PSA: Support Types

I hear people complain about this a lot, so I thought I would enlighten others. The support role is not 100% composed of healing and shielding. That is not what makes a support. A support is a champion that helps the ADC snowball. This can happen in several forms:

1. Heal/Shield Supports - this is the most obvious support type. They naturally help the ADC by helping them mitigate damage. This group is composed of supports like Janna, Soraka, and Nami.

2. Crowd Control/Tank Supports - this type of support utilizes heavy CC to lock down enemies and often, tank damage of they're tanks. This group is composed supports like Braum, Thresh, and Blitzcrank.

3. Poke Supports - this type of support assists the ADC by apply heavy damage pressure. By poking, they help bully the enemy champions and either set them up to be killed or drive them from the lane, denying them farm and experience. This group is composed of supports like Brand, Zyra, and Morgana.

4. Utility Supports - this type specializes in forms of abilities that grant boons and advantages to the ADC that may not necessarily be tied to buffs or other such things. This group's is composed of supports like Bard and Zilean.

Of course, most champions are not limited to one archetype, and many fall into multiple categories, such as Sona (Poke, Utility, Heal), Karma (Poke, Shield), Rakan (CC, Shield), Taric (CC, Utility, Shield). There are many varieties of supports, and they all have different strengths and weaknesses.

There are even functional off meta supports that operate very well in the categories, such as Miss Fortune, Vel'Koz, Annie, and Volibear, among others. Really, so long as you understand the categories and how to use a champ to help the ADC bloom into late game, you can practically take any champion as a support and make it work.

So please consider all of these points the next time you want to blast a player for not taking a "real support" without any heals or shields.