Where is the love for these OG supports?
Why Estes, Rafaela, and Nana never see play in MPL and ranked play
This article was written by Chise Alcantara.
A few days ago I queued up for a rank game and was placed in the last slot. The rest of my team were composed of a tank, a marksman, a fighter, and an assassin so I insta-locked Estes and said I would lane with the marksman because I felt comfortable with playing him and felt like he would fit in this aggressive team composition that had a lot of consistent DPS.
By the time we got into lane, my marksman (who I was going to support with all my love, affection, and spirit of camaraderie) had already flooded my chatbox with hurtful, violent reactions about picking Estes. Needless to say, said marksman fed and caused us the game while I got MVP with the most kill participation in my team. Am I salty or bitter at him for flaming me? Of course not. Why? Because, not only was I the better, more understanding person in this situation—I actually saw his point.
Even though I was relatively fed, I didn’t really feel I contributed much to the game at all. Calling Estes underpowered is an understatement. Ever since the nerfs of his heal last year, he has never been the same and he’s been part of the trifecta of “useless” heroes along with Nana and Rafael for a while now. But, why do people consider them useless?
“I think it’s because of the way gold works in Mobile Legends, at least when compared to traditional MOBAs,” says Shin Boo, veteran shoutcaster. “In ML, laning is not really emphasized because you get gold even if you don’t last hit the minions. Sustain supports, like Estes and Rafael, are really good when you have to stay in lane, which isn’t really necessary in ML.” We also haven’t seen Nana in a while since her damage is negligible compared to other mages that provide the same kind of CC.
Most supports that are used in the MPL PH have a lot of impact either defensively, offensively, or even both. Examples of these are Angela and Diggie, that both have really huge influence in team fights. Angela has global map pressure thanks to her ultimate, which can easily make any 1v1 sway in her team’s favor. Diggie on the other hand has the ability to nullify the enemy team’s initiations adding to his team’s survivability.
We’ve seen a few tank supports in some of the games like Lolita, who specializes in blocking range skills and Minotaur, a cc-machine with great survivability but has conditional effectiveness because of his rage mechanic that regulated him to B-Tier. “You’d want more combat oriented abilities if you want to have an impact in this assassin dominated meta. Also, it’s more shield over heal,” says Shin Boo. After all, if the enemy kills your carry before you can even heal him or her, than it’s pointless.
The supports that aren’t in the meta right now are most really old heroes, which leads us to believe that their kits seem a bit outdated compared to the more flexible and arguably more thought out skills some of the new releases have today. There have been talks of reworking Nana, which are pretty exciting but no mention of Estes nor Rafaela. Hopefully these supports will eventually get the support they need as the meta changes come regular season.
