Please do not nerf Soraka

Robert Smith·Nov 19, 2015·9 votes·1,640 views

still has a low pick rate and she was not buffed because of the new patch. She is just using what she always had and the fact she is considered too strong because self healing was nerfed is not enough reason to make her weaker. If anything needs a few buffs seeing how she is super vulnerable to focus. Please Meddler reconsider nerfing her or at least keep the removal of grievous wounds on her ult.

Edit: I'm not saying she needs any buffs, she is fine the way she is. If she needed anything changed about her it would lean more towards a small buff like a constant projectile speed on her Q at all distances.

32 Comments

Penguin EclipseNov 19, 20154 votes

What she needs are actual risks. The 10% health cost and short healing range were supposed to accomplish that. But they have not proven to be sufficient. She doesn't need actual nerfs but as is, it is safe to say she is oppressive.

MarthianNov 19, 20151 votes

honestly, I don't think the healing range is that short. Feel like it be made smaller.

Joe DreddNov 19, 20154 votes

Delusional soraka main

coevkeNov 19, 20154 votes

He's just defending his freelo. [slayer-pantheon-thumbs]

Wolfram OxfordNov 19, 20153 votes

She needs no buffs at all, with a protect the ____ comps she can do pretty good. Imagine running Lulu Shen or anything else like this, with a good front line Soraka is the Kog'maw/Vayne of supports, scales well and can carry.

KrinuNov 19, 20153 votes

Soraka main here.

While you won't find many entries under "Soraka" with this preseason patch, she's definitely been heavily affected by the changes. Most of the changes are buffs to her, both in terms of absolute strength and relative power, but she's also gained a few vulnerabilities.

The consolidation of Sightstone with a gold income item was a HUGE buff, because it allows her to buy an extra AP item while still providing vision. The downside to this is that she loses both the on-use movement speed and the passive movement speed buff, meaning that she has to be more careful about positioning than she already needs to.
The grievous wound change made her more powerful when ignored and weaker when targeted. If she gets out of position, she can't rely on her Q heal to keep her alive until she's safe. The flipside is that you can't ever stop her from healing her allies outside of killing her. This sort of fits in with her "shoot the medic first" approach that Riot made with her: She's not a support; she's a carry that works by stopping you from killing her team instead of killing you.
The new mastery changes are a significant buff to her. While 10% more healing is nothing to sneeze at, it's actually pretty close to even for her early game due to the loss of low-level AP. It's a win late game, but that's never where Soraka's been particularly powerful. The real advantage, however, comes from the 15% resistance buff she applies with her heals. Build Ardent Censer, and suddenly her W grants 15% AS, 15% bonus resistances, and some on-hit magic damage. It turns bruisers - especially AS based ones like Irelia - into horrifying monsters.
The weakening of Face of the Mountain means that tank supports aren't also sustain supports, which I personally think is a great call. It's sort of silly having a tank/engage support able to pick up one item that renders an entire class of supports irrelevant. While this doesn't directly affect her power, it definitely changes her place in the support landscape.
The AD powerspike arriving earlier combined with the large nerfs to AP items hurts her. While supports have a lot more gold than they used to, thanks to shutdown gold getting shared and the vastly increased support gold incomes, she's still slower to get AP now than she was last patch on top of the AD champions she lanes with getting power spikes earlier.
She really doesn't care about the potion change. Mana was never a major limiting factor in a typical support build (buying coin, maxing W first, using Q for sustain only and not poke), so the loss of mana potions just warrants a "meh, whatever" from her.

Overall, I don't think she's a huge problem at the moment, outside of her interaction with Graves. Graves' massive armor/MR bonus from quickdraw combined with Soraka's sustain and resistance boosts means that he can pull off tank-level tower dives with no defensive gear whatsoever.

Robert SmithNov 20, 20151 votes

The way I see it is that Soraka was changed in little ways because of masteries. The champions around her were changed for better or for worse. She also counters the damage Riot wanted to give to ADCs so instead of fixing that they want to nerf her instead. I may be wrong here but they seem to want to nerf the few rather than tweak the many. The many here being already changed in the first place.

dangopeeNov 19, 20152 votes

Nah. Gut the goat.

MarthianNov 19, 20154 votes

Only if we get to gut the hook, lantern and the robit.

PennsNov 19, 20152 votes

she was not buffed because of the new patch.

-Grievous wounds are trash now - item 3092 is pretty op now -That new keystone mastery makes winning against her in lane impossible -kek

MimyNov 19, 20151 votes

She wasn't buffed directly. xD

Pluss If the grevious wounds comes from item 3033 It just puts it back on them AFTER her ult... so her Ws don't do much..

I lost a game as a raka... The other team just got too strong for me to outheal.. It was late game.. both sides were pretty even till that point but once past that point.. it was GG..

They also had a Jax with item 3124

So us having me as a soraka and them having a jax sorta evened out the game up till late games when they snowballed over us..

It was a fun long game.. perhaps the longest game I had..

Joe DreddNov 19, 20152 votes

a game

woah so much experience

MimyNov 19, 20151 votes

I know, it was a lot.

it hurts that all we can do is wait to see what riot does... Oh no!

MarthianNov 19, 20151 votes

Pluss If the grevious wounds comes from It just puts it back on them AFTER her ult... so her Ws don't do much..

Grievous Wounds no longer affects heals from allies. It only affects self-heals now. So her allies heal the same (ultimately what she wants to do), but if she gets hit, her healing from Q is reduced. Her ult currently removes GW, but it may no longer do that soon.

MimyNov 19, 20151 votes

Whats the point in GW if it doesn't reduce all healing?

I think GW needs a buff.. more than soraka needing a nerf than.. grievous wounds should also counter summoner 7

I thought the the point was that.. the ult removed GW in order to have full heal effect (Because it's an ult) but W could still be reduced..

Idk that's how I always thought.. I agree raka could use some nerfs.. but she don't need gutted..

Maybe **increase W cool down to where you need 45% CDR for the 2 second heal? ** Which wont be til late game therefore **nerfing her early effectively.. **

W Cooldown 5.5 / 5 / 4.5 / 3 / 3.5 (Give or take) up From 4 / 3.5 / 3 / 2.5 / 2

Ultimate - (+50% AP) 」 down from (+ 55% AP)

Now that's a good amount that might make her to were she was before Preseason..

Other than that I'd make GW reduce all outside healing.. therefore making raka more or less useless..

MarthianNov 20, 20151 votes

Other than that I'd make GW reduce all outside healing.. therefore making raka more or less useless..

Rather they keep it that way and rebalance outside healing if it becomes an issue rather than have to balance champion heals around GW (though I personally would have rather they remove GW completely and rebalance problem champions based on that.)

MimyNov 20, 20151 votes

Simplest correct solution is.always best answer.people always say.

EcchiOtakuTMNov 19, 20152 votes

She doesn't need the grievous wound removal on ulti that's it

Robert SmithNov 19, 20151 votes

She's always had it and no one complained when there was less GW. Now more people can have it so that makes it more valuable to have.

EcchiOtakuTMNov 20, 20151 votes

I know she always had it but now that GW only affects self-heals she doesn't need it anymore and once they remove that riot won't nerf the other things about soraka :c

Robert SmithNov 20, 20151 votes

I'm also not sure that ignite was changed to be like other GW which if it was then I would be okay

EcchiOtakuTMNov 20, 20151 votes

All grevious wounds were changed including ignite, so soraka removing it is too much now that her kit is not halted from healing allies. Otherwise her kit is fine.

H3lla MoneysNov 19, 20152 votes

Soraka right now is everything Riot never wanted her to be. She automatically turns any lane into a stalemate where trying to trade with her is just a waste of mana. The only way to kill her lane is through ganks and massive burst damage. She just makes the entire laning phase incredibly stale and uneventful.

Robert SmithNov 20, 20151 votes

You focus her or poke the adc while dodging her Q. I've played enough games as her to know a good Blitzcrank means certain death for her because of how close she needs to be to cast Q. And if she is healing the Adc switch focus to her since she is probably low health by then.

ivnkoxhcucNov 19, 20151 votes

WAit, can someone link me the nerfs?

Robert SmithNov 20, 20151 votes

There is no actual nerfs, Meddler just said she seemed too strong and they might consider nerfing her. Removing the GW part of her Ult was on the table.

insaiyanbaccaNov 19, 20151 votes

lol "she is just using what she always had" so is yas tbh and hes demolishing everyone

RysophageNov 19, 20151 votes

raka is cancer and impossible to lane against. she needs nerfs.

Athenes LuluNov 20, 20151 votes

Don't nerf Raka, BUFF GW.

Penguin EclipseNov 20, 20151 votes

I actually think grievous wounds are where they need to be for the first time. Healing/sustain supports have a tremendous amount of their power budget in their heals. Having that power invalidated by a single mechanic that doesn't impact any other class of supports has always been unfair. Especially now that grievous wounds can be applied with every auto attack regardless of health. And many sustain supports still struggle into the later game, which is when grievous wounds really comes into play.

At one time it was widely accepted that grievous wounds were the price you paid for being able to give permanent health when compared to supports with short duration shields. But the shield vs. heal era has passed and the only support with a shield as a primary part of their kit that still sees common play is Janna. (Technically Thresh too but his shield is used relatively little for the actual shield it provides.) For the past 2 seasons we have seen a shift to supports that have neither an ally heal nor an ally shield. There is no point in punishing one class of supports over any other class, especially when the competing classes are dominant. And with unprecedented access to sustain this season from lifesteal, masteries, and refillable pots, sustain support's primary power has more competition than ever.

In other words, Soraka needs to be balanced better. I don't think grievous wounds should be altered to fix her nor do I think grievous wounds can appropriately fix her without unfairly damaging all the other healing supports. Soraka is just exceptionally good. None of the other sustain supports are nearly as over bearing. And the health of her playstyle in particular is yet again in doubt.

Robert SmithNov 20, 20151 votes

Besides an iffy slow and Aoe silence soraka has nothing else besides healing. Sona has poke and a stun, nami can heal and damage, while also having two knock ups, and other supports with heal have hard cc or damage attached to them. Soraka only has healing going for her. If she is up against another support with healing it could just be a stalemate until the other support decides to cc her and the ADC. Outside of healing and throwing down a silence during team fights she offers less than other healng supports. It really depends on the team since she can stall the plays the enemy makes while another support can win by bursting her down while the ADCs fight each other.

Penguin EclipseNov 20, 20151 votes

{quoted}

Besides an iffy slow and Aoe silence soraka has nothing else besides healing. Sona has poke and a stun, nami can heal and damage, while also having two knock ups, and other supports with heal have hard cc or damage attached to them. Soraka only has healing going for her. If she is up against another support with healing it could just be a stalemate until the other support decides to cc her and the ADC. Outside of healing and throwing down a silence during team fights she offers less than other healng supports. It really depends on the team since she can stall the plays the enemy makes while another support can win by bursting her down while the ADCs fight each other.

Healing may be pretty much all she has but her heals are far more game changing than her sustain support counterparts. As much as I hate to admit it she has become an issue. Especially in high Elo where proper positioning makes her very difficult to handle.