Sona is squishy ;_;

TonyTonyMordecai·12/4/2014, 4:21:32 AM·4 votes·1,983 views

Hey All,

I just want to say that Sona, IMO, is too squishy to have the little damage/utility that she has, and she needs to get pretty close in order to land any of her skills, basically since her AA have some added effects based on the current tune she's playing... Either that or I just suck with her at the moment -_-

So with that! Any tips you can give me to become a better Sona? Item build paths would be nice to add as well, because I am more used to supports/supporty champs ( ) that have a little more base damage/late game potential... (I was gonna add Janna, but she is about in the middle; not too stronk, but has good escapes if things get rough)

Suggestions Please! And Item Builds!

Thanks!

23 Comments

Keisto12/4/2014, 5:47:37 AM3 votes

I believe the problem is that you're conditioned on these strong, mostly bursty, off-meta supports which is understandably harder to transition to somebody like Sona .

So let's lay out some important stats really quick Wiki Reference

Base Health: 482 +72.72 per level (1791 at level 18) Base Armor: 20.5 +3.12 per level (76.6 at level 18) Base AP: 0 Base Mana Regen: 9 per 5 seconds +0.38 per level (15.8 at level 18)

The way I see it is that you can play Sona 2 ways:

**High Poke: ** (Squishy- but more your playstyle)

With those stats in mind, we will want to improve Mana Regen, AP and Survivability. The whole shebang. Make sure you keep up the poke or you'll fall behind early.

Rune Page: 9x Magic Pen Marks, 8x Flat HP Seals, 1x Flat Armor Seal, 3x Flat MR Glyphs, 6x Flat Mana Regen/5 Glyphs, 1x Flat Armor Quint and 2x Flat AP Quints.

Masteries: Go 21-0-9

Start item 3301 and build typical support: rush item 2049 and finish item 3069 . Now go item 3028 into item 3222 and then item 3190 and/or item 3110 depending on if AP or AD is dominant on their team. Experiment with further itemization to suit it to your liking after that point.

Tank Healer (Survivability- Possibly what you're looking for, more of a team oriented Sona)

With the stats in mind, we will want to improve Mana Regen, and Survivability. Max heal and auto attack enemies safely.

Rune Page: 6x Flat Armor Marks, 3x Flat HP Marks, 8x Flat HP Seals, 1x Flat Armor Seal, 9x Flat Mana Regen/5 Glyphs, 1x Flat Armor Quint, 2x Flat HP Quints.

Masteries: Go 0-9-21

Use the same item build as the Burst build, but consider different further itemization routes.

Whatever you chose, I hope this helped you out. This took a few hours out of my sleep schedule so I'm gonna go pass out now.

Best of luck on the Rift, Afro

Centuros12/4/2014, 4:26:23 AM3 votes

Is she still squishier than a caster minion at level 1?

Zen Fury12/4/2014, 5:43:44 AM2 votes

Sona is fine the way she is. From your description, it sounds like what's wrong is how you play her. If you're engaging face to face with the enemy, you're doing it wrong. If you have no defensive runes or masteries, you're either godlike or you're a free kill.

Supports are supposed to harass, but sacrificing defense for offense is not a good strategy if your squishy. Sona is supposed to stay back, poke, and sustain. If you're taking a lot of harass, getting beat on by creeps, or the ADC is hopping on your face then you should look at how you're positioning.

FiendOfOne12/4/2014, 4:37:07 AM2 votes

I just want to say that Sona, IMO, is too squishy to have the little damage/utility that she has,

'little damage/utility' No, she doesn't do a ton of damage. Instead, she provides a 700 range poke that buffs her allie's basic attacks, a sustain/shield, a huge move speed buff for her team, and a teamfight winning ult.

and she needs to get pretty close in order to land any of her skills

700 range is pretty decent.

It Is I Emoto12/4/2014, 11:22:14 AM2 votes

Hm.. I've been recently experimenting around with Sona, and I've got some builds too. If you want a strong sustain Sona, I'd go with 4/5/21, getting first the 4 points of cdr (you don't need to though) Runes are, 9x flat Armor marks, 9x flat Armor seals OR scaling Mana regen per level seals, 9 Scaling magic resist glyphs/ flat AP glyphs (against AD teams), 2x flat CDR quints, and 1x scaling CDR quint.

I usually had good results with that build, keeping me alive at most situations, as well giving alot of utility. You'll start the game with 15% cdr and can get 40% CDR at late game.

I usually start either with item 3301 or item 3303 , depending if I can poke the enemy bot lane. After first back, upgrade your gold income item and start either on the item 3028 or item 2049 , buy 3 wards and replace the yellow trinket with the red one. You might've scored an Assist or two, wich allows you complete your sightstone/chalice , wich allows you to start with one of my favorites: the item 3010 . It gives you alot of sustain, and the item 3027 will give you alot of stats you need, AP, Health, and Mana. It will make you quite tanky, and allows you to sustain through a teamfight. After that, I'll rush the item 3222 and some boots, Then I'll start building a item 3025 . Yeah it's quite weird to build this item on Sona, but it gives you alot of stats you need, armor, mana, cdr, and it's passive synthesize very well with Sona, allowing her with each AA to slow her targets.

So far your build must be item 3096 item 3025 item 3027 item 2049 item 3222 item 1001 (any type of boots works)

Upgrade your boots and start to roam to other lanes to get some Assists. While I prefer the item 3303 , so you can poke enemies and earn gold while you earn assists, the item 3301 is more a passive item, wich is better if you're in lane. I usually don't bother to upgrade it to a full item and replace it with a situational item, that's needed for me or my team. (anyways, till that you'll have 40% cdr, meaning you can get an item without cdr, other wise you spend gold on nothing) If you don't use your CDR runes, you can replace them with AP, allowing you to build an item 3105 wich can be upgraded to item 3060 or item 3190 , wich are both great against a heavy ap team.

Against AD teams, I usually go pure armor, and not getting a chalice, since it'll get replaced by a item 3003 . (I usually don't get the additional mr if I'm laning against ad heavy teams. As well I don't keep the CDR runes if I know that I'm playing against a heavy ad team) My full build would be.. item 3110 item 3025 item 3027 item 2045 item 3117 item 3040 Wich would leave me really ranky, and benifiting of my mana items with the archangels passive.

It might be weird, but those builds did work very well for me uwu Sincere!

sad gurl12/4/2014, 4:40:01 AM1 votes

? she does NOT need to be close in laning phase you can q easily without even getting poked back out of lane it's more difficult, but her ult sets up team fights really well

vortical4212/5/2014, 4:23:30 PM1 votes

A lot of good info here, but there is one item I'm surprised no one has mentioned. Ardent Censer item 3504 can be insanely good on Sona. If you buff all four of your team mates, you just added 3000 gold worth of offensive power to your team (25% attack speed =750 gold x 4 = 3000). With some CDR, you can keep that buff up permanently, as long as you have the mana to keep spamming your 'W'. There is nothing quite as fun as popping a heal and turning your team into a buzzsaw of doom.

TonyTonyMordecai12/4/2014, 6:20:24 PM1 votes

I'm just gonna add this in here, but why is this post at 0? It's not like I'm saying anything bad, I admitted that I am probably just bad at Sona. That's why I posted this in Tips & Tricks.

See you on the Rift!

poopoo peepee12/4/2014, 5:25:29 AM1 votes

I looked at your masteries and runes for Sona. Absolutely no defense. Nor amor, mr, or anything in defensive tree. Might be part of your problem.