The real utility scaling.
I was responding to another person's post, linked above, and I actually came to the realization that Riot should have taken another approach to their attempt at utility scaling, by buffing the maximum CDR allowed, specifically targeting support characters. My response and logic path are quoted below. I really like the idea of making items that give increases to max CDR, while providing no other damage stats.
The thing about increasing max CDR, is that it then takes more items to take advantage of that. It takes dedication to CDR to abuse it, so giving an item with tank stats and +MaxCDR should not become appealing to top laners, or might actually bring previously under-appreciated items, like Stark's/Zeke's (whatever it's name is now) into the meta. Ryze might become a problem with his ability to scale harder off CDR than any other champ, but that can be addressed later.
In closing, I feel that adding items with +MaxCDR stats. or reworking current items to include +MaxCDR (such as the changes to the current gold generation support items in the linked discussion above) would give supports the true utility scaling they were supposed to get.
"Alright, here's the reasoning. Given:
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Traditional supports are primarily valued on how much utility they can bring on their abilities.
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If we ignore "utility scaling," the majority of utility comes from base ability numbers.
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CDR allows you to use more abilities in a given timeframe.
Therefore, for supports: CDR = Utility.
With that, we can assume:
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AP gives you damage.
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CDR gives you utility.
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Health and resistances give you survivability.
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Survivability allows you to keep dealing damage/applying utility.
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Utility amplifies all ALLIED damage, via enemies not being able to kill allies or directly buffing them.
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You have more allies than you have of yourself.
Given this we can make the following assumptions:
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Amplifying your own damage through AP will not be as effective as amplifying your allies' damage through utility.
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Amplifying your survivability past that of your allies' will cause you to outlive them, at which point you are amplifying, through utility, only yourself.
Therefore: Building survivability over CDR as a support is not as effective as building CDR over survivability. The same can be said of AP. "
