16.04.2017: Reworked Masteries, Added a little damage comparison
19.04.2017: Added an allround fullbuild.

WIP GUIDE
Almost everything will be rewritten with a better structure

You Bring Death
Get either the Reaper or Program Soraka Skin.
Dont even try to play an aggressive Soraka without one of those.
This guide targets people that already know how to play a Meta-Soraka.

You're a Battlemage
Change your mindset. Soraka is a healbot? No skill needed to play her? Only build support items? In what elo are you? Wannabe-Diamond 6?
Soraka is a mage, and thats how you play her. You can and will duel the enemy Syndra. And you will kill her, making her whole team flame her.

Know Your Limits
Soraka is stronger than most people think - and not just damage wise, but her general kiting (Q+AA) + outplay (E) potential is pretty good too. You need to understand her limits and more importantly how to be an active damage dealer while also healing your team. Dont expect to have huge success with this from the getgo. Practice makes perfect.
Your E is your most powerful spell and can change a fight completely if used right and will make or break what you're able to do as (especially AP) Soraka. Landing constant Q's is important too, but that's probably the least problem you'll have. You will lack early CDR, but since you get AP, youre heals will be stronger than usual. For that time they are good against burst, bad against DPS.

What you get damage wise
Damage per minute (Plat averages)
Champ - DPM
AP-Raka 511.8
Soraka 172.3
Ahri 712
Xerath 817
Ezrael 727
TF 623

>>>Minute 0 - Minions Have Spawned<<<
Watch jungle entries. Always. Try to not waste a ward on this.
Type this in chat: "Doublekill level 2 or report @ADCCHAMP"
Flash your mastery here and there, and laugh.


>>>Early/Lane<<<
Potions? No thanks, thats what your Q is for. Your Q applies damage, a slow, a movement boost for yourself when moving away from enemies and a most importantly a selfheal.
Use Q to constanly poke, and follow up with at least one AA if possible.
Due to the selfheal you can make seemingly bad trades, but at the end of the whole trade you'll probably come out ahead. And even if not, you will land Q's sooner or later to heal up. Always AA when you can do it without taking too much minion aggro, especially against melee supports. Use the laugh-emote after every third Q you've hit.
It's totally fine to miss some Qs, since the cooldown is a joke and it gives the enemy a false sense of beeing safe for a while. Play mindgames with it, watch their dodge patterns and learn to read them. Hitting Q consistantly is your bread and butter, and it will give you what's really important: Control over the lane.

At level 2 you're going to have your E and the enemy should have suffered from your poke - it's time to all-in. You have to hit that E on the most ability heavy champ (Example: Lucian, Sona, Ezrael, Zyra), or on the squishiest, or both. Follow up with more Qs and AAs. Use exhaust/flash if needed. Keep AAing and Qing them till one is dead, then try to kill the other one. Do not forget to flash your mastery.

At level 4 you'll have your heal. If you hit a Q it will empower your heal, so try to land a Q before healing and try to avoid using your heal without the Q-Special-Super-OP-Mega-Heal-Buff-Stuff. Its always good if the enemy focuses your ADC instead of you, simply because you can heal both, yourself and the ADC. If your ADC gets scared too easily from a (at first) bad looking trade, well, you can't do much.

At level 6 try to force plays with your ult. You see close fights in other lanes? Ping your R and the enemy champ, so they know you'll ult for them if they keep fighting. I dont think i need to explain that you have to ward, buy control wards and deward where needed as support.


>>>Midgame<<<
Lane over? Got firstblood and the tower? Teams start to group? Great! You should have ~37+7% MPen from Sorc. Shoes, Haunting Guise, Masteries and Runes by now. If you've got Liandrys, even better, the DoT it provides will proc with every Q.

Pressure enemies with your Q. Always try to hit it somewhere, since its range makes it pretty safe to use if the enemy has no strong gapcloser or long range CC. Just use it whenever you find an opportunity.

In teamfights, hit the most enemies possible with your Q. Your E will have the most important usage: Silence someone that needs to use an ability. Ekko jumps into your team? Silence him so he cant use their R. Boom, Ekko just died thanks to your E.

Autoattacks aren't worth much anymore at this time of the game, but if you can AA safely, do so. It's little damage, but sometimes those 150HP of damage you dealt over the course of a battle might change the outcome.


>>>Lategame<<<
You now have Athenes Unholy Grail aka 30% CDR and you'll heal for a TON of HP. Your damage against tankier champs will falloff now at latest, but you're still going to hurt squishies. So there isn't much of a change in you general gameplay - land Q, use empowered W, hold E for the right moment.
Sell your Dark Seal if you need inventory space.

Instead of going for Liandrys you can go for a Athenes, Ardent Censer and EoW rush if you really feel like you need early CDR. Usually this shouldn't be the case.
If you REALLY snowball you can go for a Rod of Ages as first item. Just be careful with the lack of vision since you will delay your sightstone for quiete a bit.
Another fun buy is Lichbane, but thats a really situational thing against immobile enemy teams where you can AA safely and often.
Zhonyas is a good choice if you really feel like you're getting successfully focused in teamfights (i.e. Vi always ults you).

You can also swap Exhaust for Heal/Ignite if you feel like you wont ever be able to make exhaust worth, or if your ADC takes exhaust for you.

It's all the same gameplay wise, but you need to CS and keep your lane in control, so it's a lot harder to play. Always keep your lane warded and never ever waste your E - when your E is on CD you are easy to gank, so make the use of it worthy. It's not a spell to just poke with.

Build:
Dark Seal + Faerie Charm (Sell Charm after lane)
-> RoA or Lichbane or Ludens -> Sorc. Shoes -> Liandrys or Morellonomicon -> Athenes
-> Anything

>>>Don't play AP Soraka if...
...the enemy team has a dive composition. It's okay if they have one champ that can engage, but if they have a Leona + Malphite + Ekko you wont have much fun as AP Soraka.
...the enemy team has many champs that heavily outrange you. Jayce + Varus + Azir are a combination where you wouldn't want to pick AP Soraka.
...your team has too many AP champs (i.E. Snydra mid + Rumble top + Gragas jungle)
...the enemy team has 3 tanks.

>>>Counters<<<
Ekko: Can gapclose + slow you. You have no real way to get away from him.
Hecarim: He can just speedup and run over your E, can't kite him once he's in your face.
Draven: Land your Q on his axe-landingspot in lane. Dont try to AA much, he's simply dealing too much damage to make it worth.
Nautlius: Once he's got his ult he can zone you to hell and back. Easy pre 6 though if you can avoid getting hooked, so you have to capitalize on that.
Lux/Velkoz/Brand/Orianna: Annoying since they have equal range or outrange you. But they are mana hungry and have higher cooldowns. Basically a skillmatchup.
Olaf/Yi: Give you a taxi to Valhalla once they ult since you can't slow them anymore.

>>>Very Specific Stuff<<<
Lee: Let Lowelo Lee Q you when you're under your tower. Let him jump onto you and E+Q+AA. Lee is silenced and rooted under your tower. Easy money.
Master Yi: He Q's onto someone? E -> RIP Yi.
Pantheon/Yasuo/Zed/TF: Put your silence down wherever they ult to.
Vi: E cancels her Q charge.
Kayle, Ekko, Zilean: E to deny them from using their ult. It's hard to do since you can only guess the time they'd activate it, so don't rely on it.
Miss Fortune, Jhin, Katarina, Xerath, Malzahar, Velkoz, Warwick: E cancels their ult.