Current Thoughts on Support?

GIadiat0rZ·Feb 3, 2017·1 votes·536 views

@Meddler Towards the end of last year, and with the (mostly enchanter) item updates that shipped with the preseason, I had read something about the game design team looking into support itemization, looking to fix some of the issues with gold, leveling, and lack of mechanical complexity that come with most of the popular supports currently; however, I haven't heard anything about it since the new season started. Is this something that's still being looked into, and if so, any thoughts on how soon we might see any changes?

7 Comments

SchmidttyGamesFeb 3, 20171 votes

They're sending Zyra to the dumpster in with 7.3. But they're going to leave Malzahar alone. Traditional Supports are still obsolete and, thanks to the absurd damage floating around, they always will be. Why bother being a traditional support when you can simply flash-r someone and they die?

CoolKnightSTFeb 3, 20171 votes

Kinda crazy since Malzahar is a lot more broken than Zyra... Start playing Malzahar yesterday. After 3 games playing him when doing everything wron (like cancelling ult etc...) I ended about 16-1-23 in all of those games...

OurLestradeFeb 3, 20171 votes

Lack of mechanical depth (No one finds spamming shield actives deep or engaging) and Sightstone have always been the core issues to me. Redemption's become the new Locket for supports too, so you're still pretty much forced to build the same items every game with your limited cash flow.

Thanks to autofill people are whining about it more at least, so that's good.

chipndip1Feb 3, 20171 votes

No one wants to hear the truth.

chipndip1Feb 3, 20171 votes

Riot isn't about to do shit about support. Tanks are the next project. Just quit supporting if you need to (assuming you're supporting now).

KaiokoFeb 3, 20171 votes

They aren't leaving Malzahar alone. His voidlings having slower movespeed is something that's going to affect him quite a bit.

AquafugeFeb 3, 20171 votes

Not even in ranked yet but I'm noticing the trend towards extra damage and no support, as a support player I find it disconcerting, i'm hoping with the new tank update it helps fix the problem because teams will need the extra utility of a support and the damage being brought by " mage supports" becomes pointless, if game play times become longer mage supports like brand and malhazar will become obsolete because tanks will be able withstand the pure damage and assassins will be able to melt squishies without having the utility/heals/shields brought by traditional supports