@Riot Let's have some follow up dicussion on zyra.

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She was designed as a mid lane mage. But she was so strong at release they nerfed her to hell and moved her into a support role. I take her mid though, as it's fun and her damage is very high, though her MS is shit.

They didn't nerf her to hell,she went from 60% winrate to 55%,what happened is that people realized her kit fits as a support better,but times change,she doesn't fit into bot lane anymore.

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Fair enough, what do you think is the best way forward then?

Honestly I feel like the latest zyra buffs proved my point,mid zyra surpassed support zyra in winrate.

I think give her some way to pressure towers better(for example give her w the same effect as azir w,or a similar one) and maybe buff her vision(increase area revealed by seeds,increase duration to 1 minute) and see how that goes from there.

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She was strong enough to be commonly used at worlds,

There's "commonly used",and there's "abused",is braum being abused now? Is alistar being abused now?

and I clearly remember a phase where there'd almost always be some high damage support bot because I stopped playing ADC during that time, it was too annoying to deal with.

It was preseason 3 where people weren't too sure about the itemization changes,but that was due to confusion,it was obvious rather fast that tanks came up on top.

People definitely always knew she was a walking bullseye though, she was an immobile high damage mage who'd melt your face in 2 seconds flat with her combo, but at the time it was difficult to deal with her because she just did too much damage with solid amounts of CC.

Sort of.

To be honest Mages have no place as support. It's one thing to 'adjust playstyle', but the concept that a high damage squishy could go bot as 'support' and not instantly lose to true supports is preposterous IMO. I mean, Zyra is basically the same archetype as the ADC except she's AP, she'd have to be just plain OP to be able to cover the ADC's weaknesses when she herself has basically the same weaknesses.

You mean she needs to be op mid lane to make sense as support? The notion isn't senseless,but it has proven false for zyra before,mind you I feel things changed again.

If champs like Leona/Thresh can't effectively deal with Zyra, what are you even supposed to do against a Zyra lane?

One thing is being effective,another is pushing her out,nobody is asking for zyra to be free win,people are generally asking to give her a chance to fight back.

Sit there and die?

Zyra being zyra? Either kill her first in a kill lane,or poke her out in a poke lane,same as always.

Pick a sustain support and play a boring ass farm lane?

It's a trade lane when one side tries to shove the other one out,I'm not sure why trying to out right kill each other like people do now is so much better.

Match them with another Mage 'support' and engage in the most brain-dead crapshoot lane ever?

Even tank supports trade in lane,I don't understand why tank supports trading is fun and good,but mages trading is "brain-dead crapshot".

But again,I don't think she can be made to work as a support with how the current meta is going,might as well focus on her mid lane,where she might work.

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Right now I use AP quints and 9x scaling CDR glyphs. So between masteries (10%), glyphs at level 6 (5%), and one rank in W (2%), it's 17% CDR at lvl 6. If you finish boots around level 8, you're at 33% by level 8. For most builds she'll be at 7% or 12% CDR at that level, which is a CD difference of 4.2/3.4 sec. on W, 3.1/2.5 sec. on E, and a whopping 34/27 sec on R.

Granted, all that is at the expense of AP glyphs, which is 10 AP for flat or 13 AP for scaling at lvl 8. That translates to a flat 6.5 damage on Q and 2 damage per plant attack throughout the game. That's a significant amount very early but becomes negligible pretty quickly.

Actually,unless running a cheese build,blues are generally mr,mr is a very important stat for a squishy support,as you only have 30 and don't gain any,you also generally won't get much focus aside from aoe damage...which is generally magic based,I'm not a fan of ap blues for that reason,on top of that I've considered just going pen all around,as zyra's build scales with it best(plants have immense base damage,lyandries passive doesn't scale with ap,and the more you have the stronger it gets),although I do feel extra cdr helps on her ult I don't feel that's where her issues are.

Part of being lower level and less experienced is inefficiency. The more I play the more I recognize times I try to poke that aren't worth the mana or that aren't likely to land or stick. The big concern I have is that if I spend a bunch of mana on an engage or poke that goes sideways, I'm left super vulnerable to ganks, all-ins, or being forced to base at bad times.

I get your point,but the issue with zyra is same as she needs to build damage to justify her existence,so does she have to poke,if you are playing passively your enemies will get the upper hand,as zyra is generally one of the easiest supports to gank,doesn't help much to her jungler(let's face it,the jungler is a lot scarier when thresh can throw him a lantern,braum can jump q when he arrives,or alistar flash q w combo),to make things worse a good tank will start getting in your face to try and force you to make him back off,fail that and you die,so you kinda have to try and keep him or his carry at low health.

So I build a tear and take meditation, and it's enough to basically not worry about mana just a few minutes after building the tear. It's also noteworthy that you can stack tear ridiculously fast from W procs at no mana cost. Plus it builds into the highest stand-alone AP item in the game and has a defensive component of occasional value; it feels slot efficient for being so helpful throughout the game.

good junglers know how squishy zyra is,if they see a tear and no sightstone...that's suicidal. On top of that I really don't feel like zyra has major mana issues,it seems wasteful for the most part.

Honestly one of the more legit (cheese)builds I've tried/heard is to again avoid sightstone,but you don't build mana regen,you build damage,heavy ap/pen rune page+you still don't get sightstone,instead you get haunting guise or morrelonomicon,if it works well you can 2v3 the unsuspecting jungler.

Needless to say I am not the biggest fan of this,as if the enemy jungler understands this you are jungler fodder,but this is solid cheese,your mana regen/cdr build...seems like a bad idea.

As to the strength of archangels staff,although I build this item probably more than I should on other champion,lyandrys on zyra is just way too damn strong,delay it only for sighstone or boots(though frankly might even want to delay tier 2 boots).

Right now I don't even bother with sightstone if I can get to level 9 before needing it. Obviously that's going to change once I start seeing players who actually clear pink wards. When I do build sightstone, I always build it after tear, usually on second back with basic boots. On first back, I'll pick up a tear, a pink, a green, and some biscuits.

Try going for haunting guise instead.

In silver it's not a problem. Other supports come back with mobi boots or upgrades to their support item. They almost never get sightstone first or come back with wards. Even when they do get sightstone, they don't get a sweeper with it. So I'm left with 2 stealth wards and a vision ward, and I'll just use seeds for vision and spawn them right before they expire. That's if I actually run out of wards or they get swept.

In higher elos people are aware of the high cd of her seeds(or at least,I would hope so...probably not all) and will punish it.

Even without a sightstone I end up with a vision advantage, but I've also got a sustain advantage from a big mana pool and the scaling regen from meditation. That said, I am getting to a point where other supports are occasionally starting to cheese the lane bushes enough that I'll need to start keeping them warded full time.

I honestly feel that your mana problems are to a large extent cause by your big focus on cdr,and overall just aren't worth it,building damage/pen instead is just better,instead of creating problems then delaying your build with tear,you get more damage and pen which will make you as strong if not stronger in lane,and VERY importantly,MUCH stronger in all in,which are critical right now,you want them to die before you do.

I feel you. None of the guides I read ever actually addressed my problems with her, so I spent a ton of time experimenting with skill order and different items. With very mixed success.

This is probably my favorite one: http://www.lolpro.com/guides/zyra/357-season-5-zyra-support-5-13-carry-from-the-bot-lane The guy also streams on occasion.

One actual success was building after liandry's and rylai's. It sounds like I'm off my rocker, but my problem has been surviving against juggernauts and AD junglers who just steamroll across the map and run you down.

I like this item on other supports,not really on zyra. The sort movement speed it provides just isn't good with her slow kit,I suggest either get cdr,upgrade to frostqueen for the active,or maybe get rylais,would definitely not suggest deadman's.

The cheesy thing here is that you almost never AA late game, so the +60 MS never expires, and it takes you right to the MS cap before hitting diminishing returns.After Liandry's, Rylai's and 40% CDR, I have no damage problems whatsoever.

honestly I would rather go for third tier ancient coin if you want movement speed,or luden's echo,also there's no such thing as "no damage problems" especially for support zyra(who generally won't get much focus),you also kinda want to aa people late,to make sure plants attack the right target.

My problem is getting caught out. And by "caught out" I mean having the audacity to be within 2000 range of a team fight with a Xin or Rengar on the other team. After that I'll go void staff or finish archangel.

that sounds like more of a job for zhonyas. And I would suggest finishing archangel a lot earlier,if you insist on going on it,build it sooner.

It's usually me getting jumped on, sadly. If I can manage to build a few items, I can usually just kill him (or get away). After 3 items, that's 1300 bonus hp and 50 bonus armor, which is pretty tanky for the amount of damage you can dish out.

It depends jumped on by whom. In plenty of cases,just let them kill you and throw your entire kit,this should lose them the fight,if we are dealing zed/rengar,get zhonyas. Mind you then they will go back to jumping your carry.

This is how I feel against Azir in lane, Xerath all the time, and Blitz in lane. I almost never see Azir right now, but by the time I'm fighting him later in the game, it's pretty easy to burst him down. I would expect fewer Blitz and more Thresh higher up, so hopefully that will get better.

Yes zyra has this issue against poke comps...she has...A LOT...of issues,would take me a lot to cover them all. Also you might see less blitz,but thresh has this thing where he can(when played by a skilled player) run at you through creeps at level 1,flay ignite you back and either kill you or force a flash,zyra's level 1 is abysmal,and higher elos abuse that better.

I love support Syndra! But it's only fun against Vayne.

I fucking hate syndra vs vayne/kalista,they keep jumping out of spheres.