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Spells:
Flash
Exhaust
Ability Order
Bravado (PASSIVE)
Taric Passive Ability
Introduction
I aim for this guide to be very detailed, with many good pointers to make good use of the build provided. Next to the main build, I will suggest variations on the main build, accompanied by an explanation of when and why you could choose to use the varations.
This guide should prove to be a good read for those interested, while also providing an easy to use and easy to copy build for those wanting to get into the action more quickly.
Hope you'll enjoy it!
Pros / Cons
spaaaaaaace |
Pros
+ Can set up kills in lane + Is naturally tanky + Provides his team with a armor aura + Provides his team with a ad/ap steroid + Provides a reliable interrupt + Provides an armor reduction debuff |
space |
space |
Cons
- Has bad poke in lane - His heal isn't very potent - Stun has traveltime - His passive is tricky to use |
Recommended Summoner Spells



Flash is simply too good to be left unused. This Summoner Spell gives Taric a very powerful escape you can use to make up for positional mistakes aswell as to get into very good positions. A very powerful move you can do as
Taric is to use
Flash to instantly get into melee range of your enemy, then use
Dazzle to stun him, allowing for a very easy follow-up with the rest of your spells. Using
Flash this way will help you get around the traveltime that
Dazzle has and will deny your opponent the opportunity to reposition himself before the stun lands.
Exhaust is an extremely powerful tool in lane, because it can render the enemy ad carry almost useless by reducing his damage output by 70% (!) and decrease his Movement Speed by 40%. Be careful not to overlap
Dazzle and
Exhaust, because you will want to use their full effect.
Alternative choices



Ignite is a Summoner Spell that I wouldn't usualy take, but if you know your enemy botlane will run
Heal,
Ignite is a very powerful direct counter to that. It is more prefered to run
Ignite on the ad carry though, because
Ignite has a habit of getting the last hits for kills and in most situations, you are better off having those kills go to your ad carry.
Clairvoyance used to be the bread and butter of the support role. Nowadays it's fallen out of favor, because giving up other Summoner Spells will mean losing a lot of power in the lane. It's still very useful for tracking the enemy jungler and will provide you with a means of checking bushes lategame, so you can safely ward.
Not Recommended



Heal is usually run by the ad carry in the current meta, because it heals the user of the spell more than those around him. If your ad carry isn't running
Heal himself and you think you'll be having a rough time in lane,
Exhaust will provide you with a more versatile and more powerful tool to protect your ad carry.
The only thing that's unique to Heal is the ability to bait. This can be very situationally useful.Promote has been used by CLG.na's Chauster on
Sona in the NA Regionals at PAX to great effect, but I'd still not recommend it, because it's really only very usefull in the particular heavy pushing strategy they were using. In any other strategy I do not see it easily used to great effect. If you ever want to push, you can help you ad carry with auto attacks to push the lane.
Recommended Masteries
- Taking 3 points in
Hardiness over
Resistance , because most damage during hard engages in the laning phase will most likely come from your enemy ad carry.
- In the Utility Tree, I take a point in
Summoner's Insight to decrease the cooldown of
Flash,
Taric's only escape spell.
- The points in
Expanded Mind and
Meditation help with the sustain, the points in
Swiftness will help landing
Dazzle on your enemies and reach melee range more quickly.
-
Greed will aid you income and
Wealth will allow you much more freedom for choosing your starting items.
-
Intelligence helps you get up to 36% Cooldown Reduction with just the main build in this guide.
- Finally,
Mastermind will decrease the cooldown on both your
Flash and your
Exhaust.
Alternative Masteries
- In the Utility tree, there's really nothing changed.
- In the Offense tree, I suggest taking one point in
Summoner's Wrath to improve your exhaust. This is actually an extremely well-spent point, because it'll improve your ad carry's damage output on the exhausted target, which should usually be the enemy ad carry, your primary target in lane exchanges.
- Next I suggest taking point in
Brute Force over
Mental Force , not because you benefit greatly from Attack Damage, but because the amount of Ability Power
Mental Force provides is really low. If you're doing your
Dazzle+
Shatter combo plus one single auto attack on your target, you'll already break even on damage output with 3 points in
Mental Force and you'll most likely be able to put out at least 2-3 auto attacks during an exchange. This is even more true when your target is not using nine
Greater Seal of Armors, since the base Magic Resist on champions is higher than their base Armor value.
Runes
Main build
Greater Mark of Armor: When you're setting up kills in the early laning phase, you might have to tank a little bit of damage from the enemy ad carry and his/her support. You will need a bit of armor to be able to properly live through this.
Since I prefer to get Gold/10 Seals for this build, I will not have the luxury of armor Seals. Thus these armor Marks will have to make up for that.
Greater Seal of Gold: These runes will provide you with a little bit of extra gold/10 to be able to quickly get a hold of your first items. Together with the Philosopher Stone and the
Heart of Gold, these runes should provide you with enough gold in mid-game to buy a good number of wards while still being able to progress through your item build.
This way you'll be tanky enough to off-tank during teamfights, so you can actually get in to useRadiance+
Shatter to set up your ad carry with an armor debuff on multiple enemies.
Greater Glyph of Scaling Magic Resist: In the bottom lane where you'll be residing during the laning phase of the game, there'll be mainly physical damage, so you will not need Magic Resist early on. These glyphs will however net you about 15 magic resist at level 11, around which time teamfights might start happening and the enemy ap carry will be the biggest threat to your team.
Greater Quintessence of Gold: Similarly to the Seals discussed above, these runes will aid you in progressing through your itembuild while still being able to ward properly.
The Quintessences are however much more efficient at providing Gold/10 than your Seals, so if you want to add some other stats to the build, I suggest replacing the Gold/10 Seals before replacing the Quintessences.
Alternative runechoices
Greater Mark of Magic Penetration: If you are running
Greater Seal of Armor, you can choose to replace the
Greater Mark of Armor with these give your
Dazzle+
Shatter-combo or your
Dazzle+
Radiance+
Shatter-combo that little bit more power.
Greater Seal of Armor: If you think you'll be having a rough time in lane with a lot of poke coming from the enemy ad carry, these can give you a lot more tankiness early on and, especially in combination with
Greater Mark of Armor, you'll be much better suited to sustain in a heavy poke lane.
- Greater Seal of Replenishment: Contrary to Greater Seal of Resillience, you'll want to pick these seals if you're going against a botlane with a support that is going to be able to poke you a lot (think:
Sona), you can opt to go for these runes. They will give you a lot more mana to play with.
When taking these runes, you'll probably want to consider maxingImbue before
Shatter, taking only 1 point in
Dazzle early. This way you'll be able to make better use of your mana. The downside is that the usefullness of the Mana Regen of these runes will fall off once you've got the Philosopher Stone while the Gold/10 will be usefull throughout the entire game.
These runes can be really powerful if you decide to start the game with boots and you're building theHeart of Gold before the Philosopher Stone.
- Greater Glyph of Replenishment: These are similar to Greater Seal of Replenishment, only less potent. In the early game you won't really miss the Magic Resist from
Greater Glyph of Scaling Magic Resist at all, but the usefullnes of the Mana Regen of these runes will fall off once you have the Philosopher's Stone.
Greater Quintessence of Movement Speed: If you really decide that you won't need any Gold/10 from runes at all, you might want to consider these Quintessences, as they will make it easier to land your
Dazzle in a good place.



Except for when you're pushing, there's one more time when you can make great use of your passive:
When farming under your own tower. When you're pushed back under your tower, you can help your ad carry's farm by hitting ranged minions once, so that the ad carry can easily finish them off after 1 tower hit. Be careful of your own minions hitting the enemy minions, as they can easily screw with your last hitting.

This is





- When you're trying to establish an agressive and dominant lane, wait until level 4 to take the first rank in
Imbue, then max it second, after
Shatter.
- When you're trying to establish a sustain lane, try to get away with 2 early ranks (for example at level 2 and 3, taking
Dazzle at level 1) in
Imbue, then max
Shatter and max
Imbue second. This way you'll have decent sustain in laning phase and still provide a good armor bonus when you get in teamfights in mid-game.

This is


Max this first, before


This is


This is

When trying to set up a burst, try to land a good




Feel free to use this ability a lot - for bursting down towers, putting out serious harrass and when doing the Dragon and Baron Nashor, because it's cooldown is fairly low.
Also don't be deceived by the damage component of this ability. While it's very nice to get the extra damage in during a teamfight when you can, don't obsess about using it to damage multiple enemies. The real power of this Ultimate is in the buff that it gives to your entire team.
Take a rank in this ability whenever you can: at level 6, 11 and 16.
Starting items



This is the main build because it's a fairly safe option to begin with against a variety of botlane combinations. The

NOTE: If you decide to go into a sustain role, take 2 levels in







This starting build also allows you to play an aggressive early game. If you manage to get this going well from the start, you will be able to dominate the lane. If you manage to get you first blood/early kills for your ad carry, you will from thereon be able to freeze the lane halfway while zoning out the enemy botlane. This will deny them the experience and the enemy ad carry creepkills, while yours is farming safely.
This strategy is more easily executed from the blue side.
- If you're starting on the blue side, try to kill the double golems before going into lane. If you kite the golems properly, you should hardly lose any health, but you and your ad carry will gain an important experience advantage going into lane. Once you get into lane, don't allow the enemy botlane to push the lane to your tower. This should allow you and your ad carry to hit level 2 before the enemy botlane does.
- If you're starting on the purple side, try to do wolves or stop the enemy botlane from doing the double golems and start pushing the lane from the start. This should allow you and your ad carrry to hit level 2 before the enemy botlane does.





With 4 wards in the pocket, you will be able to put out an early ward to help your jungler, ward your own lane bushes and the river long enough for you to get your first Gold/10 item.
The 1 health potion should help you stay healthy until you can go agressive. You shouldn't let yourself get poked too low or you'll be too weak to engage at level 2.





These starting items are a little more forgiving than the main build, giving you more potions to sustain yourself without the need of leveling





These are similar to the main build, only more focussed towards controlling the lane bush in order to get a proper engage at level 2. A smart enemy will see the


If you're up against a heavy poke support, you will want your ad carry to help you clear the ward with an auto attack. You might also want to consider swapping out 1 of your Sight Wards for 2 more

For these starting items, you might want to alter your Mastery Page a little bit. These starting items cost less gold than the other suggestions, allowing you to swap one point out of




These starting items a lot less forgiving than the main build, but will give you a much stronger level 2 fight. The extra movement speed from the boots will allow you to run in for a


You'll have to make sure to have a good kite on the double golems and not get poked too heavily however, or you won't be able to go in at level 2 at all.
Early laning phase items

Philosopher's Stone


This is where you'll want to start building your Gold/10 items that will be your main source of income for the remainder of the game. Since you'll have very little last hits as a support, you will want to be going for these items first. Luckily, these items provide very useful stats for you in the early game.
If you started with a

Next to that, you'll want to get the

Also important to get early are the





You can also switch around the



During this phase, don't forget to keep buying wards. You will want to adjust the number of wards you buy depending on the enemy lane.
- Keep warding the river/tribush at all times if your enemy team has a jungler (in the current meta that'll be every single game), because whenever you cannot see him on the map, he could be coming to your botlane to ruin the lead you've built in the lane.
Try to estimate where you're laning at the moment and how likely you or the enemy botlane are to push the lane in the next few minutes, so that you can decide wether to ward the tribush or the river. - If you're fighting a pokelane or a killlane that you cannot properly zone out at that point, you might want to also ward a lanebush, to keep track of them and to ease dodging their skillshots for both you and your ad carry.
Late laning phase items


Once you've got your


- The
Kindlegem is a generally good item for
Taric, as it provides you with more tankiness and a bit of Cooldown Reduction, increasing the rate at which you can dish out your
Dazzle+
Shatter and
Dazzle+
Radiance+
Shatter combo's and your
Imbue heals.
Other than that the main reason we build this item is because it builds intoShurelya's Battlesong. I like to build the
Kindlegem early on and then wait before building it into
Shurelya's Battlesong so that I can profit from Philosopher's Stone's Gold/10 for as long as I can. I will generally finish
Shurelya's Battlesong when laning phase is over and we start grouping up so that I can use it to help my team to engage in or disengage from teamfights.
- The other item I listed here is Kage's Lucky Pick. This is an optional item that I usually won't build, but when your lane is going extremely well/you ended up with some kills, you will be able to afford this item. The extra Ability Power from Kage's Lucky Pick will aid your
Imbue heals and the damage from your
Shatter,
Dazzle and
Radiance, giving them just that little bit of extra power. With the extra Gold/10 from this item, you will be able to build some bigger items like
Randuin's Omen in the lategame.
Kage's Lucky Pick can be sold in the lategame to build other items or it can be built into aMorello's Evil Tome lategame. When building this, it is advisable to build Mercury's Threads,
Ninja Tabi or
Mobility Boots instead of
Ionian Boots of Lucidity, because of the Cooldown Reduction Cap.
Early grouping phase items




Aegis of the Legion is one of the most cost efficient aura items in the game, providing a ton of stats to you and your allies. This item will further help you become more of an offtank in teamfights and allow you to stay in teamfights to have a greater impact.
Do pay attention to what your jungler and top are building. If they are building theAegis of the Legion, consider building a
Warden's Mail first, so that you can build into a
Randuin's Omen later on. This is because the second
Aegis of the Legion is much less effective than the first one.
Shurelya's Battlesong is another great item for teamfights, allowing you to speed up engaging/disengaging with the enemy team. This will allowing everyone on your team to get into position much quicker, improving the chance of success.
With yourHeart of Gold,
Aegis of the Legion and your
Shurelya's Battlesong, you'll be well equipped to (off-)tank some damage. You still shouldn't run in head first, this should be the job of a tank who's had proper farm and is better itemized, but you can definitely run in second and start disrupting the enemy team early on. Tanking damage however, does not mean you should die, try to assess when is the proper time to disengage! The longer you live, the more your team will be able to profit from your aura's, and the more
Imbue heals and
Dazzle stuns you will be able to put out. In the end this will outweigh you tanking damage to the very last healthpoint you've got.
- An item you should not build too late is
Ionian Boots of Lucidity. These will not only provide a welcome amount of Cooldown Reduction, but they will more importantly allow you to roam better during mid-game, allowing you to go around clearing wards with
Oracle's Elixir and place strategic Sight Wardss yourself. And ofcourse, they will allow you to escape in chases from enemies with tier 2 boots.
If you're ever tempted to build into other boots like Mercury's Threads orNinja Tabi to counter the enemy teams Magic/Physical damage or their Crowd Control, feel free to switch out the
Ionian Boots of Lucidity to take one of these items instead. You can take a hit in the Cooldown Reduction Department, especially when you're also building a Zeke's Herald.
Exteme lategame items



- Usually the main build will be the only items you'll have gold and time for to build, but there's always those extremely long games, where you'll run out of things to build. In these situations, consider
Randuin's Omen to become even more tanky and shut down the enemy ad carry with your active.
- Or consider Zeke's Herald to buff all of the allies that rely on Physical dammage and auto attacks. They'll get a very nice boost to their Attack Speed and their Lifesteal. You will gain a nice bit of Health out of the item yourself, plus a good amount of Cooldown Reduction. If you've followed the rest of the main build however, you'll only partly benefit from this Cooldown Reduction (+4% instead of +15%), as you'll get to the 40% cap.
If your team has several very good methods of engaging in teamfights, you can also consider building into Zeke's Herald instead of theShurelya's Battlesong early on. This way you'll also benefit from the Gold/10 of the Philosopher's Stone for a much longer time.
- Lastly, the
Frozen Heart will serve about the same role as the
Randuin's Omen, with the difference that it provides mana instead of health. This is ideal for when your team gets stuck in a standoff with the enemy team, having a lot of poke going both ways. With the
Frozen Heart, you'll be able to negate a good part of the enemy poke so that your team will be in better shape when the engage finally happens.
Do always make sure to keep one spot open for wards, as they are important throughout the entire game. Sometimes it is even preferable to keep 2 spots open for wards.
Thanks to JhoiJhoi for her awesome guide on making a guide!
The separator bars in this guide were also generously providid by her!
Feel free to criticize on where you disagree with my decisions and do feel free to point out mistakes on my my end. I'd love to get some good feedback and I can appreciate a good discussion.
TBD:
An analysis of laning against most popular botlane ad carries and supports as
Taric.
An excruciatingly detailed warding guide.
The separator bars in this guide were also generously providid by her!
Feel free to criticize on where you disagree with my decisions and do feel free to point out mistakes on my my end. I'd love to get some good feedback and I can appreciate a good discussion.
TBD:
An analysis of laning against most popular botlane ad carries and supports as

An excruciatingly detailed warding guide.
9-29-2012 - First created
9-30-2012 - Finished Sections Introduction, Pros/Cons, Summoner Spells, Masteries, Runes, Skills, Items and Credits.
10-3-2012 - Added Changelog, changed both masteries to exclude 3 points in
Awareness
, put them into
Swiftness
because the extra xp isn't enough to converge into any real advantage early on and it's advantage is weak lategame, while
Swiftness
will help you throughout the entire game.
9-30-2012 - Finished Sections Introduction, Pros/Cons, Summoner Spells, Masteries, Runes, Skills, Items and Credits.
10-3-2012 - Added Changelog, changed both masteries to exclude 3 points in



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