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Help with Support role

notexactlynoob·10/2/2015, 7:03:14 PM·1 votes·934 views

Hello.

I've been playing League since about June 2014, but started playing seriously since past month with proper ranked games. I love playing the support role, but I suck at it. I've tried playing other roles but the feeling of satisfaction isn't there.

After completing my promos, I was placed in B3. I managed to climb to B2 which felt amazing, but then I dropped back to B3 in a few games which completely sucked. I don't want to give up hope, but it seems hopeless. Below are some of common mistakes I make;

Warding - I feel my warding is really good in the laning phase. Unless it's something ridiculous like a Zac hoping from behind some wall or Thresh dragging an ally with his lantern I can spot ganks coming ALL the time. But once every champ has hit 6 and team fights are happening I have no clue how to ward. I try to keep a ward up at dragon at all times so we know when enemy is attempting dragon but that's about it. How to ward properly is beyond my comprehension?

Confusion - I feel I waste alot of my time walking around aimlessly. Should I simply stick to bot lane and sit my AD carry? Or should I be ready to help out wherever my team needs? Quite often I have observed like I'll be derping mid waiting for a fight to start so I can do what I do best and that is throw my spells. But nothing would happen so I'd move and a few seconds later 'An ally has been killed'. I want my movements to have a purpose and a direction, I don't want random rambling.

Harassing - I can harass and poke effectively on ranged mage supports like Nami, Lulu, Janna but I tend to play very passive on someone like Leona or Braum because I am melee and I fear I'll get killed if I try to engage into duels with enemy ADC or support. How to trade effectively? I'd like tips for both ranged and melee champs.

Champs - What champs give best possible result? I know at bronze games are lost due to player skill and not due to champ match ups. I've won games with Sejuani and Nunu support, but still I'd like to hear inputs from players who have been playing much longer than me. From the traditional support picks I love Janna and Leona. I absolutely hate Thresh and Blitzcrank, and I can't play them to save my life. But I am willing to learn them if that is what requires to climb.

I'm not expecting to reach gold this season, but I would like to improve and get to Silver atleast. Looking forward to all the help I can get from you. Thanks :)

15 Comments

Live2LetDie10/2/2015, 7:14:16 PM1 votes

Made a hefty post explaining how I went from b2-p5 as a support in one season. You can give it a look by clicking my name/posts and scroll to the bottom.

You have to carry at any role until gold and even then you have to carry your adc to late game. Anyone who says support is the easiest position fails to realize we have to predict the enemy movements as well as our carry, who we all know doesn't care about us, so it's one of the hardest.

TouchpadExpert10/3/2015, 6:21:05 PM1 votes

I am not ranked but have been playing the game for 2.5 years. I have played every champ at least once and support is my favorite role. My best supports are Thresh, Leona, Nami, Janna and Alistar. I can play all the traditional supports except Sona and Bard. Sona I dislike the play style and Bard feels weird to me. But I'll try to give you some tips on the topics you mentioned.

Warding is important and past laning phase you want to press tab a lot to check on monster timers. Ward dragon only it is up or the timer is at 2 minutes and below. Otherwise just ward the river at the jungle entrances or the side bushes. You should also be buying a pink ward. The placement of the pink ward generally depends on the enemy team's behaviors and a little bit of your own jungler's. If the enemy jungler is invading your jungle pink ward your red or blue buff (which ever is closer). If it's red buff ward the bush behind dragon. For some strange reason people almost never walk through that bush to find my wards there. If the enemy jungler or mid laner likes to gank ward the middle bush in river. And lastly if the enemy jungler likes to stay in his own jungle or if your jungler wants to invade pink the enemy jungle. Usually at a buff camp or the bush behind the blue or red buff. Or even behind wolves. Pink wards need to be hidden. The regular wards place at choke points or intersections where people show their hand by changing direction.

Confusion management takes practice. When confused press tab and look at timers and inspect the tower health bars. This info can usually persuade you on where you are needed. Unless you are warding try to stay with someone on your team. So after your jungler ganks bot and gets a kill or two and you see him make a run for mid lane follow him and ward dragon pit on your way over. Perhaps even sweep it out or save your sweeper for taking out any wards the enemy mid laner threw into their side bush.

Harassing as a poke support I easy. Throw in spell, back off, wait on cool down, repeat. As a melee laner it is a bit harder. Some champions just don't harass well. Janna, Taric, Soraka and Alistar come to mind. These champions are sustain laners. They heal up any poke they or their ADC takes. Or in Janna's case she uses the shield on her ADC who will make short trades against the enemy ADC. Sorala heals away any damage her ADC takes and throws a star call on them when they go in to take CS or attack your ADC. Do not use star call to poke if you have full hp. Alistar and Taric are counter engage champs. Disrupt the enemy when they try to all-in your team.

Leona is one of my better supports. But she requires proper positioning. Do not stray too far from your ADC or else when you go in you will strand your ADC and yourself and surely one of you will die. Jump in when you notice the enemy mispositioned or you have a gank incoming. Or watch their mana bars. Go in when they get super low on health or mana. Other wise guard your ADC and counter engage with your plethora of CC.

Every champ has a specific style or two they can play as. I made a whole thread on this months ago. I will try digging it up for you.

And the season ends very soon. Usually within a month or two after worlds. I don't know your availability but you will have to make some dramatic improvements in a short amount of time if you want gold. It's not impossible but it will take a lot of effort on your end.

Edit: Found it!

http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/tips-tricks/5BK3mUsE-the-three-types-of-laning-styles

The thread talks about the 3 different laning styles and in a later post goes on to teach you about how to counter pick your enemy lane. The laning styles are straightforward (You seem to prefer poke/sustain laners) but the counter pick takes some thinking. There are times when you want to forego counter picking the enemy laners if it leaves a glaring weakness on your team. Like when the enemy team has a Tristana and Alistar (counter-engage lane) something like Blitzcrank would be a great pick. But if your teammates are a heavy engage team (Sion, Tryndamere, Katarina and Graves) your team would be better suited with a Morgana than a Blitzcrank.

Oli10/4/2015, 1:24:34 AM1 votes

You're asking the right questions!

Warding - Post-laning phase, support warding (and gameplay in general) revolves around objective control. When there's an impending dragon/baron contest, control the area by preemptively warding entrances and clearing opponent vision. Depending on if your team is ahead or behind, you'll ward aggressively or defensively when it comes to sieging and controlling red/blue buffs on both sides of the map. You have the right idea of warding dragon at all times, but you can ward more efficiently by keeping tabs on when dragon spawns, what objective is currently being contested, and where red and blue team are currently located.

Confusion - Typically once laning phase ends (when the first bot tower falls) the winning bot lane will either rotate mid or contest dragon. Your job will be to secure vision for these objectives. If a teamfight is imminent, be ready to peel/protect your ADC. Of course your job will vary by what champion you're playing. For example Annie or Blitzcrank may look to engage, Janna or Lulu may look to peel. Try to recognize what objective is being contested and play around that.

Harassing/Champs - Supports will have different playstyles based on inherent skill kit and synergy with ADC. Draven + Leona may look to all in level two, three, and six. Soraka + Ezreal will avoid all ins and focus on sustaining. Sona + Caitlyn may try to poke the opponents out of lane or try to push down the tower asap. Try to learn the power spikes and synergies of different champs so you can plan your pick/ban accordingly. Sometimes you'll pick reactively, such as picking Alistar or Morgana to counter their Blitzcrank pick.

Leona and Braum are both champions that can (and often should) be played aggresively. As we said earlier, factors like power spiking, champion synergy, minion wave control, and zoning potential can dictate when you engage or not engage. Every support is viable, but some can be more situational. Thresh and Blitzcrank are great champs to learn, particularly in lower elo. Players often don't know how to play against them and these champs can offer low risk and high reward, if you can land your q's that is.

I know some answers I gave were very general, so I would be happy to elaborate on specifics if you'd like. Hope that helps a little!

Kamai10/4/2015, 1:48:39 AM1 votes

Warding: You really have 3 major zones that you want to ward outside of laning.

Defensive: These wards should be in the jungle just in front of your tower line. Typically, that's either blue brush or the line bush that enters near mid, the line bush by raptors or the curved bush on the side just in front of your base, and the triangle bush near bot/top lane or the bush by red buff. This ward set is best when you're behind, and should give your team time to rotate on a split-pusher and should have you avoid getting flanked.

Neutral: Warding the bush behind the enemy red buff, the bush in the river on blue side, and a ward that covers Dragon/Baron, depending on your side will usually give you vision near the river, catching people trying to rotate on you, and generally making seiges safer. You can rotate the Dragon/Baron ward to triangle bush when sieging blue bottom first tower or purple first top tower.

Aggressive: If you're already ahead, a ward at the bushes near enemy red, enemy blue, and a ward either in the straight bush near raptors or a ward middle lane as far up as you can get it will set you up the best for picks as you're pushing further in, and even if they are aware, it will usually slow down their rotations as they search for safer paths around. Generally, if you have a lot of enemies that can come in from bizarre angles, try to get your team to ward one of the major spots so you can keep a ward to help keep vision on the weird angles.

Confusion: Generally, the thing about the confusion is best solved by having a plan and telling your teammates the plan. Make sure your ADC at least has vision before you roam out, and a failed roam that communicated should at least rarely end badly. One thing to keep in mind, though, especially if you're roaming after your lane is behind is that an extended roam can pull a lot more pressure on your laner than you can hold off. Make sure that you can help against their support and one other roaming in if you are elsewhere for an extended period of time.

Extremely important. If you fall behind 3 levels and haven't died a million times, you're getting too little out of your roams. Stay with your ADC, get some experience, and see if you can keep pressure by your presence and threat on bottom tower instead of being in lane.

Harassing In general, melees don't harass, they zone. It's important to gauge where your ADC/Jungler are as a melee support. If you're in a position where nobody can follow, you lose a lot of the control that you can put forth. The threat of a Blitzcrank grab or a Leona Zenith blade is much larger than the damage they can throw, and wiffing on your engage ability means that you're giving a lot of free damage. I've been the Lulu or Sona on the other side of that matchup, and missing those abilities means that I actually have 10-15 seconds to poke you down and zone you. If they don't keep the lane bushes warded (and remember, that takes both the ADC and the support working together before first buy), that's where you can go to minimize poke and keep a lot of pressure up. As a hint along those lines, trinket wards last for 60 seconds and have a 2 minute cooldown. If you can put up pressure right when that ward fades, a lot of ADCs are going to back away and not get that ward down. That gives you 60 seconds where they can't see where your skill shots are coming from and they can't auto-attack you.

If you still don't feel comfortable with that thought, play Morgana or Nami and just keep an eye on how your ADC reacts to an enemy getting snared/stunned. That should give you a very good sense of how much room you need to leave different ADCs to react. If you watch that, it should make melee supports much easier.

You do have to remember that as a melee support, you will take damage. In return, you just need 1 good combo to force summoners if not a kill. If you can still make the play, do not panic if you take a couple of autoattacks.

Champions I think nearly any character for support can have good results. If people wanted really generalist picks for support, I would suggest Thresh and either Lulu or Nami. In general, most of the supports that are played can both give their team a lot of utility and patch up a hole in a team comp. With that in mind, I would want Morgana or Annie as supports that are a secondary damage threat, Janna, Lulu, or Nami as a pure support that can protect 1 person like none other, Braum or Thresh as a tanky protector, and Blitzcrank or Leona as tanky engage. I do think other supports are awesome in their own way, but these will cover your bases efficiently.

I would say if you just wanted to keep going as Janna and Leona, I think with practice, you can get pretty far, and if you struggle against a certain support, play them a few times.

If you want, you can send me a friend request, and when I'm on, I'd be willing to watch one or two of your games and see if I can give you help.

Aeolian Melodies10/5/2015, 12:02:42 AM1 votes

Warding

It changes with the flow of the game. You ward were the action is so your team doesn't get caught out. If you are pushing inhib turret bot, you ward the paths that they would most likely take to come and defend their tower; if you are worried that they might do Baron soon, you ward it and its vicinity so that you can see them get towards it and whether or not they're actually doing it or baiting you, etc.

Confusion

You should always be doing something productive; the exact nature depends on the game and on your pick. During the laning phase, you should be with your ADC most of the time, unless you have a support that is very good at ganking, then you can go roam mid or into the jungle with your jungler when your lane and your laning partner won't be punished for it. Typically, once you have taken the enemy bot tower, sitting next to your ADC while he's farming isn't really productive: either ward their buff (red or blue depending on your side of the map) so you can aggressively push with him, or defensively ward for him then go assist a push mid lane, or go with your jungler ward the enemy jungle a bit, etc.

Engaging

Melee supports aren't there to poke, they're there to engage. These champions are very strong at taking advantage of their enemy's misstep by locking down a poorly positioned target for an easy kill. With a melee support you must be very aware of how much damage you and your ally can deal, and how much damage you can take as punishment; WATCH OUT FOR THE CREEPS. Too many novice supports forget the damage that these little fuckers do if they gank up on you, and lose the trade solely based on how much unnecessary minion aggro they took. As a melee support you need to utilize the bushes well, as they are extremely useful to zone people with the threat of your CC; you must also ward your lane well to avoid getting baited in bad engages.

Teslyn10/5/2015, 12:30:00 AM1 votes

There are 3 supports..

Damage supports Support supports roaming supports

-support supports.. just baby sit .. thats really it.. engage .. soak up damage.. you know things people think supports should do. -roaming supports try to influence bot lane and mid.. once you figure out when you are just sitting there.. just roam mid lane and see whats going on.. maybe mid has overextended.. and they need to be punished.. -Damage supports .. this is where i live.. i pick a late game AP champion and build what is damage.. mid game is when i pick up sight stone, after my first item for damage.. i try and delete people.. thats really it.. i enjoy it.. sometimes countered in lane. so i have to save my mana than mid to late game i just delete people.. thats really it..

here is how i handle it -i use my mute button on people begging for sight stones.. warding is everyones job and if my ADC doesnt keep his ward in the right place than i assume sight isnt important to him so i dont care about his opinion.. i will just give him an excuse of when he over extended and gets ganked to say.. 'my support didnt ward' -i let people die.. this is the hardest thing to learn.. low elo.. people are stupid.. very very.. very very.. very stupid.. so they will pick unfavorable fights.. and die.. if you die with them.. it does nothing for you. -turrets will fall.. it happens.. dont hold a turret beyond reasonable.. let it drop.. the only ones that are actually really Key are inhib turrets.. even then sometimes you gotta let them fall.. watch the pros and they will leave a turret to die when its either lose a turret .. or lose a turret and die.. -KS.. low elo means 'kill steal' higher elo 'kill secured' reason for this.. low elo people want all the kills and think that they should have all of them.. i figured this out when i would leave kills for people and they would either not get the kill.. or die trying to get the kill.. if i am the only person i can control in this game.. than those kills need to go to the person i can control.. and thats me.. if the ADC wanted it.. he would do more damage.. seriously.. F that guy..

(the most important thing to learn) -Shut your mouth.. arguing is stupid.. if you say something and you catch flack for it.. why keep talking to that person .. mute and move on.. its less things to distract you.. seriously.. mute and just play the game.. low elo is full of people who cant shut up.. trust me .. i have been there.. and my god.. just shut up..

hopefully this helps you...