I've been constantly playing blitzcrank and Tahm. Both of which are my best supports. Yet no matter how hard I try, no matter how much I ward, I can't win the game. Albeit the jungler dies to the enemy jungler a lot, or mid doesn't do so well, or top isn't as tanky, what do I do as a support to win ranked matches?
You pick what you enjoy the most and you master it.
Some people will just tell you "Pick this or that champ, it's OP", but if you don't enjoy it there's no point in playing. You'll perform better on what you enjoy than on one that is considered OP but you hate it.
Grab their most fed carry (and not their front line initiators), and eat your teams most fed carry when they're about to die (and not when they're about to kill the enemy carry) respectively.
If you can consistently do those two things on those champs without feeding in the process, you're prone to climb upwards. You may not win every game, but those things are the main things for those champs that can turn teamfights and hence games around.
Blitz is probably the more impactful of the two, as blitz's mere presence can zone enemies.
It's not about how much you ward, it's about how well you ward. If your wards are concentrated at one half of the map, and teamfights take place at the other half, it doesn't matter on how much you ward.
Pick out the most important targets. If there's a 0/5/0 Zed and a 5/0/0 Ezreal, you might want to pick out Ezreal. When it comes to peeling, protect the most important ones. If your jungler is extremely fed and your ADC is feeding like mad, you may want to focus more of your peels on your jungler, but make sure your feeding ADC still gets some of the share so he can catch up. What about a fed bruiser while his teammates dish out a lot of damage? CC/stop the bruisers in their tracks, kill/focus the DPS squishies, then kill the bruiser.
Communicate. Do some shotcalling. Use your pings, but don't spam them. Sometimes, even some of the better players don't notice things even if a place is obviously warded, so it doesn't hurt to do a little reminder. If your team doesn't agree, don't just blindly go out and force them, chances are they probably won't follow up. Think compromise. If they're playing too safe, try playing just a little more aggressive, but don't commit suicide because you are trying too hard to force them, and then blame and flame at them for "not following up".
If all else fails, play around with the (probably) shitty deck of cards you still have, try to adapt. Jungler feeding? Forget about him, help out your 3 other teammates. Your ADC only likes to farm, because he's against a super poke-heavy matchup where they just can't be outplayed for some reason? Maybe it's also time for you to calm down too, because engaging would only cause trouble. I will not know how many times bot lost mainly because of how their supports... just don't know when or when not to engage! Don't be one of them.
GOLD ITEMS! No need to sell them, either. These not only help you speed up your gold gains early game, they also give you neat combative stats for cheap. And sightstone, you need it. Your yellow trinkets are not enough for anything if you really want to help contribute to warding.
If you really want to truly pursue the supporting arts by becoming a support main, grab a friend or two with you. He doesn't have to main or even play ADC, but it is definitely great having at least one person that knows how you work. And huzzah for DynamicQ, they actually benefit support mains a lot.
Just really general tips on how to make sure you lose less, because of course you can't win every single time, and that not everyone is willing to listen to anyone, either.
Can't climb as support, man. Might as well not even put support in the primary or secondary roles. You need to climb as top/mid/jungler/adc. It's the only way Riot allows people to climb... #ritologic Edit: added "adc" role
Cry, cry a lot.
you have to be double as good as everyone else in the game.
you either play a support that can easily feed your carry so blitz is a good choice or play one that can double up as a mage(i know its a bit of cheating but then u can yourself do some plays without depending on your carry entirely)
Also you have to not only predict and play around your opponent you have to do the same with your allies. figure out their play style and use it to your advantage
then just try your best, be aware of the map, maybe wander a bit you know support shit.
Well, there are a few tips I can give, but to be honest you picked a bad role to try to carry with. People will disagree with me, but it's the truth.
To be a successful support, you have to buy a support item, make sure that your carry doesn't die, and sometimes, secure kills, all while taking no minions. It's a hard job to begin with, but you also have to consider that you are heavily reliant on your carry. Not to mention warding. If you're in ranked, wards might as well not exist, because a lot of caries don't even look at the map, just as well, most people in bonze play locked screen. It isn't a huge problem, but can make things worse when you consider they don't check the map either.
If you want my advice, I'd say save being a support main for high silver (like, Silver 1, almost gold, high silver). You can't really win the game as an individual on support, which really limits the effect you can have on other lanes. Some games, when your carry is consistently good, you can sometimes get them fed enough to farm alone while you roam, but some adc's in bronze clearly should NOT be left alone under ANY CIRCUMSTANCES. If you find yourself popping devour to save your carry almost as soon as it's off cooldown, you just can't leave them alone, or they'll die.
If you want to help people like a support without cs'ing, you may want to pick up jungling. There are a lot of junglers that focus less on getting kills through sheer damage, and just locking champions down for your allies to wail on them until they die. If you like Tahm and Blitz, then you can probably still get away with jungling as Tahm. He gets super tanky, and dishes out both punishment and cc at the same time, making him pretty strong. With either a frozen mallet or a landed Q, he can stick to people and devour-loop them to death in the late game. You may just need to learn how and when to go HAM, and learn something about objective control.
Tahm is also good as a top laner, but top lane is another lane that's hard to impact the game with, just due to the sheer isolated nature of top lane. Teleport helps, but it's a major cooldown. What I can recommend is Blitz mid. AP Blitz has some pretty op ratios, and unprepared squishies who aren't used to blitz's shenanigans will definitely be caught off-guard by his burst, and cc combo. Lichbane is terrifying on him, which adds even more to the absolute terrifying nature of the godhand. Otherwise, Lux is another felixible pick that takes a lot from support roles and brings it to the mid lane. It sounds like you may play well with high utility mid mages, such as lulu, lux, blitz (if you want to go full carry-con-queso), and even Zyra is a a pretty strong mid laner that still can afford to team fight like a support. Galio may be worth a try as well, because he doubles as a tanky support champion as well.
Other than that, I guess I could tell you, as a support to ping when you see things about to go south and hope your carry listens, and take cs that your carry is obviously going to miss (i.e. if they're mid animation and about to miss the other cs; if they yell at you let them know why you did what you did, and if they don't understand mute them). Make sure you remind everyone to buy at least one pink ward, and remind your carry to use their trinket. It's basically all you can do. :/
Tahm and blitz are very weak in the meta right now. Try picking up alistar, braum, janna, bard or thresh. They are just much stronger right now and have a larger impact on the game
I find the only way you can carry as a support is if you have a great adc, supports can be the best carries but will never get recognized for it. You can carry with blitz, but not with tahm, try a more powerful damaging supp like annie or brand.
Getting outta bronze as support to really hard. You need to play carry supports.
It's definitely possible. Master a couple champs and know your limits. Communicate with your lane partner and jungler. Where wards are placed, what SS' are down, how far you can stand to harrass the other ADC without losing a significant amount of your health.
Best idea is to find someone to duo with that's relatively decent. I'm sure there are plenty of adcs looking for a support to play with in ranked that are also looking to climb.
Play supports that force plays. Alistar, Leona, Nautilus, and Trundle all heavily punish poorly positioned enemies and will dominate lower ranks. The opposite could also be okay. I've climbed to platinum playing mostly Janna and she completely shuts out most assassins and other dudes who want to dive your backline. So dudes like Janna, Nami, Poppy, and Thresh are pretty solid at disengaging and keeping dudes away.
Other people will suggest playing a mage support so you completely control the lane with your poke and you can build carry if you really wanted to, but I honestly don't recommend that because if the enemies get fed then they just 2-shot you and you're useless. At least if you're playing someone with heavy CC and is tanky, you can at least have a chance of protecting your team and having your carries take care of them.
As a support main my best advice is to learn more supports! Not every team needs a Blitzcrank or Tahm, maybe the team needs a Janna or Soraka. Look at your team, look at the enemy team and then decide which support will be the best choice. For an example, with just those 2 picks you're screwed against a good Morgana
You have to roam. I normally roam mid, if I see they have pushed into our tower. Also have good map awareness, and try to come to your team's aid, e.g. the Jungler. If you are duoing with someone, make sure they aren't shit lol. You should be fine :)
GLHF :)
