Support champions that call the bot lane of League of Legends home have access to numerous tools aimed at helping their allies succeed. While some, like Leona and Nautilus, disrupt their opponents with crowd control, enchanters like Soraka provide teammates with massive heals and shields that allow them to continue fighting.
Soraka’s resurgence in League stems from the sheer power of her healing at all stages of the game. While this ability takes away a significant portion of Soraka’s health in the laning phase, the massive low-cooldown heal it provides in the late game makes her a potent force that most enemies will attempt to target before anyone else.
League’s recent durability changes attempted to diminish the amount of healing accessible to champions, among other problematic factors. Luckily for Soraka, the combination of her W, R, and item synergy still make her heals incredibly difficult for enemies to deal with. Accompanied by the slow and silence Soraka also has in her kit, she remains a powerful support option for nearly any team composition.
Here is the best build for Soraka in League.
Best runes for Soraka
Sorcery
Keystone—Summon Aery: Soraka’s heals are further amplified when she opts to take Summon Aery as her keystone. This will provide all healed allies with a small shield for a short duration that can be crucial in taking a fight in your favor. Summon Aery also gives Soraka a bit of a damage boost when hitting enemy champions, working great with the poke on her Q she wants to pressure with in lane.
Manaflow Band: Similar to most other enchanters, Soraka struggles to maintain her mana thanks to the high costs of her abilities. Manaflow Band helps mitigate this issue slightly when Soraka damages enemy champions, restoring a portion of her mana when she fully stacks the rune.
Transcendence: Soraka wants to use all of her abilities as much as she can to help both herself and her allies. Transcendence rewards Soraka with additional ability haste as she levels up, becoming immensely more powerful at level 11 with cooldown resets on takedowns.
Scorch: Soraka’s Q is a great tool to poke enemies. Not only does this ability slow enemies hit, but it provides Soraka with a bit of healing for herself. Taking Scorch gives Soraka a bit more firepower when landing her Q, though it has a small cooldown for when it can be activated.
Resolve
Bone Plating: Between low base defenses and the health cost of her W, Soraka struggles to survive against champions that catch her off-guard. Bone Plating activates after Soraka takes any damage from enemy champions, reducing further damage from them by a decent amount.
Revitalize: Players should seek to increase the potency of Soraka’s heals in any way they can. Items will certainly impact this more than any other factor in the game, though runes like Revitalize provide buffs to her healing that are active as soon as the game begins.
Bonuses: +9 adaptive force, +9 adaptive force, +6 armor
Best starting items for Soraka
Spellthief’s Edge: As the starting item for most enchanter champions, Spellthief’s Edge rewards players with extra gold for damaging enemy champions and structures. Once the first gold threshold has been completed, the item will let players place a few wards, resetting each time they return to the fountain.
Health Potions: Soraka’s W heal is unique in that it takes from her own health to assist her ally. Between this and poke damage from the enemy bot lane, Soraka will constantly be on low health and on the verge of being sent back to the fountain. While health potions can solve the problem temporarily, players should be aware of how susceptible this champion is to damage.
Stealth Ward: As a support, Soraka wants to get as much information for her allies as she can. Wards allow her to do this. She should be careful when doing so, however, since her base armor, magic resist, and health are all very low.
Best core items for Soraka
Moonstone Renewner/Shurelya’s Battlesong: Due to the recent durability update and how efficient Soraka’s heals already are, some players are opting for Shurelya’s Battlesong as their Mythic item option to provide Soraka with another way to help her allies. Should there be a large amount of damage on the opposing team, however, the extra healing offered through Moonstone Renewer should take priority.
Chemtech Putrifier: Most opponents will rush items with access to Grievous Wounds to counter the heals Soraka offers. Players should opt for a similar strategy when playing Soraka by purchasing a Chemtech Putrifier as either their second or third completed item, which can be activated by landing her Q and E.
Ardent Censer/Staff of Flowing Waters: These quintessential support items are crucial for Soraka’s ability to further buff and support her allies. While they should both be built if possible, whichever one is built first is entirely dependent on her team composition. If the ADC is more focused on basic attacks, Ardent Censer will give them more attack speed. Staff of Flowing Water usually works better in team fights due to the buff to ability power it provides, which won’t help most ADCs.
Ionian Boots of Lucidity: Like with the Transcendence rune, building Ionian Boots of Lucidity provides Soraka with much-needed ability haste. It also gives her a small boost to her speed, which can be the difference between staying alive or looking at a gray screen.
Best late-game items for Soraka
Redemption: Soraka’s R has the distinct ability to heal all allies at once, regardless of where they are on the Rift. Yet the incredibly long cooldown of this ultimate ability forces Soraka to rely on her W, which also takes away from her health little by little. Getting a Redemption can give Soraka another wide-area heal on a shorter cooldown, also working with the other items she should already have built.
Mikael’s Blessing: Crowd control remains one of the most dangerous parts of League, especially in teamfights. An efficient amount of crowd control onto a single champion can render them completely useless and remove them from a fight without the chance to retaliate. Luckily for players, items like Mikael’s Blessing—which give support champions a hefty buff to their own stats—allow champions like Soraka to cleanse their allies from crowd control and head back into the fight.
