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I'm a 1850 LoL player, so I'm not exactly ultragood or have insane insight, but I'm by all means no newbie either.
This is something I have tried to discuss on the official LoL-forums and reddit many, many times but it was never a very successful topic. Everyone disagreed with me, which is not necessarily bad - but I was supplied with very little solid arguments. All of the arguments boiled down to 'hurdur LoL-type games have always been 5 players and it works fine'. They are mostly fueled by nostalgia, insisting that it is 'iconic'. Another argument is one that is not relevant to me at all, being that most teams consist of 5 players and that if the game were to be 4-players, they'd have to scrap one of their beloved team members. I do not care about these things, this is a hypothetical debate that isolates the game and how it is currently set-up.
So here is my attempt on tl.net, hoping I can get some good counter-arguments or maybe even some people that agree with me.
To me, the support is just a poor solution that players have come up with to deal with the useless 5th character slot. Supports are just incredibly useless compared to the other characters. Before you say that supports are not useless: that is not what I'm arguing. There is an extra character slot, a place that you can fill with any character in the game that fulfills any role you want, yet the most optimal way to fill this role is by a character that is not supposed to do anything that earns himself/herself gold over other characters. To me, that is just incredibly bad game design.
So what we currently see are characters that are able to function as well as possible with as little gold as possible to try and get the most usefulness out of them. There is just so much you can do, which makes support incredibly boring to play to the vast, vast majority of the people (up to the point where some people would rather troll and risk a ban then, god forbid, play support).
If we have a 4v4 game, that would essentially create a second top-lane (but then for bot), a 1v1-scenario. It would create much more diversity and it would be interesting to see what they'd put in botlane; some AD carries cannot lane 1v1 against a plethora of champions, but you generally need an AD carry to deal with some champions in lategame that become invulnerable to everything else (mundo, warwick, singed to name a few).
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To me, the support is just a poor solution that players have come up with to deal with the useless 5th character slot. Supports are just incredibly useless compared to the other characters
supports are the strongest champions in the game they got nerfed several times because they were just too strong even in other roles. 4v4 would be WAY more static then the game is right now less ganks (yes some supports can gank sometimes) what I would expect if that would be the case: throw the support into midlane or only play support jungles (more likely) and mainly play support midlanes on ap like janna because supports are just so insanly strong.
Edit: on a sidenote League used to be 6v6 and after that 4v4 until they started doing the now used 5v5 style.
Edit2: thought a bit about it pretty sure the team composition would be: ad mid ap either top or bot (most likely the side with blue buff on) ap or bruiser top bruiser or support jungle (most likely support which means mao or naut sth like that) maybe a support as ap like janna/soraka
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On August 12 2012 07:30 Ente wrote:Show nested quote +
To me, the support is just a poor solution that players have come up with to deal with the useless 5th character slot. Supports are just incredibly useless compared to the other characters
supports are the strongest champions in the game they got nerfed several times because they were just too strong even in other roles. 4v4 would be WAY more static then the game is right now less ganks (yes some supports can gank sometimes) what I would expect if that would be the case: throw the support into midlane or only play support jungles (more likely) and mainly play support midlanes on ap like janna because supports are just so insanly strong. Edit: on a sidenote League used to be 6v6 and after that 4v4 until they started doing the now used 5v5 style. Edit2: thought a bit about it pretty sure the team composition would be: ad mid ap either top or bot (most likely the side with blue buff on) ap or bruiser top bruiser or support jungle (most likely support which means mao or naut sth like that) maybe a support as ap like janna/soraka
Supports are not the 'strongest champions', supports are the strongest champions for the 5th and IMO unnecessary role: support. It makes sense that supports are the strongest in the support role. Because they were meant to function with nearly no gold, some abilities were made with that thought in mind, meaning they'd be overpowered if the character actually had gold.
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you remember people playing janna soraka lulu mid? Maokai Nautilus jungle who are essentially supports? Orianna/Morgana who are top tier aps right now? they are partly support aswell (they are mainly build for ap but still more supportish then a brand would be)
Supports are INSANLY good and they are the only reason why a non full itemized ad carry can survive against bruisers.
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On August 12 2012 08:01 Ente wrote:
you remember people playing janna soraka lulu mid? Maokai Nautilus jungle who are essentially supports? Orianna/Morgana who are top tier aps right now? they are partly support aswell (they are mainly build for ap but still more supportish then a brand would be)
Supports are INSANLY good and they are the only reason why a non full itemized ad carry can survive against bruisers.
@OP, this is why this topic never gets discussed properly. Some people just can't accept the simple premise that support is a filler role (which happens to have a large effect on this game I agree) and think about the actual question of whether the game would be better without one. Always gets sidetracked by someone like this.
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On August 12 2012 08:01 Ente wrote:
you remember people playing janna soraka lulu mid? Maokai Nautilus jungle who are essentially supports? Orianna/Morgana who are top tier aps right now? they are partly support aswell (they are mainly build for ap but still more supportish then a brand would be)
Supports are INSANLY good and they are the only reason why a non full itemized ad carry can survive against bruisers.
I'm actually the jungler/part-time ap mid for our noobteam and only play support junglers and largely support mids (I build morgana with triple gp/10 and 9/9/12 masteries, go figure). The abilities they have are indeed support-oriented, but the difference is that they get a lot of farm and that they usually need a lot of farm. When I'm playing Galio I'm mostly playing a support-ish role, but I get an absolute crapload of farm. Have you ever tried to play support Galio (who was it that tried it, CLG?)? It just doesn't work that well.
With 'support' I mean: 'the character on the team that gets no farm or next to no farm', not just support-ish abilities.
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Now im kinda mad Oo I dont see a single reason why it would be better without if you would put the game to four people you would make several champions close to useless because they are there to support and dont have that much direct impact themselves (most supports after the nerfes cant solo lane Taric BC Ali cant for sure( ali/bc can lane vs certain matchups but really rarely)) Most ad carries would be useless because they need way too much protection and you would most likely not see ad carries or really rarely ad carries. The interesting thing what you can do with supports is get an champion advantage somewhere(and we see it more and more with laneswapping/agressive pushing) if you would not have any you would lane way more linear because you cannot really leave a lane alone for a few mins. Yes you would have still the jungler but in my opinion thats not too much most junglers are pretty predictable.
If we have a 4v4 game, that would essentially create a second top-lane (but then for bot), a 1v1-scenario. It would create much more diversity and it would be interesting to see what they'd put in botlane; some AD carries cannot lane 1v1 against a plethora of champions, but you generally need an AD carry to deal with some champions in lategame that become invulnerable to everything else (mundo, warwick, singed to name a few).
Thats not something which I would see as a valid argument for 4v4 getting a second toplane would basically make the game more boring because it would just be mirrored yes it would be kinda interesting what people would come up with but thats only for a short amount of time until the main "meta game" is devolepoed and people will be picking the same champions over and over with a way smaller viable champion pool.
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I remember seeing janna and lulu mid. They never really seem that impressive to me. I'd personally rather the support got removed.
I don't like playing support. When my team is bad I just feel like I don't have enough impact on the game. It can be argued that if my team is bad I'd lose regardless of whether I was a support or not, but I just hate that feeling that I can't do anything.
Supports do probably have the largest impact on the game due to wards being too game changing, but I still don't like playing them.
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Your solid argument is 'supports are utterly useless'. It doesn't add up. A good support will have the map warded at critical moments, save his ad carry multiple times throughout a game. Try playing only kill lane bottom for a couple of games. It won't work against most champions. That's because once the AD carry gets farmed you're gonna get wrecked because the useless support helped him get his farm.
Also the more people the more dynamic the play, thus more farmed.
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I think the biggest problems with making it a 4v4 or removing the support position is...
-Suddenly, "support" champions arent picked anymore. What do we do with them?
-in the current meta, supports help the ad; if the AD lane were limited to 1 champion, then we'd obviously come to realize which AD champions dominate which scenarios, so teams would probably counterpick the enemy AD and we'd end up with some 1 sided laning phases. Supports with the AD help to get rid of this 1-sided factor and allow for even gameplay
-In team fights, supports offer a lot (at least in my opinion). Whether its CC, heals, nukes, etc, they make a difference which I feel is too great to simply get rid of
On August 12 2012 07:25 the p00n wrote:
yet the most optimal way to fill this role is by a character that is not supposed to do anything that earns himself/herself gold over other characters. To me, that is just incredibly bad game design.
This part. Lets ignore what "game design" is for the moment. We dont know who came up with the original idea of a designated support (at least I dont think).
You feel that having a position dedicated to ensuring a farm-dependent position makes it through the laning phase is bad?
If you look at MOBA titles DotA and HoN, it is very common to see 2 or 3 "pure support" positions, dedicated to protecting the farming hero. In fact, you even see trilanes because supporting the carry is just that important. I don't mean to directly compare the games, but the essential idea of supports existing to aid another hero is something a lot of people would consider to be essential.
As for the idea of a "filler role".. isn't the meta something we as players come up with? I honestly don't know, but did RIOT say "yeah lets make one position be support"? If not, then the players came up with it, and seeing as its still around, I would like to think they do the job.
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On August 12 2012 08:16 the p00n wrote:Show nested quote +On August 12 2012 08:01 Ente wrote:
you remember people playing janna soraka lulu mid? Maokai Nautilus jungle who are essentially supports? Orianna/Morgana who are top tier aps right now? they are partly support aswell (they are mainly build for ap but still more supportish then a brand would be)
Supports are INSANLY good and they are the only reason why a non full itemized ad carry can survive against bruisers. I'm actually the jungler/part-time ap mid for our noobteam and only play support junglers and largely support mids (I build morgana with triple gp/10 and 9/9/12 masteries, go figure). The abilities they have are indeed support-oriented, but the difference is that they get a lot of farm and that they usually need a lot of farm. When I'm playing Galio I'm mostly playing a support-ish role, but I get an absolute crapload of farm. Have you ever tried to play support Galio (who was it that tried it, CLG?)? It just doesn't work that well. With 'support' I mean: 'the character on the team that gets no farm or next to no farm', not just support-ish abilities.
That's because the current picking strategies involves having 1 person on your team not getting any gold because you need your ad carry farmed up so he/she can siege turrets and deal damage late game, should the game progress that far. Ad carries scale well with items. Supports scale well WITHOUT items, that's why they're so fucking good. Yes a farmed galio is better than a galio without farm, that's logic everyone can understand, but the only trade-off he gets from having farm is damage.
Janna, leona, taric, soraka, sona these are all characters you can give farm, but why give them farm when they can perform at 80% without giving them any farm and then have someone else who actually have good killing potential take their slot?
I would hate to see this game becoming 4v4, because people finally realized how much potential there is in diversity (2v1 top, 1v2 bot etc.). Also supports aren't a filler role. If RIOT made this game 4v4 i'd say remove the ap carry and have your support get farm instead and screw the ap carry (the support would essentially be the ap carry, but still has the babysitting function in team fights)
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I think the duo lane produces by far the most interesting and strategically deep interactions of all lanes. The only argument you seem to be putting forth is "support is boring to play", which is pretty unconvincing.
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United States47024 Posts
On August 12 2012 08:16 the p00n wrote:
With 'support' I mean: 'the character on the team that gets no farm or next to no farm', not just support-ish abilities.
Then what about Azubu Blaze being massively successful giving the support near jungler-level farm?
0-cs support only happens because people are bad at this game and don't know any better.
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Czech Republic11293 Posts
Given how interesting the 2v2 lane is (or indeed 1v2 lanes are) I'd be more in favour of making LoL 6v6. You could run trilane AND a jungle, you could go mental and do quadra lane and just kill a turret super fast and stuff. 4v4 doesn't seem that interesting compared to 6v6.
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United States47024 Posts
On August 12 2012 08:38 Alzadar wrote:
I think the duo lane produces by far the most interesting and strategically deep interactions of all lanes. The only argument you seem to be putting forth is "support is boring to play", which is pretty unconvincing.
Support is only "boring" because Riot designed supports like Soraka and Sona that have only point-and-click or target-less skills. Not because the role is inherently boring.
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The distance between turrets in mid lane is much, much smaller than the distance between turrets in top and bot. Top lane snowballs crazy hard compared to mid and is therefore a very cutthroat lane, where bruisers and a few casters are the only viable picks; if you add a second "top lane", then that takes a lot away from the unique gameplay each lane has, and restricts champion choice massively... unless you buffed AD carries to the point where they could reliably 1v1 vs. bruisers in top / bot lane, which would probably make them massively OP for when teamfights come.
So, we'd be homogenizing the game greatly... and for what? To get rid of the support role? Support is the favorite role for some people. Many more players prefer not to play support for various reasons (you have a lower impact on the game's outcome for instance), but I think the current situation leads to more varied, interesting gameplay than the OP's 4v4 suggestion.
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I personally love playing supports because i enjoy a 2v2 dynamic in-lane. 2v2 is a lot more dynamic than 1v1 in a side lane. Because of lower frequency of ganks, 1v1 bot would become a fight where everyone would play cait for the range or graves for the damage. Characters like alistar would be eliminated, Items like soul shroud would see even less use. Bot would be alot like top in that it would feel like a free farm fest alot more than it does now.
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I don't think this is the correct way to look at it, tbh. Or perhaps there's more than one way of looking at it.
Something I noticed a lot recently: Champs that are often put into the "support" role as their main role by players aren't because they are bad/useless but because of the way their skill set is built. Seems like most support Champs are just that because they only need to rely on their skills to be effective in team fights.
But you know this.
There are several supports that are able (or have been able) to hold their own in solo lanes (that include bat are not limited to: Nunu, Lulu, Alistar, etc) in order to either win/dominate lanes vs certain other champs and/or matchups, or add some damage into the lategame along with some form of strengthened support.
But you know this as well.
Maybe you can elaborate why you think champions that can function well using only their skill sets are simply bad design or otherwise "useless". Personally, I think that's real good design. Having only champs that all need to be heavily farmed in order to be effective is much more poor design than it is now, imo.
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@most people: you are ignoring what I am trying to discuss. I.e. the guy saying 'try playing only kill lane bottom and you'll see how hard you get wrecked thanks to that 'useless support''. In this scenario the kill lane takes up the support spot and as I stated in my opening post, the 'support' is what has been determined as the optimal filler role - it is obvious that any non-support is going to be inferior for the support role, even if you change that support role into something else.
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Ok, then i'm gonna say support isn't a filler role, ap carry is. Without support you can't effectively play AD carry. If you can't play AD carry effectively you can't siege turrets which obviously is the main idea of this game (killing the nexus huehue).
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EPT
