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Sona Rework Idea

zero356·3/28/2017, 9:32:23 PM·2 votes·845 views

So, there was a decent amount of Sona talk recently. Or maybe I just noticed it more because I main Sona. Regardless, it gave me a chance to rethink some things and a good opportunity to reorganize a rework idea I wrote for her. So here it is.

TL;DR at the bottom.

The basic idea is two-fold. First, make a really toned (and I mean really) toned down version of Invoker; I don't play dota, so it's mostly the idea. Second, incorporate sound into her kit more. I’m trying to make her play pattern more like playing music and her abilities feel more like sound. Now to the rework.

Passive:

Instead of flat bonuses based on the last spell cast, make it's affect based on which 3 spells were cast leading up to it, with the effect varying with number of casts of each spell and maybe order.

For example, casting one of each spell (a normal combo) would yield all three current passive effects on the next auto, but at maybe half or a third of the current strength. Casting one spell and another spell twice would yield the 1/2 or 1/3 effect of the single cast and near or at live values for the spell cast twice. For a spell cast three times to achieve the passive, the bonus would be higher (maybe 50%) than live values.

To make it more in depth they could do a couple of things. They could give power chords charged by the same skill three times an extra effect (perhaps making it an AOE explosion like Karma’s empowered Q) Or they could add bonuses based on what number each spell was; the first spell has a diminished effect while the last has an increased effect. Of course, these might be a little complicated and Sona should still be relatively newb friendly; easy to learn, hard to master. Personally, the first suggestion doesn’t seem too bad.

OK, but how do we keep this added power in check?

The passive now also comes with two added drawbacks. One, stacks building to her passive decay after not using spells. This prevents a Sona from sitting there with two q's stacked, waiting to hit you with a q and a 3-q power-chord q-enhanced auto. Two, using a fourth spell starts the cycle over from the beginning. This means she can't get to three q's and sit there, casting q whenever her passive stacks would start to decay.

The main point of this passive change is to emphasize flow and rhythm, the elements of music. The powerchord should be the culmination of the spells cast to get there. The passive "controls" emphasize not just randomly hitting buttons but flowing through the fight, making sure you keep the spells coming (which lines up with Rito's changes to her ultimate, adding CDR for her normal abilities) using your powerchord after the third spell. It also means Sona as actual decisions to make. She could hold off and try for a lot of damage with a 3-q passive, but that means she can't heal or speed up anyone that fight. From a balance perspective, I think the controls on her passive are the best points.

Abilities

I’m going to start by saying that there will be no auras. There will be AOE buffs, but no auras. Aside from balance,which I get to later, it fits thematically. A chord is three notes, and each spell would be a note. If the spell had an aura, it’s more a whole melody as opposed to a single note. Anyway, to what I have in mind.

How would her spells work?

Take away the "flying" targeted parts of her spells (the bolts that actually hit people, ally or enemy). Now many Sona players would hear that and freak, but hear me out. Instead of a targeted part, a wave of sound moves out that incorporates both the effect of the bolt (damage, healing, or speed boost) and whatever passive it granted allies (enhanced auto, shield, and speed). For me, the range on said waves should be about the size of Karthus E, Defile. As for the speed, I'm thinking slow enough for someone with a blink/dash to escape or for people on the edge to be able to walk out without getting hit, but fast enough that the average champ can't walk from mid-way to all the way out before getting hit. For something similar, think of Vlad E, except slower and it covers the whole area, not just radial bolts outward. More interestingly, this would aid mid-Sona by potentially giving her something she sorely lacked; waveclear.

Next, make the effects fall off with distance; her moves are sound and sound dissipates. And when I say effect, I mean for both allies and enemies. You can heal and shield the tank really well or give the ADC a really nice shield; not both. The same goes for auto-enhance on q and the speed boost on w. Sona herself, being at the center, would theoretically get the max effect. HOWEVER, if Riot want to focus on support Sona, and effectively kill mid-Sona, they could make it so she gets no benefits; I don't know if I want them to kill mid-Sona, but that's a question for another time and at the very least, doing this would making buffing support Sona easier without worrying about mid lane outcomes. And yes, I understand the last idea aided midlane Sona; I just haven’t decided if I’m ok with destroying it as a possibility.

I think this change is good because it again emphasizes flow. The argument has always been that you deserve to die if you let Sona get close enough for her to q and powerchord-lichbane-auto you; these changes would make it even more true. A Sona that "flows" into the fight and get's right next to the enemy AD without dying damn well should be able to kill said AD.

TL;DR Make passive depend on the all the spells used to stack it, not just the last; the spells (notes) build up to the powerchord (sort of the final note for that part). Make the spells feel more like sound, which they technically are.

15 Comments

Ahristocats3/29/2017, 6:37:04 AM3 votes

I keep seeing this suggestion of making Sona like invoker but people don't play Dota, and don't understand that Invoker has no cooldown and no mana cost on Q+W+E only on R (and invoked abilities), which is what makes it a viable concept, able to make every spells he wants

Sona on the other hand has a cooldown on Q/W/E, how the hell do you expect her in teamfight to get the 3 Q power chord effect for instance? she's going to sit here and not do anything for 12 seconds? her stacks also have a duration, so is she supposed to spam Q 3 times in lane?

you can argue that you can give her only 3 effects based on the order of Q+W+E, but this also doesn't work because this forces Sona to not use a spell in teamfight when she wants just to get a power chord effect, if she wants to quickly heal allies she can't heal them because it would fuck up her combo. this makes sona not able to actually choose what effect she wants

unless you give her 3 no-cd abilities+an invoke like ult, i don't see the concept working

Secondly, i would like Sona to finally act as an enchenter. I'm tired of Sona having to get in low range to work simply because riot can't balance her no-counterplay spells your rework doesn't fixe it, you kept her Q/W/E but increased the effect based on how enemies/allies are close. I say No to this because enchenters aren't supposed to get in the middle of a fight unless you make them tanky which is not the point of enchenters

only zhule3/29/2017, 5:52:18 AM2 votes

I feel like i've said this before but making Sona like Invoker is a bad idea. It puts a burden of knowledge on players, since it would require everyone to know all 10 possible variations of her passive. It puts a burden on Riot and likely makes Sona impossible to "balance" since now they have to figure out how to make one passive that can do 10 things not broken and not useless.

The charge system wont work. You are going to have to many times where a charge falls off at the wrong moment and now you can't cast what you want. Or Sona is going to have a skill constantly down because it was the only way to make sure she didn't lose her passive. Or worst of all, players are going to be stuck with a choice between messing up their power cord (which can takes 20+ seconds to build), because they needed to send out a clutch heal or pop a movement speed boost for a set up, or simply dying/being useless because they cant cast the needed spell at the needed time without a horrible side effect.

only zhule3/29/2017, 6:51:40 AM1 votes

So that i don't look like i'm only shitting on other people's thoughts, i'm going to list my suggestions below.

What do we want from a support Sona?

Personally i'd like a battle mage support. I'm not talking about a mage (traditional mid laner) going bottom as the "support". I'm thinking a support who's job it is to really buff their allies. The issue with current Sona is that all her abilities are "one and done". Her damage boost gives the next basic attack a bonus damage but nothing else. The heal and shield don't do much, but at later levels you can hit them so often that it doesn't really matter (so long as you have a big enough mana pool). As much as i hate it her E is the only one that doesn't fall into this "one and done" problem, it actually provides a constant boost for a set period of time. And this gets to the heart of my suggestions, abilities that provide a short term boost to allies. So we don't have the issue of old sona where you stand 800-1000 units back and provide your allies with free stats, Nor do you have the issue with current Sona where it's all about getting to the end game where you can jam out 10-20 spells per minute (since any individual spell is basically useless).

Passive: I kind of like where this is now, only real change i would like to see are visual ones. Mostly in the area of a powercord Diminuendo. This could be done by the model of the champion effected shinking based off how much less damage they do. This would make it clear to all players that the target is effected by Diminuendo.

Hymn of Valor:

Since people seem to hate on the auto targeting of his spell and "how much damage it does", i would suggest a change to a skill shot type of ability. I'm thinking something similar to Karma's empowered Q. Sona sends out a wave of sound that detonates upon hitting an enemy champion or upon reaching the selected area. If it collides with an enemy champion, they are hit for extra damage. otherwise the spell does damage in an area of effect with unit at the outer edge taking less damage then those in the center. It rewards Sona for landing the skillshot on an enemy champion, but also punishes Sona's who fire off their single offensive ability without bothering to aim or think. This change also makes Sona less reliant on a follow up auto attack for damage, and makes using the power cord a choice rather then a guarantee.

Instead of reinventing the wheel on what the other half of Valor does, i'd probably just either bump the damage up but split it between multiple attacks OR make it so the bonus damage can hit structures. Maybe Sona doesn't get the bonus damage on her autos.

If we have to change the buff, maybe something like % of damage dealt is coverted to true damage. Makes her useful to caster allies and a way to get around champions who build a ton of armor and/or magic resist.

(as an aside i don't believe that Sona does to much damage, people just dont account for the fact that most Sona's power cord attacks are a combination of 1 auto attack + an instant auto attack refresh with bonus damage coming from 2 sources + an ability hitting them + 100% total AP.... and in some casts + 50% AP and 75% base AD if she has item 3100 )

Aria of Perseverance:

I'd like this to keep a base heal given to the lowest health ally in range as part of it's usage. However instead of providing a shield, I would prefer to see this provide allies in the area a certain % spell vamp / life steal for the duration of the ability. This would mean that Sona would need to plan her W usage around engagements, instead of just hitting the button like a mad man and netting her team thousands of points of damage reduction over the course of a minute or two.

A toned down version would simply provide the spell vamp / life steal to the next 2 attacks and/or abilities.

Song of Celerity: While i dislike this ability, that's mostly to do with how poorly it scales when levels are put into it.

What if this ability didn't just provide movement speed, but also gave bonus attack speed. It would give Sona players a reason to level this skill. "do i want my allies to hit harder? heal from their attack? or get 1-2 additional attacks in?"

Crescendo:

Now i have some horrible ideas for this, the biggest one being that if an enemy is hit they have to go through their entire dance animation. I know that would never work, but it would be funny.

Seriously though, this spell is fine. Though given the changes to her abilities i would cut the bonus CDR. I want each spell to be big and impactful, which is hard to do when your champion always has 60%+ cooldown reduction at level 16.

The biggest change to Sona would be that all her abilities would have longer cooldowns. (Maybe Q doesn't go up much, meaning that Mid lane Sona could be a thing). But each of her abilities provides a big clear effect. Sona no longer is the champion of "Life or Death by a thousand tiny actions"

zero3563/29/2017, 9:24:33 PM1 votes

Ok, where to start. I had like ten minutes this morning to address some of the responses, so let me gather some thoughts and reply to some more general concerns.

First, on taking away the ability to clutch heal or speed.

From my perspective, this isn't as much of an issue because two stacks of a spell are needed to reach live values (more or less, I'm less focused on numbers), meaning one spell won't throw you off. Now, having to then q twice after might, but that's the more experimental part of the kit and I haven't read much complaints against, except Rubrick, who I address seperately.

Second, I never specified if the stacks fell off one at a time or all at once. In my head, it was all at once. Though, making them fall off one at a time (with a decent time window) could basically eradicate this as a concern.

Last, I'm less concerned with this problem anyway. If you are playing reactively the reward is having to react to your now unplanned powerchord. It means already being there, and/or playing the rest of the fight well is just as important.

Two, the point of all this

That's not really a good way of putting it, but whatever. If people take anything away from this, I'd prefer it be the controls on her passive and the way her abilities would work, which I haven't seen as much talk on (again, except Rubrick, addressed seperately). Whether that means people don't care, are ok with them, or were so concerned with the passive they ignored it and went straight to comment, I don't know.

Now that I think about, Invoker Sona may be dumb. Changing her abilities won't make her invoker. The controls on her passive could allow a straight buff to it, still without making her Invoker.

Eh, live and learn I suppose.