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Why did Riot remove all of Soraka's independance?

Lathanwalker·9/13/2015, 11:38:58 PM·3 votes·576 views

I know she was reworked a LONG time ago, but im still wondering why they would turn an easy fun to play champ into a skill based champion, dependant on a carry.

The rework basically forced her into only being a support, making her w useless unless you're in lane with someone. The only time people play soraka anywhere other than support is if they build full ad and attack speed, which i find should be unnecessary for someone who claims to also be a mage, and even if you build full ap, youre still pretty useless.

I get she's one of the best healers in the game, but Riot really made her dependant on her carry, unless you build stuff that are completely off meta.

The old Soraka was able to heal herself in lane, which was good sustain, but had a higher cooldown which made her balanced, and her passive and Q were very usefull in lane to harrass and poke EASILY, without constantly being juked, like with new new skillshot Q. Her old Q was also great in teamfights to hit multiple targets.

All the changes made to soraka with the rework basically removed her capabilty of being a mage, and made her useless in the midlane, unless you build attack speed and AD.

Also, soraka's old E made her one of the most unique champions, giving back mana to allied champs, or using it offensively to silence the target.

People say the old Soraka was annoying, but this soraka can spam her W forever if she has health pots, and enemies must find that way more annoying than just simply granting mana and health on a long cooldown.

Personally, i really liked the old Soraka and I think Riot should consider bringing back her old perks

4 Comments

HEAljvLykd9/13/2015, 11:39:27 PM1 votes

Cuz raka is a support.

Marthian9/14/2015, 12:01:42 AM1 votes

easy fun to play champ

Basically it. I played Soraka a lot prior to her rework and she was definitely easy and fun to play. Not so much for the enemy team that had a hard time killing a carry with 170+ armor, everyone taking damage over time they couldn't avoid, and free silences that couldn't be avoided. The mana donation was very good too since it allowed lane bullies to bully harder.

She paid nothing to heal the high amount she did. She was intended to be THE healer support, but was generally beaten by other supports in terms of healing since if she became too good with her previous kit, she made her team basically immortal (Healing in Moba is generally hard to balance, and the core concept of a dedicated healer is extremely toxic for a game where you want to kill the other team asap, especially if said healer pays nothing for it.) As you said, she was also a pretty good mage (and in my experience, she can also be a nasty AP bruiser that is hard to kill and whittles everyone down over time.)

The rework focused on making her THE ultimate healer. Soraka's identity is supposed to be the Dedicated Healer of LoL, and she does it very well, at the expensive of sacrificing her own life (and damage). Now she has more counterplay since you can walk out of her silence field, avoid starfall and prevent her from healing herself, and if she's healing someone too much, go destroy her face. She's still rather squishy and both builds you can do on her have weaknesses to them:

AP: She heals a ton of health, but if you focus her, she will die rather quickly since again, she's inherently squishy. Tank: She can heal almost forever, but if you focus her healing target, she generally will not be able to match the DPS of a focused team.

TL;DR Her old kit wasn't fun to play against; Relatively low risk with right build, medium-high reward for doing good.. new kit has more counterplay and risk, but now also has a very high reward. New kit solidified her role as The Ultimate Healer rather than being another support like Janna, Lulu, or Nami.