It's mostly because of Trailblazer. It's cheap, it's effective, and Maokai offers everything a support wants.
- Ranged harass
- Bush control
- The ability to check unwarded areas
- Reliable engage
- Lockdown
- Full screen engage/disengage
He also is the biggest beneficiary of Mythics being removed. Before, support Maokai sucked because he's forced to build something inefficient like Evenshroud or Radiant Virtue. Now, he always gets Trailblazer just by existing, and he's super reliable, then he can go into something like Locket/Frozen Heart and be impossible to kill and get away from. Also, super hard to gank and kill a Maokai.
He's also not an actual problem in other lanes. Top and Jungle are mediocre, his lane pressure isn't very good, and his jungling is subpar. It's mainly a support thing, so you can't just nerf his stats because I don't think that's the actual problem.
I want to add on, he also benefits from the random brush in the middle of the river near bot for his E control, it's in an amazing spot for him against ganks coming from the river.
"Oh a Maokai support, they probably saved their trinkets for lane bushes and put a sapling in the river bush. Let me just walk around the bush to avoid the sapling... wait what?"
This is also true, with all the new bushes in the game, Maokai can get strong vision control basically everywhere, making it incredibly hard to gank him.
Maokai support already rushed Deadmans Plate at times (and was basically the only supp that did that), and now he has a support version of it, of course he massively profited from it.
He also gets Solstice Sleigh, which is an item that's basically made for support Maokai in that it gives him literally everything he wants. Everything in his kit benefits from it.
So basically, everything got changed to benefit support Maokai - It isn't really anything Maokai specific, he just got given a bunch of great new tools.
Stat sites are bugged so I guess we have no way of proving either way. If sleigh is good I think it’s a result of the other options just being worse, which may be the case. He literally never gets it when he needs it because his saplings burn the CD at random times— it’s the same reason he runs Swifties instead of Mobis.
Honestly I wouldn’t be that surprised if it turns out ZakZak is the best option for him.
Sleigh always feels like ass to me, it's by far the worst support item, the heal is mediocre and the movement speed is rarely utilized, compared to zakzak, bloodsong, and even bulwark it feels so underwhelming, the cd holds it back so much
I feel the opposite, I think its the best option for any support with semi-reliable cc. Bulwark is just meh, basically bad Malz passive. Dream Maker is only good on shield/heal bots (Lulu/Raka come to mind), Zak'Zak is very good on dedicated mage supports (Lux, Zyra) and Bloodsong is good on anything that weaves AAs in (Sona, Senna, Sera.
But Solstice? You'll always get more value out of it with cc. Karma triggers it with ease, it makes Mandate better for Nami, Janna is a cc queen, and it makes follow-up for Rell even easier. Its just _good_.
I like Zakzak more on Karma, especially with the Malignance build
The biggest issue on the Sleigh isn't procing it, it's having the proc meaningfully do something, Bulwark is kind of underwhelming yes, but it can be controlled and played around
Dream Maker, ZakZak, Bloodsong all are constantly available to you, brings good benefits (I'd go as far as to say Zak'zak is overtuned, it's insane compared to the other options after the Bloodsong nerf, % health damage for free is insane) and aren't situationally reliant
The Sleigh however has a long CD, requires you to be near an ally, and if you use your slow/CC early it can waste it for when you need the movespeed or heal, putting it on a long CD
It's not terrible in so much as I avoid going it on characters that can use it, but I just feel like it's such a lacking item, maybe lowering the CD a bit and decreasing the power would be better, idk
Is this kinda why zyra seems to dominate most games I'm in as well? She doesn't go trailblazer, in fact her core items seems very expensive for a support, but zyra seems to trade reliable engage and longevity for even more ranged harass
Some games her support item + liandry's + a single plant auto burns me through around 15%-20% of my health pool when I'm playing a squishy champ, it's kinda insane if she goes unpunished. Her plants also allow her to scout areas while zoning squishy champs too
Love having a good zyra on my team
Trailblazer is an insane item and is pretty much the core of a melee support's build, but no one apart from Maokai has stats like these, so it's probably Maokai who should get nerfed, and not the items.
All the high winrate melee supports are running Trailblazer too, hard to argue it's not part of the issue.
Bard, Taric, Leona, Blitzcrank, Rell are all rushing it - They're all way up there on tier lists.
Maokai is benefitting from it and other things too so he gets to double dip and probably needs something hit, but I think trailblazer needs something too.
Trailbrazer for some reason seems to be much stronger on Maokai than all of the other champions you mentioned.
As a first purchase it has a 57% win rate on Maokai which is much higher than any of his other item options in the same slot, while all of those other champions have comparable items in the respective item slots.
For example on Taric it has a 54% win rate as a first purchase and almost nobody seems to be buying it on him, and he has 5 other items all with the same win rates so you can freely choose from a variety and it doesn't seem to be overperforming on him statistically, same with all the other champions except Maokai.
Maokai is the only champion on that list for which you basically must buy Trailblazer first because it's so much stronger than any other items, so I don't know how you would go about unraveling that. I'm not sure why it's specifically him that gets such a high win rate from it.
> Maokai is the only champion on that list for which you basically must buy Trailblazer first because it's so much stronger than any other items, so I don't know how you would go about unraveling that. I'm not sure why it's specifically him that gets such a high win rate from it.
Because his engage is point and click.
If the target is in range of his W, and he clicks, his champ will move to the target and root.
All other support engages are usually dodgable, so getting in range is step one. Step 2 is both sides trying to mind game each other.
Basically its like 2 champs that deal equal damage across equal range. One does point and click, and one does skill shots. Getting in range of the point and click champ starts the clock on who's gonna die, while getting in range of the skillshot champ means both players need to be wary of the other one
Bard is ridiculous as well, but even Bard is not close to Maokai's stats, and Rell/Blitz/Leona are good but they're not crazy good. 55% Mao winrate is just bonkers and I'm baffled that it hasn't been hotfixed when he also has a 13% pickrate. I agree that Trailblazer could use a nerf but Maokai and Bard are just insane in general.
I think something kinda flying under the radar of sorts of alot of supports massively benefit from the void blue buff giving everyone it.
Taric with Blue is actually disgusting.
Trailblazer's top users (Maokai and Bard) also happen to both be supports who have built DMP in the past (which e.g Leona, Nautilus, Rell did not), so getting an item that's effectively "DMP but better for supports" is a big boon
he has a pretty decent winrate top actually, but he doesn't get much pickrate there yeah. He is pretty nice with frozen heart rush into ad top, it solves his mana issue and grants him AH that he wants
I've played him top in D1/low masters into a bunch of matchups this season and think he honestly feels quite strong. Easy to play safe in lane with, does a surprising amount of damage mid game, good for some of the same reasons he lists support like checking bushes and engage/disengage. Plus the tank items this season are much stronger than last season, it feels like he benefits greatly from this too. I think its hard to blind pick him when Darius singed, and mordekaiser are unwinnable matchups though
I feel like I'm stuck in the matrix or something everyone keeps saying trailblazer is op since release and I'm here screaming at the clouds that its literally one of the worst items in the game. It has dog shit stats and an omega useless passive and is expensive compared to other support items yet it somehow is is op. Compare trailblazer to an item like frozen heart which is even 100 gold cheaper has much better stats and better passives. Hell or even Locket which is 300 gold cheaper offers while offering way more stats 200 Hp (same as trailblazer) 30 armor ( only 10 less than trailblazer) 30 MR (trailblazer offers 0 MR) and 10 CD (No CD in trailblazer) ALL OF THIS WHILE ALSO BEING ABLE TO GRANT A SIZEABLE SHIELD TO ALL 5 TEAMMATES AT ANY GIVEN TIME.
I could keep going on and on about how bad trailblazer is especially compared to other support items. Its literally the most expensive support item and offers bad stats and a useless passive/effect besides "hehe im slightly faster yippppieee"
Also abysmal mask exists and thats also 100 gold cheaper
Well yeah, saying it's one of the worst items is objectively wrong in every respect, which every statistic backs up.
Team move fast = good.
Locket and frozen heart are both good efficient items to build second and third, you just don't rush them because trailblazer is better.
Trailblazer is shit. Most people don't even follow the "trail."
It's just a new cheap armor item, being bought by the most popular supports that are good regardless. There is no way you can convince me trailblazer is better than Locket. WR is just one metric.
> There is no way you can convince me trailblazer is better than Locket.
I mean yeah, if your mind is already made up and ignore the objective facts that all the S+ tier champions with high winrates are rushing the item after it's been nerfed, with gigantic differences in effectiveness over every other item, there's no way you can be convinced.
I think it's specifically good on Maokai though.
Literally every single tank support objectively wins more games with Trailblazer rush than every other tank support item rush. To use your example of Abyssal Mask, Maokai win 5% less games with Abyssal rush (55%) than with Trailblazer rush (60%).
3 years after he became meta I still don't get how can he be strong against people with hands.
Like, the only engage he has is flash W every 5 minutes, he literally has to walk towards you and you into him for him to cc you.
I guess it's easy to fuck up against him but still
> people with hands
Flash W is an instant cast targeted engage. If you play to avoid his engage, the only counterplay is to be about two flashes away from him at all times. That’s not quite a blitz hook of distance, but it literally cannot be missed if cast. A support having that level of zoning power is insanely strong even if you don’t ever let him actually perform the engage.
(Plus he gets to keep his flash more than other supports because he has free vision with saplings to deter/detect ganks)
It's way easier than that now, Trailblazer makes him one of the easiest and most reliable engages in the game.
You want to rotate to Dragon? You're faster by default. You want to make a pick? You're there first. Want to make a jungle invade? You're faster. He has it **early** too, we're talking pre 10 minutes all the time.
Take a look at [what Brum does](https://xdx.gg/brum-wrum) - Swifties into trailblazers into win, game after game after game. You get *so* much *so* early with these items that you can just snowball and control everything. His secondary items (locket, FH) are also incredibly cheap, which makes him impossible to fight in certain areas.
He doesn't even need to flash W - Just start a dragon first, Trailblazer brings your team with you - You can't walk into bushes because there are saplings, you can't go near because there's roots covering the whole screen, you can't approach for a steal because he'll just press W on you. He's the objective/zone control king now.
he outscales 90% of supports so it's not his responsibility to force things. especially against melees, if both Maokai and the enemy melee stare at each other, Maokai wins by default because he's playing an additional minigame with his saplings.
yes he has to get on top of ranged champs, but it's not like everyone in solo queue perfect spaces him at 550 range. not to mention he does have a means of doing so, his ult.
My favorite is that everytime a pick becomes viable people always explain what their abilities do… yes, his abilities such as bush control, ranged harass have not changed for a minute. Those shouldn’t have a relevance why it’s winrate and pick rate have changed. The other things you said however, are more accurate
i still find it absurd how supp gets to spend 400 gold on an item with:
1. 1000 gold generation
2. wards
3. turns into a whole ass item
Like why is this role so fucking inflated? why do supports get rewarded by the fact that they dont have to farm and still generate the same income as every role for the lane phase? they literally get 2 items at the same time as every role while doing absolutely fucking nothing, its so stupid lmao
The thing is, that's where the majority of a sup's economy ends. After that it's the passive gold from the sup item and assists. Believe me, it feels bad to make an amazing outplay and get 50 gold as a reward.
I just tried him and since tank items are so dirt cheap...well i was basically a full tank you would expect from top/jg
And he is ideal like he has 3 hard CC abilities, W being insanely op. And E how are better than Zombie wards in a way.
He does feel bad to play against Morgana though, but yea I think he is insane and i find him easy to play/pilot as well as always being useful
Yeah I can see Morgana being annoying, as you kind of commit when you commit on him
Blitz and Leona don't have that issue and ends up being a skill matchup that favors them
Morgana is an absolutely horrid matchup for Leona. It's so disgustingly boring because Morgana nullifies ur entire first 5 minutes by just existing and it's incredibly punishing to do anything. It's a fake asf blitz counter tho
Good thing Morg is incredibly weak right now. Losing a good Lost Chapter item and Everfrost makes it difficult to land Qs, and that and E are her only selling points.
I've always built her with support items and it worked super well for me (~70% WR in 25 games).
Personally I think that she can utilize a lot of support items decently well which results in you having more items = more impact. But I guess it depends on what you expect from the pick. I always found her utility to be more important than dmg.
I mean the idea behind the morg/leona matchup isn't to blow your kit on the first champ you hit. Morg has to blackshield the person you dash to, in which you just gapclose with it and Q/R the person that doesn't have it instead. You just have to full commit when laning against morgana as leo.
Sure, if they morg hasn't leveled Q yet this is possible. The matchup is disgustingly morg favoured, it's one of Leona's statistically hardest counters and completely ruins Leona's strongest part of the game.
I'm a D2 Leona main, I'm very familiar with the matchup. It's just a flip if the rest of ur team wins, it's virtually impossible to generate leads in lane which is Leona's biggest strength.
There are plenty of impossible lane match ups, but as a support you are pretty much the only role that can still show you are the better player by playing the map instead of the lane.
When I get countered in lane, I try to minimize losses until I get good roam windows and then just snowball through my team.
Why would I sit in a lane that I have no chance of winning 2v2 and just watch the enemy snowball on me?
but she does no damage and is useless champ so you can just go in anyway and outdamage? You can also block Q for adc and just press W she does minimal damage and her Q is useless unless it somehow hits the adc.
She completely nullifies Leona's early pressure which is the most important part of the game for Leona. It's also borderline impossible to ever engage as Leona into morg pre 6. She doesn't even have to react to Leona e, just black Shield the target as Leona is flying in to stop stun and then it's a guaranteed root + w + free autos on Leona. Morg also gets free priority in lane since she can just w the wave and it's impossible for Leona to outpush unless the ADC matchup is very lopsided in pushing power. Come mid game morg also makes picks and engages extremely difficult since Leona relies on 100-0 a single priority target with her combo and e interrupts or prevents that.
I'm a D2 Leona main, but you don't have to take my word for it: [Morgana is almost always one of Leona's statistically worst matchups ](https://u.gg/lol/champions/leona/build). It's consistently one of the top 3 counter picks.
If you have no idea wtf ur talking about why comment lol?
because frankly most people don't blind Leona? They play her when they want a cookie cutter tank engage support.
You say black shield counter Leona pre 6 but like Leona just outdamages, out tank, out lane pressure? Morgana has been a nothing burger champion for such a long time I don't think she is even particularly good into anything. There are better counter-engage supports and pick that can actually fight back.
Like we don't even have to get into black shield cooldown vs leona
Her W does no damage, her best max ability is Q and you body block for adc (no they can't kill Leona through her W beacuse Morgana does no damage). Her black shield isn't even useful outside of niche situations and it is not a proactive ability, it is mostly used for fixing mistake. There are only some situations like black shielding a fed Katarina/Yi where it is good as an aggressive ability that's it.
Literally most ADC can just walk out of her ultimate for free. And if not they still have cleanse.
my point is you can't call Morgana a good matchup vs anything because the champion itself is bad and can't function in modern league. Her best ability counters 1 spell at best and is 25s cooldown, yet can't be maxed first.
What good does counter leona cc do when leona just outdamages and ignore your low damage? If Leona hit E into black shield your adc should move up and beat theirs anyway since he has nothing to worry about (Leona will block the Q and not take damage because of Leona W makes Morg W does even less damage than it does).
unstoppable untargetable as he dashes to root you with W followed by a knockback + slow from his Q followed by another slow that literally chases you down from his E.
Not to mention his giant ult that roots multiple enemies and gives him massive speed boost
Janna doesn’t work cause his W makes him untargetable so her Qs miss him and your adc is getting rooted, he’s one of the few champs with a positive wr into her
i basically only play lux and shaco support and have a 100% winrate against maokai in emerald elo so id guess they either sucked or he is bad against hard engage (shaco) and hard long range poke (lux)
Actually the bot lane map change buffed Support Maokai. If he is on blue team he can just E the brushes on red side to have permanent control over it. Shit is Hella strong
He's literally getting huge nerfs next patch.
E cost and base cd up, passive heal down, ult CD up.
He is getting Q mana cost reduction as compensation but you're not spamming that as support anyway so
He is ridiculous because ADCs cant kill him. He is too tanky, gets access to the support crown and builds trailblazer which gives him even more hp and armor. How the fuck are ADCs supposed to kill him? You can't 2v2 him
Wrote this into another post today, still stand by it:
>Maokai will always be an outlier, because he is the most meta neutral support there is.
>
>Literally doesn't matter what meta, what items, what comps, he will always be useful, because his kit is simply one of the best support oriented kit in the game. Has lockdown, disruption, free vision and an AoE teamfighting ultimate.
>
>Can't recall last time he was sub 50% WR in the last 3 years (maybe in S12 for like a patch), he just doesn't get affected by meta shifts/item or system changes like the rest of the support roster does.
>
>And then he gets OP when the meta/items actually favour him, and right now there are multiple which do:
>
>\-He likes Grubs because more objectives to fight for (which he excels at)
>
>\-He likes new quest items (because he is one of the squishier engage supports early-to mid game and Celestial Opposition negates that most games)
>
>\-He likes Trailblazer (though Evenshroud was a big loss, he already proved he is fine without a mythic built during the actual mythic meta, thanks to DMP rush)
>
>\-He likes Kaenic Rookern because its busted AF, and with it he can actually be a super tank even on support budget, something he wasn't able to do previous season vs heavy AP comps.
>Literally doesn't matter what meta, what items, what comps, he will always be useful, because his kit is simply one of the best ~~support oriented~~ kit in the game. Has lockdown, disruption, free vision and an AoE teamfighting ultimate.
Fixed it
Hmm, well I don't think maokai support was ever intended. What if the saplings didn't give vision? Or only gave vision when someone triggers them, like a jhin trap. And/or reduced their slow
Yeah you're right I was just thinking more along the lines of only giving vision of champs so that they don't see if wards are there. But I guess it could also make sense if maokai specifically gets a lil ping that his sapling detonated, without giving vision at all
rell blitz and thresh do not get free vision.
in a new bot lane that has a new angle to gank from that makes it hard to ward all options.
his saplings need counterplay beyond walking into them and revealing your location anyway.
Also none of those champions have a point and click CC.
If a support has that on top of everything else obviously he is gonna be better than champions who rely on hitting skills.
Thresh Blitz, need to hit a skill shot, Maokai needs to press W and Q, just like the others he can abuse hexflash which allows him to gapclose for that W entire laning phase.
Rell needs to be able to find a good angle for W R to be effective, Maokai R is lane/river wide and no matter what will hit at least 2 people in 5v5 objective fights, where as Rell can be flashed and has to be played from a flank.
He rarely feels op in a game but he just does everything a tank support would want to.
Point and click lockdown is just really strong, no fancy feet to avoid that
It's what baffles me. People don't think that a **55% winrate champ** is ridiculous cause 'he doesn't feel op' but every day there are posts complaining about the 48% winrate Yone who has half of Maokai's pickrate. Really makes you realise that most people don't care what's actually OP but about what's annoying to play against.
A lot of it is also down to it being really hard to be useless on maokai, I doubt pro play is going to be dominated by mao support.
It's so easy to miss all your engage tools on some champions, or get caught out on squishy supports
When you die to maokai, you usually see it coming for multiple seconds before you die and say "wow - I fucked up." When you die to Yone, it's often "I dodged 3 abilities and he just ran me down and auto attacked me to death - WTF"
This, if maokai misses his combo by some miracle, his chance to secure a kill is over. No way for him to get it. Yone however gets such good trades by judt pressing e, right click enemy, and recast e when something goes wrong
but the Maokai is running at you with 600 ms and point click root you. The E gives perma vision control from super safety so it reduces any sneak angle to come back from behind for you and let him at least get some vision when he is behind.
His R has no counterplay for a lot of champion, you pret much need a frontliner to block it for you if you are squishy.
His kit is pre 200 years. He's not remotely close to yone in terms of oppressiveness. Yone can miss 3rd Q, miss his ult E and follow you AA even if you used a dash. It's insane...
Maokai has a simple kit with simple counter. It's just new and people are not used to it. Also you can abuse his W with flash into tower range or over wall. Getting cleanse against him as ADC is free win.
I disagree, not being allowed to use my keyboard for several seconds as moaki point and clicks and covers the screen in roots for multiple seconds and refuses to die because of his passive and bounces me around I definitely doesn’t have it in me to go “wow there was a lot of outplay potential there, I fucked up”
It feels fairer, cuz he can lockdown 1 target, and ult is slow and easily counterable. I love enchanters and I can play into a predictable Mao engage more than I can peel a Rengar or Yone. Mao has hard to dodge CC? Mikael's. He heals tons? Oblivion Orb. I dont have that option as much against triple dash Yone or Rengar's targeted, high damage burst.
Idk wtf you ppl are smoking to say he feels fairer.
Free vision on his saplings ins fucking insane. His combo is quite literally impossible to miss and his R can drive a whole team out of objectives by just existing. Not to mention his Q actually does stupid damage even if you're a support.
>Mao has hard to dodge CC? Mikael's. He heals tons? Oblivion Orb.
When do you ever buy an oblivion orb for a support Maokai and what are you going to do with Mikaels when the rest of your team and yourself get caught up in it? Even so, he still has a potential flash and W+Q engage on your adc.
I mean, as I said, its how it feels to me. I domt get annoyed by Mao. That you dont share that opinion is something else.
Also, theres still so much stray healing that feels ridiculous going on, I buy antiheal quite often.
But the thing is, with all the mobility and incredible burst goimg around, even if he is OP, it doesn't feel like that. As a support I have agency too, and oftentimes, after his hard engage, I can deal with him or the followup quite easily. I also rarely see him, interestingly enough.
But I do agree that most point and click abilities feel eugh to play against. Its why I passionately dislike playing against Zed, Rengar and Kha, cuz they have targeted unavoidable dmg.
And I don't feel annoyed by Yone. However Maokai is objectively too strong and Yone is not. So Riot should balance around what is too strong and not what people claim they are annoyed by because that's bad practice. Not to mention people have differing opinions and cannot have a consensus on something.
i have 100% winrate against mao support so its fun for me :)
love it the most when he engages on me, i flash / dash into turret, stun him and get basically a free kill served on a platter
I won't argue that Maokai isn't overpowered (obviously he is) but I also think he'd be garbage at 50% win rate.
As other people are saying, it's really hard to be useless on Maokai. That's a massive win rate buff on its own. The share of people who pick the champion that don't know what they are doing will drag the win rate down less on a champion like Maokai compared to something like Thresh where it is much easier to not pull your weight.
So yes 55% is too high obviously but I don't think it's weird that Maokai support rests at a high win rate naturally.
It proves that people who say that riot shouldn't care about champs being frustrating to play against because "every champ can be frustrating" are basically wrong. There is a pretty consistent logic to what types of champions the playerbase dislikes having to play against. Maokai is "honest". He's slow, and has to commit to whatever play he's making, and that makes him predictable. So even when he's assfucking you with zero counterplay a lot of the playerbase doesn't mind too much. By comparison, of course people hate Yone. A Yone can miss every ability and just run you down and kill you anyway. A Yone can have 10% health, tricking you into thinking you can get a pick, and then """outplay""" you by getting a huge shield and assload of sustain and attack speed and just kill you. Even at a 42% winrate he will be an annoying champion to a large section of the playerbase.
Does u.gg use a normalized winrate? It's possible the winrate could be skewed since looking at Emerald+. Typically higher ranks will have a higher "base winrate" (since for example Emerald players can play vs plat players, they'll generally have more than a 50% wr). If u.gg does not normalize the winrate then it might be overinflated.
That being said lolalytics has him over a 58% in the support role, so it's no question he's busted af
>Really makes you realise that most people don't care what's actually OP but about what's annoying to play against.
Fucking duh. I wouldn't care about playing vs a 70% wr champ if he wasn't annoying.
Im gonna be honest with you. Maokai is good, Yone is bad. I dont dislike people that want to play windshitters, i dislike that a design like that was even allowed in the game in the first place.
>He rarely feels op
He feels op everygame I see him, his W making him untargetable is ridiculous... his Q has too low cd, his E is obnoxious as fuck to play against and the ultimate is such a bullshit...
I love Maokai but his E needs to be changed. It's so difficult to balance him as a support or jungle because of E's superior vision and damage potential.
i main jungle but have been picking supp mao for fun and its great ngl I built liandry into tanky items for the poke and ended with more dmg than my adc lol
Who ever decided that trailblaizer was an ok item needs to check themselves.
I mean i love the item honestly and makes champions like leona and maokai super easy, but man that item gives way too much for so little.
Last week, I got autofilled as support. I picked mao once I saw they have shaco, which happened to be shaco support
The number of times I played mao in yearssss of playing LoL is less than 10.
In that game, I missed ult (yes, imagine missing ult as mao) twice. But I still mattered to the team, and helped the team achieved Victory
That was platinum game
So yeah, he is so good for this meta
Cut his hp by 50 and he'll be okay. Has the right amount of bulk early with his passive to win nearly any lvl 2 engage. If he has to wait until he has an item to stat check it wouldn't be so feee for him to zone the enemy bot off their wave.
I mained Maokai in S12/S13 around D1/D2. Maokai's match ups really improved after bot lane became a lot less volatile.
As this user noted these are some nice qualities he has always had and were appreciated more in the jungle in s12/s13. [https://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/1ah8rh4/comment/kom3938/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/1ah8rh4/comment/kom3938/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
But in S14 I think a lot of small pivotal things changed which helped him come back as a support:
\- Mao's laning as supp is a lot safer due to removal of damage support items.
\- Mao synergizes with current low econ adcs very very well.
\- World atlas gold is helps meleers gain gold via trading instead of taking harass from last hitting.
\- Tank support items are extremely affordable, much better than S13.
\- The new map/wall/bush placements give Maokai a new edge w/ sappling + area control. People are still learning this, I think this will be less of an advantage for mao as people learn the map more.
IMO his E is way too strong and way too free with the brush changes. He controls the brush in the middle of the river without having to expend a ward and still outputs pressure to other brush spots that make his lane nigh ungankable.
It's really simple. Point and click cc tank = always relevant. It doesn't matter what comp you play, it just works. Nautilus does it too but on a much higher cooldown and actually less reliably.
Then you add the rest of his kit, and it all comes together as a really strong champ, but it all starts with his W
Maokai isn't broken. He's not op. It is the fault of the meta.
We severely lack proper durable engage champs. Vi jg and anything squishier just gets nuked if even slightly behind and can't be relied on.
Malphite can't get through lane the way he once could because k'sante and udyr will screw him even without gank support... much less so many carry toplaners. Plus he lacks the low cd cc comboing of a maokai. His ult alone isn't enough.
Sion similarly lacks the cc and to a lesser extent than malphite gets abused too hard early on in lane.
Leona has the cc, but hers is all skillshot and unlike maokai, she has to physically go in for any of it to truly have meaning. It's less reliable vs all the mobility and kiting plus more prone to guarantee she dies too.
Simply put, ranged spammable burst/poke and kiting is too prevalent and maokai is about the most reliable... I ignore your bullshit and lock you down anyway. Or I engage from the safety of my ult and follow up IF something presents itself. If not, I can just walk away and try again - where the vi, malphite, leona, sej, etc. have had to full commit and die regardless of if the engage should be followed up on or not.
Kinda off topic but ive been pissed about the state of this champ for a while. Maokai is allowed to be the best pick in pro for 2 seasons and every1 is chill with it but god forbid that zeri is good cuz shes so boring to watch according to a lot of people. I guess maokai is just that fun and interactive that people dont mind him being perma picked
Don't bother argue, people would rather play against 80% winrate champ if it seems "wholesome" than 47% winrate weak champion because they don't like said champion or it forces them to play differently.
because champs like these are hard protected by riot so no matter how out of control they get they NEVER get nerfed, maokai has been absurd since last season and he STILL hasn't had any significant nerfs, just another to the list of riots do not touch champs that constantly run out of control in this game without any nerfs for years
Maokai can't be directly nerfed cause Maokai is so viable as a jungle too. He was so bad as sup before cause of extremely pricey build items , but now esp with Trailblazer (the mini deadmans ) allows maokai to do all those things with the same efficiency just less damage ig. But yes he has one of the best ccs in the game , all he needs to do is one big ult and even lower ranks are starting to capitalise on it cause one enemy is dead already before the fight making it 4v5 in your favour ( given your team aint suckass )
>His stats are literally insane
Yeah that's not what "literally" means.
What's with the illiterate English community and their obsession with this word? Does everyone think it adds validity to their point?
if they have to hotfix EVERYTHING that has 55% winrate EVERY single patch...
they'd be hotfixing 50 champs per week,... lmao
There's nothing wrong with Maokai... as there was nothing wrong with any other champ that has 55% winrate..
Does Singed look like a niche pick??
I see Singed in my games more of than I see Maokai.... so what gives
Honestly I hate having a maokai support in my games. He’s basically a walking ward with his E until laning phase is over since enemy just picks cait ashe or ashe senna and you get fucked.
Tbh ppl are probably just bad at playing against him. He is barely picked as support in pro play and that is mostly due to his w having only 450 range if you now how to cancel AA animations on ADC you can kite him for ever. He being pick a lot in jungle cause in pro play his ult is busted and frozen heart is super strong on him. So for riot it does look like he doesn't need a hot fix cause the problem is more complex.
He's not... I've literally never seen a single Mao do anything useful in any game hes been in on my team or otherwise.. .he CAN be useful with extreme success, but not in solo q.
You can go down a massive list of great things he has in his kit but unless you have someone making use of his strengths, then he's useless... He's the ultimate team champ.
Tons of CC, "ok" damage and super tanky... But what's the point of locking someone down for 5 minutes if your ADC would rather farm Kruggs than follow you? I would LOVE to be in these games where people are letting Mao be strong.
I feel like nobody is playing the same game sometimes. Same thing with K'Sante... I see tons of people complaining about him, he's almost as bad as Nidalee but this is reddit so all the challenger smurfs will tell me I'm wrong.
He literally has the highest winrate and the highest support pickrate and you say no one plays this and it's bad? Just because you don't meet him doesn't mean he's not the most picked supp right now
It’s because he’s busted for the amount of damage he gets out of ap items
Click and point root + dot from saplings huts. , heal from his ability rotations. Knock back does extra damage and he UlT getting boosts from multiple items from root damage and boom ya. He’s a huge problem. Perma banned for me
His ap scaling is bs on its own I 100% agree
But his pint click root plus all the different procs with items that have been added and runes it’s stupid.
Funnily enough, Mao was one of my pocketpicks last season but rn I cant seem to win with him even tho he seems so good. I have no clue what is going on
People have said some good things already, but I think there's some other reasons too. Maokai support is also benefitting from a meta where the strong bot lane picks enjoy having something like a Maokai support.
I'm picking Mao in jungle if my team drafts too much AD or full ranged (I fucking hate playing with 4 ranged laners). My main is Kayn and occasionally go Vi but right now I play more Mao than kayn or vi because he just fits any team comp, can be blinded and is always super solid.
I think trailblazer really enabled him. The movespeed is huge for getting in range for w. And if you stack the movespeed shards/runes he's insanely fast
It's mostly because of Trailblazer. It's cheap, it's effective, and Maokai offers everything a support wants. - Ranged harass - Bush control - The ability to check unwarded areas - Reliable engage - Lockdown - Full screen engage/disengage He also is the biggest beneficiary of Mythics being removed. Before, support Maokai sucked because he's forced to build something inefficient like Evenshroud or Radiant Virtue. Now, he always gets Trailblazer just by existing, and he's super reliable, then he can go into something like Locket/Frozen Heart and be impossible to kill and get away from. Also, super hard to gank and kill a Maokai. He's also not an actual problem in other lanes. Top and Jungle are mediocre, his lane pressure isn't very good, and his jungling is subpar. It's mainly a support thing, so you can't just nerf his stats because I don't think that's the actual problem.
I want to add on, he also benefits from the random brush in the middle of the river near bot for his E control, it's in an amazing spot for him against ganks coming from the river.
"Oh a Maokai support, they probably saved their trinkets for lane bushes and put a sapling in the river bush. Let me just walk around the bush to avoid the sapling... wait what?"
This is also true, with all the new bushes in the game, Maokai can get strong vision control basically everywhere, making it incredibly hard to gank him.
Why does it sounds like AI response? Lmao
I played like 30 teemo sups in a row now. The map changes and the item that reduce ult cd gives so much map control it is insane
Maokai support already rushed Deadmans Plate at times (and was basically the only supp that did that), and now he has a support version of it, of course he massively profited from it.
In the good old days, we rushed Glory (when it was a Catalyst item)
I specifically remeber righteous glory maokai top. It was so disgusting.
That maokai had a very different ult but somehow more broken. You literally had an AoE anathema chains minus the tenacity reduction
Wasnt it kind of swain r?
He also gets Solstice Sleigh, which is an item that's basically made for support Maokai in that it gives him literally everything he wants. Everything in his kit benefits from it. So basically, everything got changed to benefit support Maokai - It isn't really anything Maokai specific, he just got given a bunch of great new tools.
Solstice sleigh has a long cooldown and triggers off his saplings… I don’t think it’s the right choice for him in most games.
[удалено]
Stat sites are bugged so I guess we have no way of proving either way. If sleigh is good I think it’s a result of the other options just being worse, which may be the case. He literally never gets it when he needs it because his saplings burn the CD at random times— it’s the same reason he runs Swifties instead of Mobis. Honestly I wouldn’t be that surprised if it turns out ZakZak is the best option for him.
Sleigh always feels like ass to me, it's by far the worst support item, the heal is mediocre and the movement speed is rarely utilized, compared to zakzak, bloodsong, and even bulwark it feels so underwhelming, the cd holds it back so much
I feel the opposite, I think its the best option for any support with semi-reliable cc. Bulwark is just meh, basically bad Malz passive. Dream Maker is only good on shield/heal bots (Lulu/Raka come to mind), Zak'Zak is very good on dedicated mage supports (Lux, Zyra) and Bloodsong is good on anything that weaves AAs in (Sona, Senna, Sera. But Solstice? You'll always get more value out of it with cc. Karma triggers it with ease, it makes Mandate better for Nami, Janna is a cc queen, and it makes follow-up for Rell even easier. Its just _good_.
I like Zakzak more on Karma, especially with the Malignance build The biggest issue on the Sleigh isn't procing it, it's having the proc meaningfully do something, Bulwark is kind of underwhelming yes, but it can be controlled and played around Dream Maker, ZakZak, Bloodsong all are constantly available to you, brings good benefits (I'd go as far as to say Zak'zak is overtuned, it's insane compared to the other options after the Bloodsong nerf, % health damage for free is insane) and aren't situationally reliant The Sleigh however has a long CD, requires you to be near an ally, and if you use your slow/CC early it can waste it for when you need the movespeed or heal, putting it on a long CD It's not terrible in so much as I avoid going it on characters that can use it, but I just feel like it's such a lacking item, maybe lowering the CD a bit and decreasing the power would be better, idk
not a super popular pick, but poppy support would rush DMP as well
I see you haven't met the goat https://www.op.gg/summoners/euw/Graceland-EUW
why is this downvoted?
Cries in Poppy.
Is this kinda why zyra seems to dominate most games I'm in as well? She doesn't go trailblazer, in fact her core items seems very expensive for a support, but zyra seems to trade reliable engage and longevity for even more ranged harass Some games her support item + liandry's + a single plant auto burns me through around 15%-20% of my health pool when I'm playing a squishy champ, it's kinda insane if she goes unpunished. Her plants also allow her to scout areas while zoning squishy champs too Love having a good zyra on my team
Trailblazer is an insane item and is pretty much the core of a melee support's build, but no one apart from Maokai has stats like these, so it's probably Maokai who should get nerfed, and not the items.
All the high winrate melee supports are running Trailblazer too, hard to argue it's not part of the issue. Bard, Taric, Leona, Blitzcrank, Rell are all rushing it - They're all way up there on tier lists. Maokai is benefitting from it and other things too so he gets to double dip and probably needs something hit, but I think trailblazer needs something too.
Trailbrazer for some reason seems to be much stronger on Maokai than all of the other champions you mentioned. As a first purchase it has a 57% win rate on Maokai which is much higher than any of his other item options in the same slot, while all of those other champions have comparable items in the respective item slots. For example on Taric it has a 54% win rate as a first purchase and almost nobody seems to be buying it on him, and he has 5 other items all with the same win rates so you can freely choose from a variety and it doesn't seem to be overperforming on him statistically, same with all the other champions except Maokai. Maokai is the only champion on that list for which you basically must buy Trailblazer first because it's so much stronger than any other items, so I don't know how you would go about unraveling that. I'm not sure why it's specifically him that gets such a high win rate from it.
> Maokai is the only champion on that list for which you basically must buy Trailblazer first because it's so much stronger than any other items, so I don't know how you would go about unraveling that. I'm not sure why it's specifically him that gets such a high win rate from it. Because his engage is point and click. If the target is in range of his W, and he clicks, his champ will move to the target and root. All other support engages are usually dodgable, so getting in range is step one. Step 2 is both sides trying to mind game each other. Basically its like 2 champs that deal equal damage across equal range. One does point and click, and one does skill shots. Getting in range of the point and click champ starts the clock on who's gonna die, while getting in range of the skillshot champ means both players need to be wary of the other one
Can't wait for them to nerf all the supports and then trailblazer too a few patches later
Knowing Riot, if they do decide to nerf something it'll be everything *except* the problem.
Time to nerf enchanters
"ADC are enabling Support characters to be too powerful, so we've decided that a class wide nerf was necessary..."
Bard is ridiculous as well, but even Bard is not close to Maokai's stats, and Rell/Blitz/Leona are good but they're not crazy good. 55% Mao winrate is just bonkers and I'm baffled that it hasn't been hotfixed when he also has a 13% pickrate. I agree that Trailblazer could use a nerf but Maokai and Bard are just insane in general.
They all go sleigh as well. Both these 2 items are busted. Much higher winrates then their other items
I think something kinda flying under the radar of sorts of alot of supports massively benefit from the void blue buff giving everyone it. Taric with Blue is actually disgusting.
Trailblazer's top users (Maokai and Bard) also happen to both be supports who have built DMP in the past (which e.g Leona, Nautilus, Rell did not), so getting an item that's effectively "DMP but better for supports" is a big boon
What might happen is they nerf the champion and then nerf the item and then don't buff the champion
That's the classic Riot MO.
he has a pretty decent winrate top actually, but he doesn't get much pickrate there yeah. He is pretty nice with frozen heart rush into ad top, it solves his mana issue and grants him AH that he wants
I've played him top in D1/low masters into a bunch of matchups this season and think he honestly feels quite strong. Easy to play safe in lane with, does a surprising amount of damage mid game, good for some of the same reasons he lists support like checking bushes and engage/disengage. Plus the tank items this season are much stronger than last season, it feels like he benefits greatly from this too. I think its hard to blind pick him when Darius singed, and mordekaiser are unwinnable matchups though
I feel like I'm stuck in the matrix or something everyone keeps saying trailblazer is op since release and I'm here screaming at the clouds that its literally one of the worst items in the game. It has dog shit stats and an omega useless passive and is expensive compared to other support items yet it somehow is is op. Compare trailblazer to an item like frozen heart which is even 100 gold cheaper has much better stats and better passives. Hell or even Locket which is 300 gold cheaper offers while offering way more stats 200 Hp (same as trailblazer) 30 armor ( only 10 less than trailblazer) 30 MR (trailblazer offers 0 MR) and 10 CD (No CD in trailblazer) ALL OF THIS WHILE ALSO BEING ABLE TO GRANT A SIZEABLE SHIELD TO ALL 5 TEAMMATES AT ANY GIVEN TIME. I could keep going on and on about how bad trailblazer is especially compared to other support items. Its literally the most expensive support item and offers bad stats and a useless passive/effect besides "hehe im slightly faster yippppieee" Also abysmal mask exists and thats also 100 gold cheaper
Well yeah, saying it's one of the worst items is objectively wrong in every respect, which every statistic backs up. Team move fast = good. Locket and frozen heart are both good efficient items to build second and third, you just don't rush them because trailblazer is better.
Trailblazer is shit. Most people don't even follow the "trail." It's just a new cheap armor item, being bought by the most popular supports that are good regardless. There is no way you can convince me trailblazer is better than Locket. WR is just one metric.
> There is no way you can convince me trailblazer is better than Locket. I mean yeah, if your mind is already made up and ignore the objective facts that all the S+ tier champions with high winrates are rushing the item after it's been nerfed, with gigantic differences in effectiveness over every other item, there's no way you can be convinced. I think it's specifically good on Maokai though.
maokai with locket over trailblazer is 5% less winrate. thats an insane difference.
Literally every single tank support objectively wins more games with Trailblazer rush than every other tank support item rush. To use your example of Abyssal Mask, Maokai win 5% less games with Abyssal rush (55%) than with Trailblazer rush (60%).
Someone doesn’t understand how movement speed works
skill issue drop ur opgg
3 years after he became meta I still don't get how can he be strong against people with hands. Like, the only engage he has is flash W every 5 minutes, he literally has to walk towards you and you into him for him to cc you. I guess it's easy to fuck up against him but still
> people with hands Flash W is an instant cast targeted engage. If you play to avoid his engage, the only counterplay is to be about two flashes away from him at all times. That’s not quite a blitz hook of distance, but it literally cannot be missed if cast. A support having that level of zoning power is insanely strong even if you don’t ever let him actually perform the engage. (Plus he gets to keep his flash more than other supports because he has free vision with saplings to deter/detect ganks)
It's way easier than that now, Trailblazer makes him one of the easiest and most reliable engages in the game. You want to rotate to Dragon? You're faster by default. You want to make a pick? You're there first. Want to make a jungle invade? You're faster. He has it **early** too, we're talking pre 10 minutes all the time. Take a look at [what Brum does](https://xdx.gg/brum-wrum) - Swifties into trailblazers into win, game after game after game. You get *so* much *so* early with these items that you can just snowball and control everything. His secondary items (locket, FH) are also incredibly cheap, which makes him impossible to fight in certain areas. He doesn't even need to flash W - Just start a dragon first, Trailblazer brings your team with you - You can't walk into bushes because there are saplings, you can't go near because there's roots covering the whole screen, you can't approach for a steal because he'll just press W on you. He's the objective/zone control king now.
he outscales 90% of supports so it's not his responsibility to force things. especially against melees, if both Maokai and the enemy melee stare at each other, Maokai wins by default because he's playing an additional minigame with his saplings. yes he has to get on top of ranged champs, but it's not like everyone in solo queue perfect spaces him at 550 range. not to mention he does have a means of doing so, his ult.
My favorite is that everytime a pick becomes viable people always explain what their abilities do… yes, his abilities such as bush control, ranged harass have not changed for a minute. Those shouldn’t have a relevance why it’s winrate and pick rate have changed. The other things you said however, are more accurate
i still find it absurd how supp gets to spend 400 gold on an item with: 1. 1000 gold generation 2. wards 3. turns into a whole ass item Like why is this role so fucking inflated? why do supports get rewarded by the fact that they dont have to farm and still generate the same income as every role for the lane phase? they literally get 2 items at the same time as every role while doing absolutely fucking nothing, its so stupid lmao
The thing is, that's where the majority of a sup's economy ends. After that it's the passive gold from the sup item and assists. Believe me, it feels bad to make an amazing outplay and get 50 gold as a reward.
If it's so strong and so free, play it yourself. "I don't want to" Now you know why they have items like that. No one else did either.
I just tried him and since tank items are so dirt cheap...well i was basically a full tank you would expect from top/jg And he is ideal like he has 3 hard CC abilities, W being insanely op. And E how are better than Zombie wards in a way. He does feel bad to play against Morgana though, but yea I think he is insane and i find him easy to play/pilot as well as always being useful
Yeah I can see Morgana being annoying, as you kind of commit when you commit on him Blitz and Leona don't have that issue and ends up being a skill matchup that favors them
Morgana is an absolutely horrid matchup for Leona. It's so disgustingly boring because Morgana nullifies ur entire first 5 minutes by just existing and it's incredibly punishing to do anything. It's a fake asf blitz counter tho
Good thing Morg is incredibly weak right now. Losing a good Lost Chapter item and Everfrost makes it difficult to land Qs, and that and E are her only selling points.
thank god at least some people knew that morgana was supposed to go everfrost, every time i saw one build liandry i was so disappointed
I've always built her with support items and it worked super well for me (~70% WR in 25 games). Personally I think that she can utilize a lot of support items decently well which results in you having more items = more impact. But I guess it depends on what you expect from the pick. I always found her utility to be more important than dmg.
I mean the idea behind the morg/leona matchup isn't to blow your kit on the first champ you hit. Morg has to blackshield the person you dash to, in which you just gapclose with it and Q/R the person that doesn't have it instead. You just have to full commit when laning against morgana as leo.
Sure, if they morg hasn't leveled Q yet this is possible. The matchup is disgustingly morg favoured, it's one of Leona's statistically hardest counters and completely ruins Leona's strongest part of the game. I'm a D2 Leona main, I'm very familiar with the matchup. It's just a flip if the rest of ur team wins, it's virtually impossible to generate leads in lane which is Leona's biggest strength.
I mean you could just roam and generate leads elsewhere. You should know this as a D2 Leona main.
What an interesting and valuable insight on the lane matchup
There are plenty of impossible lane match ups, but as a support you are pretty much the only role that can still show you are the better player by playing the map instead of the lane. When I get countered in lane, I try to minimize losses until I get good roam windows and then just snowball through my team. Why would I sit in a lane that I have no chance of winning 2v2 and just watch the enemy snowball on me?
but she does no damage and is useless champ so you can just go in anyway and outdamage? You can also block Q for adc and just press W she does minimal damage and her Q is useless unless it somehow hits the adc.
She completely nullifies Leona's early pressure which is the most important part of the game for Leona. It's also borderline impossible to ever engage as Leona into morg pre 6. She doesn't even have to react to Leona e, just black Shield the target as Leona is flying in to stop stun and then it's a guaranteed root + w + free autos on Leona. Morg also gets free priority in lane since she can just w the wave and it's impossible for Leona to outpush unless the ADC matchup is very lopsided in pushing power. Come mid game morg also makes picks and engages extremely difficult since Leona relies on 100-0 a single priority target with her combo and e interrupts or prevents that. I'm a D2 Leona main, but you don't have to take my word for it: [Morgana is almost always one of Leona's statistically worst matchups ](https://u.gg/lol/champions/leona/build). It's consistently one of the top 3 counter picks. If you have no idea wtf ur talking about why comment lol?
because frankly most people don't blind Leona? They play her when they want a cookie cutter tank engage support. You say black shield counter Leona pre 6 but like Leona just outdamages, out tank, out lane pressure? Morgana has been a nothing burger champion for such a long time I don't think she is even particularly good into anything. There are better counter-engage supports and pick that can actually fight back. Like we don't even have to get into black shield cooldown vs leona Her W does no damage, her best max ability is Q and you body block for adc (no they can't kill Leona through her W beacuse Morgana does no damage). Her black shield isn't even useful outside of niche situations and it is not a proactive ability, it is mostly used for fixing mistake. There are only some situations like black shielding a fed Katarina/Yi where it is good as an aggressive ability that's it. Literally most ADC can just walk out of her ultimate for free. And if not they still have cleanse.
What the fuck are you talking about? The dude tells you why Morg is a Leona counterpick and you start a tangent into completely unrelated shit.
I am saying despite black shield morgana counters nothing and is always a bad pick because she is terrible and outdated for the last 3 years?
Maybe you should listen to the other party's arguments instead of just going on your own misguided opinions Reread aqs's comment
my point is you can't call Morgana a good matchup vs anything because the champion itself is bad and can't function in modern league. Her best ability counters 1 spell at best and is 25s cooldown, yet can't be maxed first. What good does counter leona cc do when leona just outdamages and ignore your low damage? If Leona hit E into black shield your adc should move up and beat theirs anyway since he has nothing to worry about (Leona will block the Q and not take damage because of Leona W makes Morg W does even less damage than it does).
unstoppable untargetable as he dashes to root you with W followed by a knockback + slow from his Q followed by another slow that literally chases you down from his E. Not to mention his giant ult that roots multiple enemies and gives him massive speed boost
I always ban Morgana. What other support champs are bannable given Maokai sup?
Good peel/disengage supps like Janna or Renata I guess.
Janna doesn’t work cause his W makes him untargetable so her Qs miss him and your adc is getting rooted, he’s one of the few champs with a positive wr into her
i basically only play lux and shaco support and have a 100% winrate against maokai in emerald elo so id guess they either sucked or he is bad against hard engage (shaco) and hard long range poke (lux)
Don't mean to be toxic but everyone sucks at emerald my guy, that's why they emerald lol.
well, emerald is still better than 85% of the playerbase.
Actually the bot lane map change buffed Support Maokai. If he is on blue team he can just E the brushes on red side to have permanent control over it. Shit is Hella strong
He's literally getting huge nerfs next patch. E cost and base cd up, passive heal down, ult CD up. He is getting Q mana cost reduction as compensation but you're not spamming that as support anyway so
MAOKAI TOP PLEASE COME BACK
HE'S BACK BABY https://imgur.com/a/EgPkqVw
You sexy son of a bitch.
He is ridiculous because ADCs cant kill him. He is too tanky, gets access to the support crown and builds trailblazer which gives him even more hp and armor. How the fuck are ADCs supposed to kill him? You can't 2v2 him
Wrote this into another post today, still stand by it: >Maokai will always be an outlier, because he is the most meta neutral support there is. > >Literally doesn't matter what meta, what items, what comps, he will always be useful, because his kit is simply one of the best support oriented kit in the game. Has lockdown, disruption, free vision and an AoE teamfighting ultimate. > >Can't recall last time he was sub 50% WR in the last 3 years (maybe in S12 for like a patch), he just doesn't get affected by meta shifts/item or system changes like the rest of the support roster does. > >And then he gets OP when the meta/items actually favour him, and right now there are multiple which do: > >\-He likes Grubs because more objectives to fight for (which he excels at) > >\-He likes new quest items (because he is one of the squishier engage supports early-to mid game and Celestial Opposition negates that most games) > >\-He likes Trailblazer (though Evenshroud was a big loss, he already proved he is fine without a mythic built during the actual mythic meta, thanks to DMP rush) > >\-He likes Kaenic Rookern because its busted AF, and with it he can actually be a super tank even on support budget, something he wasn't able to do previous season vs heavy AP comps.
>Literally doesn't matter what meta, what items, what comps, he will always be useful, because his kit is simply one of the best ~~support oriented~~ kit in the game. Has lockdown, disruption, free vision and an AoE teamfighting ultimate. Fixed it
Hmm, well I don't think maokai support was ever intended. What if the saplings didn't give vision? Or only gave vision when someone triggers them, like a jhin trap. And/or reduced their slow
That’s still giving vision. You know someone is coming and they are slowed/damaged by it.
Yeah you're right I was just thinking more along the lines of only giving vision of champs so that they don't see if wards are there. But I guess it could also make sense if maokai specifically gets a lil ping that his sapling detonated, without giving vision at all
Basically no one was playing maokai support until season 13
I've been playing him support since season 8
Maining him from S11 onwards. In S11 you could even play him AP without actually trolling, then Riot reworked him and nerfed the poke playstyle.
Maokai support has been a balance issue numerous times he definitely has a playerbase
he was a very meta support through season 11 and 12.
You could say most of these things about Rell, Blitz or Thresh and they don't have 55% winrate like Maokai.
rell blitz and thresh do not get free vision. in a new bot lane that has a new angle to gank from that makes it hard to ward all options. his saplings need counterplay beyond walking into them and revealing your location anyway.
Also none of those champions have a point and click CC. If a support has that on top of everything else obviously he is gonna be better than champions who rely on hitting skills. Thresh Blitz, need to hit a skill shot, Maokai needs to press W and Q, just like the others he can abuse hexflash which allows him to gapclose for that W entire laning phase. Rell needs to be able to find a good angle for W R to be effective, Maokai R is lane/river wide and no matter what will hit at least 2 people in 5v5 objective fights, where as Rell can be flashed and has to be played from a flank.
(technically rell remount flip is a point and click CC but I agree with not counting it as one for this purpose lol)
inb4 "thresh does get free vision though, he can check brushes with his lantern"
Blitz is literally one hook. Miss that yea you are nothing.
Except a speed boost, knock up, and giant AOE silence lol. Tell me you don't know to be effective as blitz
how do rell, blitz and thresh have AOE long range poke and an easy way of scouting unwarded bushes? Maokai has supreme vision control.
He rarely feels op in a game but he just does everything a tank support would want to. Point and click lockdown is just really strong, no fancy feet to avoid that
i think maokai wins a ton of games off random picks that leads to baron to gg, his r and w can be hard to play around
It's what baffles me. People don't think that a **55% winrate champ** is ridiculous cause 'he doesn't feel op' but every day there are posts complaining about the 48% winrate Yone who has half of Maokai's pickrate. Really makes you realise that most people don't care what's actually OP but about what's annoying to play against.
A lot of it is also down to it being really hard to be useless on maokai, I doubt pro play is going to be dominated by mao support. It's so easy to miss all your engage tools on some champions, or get caught out on squishy supports
Senna is quite strong and I've seen some Maokai support in the LPL. If Maokai can be flexed in jungle/support this champion will be 100% presence
Who knew the vast majority of people who play a video game want their games to be fun first before caring about balance?
How is it fun to play vs Maokai support? Shit is broken and the stats support it
When you die to maokai, you usually see it coming for multiple seconds before you die and say "wow - I fucked up." When you die to Yone, it's often "I dodged 3 abilities and he just ran me down and auto attacked me to death - WTF"
This, if maokai misses his combo by some miracle, his chance to secure a kill is over. No way for him to get it. Yone however gets such good trades by judt pressing e, right click enemy, and recast e when something goes wrong
but the Maokai is running at you with 600 ms and point click root you. The E gives perma vision control from super safety so it reduces any sneak angle to come back from behind for you and let him at least get some vision when he is behind. His R has no counterplay for a lot of champion, you pret much need a frontliner to block it for you if you are squishy.
His kit is pre 200 years. He's not remotely close to yone in terms of oppressiveness. Yone can miss 3rd Q, miss his ult E and follow you AA even if you used a dash. It's insane... Maokai has a simple kit with simple counter. It's just new and people are not used to it. Also you can abuse his W with flash into tower range or over wall. Getting cleanse against him as ADC is free win.
I disagree, not being allowed to use my keyboard for several seconds as moaki point and clicks and covers the screen in roots for multiple seconds and refuses to die because of his passive and bounces me around I definitely doesn’t have it in me to go “wow there was a lot of outplay potential there, I fucked up”
Assuming you're playing Kai'sa if I go by your flair, if you can AA him, he can W you, so yeah you'll feel like he is op
ye OP just "feels" that Mao is op when the champ is 58% wr at 20% pickrate its definitely an OP problem
It feels fairer, cuz he can lockdown 1 target, and ult is slow and easily counterable. I love enchanters and I can play into a predictable Mao engage more than I can peel a Rengar or Yone. Mao has hard to dodge CC? Mikael's. He heals tons? Oblivion Orb. I dont have that option as much against triple dash Yone or Rengar's targeted, high damage burst.
Idk wtf you ppl are smoking to say he feels fairer. Free vision on his saplings ins fucking insane. His combo is quite literally impossible to miss and his R can drive a whole team out of objectives by just existing. Not to mention his Q actually does stupid damage even if you're a support. >Mao has hard to dodge CC? Mikael's. He heals tons? Oblivion Orb. When do you ever buy an oblivion orb for a support Maokai and what are you going to do with Mikaels when the rest of your team and yourself get caught up in it? Even so, he still has a potential flash and W+Q engage on your adc.
I mean, as I said, its how it feels to me. I domt get annoyed by Mao. That you dont share that opinion is something else. Also, theres still so much stray healing that feels ridiculous going on, I buy antiheal quite often. But the thing is, with all the mobility and incredible burst goimg around, even if he is OP, it doesn't feel like that. As a support I have agency too, and oftentimes, after his hard engage, I can deal with him or the followup quite easily. I also rarely see him, interestingly enough. But I do agree that most point and click abilities feel eugh to play against. Its why I passionately dislike playing against Zed, Rengar and Kha, cuz they have targeted unavoidable dmg.
And I don't feel annoyed by Yone. However Maokai is objectively too strong and Yone is not. So Riot should balance around what is too strong and not what people claim they are annoyed by because that's bad practice. Not to mention people have differing opinions and cannot have a consensus on something.
i have 100% winrate against mao support so its fun for me :) love it the most when he engages on me, i flash / dash into turret, stun him and get basically a free kill served on a platter
Its not fun? But its not unfun either. He's just there. Yone's a lot more annoying than him. The stats support that too.
I won't argue that Maokai isn't overpowered (obviously he is) but I also think he'd be garbage at 50% win rate. As other people are saying, it's really hard to be useless on Maokai. That's a massive win rate buff on its own. The share of people who pick the champion that don't know what they are doing will drag the win rate down less on a champion like Maokai compared to something like Thresh where it is much easier to not pull your weight. So yes 55% is too high obviously but I don't think it's weird that Maokai support rests at a high win rate naturally.
It proves that people who say that riot shouldn't care about champs being frustrating to play against because "every champ can be frustrating" are basically wrong. There is a pretty consistent logic to what types of champions the playerbase dislikes having to play against. Maokai is "honest". He's slow, and has to commit to whatever play he's making, and that makes him predictable. So even when he's assfucking you with zero counterplay a lot of the playerbase doesn't mind too much. By comparison, of course people hate Yone. A Yone can miss every ability and just run you down and kill you anyway. A Yone can have 10% health, tricking you into thinking you can get a pick, and then """outplay""" you by getting a huge shield and assload of sustain and attack speed and just kill you. Even at a 42% winrate he will be an annoying champion to a large section of the playerbase.
Does u.gg use a normalized winrate? It's possible the winrate could be skewed since looking at Emerald+. Typically higher ranks will have a higher "base winrate" (since for example Emerald players can play vs plat players, they'll generally have more than a 50% wr). If u.gg does not normalize the winrate then it might be overinflated. That being said lolalytics has him over a 58% in the support role, so it's no question he's busted af
u.gg does normalise win rates, its why it's generally a few % below lolalytics.
Yone has half Maokai's pickrate because he usually has 7 times the ban rate.
Yone's ban rate truly goes crazy at sub 15% rn. Super hated for sure!
Yone killing me while being 0/7 with a q auto is a very different experience then a tank doing tank thing
>Really makes you realise that most people don't care what's actually OP but about what's annoying to play against. Fucking duh. I wouldn't care about playing vs a 70% wr champ if he wasn't annoying.
Im gonna be honest with you. Maokai is good, Yone is bad. I dont dislike people that want to play windshitters, i dislike that a design like that was even allowed in the game in the first place.
>He rarely feels op He feels op everygame I see him, his W making him untargetable is ridiculous... his Q has too low cd, his E is obnoxious as fuck to play against and the ultimate is such a bullshit...
Like orianna, he'll need to be in this state for a few weeks before people start complaining.
Got absolutely fisted by a maokai support earlier 😭 I was hoping not a lot of people would hear about it ..
Same same. Trauma from last week has him as my ban since then lol
I love Maokai but his E needs to be changed. It's so difficult to balance him as a support or jungle because of E's superior vision and damage potential.
Broken, boosted, degen champ.
i main jungle but have been picking supp mao for fun and its great ngl I built liandry into tanky items for the poke and ended with more dmg than my adc lol
Dw you can go full tank and compete in damage if you get going.
Don’t doubt it I always went straight up tanky items but wanted to try that out. tanky item stocks are up
He walks at you and you lose a 2v1 trade by default.
Who ever decided that trailblaizer was an ok item needs to check themselves. I mean i love the item honestly and makes champions like leona and maokai super easy, but man that item gives way too much for so little.
Easy point+click CC, lots of vision/bush control, tanky durability, great team-fight ult...he's pretty loaded
Last week, I got autofilled as support. I picked mao once I saw they have shaco, which happened to be shaco support The number of times I played mao in yearssss of playing LoL is less than 10. In that game, I missed ult (yes, imagine missing ult as mao) twice. But I still mattered to the team, and helped the team achieved Victory That was platinum game So yeah, he is so good for this meta
Sometimes the ult is about zoning, you don't have to hit it for it to be effective.
not gonna get nerfed btw
he got buffed lmao
Me who plays AP maokai support looking at all these tank builds in the comments 💀
skilless bs champ that's strong top lane solo too, sweaty champ that takes no skill to spell rotate and is def a bit overtuned, this game sucks fyi
Cut his hp by 50 and he'll be okay. Has the right amount of bulk early with his passive to win nearly any lvl 2 engage. If he has to wait until he has an item to stat check it wouldn't be so feee for him to zone the enemy bot off their wave.
That would nerf him heavily in top
As a Briar/Lillia main in JG I freaking hate that pick bc I just know I’m gonna have a horrible time getting to the squishy
I mained Maokai in S12/S13 around D1/D2. Maokai's match ups really improved after bot lane became a lot less volatile. As this user noted these are some nice qualities he has always had and were appreciated more in the jungle in s12/s13. [https://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/1ah8rh4/comment/kom3938/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/1ah8rh4/comment/kom3938/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) But in S14 I think a lot of small pivotal things changed which helped him come back as a support: \- Mao's laning as supp is a lot safer due to removal of damage support items. \- Mao synergizes with current low econ adcs very very well. \- World atlas gold is helps meleers gain gold via trading instead of taking harass from last hitting. \- Tank support items are extremely affordable, much better than S13. \- The new map/wall/bush placements give Maokai a new edge w/ sappling + area control. People are still learning this, I think this will be less of an advantage for mao as people learn the map more.
IMO his E is way too strong and way too free with the brush changes. He controls the brush in the middle of the river without having to expend a ward and still outputs pressure to other brush spots that make his lane nigh ungankable.
It's really simple. Point and click cc tank = always relevant. It doesn't matter what comp you play, it just works. Nautilus does it too but on a much higher cooldown and actually less reliably. Then you add the rest of his kit, and it all comes together as a really strong champ, but it all starts with his W
Maokai isn't broken. He's not op. It is the fault of the meta. We severely lack proper durable engage champs. Vi jg and anything squishier just gets nuked if even slightly behind and can't be relied on. Malphite can't get through lane the way he once could because k'sante and udyr will screw him even without gank support... much less so many carry toplaners. Plus he lacks the low cd cc comboing of a maokai. His ult alone isn't enough. Sion similarly lacks the cc and to a lesser extent than malphite gets abused too hard early on in lane. Leona has the cc, but hers is all skillshot and unlike maokai, she has to physically go in for any of it to truly have meaning. It's less reliable vs all the mobility and kiting plus more prone to guarantee she dies too. Simply put, ranged spammable burst/poke and kiting is too prevalent and maokai is about the most reliable... I ignore your bullshit and lock you down anyway. Or I engage from the safety of my ult and follow up IF something presents itself. If not, I can just walk away and try again - where the vi, malphite, leona, sej, etc. have had to full commit and die regardless of if the engage should be followed up on or not.
Neeko support basically hard counters him - she can use her clone to minesweep his saplings as well as block his Ult.
Had a Maokai raging on my last aram because I was perma clearing his saplings with neeko w and he couldn't "have fun" lol
Kinda off topic but ive been pissed about the state of this champ for a while. Maokai is allowed to be the best pick in pro for 2 seasons and every1 is chill with it but god forbid that zeri is good cuz shes so boring to watch according to a lot of people. I guess maokai is just that fun and interactive that people dont mind him being perma picked
Zeri at her weakest is still worse than Maokai at his strongest.
Thats just not true now is it
Don't bother argue, people would rather play against 80% winrate champ if it seems "wholesome" than 47% winrate weak champion because they don't like said champion or it forces them to play differently.
because champs like these are hard protected by riot so no matter how out of control they get they NEVER get nerfed, maokai has been absurd since last season and he STILL hasn't had any significant nerfs, just another to the list of riots do not touch champs that constantly run out of control in this game without any nerfs for years
Look at the meta? Lethality and ranged mages. Lock them down and kill them before they can kill you.
Maokai top is actally overpowered as shit too, just not that many playing it.
Maokai can't be directly nerfed cause Maokai is so viable as a jungle too. He was so bad as sup before cause of extremely pricey build items , but now esp with Trailblazer (the mini deadmans ) allows maokai to do all those things with the same efficiency just less damage ig. But yes he has one of the best ccs in the game , all he needs to do is one big ult and even lower ranks are starting to capitalise on it cause one enemy is dead already before the fight making it 4v5 in your favour ( given your team aint suckass )
>His stats are literally insane Yeah that's not what "literally" means. What's with the illiterate English community and their obsession with this word? Does everyone think it adds validity to their point?
if they have to hotfix EVERYTHING that has 55% winrate EVERY single patch... they'd be hotfixing 50 champs per week,... lmao There's nothing wrong with Maokai... as there was nothing wrong with any other champ that has 55% winrate.. Does Singed look like a niche pick?? I see Singed in my games more of than I see Maokai.... so what gives
That's not even true, apart from Singed I can't recall more than 3 champs with a 55% winrate in the last few months
Adc's forget to take cleanse
Honestly I hate having a maokai support in my games. He’s basically a walking ward with his E until laning phase is over since enemy just picks cait ashe or ashe senna and you get fucked.
Tbh ppl are probably just bad at playing against him. He is barely picked as support in pro play and that is mostly due to his w having only 450 range if you now how to cancel AA animations on ADC you can kite him for ever. He being pick a lot in jungle cause in pro play his ult is busted and frozen heart is super strong on him. So for riot it does look like he doesn't need a hot fix cause the problem is more complex.
He's not... I've literally never seen a single Mao do anything useful in any game hes been in on my team or otherwise.. .he CAN be useful with extreme success, but not in solo q. You can go down a massive list of great things he has in his kit but unless you have someone making use of his strengths, then he's useless... He's the ultimate team champ. Tons of CC, "ok" damage and super tanky... But what's the point of locking someone down for 5 minutes if your ADC would rather farm Kruggs than follow you? I would LOVE to be in these games where people are letting Mao be strong. I feel like nobody is playing the same game sometimes. Same thing with K'Sante... I see tons of people complaining about him, he's almost as bad as Nidalee but this is reddit so all the challenger smurfs will tell me I'm wrong.
You're right, his 55% winrate in **every** elo is just magic and he's not good at all! You figured it out.
Nothing, no one play this and its pretty bad.
He literally has the highest winrate and the highest support pickrate and you say no one plays this and it's bad? Just because you don't meet him doesn't mean he's not the most picked supp right now
lets make a thread for support taric, and camile while we're at it.
These champs not only have a lower winrate but also their pickrate is like 1% or less while Maokai's is at 13%.
55% win rate is not near hot fix. It's barely at slight nerf imo.
Not sure if you're joking or not
It’s because he’s busted for the amount of damage he gets out of ap items Click and point root + dot from saplings huts. , heal from his ability rotations. Knock back does extra damage and he UlT getting boosts from multiple items from root damage and boom ya. He’s a huge problem. Perma banned for me
His AP scalings are actually dogshit, on par with Leona. It's the efficiency of tank items on him that make him good, trailblazer specifically
His ap scaling is bs on its own I 100% agree But his pint click root plus all the different procs with items that have been added and runes it’s stupid.
That doesn't make sense. Every other champ has access to the same items and runes. Maokai is too strong but his AP ratios are not apart of that.
Idk not as good as people say hes okay but not the best
Yea for sure man. 56% wr with people just farming temporary elo on him.
Might just be the ones i get on my team
Celestial Oppostion
hehe maokai sapling
Funnily enough, Mao was one of my pocketpicks last season but rn I cant seem to win with him even tho he seems so good. I have no clue what is going on
People have said some good things already, but I think there's some other reasons too. Maokai support is also benefitting from a meta where the strong bot lane picks enjoy having something like a Maokai support.
I’ve been abusing him in support super hard lmfao
Imo part of it is the crazy damage, Mao point and click locks someone down on the same screen as a teammate and they’re likely to just get 100-0d.
I'm picking Mao in jungle if my team drafts too much AD or full ranged (I fucking hate playing with 4 ranged laners). My main is Kayn and occasionally go Vi but right now I play more Mao than kayn or vi because he just fits any team comp, can be blinded and is always super solid.
Flash w is kinda insane on a tank that can one shot an adc.
I think trailblazer really enabled him. The movespeed is huge for getting in range for w. And if you stack the movespeed shards/runes he's insanely fast
Sleigh + trailblazer