Overview
If you need presence in the lane, look no further. Leona is a support tank with great engage options, making her a great pick for teams lacking in either frontline or the ability to start a fight. You’ll want to pair her with an aggressive carry as you’ll constantly have chances to go for kills throughout the game. Click here for the latest data on her best builds, including Runes, Items, Summoner Spells, and more.
Keys to Remember About Leona
Presence in the lane! Leona has some of the highest kill potential in the game early on, and you should look to pick her when you've got an aggressive ADC.
Despite everything about you screaming that you are a tank, you are fairly squishy in fights. Once you blow your combo you generally need to peel back -- you don't do any damage so don't overextend for auto-attacks!
Strengths
Leona has a forgiving kit in that you have two or three ways to get a fight started. With CC across three abilities and a shield to go along with it, she’s happy to jump right into the fray at any point in the game. The abilities are simple to use and it just comes down to whether or not you hit them, though landing one will always make it easy to land the rest. She has great roam potential as a result of her abilities, and in the hands of aggressive players, she can provide huge impact in the early stages of the game especially.
Weaknesses
She’ll always be a little resource starved compared to true tanks in other roles, even if they effectively do the same thing in a fight. This means she has to be a lot more careful about when she decides to go in or out of a fight, as opponents will be able to focus her down with relative ease, especially if she’s unable to get ahead early in the game. Leona’s abilities are also pretty telegraphed in that it’s not too hard to dodge her kit as long as you avoid the Zenith Blade.
Game Plan
Early Game: She has a lot of kill potential as early as level 2 or even level 1 if opponents aren’t careful. She can engage right through a minion wave thanks to Zenith Blade and should be looking to fight early and often.
Mid Game: With great lockdown capability, she should be roaming around the map and actively looking for picks either in the side lanes or by setting up vision to prepare for neutral objectives.
Late Game: She’ll generally want to use the first rotation of her kit to get a fight started and then slowly peel back from there to defend the carry. She doesn’t bring any damage to the table, so it’s not worth overextending to go for kills -- focus more on disrupting enemy movement.
