What happened to support champions? Keria playing Caitlyn and 100 Thieves bringing out the new strat with Azir support in the LCS. Are League of Legends support champions just that useless now?
Viewers have been complaining about professional League of Legends and the bot lane meta, but it seems that there are some interesting new choices for support champions being played. On January 26, 2023 T1's support Keria pulled out an unconventional pick and the LCS started off with one of the weirdest support picks to date.
What has happened to the bot lane in League of Legends, and what has made players choose these unconventional new picks?
Azir, Caitlyn, Jhin – The Newest League of Legends Support Champions
Things like Miss Fortune or Ashe support have been around for a while. Who else remember the iconic Ashe and MF bot lane from the Rox Tigers all the way back in 2016 at Madison Square Garden? Playing these off-meta supports is nothing new or weird, but now some new names have joined the list of unconventional picks.
It seems that T1's support Keria is ain a full on brawl with 2022 World Champion BeryL to find out who can play more weird support picks, right? On January 26, 2023, he pulled out a brand-new support pick, playing Caitlyn alongside Gumayusi's Varus in the second game against Kwangdong Freecs.
But Caitlyn bot wasn't the only weird pick that was chosen on January 26, 2023. In the first match of the 2023 LCS season 100 Thieves support Busio picked up another unconventional pick with Azir. Though Azir bot did not have as good of a debut as Caitlyn did with 100 Thieves losing to C9, it'll likely still make its way to your solo queue games.
Heimerdinger Support is a pretty popular option right now too, right?
Are Conventional Support Champions Dead?
These new support picks aren't going to completely kill off regular supports. Instead, these are picks that can only be played into very specific team comps and are meant as counter picks to what the enemy team has drafted. This means that you shouldn't blindly pick Azir into anything in your bronze solo queue games.
Caitlyn, for example, is an insane early game pick who excels at pushing the lane, especially when paired with another long range champion like Varus. With a bit of help from the jungler, she can push the lane and bully shorter ranged compositions with ease.
Your own team composition will play a key part when playing Caitlyn support since you'll need enough peel and Crowd Control (CC) to warrant this pick, since all she's got for peel and utility are her Yordle Snap Traps.
Similarly, Azir support is another very situational pick. His Shurima Shuffle can be great in fights and works just as well as a support as a mid lane. He's also got good poke, especially when taking trading runes like Electrocute or Comet. Busio picked this champion to counter C9's Heimerdinger, which worked well early, but Azir fell off in the later stages of the game due to a lack of utility, just like Caitlyn would.
So, while these champions are fun and unique in the bot lane, they're extremely situational and require the right team composition to pull them off, otherwise you'll just get flamed and look silly. Keep them to the pros for now guys and just play Yuumi support.