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Why is Sona's E so out of place?

AdanChristo··46 votes·6,170 views

you literally cannot get this ability early game because its so useless, and in late game it provides little to no benefit, i main Sona as an ap, not support, and even with 600+ ap her E range is so small and lasts so little, i can evade and poke but it's underpowered unless you main ap

Today, Sona is a champ that can get you verbally abused by your team, everyone knows how weak she is, and it's not weird for people to suggest you to use better supports, (this is in ranked games).

Today, Sona is a champ that has the most expensive skins, yet is rarely played.

Today, Sona is a champ that doesent fit in any lane, she ks adc's, she cant do anything else.

Sona is so useless, she can compete with Sakura from Naruto: http://orig08.deviantart.net/0125/f/2013/249/6/9/useless_sakura_by_charasasuke-d6l92ep.jpg

http://i3.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/facebook/000/651/508/ef4.jpg

http://cdn.meme.am/instances/58944902.jpg

Who's more useless? Sakura or Sona

76 Comments

Silent Pace27 votes

[deleted]

AdanChristo22 votes
  • 1, Riot needs to re-work Sona
ChaosThief9 votes

Again.

Tik1156 votes

and take feedback regarding the changes this time

or get CertainlyT to do it, guy makes anything broken as hell

OyddAWqJ5r4 votes

You mean "healthy" as hell. Let's not put it all on CertainlyT though, I'm sure if Stashu and him combine their minds they can shut out 100% of community feedback instead of only 99%.

Squidblimp3 votes

I actually wrote a thread the other day on some ideas I had for Sona, and why she needs a rework. http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/EMbpWAau-sona-is-outclassed-and-kinda-boring-she-needs-some-changes?comment=00060000 It's a little long, but I hope it's worth the read.

Malicious Metal3 votes

{quoted}

  • 1, Riot needs to re-work Sona

Mordekaiser Better think twice about it...

AdanChristo2 votes

the feels T_T, morde got axed too...

Crowe Stalker1 votes

At least Mordekaiser and Sona can be in the same lane... Not Effectively or Efficiently, but still.

Bârd1 votes

Pull a skarner.

3rd time's the charm.

Ryuku Cruxis3 votes

If they could transfer some of her q damage to her allies magic damage proc (and maybe make it last a little longer), and up the speed of her E a little lategame (it's decent early) , she'd be in a good place as an aura support. Losing her own damage on q would of course, kill her solo lane, which many will complain about.

Honestly the fact she can only keep one aura up at a time (does she still have like .5 seconds of them being stacked?) makes me think they should be permanent until changed (I think they used to be like this but unsure), which honestly would make e good enough without buffs since it could be on until you cast something else.

LankPants3 votes

Losing her own damage on q would of course, kill her solo lane, which many will complain about.

It would also destroy her early game. You either have to balance her auras around buffing up two people, or potentially buffing 5, in a few abuse cases (did you know you can passive buff a LB clone?) even more.

Assuming we don't want to break her teamfighting her lane phase would likely suffer greatly.

Silent Pace1 votes

[deleted]

chipndip13 votes

[{quoted}](name=Silent Pace,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=pEIzgRFt,comment-id=000000010001,timestamp=2015-08-30T15:45:43.936+0000)

I feel like removing powerchord's 40% bonus damage when she uses her Q would be a lot better than actually touching the damage from her two auto targeted bolts(they both deal 40 damage + an average ap ratio early on, most of her burst comes from powerchord anyway.)and replace that +40% damage bonus with something else or could just lower it from 40% to about +20%.

Isn't that just a flat nerf...

Silent Pace1 votes

[deleted]

chipndip12 votes

[{quoted}](name=Silent Pace,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=pEIzgRFt,comment-id=00000001000100000000,timestamp=2015-08-30T17:42:34.336+0000)

its so you can buff her aura damage.

But...that's just a flat nerf to her main source of damage that she has to spend 3 spells worth of mana to activate. She doesn't need it BUFFED, but it doesn't need to be nerfed. Hell, she doesn't need her Q looked at period.

Her W and E are the problems. Q is fine as it is in all honesty.

Kamai5 votes

With that nerf/readjustment, I'd probably never use PC Q intentionally again. Powerchord W and E are actually already really nice for trades.

Pika3102 votes

First and I get tired of repeating this, Sona does not use auras anymore. She uses 1-time actives that expire, actives are not auras.

The damage on Sonas Q at 40 base is already tied for the lowest damage amongst all supports. If anything, it needs to go back up to 50, asking to lower it is beyond absurd.

LankPants5 votes

In the long run her E's going to need to be replaced.

It's just not a spell that's at all useful or will ever be useful. The only time you really want to speed up your allies is when they're in trouble. The last thing you want to do as a squishy character is run face first into danger to use your 350 range MS boost. Her old E was way better because it had some insane 1000 odd range, even if the MS boost wasn't as good.

AdanChristo2 votes

1000, wow that's nice, it's too bad for new sona players :/, i can feel ok with atleast 600ms range

LankPants1 votes

The speed boost used to be absolutely pathetic though.

It was great for assist stealing.

Pika3104 votes

Mathematically, her current E actually gives less average-units-per-second than its old version until your AP reaches ~350 and that's only assuming you ALREADY have 40% CDR.

LankPants4 votes

That doesn't sound too far off.

May as well just be worse in every single way.

Her old E also had the 20 flat MS, which is effectively another 6% that she just lost in the rework.

Pika3105 votes

You didn't play the original Sona? That's a shame :(

I played her in season 3, when she used to be good and season 4 pre-patch 4.13 when she was weaker than Nami, but only marginally so by an error of player preference.

In case you weren't aware, Sona received around 24+ nerfs in patch 4.13 alone and an additional 7+ nerfs in the following patches, including everything from base AD all the way to spell range. Literally every single number on her entire kit was nerfed during this time.

I made countless suggestions over 10 months that every last one fell on deaf ears from Riot. My last decent attempt was here: http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/Is5dKpVZ-so-now-that-fair-is-finally-fair

Archon X4 votes

I get her E at level 4. Procing her passive with E saves lives and gets kills.

AdanChristo2 votes

good, now you have less mana and thus cant stay in the field too long, she has mana issues too, provide e's and you wont have enough mana to heal

The Yetii Rider3 votes

{quoted}

good, now you have less mana and thus cant stay in the field too long, she has mana issues too, provide e's and you wont have enough mana to heal

Because of her mana issues I usually first buy Tear of the Goddess. Combined with Talisman of Ascension and Ardent Censer (and the support mastery that gives you Chalice) I feel Sona's mana is manageable.

It does usually take 25 minutes or so to get all those items though.

Pika3102 votes

Not that her heal actually matters... It's the weakest and most mana-intensive heal in the entire game. Math proves that after factoring everything including CD, scaling, etc. that its overall effectiveness per-cast has been reduced by more than 95% from pre-patch 4.13.

RedCyclone4 votes

Remove it's one point wonder factor, reduce/remove ap ratio

At rank 1, make it crappy, at rank 5 make it very good

10% MS at rank one, 50% at rank five maybe reduce the cooldown per rank too

chipndip17 votes

{quoted}

Remove it's one point wonder factor, reduce/remove ap ratio

At rank 1, make it crappy, at rank 5 make it very good

10% MS at rank one, 50% at rank two maybe reduce the cooldown per rank too

50% at rank...TWO?

RedCyclone4 votes

urp, brainfart

Pika3103 votes

It's old version had rank-up value via the aura. It's because they removed the aura from the skill and left behind ONLY the active that it's lost its usefulness.

Riot is the only gaming company I know of that hates auras. It's discriminatory and blatantly biased.

Pika3101 votes

maybe reduce the cooldown per rank too

Or put all of her spells back at 7 seconds like they're SUPPOSED TO BE.

A scale consists of 7 notes, 7-second cooldown... These are things Fearless intentionally ignored and ruined whilst gutting her.

Hard Penetrator3 votes

It was good in season 1 and 2. Now its pretty garbage when champions have tons of mobility on their own, itemisation is also much much better.

In s1 you speed up a Chogat or Olaf now you speed up Lee, Zed. There is a difference.

Egillion2 votes

When was the last time we saw a support Sona in competitive play ?

...

..

.

Well

Yhea, That's what I was thinking. Poor sona :'( Lonely Sona.

Marthian2 votes

If you think Sona's E is useless, then you are a terrible Sona player. It's a aoe team speed boost, it's great for chasing/running away, and later roaming as a team to get to an objective quickly.

Other champions can do that with Talisman or Righteous Glory? Sona doesn't need to build any of those for her speed boost (but she can anyways, so she still has an advantage over others.)

And you don't even need lots of AP to make it amazing. I've gone with 200 or less AP on Sona and it still is very useful.

AdanChristo2 votes

obviously doesent play sona, ur probably those players that BM their support when they pick Sona

Marthian1 votes

Oh boy, is it the blind Sona fanboys insulting people that actually PLAYS SONA WELL posts again? I thought we got rid of those.

Go ahead and be more salty, the only changes she could possibly use is lower mana costs on W (and that's terribly iffy), she's otherwise very balanced.

People giving others crap about what support they pick have nothing to do with the champion itself. Again, would like to point out that she has a pretty great winrate/above 50%.

DJ Di02 votes

I don't think it's out of place; if fits well for her since she has no other form of self peel other than her ult. It's just got shitty numbers.

They should just buff the base values on the speed up, /maybe/ lower the ratio a bit in return but it's not that gigantic to begin with.

{quoted}

Oh boy, is it the blind Sona fanboys insulting people that actually PLAYS SONA WELL posts again? I thought we got rid of those.

Go ahead and be more salty, the only changes she could possibly use is lower mana costs on W (and that's terribly iffy), she's otherwise very balanced.

People giving others crap about what support they pick have nothing to do with the champion itself. Again, would like to point out that she has a pretty great winrate/above** 50%.**

So do Zilean and Zyra; can you tell me they don't need help either?

Even high elo Sona players agree that she's not good. (A Wild AP Sona can come off as brash sometimes; but he makes valid points.)

Pika3101 votes

That statement is an oxymoron. He claimed Sona is viable, but then you accuse him of bming Sonas.

I agree with the first half of your statement, it is obvious he doesn't play Sona. However, I'm baffled at how you came to the conclusion of the second half, especially considering I myself personally dodge every game there's a Sona on my own team.

Budupops1 votes

real mains don't complain about their champions -1

AdanChristo4 votes

useless comments will be useless comments

Budupops1 votes

stop trying to abuse ur freelo

LankPants4 votes

Stop posting on these boards, you're hurting my IQ.

Booriin1 votes

Sona is just not fun to play half of the fight, the fun just begin after she got her first AP item. That is likely already mid game and most game I play usually end at mid game too, which made me feel unsatisfactory.

But I agree with @Marthian that lower Sona's mana cost would help her a lot. However her gameplay with lack of niche just make Sona not fun to play anymore and she don't feel like she worth to pick against any other support because Sona is too generalist with almost no niche, her niche has been hidden under AP items

Sona E is not useless, it just feel underwhelm to use. E and item 1327 actually saved me few times from being caught, help me roam to ward, or help my team catch enemy with TEMPO, I found her E Aura alone don't work well when you use it to catch people without TEMPO, it is just not work in most of my matches.

http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/e8tTzj2W-speculation-518-is-the-last-chance-for-balancing-for-worlds-whos-on-the-hitlist

{quoted}

Some of the stuff we're looking at for 5.18:

Exploring Buffs

  • Zyra
  • Veigar
  • Syndra
  • Twitch

Likely Nerfs

  • Fiora
  • Morde

On watch/needs investigation

  • Skarner/Darius/Garen (where are they post 5.17?)

  • Devourer (too strong?)

  • AD Ezreal (too weak?)

  • Lulu (too strong solo, too weak support?)

  • Vayne (too reliably strong?)

Odds are high some other champs will end up being worked on too, and that some champs above will end up being taken off the list as work on the patch continues. The above are some of the key things we're looking into though.

AdanChristo1 votes

why is sona not in there? wtf

Booriin1 votes

{quoted}

why is sona not in there? wtf

Sona is just not on high priority list, that is why they said:

Odds are high some other champs will end up being worked on too,

It is likely they will work on Sona but they are not sure if they have enough time to put her on 5.18 patch. It is possible that Sona will be push bach to 5.19

I rather see they push Sona back to 5.19 than put her to 5.18 with low priority. I don't want Sona to be a low priority champion with pushed changes, It was so hard to caught Riot attention to Sona since her last nerf.

Pika3102 votes

Because Riot hates Sona, patch 4.13 proved that. Specifically, Fearless probably hates her the most out of Riot's entire staff. There're even memes like this one going around every now and then:

CasterGilgamesh1 votes

dont guys just dont......dont let sona get buffed to where she is played in the lcs riot will kassidan'ed her so hard people will call champions just like her and him sona'ed.

Pika3102 votes

Actually, they already call it Sona'd, because of the patch 4.13 gutting.

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