Vynertje's Support AMA and advice thread

[quote=Lugignaf][quote=The_Nameless_Bard]Well, whether we few [[Karma]] players like it or not, [[Karma]] either needs a real ultimate or they need to revert the change that forces her to put ranks into her R. When she had 6 skill ranks/skill and no ultimate, there was potential for her to be good enough and still retain her uniqueness if they buffed the sixth ranks in each skill to make the lack of an ultimate worth it. As is she will continue to be lackluster because she still doesn't really have an ultimate, but has to put ranks in that skill anyways.[/quote] Yes, [b]please[/b] go back to the 6 skill ranks again. They took it away from Karma for some weird reason and basically said, "no we were wrong in doing this, we don't want 6 skill levels." But then they turn around and give it to Jayce. I mean, I guess I could look past the levels in ult if they were actually meaningful, but that's really hard since, unlike most people, it powers up 3 skills when you level it, as opposed to just helping the one. I mean, it obviously doesn't power them all at the same time, but it still has that kinda thing going for it. Can we just go back to old Karma with the wave heal, slow tether that did damage and a much better shield bomb?[/quote]

[quote=Vynertje]Discussing Karma is more than encouraged, so feel free to do it here. This is a support discussion after all. Aside from that, I think Karma's main issue is that she doesn't offer as much late game utility due to the lack of an ultimate. Her W is decent and so is her E, but it's not going to make her a useful support compared to the tier-1 or 2 supports out there. Her early game is decent (although still not as dominant as you may expect) but her damage falls off and then she just flat out sucks later on. I don't think there's anything that Riot can do to put her in a balanced (support) state without going through a full rework again. If they buff the numbers she may see a rise as mid laner again, but for support her kit is just too lacklustre. [quote=Sarixis][quote=MungoGeri] It may be borderline support characters like [[lulu]], [[karma]], or [[orianna]] who suddenly jump tiers. [/quote] The reason you don't see [[orianna]] support is because she's item dependent and you NEVER want that in a support. I could see [[karma]] benefiting from the changes; but since Riot has put her in an awkward jack-of-all-trades position where she has good things but doesn't offer as much as other mages or supports which leaves her outclassed on average.[/quote] Yes, she needs at least 2-3 items (mana regen/cdr like athenes+Dcap+Void) before she becomes a factor again, aside from her strong early levels. For her goes as well, she's just too item dependent and doesn't have enough base utility to back it up. Even if her gold income as support were to increase greatly, it still wouldn't be enough to warrant picking her as a support.[/quote]

[quote=The_Nameless_Bard]I thought her old tether was trash, so pls don't give me that again, but shield bomb would be nice. Never understood why that part had to change.[/quote]

[quote=Vynertje]That shield bomb was indeed pretty cool. I also liked her old Q with the AoE heal a lot, but it had very short range which I guess made it kinda mediocre. While we're at it, wouldn't a good buff for her ult be to make it stack like sightstone stacks do nowadays?[/quote]

[quote=Sarixis][quote=Vynertje]Discussing Karma is more than encouraged, so feel free to do it here. This is a support discussion after all. Aside from that, I think Karma's main issue is that she doesn't offer as much late game utility due to the lack of an ultimate. Her W is decent and so is her E, but it's not going to make her a useful support compared to the tier-1 or 2 supports out there. Her early game is decent (although still not as dominant as you may expect) but her damage falls off and then she just flat out sucks later on. I don't think there's anything that Riot can do to put her in a balanced (support) state without going through a full rework again. If they buff the numbers she may see a rise as mid laner again, but for support her kit is just too lacklustre. [/quote] If you insist Vynetje, I just didn't want a good thread to possibly snowball into potential QQing. But then again I think my major just trains me to see worst-case scenarios. Otherwise I pretty much only play her as a solo laner so I felt it would be a bit off-topic in a support thread haha. I do agree that her utility just falls off in comparison to other supports with static values on [[inner flame]], the duration of [[inspire]]'s movement speed, and how [[focused resolve]] isn't guaranteed. She's also noticeably more item and AP dependent than the majority of mage supports which is a double-hit to her effectiveness as a support. The original rework did intend to make her more of a solo-laner overall so I feel Riot should focus on making her better there. One of her biggest issues in that role is that she's basically discount [[lulu]] so Riot needs to help her break out of Lulu's shadow. Like you said as well, to be a better support she would require a much more intensive changes or another rework to become a better support.[/quote]

[quote=Lugignaf][quote=The_Nameless_Bard]I thought her old tether was trash, so pls don't give me that again, but shield bomb would be nice. Never understood why that part had to change.[/quote] I liked old tether. Might've just been me though, who knows. sure it was sort of useless most of the time, but with a tweak or two, it would've been fine imo.[/quote]

[quote=The_Nameless_Bard]So, I [url=http://matchhistory.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/#match-details/NA1/2006535174/33457580?tab=overview]just played[/url] [[Sona]] and she honestly feels pretty decent. The mana regen changes seem to help her and the healing/shield mastery makes her W more efficient feeling. Thoughts?[/quote]

[quote=Vynertje][quote=The_Nameless_Bard]So, I [url=http://matchhistory.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/#match-details/NA1/2006535174/33457580?tab=overview]just played[/url] [[Sona]] and she honestly feels pretty decent. The mana regen changes seem to help her and the healing/shield mastery makes her W more efficient feeling. Thoughts?[/quote] Relatively speaking, she's still in a mediocre state. This is because the supports she has to compete with benefit equally much from these support changes (i.e. Nami/Lulu/Janna/). I think her problems are: 1. She has a strong and dominant laning phase, but even then has a lot of weaknesses (she's very susceptible to jungle ganks, once she falls behind or gets caught out of position once she gets snowballed upon). 2. Her late game is poor because of over-reliance on one single ultimate. To have an impact you usually need to flash ult, which can backfire horribly (also the flash-ult is by no means as reliable/safe as annie flash-tibbers).[/quote]

[quote=Sarixis]I have to agree with Vynertje sadly. [[sona]] is my most played support and quite fun imo but the weak scaling on her abilities and auras really gimps her impact post-laning phase. She could use some love this season, maybe buffing the bonus values to her auras based on [[crescendo]'s rank along with other number/utility value tweaks. She definitely has the potential to become a great jack-of-all-trades support again but currently she feels like a master-of-none.[/quote]

[quote=Mooninites][quote=OTGBionicArm]Zyra has issues beyond her mobility and squishiness. Like the fact that almost every ADC has some kind of dash now or ways to avoid the very slow and telegraphed E (Zyra's primary CC), and some champions just simply move fast enough to avoid it most of the time. Her "role" as a mage support is probably better done by the likes of [[Vel'Koz]] (Better, more spammable poke and wombo) or even [[Lux]] (Again, better poke, and also has easier to land CC due to faster projectiles). I agree that some champs might come back into the fray at bot lane, or come out for the first time, but I don't think Zyra will be one of them. As for your other examples, aside from [[Karma]] all of those champions excel in solo laning to the point of it being pointless to try them as a support. [[Nautilus]] on the other hand is ALREADY a good support and has been used as such quite a lot this year.[/quote] I fail to see how Vel'koz and Lux don't suffer the exact same problems you listed for Zyra. I would completely disagree that Velkoz and Lux do a better job of supporting. Lux is a pretty inferior support in almost every capacity, her bind is nice for catching people out and her AoE shield is pretty decent, but aside from that she brings very little over zyra. Velkoz brings more damage than zyra, but that's about it. She has much better utility than he does, better peel, better zoning and a better laning phase. She definitely has problems and weaknesses, but she's not worse than velk or lux. Karma got a pretty substantial buff with the new masteries, at least in comparison to other supports. I've been running 0/18/12 on her and so far I like it. Curious to see how Brand support will work with the new deathfire talent. Also kind of curious to see how new Morgana will work, I'm fairly certain Windspeaker's Blessing will interact with Black Shield, but not sure if that would make it worth. Lot's of tank supports seem better because of Bond of Stone IMO: Supports on the rise ++++ [[Alistar]], [[Braum]], [[Janna]], [[Karma]], [[Leona]], [[Lulu]], [[Nami]], [[Nautilus]], [[Shen]], [[Soraka]], [[Sona]], [[Tahm Kench]], [[Taric]] Supports on the decline ---- [[Annie]], [[Bard]], [[Fiddlesticks]], [[Kayle]], [[Kennen]], [[Lux]], [[Vel'koz]], [[Zilean]], [[Zyra]] Unsure ???? [[Blitzcrank]], [[Brand]], [[Galio]], [[Maokai]], [[Morgana]], [[Syndra]], [[Trundle]] I think there are a lot of supports that were heavily buffed/nerfed by the mastery changes. Some keystone changes seem great for some supports, but terrible for others. I also think the Bond of Stone instantly makes every tank support much better than they were before[/quote]