Sona Build Guide by Flammabubble

Introduction + Quick list of terms

Hey there, I'm Flammabubble and this is my Support Sona guide. I've had a lot of success playing as Sona with this build, and she is by far my best support Champion. She has everything a support could need, the sustain in lane from her Aria of Perseverance, the poke from her Hymn of Valor combined with Power Chord, the mobility from her Song of Celerity and the amazing CC from her Crescendo that can swing games.

Sona is at the moment, at least in my opinion, the strongest support in League of Legends. This is backed up by the fact that in the recent World Championships, she was played the most out of any support champion, and had an incredibly high win rate.

List of terms

This is a quick list of the terms used in this guide. I'm aware that newer players to the game may not know what I've shortened words to, so this is just in case.

AP: AP stands for Ability Power, and it is what gives magic damage to abilities
AD: Ad stands for Attack Damage, and it is how much your basic attacks do to the enemies (before taking into account their armor)
CDR: CDR stands for Cooldown Reduction. This refers to reducing the time it takes for your abilities/skills to come off of cooldown once they've been used
CC: CC stands for Crowd Control. This means skills that stop you doing what you would like to do, for example being silenced, knocked up, stunned or snared are all forms of crowd control
CV: CV stands for Clairvoyance and it is a summoner skill in League of Legends
GP5: GP5 stands for Gold Per 5, and means the amount of gold generated every 5 seconds
AOE: AOE stands for Area of Effect, and refers to skills that deal damage/have an effect in an area, not just on one champion

Pros / Cons

Pros: *Good poke damage *Good lane sustain *Just as helpful late game with her CC *Good mobility *Lots of aura's to help the team passively

SPACE

Cons: * Low AP ratio on the heal * Quite difficult to maintain mana levels * Squishy early game, can't hold the tower alone

Summoner Spells

Flash is an absolute must for Sona. While she has here Song of Celerity to give her bonus movement, she is still slow, and lacks the escape of a support like Janna for example.

Exhaust is what I will usually take on Sona. If the AD Carry takes Exhaust themselves then do not take exhaust! it's not worth having two in the lane, take one of the other summoner spells listed here.

Heal is more commonly seen on the AD Carry, as it will heal them for more, and while Sona has a heal, it has a rather low AP scaling so even though this guide yields a large amount of AP, her heal will not be doing as much as other supports, so Heal is definitely an option.

Clairvoyance can be very very useful, especially with a team that has across map ultimates such as Ezreal, Lux or Draven who may be able to use CV to steal Baron/Dragon if there are no wards. It's also useful if you are stuck in lane without any wards, and you need to check for ganks, but the meta at the moment means that generally players are much more agressive, and so CV has lost its popularity. It's still a very useful spell though.

Masteries

I go 0,9,21 with my Masteries, as I much prefer the utility on Sona. Some people go 9,0,21 and give her some bonus AP, but I find that having a little more durability is much more helpful, and I build a solid amount of AP on Sona anyway, so the bonus AP from masteries isn't really needed.

I'm not going to go over specific masteries too much, as really masteries are tailored to suit your own style of play and you can figure out why I chose what I've chosen, by just looking at what each mastery does, but I'll go over some of the more important ones.

All of my masteries in Defence are because Sona is very squishy, and she really benefits from this bonus durability.

In utility:
Summoner's Insight gives you a shorter cooldown on Flash which is incredibly helpful, and if you take Clairvoyance it also increases the duration of the sight by 2 seconds, which can be very helpful.

Intelligence is amazing on support champions in general, as it allows your spells to come up more quickly. With Sona you're going to be Cycling aura's pretty frequently, and so it can really be a gamechanger how quickly your spells come off of cooldown.

Meditation is very important, as Sona needs a lot of mana throughout the game. If you can, try and get blue buff if the mid doesn't need it, as Sona can really burn through it if you have a couple of teamfights in a row.

Runes

These are the runes I currently take as standard on Sona and you might find them a slightly weird choice, but I'll explain.

I take the Greater Mark of Magic Penetration as it gives magic penetration, this is a big help to Sona, who wants to do as much poke as she can with her Q. Additionally, as I build Sona with quite a bit of Ability power, I like having the extra magic penetration without having to specifically build for it.

and I have these on my runepage as the bonus AP helps with my heals (mildly) and with my poke. I should probably swap the seals out for Greater Seal of Scaling Ability Power as I don't build AP until late game (in general) and so scaling runes would be much better, you can pick these up yourself.

I take the Glyph of Scaling Magic Resist for a little extra durability in fights. It also stops me getting poked as badly by the enemy support (as they are usually AP)

Pros: *Gives bonus AP for the heals *You have a little more survivability *You poke for more damage

SPACE

Cons: *May find yourself out of mana quickly *Don't have as much gp5 early game as you could have *Don't have the CDR you could have

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These are much more traditional Runes for the Support. Usually, I don't take them as I find that I can do well without them, but bonus gold, mana regen and cooldowns are always good.

Pros: *Find yourself running low on mana less frequently *The bonus GP5 really makes a difference at the start of the game *You still have some magic penetration for poke damage

SPACE

Cons: *You're a little more susceptible to enemy support's poke *Don't heal for as much early game *Don't do as much damage early game

Items

SO! Items huh? In this section I'll run through a quick reasoning behind my item choices, and some possible alternatives depending on how the game is going.

Early Game Items

I start with a Faerie Charm and some wards. Quite often I will take just 4 sight wards and a mana potion, as that mana potion can be really helpful if you're low on mana and you need to help out in a gank, however you might want to pick up a Vision Ward if you think the enemy support may buy a pink ward themself. I find that if you need pink wards, you can usually cope until your first recall but it's up to you.

These 3 items are CORE TO YOUR BUILD! I cannot stress enough how important these are. If you're using my more supporty rune page, you may want to leave out the Kage's lucky pick, but I find the bonus gp5 to be useful regardless, and I build it into something later, so it's a good idea to get it anyway. If I can, I will often try to buy these before I get boots at all, but depending on how the game is going, you will need to judge if you need the escape or not. Just note that the earlier you get these, the bigger the benefit they have.

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or

These are the only 3 types of boots I reccommend on Sona. You may be wondering why I don't take Sorcerer's Shoes and that's because while I'm building more AP, you're still the support, and you're still squishy. If there's no reason for you to get Ninja Tabi or Mercury's Treads, then you should get Ionian Boots of Lucidity.

These are first on the list. I highly reccommend these if the enemy team is AD heavy and does not have much CC.
These are for if the enemy team is has more CC, and if they have a lot of AP damage.
If you don't think that either of the previous choices fit, then buy Ionian Boots of Lucidity. The bonus CDR they give you is invaluable as the support.

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Mid Game Items

This refers to items you'll want to complete around the midgame.

This is the first Item you'll want to complete. This is a core support item and can really push your team ahead in the mid game giving you that extra longevity to win those teamfights. I used to build Shurelya's first, however I think that rushing the shurelya's isn't helpful for Sona, as you lose GP5 and the benefits are just as good later, but building an Aegis first gives your team an extra edge to swing battles.

This may be a slightly odd choice for a support, but trust me if you're playing well you can definitely pull it off. The Mejai's can be an AMAZING item on Sona, especially if you're not dying very often. If you continue to get assists in teamfights, you will scale much better into the late game with the bonus AP you now have, that means your poke does more, and you heal for more. Obviously if the game isn't going well, I would skip this item, but I get it basically every game

This is either the 2nd or 3rd full item you'll want to complete, depending on if you think it's worth building the Mejai's. You'll notice you're building the Philosopher's Stone here and so will lose a little GP5, but the health, CDR and bonus move speed are very helpful for yourself and your team.

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Late Game Items

These should be the last items you end up building, and will vary slightly depending on the enemy and your own team composition.

I will build the Kage's Lucky Pick into this as it gives you 20% cooldown reduction which definitely helps you out, the bonus AP is always a good thing, and the greivous wounds active can be used on a pesky Volibear, Sion or Dr. Mundo. Alternatively, it can be used to stop the help of the likes of Soraka, or if the AD carry has a The Bloodthirster or two... It's a really helpful item to have, and I definitley reccommend it over the Deathfire Grasp that you could build.

I will build my Heart of Gold into a locket if the enemy team is not too heavy on the AD side. I like the bonus regeneration that it gives, especially as an aura, and the active can be really helpful in just tanking that little extra damage.

Alternative

IF the other team has a lot of AD and you feel like you're being squished out of fights, definitely build this. The extra armour helps you stay in fights longer, and the active can really swing battles.

Final items that you can pick up if you manage to get to this stage, are really up to you as it highly depends on how the game is going.

Tanky items:
For teams that have a lot of magic resist, an Abyssal Scepter is always a good choice, the aura is also helpful for any other mages on your team. It also gives you bonus AP and magic resist yourself. If you feel like you're getting focused, a Warmog's Armor or a Rylai's Crystal Scepter are good choices.

Support based items:
Zeke's Herald is often a good support item if your team is AD heavy. You'll have to gauge yourself if you think this item is worth it, but the aura it gives is a really nice boost.

Frozen Heart if nobody else has one and you find yourself losing fights a lot because the other team has a lot of AD champions, get yourself a Frozen Heart. The armour boost is a big help, and the aura is a real pain for the other team.

Extra damage output:
If you're stuck on what to get, some bonus AP isn't a bad idea. Athene's Unholy Grail allows you to have bonus CDR and mana regeneration that is definitely a good idea, and the AP it gives is a good amount too. I would highly reccommend the item's I've previously suggested first (I.E. Abyssal Scepter and Rylai's Crystal Scepter) But if you really want you can buy a Rabadon's Deathcap. The AP boost is phenomenal and means Crescendo does a lot of damage for an AOE ult, but I would suggest other items before this.

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If you find yourself running out of mana often early game, and you want to solve that, rather than get the Kage's Lucky Pick for the GP5, you could buy a Tear of the Goddess to upgrade to an archangel staff, or alternatively a Chalice of Harmony as it also gives you bonus magic resist.

Wards

WARDS! Make SURE you buy them EVERY TIME YOU GO BACK.

If you can't afford an item, buy some extra wards. If you would run out of space for wards by buying an item, buy wards and wait to have the gold. I cannot stress enough how important it is for you to always have wards to put down.

This is a general guide to ward locations. If you are Blue team, the ward numbers are red, if you are purple team, the ward colours are blue.

The proof is in the pudding

This is an image of the games that I have played as Sona using this build, and the good results. I will post up losses as well if I get good scores, and if you get good scores with this build that you want me to include, then send me a PM with a link =]


You'll notice that all of these are from the same day pretty much, these are just the last games I've had as Sona, I haven't screencapped any more than that, I'll upload more as I get them.

Summary

Hopefully you like this guide, I've found it to be a strong build on Sona, and provided the rest of your team are doing okay, you can really do well with it. Sona herself is a very strong champion, her Crescendo is one of the most powerful AOE crowd control spells in the game, and so you should do your best to catch as many people with it as you can. If you have any suggestions on how to improve this guide then please let me know, it's only my 2nd guide so I'm still quite new at this!