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Specifics about Supports

Creator: The Overmyynd May 8, 2012 11:09am
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The Overmyynd
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This was actually in response to a question in another post i created, but i put so much work into it, i figure i should let other people see it, an critique it as well. I pride myself on being a good support player, and any advice people might be able to give me given any of these champs/situations would be very helpful. Thanks!

Well you are partially correct, asking the AD carry who they prefer to work with is a good idea, and you are also correct in that certain characters work very well with certain other characters. Playstyle is also a big deciding factor, however. Is your AD a sit back and win based on CS kind of guy? Or does he like to run kill lanes? And does your team in general want to win by rocking lane phase, or by doing equally well in lane as the other team, but crush them in the teamfight phase? Finding the answer to all of these questions is key to deciding which support to pick. So lets go through some of the champs and answer some of these questions.

Alistar
This guy is a fearsome presence. He zones people out just by STANDING somewhere. He plays mind games with the best of em during lanephase, and offers alot to a teamfight after, to boot. Decent heal that works on everyone in a vicinity around him (good for throwing off opponent CS AND for helping keep your team alive later on). But What makes him the mindgame master are his two other abilities, his knockup and headbutt. One of the biggest fears for a laner is being out of position, away from your support, away from your turret, and into gank range. Alistar turns that nightmare into a reality. His Headbutt throws you a HUGE distance, and if he gets behind an enemy, in between him and his turret, well... its game over. And everyone else in the world KNOWS that. SO they do everything within their power to keep themselves from getting into that position. Thus, Alistar can walk somewhere, mind his own business, and zone the enemy team completely out, because they are too afraid of being put out of position so horribly to stay anywhere near him. Trying to jungle gank a lane with an Alistar in it is... tricky, to say the least. Alistars AD would have to put himself WAY out of position AND be at about half health before its an option. Any other situation, and Alistar will just knock the jungler into his turret so his AD can eat him.

Janna
This support is very popular atm. She has a shield (which serves same purpose as heals, just requires a little more skill and great reflexes to STOP the damage from happening instead of fixing it AFTER it happens), a knock up, a slow, and her ult, the Big Push (which is the reason she is so popular right now). Janna is a nice pick for lane phase, assuming the support player has good reflexes and can tell when the enemy AD is about to try and harass and shield her partner before the attack lands, but she REALLY shines once lane phase is over and teamfights start. Her ult is such a massive disruption it by itself can break teamfights into pieces, let alone when combined with someone else, like Gragas, who can do it AGAIN. Her best partners are Vayne and Tristana, again because they both have disruption spells that work very well with the team dynamic Janna would be put in. Your opponents dont matter too much, as long as your team is following the Disruption Teamfight theory, they wont have a chance in the end anyway. As far as defending from junglers, Janna gives a passive 3% boost to speed, which is meh at best, but its something. her skillshots hardly ever land outside of the big, brawling teamfights, so counting on those to defend your ad from ganks isnt the best strategy. Overall just spend cash on wards and keep them up by the tribush AND your river bush to get as much warning as possible.

Taric
This support has been, and always will be, very popular. His heals heal his target AND himself in the same spell, which makes up for the fact that its not as powerful a heal as Soraka. He is tanky, and gives his ally's a tanky buff as well, which is very powerful in lane phase. He never runs out of mana, thanks to his passive. His stun is non skillshot, which is great for picking out a target amongst a mass of creeps. The stun helps his ganks, stops enemy ganks, and just helps generate a Zone of Danger around himself, especially if he is partnered with a champ that has long distance blink/dash spells, i.e., Ezreal Corki Tristana. They can all jump in and take advantage of an enemy putting themselves out of position after Taric punishes them for it by stunning them. The same concept works, just not as well, for other dash-type ad carries, like Graves and Vayne. However Graves works fantastically well with Taric in a more passive style (the sit back and crank CS type) because he gets armor from his passive AND Taric ability. Graves tank? i think so. Also, Taric stun + Caitlyn Yordle Snap Trap = funny as hell and one long *** stun. As far as jungles, probably not the best pick against a Nocturne or Lee Sin but other than that he is good against most.

Soraka
The all around, easy to play, easy to learn, OP Healmaster. Choosing Soraka means your AD will never run out of health or mana. Ezreal can spam his beam attacks without fear of not being able to escape a gank, Graves can be as ballsy as he wants with his Buckshot, it just leaves ALOT of wiggle room for your AD to get a bit sloppy. Which is why i do not recommend her if you are running solo q. Your AD will get too brazen and feel like he has the hand of God on him, do stupid ****, then die, and blame you for it, because hey, you only have so many heals at one time. Not too sure what to counter pick for, all i know is, i HATE Soraka Ezreal lane combos. HATE them. Especially if the Ez is on his toes and knows wtf he is doing. So, Soraka can either lose the game b/c she lets a tard feel like Jesus and get himself killed, or win the game because she allows Actual Jesus with a Shotgun to go wherever he pleases, get all the creeps, all the golems, all the wraiths, and **** all over everyone. SO, its not the champ you should be picking Soraka to pair with best, its the player. Against junglers, she really falls to Udyr who goes into the *IMA STUN YOU PASSIVELY AND U CANT GET AWAY HUEHUEHUE* stance BEFORE he gets out of the bush and into silence range, but other than that, her silence can work pretty well.

These are some of the common picks, and i am familiar with them all. However there are a couple of supports that you will see and scratch your head over. These are very situational, yet if put in the RIGHT situation, will destroy bottom lane.

Maokai
The tree to end all trees. The peace-seeker, the sapling-flinger, the woody mammoth. THIS guy is a baws, all the way around. (im not biased, i swear...). Maokai has a toolkit that looks mish-mash and jumbled at first, but once you get your head around it, you realize how amazing it actually is. And how lethal. Sapling Toss has HUGE range, and is the main reason why mao is a viable support. He basically supports by harassing the hell out of the enemy and making them afraid to come near your minions to get CS. He out ranges any and all abilities the enemy AD and the enemy support might have. And on top of the range of the ability, it HURTS. ALOT. Good Maokai players will learn to time the minion waves and keep track of when they will come next, so when his sapling lands and starts chasing whomever it lands next to, they cant run through a creep wave and escape the second, much more powerful blast. Doing things this way also ensures the player never runs out of mana because he takes his time dealing all that damage. Crazy sustain from Sap Magic. His Twisted Advance and Arcane Smash are GREAT for taking advantage of enemy laners that put themselves out of position, and also for defending against ganks. and 20% reduced damage from Vengeful Maelstrom is invaluable in teamfights. He works best with characters, like Taric, that have long range blink/hop abilities, such as Ezreal Corki and Tristana altho i have had best luck with ez and trist. He is a very aggressive support. Does not do well against junglers with great gap closers like Lee Sin or Nautilus.

Blitzcrank
THIS guy... oh boy. He only has ONE goal in life, just one. To land his Rocket Grab from the bush so his perma-partner, Vayne, can eat your soul while he has you bounced and silenced. The combination of characters allows for a ridiculous CC time; blitz bounce can't be shortened by Tenacity, and Vayne's Condemn impales your *** to the wall (which blitz was kind enough to pull you to, thank you very much). Very durable thanks to his shield, and alot of people are idiots and actually attack him instead of his AD. Very stupid thing to do. Fun little fact, his Rocket Grab can't be seen until WAY too late if he launches it from a bush at you. Really only exists as support to run a kill lane (90% of the time with Vayne), isnt useful at ALL with passive characters/players, but when he is used correctly, it takes ALOT of jungle support from your guy to let you survive the lane. Notice i said "survive", not "win". even with LOTS of jungle help, its still not likely you would win a lane against blitz-vayen if they know what they are doing. Just awful to try and lane against.

Well i hope this answered your questions. If you have any more, let me know!

Hope this helped XD

As previously said, this was in response to a question, i was just too lazy to edit it to make it look like a general statement. Feel free to praise me, critique me, call me a dumbass, whateves, just tell me what you disliked and how it should be different if you choose to go the negative nancy way. Thanks alot!
Hey, if you liked any advice i gave, be sure to +rep me! Oh, and check out my Shaco and Maokail lorecraft in my Blog! I'm a starving artist in need of attention, so please feel free to read, respond, and critique me! Please? Anybody that leaves a comment (good or bad) will receive a +rep!
animal091
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what bout sona
WolfsBane
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i litterly agree with everything here, but it is kinda common knowledge
ChaosxSoul
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You forgot sona
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The Overmyynd
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Indeed i did. I really dont know how to describe sona... lots of poke, good heals, game changing ult. Good choice almost no matter who you decide to put her with. really kind of more of a late game support but her lane phase is strong as well. And i posted this MONTHS ago... How did it get back to the front page????
Hey, if you liked any advice i gave, be sure to +rep me! Oh, and check out my Shaco and Maokail lorecraft in my Blog! I'm a starving artist in need of attention, so please feel free to read, respond, and critique me! Please? Anybody that leaves a comment (good or bad) will receive a +rep!
The Overmyynd
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Like literally, 6 MONTHS ago I posted this... how???????
Hey, if you liked any advice i gave, be sure to +rep me! Oh, and check out my Shaco and Maokail lorecraft in my Blog! I'm a starving artist in need of attention, so please feel free to read, respond, and critique me! Please? Anybody that leaves a comment (good or bad) will receive a +rep!
ChaosxSoul
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Guess we got a thread necromancer here.
Thanks to TinyStar for making me this awesome sig
koridjinn
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You should take a look at Poppy support. No kidding, every time I see her bot lane it's been a kill lane. She's got the CC, the damage, the tankiness and her ult is the most broken thing ever. Once she hits level 6, nowhere is safe for you and your carry. She takes all the turret hits without any damage, feeding her carry free kills.
I do suppose Alistar would be a decent pick against her, as he's able to knock her out of range.
Clu Gulager
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i'm fairly sure turrets still hurt Poppy even with her ult on.
FalseoGod
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i'm fairly sure turrets still hurt Poppy even with her ult on.


They don't
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