Boards›Gameplay

The State of Sona

Pika310·4/20/2015, 8:53:31 AM·27 votes·8,053 views

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v636/pika310/Save%20Sona%202015%201_zpsu7qxtzkh.jpg

It's closing in on 10 months since Sona was completely gutted to unplayability. Meanwhile, Riot refuses to address the issue, blatantly displaying their discrimination against Sona players. Her win-rate in professional play has stayed an unshakable 0% since. The top Sona players worldwide have been getting repeatedly demoted and most quit the game entirely. Let's take a look at where she's at right now:

4.13:

  • 21 Documented Nerfs
  • 2 Confirmed Shadow Nerfs and at least 1 Suspected

After 4.13:

  • 5 Additionally Documented Nerfs and at least 1 Confirmed Shadow Nerf

Stats:

  • 5th Lowest base HP
  • 10th Lowest max HP (excluding Sion)
  • 3rd Lowest Base Mana amongst mage-supports, after Lulu and Zyra
  • Lowest Base AD amongst supports, tied with Soraka (excluding Thresh/Lulu)
  • 2nd Lowest max armor amongst supports, after Zyra (excluding Thresh)
  • Lowest MS tier, shared with 3 other mage-supports (9+ sit in higher tiers)

Abilities:

  • 1st, 2nd and 3rd shortest ranged spells amongst supports (4th is 43% higher, 5th+ are even more)
  • 2nd Lowest Damage potential amongst supports, after Braum
  • Lowest Base Damage on a spell, tied with Leona's Q and Taric's W & E
  • Weakest and most expensive heal in the game, even lower than Relic Shield
  • Weakest and shortest-duration shield amongst all supports
  • Weakest MS spell, roughly tied with Nami
  • Least CC amongst supports
  • Only support in the game w/o hard CC pre-6
  • Sub-par ult outclassed and out-ranged by most supports

Sona's kit is designed to be a close-range tank support, which she is not. Even if that were the case, the numbers on the abilities are still too weak to be usable, Taric's kit is stronger and has higher range. On Sona, this kit is just blatantly counter-intuitive and yet her stats still remain rock-bottom despite this. Even the abilities themselves are counter-intuitive to each other, the varied cooldowns make Power Chord extremely difficult to use Diminuendo/Tempo, meanwhile Staccato gets repeatedly nerfed in return for the other two being less accessible.

On a final note, her in-game models are still blatant downgrades and wreak of an air of unprofessionalism and complete disregard for accuracy of detail. They're amateur-made rush jobs with improper coloring that completely lacks contrast, shading or texture and display incorrect detailing contradictory to her splash-arts. You can read more about that here:

http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/skin-champion-concepts/0KPJ9lh9-am-i-the-only-one-who-bothered-by-this

http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/skin-champion-concepts/BENxLU8p-fix-sonas-robe-design

157 Comments

Jamaree4/20/2015, 8:57:36 AM22 votes

I keep seeing people say Sona is weak but then I keep seeing her win rate in ranked be above the average, but then I keep forgetting that high win rates don't matter because they don't see LCS play, but the moment they do again, people will act like they knew she was OP the entire time, ugh, this cycle never ends.

RedCyclone4/20/2015, 1:25:04 PM13 votes

and yet she still hovers around 52-54% winrate

I don't fucking get Sona, even when she is clearly outclassed she wins more then she loses could be due to her obsessive playerbase who refuse to play other supports, such as me

but i did notice you didn't mention anything about her AP scaling, because she seems to be the most moneygrubbing support due to her ability to scale with AP

Honestly I don't want Riot to be touching Sona anymore, every time it happens it's bad fuckin news, if they buff her, expect 3 nerfs 3 patches later

qetzel4/20/2015, 11:19:18 AM10 votes

http://champion.gg/champion/Sona/Support

You can say that Sona has been repeatedly nerfed. You can say that Sona doesn't feel right, doesn't play right, is easily counter picked or just isn't Sona, but you can't say she is bad. Well, you can, but you'd be either ignorant or lying.

How would you improve her, bearing in mind that straight buffs would not be right given her current statistics and a revert isn't going to happen? That is the question you should probably be answering.

ZephyrDrake4/20/2015, 6:21:17 PM6 votes

nah she is "too oppressive when not going against a heavy engage lane"... although she is also weak against poke lanes... i really have no idea what Riot is planning to do to her, they say they want to make her skills be impactful and useful and yet the last thing they did was nerf her Q... ok? how about her W and E? Riot give me something so that i know you don't hate her. Seriously, everyone has been complaining about her heal all the time yet for some annoying reason they don't do anything with it and i am sick of hearing people call Sona a heal support. USING YOUR HEAL SHOULD BE A LAST RESORT THING! her heal is pathetic and costs way too much mana for the amount it heals and the shield is only useful to prevent initial damage but TOO BAD IT'S ALSO TIED TO A HEAL!.

I really have no idea who thought that having both a shield and a heal in the same skill was a good idea when they both contradict each other in how you want to use them. You want to shield someone to prevent damage while you want to heal someone to restore the damage that was taken so that literally means that for you to make the most out of the skill it means that you have to wait for whoever you want to shield to actually have taken damage first so your heal aspect doesn't go to waste. It also doesn't help that the shield is way too short and it's value is pitiful for how short the duration is

Slamurai Jack4/20/2015, 7:33:18 PM6 votes

LeeSin 46% OP. Sona 53% unplayable. Leblanc 47% Broken. Jinx 55%. Balanced. Nidalee 49% OP AF. Evelynn 51% Trash. Keep going on about how numbers don't matter.

Dryad Soraka4/20/2015, 8:21:44 PM6 votes

She's in the top 15 highest winrates and is still op as balls lmao

Also I wouldn't call her heal expensive, have you seen Soraka's? LOL.

Elphrihaim4/20/2015, 6:52:58 PM5 votes

So...

Sona is viable.

We can agree on that, right? Her win rate is artificially high due to low pick rate, but she is viable.

However, Riot removed the things that made her Sona with her rework-- persistent auras, melodies.

And then they nerfed everything on her repeatedly after said rework.

And they keep nerfing her utility and healing... so that they don't nerf her damage.

To quote my friend from a number of other games where we played against a Sona...

"half health one combo"

Sona Q -> Powerchord+Lich, dealt ~1000 damage. She wasn't fed (long game, she had Void Staff).

But when she was trying to run from us-- something Sona used to excel at-- we caught her easily.

When she was trying to actually fight, she flopped over like a piece of paper.

Sona has lots of damage and even more potential damage, but she doesn't have, in my experience, enough of anything else. She just ults and Qs because her other buttons aren't worth it half the time, to her.

While I concur, heavily, that Sona needs changes...

I question what the right ones are, and some of the hyperbole in place.

TotalJerk4/20/2015, 4:23:16 PM5 votes

I don't believe she's underpowered or overpowered, She's just in the same boat as Yorick right now.

Riot gave her the nerfs they did because she was overbearing if you weren't playing her counters. The thing is: they didn't fix the problem. She's still just as oppressive in good matchups, but they made her even more worthless in bad matchups. You don't fix unhealthy designs by tweaking numbers.

That really ought to be a term: getting Yorick'd.

MikeYeungsSmite4/20/2015, 4:32:02 PM5 votes

How about you check the numbers yourself, in a 2v2 situation sona q potential is 120. Not at silver offcourse.

''Longer-duration ult with over triple the range'' where's the stun+aoe damage?

Two Right Wings 4/23/2015, 1:42:27 PM4 votes

Big problem with Sona isn't that she is weak, its that she isn't fun. Old sona was a blast, new sona is just a meatbag. Ironically the rework designed to make sona players feel like they were contributing in meaningful ways just made her feel awful, every ability causes me pain when I press the key. Abilities that force a utility backline support into melee range aren't fun, an E with 0 speed until you get a deathcap that has the most ridiculous short range is cool, her ults particles aren't as satisfying, only Q is still a fun ability. I would probably main old sona with the DJ skin. New Sona makes me want to quit league after a bout of games

MikeYeungsSmite4/20/2015, 8:17:28 PM4 votes

''im gonna exclude champs to proof my point -op

ALso, a wild ap sona is trash, 1 trick pony

LilxPaprika4/20/2015, 9:40:54 AM2 votes

Fixed: http://i.imgur.com/QUXmeUq.jpg

Edit: alright maybe not fixed but this could help / A good place to start.