Sion's spell cost are so low

Hochelaga·Mar 23, 2018·4 votes·522 views

I played against Sion support last night. He had Manaflow band with Relic shield. He basically just couldn't run out of mana for the whole game and didn't even have to go for a mana item.

Basically, we got forever zoned and hard lost the game.

But come on, his Q basically cost 45 mana on ALL level and his E cost 35 mana on level 1. That's nearly half lower than most support champions. This is wrong.

On the other hand, you got Sona, that has a 80 mana cost heal on level 1 and they almost start with the same amount of mana.

23 Comments

breakordoom444Mar 23, 20183 votes

Sion DOES have low mana costs compared to most SUPPORTS. sion wasnt designed to be at botlane, he is also a pretty bad pick bot lane, no peel,fast instant cc(except R) and mid game/early game harass. ALOT of top laners don't even have mana bars(yasuo,riven,kled and zed) so having a mana cost reduces ability spamming.

EschetonMar 23, 20183 votes

So you are saying someone spent a runetree and rune on mana sustain, but they aren't allowed to throw a few spells. K

DuskDaUmbreonMar 23, 20181 votes

I think his point is that Sona can go even more devoted to mana and still runs out.

chipndip1Mar 23, 20181 votes

Sona doesn't aim her entire basic kit, though.

And has a heal for two.

And has a shield for five.

And has an 100% ap ratio on her Q (50% x 2) which doesn't need to be aimed.

DuskDaUmbreonMar 23, 20181 votes

I'm not saying anything about that.

I'm just stating OP's fairly correct claim: Sona can go even more devoted to mana than a Sion (Manaflow band+Biscuits+Forbidden idol, versus just Manaflow band), and she will run out of mana first.

Sona doesn't stop running out of mana until she has Redemption and Athene's. And even then, she runs out after a teamfight.

chipndip1Mar 23, 20181 votes

If there's good reason, there's good reason. If Sona doesn't run out of mana, she just spams numbers at you freely on low cds. Her mana in and of itself is a limiter to keep her from mindlessly running team fights over.

HochelagaMar 23, 20181 votes

I was talking on early game.

HochelagaMar 23, 20181 votes

I was giving Sona for example. Nami has a 70 mana spell healing that cost 15 extra mana per level.

EschetonMar 23, 20181 votes

Yes, because she has a ranged 2 target poke that doesn't require skillshots or even right clicking. It needs gating. And she benefits greatly from things like item 3003 or item 3504 , all kinds of mana and mana sustain. Sion has...Tank items like item 3001 I guess. Something you don't wanna build on Sion Support.

HochelagaMar 23, 20181 votes

The only thing on mana sustain, is manaflow.

SuperLuigiLXIVMar 23, 20183 votes

Sion also has to aim some very telegraphed spells and can't heal his ADC, but I guess we're ignoring stuff like that for the sake of your argument?

HochelagaMar 23, 20181 votes

I'm not sure why you're saying that. Not all supports can heal their adc too. Tham kench thresh and blitz also have some target spells. None of them cost that few mana

MorganFreemanBotMar 23, 20183 votes

{quoted}

I'm not sure why you're saying that. Not all supports can heal their adc too. Tham kench thresh and blitz also have some target spells. None of them cost that few mana

Sion has massive amounts of CC and damage in his kit. Sion also has probably the most telegraphed and counter-play ridden kit in the entire game.

His Q is a large hit box stun which deals absolutely massive damage (early game) based off of his base AD alone. Inversely he has to stun himself for at least 1 whole second - upto 2 - in order to get any cc or damage out of it. During this time he cannot move, re-aim, use any abilities / summoners (outside of Smite), and the channel can be interrupted.

His W is a massive AoE % health + base damage nuke.. which is easily countered by just hitting him. Srsly, the shield's absorb is pretty low all game long.

His E is requires a middle man to reach decent ranges, meaning that you can use angles to make it absolutely impossible for him to hit you.

His R has a global warning and isn't super dangerous unless he covers some distance. It's also pretty easy to dodge.

Not all supports can heal their ADC, but all supports have some form of snap power / cc / trade potential. Sion does not. You can (relatively easily) avoid everything in his kit through movement or simply CCing him out of it, which is the cost he pays for the power he has when he lands EVERYTHING.

This is why Sion became unbelievably broken when his E was bugged to have a gigantic hit box. Sion's weakness is unreliability through counter play; if you make him reliably unavoidable he's broken as shit.

SuperLuigiLXIVMar 23, 20181 votes

When Tahm flings his tongue, he doesn't have to sit there with a giant "I'M CHARGING MY TONGUE" animation for a full second if he wants to actually land the hit and it be a valuable one.

When Thresh or Blitz fire their long-range CC, they don't need a minion as an intermediary for the range to actually be long, and the resulting CC is much better than a slow.

And they all have instant ways to protect their ADC even if you get inside their long range. Tahm can eat his ADC and has two health bars for absorbing skillshots, Thresh can flay and ult, Blitz can knockup and ult. Sion can sit there with his I'M CHARGING MY AXE animation, and maybe pop you with a slow, both of which are very difficult to effectively peel with as support in a gank situation because almost everything in this game is just so fast these days. And even if he DOES zone the jungle gank off with a well-timed Q charge that magically doesn't get interrupted, he's going to die himself so his ADC can live if it's early game, because he's got the mobility of a rusty door hinge 95% of the time.

And don't tell me his passive makes up for that. Sion's passive is worthless. The only time you might get a few hits off with it is level 1 or during a chaotic teamfight, but by the time those come around you're really not doing enough damage to be a threat. Outside of these scenarios, every death to a Sion in his passive is down to a mistake on the part of the enemy.

HochelagaMar 23, 20181 votes

I feel like you've never played against a Sion support. Sure on paper it looks awful but wait until you see a good one. What division are you?

Basically he would shout a minions, damage and slow you (arcane comet hits you + scorch) then axe you. Remember that he can cancel his axe animation early and just swing it. Starting with relic shield provides him with more hp than the average support, heals his allies and his big hit box just tanks everything for the adc. Sion can literally solo push a lane too.

Thank kench doesn't clear wave as fast as him, his tongue is easily blocked by minions, Blitz's grab basically cost 40% of his mana. he can't spam it. Thresh depends on how good is your adc.

SuperLuigiLXIVMar 23, 20181 votes

I play Sion support. I've mained him and played him in every role since his rework.

Don't lecture me about how good or bad he is, I know his strengths and weaknesses inside and out.

HochelagaMar 23, 20181 votes

Lol why the aggresive answer. I know Sion pretty well too. And I believe that his mana cost is way below others especially during early game. This isn't about -- He can hardly land his skills, so his spells shouldn't cost alot ! Your reply hasn't answered anything.

You're literally switching the subject's topic which is ''Sion's spell cost are so low''. This has nothing to do with his ult not hitting or being too predictable.

SuperLuigiLXIVMar 23, 20181 votes

Yeah, it does.

His spell costs are so low because they're telegraphed skillshots. When Sona hits her buttons, her spells WILL land. Period. Sion has to put some serious effort into landing his, and there are some champions that he's essentially got no chance of hitting on his own. And also because he's a very slow, very large melee champion, which means he not only has no escapes, he's far easier to hit with skillshots than most of the roster.

They're also low because he's a top laner and he has to go against champions who have similar if not cheaper spells, many of which are also easier to hit with than his own.

Course, if you had responded to Morgan Freeman Bot up there, you'd have already gone through all this. i didn't mention it because he'd already said all that was needed on the subject, but if you're going to avoid his post because you have no response, and continue trying to fabricate one for my posts, I'll just quote him for you.

HochelagaMar 23, 20181 votes

Telegraphed spell has nothing to do with ''oh this should cost less''. I took Sona as an example of how unfair early game mana cost was. I could have taken Nami's W if you wanted, or Blitzcrank's grab. Want a top ''telegraph'' champion? Jayce would be a good example, all of this spells cost about 50-70 mana in early game and he can easily run out of mana.

Morgan's arguments don't even stand at all.

Q dmg range from 12-120 based on charge time. him saying '' Inversely he has to stun himself for at least 1 whole second - upto 2 - in order to get any cc or damage out of it'' is false.

No matter how long he charges the Q, if it hits a target, you get a guaranteed 50% slow

W's shield is scaling on MAX HEALTH %. That is not a small shield. Sure it looks small on him because of his massive health during late game. Either way, you don't max his W first.

E's initial target range is 725, if it hits a minions, it goes forward up by 775 range for a total of 1500 range. EVEN if this spell a telegraph spell as you would say, IT'S 1500 POTENTIAL RANGE for 35 mana at level 1 that slows for 2.5 seconds, reduces armor by 20% (hidden effect for adc?) does an increased 30% magic dmg to all subsequent ennemies hit by E. Even Xerath's Q range or Jayce's blast aren't that far. Combined with Arcane comet and scorch, you get a 150 dmg spell for 35 mana on a 12 second cooldown

If all you have to do if to Avoid his spells to counter him, heck, that would be the same against a Xerath mid, and life would be easy.

But you know what, you can Keep using Morgan's argument against me even if I just proved them wrong. This conversation is over.

SuperLuigiLXIVMar 24, 20181 votes

-Yeah, it does. Nobody's spells are as telegraphed as Sion's. And that's on top of, as I pointed out, the fact that he naturally shoves waves when he casts spells, which is severely dangerous early on.

-The chargeup time is also required to charge the distance of the hit, and the slow lasts one quarter of a second.

-That is a small shield. At no stage of the game is that shield even remotely difficult to pop in a team fight. It's rarely even difficult for one person.

-Again, his E requires minions and shoves waves to be used like that. Also, you should really do your research before spouting off arguments. The armor shred only applies to things hit directly by the scream, and if that happens it's not a 1500 range spell. Xerath's got four long-range spells, Jayce's stuff hits ridiculous hard and he's got SEVEN buttons to work with, he should do less than a guy with only four. His spell also moves slower than shock blast and only requires watching Sion's position to avoid.

-I've played against plenty of people that have avoided the vast majority of my E attacks. Sucks for you that you're not one of them, but that doesn't make the move too powerful or too cheap.

-You haven't proven a single thing wrong yet. And it's hard for a conversation to be over that never began. Or was I supposed to pretend that you've had a better argument than "nuh uh" up to this point?

YokoNomiMar 23, 20181 votes

I sometimes get the feeling that Sion has an almost too forgiving pool sometimes as a top laner, which I feel like you'd have had a much better argument if you just argued his "intended" lane instead. But I'm also low elo with no sense of how Sion is intended to work, so I also don't care to speak through my lack of knowledge.