it. When Taric hits level 6, the burst potential with his stun, shatter and ultimate is enormous and you and your lane partner should try and abuse that as much as possible. However the most important thing to remember about laning is that you need to have wards, and a lot of wards, no matter how good you are, having vision is always helpful.

Taric's mid game is very dependent on the early game. If the enemy bot tower is down and the lane is pushing it is a good idea to buy some wards and start going to other lanes to try and get kills or help push the tower. However if you lost your own bot tower it still a good idea to let your AD carry freeze the lane and farm while you can roam and help your other lanes.

Taric's most important job late game is to make sure your team has the most vision possible, this means buying tons of wards and Oracle's Elixir when possible. However late game also includes a lot of team fighting. When you team fight as Taric it is very situation, it is important to priorities targets and know what your team plans to do. In some situations it is good to try to flash stun the enemy carry, however in other situations you need to stun the champions going for your carries. However you need to make sure that you use your ult on as many people as possible as fast as possible, because the bonus damage the ultimate gives you and your team is definitely important during a team fight.

Taric might not have the team fight presence that say Janna has but he is by no means a poor team fighter. He offers a lot of utility with a ranged stun to catch out of position enemies to engage a fight or to shut down and focus the fed enemy carry before they can do any significant damage to your team. Taric also offers great team fight presence because of his aura passed skill set. Bonus armor and magic resistance with Shatter and Aegis of the Legion. And as if that wasn't enough you still have your ultimate to provide extra offensive stats for you and your entire team.

Team Fight Techiniques:

• Try to engage on out of position carries to get a quick kill before any real team fight breaks out.
• If being focused save shatter for the defensive stats instead of reducing enemy stats.
• Always use your ultimate before you use shatter, the extra ability power will add some extra damage.

Lane Partner


: Ashe

Ashe tends to have a very passive laning phase. Because you are one of the most agressive supports in the game, you will not be able to set up kill after kill with ashe as you would be able to with a more agressive ad carry. However, the combined CC of both Taric and Ashe makes jungle ganks almost guaranteed kills everytime. And on the other hand, makes enemy ganks less scary because you have so much to keep them away from you.

: Caitlyn

This is a classic set up that works very well. During the laning phase you throw out a stun and she places a trap right where they are standing, and watch the money role in. Her traps also work as mini wards for those occasions when you don't have enough to place in areas such as the tri-bush.


: Corki

Corki is another great partner for Taric. Corki has some very good burst damage that is very easily hit when used alongside Taric's stun. Corki also has a built in escape so you won't have to worry as much about enemy jungle ganks.


: Ezreal

Oh how I love this matchup! Ezreal has one of the strongest early games when compared to other ad carries. Ezreal's Q is easily hit after you have landed your stun. And with the use of your W to reduce the enemies armor this will lead to some very good harass. Aslong as he keeps farming properly this will be a very strong matchup.


: Graves

Graves has great mobility and burst damage. As a Taric player this means that you will not have to worry about having him be close enough to follow up on a stun because of his dash he will always be able to quickly get in range for a buck shot and some really good harass.

: Kog Maw

Kog'Maw is rarely seen now a days as a bot lane ad carry. However, combined, you both have armor reduction abilities meaning that you both will be doing basically true damage when you auto attack. And his range is incredible which makes comboing off your stun very easy.

: Miss Fortune

Miss Fortune has a very strong early game with some very great harass. Taric works very well with Miss Fortune, a well placed stun can lead to some very lethal burst damage, also her healing reduction will help with those annoying supports like soraka or sona.


: Sivir

And your stun makes it very easy for Sivir to land a boomerang blade. Sivir also has the best defensive ability out of any ad carry meaning that you will not have to constantly use your mana to keep her health. This is a very strong matchup that I highly recommend

: Tristana

This is quite possibly the best matchup known to man! Tristana has the strongest early game I have ever seen and as you and I both know, Taric likes to play agressivly. Hit a stun and watch the money roll in. After a stun tristana will rocket jump for some nice burst and then follow up with explosive shot, auto attacks, and ignite perhaps to secure the kill. With this matchup I like running ignite and exhaust as my summoner spells because by doing so we will usually have 3-4 kills before mid game hits, which is tristana's only weakness. But come late game you will be picking off kill after kill for her. When in champion select and you are about to pick Taric, ask if somebody is a good Tristan player, it will be worth it!


: Urgot

Urgot has recently found his place as a bot lane ad powerhouse. This is especially true when played alongside Taric, because a stun means an easy to hit E which will be followed up by some very high damage with his Q spam and your armor reduction.


: Vayne

This is also a very strong lane matchup aslong as you two can communicate well. For this matchup to reach its full potential you will need to be able to combo her stun off of yours. If performed correctly this can give you some very neat tricks like knocking them into your tower, or in the most case it will deal some very significant damage.

Always ward the river. As a support player, it is your job to always have the river warded when your lane is exposed. I say when your lane is exposed because if your lane is being pushed there is no threat of a river gank. This means dragon should be warded buy tri-bush can go without a ward. You will want to conserve your ward so you can use it latter in the game.
Counter dragon wards with pink wards. Pink wards allow vision and the ability to kill enemy wards. This will not only give your team control over dragon, but it will also blind them to ganks by your jungler. If the enemy goes back and buys a pink ward to kill yours, go back. Never lose control of dragon.
Buy an early oracles to counter enemy wards. An early oracles will give your team a huge advantage. Killing enemy wards basically is like breaking their legs. They will be crippled for the rest of the game.
Stack gold per 5 items. Since you won't be taking the minion kills in lane, you will need a source of income. This is why you need to buy gold per five items. Try and get these items as soon as possible. Also, set up your runes and masteries to get you gold per five as well. This will help you buy more wards an support items to help your team.
Run defensive runes and masteries to help your durability in lane. Even on the more squishy support champions like Janna and Soraka, you still want to run armor runes and masteries. This will prevent you from dying and feeding the enemy. Remember, good support players never die. We are the immortals!
Only trade with ranged carry. Try to avoid going commando on the enemies in bottom lane. Watch and protect your ad like a guardian. Engage when he does and make sure he does not die.
Don't last hit unless your ad is at base! This is elementary support, but just in case you do not know, never take minion kills. The meta is designed so that the ad carries can get as much gold as possible so they can do tons of damage late game. If you take cs from your carry bot lane you will surely lose.

Here is a map showing the most common warding spots.
Remember, it is always a good idea to pink ward dragon and baron to deny the enemy from having vision.

Taric is one of the best if not the best aggressive support, if you are the aggressive type, and you play support, Taric is definitely your guy. If you made it this far I would like to thank you for taking the time to read my guide. This has been my first guide and I Hope to learn a lot from it. Feel free to leave both positive and negative critique, I will make sure I listen to it and improve upon in the future. I hope my guide has helped you with playing Taric and I hope to see you in the future with my other support guides.