Support: what to do with a bad ADC.

DivineWalrus99·10/22/2019, 6:29:28 PM·8 votes·8,821 views

So lets set the stage, you are a Blitzcrank, you go to the bottem lane and you see a great oppertunity to use the rocket grab. You Q, connect, E,the Enemy Duo fights back, and then you realize that as soon as you engaged, your ADC ditched you and you die. Even though you two had an edge against the enemies, your ADC doesn't know what to do, or doesn't do anything at all.

Here's another, you are a Sona, you and the ADC have an item advantage, and enemy jungler was just spotted at top, HP and Mana is good to go, your minions are pushing in, you ping to let your ADC know you are attacking the enemies... and they just ? mark ping you as you engage...

What am I suppose to do when my ADC doesn't do anything? or worse, what do I do if my ADC is feeding out of their minds?

51 Comments

Daddy Ants10/22/2019, 11:29:01 PM7 votes

Don't take cs

CS is gonna be the only way back into the game for the ADC.

Roam
Set up Vision
Deny enemy vision
Invade with your jungler
Gank a lane with your jungler.

Plenty for you to do on the map.

Sewer Side10/23/2019, 12:43:15 AM7 votes

If your ADC is bad, abandon them and hard roam with your jungler.

Only go back to lane when your ADC is hard pushed so you still get some exp and go roam again. You become a team support and get other relevant lanes ahead.

And when you’re hard roaming, the enemy support ends up having to respond within 2 mins (since the enemy mid/top will get mad salty at your camps in their lanes), leaving your ADC in a 1v1 lane (usually), so less chance to int.

OtterlyLost10/22/2019, 6:35:58 PM6 votes

The same thing that ADCs have to do if their support is a potato, which is something I feel like happens far more often as someone who plays both roles. You play around it. You acknowledge that your laning partner is clueless and play safe.

Edit: And some of these replies just go to show, yeap, its usually the support who is the potato. Best of luck, my friend.

Magnesium1410/22/2019, 8:24:06 PM6 votes

Here:s a general rule of thumb whenever I play support:

1: Roam 2: Make plays in other lanes 3: Vision 4: Objectives 5:Counter jungle if all else fails 6:Be toxic in chat

No matter what tho do not support a feeding adc.

ROYALR3IGN10/22/2019, 7:11:11 PM4 votes

Depends on who you're playing. If you're playing poke, keep poking so your AD can farm. If you're playing engage it sucks but save your cc for when the JG shows up or save it to peel if the enemy engages on you. If they can safely farm under tower you're welcome to try roaming to get mid fed if it is otherwise even or winning but this is if you're playing engage.

MissRippedJeans10/22/2019, 6:37:04 PM4 votes

I struggle with this a lot. Honestly, one of the best things you can do is gank mid lane or help jungle if he invades enemy jungle. It sucks when you don't have synergy with your ADC, but don't forget there are other lanes you can help out!

Sune10/22/2019, 6:50:33 PM3 votes

Depends on how bad it is, I'll usually stay in lane and just try to finish my support item. After that I'll prob leave bot lane, and rotate around the map trying to make plays. If there's nothing on the map, I'll go deep warding, then sit with whoever is the most fed/most likely to actually help me until the next objective comes up.

Smyrage10/23/2019, 8:53:22 AM2 votes

I would say as a player, who played most of his matches on botlane, the core issue on that lane is bad drafting. Both Support and the ADC need to understand what each other can do. E.g if your support picked an enchanter and you pick Xayah into it, because you feel like it, then don't be surprised that neither of you won't be able to do anything, because Xayah requires an engage support. It works the other way around as well. A badly drafted botlane is miserable.

Another thing I noticed that is that usually Supports start being toxic, if their ADC dies, even if his/her death was caused by the Support forcing the ADC out of position or not using the abilities correctly. As Pyke you can get away with your abilities if they start engaging, but your ADC can't, so if you didn't even attempt to use your E to stun the enemy and you only used it to save yourself, then don't be surprised that your ADC died. (part of the reason why I think that Pyke was just meant to cater toxic assassin mains, who got autofilled into support role).

I believe a good support can make a disfunctional ADC to work as well. It happens that you get one who is stupid beyond redemption, but it's usually rare. You can suspect such if e.g your ADC is Tristana, because Tristana players can be extremely stupid. However as ADC you are much more likely to get a bad support and if you are playing an ADC that needs a lot of supporting, then you are screwed.

Hammermancer10/22/2019, 7:18:23 PM2 votes

If you're playing Thresh then fuck it, you're the ADC now, take all the farm, all the souls, all the infinite edges and static shivs, the world will appreciate you and your adc will get reported when he starts raging in chat while being 0/4 vs your 3/1 score

GladysmTcO10/22/2019, 6:34:10 PM2 votes

Hard to say as its situation-dependent its best to just not rely on anyone on your team to make plays tho unless it's very obvious they will follow up

Baby Ghoul10/23/2019, 12:06:42 PM1 votes

You can't really do anything with a bad or toxic ADC. The best you can do is minimize their deaths and make plays happen on the rest of the map.

Mute the ADC. So many ADCs are divas from my experience, so if you let them throw their fit in peace, they'll tire themselves out and be ready to group late game.
Roam. Blitzcrank is big right now, and you should be roaming mid as him regardless. Getting a mage ahead early game is actually even more effective than getting an ADC ahead because games are called so soon these days.
Don't completely forget about bot lane. You can't stand in mid all game, otherwise the enemy is going to dive the ADC, especially be careful about leaving the lane when the enemy has rift herald.

Josh Sand10/23/2019, 1:18:22 PM1 votes

If the ADC doesn't do anything off of your engages, just let them farm it out. If you engage once, and they don't follow up - shame on them. If you engage a second time and they don't follow up - shame on you. :P

But no, it does actually suck when this happens. The important thing is that you have to mentally replay your first engage that didn't have any follow up. Did you engage too far away from the ADC? Was your engage too abrupt? Was the ADC even trying to get in position for it? Did they still try to commit, albeit just a little late? Did they completely ignore you and give you the "?" ping?

If it looks like they gave it some effort, slow down what you were doing before, and try to get into sync with them. If it looks like the ADC just doesn't want to interact with the opposing laners, let them farm it out while you try to get gains elsewhere, (if you can do it without losing too much XP). Ideally (barring jg intervention), both bot lanes stay passive and just come out even.

If the ADC is straight up feeding their ass off, and if its completely egregious, and hes being an asshole, and I can't calm the guy down, then take some CS. That will usually shock them into playing passively again, because then they are just happy to start getting CS again, instead of continuing to suicide in bullshit trades.

But I have to stress, if the ADC is actually trying, and not being a jerk, continue to help them as best as you can. If they keep a positive mindset, then they can always make it back into the game.

Pika Fox10/23/2019, 1:57:33 PM1 votes

Double check to make sure there wasnt a massive wave when you engaged. Loss of 5+ CS generally isnt worth the risk.

Ping before engaging.

Roam. If all else fails, your ADC is too useless to carry you anyway, put pressure mid. Blitz cant afford to not be getting pressure going early.

ShyImagoghnar10/23/2019, 3:05:12 PM1 votes

i'm sure lolskillcapped has a video on dealing with a bad adc as support

i'd suggest picking pyke, but g2 shitting all over the LEC with pyke in every lane has kinda ruined that. 66% ban rate now. feelsrealbadman

Thefrostyviking10/23/2019, 3:56:09 PM1 votes

Well it´s hard to say for certain as this stuff is always circumstance based but generally you´d do the same as what you do when you get a bad support as a marksman.

You do your best to simply survive and then hope that you can somehow turn things around in the skirmish and later the teamfight phases.

Paroe10/23/2019, 4:00:00 PM1 votes

As a yuumi main... ... Once lane phase is over - your lanes tower is lost or taken - you abandon them until they come online and focus on another lane.

In the case of ezreal though.. just dont bother with him. He gets hit by every skillshot and every enemy CC then whines about how you never healed him.

CurS1VE10/23/2019, 4:28:41 PM1 votes

So i play both and so far i have noticed that (at least in low elo) both support and ad's are usually really bad but supports get auto filled more often and omg that's tilting.

I would say just be mindful of the matchups you are playing early, like lv 1-3 kill pressure, just because you CAN hook someone as blitz (even if all are full hp/hp) doesn't actually mean you should, kinda like playing leona early, yeah you can E in and if you are lv 2 you can Q or whateva but what exactly do you want to happen? Who are you engaging on and who is stronger at that point?

Example would be you (Blitzcrank) and your AD is a Ezreal You are playing into a Lux + Cait, you are all same level and same hp/mp

you may say "Hey i can hook this lux" except really you should be saying, "If i hook this lux can we burst her down" and the answer is flat out No you cannot, not with a lv 2 Ezreal

now if you let ezreal poke them down and you get a hp advantage or they get low on mp or something then maybe it's possible but early on the lux is more capable of putting out burst dmg than your ezreal and same with the cait.

Just saying you are playing blitz and you can hook doesn't actually frame things fairly because you are not actually telling anyone who is on your team and what you are actually up against.

I play both sup and AD and when a Leona dives into a Cait lux or Morg caitr Ashe Zyra, Almost anything with a Draven, you dam right i leave! That's just a straight up int because they don't understand the dmg capability of the champs and matchups.

Sun Tzu has rules of War and honestly it's pretty simple, if you are stronger you fight, if you are weaker you run and wait till you are stronger (paraphrasing obv) The same is true for bot lane or any lane for that matter, scaling is a thing, power spikes are a thing and not all champs are capable of the same output at the same time

I would say (even if you are higher elo than me which you prolly are) if you aren't actually being mindful of those things then you are actually the one playing poorly and you just don't understand why

DivineWalrus9910/23/2019, 7:46:10 PM1 votes

I wanna thank you guys for the feedback, I learned a lot from this thread and I will be sure to make good use of what I have learned.

LightswornLance10/23/2019, 11:39:21 PM1 votes

Just roam, play something like bard alistar or leona. And just roam. Most ADC players are complete MonkeyKing 's and either never fight the enemy laner or always fight the enemy laner. Even if you are an enchanter you can just roam and invade with your jungler. The best time I've ever had as a jungler was when a Nami roamed and I just got to take the enemies entire bot side for free. Plus you can dive mid with 3 people pretty easily.

Gabresol11/11/2019, 5:02:52 PM1 votes

Why do you think mages are so popular on bot?

Get210/22/2019, 6:36:03 PM1 votes

I try to learn from those mistakes as well. If you see someone not willing nor able to follow-up, help them farm safely. If they're just tanking your lane, not much you can do.

Doge202010/22/2019, 8:29:44 PM1 votes

I would say, ward the jungle around bot (so wards in tri, river brush and one or two wards in the bot lane brushes if the enemy supp can engage easily and likes to engage from the brush) then go roam to mid or the enemy botside jungle. IMPORTANT: make sure to tell your adc that you are roaming, either through the chat, pings or vocally in y’all are in a VC. As an ADC player, I find it helpful if my support has my back by pinging me to back off if he sees an incoming gank. Most of the time I might see the gank coming and back up, but it’s reassuring when my supp shows their map awareness even if they are on the other side of the map.

But I think it mainly depends on the support you are playing, if you are playing an engage/roaming champ like Bard, Pyke, Thresh or even any poke mage then I would recommend making plays around the map. but if you are a protective enchanter than I recommend staying with your adc to make sure he/she stays alive (soraka is a great pick for this because her ult still lets her influence the map while she stays with her ADC). For any support style, if you have the opportunity to go and help an ally in a nearby fight or with an objective then you should 100% do it. You don’t need to babysit your ADC, and if anything the ADC farming alone can actually be extremely helpful for him, he can get solo lane EXP to get levels faster and he can farm the lane easier.

Troll Slaiyer10/22/2019, 11:02:19 PM1 votes

accept it and move on

General Esdeath 10/22/2019, 11:22:23 PM1 votes

Depends who I am

carry champ like Brand/Vel? Take cs and kills then roam once I'm strong

utility? Roam at 6

Light of Madness10/22/2019, 11:52:39 PM1 votes

Roam, forget the lane and try to help another on ur team

PaladinNO10/23/2019, 1:52:52 AM1 votes

As a utility support main, I adapt over the course of the laning phase to the skill level/playstyle of the ADC. I do not even attempt to make moves/plays unless I know for sure the ADC is skill-wise able or capable (thinking HP/mana-wise here) to follow up on it.

This is why I don't like engage-Supports (Leona, Alistar etc.), because then I am given to the ADC to follow up. And if he doesn't, can't (this one I try to avoid) or performs in what I, subjectively, perceives to be wrong, then that game won't be much fun. Which is why I much more prefer back-line Supports, where I am the one having to do the reacting. Letting the ADC take the lead role, and I can follow up as, well, support.

I try not to actually act on any prejudice I may have in the lobby, regarding champion picks, possible combos etc. But I do go into the game based on that initial gut-feeling. However, I have long since learned not to judge the ADC by his pick, even though he may not pick something that would be in my mind a good synergy with what I am picking.

However, if the ADC is feeding and is 115(!) % beyond any hope of actually improving - not recovering with farm and what not, but acually limited by skill - then you can leave him and support whatever lane could use your help the most. Won't help the ADC any, but...the overall team comes first as far as I'm concerned.

As a Support, you are under no obligation to outright waste your time on the ADC. But that "leave the lane"-bar is incredibly high for us, and we cannot label the ADC in any way after just 3 minutes or so. If the ADC is 0/5/0 after 10 minutes, then yes, you can safely leave IF the ADC refuses to take any good, properly conveyed advice you try to give.

The moment to make a decision either way comes with experience with different ADCs over a number of games. Frankly, all you can do until you've learned how to act in the different scenarios, whether to leave or stay or how to play and interact with your ADC, is to take the experience from the games, for better or for worse and set a baseline for what to do the next time in that same situation.

But as I said, don't jump to conclusions too early. The the game play out, let the ADC show his playstyle and skill level in various situations, both when ganked, playing offensively and defensively, and take it from there. And ultimately, listen to your gut-feeling, because in the long run, it is usually right. :)

MikeJ122O10/23/2019, 7:45:52 AM1 votes

I would wait the laning phase out, trying not to fight much but just farm, and worry about grouping to work on other objectives later.

Crispy0Snake10/23/2019, 10:02:07 AM1 votes

So lets set the stage, you are a Blitzcrank, you go to the bottem lane and you see a great oppertunity to use the rocket grab. You Q, connect, E,the Enemy Duo fights back, and then you realize that as soon as you engaged, your ADC ditched you and you die. Even though you two had an edge against the enemies

Ping that you're going to target one of them so the adc understands what you're doing, if a hook comes out of nowhere an ADC is less likely to respond. Also see what your ADC is doing, their items and level, and gauge if they CAN fight before you go. That Kaisa item 1054 item 3070 item 1001 is going to watch you die. She has no AD.

Here's another, you are a Sona, you and the ADC have an item advantage, and enemy jungler was just spotted at top, HP and Mana is good to go, your minions are pushing in, you ping to let your ADC know you are attacking the enemies... and they just ? mark ping you as you engage...

Why are you trying to dive or going beyond the minion wave as Sona? you can easily zone from minions in a safe way when you're ahead and diving as a sona in laning phase is always a bad idea

Check if you even win the fight you're trying to start

Communicate as best you can, show clear intent of your plays

Don't flame, if they want to farm then just support them in that

Ultimately this could be "what do you do with bad team mates?" you go next. If they're so bad they deserve to lose because they're dead weight, unfortunately you're going down with them

ClaireRedfield10/23/2019, 11:17:30 AM1 votes

soak xp and roam. once mid game hits start supporting the best performing player on your team forget the adc exist. essentially keep calm and play the game to your teams strengths.