Things got changed up a little in the recent preseason changes for League of Legends. Support characters have had their income stats thrown all over the shop, with the hope that they will offer more player agency. However the changes in the patch have lead some on the Riot forums to believe that the changes will make Support an exceptionally unappealing role, and that “AP mids are now going to replace these nerfed pieces of junk”.
Riot are convinced that this skepticism of the changes made to League of Legends is unfounded, and Lead Content Designer Morello has taken to the forums to clear the air a little. “AP Mids may have additional viability bottom lane, though our changes are specifically to bulwark against that,” he assures the LoL community.
In his post Morello notes that “Support needed satisfaction, a more fleshed-out identity of “helper,” and a place in the game that’s real and valid. That’s the entire premise of the preseason support changes… We now have a world of characters who have been only balanced to have no gold now having quite a bit of gold!”
Morello points out three main issues that have occurred because of the preseason changes. He explains that the old support balance base lines are no longer valid or balanced, noting that if the same kind of stat boost was applied to Marksmen, Fighters or Mages gold income the balance would still be askew.
Previous to the patch, people saw Support characters as champions that worked well with limited gold resources. Whilst this is no longer the case with the Support gold income changed, Morello believes this helps make the Support a more valuable role. “By introducing support scaling, supports become MORE supportive through gold – either through acquisition of active items or AP scaling on utility. This is all done specifically to not have AP Mages and Supports fight each other in a raw numbers perspective, and instead provide supports with scaling that fits their role of helping people and working with their team.”
As regards to the patch being called a nerf, Morello thinks such claims are “insane”. Support income should be increased to between 3000 and 6000 per game, and he notes that the team at Riot were very careful when making changes to ensure Supports were protected from becoming obsolete.
It’s clear that Riot are very confident in the changes made to Support characters, and their argument certainly makes the class sound far more compelling. Are you convinced that it’s a positive change though, or still standing stalwart against these meddlesome additions?