Ideas to make support more interesting

WillHerschel·May 8, 2018·3 votes·1,073 views

With massive changes on the way for support and bot lane around this 2018 mid season I thought it would be worth while to discuss current thoughts on support particularly from the view of support mains and how to make the roll feel less bland and more diverse. For some context I've recently been finding that several supports play the same way (poke/lane dominance, sustain, engage/kill threat) and have almost identical game patterns or at least some combination of existing patterns (Nami who pokes and sustains). I also think that most of what gave support champions a unique and interesting identity has been lost for balancing reasons or pushed to items, for example the soraka ult no longer removing grievous wounds takes away something interesting and skill oriented and pushed her into being for the most part just another lane poke healer. The support game then becomes a question of who is best at one of the generic patterns at the time (of course there are a few outliers but they are often off-meta and ignored in balancing for the pro scene).

I think that Riot could learn a lot from other games with support roles from several genres (MMO, arena, other Mobas). My current thought is that buff/debuff support is a very under-explored area in League of Legends. As far as fairly meta supports go there are mostly attack damage buffs, attack speed buffs, and movement speed buffs, some of which any champion can get with an ardent censor. Many other games have support characters that can give mana buffs, critical strike buffs, resistance buffs (more things like Lulu's ult), on hit effects (which I think only Nami really has and it's pretty underwhelming, at least visually), cooldown refreshes/buffs, regeneration buffs, auras, and even cloaking allies. Also the support cast is also almost completely devoid of debuffs other than slows. I think there's plenty of room for champions that offer MR/armor shred, mana debuffs, slowing enemy cooldowns, healing allies on hitting an opponent (old Shen q), and silence abilities (which are few and far in-between). Most of these mechanics are in game but exist on champions that aren't support or items that aren't support oriented.

As a side note I think there's also room for more zone control with user created terrain, buffing/debuffing totems, shield zones (like the recent but removed locket changes on PBE).

I suppose I'm mostly wondering if there are others in the community that feel the same way and have even better ideas on how to breathe some life into perhaps the least popular roll (for some time now) in the hopes that maybe something will change.

8 Comments

Aerial Queen LizMay 8, 20183 votes

We're getting a new support soon, we might see some new mechanic hopefully.

WillHerschelMay 8, 20182 votes

Not to fall into the nautical puns but I really am holding my breath. I do think there's a lot of room for more variety without even adding new mechanics though, I just don't know why all of these support like abilities never find their way onto an actual support.

ZT XperimentorMay 10, 20182 votes

Maybe if they'd stop overloading carry champions, they'd have more things to give other champions.

Chibi BronzlifeMay 8, 20181 votes

No, support isn't struggling for this reason. Champion diversity is one thing that Support doesn't lack. Support has THE MOST different playstyle options as you yourself have highlighted. The problem is Support's main job, vision is locked behind a quest now. It makes early game very hard on botlane and not fun.

WillHerschelMay 8, 20182 votes

I would argue that support by definition should be more diverse, I just think there isn't much diversity in the way each champion accomplishes the same goal. For example, I think that late game hyper carrying on Vayne is done very differently than how one does it on Kog'ma. Or split pushing as Fiora is very different than Nasus. I personally don't find playing Alistar very different stylistically from playing Leona or any of the E girls overly different. I also am not a big fan of the support item vision quests, I always thought sight stone enchantments like jungle items would have been a nifty idea.

Chibi BronzlifeMay 8, 20181 votes

{quoted}

I would argue that support by definition should be more diverse, I just think there isn't much diversity in the way each champion accomplishes the same goal. For example, I think that late game hyper carrying on Vayne is done very differently than how one does it on Kog'ma. Or split pushing as Fiora is very different than Nasus. I personally don't find playing Alistar very different stylistically from playing Leona or any of the E girls overly different. I also am not a big fan of the support item vision quests, I always thought sight stone enchantments like jungle items would have been a nifty idea.

I would argue that you're wrong. The champions are just as diverse in support. I've been a support only player since season 3. Just because the big three right now are shielders doesn't mean that the role is not diverse. Janna is full disengage with a power amping shield, Morg is hybrid disengage/catch/lockdown Q and R being very versatile in how you use them, plus she can stall enemy pushes with her W. Lulu is full protection/buffing/debuffing, her skills do way too much to specify each individually.

WillHerschelMay 9, 20181 votes

Fiddlesticks

AptestMay 8, 20181 votes

IMHO there is no worse skill to give to a support champion, than a buff.

The reason is, buffs transfer power to already stronger champions, without appropriating their decision making.

What I would like to see, are map modifications, specifically ones that can have interaction from both ally and opponent, and traps. These two items offer both outplaying mechanics, and do not userp agency from the opponent.