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The Bot Lane Meta Discourages People To Play Support

JVP15··3 votes·814 views

Hi. I am a recently Gold Support main who queues as Support/Top in ranked (and gets support 90% of the time). It is popular to complain on the boards about autofill. It is also popular to complain about the bot lane meta on the boards. This is why I am making a connection between the two problems.

People don't like Autofill because (at least mainly) it forces them to play support and not their main role in order to reduce queue times. I personally don't mind autofill, aside from the fact that I don't get my 5 second queue time anymore.

I really don't like the bot lane meta. What is this bot lane meta I am referring too? Well, either you are like Taliyah and you live under a rock, or you like asking hypothetical questions just to be a jerk and I don't want to be friends with you any more. Get out of my thread.

No wait. Baby, please, come back. I didn't mean what I said!

Anyways, I don't like getting 4-5 man ganked and tower dove bot lane. Support and ADC players already have to rely on another person (ADC and Support players respectively) to decide how well their lane will do. Bot lane is just full of objectives juicier than Sona's Ashe, and so it is highly advantageous for all lanes to try and win bot lane by ganking. This means that, instead of the ADC and Support relying on eachother to do well and communicate, they now have to rely on 3 other players (jungle, top, and mid). The team that camps and snowballs off of bot lane the most is the team that is most likely to win, so if top, jungle, and mid aren't camping bot lane on one team, then they are likely to lose as the other team will be able to take a dragon and bot tower when they 5-man gangbang bot.

This actually relates to autofill. Autofill mainly forces players to play support. Personally, I love support, and many other people on the boards have learned to enjoy it too. However, because of the bot lane meta, support has less say in how the game proceeds. Even the best Janna cannot peel against a competent four-five man dive. This is not to say that Support doesn't have impact on the game, but mid and jungle have more impact over bot lane right now than either the ADC or Support.

In terms of influence, it is more advantageous to play mid or jungle than it is to play Support or ADC because of this bot lane meta. People want to win, and more influence means an increased chance of winning.

Basically, this bot lane meta means that it is more advantageous that people play mid or jungle, which means that there are less support players, which means that the queue has to find more support players, which means more people will be autofilled into support, which means more people will complain that they are autofilled.

In the end, I believe one thing is clear. Better nerf Irelia.

4 Comments

woodvsmurph1 votes

Hi, I play top/support (used to main support for 2+ seasons). I am with you that it CAN be overly annoying when a team just camps and dives bot all game long. I agree with adc's that their MID GAME is a bit underpowered as compared to other roles; however their late game is GROSSLY overpowered compared to what it should be. Coming from a guy who is more often than not camped 1v2 top lane with 0 help from team (not even a ward by jungler as he/she passes by to red buff), I know what it is like to be camped and watch teammates do nothing to exploit the fact that they have numbers advantage elsewhere or to make an effort to help you. It sucks a lot. Losing a game like that where you are still doing better kda and cs wise than your teammates when YOU are the one being camped sucks even more. I saw a vid recently that I'm trying to take to heart -- talking about how 25% of your games are basically a guaranteed loss and don't let yourself tilt over them and pull your hair out. That is step 1 -- realize some games are unwinnable and don't let it tilt you too hard. 2. Get deep wards when enemy bot bases or when they are shoved to tower and you see enemy jungler and mid far away -- ward river by drag or even by mid, ward enemy red buff or behind drag. This means enemy jungler either has to gank bot from your own jungle or from the lane -- giving you a better chance to escape or kite it out until help arrives. 3. My apologies if you already do this, but if you don't -- consider the enemy team comp and your team comp. Is your adc immobile? Is theirs immobile? Long or short ranged? Does their support have good all-in or peel or healing? Pick accordingly. Ex: If you have a weak early game adc with low mobility, don't pick a melee engage support or you will find yourself alone. If their tower-dive isn't great without jungle or mid lane ganks, maybe try kayle support -- once you hit 6, you have decent damage, a slow, armor shred, a heal/move speed boost for you or your adc, and an ult to deny them bursting you out. If you need mobility and peel, try karma. If they want to dive and have decent cc and tank stats, maybe a tamh -- save your adc from their cc and burst or a leona or thresh -- lock up the person tanking tower for them, so they have to tank too long and either die or have to flash to escape. At least burning their flash makes them have to wait longer to tower dive again. Ping your trinket/sightstone charges and cd -- so your adc realizes they need to help ward early on too. Keep a closer eye on mid or top and jungle to see when they MIGHT be coming bot to gank you. Ex: did enemy jungle just gank top or mid with blue buff? That means they are prob coming bot side next.

JVP151 votes

This is a long and well thought out post. Thank you for taking the time to write this. I try to do a lot of these things (analyze team comps, look at the map and try to figure out jungler presence) and I do play most of those supports aside from Kayle. I need to work on my deep warding though, and that is something I could actually use some advice on.

In ranked, I play a lot of Janna because of her overall utility, safety, and winrate, but I feel like I need to be in lane 24/7 so that I can properly utilize my Ancient Amulet and keep up in experience. Deep warding or roaming requires that I leave lane for quite some time, leaving my ADC alone to farm and potentially die, and lose gold and experience. Do you have any tips on how to get good vision of the enemy jungle whilst minimizing the amount of farm and XP I miss?

woodvsmurph1 votes

Hey thanks -- I almost never get positive replies to my posts. I would say that early game, you try to delay your recall and deep ward right before you back -- when enemy adc is in base. Keep eyes on map too -- like if you know enemy jungler started red buff, then when your red or blue buff respawns (whichever your jungler started at on first clear), the enemy jungler is prob at that buff. Likely they will clear that side of jungle before going to other side of jungle or ganking a lane. Watch to see if your laners have a "tell" ex: thresh starts walking up to you -- threatening hook/flay. If they start playing more agro, they probably have a gank incoming. When your adc can farm by tower for awhile without dying, it can also be an ok time to walk through red/blue buff area to ward by drag. If you shove enemy to their tower -- ping your adc to back off and let them know you are leaving for a bit to ward -- make sure they know before you leave though. When needed, just try to play safer -- don't need deep wards if you are farming by your tower. You see mid go mia and don't see their jungler either, be ready to run. It's better to miss cs and lose a tower than to stay at tower and feed 2 kills 2v4. At lvl 9, I always prefer going blue trinket so I can get perma-wards in my jungle and use my sightstone for more agressive wards in river or their jungle. As we know, supports seem to be the only people capable of warding with trinkets after 3 min into game. I personally dislike janna just because like you say she depends on her adc to be good -- more so than a thresh or leona, but if you can make it to mid/late game fine, you will be able to carry harder as janna. So keep that in mind when it feels you are falling a bit behind and want to do more early -- and remind your adc of that too. It encourages yourself and teammates and might stop you trying too hard to make a big play early that ends up costing you more.

Oh, and if you try kayle support item 3301 , item 2049 or item 3107 (then the other one), item 2302 , item 3115 item 3116 item 3151

Your goal isn't to carry - it's to maximize peeling for carries via q and rylai's plus your heal. Redemption is great first complete item because it makes you fairly tanky and gives you mana regen. Start e for harass at lvl 1 -- can give push power too if you have an adc like varus to aoe waveclear and hit 2 before enemy. W second. Then q. Then scale up w and e as needed -- maximize that healing and speed boost for you or adc to escape ganks and negate damage taken during trades; maximize damage and done during trades via e. Q is just utility slow. If they are playing a healer or shield support, engage only when your adc can help and focus whoever is squishier on their team. It's about poking them down more than they can sustain. If they have a cc melee tank -- focus their adc and harass every chance you get when the support's cc is down. Zone them off cs if you can early on -- lvl 1 and 2, you trade even in damage with autos vs their adc. Keep spread from your adc so they can't cc or easily swap focus between you both -- this let's you abuse the heal and move speed of your w -- you can heal and kite back with whoever they focus while the other stays dealing damage. When they swap focus, the other person can come back in or you can both kite back as needed. At 6+, abuse your ult -- if they have burst (think mf ult/lucian ult), make them focus 1 person only with it and use your r to block the damage. Or if you are going to be tower dove/ganked, position so that they can only focus one of you -- this way you don't have to guess who to ult. Use heal/speed boost to help them escape or chase after ult ends. If it is clear you can't save one of you, just ensure one person gets out alive if possible. Best of luck.

JVP151 votes

Thanks for the tips! I think I will have to try Kayle support. It sounds like it will force the enemy to think and play differently.

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