Thanks for coming back and voicing your new impressions!

I've also finally finished the sections that needed rewriting. I guess I could finally call this the guide's 'v1.0'.

I'm glad you like it!

I see you revised it, it's looking pretty good.

A balance of Support and AP is what I play for Sona when i'm not playing super-competitive 0CS Sona, haha.

An upvote from me.

Thanks for your positive feedback and vote!
The balance in extra HP / AP is really what I was going for when trying to go a bit more offensive. There's no point in trying to get closer if they'll two-shot you.
As for Kage's Lucky Pick, I personally buy it because games inevitably last until 20 minutes. Since it's commonly purchased around the 10-minute mark, I won't be losing gold there because the other gold items will already be profitable enough to pay for it even if it doesn't yet pay itself. As for later, that'll be 150% of the gold/5 I'd be getting without it. But again, I just trust the maths, it's just a matter of opinion, I guess.

For the suggested changes, I did indeed switch the skill order to get Song of Celerity an early point, but as not to lose my original idea, there's a paragraph in there so people may try it the way it was or balance it a bit. It works for me, so I guess maybe it'll work for someone else, even if we're not the majority.
Also changed the text close to those two masteries. Good Hands still doesn't seem as tasty for me to switch them, but I consider them to be of personal choice. It's not something critical for the build like, say, Presence of the Master or Archaic Knowledge .
Next will be the Gameplay update, where I'll add more into warding, as suggested.

I'm also very fond of this way of playing Sona and it really is meant to be fun to play, not epic-competitive-perfect-ideal-utopic to play.
Thanks once again for your suggestions and positive feedback!

Had to put this comment to vote +1 Check the comment above for details. :)

Nice format on the guide and pretty nice item choices as well. Althought I don't like Kage's Lucky Pick because it doesnt give good enough benefit for the coins since you will have good enough gold generating with 2 items. This item will only take place in your inventory from building some real items since you always have to have 1 free spot in your inventory for wards (and you should mention a bit more about warding in your guide since that's your passive job as a support). Other than that I like how you build lots of HP and decent amount of AP balancing her survivability and damage. Too bad in Ranked games you'll never get the coins to buy these items beyond Rod of Ages and part of Rylai's Crystal Scepter, but in Normal games you'll surely faceroll the opposite team. Supports can be offensive, though you say it's an AP carry build ^^
I understand this an AP caster build, but in normal games will surely work as a support build as well since they're not too keen on not allowing supports to farm.

I have 2 suggestions which someone already pointed: you should take Song of Celerity earlier, at lvl3-5 because though you say you don't see the benefit but the slow given by it to your Power Chord is really useful unless you completely forget to use it and have trouvle remembering which aura you have on, but imo power chording with the right aura makes the difference between an awesome Sona and an average Sona.
Also Good Hands is better than Perseverence with your regen items, because 4% is really small amount of regen from what you have. But I personally use both :3

Good luck with this guide, I hope these metagame ********ters don't come complain here just because they think there is only one right way to play. +1 from me, because I like facerolling with AP Sona :)

Thank you both for your comments so far.
I'm actually still working on this guide, and I'll be adding much more detail into every single aspect of every single choice I make.
The 'AP Carry' title I gave Sona in this guide has already been removed, as it really didn't match the build at all, like you both pointed out.
As for her not being able to match that list of AP Carries, that's fine - we won't be losing any of your supporting capabilities with this build, that's for sure.
As for Song of Celerity, I originally got it a point by level 4, but I started to feel it wasn't paying off. In any case, the Skill section is next in line to be rewritten, and if I don't change the actual skill order, I'll at least comment about it as a viable option.
Thanks!

AP Carry Sona is fun, only semi-trolling, but really not viable in anything close to competitive.

As for the guide, what I REALLY don't understand is the item sequence. Why get gp/10 items? Sure you're a "support", but you're playing as an AP Carry. Your argument is that they're simply great items, but you don't really see other AP carries like Annie picking up a Philos, and a HoG. :I

Getting a point on your Song of Celerity at 4 is definitely NOT a waste, as even then the slowing power chord,when used correctly, is a major help.

Not gonna vote on this quite yet.

sona isnt a viable ap carry
i mean veigar does 10x more dmg than sona at when both are at full build
so rly u just took out a spot for a better champ and since u dont have any res
ur ganna die to a veigar, annie, leblanc, malzahar, brand, even taric can beat
you all they have to do is stay behind minions so you cant harrass then you
harrass them urself and eventually you'll die from lack of farm and underlvl

second, evry support but support ali got nerfed during that (riot: "NERF SUSTAIN; DEY OP") patch