Vynertje's Support AMA and advice thread

[quote=The_Nameless_Bard]They mean the [[greater vision totem]] if I'm not mistaken.[/quote]

[quote=Out Of Pancakes]What do you play into a [[janna]] pick?[/quote]

[quote=Vynertje][quote=Out Of Pancakes]What do you play into a [[janna]] pick?[/quote] Usually [[Nami]]. Although it's relatively hard to play you can turn it into a skill matchup if you bait [[eye of the storm]] with an AA, waiting till it's on CD and then using your full combo with W/E on her/adc. I think [[lulu]] does fine as well, again you can try to bait a shield or just fire your Q on the target without the shield on. Not sure how [[sona]] would work because I don't play her but I'm figuring she can essentially do the same with high poke/pressure. More general advice would be to not pick a support that fully relies on engages against her, because that's what she excels against. Most ranged/pokey supports can turn it into a skill matchup if you can make good use of her cooldowns.[/quote]

[quote=MungoGeri][quote=Vynertje][spoiler]Allow me to elaborate. For example, you have a build which relies on heavy attack speed/on hit damage. Mathematically speaking it does a metric shitton of damage, even when you are factoring enemy armor, magic resist and health. However, what you cannot mathematically estimate is the amount of attack speed you lose due to kiting the enemy (you cannot just stand still and hit the enemy, you will die if you don't try to kite backwards) or actually being kited/cc'd etc. I did this once on a 2.5 attack speed [[kayle]] build. However, with so much attack speed it is practically impossible to kite backwards and still get 2.5 attacks per second, so you will lose some attacks. I'd estimate you can perhaps still get 1.5 attack per second when kiting backwards, down from the 2.5. So while that 2.5 attack speed build may have seemed so good, you'd perhaps have been better off with a little bit more AP or AD. --- [i]Note for this example: attack speed makes your attack animation go faster, so it doesn't mean you should necessarily aim for that 1.5 AS. When you're forced to kite backwards you will still lose a portion of that, perhaps dropping down to 1.2. However, as attack speed animation and kiting is something that depends on player skill, fight details and the specific champion, you cannot estimate a set % of AS you lose due to kiting. Therefore that is just one reason you cannot mathematically judge what build is best.[/i][/spoiler][/quote] And yet, what you are doing here is discussing numbers. There's a zone between making bad calculations that assume everything works absolutely perfectly all the time and simply throwing up your hands and assuming hand-waving arguments are good enough. I absolutely disagree with your statement saying "you cannot estimate a set % of AS you lose to kiting." Try looking at some videos of yourself kiting and see how many shots you tend to get off per second while kiting, and if kiting is critically important for your character, then optimize your build around an estimated optimal AS number. I have no problem with someone arguing that, for example, my Jungle Lulu guide is unrealistic because its damage tables assume that one stands still and unloads everything perfectly. I agree completely, but it's a starting point. If you want to say, no, you really don't want 2.5 attacks/second, because you can't kite that way, then tell me how many attacks/second you want, and I can optimize around that. Similarly, I see a lot of high ELO guides that use more health runes than I tend to run in low ELO games. That makes sense to me. I can see how high ELO players would be able to bully a squishy opponent in lane. So, tell me a starting target health level one should be at to be competitive (and preferably explain how you arrived at that number) and again, I can optimize around that. However, I don't give much weight to statements like, "I tend to use this build and it seems to work well for me." First, you might be doing other things well. Your reaction times and lag might be awesome, or you might have great vision control and map awareness. Second, humans tend to have a lot of cognitive biases. We tend to remember the "hits" where things went well and forget the "misses" where things didn't go well. Video game players are like drivers -- 90% of people think they're better than average. Third, in a game like LOL, there's a lot of peer pressure to conform to certain champions and builds based on what people might have seen in streams or LCS videos, and people may not realize that those champion and build choices may have been chosen for game-specific reasons such as the ally or enemy team makeup. So that's where number crunching comes into play -- to try to eliminate some of those biases. I agree that if one assumes only perfect situations, then you might be led astray. For example, if you only assume full builds where you can stand and unload without any kiting or CC hitting you, then that's just not realistic. But, I believe you can make some decent estimations about what a realistic fight is like, what the typical gold/time curve is like over a game, and optimize around those situations.[/quote]

[quote=Slappiz][quote=Vynertje][quote=Out Of Pancakes]What do you play into a [[janna]] pick?[/quote] Usually [[Nami]]. Although it's relatively hard to play you can turn it into a skill matchup if you bait [[eye of the storm]] with an AA, waiting till it's on CD and then using your full combo with W/E on her/adc. I think [[lulu]] does fine as well, again you can try to bait a shield or just fire your Q on the target without the shield on. Not sure how [[sona]] would work because I don't play her but I'm figuring she can essentially do the same with high poke/pressure. More general advice would be to not pick a support that fully relies on engages against her, because that's what she excels against. Most ranged/pokey supports can turn it into a skill matchup if you can make good use of her cooldowns.[/quote] [[Sona]] is probably the strongest support against [[Janna]]. [[Nami]], [[Lulu]], [[Annie]], [[Zyra]] and [[Braum]] does well against her as well.[/quote]

[quote=Vynertje][quote=MungoGeri] And yet, what you are doing here is discussing numbers. There's a zone between making bad calculations that assume everything works absolutely perfectly all the time and simply throwing up your hands and assuming hand-waving arguments are good enough. I absolutely disagree with your statement saying "you cannot estimate a set % of AS you lose to kiting." [b]Try looking at some videos of yourself kiting and see how many shots you tend to get off per second while kiting, and if kiting is critically important for your character, then optimize your build around an estimated optimal AS number. [/b][/quote] Specifically to the bold section: You are already missing the point here. Yes, I can estimate a % for myself, but that doesn't apply to every situation nor does it apply to every player. Sometimes you are facing an enemy who is relatively easy to kite, sometimes you are not. Some players will be like doublelift, some others kite like me. Another factor you just cannot express mathematically is waveclear, siege potential etc etc etc. The list goes on with reasons why it may not apply every situation. [quote] Similarly, I see a lot of high ELO guides that use more health runes than I tend to run in low ELO games. That makes sense to me. I can see how high ELO players would be able to bully a squishy opponent in lane. [/quote] This is bullshit. Main reason you don't see as much health in your low elo games is because health runes are 1. super expensive and 2. only got used a lot since the rune changes somewhere in S4. It's also nonsense to say that high Elo players can bully squishy players better. That's just like saying it's easier for high Elo players to play skillshot heavy champions - it isn't, because enemies will also dodge the skillshots more regularly than low Elo players do. [quote] However, I don't give much weight to statements like, "I tend to use this build and it seems to work well for me." First, you might be doing other things well. Your reaction times and lag might be awesome, or you might have great vision control and map awareness. Second, humans tend to have a lot of cognitive biases. We tend to remember the "hits" where things went well and forget the "misses" where things didn't go well. Video game players are like drivers -- 90% of people think they're better than average. Third, in a game like LOL, there's a lot of peer pressure to conform to certain champions and builds based on what people might have seen in streams or LCS videos, and people may not realize that those champion and build choices may have been chosen for game-specific reasons such as the ally or enemy team makeup. [/quote] I completely agree with this. There is a pretty big line between saying "I do this because it works for me" and actually explaining why WITHOUT using math though. [quote] So that's where number crunching comes into play -- to try to eliminate some of those biases. I agree that if one assumes only perfect situations, then you might be led astray. For example, if you only assume full builds where you can stand and unload without any kiting or CC hitting you, then that's just not realistic. But, I believe you can make some decent estimations about what a realistic fight is like, what the typical gold/time curve is like over a game, and optimize around those situations.[/quote] Up to some extent, yes. Math can indeed be used to eliminate biases but it can NOT be used to actually make a decision otherwise uninformed. So yeah, I obviously do use some sense of maths when I'm picking my runes, when I'm deciding between whether I should go BORK or BT, PD or Shiv but you cannot argue a build to be valid just based on numbers because they WILL be misleading. Anyway - just like the volibear discussion, I'd like to keep all comments in this topic related to the actual subject: supporting. If you really like to keep on arguing, make a thread in the appropriate forum and continue there.[/quote]

[quote=Jimmydoggga 2.0]When you get items for supports what stats are you looking for in general? I generally run something like: Gold income Wards Utility (that their kit doesn't have already) CDR Mana regen/AP Is that similar to your item purchases?[/quote]

[quote=The_Nameless_Bard]Not to butt in (she says before butting in), but that depends on both the champion and the game in question. Generally gp10 items, wards (both [[stealth ward]]s and [[vision ward]]s, often), [[sweeping lens]]/[[oracle's lens]], and [[sightstone]]/[[ruby sightstone]] are core items for any support. [[boots of mobility]] are also nearly always a reasonable option (with a few exceptions like [[Vel'koz]] who just don't utilize them well). Champions like [[Thresh]] and [[Leona]] nearly always need to itemize a combination of tank stats and utility. They don't benefit from many of the pure utility items and they can't really afford to build offensively often. Champions like [[Janna]] and [[Nami]] are more flexible. They often favor utility and some tankiness over damage, but they can build more damage heavy (or tanky) if needed. Mage supports like [[Karma]], [[Vel'koz]], and [[Zyra]] tend to favor offensive builds with some utility thrown in, they don't really benefit from full utility or tanky builds. They're often secondary(/tertiary) damage dealers in teamfights and are mostly used to secure an early advantage in lane. [[Zyra]] is a bit different in that her ult gives her a strong initiate allowing her to do a bit more even if she doesn't have a lot of damage items.[/quote]

[quote=Jimmydoggga 2.0]I'm wondering a little bit more about item preferences. Like is it generally better to get Frozen Heart over Randuins on Leona so you can have your stun up more often? Is it better to get Frozen Heart over Morellonomicon on Nami in general? (Although that is probably a stupid question to ask)[/quote]

[quote=Out Of Pancakes][quote=Jimmydoggga 2.0] Is it better to get Frozen Heart over Morellonomicon on Nami in general? (Although that is probably a stupid question to ask)[/quote] Wut. Those two items have very different roles, I can't see in which case scenario you'd be hesitating between them ^^'[/quote]