Staying Relevant — Supporting in 7.xx
Some time ago we touched on how important supporting is in Dota. The ideas presented in the post still hold true to this day, perhaps even more so. Over the last year Dota has received various changes, and many of them have made the lives of support easier, further empowering them in the earlier stages of the game.
When Valve introduced talents, coupled with the aforementioned improvements for the early game, they affected the scalability of support heroes. Thinking of them only as bait “volunteers” and ward machines have always been a mistake, and in the current meta, supports in the late-game are still a force to be reckoned with, not necessarily providing the damage, but bringing a lot of utility. However, to be fully effective, they do require some items and levels, and managing the support economy is a very deep and complicated topic.
Be proactive
The most common mistake supports do in the early game is not micro-related. It is their persistent inability to get out of their comfort zone and start doing something on the map, when the ability presents itself.
Zoning the enemy offlaner is an important aspect of the early game — it leaves them vulnerable for potential ganks, heavily restricts their level progression, and tips the scales in favor of your core hero, if the game will require your core to 1v1 them. The latter is incredibly important, as you want to get to the point where your core is independent as early as possible, to free the supports up.
If you see that your core is capable of holding his ground in a 1v1 scenario, do not attempt to “win more”, as this activity does come with diminishing returns. Moreover, if you have managed to successfully drive away the enemy hero, there is absolutely no reason for you to stay in the lane.
Spend this time picking up bounty runes or harassing the enemy out of their jungle. Use it to stack camps or pull creep waves, or attempt a gank on a different lane — do not idly sit in your lane, leaching experience. All this time investment not only pays off for your team, but also bolsters your own ability to stay relevant.
In fact, in many scenarios being off the map from the very beginning can be the most appropriate course of action. There are certain offlane heroes who are perfectly capable of holding their ground in 1v2 and even 1v3 scenarios and shrug off the harassment. Trying to zone them out, therefore, will only result in both you and your core losing the experience race — something that can be extremely dangerous and can lose the game outright. Focusing on your own experience and gold progression, with the help of pulls and bounty runes, will more likely provide an opening for a successful gank or better zoning, as it will potentially give your hero an extra ability to work with and maybe even boots.
Always carry a TP, don’t always use it
Teleport scrolls are the bread and butter of the game — you must always have one in your inventory, regardless of the stage of the game. Having an option, however, does not always mean that you have to use it.
There are many reasons for a support hero to want to go back to base: you might need to regenerate mana and health, you might have been killed or you want to pick up items without using the courier. When returning to lane, carefully consider whether your presence there is required at this exact moment — otherwise you risk spending unnecessary gold and putting your only means of helping other lanes on cooldown.
It is absolutely worth it to TP to a lane when your ally is ganked, as worst case scenario is that you get to leach some solo experience. Therefore it is even more important to have a scroll at the ready. And there is nothing wrong with walking back, especially as a support hero, as you can still be useful on your way, by stacking camps and picking up runes.
Cherish your life
The sacrificial mentality of support players is something many of us have to unlearn and is perhaps the biggest change from the early days of Dota. You have to survive to get the needed experience and you need to be careful with your life, as you can and must stay relevant throughout the game.
For most supports hit-and-run tactics is always the best course of action — go in, use your spells, get out. There is rarely a reason for you to hit with your measly attack speed and damage, if it puts you in any danger. A guaranteed second usage of your spells is almost always preferable.
Saving your teammates is still often a priority and sometimes you will have to pay with your life, but always make sure that the sacrifice is guaranteed to have an impact, and won’t simply feed the opponent.
Use your gold wisely
The whole point basically boils down to “stop using reliable gold on wards”. Yes, you have to purchase wards and yes, the costs of it add up, but with gold talents, bounty runes and general ability to kill a jungle creep, there is rarely a reason for you to spend reliable gold on consumables, wards and smaller items. Save it for when you need a 
Staff of Wizardry for your 
Force Staff, or 
Talisman of Evasion for your 
Solar Crest.
You will die in a typical game of Dota as a support. Unless it is a complete stomp against incompetent enemies, you will probably die multiple times. Dying is already a massive hit to your economy and level progression, don’t make it worse by losing extra gold.
Ask your teammates for space
There is a reason you were stacking camps and allowed your core hero to have uninterrupted farm in the early game, while you were running around collecting bounty runes and ganking — at some point you will need them to give you some personal space and get experience and gold.
The gold cores get from a stacked jungle with a decently farming core hero won’t always be as high, as what they would get from the lane, but it will almost always be beneficial for the team as a whole. Jungle is another source of income, but it must be cleared once in a while, for it to have any effect on the game. Leaving supports in lane will often allow them to hit the necessary level, be it their ultimate or an early gold/xp talent. When playing support, ask for this space and do your best to get the maximum from it.
Closing Thoughts
To think that the support became important only recently would be wrong — they were always an important part of your team, regardless of the patch and state of the game. In the recent years, however, they were empowered to a point, where if you don’t utilise them to their fullest, it will be excruciatingly hard for your cores to carry the game, especially if the enemy support knows what he’s doing.
Be proactive, cherish your life and you will stay relevant throughout the game and win it. Or adhere to the status quo, put all the responsibility on the shoulders of your carries and complain how you can’t rank up because of bad teammates, despite you “warding all game”. The choice is yours.
GANDALF BEST INVOKER EU
Hey, Since Dazzle is my favorite character, I was wondering whether you think playing Dazzle as less of a Save-from-every-gank hero and more of a gank helper is viable?
I am best RU support and about top 20 in EU
really good article really underlines the key supports attributes at higher mmr as well as lower!
Oh Rubick, Clockwerk and Enigma, my beloveds. How good it feels to carry your carry into carrying you!
I think it was leech not leach, but....
Nice article
Thank you for this article. Support can be confusing and misunderstood.
One of the best articles ever written on Dotabuff. The argument against "winning more" alone was worth writing the article.
Very well writtten ez article gg
One personal tip / opinion I'd like to add for lower-mid tier games: Build an HP item early! When you're a rubick or a CM with a blink dagger, arcane boots and 1k health @ 40 mins you're not really going to contribute all too much in an equal game. However, I lost count of how many fights were turned around because I built an atos / aghs instead and survived on 100 hp. You don't have to go that far, a simple point booster or even a bracer can make a huge difference.
i used to hate supporting but lately all i want is win, So i am keep playing as a support and i have decent win rate.
I stopped playing supp cuz my carry is suck
just buy wards and stay out of my way..ill carry any support's noob ass
"lul" said the SEA server players
i'm on a 7 win streak with dazzle in ranked games, i'm climbing in mmr just by playin support(1700 to 2600). this article makes me happy, maybe support players will finally be recognized !!! i get a lot of commend but lots of people forget to even thank you for ur hard work in games. How many carrys think so high of themself forgetting there early stage was won because of there supp...
I've been playing Dota for just over 2 years now. I calibrated my MMR at 1.8 k and I was told by friends that 'You can only win ranked games if you play mid or carry'. I tried this but actually lost MMR to 1.4 k. I switched to support and I've reached yesterday 3.1 k MMR. Supporting is for me the most fun role to play and arguably the role that dictates the early to mid game dynamic. And I still find people that think that supporting is for noobs or low skill players. Tell that to Misery, Zai, Jerax, Fly, Yapzor, Puppey, Kuroky, GH and others. Supporting is fun and much more important than what the community currently thinks. Good article!
I think Icefrog will continue to nerf them.
Playing support is fun until your cores throw the game when your team is much ahead.
I learned the game playing supp heroes, specially lion. I think my problem is to be followed by teammates cuz I like to play aggressive when supporting using smokes and wards to gank. Sometimes they even do the gank with me and fall back to jungle instead of taking objectives. This makes supporting very irritating in 2k.
@Angry Spatula - the aggressive dazzle build maxing poison touch seems to be more popular lately. Great for early kills in your lane as well as punishing a tower dive by an opponent in any lane (always have a TP ready like the article suggests). Being aggressive keeps the offlaner off of your carry and hinders your opponents' farm, as opposed to only focusing on healing your carry which doesn't stop the offlaner from having an impact.
Dont forget to mention supports MUST be in fog of war always - dont try to depush / push a lane unless its near tower and your allies in your touch , unless you play shaman or something
but really most important thing is stay in fog
Then mostly warding and deward
in this meta counter ganking and ganking as double support is important
pos 4 and 5 should work together
after 20 min your cores can buy you support items just ask
"leaching" should be "leeching"
In SEA servers, there is no such thing as "supports"
I learn from the best. I learn from mastah singsing. Boot+orb of venom as starting items, i go kill kill murder murder.
supports cant push so they cant win the game simple...regardless of the points being made for supports, if your carrys are retarded and dont push objectives after kills you can keep wiping the other team it wont mean shit late game and they'll push and win it
even supports like shaman who have pushing potential its not a direct push by any means, his ult is more like a complimentary sort of push you cant depend on it as your primary push strat....maybe late game with aghs and refresher but he's like the only support with that mechanic anyway
so supports can net you kills and farm but cant win you the game...same thing can be said with killing heroes like pudge and timber...if you want to climb the mmr ladder the first thing you need is a pushing hero who is self dependent for the most part and you can fall back to the jungle with if youre getting rekt in lane
think troll and lc
in the trenches its always a great idea to go shadow blade and rat...just carry a tp
^ this comment sucks
Пустил слезу
Yea that mentality that supports are for noobs is so dumb. Any idiot can right click on creeps. Creating strategies and making calls to ganks and pulls are what shape the overall games outcome. Make sure you convert wins into solid Pushes and it's gg.
I don't like the last line, despite the truth of it. It comes across as an opinion, which articles are not for. Articles are for facts and food for thought. However on the whole it was a very nice and I personally completely forgot that reliable gold existed and will now take it into consideration in all games, not just on supports.
Thank you.
Играю онли на саппах, советы для начинающих игроков.
Но все равно думаю многим будет интересно почитать.
Worst thing you can experience as support, is to support your carry who is total retard!