Boards›Gameplay

Bard as a (weak) utility support

ArtaSoral·3/24/2015, 5:04:29 PM·2 votes·1,900 views

I'm a support main, and my favorite type of support to play is utility. Hence 2 of my main champions are Janna and Thresh, and i like to build them utility. Many people have already been talking about how bard does no dmg and is squishy as a marshmallow. For me personally those aren't issues because that's not what bards about; he's not engage, like Leona, and he's not poke, like Sona. He's utility and the support that most closely follows full utility like him is Janna. So lets talk about Bard's utility , especially as compared to Janna:

Passive: OK pet peeve of mine already is how self-contradictory his passive is. On the one hand you need to get the chimes to upgrade your meeps, so you wanna pick them up right away. However a huge boon of these chimes is the movespeed boost, if you wanna roam into a lane and gank you should be aiming to be have the speed buff stacked at least 3 times (although even then his ganks are awfully weak w/o ult). The mana regen is kinda nice because of how it helps out your W sustain but I dont think thats enough to make this passive worth it Compared to Janna's inborn captain boots his passive is a: self serving (not super helpful to the team) and b: unreliable. Keep in mind because of Janna W passive shes going to be able to give her teammates the speed boost in the right direction, to chase or to run.

Q: HUGE advantage Janna as both an engage and of course disengage. Large AOE, goes through any number of targets, and knockup (imho better than stun bc it can stop jump-ins like Leo zenith blade and Lee Sin resonating strike) Bards frankly sucks in comparison. Short range, incredibly difficult to hit, block able by minions (yes i know 2, but not that hard to hid behind 2 minions) and a maximum of 2 targets hit. The projectile movespeed is also abhorrently slow.

W: Ugg another of these self-contradictory abilities. On the one hand you want to leave them around so they build up strength (which btw doesnt it seem rly weak even at full strength and not at all mana efficient, idk mby just me). On the other hand leaving around means either A: they're in a safe spot so the movespeed boost is wasted or B: they're in an unsafe spot and telegraph where you or your adc are going to go, making it easy for skillshots to be directed there. Janna's W has a passive that makes her movespeed increase, permanently (unlike bard chimes). Hence she actualy becomes better at roaming than bard. In addition, its a decent slow (stronger than bards q if he fails the stun) for added cc. Truth be told I'm comparing the wrong skills though: should be Janna's shield vs Bard Heal. Just on a numbers game the shield saves more dmg (base lvl 1 for shield 80, heal at full charge 75. Shield 70% AP, Heal at full charge 45% AP) and although movespeed buff is probably better than added AD, because the movespeed buff is rly only useful if you cast the w on a champ you get very little heal then.

E: Bards unique skill; and no real problems there imho. Perhaps they should buff the ally speed boost within the portal because its a little too situational maybe, but its tough to say with no real similar abilities in League to compare it against.

R: Really cool idea but in practice pretty darn awe full in my opinion. I'm not going to get into it in depth now, but suffice it to say the only good uses iv had with this ult is as a leash to help set up a gank or secure a chase, so basically as a leash. The ironic thing is, of course, sometimes the zohnyas effect has allowed peoples cooldowns to come back online and they get to escape anyway. I have never (and yes it might just be my lack of skill) been able to affectivly use the zohnyas aspect on teammates to save them (almost worked once but ignite got him in the end) Compared to Janna's AOE heal+ knockback which is amazing to disengage and, if you can pull it off, flash ult for engage. I have to say Janna's wins

That long breakdown aside i feel like the biggest issue with bard is a lack of proper identity. He really bad at disengaging because portal works for both teams. stun is perilously hard to hit, and w is small speed boost for one target. He not amazing at engage either (although hes certainly better at it than disengage) e is nice but dangerous if you go into a bad situation, ult has target immunity built in, and again q is unreliable (i really don't like his q). His ganks are really weak, and to do them properly you need to save up strategically places chimes for the movespeed.

P.S: Bards win rate speaks for itself. 36.83%. Next lowest is Zillean with 41.76% and Elise with 41.78%

P.P.S: It's been pointed out to me that Bard hasn't been out long enough for the win rate percentage to mean much yet. I retract that argument.

10 Comments

DreadPirateChris3/24/2015, 7:17:58 PM2 votes

I like that you actually analyzed this instead of just crying that Bard is too weak. However, even though I have a terrible record with bard, I have managed to save both myself and teammates several times with the ult. It is easier to use it for holding someone in place until your team catches up. It seems like it -should- be a teamfight changer, but both in my own games and in videos I've watched I see that a perfect game-changer ult - one that freezes all but one member of the enemy team - ends up resulting in nothing but a 2 second delay in the fight. What -should- happen is that the isolated enemy gets bursted down. Clearly you should ping target the isolated member, but with everyone on both teams moving around you only have to ult the moment the team positioning would let this work, and even then you may end up isolating a different champion than you intended because of the charging delay on the ult. Maybe that move is only going to happen in teams on voice chat.

I think you misinterpret the power of his E - it is actually incredibly good disengage. Yes, the enemy team can use it, which is why you stand right in front of the exit to the portal. You have a free, virtually undodgeable stun if they do. Because of how the journey works, there's guaranteed to be a wall directly behind a person exiting the portal, and because of how the Q works if you hit a person and the wall behind them, you get a stun. In a long, late game journey you don't even have to wait to stun them because with points in E there's a substantial team move speed difference. With only one point in E or in a short journey though, wait to see if you need to stun so your carries (or you!) don't get hunted down.

Win-rate alone doesn't mean a whole lot on a new champion, but I am concerned because of a few things.

  • Bard's popularity is dropping steadily. His win rate is not rising. As the people playing Bard shrinks down to only those who really know and like the champion, his win rate should rise, but it isn't doing so.
  • In high ELO games where teamwork is better, you would expect better capitalization on Bard's kit. No more people ignoring health packs or taking health packs when already at full health, coordinated jungle/support magical journey ganks or invades, game-changing ults at dragon and baron being followed up on. However, this also isn't happening. His win rate in high ELO ranked 5s teams is abysmal and might be dropping but the day-to-day variance is huge so I can't say that with confidence. It does look like better team coordination means an easier time taking advantage of Bard when he goes to get chimes, or maybe that's just denying Bard chimes because he knows he'll get picked off and/or his laner will get ganked if he leaves lane.

It's possible that people just haven't figured him out yet. I will say it's a problem that his most successful kit seems to be talisman/ruby sightstone/locket/frozen heart/mobi boots. That's a 0 AP build leaving his heals in a really bad spot. He could take AP in his situational slot, if nothing else is more important (like Mikael's or Zz'rot). When he does take AP, it's usually twin shadows or replacing locket with banner of command. That's still not a lot of AP. Maybe there's a better build that mixes in some AP without compromising his utility/tankiness/mana needs too much. Or there could be some totally off the wall build that nobody has thought of yet that isn't 'utility-tank' at all. It's not looking promising though.

Kratos2633/24/2015, 5:16:21 PM1 votes

Bard win rate doesn't speak for itself for the simple reason he's new. You need to first give it time before having the right to uses statistics with new champs.

The Bearded Bard3/24/2015, 5:20:28 PM1 votes

His W could definitely use a buff, other than that I think he's fine. But 100+ mana for a pretty terrible heal is not okay. I'd even be okay with it having a duration if that meant it could be stronger. His passive enhanced attacks also feel quite weak.

I would agree with the Q being weak, but it's really not. Sure it's hard to hit, but have you ever considered combining it with your E? Bait the enemy into your portal and throw your Q as they come out, that's an automatic stun on at least one person, most likely 2.

He's not nearly as bad as everyone makes him out to be.

chipi993/24/2015, 5:24:06 PM1 votes

From what I played of him(1 match, so far) , he is good at baiting the enmy team.

Ash Lockheart3/24/2015, 5:34:33 PM1 votes

Janna does more damage then bard, and it does a knock up. Please don't try to compare bard to other supports because every other support can out support him right now.

The Bearded Bard3/24/2015, 6:02:54 PM1 votes

Also a huge problem with him is that none of the support items are good on him. He's not in lane enough to get coin, isn't melee for relic, and doesn't do enough damage to get spellthief.