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What's better as a support; a passive play style or a more aggressive one?

BigFreakinRoy·1/21/2019, 1:49:24 AM·2 votes·6,020 views

I have two friends who got me into this game and they have totally different viewpoints on this topic. I'm pretty new so I don't know which one is right. One of my friends says I have to play more aggressive (since I have a passive play style) and the other one is saying that my play style is fine and he's just mad that he overextended on his gank and wants to blame me. (Since the one who says I should play more aggressive is a jungler. the one who says I should play passive is the ADC) Here is my play style: I play Blitzcrank and I only push when I land a hook or when the other team has less health or level than me. If they they are hiding behind a tower, then I back off. If both teams have the same health and same everything I never go in until I land the hook. I never push against top laners unless I have the support of a top laner myself. If they have more people than us, I will say to my ADC that we should retreat until help comes. (Unless they are all weaker than us) I'm open to criticism and tell me who is right in this situation. I genuinely don't know who is right.

16 Comments

MagicFlyingLlama1/21/2019, 2:13:42 AM3 votes

Situational, but right now the whole state of support in general is damage and threat focused.

Syrile1/21/2019, 3:14:05 AM2 votes

On the whole, the aggressor makes the rules. I tend to play very aggressive once I am familiar with a champion, be it as support or mid or top or adc or whatever else. However, there are times that one must pull back and play defensive (clear counter-picks or champions that are outright overpowered early game, etc).

But if you have the chance to play aggressive, it tends to give you more options. Thus why I am a big fan of Leona as support. And engage supports in general. As well as a lot of mages that I can use (mid main after all) to harass the enemy team out of lane or make it unsafe for them to CS.

WukongMain1/21/2019, 2:16:18 AM2 votes

Neither is correct. But they also not wrong.

You have to find a balance between offensive and defensive, Understand when you have the freedom to be aggressive and when you are forced into a passive stance. This usually changes many times during the course of the laning phase, Power spikes/Cooldowns/items/ganks ect...

There's no right or wrong when it comes to how Aggressive / Passive someone should be there are too many variables involved for any one answer to always be the correct one. Who your teammates are heavily impacts this and you'll have to gauge this on a per game basis. (basically are they trash players who wont followup? or are they amazing and have the capacity to react to your engages quickly).

Which stance are you more suited to? Personally i find i win more games when i'm aggressive and take action and so, I tend to try to play champions who align with this. I main wukong for this reason who has the ability to go full on aggro and force engages with a flash ulti. Others might not win games with this style of play so they try to play passive champions like Soraka or Janna who excel at stopping the opponents aggression.

If you think blitzcrank's hooks are fun, Try playing Pyke... So fun.

tl:dr = There are times to be passive and there are times to be aggressive. Master the art of knowing when to swap styles and you'll find success.

ı Sona ı1/21/2019, 3:19:29 AM1 votes

There is no better or worse as it is subject to match up, strategy, and skill. It may be better to be more aggressive, it may be better to be more passive.

Aladoron1/21/2019, 10:02:26 AM1 votes

Well, there is no right or bad tactic. The main point is that you and your adc should play the same. (He being aggressive while you are in the back will result in his death, with probably 0 result, and doing the other way around too.) I do not know how passive you are, but you might be able to zone a bit when your hook is up (not zoning out of XP, but at least some lasthits.)

But in the end, there is no better tactic, I mean there is, but not this general, it would depend on matchup, enemy/your jungler etc... But all In all, both tactics are ok, if you do it properly.

Saezio1/21/2019, 2:05:52 PM1 votes

Blitz is tricky. You need to make the enemy think you are playing aggressively by always looking for the Q angle but only using that Q when you are very very certain you will hit it. While your Q is on CD you are basically a nothing champion so you want to have it available most time and you need to fake hooks etc to make enemy miss CS or back off when you actually have no intention of hooking. Also the best way to play the lane is to wait for level 2 or 3 run/flash on the enemy ADC and E them then while they are knocked up walk slightly backwards and then hook. Worst case you get a flash out the ADC and your hooking life got way easier, best case you got a kill. Blitz is an ALL-In champion so you want to have Q-E and Aftershock all up when you make a move.

Terozu1/21/2019, 7:29:47 PM1 votes

Entirely depends on the champ tbh.

Paravozikchoocho1/21/2019, 2:04:39 AM1 votes

Well Blitzcrank needs to play aggressively If you want to play passive champions like Janna Lulu Nami fits this playstyle more.

There is no "better playstyle" it is up to you and the situation.

Tbh I won't read what you do, as I don't play Blitzcrank and other hook supports ,so not competent here

Telephone Booth1/24/2019, 5:18:29 AM1 votes

That is dependant on the match up.

Live2LetDie1/21/2019, 2:06:27 AM1 votes

depends on the adc really. Alot of top players play passive supports that buff the adc. Things like blitz and thresh are make and break while others easily still provide usefulnes for your team

Kei1431/21/2019, 2:26:55 AM1 votes

It's kind of match up dependant.

You need to look at your team's champs and the enemy's and play to your strengths.

Also if you can, look at how your partner and enemy moves, those will tell you how you should play.

Btw, you don't have to land a hook all the time. If you step forward and threaten them with a hook, it sometimes will be good enough to zone them off CS or exp.