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Why is Brand getting a buff to his midlane , while Zyra Mid is still sitting in the garbage can?

Zoekt··5 votes·885 views

I mean , I'm not trying to be mean or something, but I don't think this is fair at all. Zyra Mid has been gutted because of her oppresive playstyle as a support, making her one of the worst midlane mages in the game, although Riot promised that they will preserve Zyra's midlane identity. Now she is sitting at one of the lowest winraters as a support while her midlane is basically non-existent. Zyra Mains expressed their deep concerns regarding support Zyra, wanting you(Riot) to make her a viable midlaner again. In the end , you decided to nerf her support playstyle without giving any buffs to midlane Zyra.

Back to the topic, Brand is another champion similar to Zyra, in a sense that his midlane suffers a lot due to his immobility,egregious waveclear while also being easy to gank. Although support seems to be the ,,prefered" role for Brand , since the majority of Brand players play him as a support champ while also being used quite a lot actually in the professional play as a support , you decided to give him better waveclear and increase the ratios of his E, these buffs coming out of nowhere. I don't know if ,,prefered "is the correct word in this sentence , since Brand players are going through the same thing Zyra Players are, meaning that they don't want to play him as a support, but that is his only viable role, but you get the idea.

Malzahar is another one. Although his rework was not supposed to make him a support, he slowly became one of the top tier supports in the game due to his extremely reliable point and click lockdown ult. You decided to make him a midlaner , since his supportive playstyle was ,,too toxic' for the community. I mean, Zyra is definetly the definition of fairness and counterplay in bottom lane , right? Having to fight like 600 random plants in the botlane is definetly fair , right?

Don't get me wrong , I would love to see traditional mages like Brand back in midlane , but at least do the same for Zyra. There was really no reason to balance her for the support role, since Zyra mains wanted her to be a midlaner and NOT A SUPPORT.The changes you wanted to give to Zyra's plants could have made her much , much better in the midlane , especially if you decided to give her better ratio sand some defensive stats( like she gets MS for being near her plants , like how Heimer's passive works).

I would really want to see what other players think of this situation. I'm pretty disappointed, since other mages that became supports are now finding their way back to the midlane , while Zyra is still ,,the glorified plant support" of League of Legends.

6 Comments

hi hi its zy zy3 votes

riot hates zyra and it's a known fact. she's been sitting at barely over 50% (rarely) or under 50% (usually) winrate for 7 or more patches in a row, i've lost count at this point. she's always had trouble being crowded out by other mid laners stealing her (shoehorned) role as support by doing better damage more reliably and having more relevance in lane, and now that ancient coin gives more gold than spellthiefs edge and locket/redemption/ardent is as powerful as it is, there's no reason to pick zyra when you can just choose bard and outdamage her at all levels of lane phase and outscale her with utility or choose a shield bot support and nullify all her damage and laugh as she goes oom while you restore mana from your coin and get more gold while doing it.

MoldyCheese11 votes

B e C a U s E z Y r A ' s P l a N t S f U c K i N g H u R t ! 1 ! 1

A n D t H e R e C a N b E 8 o F t H e M

S h E a L r E a D y O n E s H o T s T h E a D, p L e A s E n O t U r R e t M E t A 1 !

sit kid1 votes

Because bot lane isn't tanks and healers only...?

Zoekt1 votes

You don't get it. I like that fact that we also have damage supports like Zyra and Brand, but why is Riot trying to make Brand a midlaner again while ignoring Zyra?

sit kid1 votes

Because making brand a mid laner makes him worse as a support in comparison...

Aside from Zyra, Brand and Karma, what AP non-enchanter champions go support?

Zyra isn't terrible mid, but is definetely more a cheese pick than a consistent strong laner.

Yuyiyo1 votes

I think Zyra's ultimate might be holding her back from being more than a support, simply because it is fantastic as counter-engage but not really good at engage unless you make a flash ult play. So, she is good against hard engage supports (pokes them out so they can't engage, ults when they do engage for massive damage) but in the midlane, no one has really hard engage except assassins... however, assassins mobility make it difficult for her to actually kill with her ult and slow skill shots, and her lack of mobility means they can usually get on top of her and burst her down.

In a solo lane, her root is the only real way of her getting a kill, and it's so easy to doge that usually isnt going to happen. Otherwise they would just walk away from the plants and zyra can't really do anything about that.

It's the nature of her kit, isn't it? And in the late game, she is basically an ult-bot, and mid lane mages that are basically ult bots do have a history of being used as supports. She has like, zero ability to actually kill someone unless they engage on her or she lands a sneaky root. So, she is a great backline for bursting people that engage on her adc. Thus, she is a better support. But other mages like ahri, lux, xerath, ziggs... they can poke from farther away, have more reliable CC, or have great ultimates that can be used without waiting for the enemy to mess up. Thus, they are better for midlane.

Unless she gets a rework, she really can't be a super viable midlaner against anyone who knows not to engage on her. She is like annie, annie isn't super popular cause if people just don't fight annie, annie can't really do anything about it.

Asking for zyra ratio buffs would just make her overpowered in the support role, it wouldn't fix her kit's issues.

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