Why not? Rammus Support

Salutations Fellow League of Legends Fans

Let me start off by saying this is my first post on the boards....so bear with me.

The topic is Rammus Support, and why he may be a completely overlooked support character given the new meta changes. This post is only to serve as an entry point to the discussion, as I am still personally trying to figure out exactly how these new changes will affect the Rift come Season 6. What can be said is that the abilities of Rammus offer a great deal of engage, utility, and overall flexibility in both the lane, mid-game, and late game scenarios.I will just touch on my thought process on this matter below first on the overall meta and then by ability.

The Meta

   The Juggernaut patch brought with it the titanic health of many top lane tanks (and fighters....cough cough) which really changed the team fight dynamic. Squishy supports fell to the wayside, kiting became imperative, and the proper engage all the more necessary. This altered many compositions which had been tried and true on the bottom lane as Braum, Thresh, and Alistar got ever more tanky while Soraka (and others) fell out of favor. [Lest us not forget that we saw Shen support at World's...] 
   
   This being said and with what we know about Season 6; I began considering characters which fit well not only into the new Juggernaut patch meta but also brought area of effect and or crowd control abilities which could be utilized to support the carry. When I began searching through all the abilities of characters it dawned on me when reading more into Bard. Wandering....wandering...wa-wh- why not Rammus!?!?

Passive: Spiked Shell; Rammus gains additional damage as his shell becomes reinforced: converting 25% of his Armor into Attack Damage. This is definitely the weakest aspect of a Rammus support idea, as Armor stacking usually begins mid-game for a support (given there exists many circumstances where this is not the case....) and thus there is not much benefit gained from it in the lane phase. Yet, late game it does provide some flexibility for a Rammus support to provide that extra damage needed in a 5 v 5 team fight.

Q: Powerball; Rammus accelerates towards his enemies, dealing damage and slowing targets affected by the impact. As the epiphany went, a new wandering support rested in the Powerball ability of Rammus. Currently it does stack with the bonus from Mobility Boots, which confers a huge boost of speed, allowing Rammus to quickly close ground; be it early lane phase or late game base rushes. Specifically in the early to mid-game, Powerball allows Rammus to be the 2nd forgotten character on the map (Junglers #1 :D ) providing support on mid-lane ganks, tower dives, etc. Furthermore, the slow aspect of this ability allows for other characters to close the gap/and or deal more damage within the window of opportunity, thereby truly increasing the overall utility of this ability with Rammus in a support position.

W: Defensive Ball Curl; Rammus goes into defensive formation, vastly increasing his Armor and Magic Resist, while returning damage to attacks. Once again we have an ability which creates a great opportunity for a support to have peal potential for the carry/team naturally. While harassing the other carry in lane, this ability confers defensive bonuses against the main two types of damage, thereby not leaving Rammus lopsided in terms of defense like some supports run into.
The second part of this ability also confers an advantage to any carry in lane phase with Rammus, as his Defensive Ball Curl deals damage back to those who attack him. A natural, all encompassing Thornmail, if you will. While most supports lack damage dealing capability in the early to mid-game, this ability seems to scale well with typical support builds, as well as the typical tank role. The synergy present in the current meta along with standard support builds yields to Rammus a great deal of utility throughout the game....and arguably an ever more attractive pick for support.

E: Puncturing Taunt; Rammus taunts and enemy champion or monster into a reckless assault against Rammus' hard shell, reducing Armor temporarily. The taunt aspect of this ability is what got Shen into World's....and it should be recognized for Rammus as well. The taunt is one of the best controls in League of Legends if utilized properly. Within the support role, Rammus will absolutely need to take Armor runes to survive the lane phase, but this ultimately works out well in the end due to standard build patterns. As such, the taunt gives both engage and dis-engage potential to Rammus and his lane partner. In team fight, it allows a specific damage dealer to be subdued while the rest of their team is whittled away. The Armor reduction aspect of this ability is what really sold me on the idea of Rammus being able to fill the support role effectively. Many marksman take Armor runes to increase their ability to stay in lane and gain all that wonderful CS (aka GOLD!!!!!). Now, if a support had an ability to just, like magic, make those runes disappear wouldn't that be great? Well, it isn't that good of a deal with Rammus, but the initial math seems to work out quite nicely in favor of the marksman in lane with Rammus.

R: Tremors; Rammus creates waves of destruction pulsing through the ground, causing damage to units and structures near him. I'm going to skip the utility of this ability while in lane with the carry, and instead focus on its utility in tower pushing, the "roaming" support role idea, and team fight. His Q makes Rammus up to be a tower dive King, as well as a valuable asset in a split push scenario, since his R does damage to structures . Being able in the mid game to deal "damage passively" to a tower while still focusing on peeling and or tanking tower agro is absolutely monumental. The roaming support idea; considering all of his other abilities, specifically his Q, Rammus offers the ability to roam the map, providing support wherever it may be needed in short notice, without the waste of a TP! This greatly increases the ability to pinser, dive, pinch, corner and cut off your enemies from help, allowing an easy kill and gold. The ability to quickly move about the map and change the numbers in a fight makes Rammus an interesting choice for support in mid and late game scenarios. Finally, in team fight, much like on the tower dive, the Rammus' ultimate allows him to keep focus on the target while still dealing AoE damage. Furthermore, graphically, his ultimate is not that "flashy" and when in a 5 v 5 "ability dump" Rammus' damage goes relatively un-noticed.... Yet, it is still there.

Please let me know what you think about this, keep the comments classy, and I will hope to get numbers and better level by level breakdown up soon!

GLHF- Be safe on the Rift RipnTrousers