General Support Guide!

General Support Guide!

Introduction: What does a support do anyway?

Even though supporting is one of the least favorite role in the League, it's by far not the least important role. As a support your goal early game is to get your AD carry either farmed or fed. This usually gets achieved with tier 1 support champions.

Getting your AD fed isn't enough though, you will also need to get enough vision on the map so you can do objectives (like dragon or counter-jungling) more effective. It's also nice to have vision to see ganks coming and eventually save your life. I will be discussing about good warding spots and how to pull some tricks off with them.

And at last, I will be discussing how to win your lane by (for example) zoning your opponents, counter-gank, special notes for certain champions and how to harass effectively.


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Runes:

Tanky:
Armor
12.69
Magic Resist Per Level (2.7 At Champion Level 18)
1.35
Health
78.00
Armor Penetration And .62 Magic Penetration
8.10

Offensive AP:
Magic Penetration
7.83
Armor
12.69
Magic Resist Per Level (2.7 At Champion Level 18)
1.35
Ability Power
14.85

Full Tank:
Armor
20.88
Magic Resist Per Level (2.7 At Champion Level 18)
1.35
Health
78.00

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Masteries:



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Item Build:

Start: Doran's Shield OR Ancient Coin (read starting items for reasoning)
Towards mid game: Get the stat components for mid game to keep fighting (hence not upgrading ruby to sightstone)

REPLACE YOUR TRINKET AFTER BUYING SIGHTSTONE
Sightstone has no more limit since season 4, so you can still place 3 wards at the same time with just your sightstone.

Mid game: Usually, Sunfire Cape is really good to take as a first item. when they have a lot of AP though, get either Spirit Visage or Banshee's Veil first. Getting a Giant's Belt early makes you tanky so you can initiate.



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Warding:

Get. Wards. Even if you're not playing support.

Time their wards!
Timing wards makes it so much easier for you and the jungler to know when to gank. Just call things like "river 6 03" and "tri 7 15" and the jungler knows either to continue grinding Experience or come via lane/tribush.

Go 'Silent Warding'!
'Silent Warding' is another trick I discovered. If you ward the brush you're in and you weren't revealed while doing that, the opponent won't see you've placed a ward there. This is such a big advantage when you're playing supports like Leona and Thresh because the element of surprise (and presence) still is active.

Go Silent Warding when you know the minion flow will force you out the brush (this is usually when their support starts invading your brush). Do it a few seconds before you have to leave or else they can still see the ward when they walk in (the ward is still a few seconds visible before going invisible as you know).

Discover wards
You can discover if they have a ward in the brush by trying to attract the next minion wave. You basically stand as far as possible in the brush and wait if minions start moving to you. This is recommended if your jungler wants to gank your lane. If you're sure it's not warded, don't try to stand in the brush so they won't ward it.

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Laning Phase

The most important phase when looking at building up. Every mistake can be crucial of losing the lane. There are several things you will need to take care of:
Keeping stustain: If you AD (or you) are low on either health or mana (and they're not), you just cannot play agressive. You can try to zone the opponents but cannot force a fight.

Having wards up: I think this should be clear why. Do keep in mind that the jungler still can come via the lane, so don't hesitate to often put a ward in the lane brush as well. When warding, think of the 'Silent Warding' trick. When they don't know it has been warded they're wasting time and exp.

Showing presence: This is so important when playing aggressive champions. If you fail to zone them let them push, because when you engage they have a long way to go back to their beloved turret. Remember: In early game, Support > Marksman.

Starting Doran's Shield helps a lot as well to show presence because they won't be able to poke you out anymore. Starting Ancient Coin makes you squishier and forces you to play more passive. Economically, this is the safest and most secure choice. In case you want to snowball, it's a bad idea to start Ancient Coin.

If you succeed at zoning make sure they cannot reach any CS, or even better any experience at all. Make sure though you've warded the river/tribrush so you know you can't get backstabbed doing this.

Knowing when to initiate: Keep the silent warding trick in mind, it can help so much with initiating. Skills like condemn and a headbutt against the wall work really well when initiating. Don't forget your summoner spells as well.

Also keep an eye on their positioning. If they get chased down by minions it's a good moment to initiate on them since the minion damage is high early game.

Pushing your lane: I usually do this when we are sure we can win the 2v2 fights, when they are roaming, they have gone back to base, we want them to miss CS or when we need to go back. I'm telling the carry to push as well.
Do keep in mind they have a jungler and their mid (or even top teleport) might come for a gank. Make sure when you're pushing you always have wards up. It's also smart to ward Dragon AND tri-brush when your AD carry is fed as well.

Trades/Harassing: If you're a sustainy / tanky support you're willing to force trades with the opposing team.
If you can win trades you're most likely to zone them and eventually give them a lack of CS and experience. When harassing, ALWAYS try to harass their ADC. The support will get their income anyhow - the ADC has to work for it.

If you see their AD going for a CS kill, feel free to harass the AD like Soraka's banana attack.
If you see their minion wave is nearly gone and your wave still has some minions, you can consider engaging. Do keep in mind their jungler could be around as well. Do not engage when you can't win trades or you or your carry's health/mana is low compared to theirs.

CSing at the tower: Your AD carry will have a harder time farming at the tower because of the turret aggro. To help your carry out, look at the minions HP and often attack them to get them that low that either the turret barely won't kill it or your AD can kill it easily.

If you are getting good at this, you'll notice that your AD will not or will get little behind CS because you've helped him a lot under the turret. This could make the difference when both AD carries are buying items.

Melee minions need three turret hits and barely survive two, so it's best to leave them unless your AD or allied minions have harassed that fighter minion.
Caster minions (ranged) need two turret hits and pretty much survive one turret hit. It's smart to auto-attack the caster minion once under tower early game so your AD carry can get them with ease.

Keep in mind that you are mainly attacking the minion who is getting tower aggro, since that is mainly the best option to help out your AD carry.

Fighting: When a fight starts, make sure you and your Marksman focus the same target if you're willing to fight as well. I've lost many lanes because of this lack of synergy. It's way easier to do this when you're communicating via a third-party program like Skype or TeamSpeak. Pinging helps as well.
It's recommended to focus their Marksman because they have to farm for their money while their supports will regenerate it anyway.

Some lane combo recommendations:
Annie + Draven: Insane ham for early game. Works really good to get a kill at level 2. Start Q as Annie so you can poke them down for the level 2 cheese.
Blitzcrank/Taric/Alistar + Caitlyn: This combo is good for lane control. Push lane, poke them down, initiate when they're low. Weak versus all-inners like Leona.
Thresh/Leona + Jinx: Enormous lane presence, a lot of kill potential throughout the early game at levels 2, 3 and 6.

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Team Fights:

Team fights
Time to kick some butts. If everything worked well your AD carry could have a lot of farm (depends if (s)he's a good farmer) and perhaps some kills as well. You items are ready to use and summoners just came from cooldown. It's time to win the fight.

You still have a lot of influence in the teamfight. Here are a few ways to win a fight:
Make sure you've warded the brushes around you where the fight will be held. There is nothing more annoying than not being able to attack your target because you can't see it.
If you have Clairvoyance, make sure to disable as many brushes as you can as soon as the fight starts.

Don't forget to use your summoners (like exhaust). Really, if you do forget them they can burst, lifesteal or your team can get AoE'd. Their team will crush you. This also count for actives of items like Locket of the Iron Solari and Randuin's Omen.

Do your thing and get out.
If you're an initiator, try to get in, blow your cooldowns when necessary and get out of the fight to wait for your cooldowns unless you're willing to soak damage.
Keep an eye on your Marksman / AP Carry though (whoever deals the most damage). If you know they will get bursted when you're frontlining, you should consider going back to the backline to peel.

Ping enemies who should be focussed. This usually is either their AD or AP carry since they build for dealing damage. Pinging them make your team realize they shouldn't waste their abilities on a random Amumu or any other tanky person. Do this before the team fight starts so it's clear for your team.


Thanks for reading