Armadon (spine burst)

[iwaskurt]

Does it seem odd to anyone else that a skill on a 3 sec cd requires you to stop moving every time it casts?

I haven't seen this guy more than 10 times in over 300 games. Is he just a trashy unit or is there something more to him than a snare?

[KatyPerry]

He's an awesome tank. He also can slow and harass low-hp heroes in the early game with a Ring of the Teacher and Spine Burst.

Armadon probably isn't the strongest hero out there, but he's very playable and fun.

[IntErlIdEr]

The stopping issue is, though, bothering me since DotA. I believe that the "step" it does when casting any skill was a limitation from the WC3 engine that was ported here as a part of the "carbon copy" procedure. It should, of course, be removed.

!seals

~IntEr

[KatyPerry]

The stop is there to keep his Ultimate at bay. If he wouldn't had to stop during that cast he could easily outrun almost every hero in the game.

[Jake]

The stop is there to keep his Ultimate at bay. If he wouldn't had to stop during that cast he could easily outrun almost every hero in the game.
That's the point of the ultimate! But he couldn't win Defiler, Scout or Madman.

[KatyPerry]

Defiler has the highest MS in the game and Scout or Madman get MAX-MS due to WindWalk, so yeah... nice comparison.

And Armadon CAN outrun every hero in the game if you just use Goo and Spine Burst on Cooldown to slow & damage your enemies and buff your MS & attackspeed. It's just not THAT easy.

[iwaskurt]

So.. the reason for the casting time is what?

Would the removal of the casting time/stop really upset the balance of things?

Like I said.. this is a unit that seems to be on the low end of choice.

[Kietharr]

He needs magic stick/wand to be added in, don't know why the hell they weren't, stick was a pre 6.60 item and funnily enough they ported over the ONLY hero who really used it effectively.

[Pokemaster]

spine burst is crap in HoN, it needs to get buffed to dota version

[cr0ss]

spine burst is crap in HoN, it needs to get buffed to dota version

Truth. the spines don't really seem to stack more than the once. The damage it is doing is minimal.

[Zejety]

He needs magic stick/wand to be added in, don't know why the hell they weren't, stick was a pre 6.60 item and funnily enough they ported over the ONLY hero who really used it effectively.

And the hero that is countered by it the most. And Wand is used effectively by almost all heroes.
OT: I'm failry new to HoN but an experienced DotA player. Is Armadon a true port of 6.59 Bristleback? If yes, he must be horribly underpowered. Before 6.60's reslease, everybody was *****ing how BB was overnerfed. 6.60 buffed him considerably and IMHO he's more balanced now.
I'd suggest to apply the same buffs Icefrog did (buff INT gain and Bristleback's auto-Quillspray threshold).

[`Shifty]

Pleeeaaaaase buff this hero.. I love the whole concept of him being a true chaser with very spamable, low cd spells. The big fix neeeeeds to be with the casting time of his quills, it makes it a lot harder to chase. The whole point of there not being a casting time was so that you could chase with spells and he wouldn't have to attack very much if at all, but now it is much more simple to hardly ever use it because it gives the enemy the opportunity to escape.

Buff his int, take the casting animation away and maybe another slight buff to another mechanism of his.

[KatyPerry]

If S2 feels to buff him they should just change him to the 6.60 Version of BB.

[Edemkee]

I've sort of a non-play issue with him, Armadon's backstory clearly implies he joined the Hellbourne, not the Legion, yet he still is in the legion. Just cosmetics, but still.

[DruidFluids]

Do the spines have traveling time? Last game with him I was in a heavy harassing lane, and for the life of me I couldn't last hit any creep at a distance away.

[KatyPerry]

Yes, they need a certain amount of time to hit their targets.

[DruidFluids]

Boo. That completely destroys their early game usefulness.

[KatyPerry]

No, they rape in the early game if you have a Ring of the Teacher and a low HP (=AGI-heroe) on your lane.

[DruidFluids]

Meh... Even with some decent mana regen, they don't really give the oppsing team much of a negative impact early on. Unless that agi hero has no source of health regeneration, then yes, it would be a threat.

On a side note. Seek old Blademail back! 20% melee damage return before being reduced by Bristle's passive was too good!

[twincannon]

He definitely needs to pause to cast. I can't imagine an armadon who can just run at you, getting faster and faster, with a passive DoT... would be really gross.

And yeah for early game harass they're absolutely incredible. Just make sure to lane against 2 heroes. Doesn't matter melee/range the spikes have such a long range they'll hit anything. Probably the easiest Str hero to lane with in the game aside maybe accursed.

[Triangleman1]

spine burst really doesn't do so much damage that it's great at harassing. certainly not as great as just having a ranged hero.

I hate to say HoN should just follow dota, since they're their own company, but there are some very good changes in dota that they should consider.

[_Archangel_]

He's going to be poo until they buff him to 6.61b state.

[Share]

My biggest issue with spine burst is that the animation of the spine actually has to reach its target before damaging. Being a quite slow moving projectile it often misses. In dota the spines were pretty much instant damage to enemies in it's radius.