Issues regarding Soraka gameplay change
Personally, I like the supporting factor that Soraka has. Her heals are more powerful now and they are her primary presence in the team. This is what I loved about Soraka in her previous update: her silence was long enough to disable ability-based champions, her heals were powerful enough in one burst to keep a person alive, and her Q made sustained fights her specialty. Now, she has rapid healing and excellent laning and supporting potential. The speed boost is a lot of fun as well.
Unfortunately, her means of sustain are far too unreliable to be considered a means of keeping her in the fight. Every single game that I have played as Soraka has ended up in the late game with me healing all my allies so that they can push, while me, being low on health due to the heal cost, having to back. Granted, it may be Riot's intent to make Soraka's sustain unreliable, but the downside to this is hypocritically reducing her presence in fights. Her cooldowns on her 2 offensive abilities are too high to be of any use. The silence is too brief and the root is too rare on her E, and the cooldown and scaling on her Q makes it so she deals no damage to anyone, even the squishies late game. Soraka has a good supportive presence, but absolutely nothing else.
Ultimately, I am dissatisfied with the gameplay change. The cost on her W coming from her maximum health punishes Soraka for building tanky, and she deals no damage or providing means of crowd control. The only purpose she has is support, and this infuriates me. Riot should not lock a champion into one role, EVER. Flexibility is a virtue that I love in League of Legends, thus i pray that they never do this to any other champion in the game.
What do you guys think, as a community, what could make Soraka more than a support? I think reducing the cooldowns on her E and Q while buffing the late game ratios could make her a more viable mage. Also, changing the cost on her W to come from her current health but having a higher mana cost could make it so she doesn't have to back as much. I really love Soraka, so I hope she can be of use other than as a support.