after +130lvl, playing almost exclusively supp, ive come to the conclussion that there are 7 types of support:
- poke (such as lux, brand, xerath, vel'koz, shaco, neeko, zoe and vex)
- all in (such as nautilus, leona, allistar, thresh, shen and rell)
- peel or disengage (such as janna, renata glasc, lulu and braum)
- 50/50 (such as pyke, pantheon, thresh and blitzcrank)
- sustain (such as yuumi, nami, sona and soraka)
- utility (zilean, bard and ivern)
- jack of all trades (morgana, rakan and taric)

poke supports are not really supports, since they lack of the amount of utility/cc/heal/sustain that other supps do have. anyway because of the ridiculous dmg and cooldowns their abilities have, they are pretty popular in low elo. they usually are midlaners and are based off skillshots. the only way they actually help is by damaging/poking the enemies in botlane leaving them low enough fot the adc to kill them. but following that logic, pretty much every lane in league is a support, cuz they have to focus on dmg. see? they are not supports, and they are quite stronger than other supps in low elo.

however, they can mainly get countered by two types of support: the all in & the sustain. this is because the all in can keep them cc'd long enough for the carrie to destroy them, and the sustains can heal up themselves/their adc quickly after they get hit by a poke supps ability. although all in supports, counter them, the fact that being closer to them makes it easier for them to land a skillshot is an example of why its hard to win against them and why they are so obnoxious.

for poke supps itemization u just focus on building a mid carry build with items such as ludens, liandrys, rabadons, etc. (another example of why this poke "supps" arent real supports)

all in supports main objective during both laning and after it is to engage the enemy team when neccesary. most of them have at least 3 cc abilities, usually a hook being one of them (like nautis q or leonas e), focusing their cc in the champ with more potential to dmg or potential to make their team win a team fight.

due to their tankiness, they have barely any problem to get in the middle of their team and apply their cc while their teammates get into the fight. still, during laning phase they can get severely countered by two types of supports: peel or disengage % 50/50; since peel or disengage supps champs are designed to have abilities to slow or deny all in supports engage and cc and 50/50 supports, that pretty much have a more versatile version of all in (ill explain later in their own category) that can deny their cc

for their itemization, all in supports, can either choose between normal tank items (like sunfire aegis and turbo chemtank) and tanky supp items (like solaris or evenshroud items).

peel or disengage supports are specifically designed to stop an enemies engage and/or protect with shields (and healing in a few cases). their utility is somewhat passive, meaning that is better to use their abilities once an enemies has tried to engage u or ur adc than using them in an attempt to engage. another way that peel or disengage supports make themselves useful is by buffing their adc and/or debuffing their enemies, like lulus w and r, jannas passive or renata glascs w.

they usually get countered by poke supports and champs with lots of dmg that, arent strictly poke supps (like pyke, pantheon or senna), since peel or disengage supports are usually rather squishy and lack of tankiness.

peel or disengage supports builds are focused on enchanter items (like moonstone, shurelyas or the staff of flowing water), but also sometimes incorporate somewhat tanky supp items (like solaris, anatemas or knights vow).

now, this category is special, since 50/50 supports have mostly cc abilities, like the all in class, but they can use it both when attempting to engage or to disengage. for example, pykes q and blitzcrank q are both hooks, however, unlike the all in supps hooks, they bring the enemy close to the 50/50 supports, instead of imoblizing the enemy and getting the all in champ closer to the hooked champ.

on the other hand, they also can be quite qood at disengaging or denying an enemies engage on their adc using their hooks to save distance between their adc and the enemy support; or, if they are the ones getting engaged, they usually have some stun+mobility combo to run away with (like pykes e or blitzcrank e+w). they offer versatility to a certain point.

since they are a kind of mix between disengage and engage, they get countered by their own class and the peel or disengage supps

since they are really different between them, the itemization is unique for each champ. pantheon and pyke build ad/lethality items, but blitzcrank can build both an enchanter/tanky supp, full tank or full ap items.

the sustain supports focus on healing, shielding and buffing their adc/teammates, so they are a version of the peel or disengage supports that can "engage" (obviously not with the same ease as all in supps), but they gain the disadvantage of being more dependent of their teammates to actually deal dmg. however, the sustain supports can both play behind their adc in a passive way, just healing whenever a trade is made; or they can be the ones actually looking for trades.

their main counters are the all in & 50/50 supports, since they cant use their main power: healing abilities, while stunned; and dont have enough cc/shields to answer the heavy cc engage.

their itemization is focused on enchanter items or just items that generally increase the healing they can potentially give (like moonstone, redemption, mikaels or the chemtech putrifier)

id like to consider the following chapters as the second half of this guide, since we have finally moved from the classic supp division to the two special types of support: the utility supports and the jack of all trades supports

also, because of the wide range of playstyle that these two types have, they dont really have a class counter. it really depends on how broken is the champ ur playing against and how good u are with these champs.

lets see:

utility supports are simple to understand, hard to design and quite difficult to play most of the times. they offer alternative and unique ways to help their team. the main 3 utility supps are zilean, ivern and bard (although its also debatable whether ornn is a champ belonging to this same class).


· the utility zilean offers other than the classical stuns, slows and speed buffs are his bombs (able to attach both to enemy and ally champs), his passive (being able to give xp to allies) and his r (which is pretty much an guardian angel at lvl6).


· iverns utility is surprisingly unnoticed in botlane:

- passive: every time an ally kills either the red camp or the blue camp, one of iverns allies (or ivern itself) get that same buff, so its 2 buffs for killing 1 camp
- q: its both a stun and a dash, not only for ivern, but for his allies too.
- w: although its probably, the least useful ability, but u can still deny basic incoming attacks, bait useless wards, deny enemy vision, force enemies to facecheck and get temporary vision from places with fog of war.
- e: its a temporary shield, that, once it disappears (either because of the time
or because of taken dmg) explodes and deals dmg and slows in an aoe
- r: ur true botlane partner when playing ivern supp and ur biggest powerspike. it
it tanks skillshots, it deals dmg and cc and it can zone pretty well.


· bards utility is probably the most difficult to use. other than his stun/slow and his heal, he has his e (a straight line portal that makes u untargetable while travelling in it, that both ur team and the enemies can use) and his r (an aoe zhonyas that affects both allies and enemies creeps and turrets and neutral camps). also his passive is basically an aoe basic attack buff that makes it easier to roam to other lanes or important places in the jgl.


although zilean and ivern are usually built as enchanters/full ap carries, bard does not follow this "rule". he can build almost anything, from tank to lethality and from enchanter to adc. his unique kit makes it possible to fulfill any class with relative ease.

if utility supports are considered special because they have unique abilities in the game, jack of all trades supports are special for a totally different reason: they have a bit of every classical supp class. however, this perk isnt totally broken (except for morgana) since they still have to decide what aspect of their kit to level up. there are 3 main jack of all trades champs: rakan, morgana and taric.

· rakan is the perfect example of what a good jack of all trades support design looks like. he has capacity to engage, deal a considerable burst of dmg/poke, heal, and both disengage and engage, but it isnt unfair to play against him.

· morgana is pretty much the opposite, a horribly designed jack of all trades support: she still has engage/heavy cc, disengage, peel and sustain on her e, and dmg on her q, w and r. however, her dmg is too high, her q stun lasts for too much and has a broken hitbox, her e is makes it impossible to engage on her or her adc and his r is a massive aoe stun that lasts for even more time than her q. shes unfair and unfun to play against.

· taric is another good example of a jack of all trades support, his pasives basic attacks deal a good amount of dmg, he has a heal and a shield, a great stun for both engaging an disengaging and a strong ult that isnt totally broken, since it turns out to be really predictable and slow to cast. he is a very much less mobile version of rakan.

another example of why rakan and taric are good examples of jack of all trades supports design is their itemization is a mix of items that usually belong to other classic supports classes, they can build frostfire gauntlet, solaris, moonstone and even, everfrost. on the other hand, morgana uniquely builds ap dmg which is against her design idea.

i actually made this guide in hope that itd help me understand my role even better, and i think it actually is going to make an impact on my playstale.

my final conclussion is that ur hyper cringe if u play poke supports or morgana, they are absolutely unplayable and garbage champs for people with barely any neurons (para putos fracasados de mierda).