The thing about variance/counter-play vs. reliability

So I made a long post a few days ago about how enchanters don't offer much to play around in their play styles, and how the other classes of supports do, and how that's kind of an issue. A good deal of people responded, and some of those people disagreed, saying I just "hate enchanters"...which CAN'T BE FURTHER from the truth, or I "wrongly think that skill shots are the only form of skill expression". This is a post designed to straighten all this out.

When I say "Enchanters have no counter-play/variance", I'm not necessarily saying "There's no feasible answer to dealing with enchanters." I'm saying "When an enchanter does a thing, there is no real counter-action for that thing outside of waiting until it goes away or bashing your face through it." Let's take a few examples: First up...Lulu

• Can't do shit about her passive...obviously.

• Q can be dodged. More on this later.

• W on allies is a buff, so you can't do crap about it. W on enemies is a targeted polymorph, so you can't do much about that besides "Wait until it goes away".

• E is a shield. Can't do shit about that besides "Break the shield" or "Don't do shit until it goes away". E on enemies is a targeted, damaging placement change for Pix, which then moves Q so it basically comes from either Lulu or right on top of that enemy, thus making it so they can't dodge Q, either.

• R is another ally buff. Can't do shit about it besides "Wait it out" or "Kill them through the buff".

This is an example of a champ that has very little variance in their kit. If I click W on an enemy, there's no missing here. If I click R on an ally, there's no "partial success case" or "failure case". Anything Lulu chooses to do, save her Glitterlance, gets full value the second you use it. There's nothing to play around. No timers, no skill shots, no "low points", no nothing. You could very well put Sona in this space and it'd add up to the same thing.

Next up...Janna

• Can't do shit about the passive. Fair enough.

• Q is a skill shot. Can be missed. Can be dodged.

• W is a targeted, damaging slow. She slows down in movement speed afterwards.

• E is a targeted shield on allies. Can't do much here.

• R is an aoe knockback from herself that heals allies.

Now, this kit actually has more variance than Lulu's, objectively speaking. In practice, however, some of that goodwill goes out the window. The thing is that Janna's VERY reactive as a champion. This means that much of what she does is going to be after enemies do a thing, right? So if I'm diving someone with a champ like Kled, and Janna comes up and shields in reaction, I can't play around that shield, so we eat through it. Then she presses her W. Can't play around that, so we wade through the slow. Then she's pressing R...still can't play around an instant, massive, aoe knock back that heals allies inside of it. So we're starting to see the issue that, although Janna isn't necessarily as bad as Lulu on paper, in practice, once again, only Q has any feasible amount of variance to it, and Q's more of a side thing than a defining part of her play. Soraka is also defined by this "paper =/= practice" sort of issue.

Lastly, let's look at Nami

• Insert bullet for passive here.

• Q's an aoe suspension that can be dodged.

• W is targeted, but you can move its landing position so it doesn't bounce back to her team.

• E is a buff for damage + slows on AAs. Can't do shit about it.

• R is an aoe, slow moving knock-up with a slow after it.

This is an example of a more modern, proper enchanter kit for today's times. Not EVERYTHING here is skill shots. Not EVERYTHING is targeted. There's a strong mix of reliable moves and moves with strong payout for landing, given their variance. You could fit Taric's kit here...even though he's mainly a Warden with enchanter bits, and it'd basically add up to the same conclusion.

That's the point being made here. Problem enchanters have an issue where the only feasible counter-play is "kill them", rather than "do a thing to get around that thing". I'm not saying every enchanter has to have skill shots on every button. I'm saying that you can't have a kit be functional and healthy in today's LoL when it's so heavily set on reactive, guaranteed output. There needs to be some shit to play around when you're alive.