After the release of Seraphine at the end of 2020, League of Legends’ long-standing musician, Sona, fell into obscurity. This new idol-like champion possessed many similarities to Sona and completely replaced her in the support role, leaving many players to wonder how exactly Sona would be revitalized.
Riot Games issued a rework for Sona last summer after months of discussions with Sona players on how they’d like to see her regain her identity. After some initial delays, Sona released in a new, powerful way, rewarding players once more for playing this enchanter aggressively instead of standing back in lane.
Sona has since remained a popular champion for players in solo queue, though is often outclassed by other champions in the support role like Soraka and Nami. Nevertheless, Sona is still a great pick with certain teams due to her ability to heal, speed up, and provide damage boosts to all allies at the same time with basic abilities, as well as stunning enemies with her ultimate.
Here is the best build for Sona in League.
Best runes for Sona
Sorcery
Keystone—Summon Aery: The core of Sona’s playstyle as an enchanter is set in her optimal keystone, Summon Aery. Whether it be through extra shields when healing allies or a bit of extra poke damage on her Q, Summon Aery turns Sona into a very scary lane bully. This keystone becomes even more important in mid-to-late-game team fights where you’ll be healing and speeding up multiple allies at once.
Manaflow Band: Like most enchanters, Sona struggles immensely to balance her mana due to the hefty costs of each of her abilities. Manaflow Band helps to solve this slightly and allows Sona to spam abilities often.
Transcendence: Sona wants to use her abilities as often as she can. While many of her items will grant her large amounts of ability haste, Transcendence will provide her with more for simply leveling up.
Gathering Storm: For an enchanter, Sona does a surprising amount of damage when using her empowered Q on enemies. Gathering Storm allows her to deal even more damage with this ability as the game goes on, which can be crucial for chipping down enemies for allies to take down.
Resolve
Bone Plating: Most of the time you will not be building items to boost Sona’s defenses, as she wants to prioritize her ability to heal allies. This rune helps Sona’s own sustain in lane where she’ll likely be the recipient of two or three sources of damage at a time.
Revitalize: The heal from Sona’s E accompanied by the shield Summon Aery provides is central to her identity. Revitalize gives these assets a bit of a boost, most notably seen when more items are built.
Bonuses: +9 Adaptive Force, +9 Adaptive Force, +6 Armor
Best starting items for Sona
Spellthief’s Edge: Sona’s recent gameplay changes reward her for using her abilities, especially poking enemies with her Q. Basic attacks and her Q on enemy champions will proc Spellthief’s Edge and give her bonus gold, becoming her central warding item when she has accrued enough bonus gold.
Health Potion: Many enchanter and mage supports suffer from very low armor and magic resist, and Sona is no exception. This leaves her very susceptible to damage from both the enemy ADC and support, making health potions into the mid-game crucial.
Stealth Ward: Sona is an exceptional warding champion due to her ability to speed herself up with her E. Players should keep an eye on the bottom river to watch for the enemy jungler and provide the rest of your team with information.
Best core items for Sona
Tear of the Goddess/Archangel’s Staff (Seraph’s Embrace): Unlike most support champions, Sona does not want to immediately purchase a Mythic item. When players have accumulated enough gold, they should buy a Tear of the Goddess as soon as they can as an early solution to Sona’s high mana costs. While a Mythic item should be bought before Archangel’s Staff is fully completed, fully evolving this item into Seraph’s Embrace will allow Sona to spam abilities as if they had no mana costs at all.
Moonstone Renewer: Sona’s healing power reaches another level when she purchases Moonstone Renewner. This Mythic item not only increases the heal associated with Sona’s W, but also grants her additional healing to nearby allies when damaging enemies, and therefore should be her first completed item.
Ionian Boots of Lucidity: These boots are the optimal choice for Sona as it provides her with much-needed speed, as well as a small increase to her ability haste and summoner spell haste. They may seem small, but they are the first source of haste that Sona will have access to outside of her runes.
Best late-game items for Sona
Chemtech Putrifier: League’s recent durability update significantly reduced healing among all champions and items. However, support players will likely find that their enemies still have access to healing that can turn the tide of fights, making items like Chemtech Putrifier that inflict Grievous Wounds very helpful. This item also provides a large amount of ability power, ability haste, and mana regeneration that compliments Sona’s poking/healing play style.
Staff of Flowing Waters/Ardent Censer: Both of these Legendary-tier support items can be purchased interchangeably depending on team composition. If your team has strong ability-focused champions, Staff of Flowing Waters should be prioritized. Otherwise Ardent Censer will give a major buff to the attack speed of your ADC. Both items provide Sona with ability power, mana regeneration, and small buffs to her healing and shielding power and should be built together if the game runs late.
