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[Champion Pool Discussion] Should You Always Bring Braum? (Tank Support Discussion)

MrBuffington·7/9/2014, 5:32:08 PM·1 votes·241 views

Hey y'all,

So I was a support main in Season 3, back when I was in Silver. This season I was placed in Bronze III, and learned to fill each role adequately in order to pull myself back into Silver. Now that I'm back in Silver, I'm looking to return to my support roots (of course as my team allows), but instead of returning to the squishier utility/poke/sustain supports I used to play a lot, I'm really digging the tanky supports at the moment (Call it the "Braum-Effect")

What I'm asking for is your advice for developing a champion pool around tanky supports. There are about five champions in my pool or on my radar right now, what I'm having trouble with is figuring out when I should be picking them. I'll basically outline my picks with some pro/con analysis, let me know things I missed or got wrong, and also some other champions I should be considering, and when/why to pick them!

  • Braum Obviously. One of my favorite things about this beautiful mustached man is that you look and feel invincible when playing him. Supposedly he does have a weaker laning phase (which I haven't really noticed), but my impression is that he's a pick for when you have an ADC who can easily proc your passive stacks (ie. Lucian's passive, Caitlyn's range) or an ADC who may need a bit more protection (ie. Kog'Maw).
  • Gragas My personal favorite at the moment, sort of the instigator of this thread. Basically, I don't know when I would pick Braum over Gragas, strange as that seems. I build Gragas almost purely tank (maybe a haunting guise if I need a bit more damage), but what's nice is that he does have much more offensive capability than Braum. Braum is nearly unmatched in his defensive ability, but I find I can soak damage for my AD as Gragas (and heal up with the passive) as well as zone people completely away from minions with Barrel Roll.
  • Alistar Alistar was one of the first champions I got and probably one of the champions I've played the least. The medium-long cooldowns and high mana costs were always difficult for me to manage (especially when you just want to WQ everything). Two things have sparked my recent interest in him though: 1) I'm getting a better understanding of playing disruptive, tanky supports with Gragas and Braum. 2) He's getting some love in an upcoming patch (possibly 4.12). He seems pretty susceptible to poke, but does seem to have some pretty powerful zoning presence, not to mention being freakishly tanky with his ult.
  • Leona She seems to suffer from many of the same weaknesses as Alistar, but has many of his strengths too (lots of utility, really hard to kill). My main trouble with her is landing ults, which of course can be remedied with practice.
  • Thresh Ah yes, Thresh. Probably the least tanky of the above group, but depending on your build, he can be pretty hard to kill. I do enjoy playing him, and wouldn't say I'm terrible with him, though I feel I've suffered from some poor luck (see my Bad Karma thread)/not being able to have similar game-changing impact with him as I can with Braum/Gragas.

And that's about it from me (trying to keep this post a bit shorter), let me know what you guys think, and your thoughts on champions I didn't mention (ex. Taric , Blitzcrank , Chogath ?, Volibear ?)

TL;DR: Basically, what are situations you would pick certain tanky supports (ones I mentioned and otherwise) and why?

Thanks for reading!

16 Comments

MrSc0tty7/15/2014, 2:51:57 PM2 votes

Braum: awesome all around, but shines best vs team comps that contain projectile ult reliant champs, or melee ranged sustained damage he can puppy dog off with his passive and slow. Very much peel focused, he brings one good engage. Easy to pick up, always awesome. He suffers vs heavy poke and disengage like Morgana, Sona, and Nami, so have a few alternatives for that.

Gragas: a dive engager very akin to Leona. I wouldn't play both of them, as the differences are quite slight. He favors skirmishes a bit more than Leona's pure Yolomode fight-and-kill-or-die style, but his engage pattern of gapclose+brief stun+damage+tank with a nice big WHOOMP THERE IT IS ulti makes his style very very similar. I'd say play one or the other pick whichever you prefer.

Leona: see above. For those games where you just need the hardest engage possible. I like picking Leona into teams where my jungler and top lack hard engage and we need someone to get in and disrupt the teamfight. The biggest issue people have with Leona is not knowing how to get in, deal your damage and get out instead of hunting after one more of her weak autos-if you deal a chunk to the enemy duo and get off unscathed, you've done your job. Suffers hard against people who can punish her engages (thresh) or heal off the damage (Sona).

Taric: TARIC IS SOOO BAD! Is usually what people say these days, and they're wrong. He just has a very very specific niche and if you don't play to that niche, he's boned. Taric is not a champ you main. He's a very simple champ you learn and have ready for when he's needed. He's the only tank support who shines against sustain laners like Soraka and Sona, and he's got that sweet mix of peel, engage and reliability that others lack-provided you only want to stun one guy. And that's the catch, he's totally single target and 90% of his power is that dazzle. So you pick him into comps where he can either set up that sweet pick for a high burst teammate, or where he can lock down that Zed, Fizz, whoever when they dive in solo and squishy and just take them out of the fight. Learn Taric. It's easy. Learn where he shines and hell dazzle you and your enemies.

Thresh: Sona, Morgana, Braum. Those are the three champs you don't want to pick thresh into. Other than that, go nuts. Thresh is always good and scales hard with skill level. If you're looking for a champ to be your mainstay, odds are you wanna play thresh.

Worgslarg7/9/2014, 5:53:59 PM1 votes

Cho'gath is one that I like, especially against someone like ezreal, where his silence can be game making.

He also has great synergy with yasuo.

I prefer leona to most of the above because of how easily she can hand the lane to an adc if she gets a zenith blade hit at level 2-3

Angry Monster7/9/2014, 5:58:24 PM1 votes

Agaist all AD comps taric might be the best around, with him sharing AR with the team and hit ult is a damage boost.

Malphite can be fun if you learn how to support with him. I had a 2 month period where i was only supporting as him in g2. He can be poked out but if you can get on top of the enemy you can mess them up with all your debuffs.(morg just ruins your day though)

Dragon Fang Shot7/9/2014, 6:14:13 PM1 votes

I think Taric is a solid support, but his ultimate is pretty much worthless. The aura radius is small (500 units, which is near the lowest end of ranged autoattacks) and the stat boosts are meager (15/25/35 AD and AP). Besides that, the only downsides are his early game mana costs, especially on his heal, and armor is more effective than MR on him because of his armor scaling.