Velkoz is a ranged mage that specializes in attacking enemies from afar and in unique ways. He is also known for his true damage, which makes him a huge threat if you manage to get hit by everything in his kit.
Velkoz, while one of the weaker champions on this list, can still be very effective, especially in the laning phase. He excels at keeping enemies away and poking them from far distances and unique angles. The trade-off of this power, however, is that he is very vulnerable to ganks due to his lack of mobility and limited crowd control. While this champion isn’t the best, he’s definitely underrated and can be played to a high level with great results when played properly.
Pros
Can poke from far distances
Can help your adc clear waves quickly
Deals a high amount of true damage.
His poke is hard to predict.
Can burst enemies from far distances with full combo
Cons
Lacks any form of mobility
Lacks crowd control to keep high-mobility champions off himself.
Very hard to play efficiently.
Hard to fight enemies when playing from behind.
Very difficult champion to teamfight correctly with
9. Shaco
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Shaco is an assassin-type support that works best at catching your enemies off-guard and tricking them. He can either be an absolute nightmare on the rift or come off as nothing more than a nuisance.
Shaco is a support that can either carry games or simply make it difficult for the enemy to win. His high mobility and invisibility, combined with his boxes, make him a surprisingly diverse support. He can harass enemies quite well but lacks the direct fighting power in most situations if he doesn’t trick his enemies into stepping into his box range, which is his main source of damage, especially early on. But as a support, you’ll find that you have a lot of power when outside of your lane; that is where Shaco really excels: when invading, roaming, and being a nuisance on the map.
Pros
High mobility
High survivability
Can catch enemies off guard.
canward areas on the map very safely.
Very efficient when used to invade or roam
Great at counter engaging lane duels
Cons
Lacks direct fighting power
Doesn't scale well without gold.
Slightly countered by pink wards and Oracles Lens.
It requires setup to get kills in most situations.
Lacks teamfight power
Struggles versus safe-poking champions
8. Brand
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Brand is a burst mage-type support that excels at dealing a lot of damage in a short period of time. With his high burst and max health damage, he can dominate many matchups, especially in team fights.
Brand is the type of support that can do well in lane but truly dominates team fight settings. With his high burst and high potential for spreading damage across the enemy team, he can do a lot of damage, even with the limited gold support gives you. While you can poke in the lane, you will sometimes find that you will push the wave due to the high aoe of Brand’s w and e abilities. This means, compared to other supports, you won’t be as effective at poking while freezing the lane.
His ability to carry is very reliant on hitting his abilities to make full use of his passive. His powerful potential for high AOE damage makes him a big threat in most matchups, especially when you start entering teamfights. Also, unlike others on this list, he doesn't fear tanks and typically builds to go against them anyway.
Pros
High Burst
High damage in teamfight settings
Does percent max health damage
Can push waves quickly
Cons
Lacks mobility
Naturally pushes waves when poking
Difficult to land/ limited CC
Most abilities can be avoided easily.
Struggles warding safely
7. Pyke
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Pyke is an assassin-type support that excels at engaging and catching enemies with his high mobility and hook. He’s known for either dominating games with his ultimate execution or escaping tight situations with his stealth.
Pyke will usually be the type of character that can either dominate a game or feel quite useless. Luckily, his kit gives him a lot of tools, such as stealth, a hook, a stun, and an execute, to help him get ahead early on. Using these tools, you’ll have to try and get ahead, or else you’ll eventually fall off and not be that useful.
Pyke is a character who makes tough decisions. Sometimes you’ll have to use your cooldowns to go in, but if you do, you’ll most likely have to fully commit in most situations, or else your stealth won’t be enough to get you out sometimes. But Pyke has the potential to highly reward players when played correctly; he’s a master of catching your enemies off guard. This is where his main ability to carry comes from, his high damage and his ability to hard engage.
Pros
High mobility
A lot of crowd control
Self sustain after taking damage
High early damage and high damage when fed
Great at roaming
Incredibly fast
Can typically ward quite safely.
Cons
Short range
Scales horribly without gold
Requires engaging or hooking enemies to be useful.
Weak against poke lanes
Cannot be built to be tanky.
Dies quickly if mispositioned
6. Morgana
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She is able to poke, but typically only when landing her key ability, her q. This means that Morgana depends heavily on landing this one ability to be useful. Morgana also provides her ally with support with her shield, which makes her great versus champions with high CC, as the shield can cause her to ignore all of it. Morgana has many tools in her kit, but it heavily depends on the player landing and timing the key abilities to find use out of her kit.
Morgana mainly carries through her damage with her main combo and then depends on her allies to assist her when she uses her long CC chains. While she may be on the lower end of damage on this list, the utility she provides while doing the damage she deals is easily one of the best.
Pros
Long range
A lot of CC
CC immunity
Can assist in pushing waves
Can ward relatively safely
Can be useful at all stages of the game.
Cons
Very dependent on landing Q
You cannot poke if enemies stand behind minions.
Struggles against poke champions
No mobility
Struggles against champions with high mobility
5. Lux
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Lux is a burst artillery-type mage who excels at catching enemies from afar and bursting them with high damage. She brings a moderate amount of utility and CC that allows her to deal damage quite safely.
Lux is really good at poking from safe distances and providing long-range utility with slows and shields. She can also do a lot of damage quickly when using her full combo. She can dominate the lane, especially when paired with a carry that can make use of her range such as Caitlyn.
Lux as a carry can bring out incredibly high damage, even from the support role, but requires gold to be effective when it concerns her damage. But when Lux gets gold, she’s a monster carry and can easily cause many issues for the enemy team, even from extremely far ranges using her ultimate.
Pros
Long range
Safe poke
High burst
Can ward safely
Decent utility
Cons
No mobility
Low survivability
Weak into champions with high engage or better poke
Skills are slow and avoidable.
Struggles against champions with high mobility
4. Zilean
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Zilean is a range-type support that specializes in high utility while also doing decent damage. He has the ability to greatly slow enemies and even resurrect allies, which gives him some of the best utility in the game, but at a limited value.
Zilean is incredibly unique, as he has a lot in his kit, but it’s all very conditional. His revive is one of the most powerful abilities in the game, but it requires great timing for the player you cast the skill on to die. Zilean also has great CC with a high value slow and a stun if you hit both of his q’s on the same target. While he has great utility, his low range on his E, combined with the need to hit both q’s to get full value, makes it hard to get full value on the champion.
While his solo carry potential isn’t as high as some others on this list, the utility he provides while providing good damage and crowd control easily makes him one of the best carries when it comes to supports. He’s also the most efficient person on this list when it comes to having a good person to carry with him, as he enables both them and himself to be in the best position possible.
Pros
Tons of crowd control
High utility
Good poke
Good at all stages of the game.
Can resurrect teammates
Good at engaging in lane
Good at roaming
Cons
Low overall damage
Little mobility outside speed boost
Quite a weak early game.
Mana issues
3. Xerath
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Xerath is an artillery mage-type support that can deal high damage from very far away. He also brings utility with a slow and stun, while also being able to sustain his mana in lane, making him able to last longer than other typical poke champions.
Xerath is probably one of the best poke supports in the game when it comes to raw damage with range. He wins many matchups against other poke champions and typically reigns supreme partially due to his mana sustain with his passive. Xerath does fall off when he faces tanky champions who can easily engage him from far distances, so it’s best to abuse the maximum distance of your range when possible in those matchups.
He can carry his allies by constantly lowering the enemies health with high damage far range poke. While he does not do well in direct fights like some others on this list, he can assist in fights while being completely safe.
Pros
High poke damage
Very high range
Rarely has mana issues
High burst damage
Decent utility
Cons
Struggles against champions with high mobility
No Mobility
Struggles against long-range engagement champions.
2. Zyra
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Zyra is a control-type mage that’s amazing at controlling both the lane and teamfights. With her summons and CC, she can control most situations and leave her enemies surprised with her rather high damage.
Zyra is an amazing support, especially when the enemy doesn’t have many ways to get onto her. She has an incredibly high CC chain along with plants that make it hard for enemies to win trades versus her. She has poke, which is quite safe behind minions, and can burst enemies using her full combo, which is rather easy to hit. Out of many champions on this list, she is probably one of the easiest to play, but also one of the strongest.
Zyra is a particularly strong carry due to her ability to control fights while keeping a safe distance. Unlike most champions on this list, she can control wide areas without putting herself at risk. Her CC is also much harder to dodge than others.
Pros
High damage
Good poke
Tons of CC
Can ward relatively safely
Good at catching enemies out
Amazing teamfighting
Cons
No Mobility
Can fall off at later stages if not fed.
Weak against enchanters with poke.
1. Senna
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Senna is a marksman-type support who provides healing, utility, and damage to her team. She can sustain herself and her allies while providing powerful benefits as she scales into the late game.
Senna is a very interesting champion because her role changes as the game goes on. She starts as a strong support who has good poke and really strong healing, which makes her difficult to deal with in the laning phase. But as she scales with souls, she becomes a powerhouse of range and damage in the late game.
The longer the game goes on, the stronger she is. Senna suffers mostly midgame, where her utility isn’t as strong, but yet she hasn’t scaled enough to be a threat. But late into the game, she has the potential to become even stronger than your actual ad carry.
Pros
Very good power scaling
Great healing
Amazing utility
Good poke
Not gold-reliant
Can impact other lanes without roaming
Great teamfighting
Cons
Awkward midgame
Low mobility
Cannot ward safely.
Dependent on passive to scale
Struggles against champions with a lot of CC who can engage her.
As the Observer, I, Elijah, seek to learn more about how magic works, to learn more about the tales of the heroes of these different universes, and to rewrite the story of our world.
