{{champion:16}} Soraka's Problem - Identifying the problem, possible solution

Commander KYA·Oct 9, 2014·4 votes·915 views

Her cost for healing is 10% of her maximum health. This means that the cost increases as you build health items. Whereas the healing done does not scale off of her health but rather off of her AP ratios.

This means that Soraka could lose more health than she heals!

Her only viable build is to not build ANY health items but rather HP/5 items and to stack as much AP as possible.

Horrible design guys! You can do better! The relationship between the health taken away and the health given to an ally should be constant and based off of the same stat. And the health healed should be more than the health taken away. And the health taken away should be equal to the health restored by her Q - Starfall

6 Comments

Linna ExcelOct 9, 20144 votes

They wanted her to die more, so they added a health cost and gave her heal no range at all.

All I know is she isn't fun to play anymore.

Gareth TankinOct 9, 20144 votes

I've played near a hundred games as her, and for the first dozen I felt kinda the same... Then I actually started learning to build her, learning to play her, talking the adc through her strengths/weaknesses before game, exc.

Hp5 items are only good in the first 10~ mins, I rarely ever buy an hp5 item after the start of the game. You just don't get enough return for the increasing hp cost. Yeah, HP isn't a good stat on her, but Soraka as a whole really shouldn't be building much hp anyways. She is a champ where you should be building as much AP as you can get a way with. Her Astral Infusion has a wicked AP ratio (.6 every 1.5~ seconds that avoids magic resist) and AP really helps her keep her health up (.2-4 ap per target hit that avoids magic resist). Sona, Nami, exc. are great with little if any gold, Soraka... she is a snowballer, she is mediocre if you build the token support talisman/mikeal's but she is great if you are able to build stuff like soulstealer/archangeal's/zhonyas.

Making how much she heals based partly on the hp cost... what she needs is less feul for snowballing. She needs to rely on items less, she is a support after all. Making the heal something like heal for 80/.../280 (.4 ap + .6% max hp) could help with that. It'll mean more level based scaling on Astral Infusion (you gain 35~hp per level) so she isn't as item reliant. Building AP would still be good because it still gives the good sustain through starcall.

MotherChurchOct 9, 20142 votes

I agree with OP. The heal is too costly. Either make it stronger or reduce the % health cost. It makes little sense right now.

Kowe The EwokOct 9, 20141 votes

You're playing her wrong. You're tod efensive. Early on with low HP her heal is no heal, but a health trade. You grants your carry your health regenartion. You have to balance the skillpoints in Q and W. Poke the enemies as much as you can, once you get in danger of overhealing yourself by poking the enemies you're good to heal your carry.

Lategame you will be able to spamm your heal in teamfight.

SelflessTeammateOct 9, 20141 votes

I'm still learning, but trying to adjust to New Soraka is even harder than I thought it would be. I first tried what I thought was pretty standard: Heal first, then Starcall, then that Silence thing. Well, that tends to not work out, because she becomes absurdly fragile, and Starcall has very little range and is exceptionally difficult to actually hit, as well as easy to notice and dodge.

During the laning phase, I find myself aiming Starcall behind them, as they're likely to simply run backward to avoid it. But because the casting range is so short, this almost always forces her to immediately retreat after casting it.

Realizing that Heal doesn't particularly scale that well and Starcall was just too slow to land, I tried doing the exact opposite: Silence -> Starcall -> Heal (Still of course getting heal at level 1). The Silence move is actually quite good for harassment. Its AoE is decent enough and it's instant damage. It also makes for an excellent escape tactic, as you can cast it in the path of your pursuer to halt them for a couple of seconds, which can make enough of a difference, as well as buy you time in case someone's coming to help. Combine that with a quick Starcall cast, and Soraka gets some of her health back, too, as well as a little extra bonus damage.

Again, I'm still figuring it out, but the way I used to do it--prioritizing Heal, Starcall, Silence, in that order--just doesn't work very well. The range of Heal, as well as the impossibility of casting it on herself, makes her exceptionally vulnerable. She can be quite helpful in team-fights and Wish is always an excellent move if your jungler runs into their jungler and things don't look good. But the Silence circle seems to be underrated right now. If nothing else, it scares the others on the bottom lane, and has proven helpful for both escapes and teamfights. It also scales nicely.

The way Heal works now is strange to work with, and Starcall isn't really doable for her to regain health, as it only works on Champions, not minions or monsters. But she can harass a bit better with the Silence circle, and if it detonates with an enemy Champion in it, it's an easy Starcall hit. You can only aim behind enemy champions for so long before they get the picture and just move to the side--the AoE is pretty tight.

Those are my personal thoughts on it.