how to play during the assasin meta as a support?

JarodDempsey··9 votes·6,964 views

All ive been seeing in bot lane on the enemy team is assasins/high damage casters, and a ton of pyke. How can I play against that? I had been maining enchanters but between the nerfs to early cdr, shield/heal power, shields, and mana I can barely compete with one high damage enemy much less two.

In the old days enchanters were viable because damage wasnt so bursty that their single target heals/shields could contribute a lot to a team over the course of fights due to longer durations. Then enchanters were viable because they were good at keeping 1 target alive which synergized well with adc's who could do significant damage if kept alive long enough. Now, enchanters can barely keep 1 target from being instabursted assuming none of their skills are on cool down and even then the target has a huge chance of dying a couple seconds later because assasins can flash+right click to do like 20% of a targets hp in damage or more as soon as the enchanters skills are down/on cooldown.

Looking at other support classes we have the tanks, the cc, and the dps left. Tanks arent actually all that tanky in early game and will easily run out of mana with the frequency that some meta picks can poke, CC heavy supports while good in theory are generally a bad idea simply because they tend to have higher cooldowns and without the ability to stop both the enemies in bot lane, (with the exception of maybe like lux) they will eventually lose the lane from being outtraded. Which really only leaves damage heavy supports as a viable option in this meta. Which is very sad because now literally every role is ruled by high damage champs.

If anyone could offer any tips thatd be great.

TLDR: riot somehow managed to make a meta worse than the adc meta.

23 Comments

Even6 votes

Exactly how I feel, I dont understand why they choose now to nerf shields/heals, when people complain about too much damage.

Troll for Trump1 votes

[{quoted}](name=I NEED YOU,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=rfVvA3sB,comment-id=0000,timestamp=2018-06-17T00:34:09.720+0000)

Exactly how I feel, I dont understand why they choose now to nerf shields/heals, when people complain about too much damage.

No a lot of people complained about shields/heals because they would keep carries alive, fueling not only cheese comps, but teams completely revolved around ADCs. You couldn't kill off ADCs and fights just became ADC vs ADC

JarodDempsey1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Ðownright Darius,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=rfVvA3sB,comment-id=00000000,timestamp=2018-06-17T01:26:16.466+0000)

No a lot of people complained about shields/heals because they would keep carries alive, fueling not only cheese comps, but teams completely revolved around ADCs. You couldn't kill off ADCs and fights just became ADC vs ADC

riot really shouldve just addressed adcs directly instead of nerfing supports as well, now all the fairweather adc mains have moved to more viable high damage botlaners while enchanters have been nerfed so the ease of using those high dps champs is comparable to prenerf adcs. aka riot really just shifted the damage creep problem and shafted enchanters in the process.

Troll for Trump2 votes

No, they didn't need to nerf ADCs, because ADCs weren't the problem, it was all the peel and free stats certain supports would give them. It was to the point that marksman didn't even need to get lifesteal items.

xelaker1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Ðownright Darius,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=rfVvA3sB,comment-id=0000000000000000,timestamp=2018-06-17T02:08:46.955+0000)

No, they didn't need to nerf ADCs, because ADCs weren't the problem, it was all the peel and free stats certain supports would give them. It was to the point that marksman didn't even need to get lifesteal items.

because they decided to make all of those stupid supporty items that let enchanters and healers buff and heal even more. I rue the day they make supports "more fun"

Troll for Trump2 votes

{quoted}

because they decided to make all of those stupid supporty items that let enchanters and healers buff and heal even more. I rue the day they make supports "more fun"

Well a lot of supports were tired of having no impact. I think around that time they were up in arms about every non-janna enchanter being crap, and making memes about carry supports.

xelaker1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Ðownright Darius,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=rfVvA3sB,comment-id=000000000000000000000000,timestamp=2018-06-17T07:58:01.513+0000)

Well a lot of supports were tired of having no impact. I think around that time they were up in arms about every non-janna enchanter being crap, and making memes about carry supports.

supports had impact it just wasn't razzle dazzle impact that everyone demands anymore

Daddy Ants1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Ðownright Darius,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=rfVvA3sB,comment-id=0000000000000000,timestamp=2018-06-17T02:08:46.955+0000)

No, they didn't need to nerf ADCs, because ADCs weren't the problem, it was all the peel and free stats certain supports would give them. It was to the point that marksman didn't even need to get lifesteal items.

I up voted you.

Shame to see what Boards has become when you get down voted for presenting a valid point.

+300 on all ADC items + Reworking IE + base stat nerfs was too far imo.

+150 on zeals + IE getting nerfed from +50% crit damage to 25/30% would have been fairer.

DracosKasu2 votes

The result of the adc nerf was cause by hyper carry which was scaling way too fast. Nowday, most of the item change have buff assasin/fighter overall also they have be buff/revert since the start of the season. So they just transfer the power of one to an another subtype.

Troll for Trump1 votes

{quoted}

The result of the adc nerf was cause by hyper carry which was scaling way too fast. Nowday, most of the item change have buff assasin/fighter overall also they have be buff/revert since the start of the season. So they just transfer the power of one to an another subtype.

It's a transfer, but it's not a complete transfer. It's not so much a meta, as in ADCs are obsolete and it's almost completely assassins/fighters. ADCs are still very much viable. Crit might need a bit of a buff, but I personally don't think so.

You do have to admit right now the game is more diverse than it has been for many years.

JackMcSnipeyz3 votes

Amm, have you missed the patch where riot nuked 90% of the adc roster?

NoobTangerang1 votes

[{quoted}](name=I NEED YOU,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=rfVvA3sB,comment-id=0000,timestamp=2018-06-17T00:34:09.720+0000)

Exactly how I feel, I dont understand why they choose now to nerf shields/heals, when people complain about too much damage.

cus shield spamming ?

Kanzaki Ranko3 votes

90% of supports fuck assassins, just do normal stuff

Odyca2 votes

Honestly, I've still had a ton of success with Rakan and Taric. Thresh is still very good versus the Assassin meta. Alistar has his mana issues but manaflow helps that a lot. Poppy vs dash heavy botlanes is also very good, grab bami's cinder and grasp of the undying and abuse the poke with her passive to gain stacks of free health they dive in you just w and or ult. ( Yes I know Poppy isn't a highly viable support, but it's situational.)

JarodDempsey1 votes

{quoted}

Honestly, I've still had a ton of success with Rakan and Taric. Thresh is still very good versus the Assassin meta. Alistar has his mana issues but manaflow helps that a lot. Poppy vs dash heavy botlanes is also very good, grab bami's cinder and grasp of the undying and abuse the poke with her passive to gain stacks of free health they dive in you just w and or ult. ( Yes I know Poppy isn't a highly viable support, but it's situational.)

This doesnt surprise me, if any supports were to beenfit in an assasin meta itd be the tanky high cc supps of which all you mentiond are. Which is good for them but still sucks for squishy low cc sups

10Tickler2 votes

Taric - Armor, Heals, Invuln and a Stun with 2 sources. Leona - Armor, 2 stuns with one offering a slow, and a root. Alistar - knockup, knockback, Damage Reduction and a (Delayed) stun Braum - High resistance stats, Tanky build path, knockup, slow, (Delayed) Stun Fiddlesticks - Silence, Fear. Lulu - Polymorph, Ultimate negates high burst, Shield, slow Janna - Knockup, Slow, Shield, Knockback, MS buff for teammates Morgana - Snare, Stun, Magic Shield Rakan - Knockup, Charm, Shield TahmKench - Stun, Escape mechanisms, Shield/Regen Thresh - Stun, slows, Escape Mechanism Zilean - Stun, Resurrection.

Supports EXIST to provide the exact thing that counters Assassins. Tankiness (Build Armor to negate lethality assassins), CC (A Stunned/Rooted/polymorphed Assassin can't combo your carry), and Mobility (An assassin that can't catch the carry, can't kill the carry). What you'll find yourself wanting to do is ward deeper, more frequently and properly. Guard common Paths for Assassins who roam from mid, and once you spot them, you can freely leave. Akali/Evelynn with their stealth mechanics are a little harder to evade, but a Sweeper WILL outline them if the akali shrouds, letting you hit her with AOE, and Evelynn becomes visible whenever she gets ready to attack.

Encourage your partner to farm safely and avoid poking for no reason when there's an assassin in the game, taking lane-damage early makes roaming WAY more powerful, most of the work is done. Your goal is for the Botlane carry to BUILD ITEMS and SCALE, so lategame the assassin tries to eliminate them, and ends up dead for trying.

It takes time and practice, but I believe in you m8y

JarodDempsey1 votes

{quoted}

Taric - Armor, Heals, Invuln and a Stun with 2 sources. Leona - Armor, 2 stuns with one offering a slow, and a root. Alistar - knockup, knockback, Damage Reduction and a (Delayed) stun Braum - High resistance stats, Tanky build path, knockup, slow, (Delayed) Stun Fiddlesticks - Silence, Fear. Lulu - Polymorph, Ultimate negates high burst, Shield, slow Janna - Knockup, Slow, Shield, Knockback, MS buff for teammates Morgana - Snare, Stun, Magic Shield Rakan - Knockup, Charm, Shield TahmKench - Stun, Escape mechanisms, Shield/Regen Thresh - Stun, slows, Escape Mechanism Zilean - Stun, Resurrection.

Supports EXIST to provide the exact thing that counters Assassins. Tankiness (Build Armor to negate lethality assassins), CC (A Stunned/Rooted/polymorphed Assassin can't combo your carry), and Mobility (An assassin that can't catch the carry, can't kill the carry). What you'll find yourself wanting to do is ward deeper, more frequently and properly. Guard common Paths for Assassins who roam from mid, and once you spot them, you can freely leave. Akali/Evelynn with their stealth mechanics are a little harder to evade, but a Sweeper WILL outline them if the akali shrouds, letting you hit her with AOE, and Evelynn becomes visible whenever she gets ready to attack.

Encourage your partner to farm safely and avoid poking for no reason when there's an assassin in the game, taking lane-damage early makes roaming WAY more powerful, most of the work is done. Your goal is for the Botlane carry to BUILD ITEMS and SCALE, so lategame the assassin tries to eliminate them, and ends up dead for trying.

It takes time and practice, but I believe in you m8y

Taric - I used to like taric before his rework but now hes very mana hungry and I feel like you have to invest too much in any of his skills for it to be consistently useful. His stun is alright but will fall off in effectiveness when protecting squishy targets in late game, his heal isnt very good for most of the game, his shield is very weak and has a high cooldown since its most to facilitate the link mechanic and his ult is terrible at countering burst due to how super delayed it is. Leona - I didnt think about leona, shes never been someone i considered playing but she does have a ton of cc and early tankiness so she does sound like a viable choice. Alistar - not a bad choice with all his cc, his new heal is garbotrash after rework which is annoying and hes not always great at directly aiding an ally because of it but the peel does go a long way Braum - less effective now than in adc meta. still useful against most caster enemy comps but vs ad assasins (which ive been seeing often) not super effective due to delayed hard cc and lack of shield usefulness Fiddlesticks - solid cc but primarily used for his damage, a viable choice Lulu - an enchanter who survivedthe enchanter nerfs only because her kit has everything else in it Janna - janna is always good, not only bc of her shield(which as gotten nerfed) but because of her amazing peel in conjunction with her soft cc, passive ms and heal on ult, shes another enchanter who survived the nerfs well due ti having a fuck ton of other stuff in her kit which is sad bc she and lulu were the primary reasons for the enchanter nerfs in the first damn place Morgana - not super useful against the ad assasins ive been seeing, her snare is long but due to being slow is easy to dodge until assasins are already well within range to do moderate damage to target. Her stun is much to delayed to be used as peel in most cases but she does still do well against ap assasins and high damage early ap casters like ziggs and fiddle Rakan - he is a verygoiod choice, i actually bought him like a week ago bc i thought he seemed cool , ill definitely have to try him. My main concern though is his own tankiness, his passive shield is alright but he always just seems fragile to me, especially leeping into danger like he does TahmKench - his stun is very delayed so not sure how often thatd be useful in the assasin meta but his consum is very useful and his grey health is also quite helpful, not a bad choice. I'll consider buying him since i do allways play him when hes free Thresh - I try to avoid super meta supports bc it's rlly boring seeing them all the time which is why i hadnt played thresh until recently but between the 2 cc's in his main kit and his lantern which works really well to counter displacements he can build pretty tanky and still be very useful so i might consdier purchasing him as well, also Nautilus would be a slightly less effective but more tanky option as well Zilean - primarily a damage support, hes actually fun to play (i play him in aram a lot lately) but his bomb cc isnt super reliable especially considering assasins tend to move super fast and bombs dont always like to end up on the same target. His ult is quite good though id be worried about its efficacy on a squishy target considering its lengthy cooldown vs the very often ability of assasins to burst these days

My problems dont lie much in jungle or mid consistently being assasins it is now more that the enemy laners are at least 1 assasin and usually one other high damage champ as well. So much damage early in the match simply outcompetes many enchanters mana/sustain ability and both of the enchanters i play lack reliable hard cc. It just very much seems that without directly stopping enemies from doing the damage that theres no longer an effective way to counter the damage aka shields/heals are too weak to do their intended job.

I mean yeah most of the reasons the assasins have been doing well in my lanes is because my adc's positioning is lacking such that they get caught and then me being an enchanter with little to no peel cant do enough to prevent the 100 to 0 in a couple seconds that the current meta affords by using my now weakened shield/heal but ill try to make sure my adc is aware of the tactics of the enemy laners from now on even if it seems a bit presumptuous on my part to inform them but i guess it's better than regularly loosing lane.

TLDR: Enchanters now need reliable hard cc in their primary kit to be viable which unfortunately for me is none of the ones i play item 3070

420 grams1 votes

Pick brand and nuke their whole team

King Braum1 votes

If you want to continue playing traditional supports i'd say play janna as her movement speed allows to her avoid most danger while still being able to do her job propperly, tank supports at typically a little harder to play now with all the damage going on but if you must play blitzcrank as he can play at a distance, disengage when he needs to and pull for quick ingages.

as for none traditional supports, vel'koz and brand are basically pocket nukes right now so try those

JarodDempsey1 votes

[{quoted}](name=King Braum,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=rfVvA3sB,comment-id=0002,timestamp=2018-06-17T02:01:51.685+0000)

If you want to continue playing traditional supports i'd say play janna as her movement speed allows to her avoid most danger while still being able to do her job propperly, tank supports at typically a little harder to play now with all the damage going on but if you must play blitzcrank as he can play at a distance, disengage when he needs to and pull for quick ingages.

as for none traditional supports, vel'koz and brand are basically pocket nukes right now so try those

brand is not my cup of tea, and i did like vel as a supp before they super nerfed his passive, now his lack of movement speed and tons of squish really makes him a liability unless the team has some serious peel.

edit: also i suppose i could play janna but shes so generic and i very much dislike how op blitz grab is so i dont play him

King Braum2 votes

yeah it's a little bit of a problem right now, honestly i feel like things would be a lot better if supports just had better items to express in game identity instead of being forced into a singular build path but it's simply how it is this season.

I currently play janna with a sorcery/inspiration build, her high movement speed allows her to avoid a lot of the high damage champions by simply outrunning them and her Q and W allow for some fun bait plays, she's especially fun in late game as you can gain up to 25% additional movement speed and slow targets for nearly 90%, you essentially become a racecar, just zooming past enemies and keeping them in place while your adc runs up to finish them

JarodDempsey1 votes

[{quoted}](name=King Braum,realm=EUW,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=rfVvA3sB,comment-id=000200000000,timestamp=2018-06-17T04:12:15.859+0000)

yeah it's a little bit of a problem right now, honestly i feel like things would be a lot better if supports just had better items to express in game identity instead of being forced into a singular build path but it's simply how it is this season.

I currently play janna with a sorcery/inspiration build, her high movement speed allows her to avoid a lot of the high damage champions by simply outrunning them and her Q and W allow for some fun bait plays, she's especially fun in late game as you can gain up to 25% additional movement speed and slow targets for nearly 90%, you essentially become a racecar, just zooming past enemies and keeping them in place while your adc runs up to finish them

i think i might have to bite the bullet and get janna. At least she has a lot of skins to choose from. Kinda sad though that the biggest reason for the shield nerf is still the most viable enchanter.

Tokogawaruf1 votes

Just got out of a Urgot - Zilean Supp game (my best and favorite Supp of all time for years) against Yasou - Pyke.

When Riot tries to kill Roles, they do it right. first Crit ADCs, now Encharters, practicly unplayable

More from Gameplay

More by JarodDempsey