League of Legends: League of Lessons

The protector's pouch

This section is dedicated to the magical pouch that your champion carries around, which contains tools to help you and your Carries in their quest for "Can't Touch This", or at least minimises the touching, as Carries who get touched too much by the enemy are dead Carries.

For the game opening, as a Support, I usually go for Faerie Charm, three Sight Wards, two health potions and one mana potion. Three Wards are sufficient to keep your prime ward location warded until your automatic gold generation enables you to get your first GP10 item, which is usually Philosopher's Stone, and, at the same time, the potions allow you to sustain yourself in your lane to guard your Carry.

The items above are a rough list of the items that are viable options for a Support to purchase, but do remember to prioritise the purchase of Wards and Oracles before you decide to go for end-game Support items.

Aegis of the Legion

This item is very useful if you face an opponent with very balanced damage types of both physical and magical. The team-wide magic-resist and armour-boosting aura can help cut out a significant part of the opponent's damage on your team, especially if the damage is being done to paper-cannon-type players who go with fully offensive items.

Shurelya's Reverie

One of the items I would recommend most for Support, the two-second instant speed boost for your team, can be used for multiple situations; for instance, chasing fleeing enemies, fleeing from chasing enemies in a disadvantageous fight, and catching up to vulnerable opponents who have placed themselves in a bad position. The utility and usage of this item is limitless, depending on how or when you use it.

Randuin's Omen

This item is exceptionally useful for the Big Daddy-type Support that charges into the fray and disrupts the opponents. Some examples of Big Daddy-type Supports include Alistar, Blitzcrank, Shen, and Taric. It also has its occasional use on ranged Supports, if you wish to have an extra mechanism to keep the enemy Bruisers off your Carries.

Soul Shroud

Have a team that is cool-down reliant? You can consider getting Soul Shroud. The 10 percent increased cool-down reduction for your team can help your team thrash out more damage, and teammates that possess juking abilities can use them at faster rates. The extra health it provides also means that you can play a little more recklessly during team clashes, running deeper into enemy lines to cause more disruption at their core.

Zeke's Herald

This item has surfaced on Supports more often after the nerf on all of the physical life-stealing items. Supports who get this are aiming to help their physical Bruisers and Carries make up for the nerf by purchasing an item that provides a life-steal aura, so that they are able to better sustain themselves in a fight. I recommend getting this towards the later phases of the game, and concentrating more on purchasing other Support items, as it does not provide much utility to the Support itself.

Locket of the Iron Solari

This item absorbs up to 230 damage at level 18; it allows your entire team to soak up roughly one extra attack by the opponents, or to save a fleeing ally from a damage-over-time spell, like Ignite, that would otherwise kill them. It's as useful as a burst-defence mechanism, for example that by Soraka, who can burst-heal a dying teammate and then throw out this item's shield to cover the entire team.