Talk:Soraka/@comment-26808509-20150727123647/@comment-26837195-20150730121451

As a Soraka mid/top and Xerath every-role-even-jg main (yes, you heard that right. I play her mid and Xerath supp. I never play Soraka supp.) I feel the urge to add in to this conversation. Soraka's Q is perfectly fine as her heals are ridiculously high with enough AP (and I build Muramana on her!), her damage is amazing early on, but the terrible AP ratio makes it fall off.

Firstly, her damage

The slow is only a secondary part of Q, it's meant to be a self heal as anyone can walk through it without feeling a thing mid game, Xerath's Q does 10 more base damage and has 40% more AP damage! It's her E that needs balancing for non-supp roles. It does very little in damage unless you're in a favourable matchup like kat or MF, who have channeled ults, or if you have Twin Shadows early on by farming a lot or getting fed.

Her main nuke late game is her AD and occasionally E. Her Q slow is unreliable and E is impossible to proc twice without a strong slow, so rush Twin Shadows along with Muramana + Seraph's Embrace, then Lichbane and Frozen Heart, if you really are interested in getting Xerath-like damage. There are only TWO abilities that block projectiles, it's not that hard as you can silence with E beforehand if you're in one of those unfavourable matchups. She carries the game with her ridiculous heals (Keep in mind mid gets more gold and levels than supp! Imagine how much you can do with all that money!) and damage. With Twin Shadows and Muramana (or Rylai if you're that kind of person), her main combo in teamfights is W Q AA W E TS AA W Q AA AA AA R. Compared to Xerath, that combo is nothing in damage but a lot in heals.

Then there's her ability to hit it in the first place. If you're support I guess it's hard as you make the mistake of hitting at max range. Only use it when you need a heal or the enemy is closer than max range!! Regardless of your role!! Don't treat is as a "970 long range nuke", treat it as a "650~ medium range spell vamp". It's probably better to use Wish to heal yourself if you're in such a bad situation as to have no HP Regen runes/items, need to heal your team mate enough to get below 50% health, and not be able to hit Q at the same time! (The longest base range auto attack in the game is Caitlyn, so honestly you don't need to be that far if you're healing the ADC)

Finally, there's her dependance on Q. Xerath also has double the cooldown in his W than Soraka's Q, along with lower base damage. Xerath's W is not as good early game. Take advantage of that, as putting all your levels in Q instead of W (if your ADC is being suicidal, max W, otherwise even support-level AP from items can cover 30 HP per rank. The cooldown shouldn't matter if your ADC isn't melee, suicidal or up against a very kill-the-champ duo at bot like Leona and Ezreal or something). You will rarely have trouble healing your ADC if he's not dumb. level Q a lot early game, but the second a tower falls anywhere, mid game begins and start levelling W instead.