Leona vs Taric Counter Pick

Cosmic Radiance is the reason this pairing reads the way it does. Taric makes nearby allies invulnerable for a short duration after a delay, which cancels the payoff of a cleanly executed engage, and Leona sits at a 46.5% win rate across 809 games on patch 16.13.1 with a Hard grade.

Before ultimates the two are close. Leona holds 43 base armor to 40 and 646 health to 645, with 124.6 armor at level 18 against 113.1, and both stun off a short setup: Shield of Daybreak as an empowered attack, Dazzle as a delayed beam. Taric’s 150 attack range gives him a small poke edge, and Bravado empowers his next two attacks after any cast while reducing his cooldowns, which makes his sustained trading better than a support’s usually is.

The rest is a healing and armor problem. Starlight’s Touch heals nearby allies from charges built by those Bravado attacks, and Bastion passively raises armor on Taric and on whichever ally carries it, blunting a marksman’s physical output as well as Leona’s mixed damage. His difficulty rating of 3 against her 4 describes a kit that performs reliably without unusual demands. Forcing fights while Cosmic Radiance is on cooldown, and using Solar Flare to separate Taric from the ally he is shielding, is the realistic approach.