With 3.14 on the way, Morello has posted on the forums in an attempt to clear the air on some of the support balance changes included in the patch.
"Let me speak to this a little;
In the initial reveal, we were talking about the new gold flow for supports - more gold, items and general "agency" being something long overdue for Support characters (in this context, Soraka, Sona, Lulu, Taric, Janna and Nami) who have been overworked and underfed despite actual impact or performance.
We now have a world of characters who have been only balanced to have no gold now having quite a bit of gold! This comes with a few truths:
1) The old support balance base lines no longer are balanced and valid, anymore than if we increased Marksmen, Fighter or Mage gold by the same amount would be.
2) Supports have been previously defined as "characters who function well with no gold." Now that's no longer the case, overtuned/undertuned mages (if we'd not made changes) is a bad identity. By introducing support scaling, supports become MORE supportive through gold - either through acquisition of active items or AP scaling on utility. This is all done specifically to not have AP Mages and Supports fight each other in a raw numbers perspective, and instead provide supports with scaling that fits their role of helping people and working with their team.
3) Looking at these changes, seeing "NERFS" as the takeaway is...well, I don't know how to put it....insane. One of the patch notes could be "increased income by 3000-6000 gold per game". We actually were very conservative on these champion changes in an effort to protect supports from obsoletion (and will react aggressively if that becomes the case in practice).
A glance at the patch notes can read like a nerf, if you ignore the context or associated changes. AP Mids may have additional viability bottom lane, though our changes are specifically to bulwark against that.
Support needed satisfaction, a more fleshed-out identity of "helper," and a place in the game that's real and valid. That's the entire premise of the preseason support changes.
EDIT: Unreasonable rage downvotes, or real thing that you guys disagree with?"
When criticized for the the "Black Cleaver OP" fiasco from early S3, he replied:
"Sure - it's true this stuff is pretty complex and difficult. Does the short-term Black Cleaver issue (that we then fixed) mean we shouldn't have made the changes at all? That doesn't seem like a good trade-off to me.
If the worries are true, then we'll address it to make sure it's not permanent."
When asked why Janna and Lulu received nerfs but nothing to Annie's ( who has recently emeraged as a popular support pick ) AP ratios, he responded:
"When Lulu and Janna could lane and get gold she pushed Annie out of mid lane - these characters have gone insane with normal gold multiple times when allowed to solo lane. Now we COULD see a world where one of these characters can solo and we won't have to gut it - one definite advantage.
These characters should be about SUPPORT. If they're about damage, they're not support at all - they're mages."
As for an overall view on the changes and traditional supports, he commented:
"The support changes (Leona as an exception and experiment) are here to ensure core helpers are scaling in a new way. Tanks and Fighters (Thresh is a Fighter/Support hybird, really) have understood scaling frameworks that are well-understood - supports are the only characters who have never had a way to scale that made sense for them, was cohesive with their place in the game, and balancable."
Commenting on the communities reaction to these preseason changes, he noted:
"You guys are reacting to what is a temporal, possible problem in a time when those will be the case; preseason. There's a specific reason we wait until between Ranked Seasons to do this stuff - to make sure the details can be managed before it's "for keeps." The direction is theory-craftable, but details really aren't."
He continued:
"If this is the problem, we can increase support utility ratios - and if that is really not good, we will. It's a real risk, but the difference is this is a temporal issue, just like League of X was in preseason last year. That's the time to do this stuff, get the data/feedback, and get it in tuning for 2014. If I seem like I'm not worried, it's because the path forward is clear in any case - the whole preseason plan is predicated on tuning being imperfect and us being on-deck to fix it."
When asked what's so wrong with traditional supports ( such as Soraka, Taric, Sona, Nami, Leona, and Lulu ) having high AP ratios and doing damage, he replied:
"They do deal some.
Not a ton because they shield, heal, buff and speed up allies. Sometimes they have tank-level CC.
I need to leave for now. Bottom line on this stuff;
1) Supports can do some damage; supports are not primary damage-dealers.
2) If the tuning is off and AP mids blow away support characters, we'll adjust aggressively throughout preseason.
3) Having not had gold in 3 years is not a counter-argument for why this class can not have damage nerfs when it should be focused on utility, which is how we will likely continue to scale them (CD's, duration, intensity, impact)."
As for why Riot didn't just add the utility scaling and leave the AP ratios alone until more testing could be done, he commented:
"We did this originally and it was crazyland. These nerfs after the best stab after 3 months of internal testing."
When asked about scaling CC times up with AP, Morello commented:
"Don't want to scale CC with AP at all. Might be tough for a couple characters (though they likely just scale better on HP/CDR)."
