So lemme get this straight...again...

chipndip1·Dec 6, 2017·185 votes·8,166 views

Nerf her base armor
Nerf her W's shield and heal
Nerf Aery (totally understood on this one)
Nerf her Q AA aura in clean half
Nerf her Q mana cost so it costs 33% more
Nerf Kleptomancy's bonus range if she bothers with it

...oh but we're not done

PBE's New notes

Nerf the sorcery line's starting ap by 5
Nerf all shield/heal passives on all heal/shield items

Meanwhile

Q buff reversion

Riot what did Sona players do to you? I'm actually legitimately pissed right now.

253 Comments

Daedric EtwahlDec 6, 201781 votes

Even more laughable was the context in the patch notes:

"Even after her mid-patch nerfs back in 7.22, Sona's lane poke is overbearing."

Except you didn't fucking nerf the damage in that mid-patch nerf? Hello? If that was the problem to begin with then you should have just nerfed that at the start.

What a fucking joke, honestly.

Squidward DabDec 6, 201742 votes

There are WAAYYY more ‘overbearing’ support champs than Sona

Heckin SupportDec 6, 20172 votes

[{quoted}](name=Daedric Etwahl,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=BiuYdAPO,comment-id=0002,timestamp=2017-12-06T09:40:13.927+0000)

"Even after her mid-patch nerfs back in 7.22, Sona's lane poke is overbearing."

Oh you mean the only thing she's great at? She's too good at the one thing she does good as? I wish Riot would bite the bullet and give her a fully fledged rework and turn her into a real invoker.

Daedric EtwahlDec 6, 20179 votes

At this point it wasnt even the one thing she was great at. More like the only thing she could even do in lane.

Heckin SupportDec 6, 20174 votes

[{quoted}](name=Daedric Etwahl,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=BiuYdAPO,comment-id=000200020000,timestamp=2017-12-06T20:00:22.420+0000)

At this point it wasnt even the one thing she was great at. More like the only thing she could even do in lane.

I hate how she's a poke bot. I hate how she was abused because of ardent censor. I hate that so much of her power is tied to her Q and ult. I wish Riot would just rework her!

Daedric EtwahlDec 6, 20176 votes

Thing is I don't even mind giving up extra early power to have that lategame fantasy. I love that lategame powerhouse. But Riot's gone above and beyond to make sure Sona's early game is so trash that she has almost no hope of reaching that lategame

Weiss GuertenaDec 6, 20175 votes

It's almost like Riot butchered her W several times over and made her E into the single worst ability in the entire game to invest more than 1 point into, so her Q+P is the one bright point of her kit, or at least was until this bullshit patch.

Meanwhile Ezreal still abusing Kleptomancy, and the mastery gets actually nerfed for everyone not named Ezreal or Gangplank. Riot's balance team is either awfully stupid or biased, possibly both.

Weiss GuertenaDec 6, 20176 votes

Because Riot's "balance" team clearly has no fucking idea what they are doing with Sona. They are just throwing nerfs around 3-4 at the time hoping one of them will hit the spot, and never bother fixing the mess made by unnecessary ones.

BlåbæretDec 6, 201740 votes

You should know by now that Riot doesn't nerf marksmen. The entire balance team is made out of ADC mains, so no surprise there.

AbibyamaDec 6, 201714 votes

Wait I thought they were Support mains

TheHappyReaperzDec 6, 201713 votes

Wait I thought they were Orianna mains.

ThefrostyvikingDec 6, 20176 votes

Wait i thought they were tank mains.

Spank the FoxDec 6, 20178 votes

But they’re support and mage mains, lol

FairyfleurDec 6, 201721 votes

The balance team's mains change to fit the board's script

MizayaDec 6, 201710 votes

Proof?

SqkergDec 6, 20178 votes

Dear god, he said the forbidden word...

VekknaDec 6, 201738 votes

I mean...I have played a lot of League, as support, mid, and adc. I'm not a Sona player, and I suck at playing her, so this isn't an opinion rooted in bias.

No matter how high Sona's win rate is, she never pisses me off or feels fundamentally unfair to play against. Maybe the "hidden power" is hidden from enemies, too? But at the end of the day, I'm fine with Sona because:

She doesn't appear out of stealth and vaporize me (like Twitch)
She doesn't blink around with 0-counterplay combos (like insec Lee)
She might have the burst of a carry, but not with 4k hp, dps, and suppress/true damage (like Cho and WW)

Like...Sona is visible. You can play around her. She's infinitely less toxic than a Q-spamming Soraka with Aery/Comet during laning. She's far more fair to gank than Janna/Lulu/Thresh. She doesn't get guaranteed kills by landing a single ability like Blitz or Leona.

As an adc, support, or mid, I would rather play against Sona than any of the champs I just listed.

EkitaihDec 6, 20175 votes

{quoted}

I mean...I have played a lot of League, as support, mid, and adc. I'm not a Sona player, and I suck at playing her, so this isn't an opinion rooted in bias.

No matter how high Sona's win rate is, she never pisses me off or feels fundamentally unfair to play against. Maybe the "hidden power" is hidden from enemies, too? But at the end of the day, I'm fine with Sona because:

She doesn't appear out of stealth and vaporize me (like Twitch)

She doesn't blink around with 0-counterplay combos (like insec Lee)

She might have the burst of a carry, but not with 4k hp, dps, and suppress/true damage (like Cho and WW)

Like...Sona is visible. You can play around her. She's infinitely less toxic than a Q-spamming Soraka with Aery/Comet during laning. She's far more fair to gank than Janna/Lulu/Thresh. She doesn't get guaranteed kills by landing a single ability like Blitz or Leona.

As an adc, support, or mid, I would rather play against Sona than any of the champs I just listed.

I would like to point out that you stated you had an unbiased opinion while inputting quite a bit of bias. XD Lee Sin is actually in a bad place right now. Sitting at a whopping 48% win rate, you really have to try hard to win with him because he's not a very easy champ. He has a high skill cap and he pays for it. Sona doesn't really have a high skill cap and she was strong. So it was a calculated nerf. Now I can't really say anything about Cho and Warwick. They are both pretty strong right now. Only things that can really touch them are ADCs who build item 3123 or item 3036 (Latter being better than the former IMO) or sometimes mages can build item 3165 and get some decent damage to deal with them but ultimately they are pretty strong. Warwick really suffers from Grievous wounds. As far as Twitch, he's easy to handle. CC or burst (or both), he drops in an instant. His ability to go invisible is strong, but a lot of ADCs have pretty strong abilities. Tris just jumps in and destroys people. Ezreal and Arcane Shift (or, rather, an unlimited flash on low cooldown. XD). MF is stronger than Twitch right now because she abuses Lethality. I mean, there are always going to be busted champs. And Riot is working around those aspects. Constantly changing to attempt to keep the balance. There will never be TRUE balance. But Riot is trying their best to keep it fresh. They know that with a game with so much variability, it's fan base will find a way to break something. Sona was just the one of those that they felt needed to be a bit more balanced.

VekknaDec 6, 201718 votes

I wasn't soliciting opinions on champions that I hate. Sorry, but I don't really care if you agree with my totally subjective, 100% anecdotal point of view.

The goal of my post is to say that when the champs I listed (amongst others) are strong you feel like you're being cheesed. Even a lot of champs with reasonable win rates feel like absolute cancer to play against, even when you win, and Yasuo and Zed are great examples of that.

My entire point is that of all the major balance issues in the game right now, Sona is one of the few that doesn't directly translate to me having a miserable fucking experience playing against her.

I can see her. I can punish her. I can kill her.

It's not like WW where he runs you down at 600 MS and kills you with a suppress into a fear while healing off the turret damage. While being immune to peel and following you automatically when you flash.

So if I have to choose between a 50% WR Warwick pulling that fucking bullshit and a 56% WR Sona that dies to any pick, I pick the overpowered Sona because she's more fun to have in the game. If she assassinates me, I can always say "well, at least she didn't have 4000 hp."

To clarify, I'm not biased for or against Sona. I don't have a vested interest in whether she's strong because I feed on her no matter how strong she is, and I don't play her much anyway.

SchmidttyGamesDec 6, 20171 votes

The problem with Sona's kit is something we're going to soon see with Zoe, Orianna, and every other mage with an empowered Auto Attack. Sheen/Lich Bane.

After getting 1050 gold (or less in some cases), her Q poke was literally a triplicate hit that, under the new system, equated to half your health at level 4. Zoe can do that too, in two ways if you're good with her Q. When you couple that with Sona's ability to make carries faster (E), and braindead heal/shield (W), she has to sacrifice something somewhere.

They are overdoing it, but I sense that it's not because of Sona herself, but something that's going to change 8.1 with the runes.

VekknaDec 7, 20173 votes

Pretty sure if Sheen Orianna was going to happen it would have happened by now.

But you can still compare Sona and Nami, and Nami's numbers are higher across the board until extremely late game. If the complaints are about laning power, 100% of the criticism of Sona applies moreso to Nami. And Nami's win rate is just under 55% right now.

And, tbh, playing against Nami is way more annoying than Sona b/c you have to play around Nami's stun on every engage/trade. Sona hits QaaW and does less damage and less healing than Nami just hitting W.

RedCycloneDec 6, 201726 votes

I'll be monitoring her winrates for the next few days

The moment she goes below 50% I am going to write up a storm

DarkeusDec 6, 20172 votes

{quoted}

I'll be monitoring her winrates for the next few days

The moment she goes below 50% I am going to write up a storm

Get ready soon. I predict it will be below 50% by tomorrow, maybe even tonight, IMO.

LankPantsDec 6, 20178 votes

The one day data from lolalytics on patch 7.14 is already at 47.14%. It's not the be-all and end-all and one day is subject to fluctuation, but it's certainly not a good sign.

EkitaihDec 6, 20174 votes

{quoted}

The one day data from lolalytics on patch 7.14 is already at 47.14%. It's not the be-all and end-all and one day is subject to fluctuation, but it's certainly not a good sign.

The problem with this data is that it's skewed. The reason it's skewed is because it doesn't take into consideration any variables. Plus there is a very low amount of games that have been analyzed. The variables that I mentioned are these:

Summoners are used to a certain way the champ is played. They have been playing this champ quite a lot and any change can have a big impact on how they play. They haven't had an adequate amount of time to appropriately compensate for the nerf.
As you and I have said, it hasn't had enough games to offer an accurate summation of the champ.
People are aware of the nerf and they are taking advantage of that fact. Ultimately people haven't quite adjusted to the new Sona, so I don't believe we'll get accurate data until probably a week or so. We'll see in time. She could very well drop this low, but I don't believe this will be the case. If so, I'm usually one to admit when I'm wrong. So we shall see! c: [slayer-jinx-wink]

DarkeusDec 6, 20174 votes

{quoted}

The problem with this data is that it's skewed. The reason it's skewed is because it doesn't take into consideration any variables. Plus there is a very low amount of games that have been analyzed. The variables that I mentioned are these:

Summoners are used to a certain way the champ is played. They have been playing this champ quite a lot and any change can have a big impact on how they play. They haven't had an adequate amount of time to appropriately compensate for the nerf.

As you and I have said, it hasn't had enough games to offer an accurate summation of the champ.

People are aware of the nerf and they are taking advantage of that fact. Ultimately people haven't quite adjusted to the new Sona, so I don't believe we'll get accurate data until probably a week or so. We'll see in time. She could very well drop this low, but I don't believe this will be the case. If so, I'm usually one to admit when I'm wrong. So we shall see! c: [slayer-jinx-wink]

Fair points. But it is showing a disturbing statistical trend, whether it is too early or not. Early evidence is not good for her right now. Not going to claim victory yet (Not like I want to. I just want my main back not watch as she becomes worthless) but the stats seem to be skewing towards exactly what most of us have been saying.

EkitaihDec 6, 20171 votes

[{quoted}](name=Darkeus Wolf,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=BiuYdAPO,comment-id=000b0000000000020000,timestamp=2017-12-06T17:05:41.784+0000)

Fair points. But it is showing a disturbing statistical trend, whether it is too early or not. Early evidence is not good for her right now. Not going to claim victory yet (Not like I want to. I just want my main back not watch as she becomes worthless) but the stats seem to be skewing towards exactly what most of us have been saying.

Out of curiousity, is there a way you can take a picture or anything for the current stats? Anywhere that I look on this site shows that she's currently sitting at a 50-51% win rate for the current patch.

LankPantsDec 6, 20178 votes

https://imgur.com/a/rOUZp

That's what I see right now, but as I said it's almost certainly better to wait at least a few days before drawing conclusions, this is just the preliminary number.

LankPantsDec 6, 20179 votes

Summoners are used to a certain way the champ is played. They have been playing this champ quite a lot and any change can have a big impact on how they play. They haven't had an adequate amount of time to appropriately compensate for the nerf.

Irrelevant. The way Sona is played hasn't changed, she's just weaker.

As you and I have said, it hasn't had enough games to offer an accurate summation of the champ.

Correct. That's why I'd wait at least 3-4 days before calling anything definitive.

People are aware of the nerf and they are taking advantage of that fact.

If people taking advantage of the Sona nerfs causes her to fall to 47% winrate it shows the nerfs were to harsh. This is another non-point.

EkitaihDec 6, 20172 votes

{quoted}

The one day data from lolalytics on patch 7.14 is already at 47.14%. It's not the be-all and end-all and one day is subject to fluctuation, but it's certainly not a good sign.

Im Taylor SwiftDec 6, 20174 votes

check the winrate graph in that page and there you can see that today she currently is at 45.36 winrate.

Scary DoorDec 6, 20175 votes

{quoted}

I'll be monitoring her winrates for the next few days

The moment she goes below 50% I am going to write up a storm

I cannot find a consistent period in League's history where Sona hasn't been above a 50% win rate and in the top 30, or so, overall win rates.

Sona mains need to understand that non-skillshot, non-point-and-click, unavoidable harass is not the healthiest of designs and that's why Riot keeps it in check... now even I will admit that the nerfs to aery, the base AP in the sorcery tree by 5 and some of the recent changes are absolutely over-the-top.

I'd say rework Sona, but there's about a 75% chance (based on other reworks) that it would turn out horribly.

RedCycloneDec 6, 20178 votes

Sona's been above 50% winrate for atleast 5 years now, that's why it's such a big deal

Also you need to realize that some Sona mains know that Sona is a easy champ, it's basically the reason why she is always over 50% And know that what a lot of us do want is better skill expression on her kit, when the rework was in development a Rioter made a thread to discuss what we want, better skill expression was probably the most requested thing in there...then they just slapped her with the URF passive on her ult and made us mash buttons more

big boi edriDec 6, 20179 votes

[{quoted}](name=Scary Door,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=BiuYdAPO,comment-id=000b0001,timestamp=2017-12-06T15:13:00.834+0000)

Sona mains need to understand that non-skillshot, non-point-and-click, unavoidable harass is not the healthiest of designs and that's why Riot keeps it in check...

Pantheon disagrees.

Faceroll TacticsDec 6, 20174 votes

Coming from a teemo player panth is only good for 15 minutes then he becomes hot garbage. Renekton is leagues better because he is actually somewhat relevant later on

Aatrox Mid 1v5Dec 6, 201723 votes

They should've increased her AP scaling on her q by more than 10%...

ElsewiseDec 7, 20172 votes

No thanks, I don't like getting chunked for 50% of my health. At level 1.

only zhuleDec 7, 20173 votes

{quoted}

No thanks, I don't like getting chunked for 50% of my health. At level 1.

BULL FUCKING SHIT you are getting 50% hit at level one by sona alone. Let's do some basic math (pre change), Sona has 46 base attack damage, Sona's Q does 40 magic damage per bolt and gave her a bonus of 20 magic damage on her next auto attack. Her passive gives another 15 damage. If we factor in scaling you get about 30 extra damage. So far assume she sets up the AA reset you are looking at 182 damage before factoring in resistances. Not even Kled MINUS HIS MOUNT has a small enough health pool to be 50% at level one by a full rotation from Sona. These numbers also do not include base resistance numbers, meaning that the amount of damage going out is even smaller.

Without factoring in resistance of any kind, and assuming the average health pool for a champion at level one is 550. Sona is at best 33%'ing you (38% if it's Caitlyn who has the lowest starting health in the game)

ThilmerDec 6, 201720 votes

You forgot that they actually nerfed HER BREAST SIZE when they reworked her. [sona-playing]

I think at this point is faster to make a list of Sona's assets that hasn't been nerfed.

DarkeusDec 6, 201718 votes

I don't get it. Sona had already dropped to 52% winrate. I am convinced Riot has no clue what they are doing... AT ALL this preseason.

Big Black CrocDec 6, 201710 votes

Correction, riot NEVER has an idea what there doing in terms of balance, at least at the start of season6

Agent CorgiDec 6, 201713 votes

That seems like alot compared to what Ezreal is getting. The sad thing is I barely even see Sona anymore, Ezreals are more common on my end. [cass-cry]

Void Baboon RFDec 6, 201712 votes

Whatever just because Ezreal is a degenerate doesn't mean I'm going to pretend Sona is healthy for the game in any way.

TheHappyReaperzDec 6, 20175 votes

Gee, maybe a champion that spams heals, shields, and undodgeable poke is overbearing. Who knew?

FairyfleurDec 6, 201718 votes

She can't spam any heals unless she wants to go oom? And even then the heal is incredibly low.

InfernapeDec 6, 20172 votes

Well until she gets a Tear.

zero356Dec 6, 20172 votes

Who the fuck buys Tear on Sona? Maybe it's a new-fangled thing, but anyone opting for tear on Sona, barring being already ahead, is basically asking to lose ~~ARAM excepted~~

TonyTonyMordecaiDec 6, 20174 votes

Tear has been one of my very first items on Sona for a while now.

zero356Dec 6, 20175 votes

I see, maybe I just suck But I've always found the other items ( item 3057 item 3098 ) that fit into her more standard/EARLY build to be enough