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New Soraka: Frost Queen's Claim or Talisman of Ascension?

oEJsW9rvPA·11/17/2014, 8:09:40 PM·1 votes·4,431 views

Which do you think is a preferable starting/finishing item for the new Soraka?

Benefits of Ancient Coin start: HP Regen, Mana Regen, 20 Cooldown reduction, passive Gold Income. Talisman's active works to gain even more speed to heal an ally from a distance, to aid the escape of a low-health ally from a dangerous situation along with Heal, etc.

Benefits of Spellthief's Edge start: Mana Regen, passive Gold Income, Soraka's inherent need to land Q's, long range autos, and AOE spells make it easy to gain the Bonus Gold. Frost Queen's Claim active adds another, easy to land source of CC to Soraka's Kit, perhaps allowing a better chance for her E to Root, or as a backup plan for a missed Q or E.

Talisman offers an extra 10% CDR than Frost Queen, but Frost Queen gives 50 AP to a champion who, in my experience, wouldn't necessarily build a lot AP. What do you think? Is the 50 AP significant enough to help Raka's heals? Is Talisman unnecessary because it's easy to reach the 40% CDR mark? Is the HP regen from Coin significantly more beneficial than the AP Spell Thief gives? Is the gold you can earn from Spellthief more reliable than relying on your lane-mate's farm?

I really like the new Soraka and would like to maximize my builds. Thanks!

11 Comments

eztarg3t11/17/2014, 8:12:59 PM3 votes

I go with spellthief more often than not because I try to abuse her AP ratio as much as I can. Then again, I'm a VS AI only scrublord so my opinion is moot.

The Chin11/17/2014, 8:43:02 PM2 votes

Most of the time, talisman because she benefits a lot from the HP regen.

If you max her Q first she does a lot of damage, but that damage mostly scales with levels, not really from AP. The second time I played soraka I went spellthiefs and built deathcap after sightstone and was very underwhelmed with her damage.

So I think it's better to lean into her strengths as a healer, build talisman and max W first. Her sustain is pretty OP.

iluvalar11/17/2014, 9:20:22 PM2 votes

Depending on your ap ratio, you can heal for about 2.5 to 3x you own health. Because of this the 15-25hp5 from the talisman turn into 35-75hp5 on Soraka. That's roughty a free potion every 15 seconds or about 25gp10 extra for your team.

So I'd go for a talisman... However I found that a frost fang is much better early game for poking. If you are facing an heavy all-in champion like blitz or leona, you might prefer to convert into a poking supports as your sustain wont be that useful at all...

Fashion Mage11/17/2014, 11:08:23 PM1 votes

I typically go with Spellthief's simply because it has the potential to offer much more gold. Although I don't usually upgrade it into Frost Queen's (I sell it eventually), its active ability goes quite nicely with Equinox.

Valsing11/17/2014, 11:57:16 PM1 votes

I personally go Tailsman because of three reasons.

  1. Sorakas autos and Q I is her primary source of harass.
  2. From my experience her Q chews through her mana like crazy earily game.
  3. Also I find if I get close enough to auto attack. I'm open to getting harassed back and/or engaged on.

And the reason the third point is bad for Soraka is that she can't heal herself outside of health pots and landing her Q consistently. So any damage she takes reduces the amount of healing you can do safely. Also E is to long a cooldown to be spamming it without thought and would lead you to wishing you had your E a lot.

All in all Frostqueen is a good item on someone like Nami or Sona, but Soraka is just not a that good of a harassing support. Her Q is made to be a tool help her sustain not to harass constantly like her old Q. So she has a hard time getting the full benefit of it. Yes, you could get more gold Frostqueens, and helps you land the root on your E. But the sacrifices you are likely to make in my opinion are too great to make it worth it.

P.S. Coin gives you the extra gold if a minion dies near you even if it was killed by other minions. Just though I'd say that because you seem to think otherwise not trying to be a smartbutt or anything.

NorthernDruid11/18/2014, 9:33:52 AM1 votes

It would be interesting to try Spellthief, but the tier 2 and 3 upgrades of the ancient coin gives so much regen and a nice bit of CDR.

especially since they also proc extra healing along the gold from nearby minions dying.

Dryad Soraka11/18/2014, 9:36:10 AM1 votes

I rarely upgrade to frost queen but spellthief is what I would do.

it's all sort of situational anyways, if your team needs mobility go with talisman.

Duke Anax11/18/2014, 9:59:28 AM1 votes

You should check the items occasionally. Talisman hasn't given extra cdr for a while, they removed that in favour of permanent movespeed bonus.

That being said I always have more success with Frostfang than with Nomad's.

Soraka is so much better with AP and items, that I even run her mid sometimes.

I always get a flask and maybe some extra mana pots to deal with sustain. I also run teleport to quickly recharge earlygame and countergank midgame.

M4nTiCoR311/19/2014, 9:12:16 PM1 votes

Health regeneration just feels so critical to her kit I run all I can get, and without any built in peel that is reliable (nami bubble for example), harassing with autos feels incredibly unsafe. Especially against Leona, Thresh, Blitz, Morgana, and several other common supports.

I have stuck to strictly leveling W with one point in Q for cheap heals. I will also poke with her E whenever I can catch 2 or more in tight quaters, as it has the same cost as Q early but is instant cast and forces enemies to either back away from farm and last hits or risk getting rooted and hit with my Q for sure.

Just be careful to make sure your E counts. I will only do it if A. I can hit both bot laners, and B. I can time it to deny farm of their ADC. Otherwise you are vulnerable while it's on cooldown if they decide to go all in and you must be very careful until it's back up. Going all in on Soraka and her ADC while her silence is up is a futile effort if she lands it, and she can quickly turn a fight in her favor with her W spam on her ADC.

In short my vote is always for coin on Sorak-n-Rolla.

Corgski11/19/2014, 10:38:27 PM1 votes

Coin with HP gen quints and seals is ideal for Soraka. You need to maximize your regen to heal more often which Coin helps you with.

SmokingPuffin11/21/2014, 4:40:14 PM1 votes

Talisman is better later, but Spellthief and Frostfang are better in lane.

Would recommend starting Edge, getting Frostfang quickly, then only upgrading to FQC very late in your build. Soraka doesn't really want those stats.

Would rec Coin start against things you can't poke safely, mainly Annie Leona Blitzcrank.