Battle of the Healers – Medic VS Sona again

“Medic, what the hell are you doing?”

Well, Sona got reworked, so I felt I ought to give her a chance and see if she fares better than Medic now or not. The Team Fortress Classic Medic will never change and chances are that the Team Fortress 2 Medic won’t change either, but since Sona has, maybe she does better now? Um, well, actually, no.

Before we start, we ought to go over what happened to the poor mute musician. Before the 4.13 patch, Sona got by with equal cooldowns on her 3 main skills and her gimmick was that she had ‘auras’ from playing her music. That is to say that if you stood near her, she’d give you a tiny weeny power boost, depending on her last used spell. Sona was the champion of attrition, as she’d win battles over a long period of time rather than just jumping on your lane partner and killing them instantly like the more popular supports do these days. Sona’s main source of damage came from her ultimate and her Q power chord, which, after having used three spells, the third of which was her Q, her next basic attack would do double damage plus a bit extra.

Most of that is gone now. Medic would have beaten her before, but now he utterly kicks her backside. But not her boobs. Sona’s boobs are not to be messed with. Why is this? Sona wasn’t a particularly powerful champion in the current meta (although she’s always been there), but Riot thought Sona was not flashy enough, so they mutilated her into something else.

Sona is literally a Medic now. Not even a good Medic. Sona’s a Vaccinator Medic.

Alright, let me explain. Sona no longer has any auras. Instead, when she uses one of her abilities (two of which have been weakened), a small circle appears around her. She needs to run towards allies to tag them in the circle. This gives them a tiny weeny buff. The buffs are: extra magic damage on their next basic attack, a minuscule shield that lasts one second and a speed buff that lasts for one second. A bit like the Vaccinator’s three resistances, except allies can only accept each buff once before the circle disappears. This magic circle is also incredibly small, smaller than the range of a Medi Gun beam, forcing a Sona to run up close to her team mates.

Another issue here is that these tiny buffs are weaker than Vaccinator ones because you can only apply them once for three seconds after using a spell and you can’t apply them as regularly. The only time you can’t change a Vaccinator resistance is when you’re Ubering, but Sona’s got to wait between 7 and 18 seconds to be able to change or reapply a buff. The buffs do have a similar amount of power to the Vaccinator resistances but it feels futile when you’ve got less time to apply them, they don’t last as long and they actually cost something to apply, since all Sona’s spells use mana.

On top of ALL of this, both Sona’s damage AND her heal got nerfed. Her heal does about 3/4 of what it used to. Yes, the buff circle gives you a shield, but the shield only lasts for one second and the shield is so tiny, it only really blocks one auto attack. The range on Sona’s Q, her only non-ultimate damaging spell, was reduced and her Q Power Chord, which I mentioned earlier, was cut in half. The only spell left unchanged was her ultimate, the 1.5 second dancing stun, that gives tiny boosts to other spells when leveled up. They made changes to her speed boost, but they’re more for personal use and work more like a really, really bad Disciplinary Action rather than a Medic-y spell.

That’s not to say that the new Sona is useless, oh no, she’s still an absolute monster in All Random, All Mid, since everyone’s grouped up and can make the most out of her circle buffs, but she’s lost a lot of who she was. She’s no longer “music lady who plays songs to make people stronger while they fight” or the Queen of Dragging Out 2v2 Fights. She’s just a very weird temporary buffing thing.

On the plus side, at least Sona looks prettier now. But Medic has more hats and doesn’t need to rely on breasts for sex appeal.

Random, related note, happy birthday, everyone who’s got a birthday today, including my brother.