General DiscussionPlaying Support

lion is my best support, and if you really hate on ur mid you can go take mid farm and have a really strong mid game hero. He has good continuous gank ability with his mana drain and ridiculous disables

shadow demon is one of the most ridiculously powerful supports that can 1v1 someone with much more farm than him and still kill. Purge counters almost all carries and disruption is just amazing.

SD and Kotl are probably the two strongest supports out there nowadays, maybe along with nyx and undying.

Lion is my best and most effective hero and I can honestly say I have games where ive won single handedly with him.

Good supports can make or break a game just as much as carries or solo mids imo but they are just underappreciated

and to OP: good for you for picking supports, need more people like that in the community rather than 5 carry all day

@kittens

I really don't care much about viability or tiering when it comes to picking which kinds of supports I use. The decision is intrinsic in that I just look at the skill-sets of each support and decide whether or not I can have fun with that hero. Jakiro seems to lean more on the offensive, so I'll probably not pick him.

How does Gyro & Magi combo work out?

@)-( (_) ) (

I've played Lion a few times, and I love him. I tried him on mid (bot-game) one time against Viper, and I was a disaster!

What are your tactics with him?
Which spells do you level up first, Spike or Hex? Why one over the other?
Do you level up Mana Drain at all? If so, when?
What is your build with him?

ima suppoting in every match ;) babysitter+wardbitch role.

i love to play lina babysitter. Long range attack, highe damage nuke, cheap aoe stun. Lane domination in most games. Often early kills if your carry is paying attention. And dat ganks at lvl 6 does the job. Also when i got first invi rune i go mid to do some damage and sometimes kill to give advantage to our mid player. But please, dont wait with ult until target will have 100 hp, its just wasted damage. Nuke 75% hp target so theres more use of that damage and let carry take the kill.

My second favourite hero is dazzle. Amazing support, few skill builds usefull depending on lanes. Extremely fun to play :)

Sometimes I also pick zeus as support when playing pubs with friends. I know it sounds weird, but its fun to lane like that and mid game requires insane amounts of patience and attention when youre underfed warding zeus with arcanes and 2 branches ; )
Just get forcestaff and drums/eul for lategame, you can do insane amount of damage in teamfights thanks to passive E.

@nkd

I played with a Zeus who was severely underfed one time. I asked him mid-game where his items were and his lane partner Troll said Zeus gave all the creep kills to him, and he kept buying wards. I never really saw Zeus as a warding hero, or maybe I don't watch enough games to notice.

I'm not really interested in Dazzle as he is a bit popular. I prefer to play underused supports and heroes.

Slayer !!

shadow shaman... two disables, a nuke and a one of the best pushing ulties in the game

Shameless plug for this guide, it is highlighted on PD now: http://www.playdota.com/guides/how-to-play-support. Admittedly i really dont feel like i have been playing some outstanding support lately mainly due to mm doesnt allow you to know if you should play the high impact hero in the team, carry cant carry and mid player sucks.

My personal support hero has to be CM. That bitch is disgustingly good^^

And yes, people who dare to piss on a support who spent every gold and play for the team deserve to die in hell, 'Playing support is against human nature.'.

A good support imo has a stun or if not then a really powerful teamfight skill. They buy courier, wards if they are not on cooldown, and spends gold on supportive items like sheepstick and mek.

Support is so bad on the lower matchmaking tiers I'll normally thank profusely even if they just buy wards when asked and courier at start lol.

I support like a little bitch, what with me being bad at the game my best chance of winning is hoping we have a competent carry or two that I can play Lich for. I love Lich, deny, deny, deny CHAIN FROST! Ward, deny, deny, NUKE! Deny, deny, deny, ward, CHAIN FROST!

Beast.

I couldn't disagree with kittens more. AA is a GREAT support. He can frost/stun them for a long time and it makes it very easy to give your carry kills/breathing room. CM by kittens theory would also not be a viable support, but she's also great. Extra manage for everyone, frostbite (stun with damage) and a slow make her fantastic. Her range is also pretty good (600 I think) which is great for a harass. She's slow and squishy, but that isn't a disqualifier in being a good support. Most supports are squishy anyway. KOTL and a list of others all have the same issue.

CM got drafted just yesterday? or the day before can't remember which team but I'm pretty sure it was like semi finals of the defence 3?

Favourite support to play would be Wisp. Doesn't involve as much ward-bitching, more action, aggression etc. I get to control when the enemy dies, a bit like mid, the role I prefer to play. I tend to get Tranquils + Soul Ring and then go for tankiness, skipping Meka and Mana Boots, the default support gear. Or ES just because of how powerful Fissure blocking is early on and slamming.

As for what my favourite supports are when they support me, probably SD or any healer like Treant, WL, Omni, Dazzle. I like to play burst heroes with carry potential like SF, Invoker and Meepo, which are also very easy to kill with focus. Heroes that fix that are nice. SD just makes them deadlier, but that is fine too, killing them before they focus me down is just as good as not dying to intense focusing.

Honorable mention to Veno for almost always securing a kill, even though it does not offer much defense bar wards. Surprise Gale gank to mid also wins the lane, really good with Cold Snap or Razes.

fuck carrys i just play dem solo mid cuz i don't need to rely on noobs in my lane to play good

Who is your favorite support to use?
- lion, lina

Who is your favorite support for your favorite carry?
- i love to 'support' drow/gyrocopter as sand king :]

My favourite support:
A-A and Warlock

Necrolyte/dazzle/omni are fun 2

my fav would be enchantress, can't get bored with that hero; though not that easy to play correctly but it can be very rewarding and you can transition into a badass carry late game and own everything

Favourite support:
Lina , Sand King, Rubick

Who is your favorite support for your favorite carry?
It is tough to be original with this question, but i would pick SD with AM to make 5AM late game fun

I think a better question here would be,
Who is your favourite support to counter against your most hated carry?
For me, I love to pick Leshrac against Templar Assassin

I actually suggested a nasty buff for Crystal Maiden, but people hated it. =(

Replace her first skill.

Snow Patch: Creates an area on the ground where enemy heroes lose movement speed while giving her bonus movement speed of the same amount. Once a snow patch is placed that exceeds the maximum number, the first one placed disappears. They do not prevent neutral creeps from spawning. Similar to Broodmother's Webs.

She and all allied heroes have vision of the Snow Patch and any enemy heroes who walk through it. This is essentially a ward and utility skill. It also relieves her of having to buy wards with gold she has difficulty attaining considering she has a rather low damage output to begin with, and the fact that it's her "job" anyway.

Range: 700
Radius: 600
Duration: 3/4/5/6 minutes
Enemy Movement Slow: 15%/21%/27%/33%
Bonus Movement Speed for CM: 15%/21%/27%/33%
Quantity: 2/3/4/5
Cooldown: 15
Mana Cost: 100/120/140/160

Do you guys think this is too overpowered for a buff?

Wisp and Leshrac, good supports and very helpful mid-late game

Hey fool.

i love to play Carry.. but support to.. i play them all.. my favorite support for lane is venomancer.. to much dmg and to much push if need it.. kotl is a very good support but some ppl push with his illum and this is not good for your carry bc you push all the time .. but if you playing him smart without pushing he is a pain in the ass for enemy team^^ AA is a very good support for trilane.. hmm something like Venom AA and Sven - or naix.. or whatever carry with stun or slow
so AA can activate hes second skill.or first dont remember sorry.. (sorry for bad english) good luck with my information .. you can find so many combo.. just think .. these days i wanna try wisp..

and sd is a very good counter to Phantom lancer .. anti-mage.. and more. but especially these two

i think omni knight is one of best supports in game. he has magic immunity, heal, slow, and physical immunity. all in one. i love laning with this hero. your carry wont bkb.

i play mostly support when i premade with friends.
some of the best lanes are in my opinion Venom + Sven
Sand King + Sven
Leshrac + Sven
for trilanes a combination of those above - you can use other carrys aswell ofc but i like how sven + stun can basicly kill anything from lvl1 easy

I play support exclusively.
- Dazzle for spamming heals and his survivability
- CM, Lich, Lion for stuns and their easy mana management
- Visage because he's cool

is riki support ?

mobile ward. so yes.

tidehunter for sure !

pudge as support in sidelanes is op just buy qualing blade, cut trees near tower nad hook them like a baws

no.1 goal is a sidelane support is ensuring your carry is getting good farm. That can mean a number of things. If its a tough lane, you may need to stay in the lane and create space for them to farm and keep the enemy back as much as possible. If its a lane they can solo quite well, then you pull/double pull, maybe look for a kill (if they are gankable), or even look for kills or just pressure mid.

I don't play support too much, but you can check these games out (even if its just the laning stage):
http://dotabuff.com/matches/135316484
http://dotabuff.com/matches/135250411

For me jakiro and lion seem to be best support/babysitters. They are both great harassers, have aoe stun and good nukes, and most important, can be played decent without any item except boots.
With lina and leshrac I kinda' feel I need items to avoid feeding. Lich and dazzle are also good, but the lack of aoe stun makes me feel useless after ~30 min.

The thing that pisses me off in pub games is that many "supports" think mekasm and arcanes are more important then wards and carry's farm.

Edit:
@You_Got_Fukt
Supporting against 1 solo lane is easy. Supporting against 2 stunners is the real deal(Ex: ck + lina, sven + jakiro, tiny + leshrac, etc).

Chen is my favorite and possibly the most fun support to play. :)

Hard support, obviously lich, supporting someone on hardlane. Winning hardlane, winning game!

Lina -> because i get tons of kills that make me happy.

Rhasta -> because i get tons of towers and creeps which give me items and make me happy, once i hit 6.

Shadow priest -> because i just own with him.

Warlock -> because he is inbalanced shit and i win 90% games with him.

Apperantly wisp owns a lot, but im not used to him so... DODGE!

Im sure i missed something i like but dont care.

Who i like to support. HONESTLY NOONE COS ALL SUCK.

Visage, most enjoyable support once you get used to him. Solo killing unaware midlaners or carries thanks to the massive familiars burst and nuke, carrying games, deadly ganks for no manacost...

kotl..