Soraka needs a buff

StoryDuck·Oct 31, 2015·6 votes·838 views

With this coming:

Mortal Reminder 2500gold Grants 40 Attack Damage; UNIQUE Passive – Executioner: Physical damage inflicts Grievous Wounds on enemy champions for 5 seconds. UNIQUE Passive – Last Whisper: +40% Bonus Armor Penetration.

Soraka needs a buff. Mind you not a big one. But a needed one.

R - Soraka calls upon the stars, removing Grievous Wounds and preventing grievous wounds from being applied again for 4 seconds on all allied champions and herself, including untargetable allies, and healing them for 150/250/350 (+55% AP). Wish's healing is increased by 50% on allied champions who are below 40% of their maximum health.

12 Comments

CoolKnightSTOct 31, 20152 votes

Soraka is actualy really strong in the current meta. Everywhere besides competive actualy. Did you known she's perma banned in challenger right now. It's her playstyle & how your team has to play arround you that's the issue in lower brackets of play. She wins lane by out sustaining the enemy team. Try hp regen runes on her. O god you will laugh that game.

I'm almost sure Soraka will be a problem without this Grievous Wounds item. If she still seems to be to strong pre 6. Than we could give her the Sona treatment. We reduce the base healing from her W but give her ultimate passively 10% increased healing. This would shift her healing power to her level 6 and maybe people will try to max Q first.

StoryDuckOct 31, 20153 votes

I cannot find this statistic about Challenger level having 100% Soraka ban rate not even a 50% ban rate. Could you link me this data? Also, you're an ADC main :P I'm not sure you have support's best interests at heart <3

CoolKnightSTOct 31, 20151 votes

It's really hard to have proof on these kind of statics because currently their is a little game involved arround this:

+ doesn't work together
Ones they see an they build an entire comp to counter her (so basicly she's often picked later in the draft)
When you pick you need to have engage on your team. The problem is that the enemy team will always try to pick that.
Their are a lot of other powerpicks that are just as free elo as Soraka. This result into a lot of cases the support is forced into picking a hard engage support like

Their are still some things I can proof:

has the 2th highest banrate in solo Q for supports right now (4.99%). Number one is with 31.9%.
has the 4th highest winrate in solo Q from all champions (3th highest as support). Number one is Blitz & Brand. This makes Soraka the strongest utility support add this point in the game.

StoryDuckOct 31, 20152 votes

Engage is a clear weakness for any champion being immobile. This is true for every protect the ADC comp in history. On another note, Soraka is a powerful pick in Solo Q for two reasons. 1: She can help carry from a support position when ahead much easier then other supports. This is because players in solo Q rarely communicate as much as in team games. 2: She can punish coordination mistakes far more then any other support. As above in solo Q it's pretty hard to have everyone target the same target at the same time. Soraka can punish this by healing damage as it comes in. However, compare that to team play in which players can say "I'm targeting _____" in which players can coordinate to deal damage at the same time. This is why you don't see Soraka in LCS, because when 2+ champions deal their damage at the same time Soraka cannot heal it because the target dies too quickly.

Also found this:

Diamond+ pick/ban rates

9.5% pick at that rank 5.4 ban rate and 51.2% win rate. I have no problem with passion but please don't make up things like "She's Perma banned in challenger".

Thresh has a 40.4% pick rate in Diamond+ Blitz 17.4% pick rate Alistar 17.3% Janna 14.8% Braum 14.8%

Baby GhoulOct 31, 20152 votes

{quoted}

Soraka is actualy really strong in the current meta. Everywhere besides competive actualy. Did you known she's perma banned in challenger right now. It's her playstyle & how your team has to play arround you that's the issue in lower brackets of play. She wins lane by out sustaining the enemy team. Try hp regen runes on her. O god you will laugh that game.

I'm almost sure Soraka will be a problem without this Grievous Wounds item. If she still seems to be to strong pre 6. Than we could give her the Sona treatment. We reduce the base healing from her W but give her ultimate passively 10% increased healing. This would shift her healing power to her level 6 and maybe people will try to max Q first.

I'm curious to see those rune pages. It doesn't seem like Soraka has a set rune page like most supports, I see a lot of people using different things, which I think is nice.

I also agree. Soraka is extremely strong across all leagues if you learn how to position your silence correctly, and you realize that when you start helping your teammates win fights that you'll have a huge target on your back. Her sustain is almost always underestimated.

StoryDuckOct 31, 20153 votes

I'm a Soraka main (and so are you awesome!) so I know exactly what you are talking about. However, keep in mind that the ways to apply grievous wounds is limited. Currently summoner 14 which applies it once. And item 3165 which applies multiple times but only if below 40% health. This new item applies it on AAs and abilities that deal physical damage from the first hit and applies it every hit there after. This is also a new item that has 0 drawback in getting built because Last Whisper was already a core item on most AD based champions but now it have this tacked on. Building items to counter healing came at a cost before now they introduce one with no drawback and its a core item for ADCs that want to take down tanks. Soraka being the "True" healer of LOL should be able to counter such an item. Now, if the item was similar to Morello and only applied after the target is below 40% health then I would have no problem with this item and Soraka would not need this buff.

Kat HeadOct 31, 20151 votes

{quoted}

I'm a Soraka main (and so are you awesome!) so I know exactly what you are talking about. However, keep in mind that the ways to apply grievous wounds is limited. Currently which applies it once. And which applies multiple times but only if below 40% health. This new item applies it on AAs and abilities that deal physical damage from the first hit and applies it every hit there after. This is also a new item that has 0 drawback in getting built because Last Whisper was already a core item on most AD based champions but now it have this tacked on. Building items to counter healing came at a cost before now they introduce one with no drawback and its a core item for ADCs that want to take down tanks. Soraka being the "True" healer of LOL should be able to counter such an item. Now, if the item was similar to Morello and only applied after the target is below 40% health then I would have no problem with this item and Soraka would not need this buff.

item 3085 supposedly will have critical strike on it and will actually be a good im not a troll for building it item, on hit mortal wounds everywhere. I think raka has massive buffs in the new mastery tree though.

Soraka needs to be weaker than she is now. I also abuse the freelo goat when forced to play support.

StoryDuckOct 31, 20152 votes

Everyone has buffs coming from the new mastery tree this includes ADCs (although I am really excited about +10% heals and shields). Soraka has some pretty clear weaknesses. She doesn't like assassin's for one. They can scale so well that they can 100-0 targets in .5 seconds that doesn't even let Soraka heal and if they have any ability to dive the enemy team she's isn't exactly the most mobile champion. That said, she does have ridiculous synergy with Juggernauts because they build equal amounts def and off so they get a lot more out of her healing and often have some good peeling abilities to protect her.

Kat HeadOct 31, 20151 votes

{quoted}

Everyone has buffs coming from the new mastery tree this includes ADCs (although I am really excited about +10% heals and shields). Soraka has some pretty clear weaknesses. She doesn't like assassin's for one. They can scale so well that they can 100-0 targets in .5 seconds that doesn't even let Soraka heal and if they have any ability to dive the enemy team she's isn't exactly the most mobile champion. That said, she does have ridiculous synergy with Juggernauts because they build equal amounts def and off so they get a lot more out of her healing and often have some good peeling abilities to protect her.

Soraka counters assassins (the ones not named Rengar or Talon).

Interrupting any assassins combo with her instant aoe silence Garentees the assassins death and that her team mate will live.

StoryDuckOct 31, 20152 votes

She counters Zed not assassins. This is because Zed has delays built into his jumping and ult damage.

Assassin's that do not have delays in their abilities and can (and I said can not will, they need items to do it) 100/0 the ADC: Ahri Diana Fizz Kassadin Khazix Leblanc Rengar Shaco Talon

Also some burst mages can 100/0 an ADC (and many other targets) target near instantly preventing Soraka from having an impact: Annie Blitzcrank Lissandra Ryze Syndra Viktor

I will grant that Soraka can counter an Assassin's early game before they get the items to burst down a target. Late game she cannot. Unless they are playing very poorly there is less then a 0.5 second time in which one could react to them unloading enough damage to kill a carry. If you are able to react within 0.2 seconds to stop that damage...well damn you must be in Challenger cause that's insane.

CoolKnightSTOct 31, 20153 votes

Enjoy your free Elo:

Hp regen Quins
Armor Marks
Scaling Hp regen Seals
Mr Glyphs

Their is an alternative build that included heavy AP (I believe AP/AR Quins, AP Glyphs, Health Seals) Basicly an Janna page. But it seems the build slowly start to fall off.

Adrian is also working on a more offensive early game oriënted alternative for the hp regen build:

2x Hp regen Quins
1x Mana regen Quins
9x Armor Marks
5x Health Seals
4x Armor Seals
9x Mr Glyphs

Still one more note about Soraka playstyle. When you are playing the hp regen build. Don't spam your abilities. Just heal your adc & their is litterly thing they can do. Don't forget to use smart cast on your W & E to fully utilize your abilities.