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Please do not put the PBE changes for raka through

Shurimoo·2/9/2020, 7:30:45 AM·9 votes·4,052 views

" Starcall (Q) Self heal lowered from [60/80/100/120/140 (+50% AP)] to [30/40/50/60/70 (+30% AP)] movement speed lowered from 15/20/25/30/35% to 15/17.5/20/22.5/25% Mana cost increased from 40/45/50/55/60 to 60/65/70/75/80

Astral Infusion (W) 
    heal increased from 80/110/140/170/200 to 80/115/150/185/220
    mana cost lowered from 50/55/60/65/70 to 40/45/50/55/60
    [New] Now notes "if cast while affected with Rejuvenation, Soraka will incur no Max Health cost"

" please do not do this

Her build will simply become warmogs and enough hp to activate it and she will be unassassinateable. Why should you care about your max hp heal cost if you don't have to spend any health whatsoever to heal someone 2-3 times off landing a single q? Normally surrender@20 has context links to posts on twitter or here that at least explain why the changes are being made but, at least so far, this one has none and I'm at a complete loss what its intent even is aside from, the way I see it, pointlessly ruining soraka's skill expression and counterplay.

Thinking about it some more: Rejuvination passive is 5s at all ranks(IIRC; please let me know if that isnt the case), so she maxes W every game instead of choosing between Q or W depending on matchup/how people are playing (removal of skill expression) If enemy engages on her early she is weaker, due to losing sig. amounts of self-healing on q and maxing W now but that just means she sits back; her only goal is to get through laning, which she can easily do if they engage on her ADC because she is maxing W now along with her W healing being increased by 5/rank. She spends no hp if she lands a Q, so the only person losing hp in an engage is her ADC (except they arent because soraka is casting W on them). Even better: Soraka's adc just goes Cleanse. Now ignite is useless, and laning phase is likely a done deal.

Laning phase is over, soraka now has warmogs+/ KV; ardent, etc (obviously that's more items than just laning phase end but that isn't the point. She will build tanky enough to be unassassinateable but definitely wants healing boost to increase her W, so enough HP to activate warmogs, a little resist, and ardent/athenes). Your counterplay no longer revolves around disrupting or focusing soraka, your only avenue is to pray you can instakill her heal target through her higher W value, endless heals for poke (warmogs) and KV passive. If you engage on someone, she likely gets a free Q unless you flash it. Now she spends no HP and doesn't lose HP for healing people during the fight, meaning enemy team HP is effectively infinite until she dies or is forced out. If you manage to kill the DPS through her W and KV then congrats, you've probably won the fight but her ADC also has PD, can go DD, and has cleanse (as we established earlier), making this fairly unlikely in my eyes (though damage is very high in the game, and obviously people messing up isn't impossible) but the point is, I don't think these changes do anything good for the game or Soraka.

32 Comments

Baby Ghoul2/9/2020, 8:24:51 AM12 votes

The issue with top lane Soraka isn't Soraka. It's the lane in general. Instead of recognizing that, we're getting another bandaid and they're undoing one of the few good changes they made in the past few years, which was making Soraka an interactive champion.

This change is going to cause Soraka to be a healbot again, which is what she was changed from because she had next to no interaction in lane years ago. She would just stand behind her ADC and heal. I guess with the release of Yuumi, they don't really mind having champions like that anymore, but I have to say as a Soraka main it's pretty sad to see the path they've set. Sure, you're somewhat more vulnerable, but you still stand from a safe distance and only an assassin can touch you. A really good Soraka is going to use her E wisely for that occasion.

The previous changes made her more of a lane bully, which is fine in bot lane. She's dealt with pretty easily by mage supports like Zyra because they can spam poke at a safe enough distance that her Q is hard to hit due to the slow missile time. Against engage supports like Nautilus she's just dead or wasting flash if she tries to consistently harass. She can't really get out of hand unless the enemy plays badly (i.e. buying Executioner's Calling first back when they're getting whopped by her Q).

Most melee top laners don't have any tools early game to deal with Soraka's Qs, so they get easily bullied out of lane. When they do, she has anti-engage with her E. When the laning phase is over it doesn't matter because Soraka was designed to transition into a more heal-focused champion later in the game to give people a chance to build anti-healing and to make her work towards that goal.

The Q nerfs and W buffs are going to change that. I get why they're buffing W with a Q nerf, because if they just put out the Q nerf, Soraka would have no chance bot lane in this meta.

Personally, I preferred their first proposed minion damage nerf. It was still a bandaid, but not one that caused problems on the other side of the map.

KFCeytron2/9/2020, 8:01:11 AM7 votes

This change moves some of Soraka's survivability into the assumption that she's in a duo lane by reducing the strength of her Q while mitigating some of the cost of her W. It's intended to put a stop to solo lane Soraka, because her Q is nearly instant in melee range and there's a lot of that in top lane where she's been causing problems for a few days now.

koshkyra2/9/2020, 2:06:14 PM6 votes

Soraka has been one of the only champions keeping me playing the game the last few years and i guess i have to drop her now because these changes literally take all the fun out of her kit.

Im slowly losing more and more of my champions and its only a matter of time before they ruin everything for me since i dont play their precious favorites like assassins and kaisa.

FSRER2/9/2020, 8:19:08 AM4 votes

So...they will make her awful to play in laning phase but she will still remain a perma ban pick because her late game will be so extremely good with her being unkillable and healing half healthbars with 1 W on top of grievous wounds... This balance team has to go! ASAP!

3TWarrior2/9/2020, 5:55:54 PM3 votes

what's even more stupid is that ANY support can do this. sona did it, lulu did it, soraka did it, senna did it,

unless you nerf them so much that their entire gameplay is crushed, they can continue to do the strat

I wouldn't be surprised if Zilean is the next on the hit list because he does just as well in mid lane, can function top and does not care too much about the lane phase so long as he is allowed to scale

What are they going to do, kill off every support in the game?

crippler382/9/2020, 5:36:48 PM2 votes

I'd prefer they give more bruiser buffs tbh. She's a mess because they can't kill anyone who has any escape tools and doesn't want to fight right now.

ModKnightsKemplar2/9/2020, 6:01:06 PM2 votes

Unpopular opinion: Soraka has been broken always.

I was going to say "Soraka has been broken ever since they gave her W a massive health cost," be let's be real. She was broken before that, too. She's been broken in every iteration that she has ever existed in. Not from a balance perspective, but from a granular design perspective.

And the reason is very simple: you cannot make a point and click, 0 skill, high healing ability both balanced and fun at the same time.

And the solution is simple: give that damn ability some skill expression.

I'm not saying I know exactly how; I'm not saying I'm a design genius who has all the answers. But I do think that the problem is pretty easily identifiable. Low skill expression is the reason enchanters have always been awful in this game, and they won't be both balanced and fun for a large percentage of players until that changes.

Disclaimer: This is an opinion; I have styled my argument in a persuasive, factual style for readability and brevity. I acknowledge that my opinion is not the law.

Towboat4212/9/2020, 8:50:39 AM1 votes

Honestly just wanted her base damage on her abilities to be reduced so she cant harass enemy top laners right out the gate, her healing isnt really the issue it's the fact that she pokes you from safety and refuses to interact with you using barrier her silence and flash to completly shut down any attempt to stop her.

Sluiceway2/9/2020, 6:53:37 PM1 votes

I wonder if the issue is with Soraka or her Itemization, and that of the opposing team. Both Redemption and Athene's boost the potency of her healing and are core items on a solo lane Soraka build. On the other hand, I was watching the LEC yesterday, and during the Renegades V Mad Lions match, which had Aatrox against Soraka, only Hans sama built a grievous wounds item even though Morellonomicon, Thorn Mail, and Executioner's Calling were available. At least in this one case, it seems that Renegades chose to ignore healing reduction and tried to power through. Nor did it occur to them to run their own utility champ in top lane. What, then, is the point of all their coaching staff if no one among them can figure out how to counter healing without Riot stepping in and trying to force champions into specific roles?