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AP utility scaling on supports has become almost pointless

Zielmann·1/18/2017, 5:14:26 PM·113 votes·5,462 views

A loooong time ago, like way back in patch 3.14, supports like Nami and Janna (I focus on these as they're my main two supports) had changes made to their kits, to give them utility scaling with AP on their abilities. As I recall, it was partially to address some of the supports being too strong in solo lanes (they shifted some scaling off damage an onto utility), while still making the support items of the day feel like the provided something meaningful for those champions' kits. Though this also came with a nerf to the base utility on those spells, under the assumption that the supports would naturally pick up enough AP along the way to scale the utility to where it was equal, or even stronger, than it had been before.

This was fine back then, because support items weren't as specialized as they are today. And those that existed tended to have some AP tacked on them here and there. It wasn't too difficult to get the support items you wanted/needed and grab enough AP to meaningfully scale up your utility, as well as having your abilities sting just a bit more.

But let's look at where we are today. Since the shiny new support items came out with this season, a lot of access to AP for supports has disappeared. Looking at the builds for Janna and Nami on champion.gg, they might pick up just a single item with any AP on it, if any at all. And that's often not until later in the game. The core build is based entirely off the new % healing/shielding stat, which further scales the actives for both Redemption and Locket.

I'm not trying to say the build is bad, or that Janna and Nami aren't in a good place. What bothers me is that the build is largely there to scale off itself, plus the shields/heals these two champions have, while not allowing them to take advantage of any of the actual scaling in their kits (for both damage and utility). Does the build feel strong? Yes. Do I feel like the build is enhancing everything my champion has to offer with their kit? Hardly. If I go with the new build, I definitely notice that my utility (particularly the slows and allied MS buffs) is weaker than it was when I could pick up a fair amount of AP with the support items.

82 Comments

BastionKross1/18/2017, 6:39:15 PM25 votes

It didn't work back then either, mostly because Riot wouldn't allow the scaling to reach the point where it was

equal, or even stronger, than it had been before

often enough.

Let me give an example. X champion has a 30% slow. Utility scaling is added, and that is changed to 10% + 10% for every 100 AP. In order to get back to a 30% slow, X would have to have 200 AP. That's not even remotely close to fair for several reasons.

But yet that's what happened. Riot made the scalings so slow that supports would often need 150+ AP just to equal the utility that they had before. This was "justified" in that now supports could scale their utility above what they had before... if they invested significant amounts of gold into big ticket AP items.

When Riot approached us with promises of utility scaling and giving supports the feeling of power and growth from items, we were expecting something like X getting a 25% + 10% for every 100 AP scaling slow. Start off with a similar level of utility, but only get stronger. We expected late game supports to turn slows into near roots, and give such powerful MS buffs that champs became Sonic the Hedgehog, and give out shields that doubled your HP bar.

We expected late game supports to be more powerful in utility, and they weren't. They ended up with nearly the same amount of utility they had before, only with utility scaling they didn't have it all game and had to invest gold to get it back.

All utility scaling ended up doing was handicapping supports. All the other classes got to keep their utility right from level 1, but supports had to buy theirs. A complete dick move to do that to a group of champions who have the worst gold flow in the game.

And remember, this was Riot's idea of helping supports. Breaking their kneecaps and hobbling them at the start of a match for a small chance at running slightly faster at the end than they could before they had their legs broken. With friends like that, who needs enemies?

THE RlVER KlNG1/19/2017, 1:05:16 AM7 votes

Riot hating supports being played elsewhere has never been new

item 3070 Alistar Janna Nautilus Sona TahmKench Zilean item 3070

(Lulu solo lane can burn in hell so long as I care)

but Brand Karma Malzahar Lux Zyra is fine to them

xBushx1/18/2017, 5:20:09 PM7 votes

Up voted for Visibility!

I too am curious about this. But then again lulu did just get some ap scaling buffs.

FantasySniper1/18/2017, 11:33:36 PM5 votes

We really should just turn all this "bonus healing and shielding" business into a legitimate stat already.

It would solve the issues with supports getting too much damage out of expensive AP builds, and mid lane mages building cheapo support items.

Mythic pepe1/19/2017, 9:48:36 AM3 votes

"you play like we want or you wont play at all" its basically just riot dumbing down the game

Dolasaur1/18/2017, 9:23:31 PM3 votes

After agonizing about how to respond to this for like an hour (and writing up a bunch of calculation tables I decided not to include because you can't do spoilers on this forum)... I think I generally agree with you. I don't agree specifically that they're almost "pointless"; you're going to get the strongest shields if you do a combination of heal/shield power and AP. And I have some friends that eschew the currently popular Redemption/Locket rushes in favor of going full AP on Janna for the move speed and shield AD bonus (even foregoing boots), and they have fun and success with that build.

But I do think this would interesting to hear Riot address. As it is right now, going for lots of AP is generally seen like a suboptimal choice, sort of like whichever Ezreal build isn't popular at the moment. And keeping the nontrivial AP scaling when they are pushing so hard for people to use the new items (because they want people to feel the support's impact) seems like some vestigial appendage.

Raoul1/18/2017, 9:37:25 PM2 votes

It has ALWAYS been useless. I dont know which idiot came up with the idea, but it was the beginning of the end for real support champions.

Soon after Mages took over and Riot was like "UUHHHHHHHHHHHH We just dont know what went wrong...."

RIOT Balancing team after killing traditional supports: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LOljwJCujLk

RedCyclone1/18/2017, 5:55:37 PM2 votes

I mean it's always been a problem, why build AP for utility when you could just build AP on a champion (mage) who already has that utility

The Yetii Rider1/18/2017, 10:32:55 PM1 votes

Utility scaling for almost every support has been removed or nerfed since it was introduced. Soraka no longer gives armor, so she doesn't have an AP scaling on the armor she gives. Sona's AP scaling on Power Chord is barely noticeable unless you build her full AP (and really, Power Chord is the main problem with Sona and the reason everyone builds her with Lich Bane and goes burst mage), Lulu lost the AP scaling on her slow, Alistar no longer has an AP scaling on his heal, Taric's AP scaling on his heal is very weak...

They keep it there for 'build diversity', I guess. But at this point we really should just take AP scalings off supports altogether. Not just for utility, but for damage as well. That way we can simply say "They have no viability in solo lanes, period" and can buff their bases into something reasonable.

Supports should all scale off mana regeneration and CDR. Those are their two main stats anyway.

doiminat0r36001/18/2017, 11:45:43 PM1 votes

AP scaling on supports is supposed to be used on heals and shields. Either you build Tanky Raka, or increase your heal power raka. Same thing with Janna. Either go always CC with CDR and AP, or go tank with just CC with higher cooldowns.

Bladerunner77771/19/2017, 2:54:41 AM1 votes

How is this a problem?

Let them scale with anything else and they're unbalancable

Let them scale better with AP and they literally only get stronger (which they don't need at all), and you also run the risk of creating a powerful solo-laner, which requires nerfing which just leads to a slew of problems (ie Lulu).

Remove the scaling altogether and there is little difference between a "fed" (lots of money) Janna/Nami and a losing Janna/Nami. That's just... dumb. No champion should be entirely exempt from becoming relatively weaker as a result of playing poorly.

No changes necessary.