For LIVE educational commentary and real-time answers:
• Follow my stream here (I go live in the evenings EST time)

Socials:
• Youtube
• Twitch
• Discord
• Twitter

Introduction

A U T H O R

Hey everyone! I'm King Naki, a high diamond elo player and content creator for all things mid/support. I'm streaming daily on twitch so feel free to catch me on there! I've been playing LoL since late-2017 and have managed to climb the ladder due to my previous background in competitive play. I really enjoy creating guides and helping newer players get a grasp on the champions they want to play and also League in general. Thank you for checking out my guides and I hope they'll help you skyrocket through ranked or simply give you a better understanding of a champion you'd like to try out! :)


Role

S U P P O R T

The support role in League of Legends is probably the most underrated role in terms of popularity, but in terms of importance and play-making this role truly shines. Supports are almost always the kings/queens of mid to late game team-fighting and can literally turn the tides of battle in seconds through their heavy crowd-control abilities and team-buffs.

Your main objective as a support player is to seek out a win-condition on your team and do everything in your power to get them to carry your team to victory. This win-condition is usually your ADC (attack damage carry), but can also very much be your mid-laner, top-laner, and also your jungler (depending on the class they are playing (obviously an assassin will have significantly higher carry potential than a tank).
Because of this, it is sometimes your duty to choose who you want to support in your team’s struggle to victory. If your ADC is feeding and not performing admirably, do not dump your key-ability buffs or items on them as effects will be negligible, instead use your items/abilities on your mid-laner, top-laner, or jungler in a skirmish or team-fight. Ex. If your Jhin is 0/3/0 and your Katarina is 3/0/0, you want to prioritize getting her to carry the game as she already has a lead.

Your side-objectives as a support include shot-calling objectives and warding. Warding is difficult to learn and keep tabs on so I highly recommend you Youtube high elo support warding guides that will help you create vision and opportunity for your team. Shot-calling objectives is a difficult task initially that you will learn as you learn the macro (map knowledge and control of the map) in League of Legends. Generally speaking, you always want to be looking to make Baron, Dragon, and Turret shot-calls based on the situation at hand.

The priority is usually inhibitor > turret > baron > dragon (higher depending on type) > scuttle.

Always keep this in mind and direct your team to victory by using anonymous pings (simply click the ping button without selecting an option on the map), as pinging anonymously takes away stigma from your score/where you are standing as a player. Watching high-level Korean play, it can be inferred that spam-pinging is highly effective and you will literally see your teammates move to the objective you are anonymously spam pinging if you do this in the correct time-window and manner. Do NOT spam-ping randomly or too often as this will confuse your team and decrease your chance of getting them to converge on objectives later in the game.

This guide will teach you the individual abilities, runes, and items of the support you are playing so that you can build in an advanced way that will improve your chances of victory.


Ranked

C L I M B I N G

If you wish to climb with the support role you will need to follow simple measures that all slightly increase your chance of victory, forming a bigger percentage that increases your victory in the end.

First and foremost, if your team is toxic even in the slightest, mute them. You can either do /muteall or just mute the individual affecting your mental. You do not need chat to communicate to your team, all you need is pings, especially in lower elos where not many players call out enemy summoner spells.

Keep your champion pool small when climbing, usually ranging from 2-3 champions so that you are not constantly learning/readjusting to playstyles and keeping your winrates consistent. This isn’t just a random tip either, it is literally fact that maintaining small champion pools helps you climb. Usually these champions should be meta-oriented even in the slightest, so look up some tier-lists to help you get an idea of what champions are doing well in the current meta. If you disregard the meta, you can still climb but only if you are consistently proficient on said champion.

Try not to tilt whatsoever as that mental carries on to future games and statistically decreases your performance. If you feel tilted, take a break and come back to your climbing sessions later on.

Now without further ado, let's jump into the builds!

Runes

D O M I N A T I O N

KEYSTONE Electrocute: Very effective rune for Zyra as it is easily proc’d with her abilities and plants. Use this to nuke squishy targets. RUNE Cheap Shot: A true-damage rune that activates in any instance damage is applied with/after crowd control. Works well with Zyra’s Grasping Roots and Stranglethorns. RUNE Eyeball Collection: Since this is an AP heavy build, this rune further maximizes your AP and makes up for the fact that Zyra doesn't get a lot of gold to purchase AP items due to being a support. RUNE Ultimate Hunter: This rune paired with Presence of Mind gives Zyra the potential to cast her ultimate, Stranglethorns on a low cooldown, abusing it’s crowd control and plant-empowering potential. Runes P R E C I S I O N RUNE Presence of Mind: Ties the whole rune build together and allows Zyra to always have mana during teamfights/skirmishes and also significantly decreases her Stranglethorns cooldown on kills/assists. RUNE Coup de Grace: Free damage rune that works exceptionally well with Zyra’s kit as it requires the enemy to be below a certain HP threshold to active, perfect as Zyra is a burst mage who often bursts down enemies quickly. Summoner S P E L L S SPELL Flash: Key summoner spell on every champion. SPELL Ignite: Harass rune in lane. Applies a -40% healing debuff for the duration. Amazing against healing champions such as Soraka and Nami. Time the cooldown of the enemy Heal as Ignite has a shorter cooldown and can be used strategically to engage when the enemy doesn't have Heal up.

Abilities

B R E A K D O W N

PASSIVE Garden of Thorns: Zyra’s passive that spawns random flower buds usually in the direction she is moving/facing. Difficult to use effectively as you have to keep track of this passive’s timer during teamfights. ABILITY Deadly Spines: A burst ability that is cast in a horizontal line in front of Zyra. The area where she can summon a Rampant Growth spitting plant is actually larger than the damage area, use this to your advantage. ABILITY Rampant Growth: An ability that stores flower buds and allows Zyra to sprout them. These buds sit and wait for Deadly Spines or Grasping Roots to be used on them to transform into spitting plants or slowing plants, respectively. Get into a habit of first casting Deadly Spines or Grasping Roots and THEN using Rampant Growth while those abilities are casting. If you cast Rampant Growth first, the enemy will be able to predict where and what plant you are planning to spawn. This ability also grants vision and can be used as a temporary mini-ward. Using ability as a ward in key locations can really save you and your adc from a gank. ABILITY Grasping Roots Zyra’s root ability that needs to be maxed first to utilize it for it’s full potential. Very useful for locking enemies down while they get bombarded by your plants. A simple combo you can try is E > W > Q > W, casting Rampant Growth in between your abilities and preventing your enemies from seeing what plant your casting or where it’s going to be summoned. ULTIMATE Stranglethorns: Game changing ultimate that deals damage and then knocks up enemies. Can be easily cast into a Grasping Roots either before or after this ultimate, depending on the situation. This ultimate also enrages your plants, making them deal more damage and gives them increased survivability. To maximize the effectiveness of this ultimate, try not to start a teamfight with it, but rather have your plants placed and then use Stranglethorns to knock-up an enemy, making them super vulnerable to your plant damage and increasing the damage output of your plants.

Items

C O R E

CORE Shard of True Ice: Key poke-mage starting item. This item is the third evolution of Spellthief's Edge. Make sure to poke consistently in lane to evolve Spellthief's Edge and get a gold lead on the enemy support. CORE Sorcerer's Shoes: Mage boots that provide magic penetration against magic resistances. CORE Rylai's Crystal Scepter: Key item on Zyra that gives all of her abilities (including plants) a slow. This is especially useful for your ranged spitting plants as it makes them constantly slow enemies from long ranges. Also useful for your ultimate as Stranglethorns deals damage and then knocks-up, this item ensurs you land the knock-up easier. CORE Liandry's Torment: Another key item in Zyra’s kit. This item pairs with Rylai's Crystal Scepter to do insane burn damage to enemies as the max % hp burn on this item DOUBLES when enemies are under crowd control effects. This item is built after Rylai's Crystal Scepter as the slow is more useful early and the burn from Liandry's Torment is more useful late when enemies are tankier. Items O P T I O N A L OPTIONAL Void Staff: A great late-game item that penetrates enemy magic resistance. Do not build early as enemies would not have built significant amounts of magic resistance for this item to take full effect. OPTIONAL Banshee's Veil: Works well against AP dominated compositions or AP assassins that are targeting you. Ex. Evelynn, Nidalee, Fizz. OPTIONAL Zhonya's Hourglass: Almost always the better choice over Banshee's Veil. Works especially well for AD assassins who dive you. Do you not use too early as the key is to get the enemy AD to waste crucial skills on you. OPTIONAL Mejai's Soulstealer: Rare opportunity item that works wonders when you are ahead. If scared of commitment, get Dark Seal instead. OPTIONAL Morellonomicon: Rare opportunity item that works well in negating the enemy’s team healing. A must get item against healing-enchanters such as Soraka and Nami. Only get this item if your team’s AP mage/assassin is not buying it, otherwise it’s not as effective. On Zyra specifically however, this item also penetrates enemy resistances through it’s build path item, Oblivion Orb, placing it much higher on the “needed after core build” item list.