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In this guide, I will tell you how and why I play/build Soraka the way I do. I will try my best to explain why I build the way I do and how my personal play-style is with this champion. I will also explain why you should at least appreciate your support because, to be honest, we are very underrated for what we do.

Where do I start when it comes to describing supports and the rules they follow?

Support is probably one of the most important roles, and underrated roles, in the game. They control the flow of the game and a great deal of map control. A lot of things happen behind the kills that most people do not realize or refuse to. As the name implies, this role helps the team to achieve victory by enabling them to get kills and objectives, such as the Rift Herald, Baron Nashor or the Dragon.


As a support, you head to the bottom lane with your AD Carry, and as the name implies, you support them. When you are in laning phase, don't last hit the minions for gold. There are items that will passively give you gold as the game progresses (That being said, you can farm the minions when your ADC is out of lane). Your job is not to take kills, but to set up kills for your team, so try not to kill steal!

Watch the whole map, not just your own lane, and ping/inform your allies of approaching enemies. Pinging missing champions and maybe even writing in the chat goes to this section and even if your Mid doesn't say anything, but the enemy is gone there, you can ping it instead. Remember to buy and put wards and beware of ganks, inform your own Jungler of the enemy wards, and set up ganks. Remember: you can only place 3 wards at a time and 1 Control Ward. Remind others to ward as well, this is a team game.

Soraka is one of my favorite supports to play. She has powerful utility, decent poke, and has the capability to shut down threats through her healing. I have enjoyed playing her for a long time, even more so recently! I tend to focus on a more passive play-style than a more aggressive one, which is fine with me (though she has the ability to be aggressive!)

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Pros + Creazy healing power + Map-wide heal + Strong poke + Silence + Self sustain + Increased movement speed toward low health allies Soraka is a great support when you need to focus on heals! You don't even need to get close to battle to heal someone with Wish and the amount of HP you sacrifice with Astral Infusion is nothing compared to how much your team gains. She crowed control is also nice with an instant silence on Equinox and her bonus movement speed with her Salvation to get to low allies quickly.

Cons - Squishy - No escape - AP ratios - Countered easily - Mana reliant - Low damage - Team reliant Like all champions, Soraka has her downfalls. She is a very squishy support that is heavily targeted, so she's reliant on her team in order to protect her. She has little no to mobility, so if she gets caught out while warding or attempting to roam she becomes the prime target for the enemy jungler or enemy roaming champions.

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This is where I try to explain why I chose the masteries I do and compare them to the others that I do not. I will attempt to do this as clearly as possible without too much-unneeded text!

SORCERY

Summon Aery is my preferred choice when playing as Soraka. That is because it can be used defensively or offensively. For example, whenever you heal an allay it grants them a shield that for 35-80 (based on level) that lasts for 2 seconds which can be important early game. You can also use it as a poking tool in lane because when you hit an enemy champion with an ability it does 10-40 (based on level) damage. (I usually play her defensively and around her heals so I find this to be the best keystone!)

I've honestly been running this lately. Since Soraka rarely has mana issues in lane, this gives you a big boost from level 6 onwards. Plus, the way it interacts with Moonstone Renewer, Revitalize and Wish's healing modifiers. It can also decrease your ultimate's cooldown whenever you get any kill or assist.

With Soraka being a slow champion, it's great to have the extra movement speed. Not only that, Celerity makes it to where all movement speed bonuses are 7% more effective and you also gain 1% movement speed. This work well with her passive, Salvation , or after she hits an enemy champion with her Starcall. This is a great mastery to have especially when it's paired with Boots of Swiftness!

I feel like this is the best choice for Soraka. The AP scaling it proves is very powerful and with games that last a long time, you'll be consistently hitting the higher end of the bonuses more often. This allows you to heal eeven more into late-game considering her heal is based off of her AP.

RESOLVE

Bone Plating helps you surivive in lane longer by reducing the amount of incoming damage you take from auto-attacks and abilities. This is extreamly helpful because being a Soraka, not only are you squishy, but you tend to get focused on during fights.

Soraka, if you couldn't' tell, loves to heal her teammates! This mastery, specifically, works really well with her kit because the heals and shields she has will be stronger, even more so when your allies are below 40% HP. Revitalize is basically the reason I consider taking anything from the Resolve track.

Arcane Comet and Phase Rush Arcane Comet is used if you prefer a more aggressive play-style and harass your enemy a lot with Soraka. It's nice since your Starcall slows your opponent which makes it almost impossible to outrun your Arcane Comet damage. As stated above, I don't play aggressively with Soraka (because I am afraid of finding myself in an unfriendly situation) so I do not prefer this keystone myself. I am not exactly sure if Phase Rush is actually used on any champion. It'll grant you up to 3 stacks when hitting enemy champions and will grant you 25-40% movement speed (based on level) and up to 75% slow resist for 3 seconds. I personally don't recommend it.

Nullifying Orb and Nimbus Cloak Nullifying Orb could be useful for when you are facing AP champions, but I found that it generally doesn't give you too much and it feels like a waste in terms of utilization for Soraka. Nimbus Cloak is probably my second favorite mastery for Soraka. It gives you extra movement speed after you use your ultimate, which is why it makes this a nice second option, especially when you want to disengage from a terrible situation! (Though, I still prefer Manaflow Band of this any day! I love me my extra mana and my mana regen!)

Transcendence and Absolute Focus I found that this is a solid choice on Soraka. The extra ability haste it has allows you to safley spam abilities during laning phase and later in team fights as the game goes on. The ability haste it has. Absolute Focus is probably the worst choice for Soraka in my opinion and I feel as though it's obvious! Absolute Focus give you bonus AP when you are above 70% of your maximum health! You are Soraka! That means you will never be that full of health because your healing ability ( Astral Infusion) takes 10% of your health every time you use it! Think about it!

Scorch and Waterwalking Poking your enemy is lane is almost a must, but I don't recommend Scorch because the extra damage that it give you is nearly non-existent. Plus it doesn't fit my passive play-style so I have no reason to take it. Waterwalking I have noticed is for champions who tend to roam and are in the river are a good amount. I can see it being a viable option for Soraka, but I personally don't use it. Since I am a passive Soraka, I tend to stay by my own ADC so I don't use it.

When you pick your secondary stats, I feel like you can change them for different games. I tend to take the Adapdive Force for the first tier to help with hearly game heals. This is especially helpful when your ADC keeps getting poked out or if your jungler tends to gank early. For the second tier I run movement speed because I feel like Soraka needs it; especially if your team likes to teamfight and you need to be there. Plus, it makes you a little harder to pin down with CC. For the third tier, I tend to go straight health, but take the MR or the Armor one if you think you'll need it.

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- FLASH: This is standered on every champion, support or not. Since Soraka does not have any real escape, taking this spell will be a life-saver! EXHAUST: This I find is a must on any support champion! Not only does it slow the enemy champion affected by 30% for 2.5 seconds in order to help secure your carry a kill, you can use it to get out of a sticky situation or disengage if need-be. IGNITE: This is not a spell I perosnally use or would reccomend, but that does not stop me from seeing other people take it on Soraka for some reason. I see it mostly in aggressive play-style. I would still personally recommend Exhaust and Flash. HEAL: This is not a spell I perosnally use or would reccomend, but that does not stop me from seeing other people take it on Soraka. I can see it being viable in a game where you are heavily poked and focused on, using it to help heal your ADC when your skill is down or to try and help them escape since activating it not only gives them a small amount of health back, but also a small boost in movemement speed. [/i].

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PASSIVE ABILITY

Salvation (Passive): This is her passive. It gives Soraka a 70% movement speed bonus when moving towards allied champions that are below 40% of their maximum health. What is nice about this, is that she will continue her bonus movement speed as long as she is facing the champion, even if she can't see them in her line of site via terrain.

Q

Starcall (Q): This will be your main source of damage when it comes to harass. It provides some sustain in lane because if you hit enemy champions it gives you Rejuvenation for 4 seconds and slows the enemy by 30% for 2 seconds. This is what I usually max second, the first being her W.

W

Astral Infusion (W): This is probably the ability you will be using the most. This ability will most likely be the first you max for obvious reasons; you are a healer. Each heal costs 0 mana but costs 10% of your maximum health; that means that this will almost always be up (Unless you are below 5% of your maximum health).

E

Equinox (E): This is both a silence and a root. This ability works well against Katarina and Malzahar because both their ultimate abilities will have them stand in place for a period of time, which makes it useful to silence those. While the silence is an automatic effect, the root will not take place unless a champion is standing on the zone as it detonates (which is 1.5 seconds after casting), so I usually max this last.

R

Wish (R): This is quite an ability when used properly. Soraka calls upon the stars to heal her and her allies. This ability is crucial early game, so watch your team's health bars and the map. I found that I use it early game when I see the enemy jungler either mid or top lane and I try to save my team member who is being ganked. Don't waste it though, be sure that when you use it you are either have the chance to turn that fight around!

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#1 Wish 6 / 11 / 16 #2 Astral Infusion 1 / 4 / 5 / 7 / 9 #3 Starcall 2 / 8 / 10 / 12 / 13 #4 Equinox 3 / 14 / 15 / 17 / 18

> > > Alright, so to be clear I tend to vary on my skill sequence, but I always tend to start off with my E. A lot of times I don't completely ignore I also prefer to go Starcall over Equinox second due to the amount of time it takes for Equinox to silence a champion. I found that I had more luck just poking them than trying to silence them. Although, as stated in the Abilities section above, Equinox comes in handy when it comes to champion like Malzahar and Katarina who have abilities that requires them to stay in one place for a period of time.

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This is probably my favorite item when it comes to healing. It's an active game-changer and viable as a first buy if you so wish it. I usually buy it as my 2nd or 3rd buy (if at all) depending on the situation. This is a great item for teams that are heavy team-fight focused, as when you activate it it'll drop an AoE 200-400 heal that scales with the target's level for your allies. The enemies that stand in the circle will take a 10% hit to their max health. You can even active it while dead!

This item is good for its raw healing power in a single item slot and also for its active, which cleanses CC from an ally. That makes it great for teams against heavy CC with champions such as Amumu, Nunu & Willump or Veigar.

This is a great item, but probably not my first pick for Soraka. The active on it makes it great for engaging and disengaging in fights as it grants all allies round you 30% bonus movement speed for 4 seconds. Personally, I use this more on engage heavy champions like Leona.

I don't see this item very often and I'm unsure why. I like it as an extra item because the value of it doesn't get reduced by healing reduction. It's a good item against champions that deal big AoE damage and will easily consume the whole shield on all targets such as Twitch or Brand (especally Brand because he applies Oblivion Orb super well and it's annoying).

I truthfully don't find this item worth it for Soraka. While you can proc it with Starcall, the overall benefit of all the other items makes this one not really worth it.

This is a strong item, however Soraka gets nothing out of it. The AP and MS it offers is nice, though. This is more applicable when you have AP-heavy carries as it provides the aformentioned AP and MS to both of you.

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This is where I'll talk about how I usually play as Soraka. Please, keep in mind that you can either play this champion or any champion, aggressively or defensively--but here I will focus on my own personal play-style.



This phase usually goes from the beginning of the game to when the first turret, ally or enemy, gets destroyed--also known as The Laning Phase. So, with that in mind, the main thing you want to do during this phase is to keep your ADC alive and to try to get your enemy's turret.

The first thing I like to do when I get into lane (if I did not go Health Potion starting items) is to place a Control Ward into the closest set of bushes near our tier 1 turret. Once the minions have spawned, I'll place a regular Stealth Ward into the river bush closest to lane. This helps with jungle vision when it comes to early ganks.

With Soraka being a relitively squishy champion with a lack of a strong engage or CC, most if not all of the actual laning phase will be about resilience and careful positioning. Surviving the enemy poke and skill-shots is crucial while protecting the ADC. While your ADC farms minions, I tend to try and only kill siege minions (cannon minion) that appears every few waves to proc the passive on World Atlas. I will also use Starcall in an attempt to poke the enemies for the same reason while attempting to help with lane control. While poking, I'll be sure to try and heal my ADC with Astral Infusion while managing my mana and my health carefully. Remember, one of Soraka's best traits is her sustain.
Dragon spawns at the 5 Minute mark, which means that once it does, I'll attempt to place a Stealth Ward right in front of the pit. I don't place one inside the pit because if the enemy team decides to pull it out, you won't be able to see it. While that in and of itself is telling enough for when they are fighting it, it makes it difficult to decide whether or not we can contest it or steal it.
Once I hit level 6 and gain Wish, I'll attempt to watch my teammate's health bars (I like to keep mine right above my map instead of to the left, that way I can watch the map itself at the same time). This way, if I think it's possible for them to either just surivive or to turn a fight around and win, I'll activate it. Sometimes that little bit of health back is all it takes to turn the tides of a fight. Plus: A free assist!


Mid-game, as most players agree, starts when the tier 1 turret is destoryed. By now I would usually have my core items, and a finished (if not, starting) my third item. During this phase, your team and you will want to keep focusing objectives such as the other tier 1 turrets and more dragons, rift herald and Atakhan.


During the fight for objectives, you'll untimetley have teamfights. During these, you need to keep in mind that your position is important. Soraka should safely stay in the back-line if possible, in order to maximize her healing otential and to lessen the risk of being targeted and caught out by the enemy team. If she gets caught out, the only healing that can be done is if you have Redemption built.



I personally consider late game when one team is attacking the enemy inhibitor, but to be honest I'm not really sure where it starts. Some others consider it when you have almost, if not all, of your build completed. Truthfully, by this point in the game you should already have a grasp of what you are doing. All you have to do is play until the end.

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