Board Thread:General discussion/@comment-5419934-20121223143249/@comment-90.32.123.4-20121229194858

She gets a lot stronger at level 9 and 13 because of the boost her primary spells get.

But it doesn't change the fact that she can't initiate, has low burst outside of her ultimate, that using E before her ult is suboptimal and her ult is so telegraphed (not instant, and then every sphere hits at a different time) that it's easy to use a shield/heal/other and if needed flash out of range to ensure that there won't a follow-up.

She is squishy and has to get very close to ult (675 range of an AD or AP carry means that everyone in the enemy team should be in range to it you with autos or spells, even a Sivir since her build will include MS and yours oughtn't), but her ult isn't a teamfight changer like Orianna's or Galio's, rather it's a finisher for a single person. Unless it's worth it to sacrifice yourself to get a single enemy down, you'll have less utility.

Consider it like this: you have good sustained dps from Q and because Syndra has great synergy with CDR (to be able to fuel your ult quickly), so she should have good utility through low-medium cooldowns on W and E too. Compared to a burst mage like Brand or Xerath, you're stronger the longer the fights goes on. So you can't sacrifice yourself during the initiation stage just to kill someone, you'd be losing most of your teamfighting strength. On the other hand, if you wait for the clean-up phase or a safe moment to ult a key target (which will always be hard against an AD carry with good positioning, especially if he has long range like Caitlyn or Tristana, and if his team can peel for him) then it's like only bringing utility and some dps to the fight: without your ult you have no burst, and teams with strong initiation (like Annie or Orianna for example) can abuse this fact by outputing a lot more damage than you before you get to ult safely. It's no huge having a clear shot on the enemy AD if you have already lost the fight by that point.

This makes Syndra a pretty awkward AP champion, mostly because of her range, despite the excellent utility that she brings and the medium-range poke she provides.