[Minor Rework][Soraka] Less Heal Spam, More Utility and Strategic Decisions
#Minor Soraka Rework
A suggestion to preserve Soraka's identity as the best healer in the game while adding more strategic decisions and tools to her kit.
##Objectives
- Preserve Soraka's core identity.
- Change her healing patterns from frequent low-value heals to large heals that must be handed out carefully.
- Provide Soraka with more disengage tools to better fit her defensive playstyle.
- Improve Soraka's feel (impact, fairness, counterplay), for the player, her allies and her enemies.
- Provide Soraka with more dynamism, so that she feels more active in both laning and teamfights.
##Proposed Changes
Passive: Salvation
New: Those In Need. Soraka's Astral Infusion and Wish heal for 1% more for every 1% of health missing from their target.
Q: Starcall
Unchanged.
W: Astral Infusion
New Cost: 20% of Soraka's health + 60/70/80/90/100 mana. New Cooldown: 16/15/14/13/12 seconds. New Heal: 120/160/200/240/280 (+60% AP).
E: Equinox
New Range: Self. New Cost: 80 mana. New Functionality: Soraka pulses with astral energy, pushing all enemies to the edge of the area, dealing 140/180/220/260/300 (+40% AP) magic damage and silencing them for 0.5/0.75/1/1.25/1.5 seconds. New Functionality: If Soraka successfully damages an Equinox-silenced enemy with Starcall, the enemy is rooted for 1.1/1.2/1.3/1.4/1.5 seconds.
R: Wish
New Cooldown: 180/150/120 seconds. New Heal: 200/300/400 (+70% AP).
##Results
These changes allow Soraka to feel like a powerful support that turns the tides of a battle and saves her allies in the nick of time, it preserves her identity as the healer in the game, and it gives her tools to be more dynamic against threats while cementing her identity as a sustain/disengage support.
It was important for me that Soraka has that "awe" factor when it comes to healing. Thanks to the addition to the Salvation passive and the tweaked values on her Astral Infusion and Wish spells, she heals for a truly impressive amount... but she can only do so sparingly. That's the key to adding more fairness and counterplay to Soraka.
Because her cooldowns and mana costs are so high, she has to be very strategic with her abilities. She can still cast Starcall for a frequent slow, AoE damage and self-buff, but her crucial abilities (her W, E and R) must be cast with care and foresight. Soraka now feels very powerful, but it's also possible to either bait her cooldowns before going in, or simply act with swiftness and punish her for hesitating.
By condensing Soraka's power, her opponents now have windows of opportunity to punish mistakes while still preserving Soraka's core identity. These changes also allow for enemies to feel less helpless against her, and it helps her playstyle be less of a slow grinding of the enemy. Soraka can definitely undo a lot of damage, but she can only do so once per engagement. Choosing when to do so (especially when one takes into account the addition to her passive and masteries like Windspeaker's Blessing) is going to be the key to the new playstyle.
##Conclusions
Overall, I think this direction is the way to go for a healthier Soraka. There is room in League of Legends for healing-focused champions, and there are ways for them to feel powerful, but they need to come with strategic decisions and windows of opportunity.
As always, comments are quite welcome.