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This is the first evaluation of The Changeling. Anyone may comment, but only Suggestion Judge votes will be counted at the end of the evaluation.
Remember, all numbers are changeable as it is almost impossible to balance a hero without play testing.
Vote on the concepts please, and if you vote no I would very much like to hear why.
Also, I would really appreciate it if you read all the way through before voting.
Marsuvius the Doppelganger –
Team - Legion
An ancient creature with the power to take on any shape, Marsuvius was swapped with a baby prince of a kingdom allied with the legion as a ploy by the Hellbourne. During his “childhood” Marsuvius was shown such kindness that he began to love his “parents”. When the time came for him to finally betray the kingdom, he found himself so enamoured with it that he couldn’t bring himself to complete his traitorous act. Instead, he fled to the battlefield to apply his skills to the war against the Hellbourne.
Art style –Princely and regal, he looks like royalty at least until he attacks or gets attacked. In those moments his true form as a changeling is revealed, his skin a slightly trancelucent grey gel. When he attacks, he forms his arm into a spike and impales the enemy.
Animation – He struts into battle, a hand on the hilt of a sword he never draws or uses, his cape flows out behind him prominently displaying his insignia.
Move speed – 300
As a melee hero, he needs a solid move speed to be able to last hit creeps or get attacks off.
Attack type - Melee (125)
Marsuvius is a melee strength carry, whose job is to dish out as much damage as possible.
Attributes -
Strength – 20(1.9)
Strength, his primary attribute, this lets him tank long enough to get off the damage he will need to control a battle with his ultimate.
Agility – 19(1.8)
Agility controls his attack speed and armor, and will be important as the game goes on.
Intelligence – 22(2)
Intelligence gives him the mana he needs to use Shadow and set snares.
Stats are going to be the biggest factor to control his balance. It is ideal for him to be able to farm early game and support in ganks, but still be weak enough that he can be taken down fairly easily.
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And now for the skills!
Shadow of Ruin– Marsuvius stabs the target from a range, injecting a parasitic Shadow born from his essence into the target. This Shadow attaches to their core and matures over time just waiting for the signal from Marsuvius to explode from its shell and deal damage in an area.
Marsuvius’s façade vanishes temporarily and he leans forward sending out a long thin spike into the target. On detonation, spikes burst out of the unit in all directions.
Targets afflicted with Shadow glow slightly grey to Marsuvius and allies, but otherwise only the target knows that they have been afflicted.
Each target can only have one Shadow at a time.
Marsuvius can trigger a second option on the ability to instantly explode all Shadows placed.
Shadows get stronger the longer they are left without exploding, reaching their max damage 30 seconds after placement.
Allies can be afflicted with a Shadow, but take no damage when the Shadow is detonated.
Shadows last until detonated and can only be removed by death.
At all levels, the max damage is to the target and deals half damage to every other unit in the area.
Single Shadows can’t be detonated by themselves unless they are the only ones in existence.
This ability deals 20 damage to the target when used.
Level 1 – 75 max damage.
Level 2 – 150 max damage.
Level 3 - 225 max damage.
Level 4 - 300 max damage.
On detonation each Shadow affects an area 150 in radius.
Range- 700 at all levels.
Manacost – 80/100/120/140
Cooldown – 10/10/10/10
This is a complicated ability so I will spend some time explaining exactly how it works and how you might use it.
Let’s say you are pushing a lane by yourself at level 7. As you push the lane you apply Shadows to all the allied creeps. Suddenly, someone calls mia and you feel like you are going to be ganked so you back. As you look back, sure enough, Madman and Arachna had come to gank you. Madman goes up to finish off the ranged creeps and try and make some gold after a failed gank. You detonate the Shadows, and madman takes heavy damage and (hopefully) dies.
Another situation, its late game and the enemy is pushing your base. You have managed to put a Shadow on each of the enemy heroes before they pushed. Right at the base of your tower, you have a snare set. The enemy runs in under your tower and begins to hammer on it. You move in and activate your snare pulling them all close together near you. Then you detonate your Shadows, your aura multiplying the damage, and then your teammates rush in to clean up the nasty mess you just made.
The mana cost is such that it won’t be precisely spammable, but still useable often enough to deal damage and farm with.
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Snare – Marsuvius forms a piece of himself into a spike and impales it into the ground where it awaits his signal.
Marsuvius points at the ground and his finger shoots into the ground with a soft thump.
When activated, the spike shoots up from the ground and impales everything nearby before pulling it towards the center focus.
The snare has almost no sight range, but if an enemy is standing on top of it they will be visible.
The snare has the ability Reversal, which sucks all nearby units together into a group and lowers their magic armor while removing the snare.
The snare can only be placed at a melee range, and quickly fades to invisibility.
The runes can be detonated by selecting them and using the ability, or by a detonate part of the ability on Marsuvius that automatically detonates the most recent rune.
Has a two second casting time at all levels.
Magic armor loss doesn’t stack!
Does 20 damage to each enemy target snared.
Level 1 – Maximum one rune placed, 1 magic armor lost.
Level 2 – Maximum two runes placed, 2 magic armor lost.
Level 3 - Maximum three runes placed, 3 magic armor lost.
Level 4 - Maximum four rune placed, 4 magic armor lost.
On detonation sucks all units in and lowers magic armor of enemies in a 400 radius.
Range- Melee range at all levels.
Manacost – 100/120/140/160
Cooldown – 40/35/30/25
Most of the uses for this ability are obvious, but I’m going to point out a couple that you might not have thought of.
Marsuvius is jungling and gets ganked by Ophelia. Ophelia moves her creeps in to attack, but Marsuivus was expecting this and activates a set snare that pulls a neutral creep spawn and Ophelia together. Unfortunately for Ophelia it’s a minotaur spawn that quickly stomps and stuns her and her creeps. Marsuvius detonates his Shadows planted in the minotaur spawn, and proceeds to gank Ophelia.
Marsuvius is laneing early game and has set up 3 snares all barely overlapping in his lane. One of his enemies in the lane steps into the range of the furthest snare and Marsuvius quickly chain detonates the snares resulting in his enemy and whatever creeps that were in the lane now standing at the base of the tower. Marsuvius moves in to finish the job.
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Diffusion– Enemies that come within range of Marsuvius are linked together by Marsuvius and spread damage between them.
All enemies in this auras effect take an extra damage % of the damage any of them take.
This doesn’t distribute damage from this ability.
This isn’t spirit link; It doesn’t share the damage, rather it deals fresh damage. The target still takes 100% of the incoming damage.
This ability works from both physical and magic damage, meaning splash damage would trigger it.
Level 1 –Spreads 1% of the damage taken to each unit in the area.
Level 2 – Spreads 2% of the damage taken to each unit in the area.
Level 3 - Spreads 3% of the damage taken to each unit in the area.
Level 4 – Spreads 4% of the damage taken to each unit in the area.
Manacost – 0/0/0/0
Cooldown - 0/0/0/0
Area -400 radius.
This is basically warlocks old link ability, but as an aura with no maximum number of targets.
This ability is part of what changes him from a nuker to a carry.
This ability really shines when used in conjunction with area of effect nukes or splash damage.
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Changeling(Ultimate) – Marsuvius draws in the essence of his victims, burning it to temporarily enhance himself.
Changeling is a passive ability that only affects Marsuvius.
Changeling adds damage every second, each tick having its own expiration time.
At the end of each second, this ability totals the damage that has happened since the start of the second, and takes 10 percent of it and adds it to Changelings current damage without replacing the old Changeling buffs that haven’t expired yet.
Includes both spell damage and physical damage.
Level 1 – 1 second duration on each buff
Level 2 – 2 second duration on each buff
Level 3 – 3 second duration on each buff
Oh wow, this is going to be tough to explain. I think I’m best off just going through the math.
Assuming you do 100 damage per second, and start with no current buff, and are attacking constantly for 10 seconds, this is basically what your damage would look like.
1st second, no extra damage – 100 damage.
2nd second, 10% of 100 damage extra, 110 damage, 1 buff active with 3 seconds left.
3rd second, 10% of 110 damage extra, 121 damage, 2 buffs active, one with 2 seconds one with 3 seconds.
4th second, 10% of 121 damage extra, 133 damage, 3 buffs active, one with 3 seconds, one with two one with one second.
5th second, first buff fades, 10% of 123 damage extra, 135 damage, 3 buffs active, one with 3 seconds, one with two one with one second.
6th second, second buff fades, 10% of 124 damage extra, 136 damage, 3 buffs active, one with 3 seconds, one with two one with one second.
7th second, third buff fades, 10% of 124 damage extra, 136 damage, 3 buffs active, one with 3 seconds, one with two one with one second.
Anyway, the end result is that you deal a lot of damage if you deal a lot of damage. Each point of damage from the area of effect aura adds to your total damage per second. The more you attack, the higher your damage gets as well, but at a much slower rate than the initial burst.
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(The most important part!)
Role – Marsuvius is a damage dealing carry with some interesting farming capabilities that can also support in early game ganks.
Anyway, that’s enough writing for now, probably too much. Hope you like him.
Adding color soon.
All of the abilities are interesting ideas, although the last one seems to be a weakened version of Ursa's Fury Swipes with a time limit on stacks.
Shadow of Ruin is very neat, and would be a ton of fun with that lowish cooldown if it didn't have very low AoE and very high mana cost. Because of those two things, it is essentially a single target nuke every 10 seconds or an expensive way to farm creeps.
Snare is a nice remake of Vacuum from Dark Seer. The only thing I'd change about it is the 2 second cast time, which renders it very difficult to use in a team fight.
Diffusion is all right, but seems like a complicated, weaker version of Soul Reaper's aura. If you destroy a 2000 HP hero while another enemy hero stands next to him, he will only take 80 damage from the aura. If you kill 4 such 2000 HP heroes, the other hero (assuming all are in this 450 range) will take 320 damage. On the other hand, improving the percentage will make early game laning imbalanced because the creeps each wave take about (550 * 4 + 300) or more damage which will do 100 damage to each other unit with level 4 Diffusion as it is now. 100 damage each creep wave for free is not too bad.
Where Ursa had a bit of synergy with increased attack speed, a slow, and Fury Swipes, this hero has even less. He has no slow to allow him to continue to hit opponents and no IAS to buff his lowest stat (Agi). His passive is only useful in close combat team with many units around, at which point he is likely to get CC'ed since even the slightest slow (e.g., level 1 Unholy Shackles) will render his Ultimate useless and his aura often out of range.
Scythe, you fail so much at reading.
Shadow of Ruin stays permanently. It doesn't explode until you blow all of them.
Snare is a trap, and by trap I mean trap you bad, not place a trap and then blow it up immediately because you are such a boss that you can't set a real trap.
Diffusion and Soul Reapers aura are so dissimilar its disgusting. A 300 damage Defiler nuke that hits 10 units near Marsuvius would deal an extra 120 damage to each unit hit by the wave, for a total of 420 damage to each target hit by the wave and 120 for each target in range of his aura but not in hit by the wave. Meaning that this ability just did an extra 1200 damage, spread among 10 targets.
Your comparison with Ursa's damage buff is absurd. This ability works on all damage dealt, not just attack damage. Its not meant to be like ursa and eat a single target. Lets say you have 5 units shadowed. You pop the shadows for 1500 damage, that gets added to your damage stack, you suddenly have +150 damage for 3 seconds, on the first attack, the next damage buff would stack on top of that for even more damage.
Your failure to understand this hero is almost criminal.
One extra pointer to anyone reading this, the damage might seem extreme, but please remember that he has no holds, no slows, nothing to keep his enemies in place to kill, so he will be relying on teammates to keep him enabled and attacking the enemy.
Also, I gave up being nice after I got my votes, there is a reason I don't spend much time on forums. I just can't stand the people
I'll be nice again for at least the rest of this thread at moderator warning.
Yes, so you could try and put one on each enemy hero, which would take at least a minute to set up and cost 700 mana at level 4. This is very expensive and means you can't use the nuke without ruining your setup.Originally Posted by bittersweets
It is still a melee range Dark Seer Vacuum that does no damage and takes 2 seconds to set up, meaning it is underpowered in a team fight unless you lay them without the opponent seeing you while you're defending or being chased. It's just not versatile.
Take a screenshot the next time 10 enemy units are within 450 range of any hero other than one who has blink. Even then, this damage is going to be done mostly to creeps unless the opponent is diving into you and Marsuvius is within 450 range of their creep wave and those heroes. Let's pray you don't die while the Defiler runs away after you've done your bonus 120 damage to each of those heroes who were close enough. Anyway, the aura is nice, it just needs more range and is overly (in my opinion) affected by creeps.
Once again, this setup takes at the very least 40 seconds and costs 700 mana. Now you do all this and maximize the bonus damage, and you get +150 damage for 1 second at level 7, 2 seconds at level 11, and 3 seconds at level 16. This hero would be amazing with a blink, but as it stands all of this time and mana gives you a lackluster reward considering it is his ultimate. In comparison, Hammerstorm can pull +150 damage out for much longer than 3 seconds, doesn't require any setup, doesn't need to keep hitting anything, and he also has an AoE stun. I would suggest that his ult passively give him bonus %IAS and %MS based on his attack damage.
Your failure to understand this hero's flaws is even more felonious!
Bottom line: Snare needs to be more versatile. Diffusal Aura needs more range (and in proportion maybe a lower %). Changeling needs to give him bonus AS/MS based on something (such as bonus damage).
Last edited by Scythe; 09-24-2009 at 10:34 PM.
Bitter- I would recommend that you, if no where else, conduct yourself with more respect and decorum in the evaluation thread for your own hero they you are currently known for and displaying.
Anyways
An interesting partial interpretation of techies to say the least. I don't like the look of Shadow from the outset, it seems like a far too powerful skill that simply reducing damage won't fix.
Clarifications-
Do shadows detonate on the death of the unit? Do they grant vision?
Does the ult calculate all damage done or just damage done by auto attacking?
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I have no respect for someone who doesn't deserve it.
Anyone who thinks this hero and techies have a common play style deserves no respect from me.
Shadows are removed when a unit dies. They don't grant vision. Nowhere does it say they grant vision, the gray would only appear when the hero is not hidden by fog, if that is what you were thinking. Its simply there as an indicator to help coordinate ganks.
Each unit can only have one shadow a time, a 300 damage small area nuke that can be used every 10 seconds would be a good comparison for balance, the only difference is you choose when it hits.
The person above you, however stupid they might be, seems to think shadow is underpowered. I propose that such a drastic difference in belief is evidence in favor of the abilities balanced state.
The ultimate calculates using all damage, including damage distributed by the aura.
How I act and my hero have nothing to do with each other, keep that in mind while you are passing judgment.
I'm done even responding to Scythe, he can't even understand how to set up a trap before a battle and then spring it after the battle starts.
The trap should have 0 cast time.
I didn't say Shadow was underpowered, it is his Ultimate that is underpowered EVEN when Shadow is used with it. If anything, I agree that Shadow is overpowered. It can do a massive 600 damage to one target every 20 seconds at worst.
Let me reiterate the bottom line: Snare needs to be more versatile. Diffusal Aura needs more range (and in proportion maybe a lower %). Changeling needs to give him bonus AS/MS based on something (such as bonus damage).
God do you even read before you start saying stupid crap?
Why don't you reread how shadow works?
Why don't you read my example for snare?
Why don't you read my post about why changeling isn't overpowered even with its huge potential for bonus damage?
Why don't you just stop typing and go troll someone else?
There is no way anyone can be as stupid as you are without trying.
Why in the world do you think you aren't stupid?
Why in the world don't you want to improve yourself?
Why in the world don't you understand English?
Nicely done. That vow lasted what, seven whole minutes?
A 300 small AoE nuke is not a good comparison for this skill, since its design inherently encourages grouping them together for mass use. The exact scenario you describe in your explanation of Shadows outlines its unbalanced nature- you should not be able to use a skill to remotely kill someone like that, especially on a hero with other such functionality.
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Thanks, I have trouble ignoring such people =(
I understand your concerns, but if you spend 50 seconds setting up a trap like that, it will do some damage. If your opponents just let you set it all up, they almost deserve to get exploded. Furthermore, 150 area is so small that even if 5 enemies were pulled together with a trap, each explosion would only hit like 3 of the 5. You are arguing that it would be overpowered with out actually being able to try it or a skill of a similar nature because none exist. Besides, even in a perfectly ideal situation like I described in my examples, other heroes could still do a better job with less effort I think.
Soul stealer for example has 900 damage in area of effect nukes not counting his ultimate. Lets make an ideal situation to maximize damage to heroes. Tempest just caught 5 people in an ulti, soulstealer runs in and drops 3 300 aoe nukes hitting all 5 heroes with each one. Thats 1500 damage a nuke for a total of 4500 damage. You might argue that marsuvius's situation is less situational or more likely, but what are the odds that all 5 enemies will have a shadow on them at once, the odds that they will all be in range of a single trap at once, the odds that you don't get stunned or nuked to death when you run up to apply your aura to them, the odds that you can actually finish them.
My example involving setting the shadows on allied creeps is even more out there, how in the world are you going to keep a creep alive for the time it takes for a shadow to mature? I mean one yes, maybe. Maybe even two of them, but any more then that and its just terribly unlikely.
Sure its easy to say that soulstealer can deal 4500 damage without even using his ultimate, in practice a favorable situation needs to be crafted with teamwork and maybe a little bit of luck.
Very interesting hero. Seems hard to play but i like the concept.
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I would appreciate it if you made arguments instead of insulting me like a child. For example, you could tell me why this hero is a viable pick over Hammerstorm in any situation.
Your examples for Snare are laughable. In one, Ophelia and at least 2 of her creeps must all be walking close to each other, you have to predict where she goes long in advance and pray she goes close enough to the Snare(s), you have to set up multiple traps unless you expect her to walk within 400 range of the Minotaur, you can't kill off the Minotaur if you want the stun, and for all this you get a Minotaur stun! In the other, you spend 1.5 minutes and 420 mana for what is basically a Devourer Meat Hook that deals no damage. Granted, this second method of using Snare is nice mid/late game, but it is best used defensively because of the exhaustive setup time and cost and the melee range of cast showing your opponents where you are putting them (maybe a very short cast time would help).
You probably didn't read my comparison to Hammerstorm, so I'll tell you again. Hammerstorm's Ultimate can pull a consistent +150 damage out for much longer than 3 seconds, doesn't require any setup, doesn't need to keep hitting anything, and he also has an AoE stun. Marsuvius requires setup or his aura + team nukes to get to +150 damage yet has no disable and must continue to do impossible amounts of damage to maintain this.
As for your comparison with Soulstealer, Shadow is targetted while Soulstealer's nuke requires aim and can be dodged in most situations. Am I wrong in saying that you can do 600 damage to a single target every 20 seconds? Place a Shadow, wait until cooldown is over, detonate, place another, detonate.
Let me reiterate the bottom line: Snare needs to be more versatile. Diffusal Aura needs more range (and in proportion maybe a lower %). Changeling needs to give him bonus AS/MS based on something (such as bonus damage).
Don't worry, you can post critically on my hero should you feel the need. Just keep in mind I have never voted no on any of your heroes.
Last edited by Scythe; 09-25-2009 at 11:10 AM.
I should just ignore you, but it is terribly hard.
To deal 600 damage to a single target with Shadow, it would take 80 seconds under almost every circumstance.
Moon Queen on the other hand in 80 seconds without using her ultimate or attacking the enemy can deal 3900 damage from a huge range.
Snare is more versatile then vacuum because you can set multiple snares up.
You can trigger them one after another to keep a large group of units in one place, and lower their magic armor.
If you are using it at melee range during a battle, you are using it wrong.
Marsuvius can consistently pull out much much higher damage bonuses then Hammerstorm with Changeling.
I would appreciate it if you actually read the hero and found these things out for yourself.
Furthermore, I disliked your hero so much that I declined to comment on it or vote because it is a lost cause.
What you see as an insult, was a series of genuine questions that you answered not at all.
Finally, ALL NUMBERS ARE NOT SET IN STONE. DON'T F'ING POST ABOUT THEM YOU ILLITERATE SCUM
Maybe it will help if I leave out all of my opinions.
Quoting you:
Level 4 - 300 max damage.
On detonation each Shadow affects an area 150 in radius.
Range- 700 at all levels.
Manacost – 80/100/120/140
Cooldown – 10/10/10/10
If you put it on 2 enemy heroes who are laning together, you can instantly do 600 damage to EACH if you just wait until they are next to each other. Taking 80 seconds doesn't mean the 600 damage is spread over 80 seconds, so it's like you saying Pyromancer's Ultimate takes 90 seconds to do 675 damage.
Quoting your hero description:
The snare can only be placed at a melee range, and quickly fades to invisibility.
The runes can be detonated by selecting them and using the ability, or by a detonate part of the ability on Marsuvius that automatically detonates the most recent rune.
Has a two second casting time at all levels.
Quoting you:
There is no way anyone can be as stupid as you are without trying.
Why in the world do you think you aren't stupid?
Why in the world don't you want to improve yourself?
Why in the world don't you understand English?
Guys lets try to shift all this hate around, and just focus on the hero. (No indirect passive hate either!)
(Let's not worry about who started it and whatnot. No finger-pointing here.) :]
I don't want to be forced into giving infractions. :[
I <3 Efel.
If I don't respond to your pm, it's because I'm currently processing and evaluating other pms.
http://fallacyfiles.org/quotcont.html
The fallacy you committed 3 times.
From the time you place the ability to the time you can activate it for full damage, there is 30 seconds. Even placing it on 2 heroes and hoping they end up near each other 30 seconds later, its 10 seconds to cast it on the second one, and then a 30 second wait until you can explode it for full damage. This is entirely different then pyromancers ultimate, you are only counting cooldown, I'm counting the abilities effect delay.
I'm sorry that you can't understand that the snares don't automatically activate after you set one.
I'm sorry that you can't answer those honest questions, because apparently you don't know the answers yourself.
What is the difference between cruelty and stupidity?
Intent and only intent.
Both result in pain and suffering for everyone around them.
Since cruelty is not allowed on this forum, we should give an infraction to scythe.
Folks, calm down.
First, from a neutral perspective, I'm just going to say a few things to both of you:
@bittersweets - Tone down the aggression, please. If someone doesn't understand your hero as well as you do, and makes a mistake, there is no need to turn to anger and respond heatedly. I'm aware that Scythe misread a few key points about your hero, but that's no need to start a flame war. This is an evaluation, expect to be Judged by all types of posters; whether they conduct their evaluation with a professional nature, or with the tact of a common forum troll (generally speaking, not aimed @ Scythe), I ask you to do your best to and hold on to your temper.
As for Sabre's comment about Marsuvius loosely relating to Goblin Techies from DotA, he's not as incorrect as you seem to think; at least for two of his four abilities. Shadow of Ruin being somewhat similar to a unit-targeted version of Land Mines, while Snare is somewhat similar to Stasis Trap. While far from identical, the similarities ARE there. No need to brutalize his observation simply because you didn't initially see it.
@Scythe - You bring up some good points, but like I said to bittersweets, tone down the aggression. Yes, this is an evaluation and you have the right to put forward your honest thoughts, but please try and do it in a more professional, less antagonizing way. If the creator of a suggestion contradicts what he/she may have noted in their post, perhaps they simply wrote it down or explained their idea incorrectly. You have the right to disagree with their idea, but there is no need to attempt to tear them down for making a mistake. To set things straight, you do have the wrong idea about Shadow of Ruin. As bittersweets stated in his last post, each Shadow gains damage over the course of 30 seconds. Each Shadow is not created with maximum damage, so instead of becoming a standard 300 damage nuke, it generally becomes a more strategic skill, requiring advanced map awareness & pre-planning.
Anyway, enough of that. On to my initial review:
I'm going to have to start this off by disagreeing with your ideal role of Marsuvius. You say he is intended to be a carry hero? It's tough to see how that would be easily accomplished. Currently, he feels a like his role is too undefined. He has aspects of a carry, for sure (Diffusion & Changeling), but his first (Shadow of Ruin) and second (Snare) skills seem like pure support.
Secondly, as a melee hero, with primarily melee-range skills, he will have extremely weak lane control. You may argue that Shadow of Ruin is his form of lane control, but I disagree. The only way to recieve decent damage from this skill on a non-hero is to run back and pre-apply a Shadow to a creep or two before they reach the opposing wave. Other than that, you can apply Shadows to yourself, your lane partner, and one to each opponent in your lane. The only effective method to use this would be to prep each Shadow, wait out the duration for maximum effectiveness, and then rush with everything you have, activating all Shadows when within range. Since snares can only be applied from melee range, AND have a lengthy cast time, they are useless in a lane. As is your aura, against any decent player with a ranged hero, who should be able to kite you before you can do damage. This hero is doomed to be dominated early game, and without an actual disable, he's going to be COMPLETELY reliant on both items and allies to be moderatly useful.
Here's a "quick" breakdown of his skills:
Welp, that about does it. If you actually read the whole thing, huge props. If not... well, I don't really care. At this point, I'm leaning towards a no, but if you feel otherwise, you have several days to change my mind. Have at it!
Sparknotes:
- Extremely weak early game, will be easily dominated by a strong lane
- Shadow of Ruin is overly situational, forced pre-planning creates vulnerability to the unknown.
- Snare has the similar issues as the above for Shadow of Ruin.
- Diffusion has a solid concept, but the numbers may need some work
- Changeling is another solid skill, but some sort of disable might be a better option.
Oh, a final opinion: Marsuvius might be better off as an Intelligence hero, either melee or ranged. I think it would be much more effective to model him around becoming more of a supportive hero, as opposed to a carry. That's all I'll say on that, but think about it.
Last edited by Anghkor; 09-26-2009 at 03:35 AM.
"Everything is valuable under the right conditions. To a man dying of thirst, water be more precious than gold. To a drowning man, water be of little worth and great trouble."
"The best way to predict your future is to create it."
You told me that you didn't think he was a carry and then proceeded to say he had a weak early game.
Shadow of Ruin is easily tweaked by changing the maturity rate.Also, you can pre-plan without putting yourself in danger.
Snare is the way it is because you can chain them to move large numbers of units a long distance.
I did a lot of work on the numbers for diffusion, you aren't considering how well it multiplies area damage.
Changeling is his primary damage dealing ability, what makes him a carry.
The idea is to set up shadows on possibly unrelated units like neutrals or preferrably the enemy team, pull them all together with a snare so your team can start aoeing them more effectively and then blow your shadows and run in with your +1000 damage and proceed to sit on the enemy team.
He has such an exteme damage potential, adding a slow to snare would make him overpowered. Either way, I don't see any way you could know exactly how it would play out any better then I would.
He needs his items to prevent disables, maximize his damage with ias, give him splash, survive a team battle. Once he has everything he needs, he can carry very strongly.
He doesn't have any disables of his own for a reason, if you actually did the math on his ultimate or considered what happens when you snare 5 shadowed units together...
If anything, changing the cooldown and maturity rate on shadows to make them more flexible is possibly the only change I would consider.
Also, you seem to forget you aren't voting on numbers, you are voting on the concept. If the concept isn't impossible to implement and would be interesting to play, you are obligated to vote yes.
I'll spend the next little bit going through each of your negative comments and attempting to refute them, as well as clarifying the stuff you asked about -
Shadow of Ruin is not countered by a lifetube, a normal nuke would be, but Shadow isn't. This is because you choose when you blow it up, and a lifetube can't regen damage that hasn't happened yet.
You seem to think shadow can only be used to harass an enemy, in fact it is used in an opposite manner. You will only be exploding a shadow when you want to kill the enemy.
Like I said, you don't have to make yourself vulnerable to place a shadow, I don't know why you thought as much.
Shadow relies absolutely not at all on your enemy being foolish, 2 enemies with matured shadows on top of a snare is 600 damage instantly, and with a magic armor penalty for even more effect, this is unavoidable unless both units stay away from each other. During a push, that is impossible.
Shadow isn't purely an initiator, it can also be used as a finisher similar to zeus's ultimate, it can be used to play mind games with the opponent for example, preventing a push because there are shadows on every hero, or making a melee hero avoid killing a creep with an unmatured shadow, placing a shadow on an allied hero causing the enemy hero to avoid them etc.
Snare has a 400 aoe, it says that in the skill.
Snare is terribly powerful, you can chain them to move units past towers. The magic armor reduction is also a very powerful thing in itself, especially with the AoE teams that are popular. The difficulty in use is to balance that out.
People would use it as an area support spell if you removed the trapping parts of it, and quite frankly that isn't as fun as setting up a trap for your enemies to fall into. It is a matter of opinion, and thus shouldn't be a part of your judging.
The numbers on Diffusion are carefully pruned, I don't think you understand it very well.
Changeling isn't situational.
When used right, you can easily get gigantic numbers without effort.
It is added to his regular attack, not an extra attack or a special effect like bash.
AoE? Are we even talking about the same skill? This really makes me question your qualification to judge my hero.
Any damage that would give credit for a kill to marsuvius(this includes diffusion) would count for this skill.
He isn't a supportive hero, he is a hero that relies on support to maximize his potential.
Phew. Long counter-post.
Last edited by bittersweets; 09-26-2009 at 02:30 AM.
I'm working in the morning, so I don't have the time at the moment to dispute most of this. However:Yes, I did. You're saying that any hero that fails early game is forced to fall into the "carry" position? I disagree. However sure, as you this hero currently stands he's best suited to play a carry, but ONLY after farming for the majority of the game. My point was that if he skills were re-oriented to a supporting role, he would have much more potential through the entirety of a match.
My point was that it isn't spammable unlike a regular nuke. A common damage dealing nuke deals 200-300 damage with a 6 to 15 second cooldown. This can be repeated frequently, resulting in easy abuse since it's extremely hard to keep up your health even with moderate regeneration. Your skill however, while the potential burst is high if applied perfectly (very situational), is easily countered by regeneration due to it's maturity time post-cast. Since you can only have one Shadow on a target, abuse isn't really possible against a decent opponent.
You're right, I don't. But in all honestly, neither do you. A hero on paper is completely different from a hero in-game. What might look and feel balanced originally, may be rediculously broken once implemented.
Actually at this point, while initial numbers shouldn't be the primary reason why a suggestion is denied, they ARE a large factor in a decision. At least for mine.
Condescending talk like this really doesn't help your chances in getting positive votes. However, if you actually read what I said in context, I was asking whether or not the damage was calculated based on the damage only YOU deal, or if it incorporated all allied damage. IF it was allied damage, I was asking how large the AoE would be on the detection.
Overall, I may have misunderstood a few points, but your heated reaction was extremely unnecessary. I'll think on it, but still leaning towards no. I'm done for tonight.
PS. I suggest you work on your attitude before someone decides to fix it for you.
"Everything is valuable under the right conditions. To a man dying of thirst, water be more precious than gold. To a drowning man, water be of little worth and great trouble."
"The best way to predict your future is to create it."
This hero is designed rather poorly.
Shadows cost far too much mana with far too much ramp up for the gain. Granted they are good nukes if applied along with Snare. However, they are simply impractical. By the time you spend the time applying Shadows to the correct targets, setting snares in perfect locations, waiting for the enemy team to push, triggers snares in the right sequence, detonating Shadows at the correct time, and having your teammates engage, your team will be initiated on by their stunners and you will be unable to do, well, anything.
Your hero essentially does what Tempest does with Blink + Black Hole, but taking ten times as long to set it up, has about the same cooldown, cannot contribute in any other ways to pushing, earlier hero killing, or teamfighting (detonating shadows ruins your perfect combo thus adding to setup time and snares cannot be placed in combat, so once your four "perfect snares" are down you have 2 weak passives for fighting, or you can replace a snare or waste your perfect shadow setup), and has an awful early game in exchange for a barely passable late game.
Your hero has absolutely no lane presence. With a 30 second ramp up time on your only nuke and the fact that snares aren't awfully powerful for the mana cost, especially early when you're already dumping massive amounts of mana just to use shadows (if you use them at all), your hero gets absolutely torn up in lane. Literally worse-than-Chronos torn up. And Chronos has a far better late game than this hero.
Setting up the hero's main combo is poorly designed as well. Between around level 7 and level 13, teamfighting doesn't happen in big fights. Your options are as follows -- lay shadows, use shadows as delayed 300 damage nukes (zues-esque fashion), perhaps use some snares to help initiate on 1-2 man teams. Overall your presence during this phase is extremely weak EVEN IF YOU USE YOUR SKILLS - you don't have the mana to spam your nukes, you don't have the mana to spam snares, your snare isn't even that powerful unless you can stack Shadow explosions, and there are no 5v5 teamfights. YOur other option is as follows: Stack shadows and let them sit until the 5v5 teamfights start. Prepare with "perfect snare chains" as you call them. And then just wait.
If you do the second, you are literally a nonfactor from level 1 to level 16, and even then you contribute to just one teamfight. If you do the first, you have a big problem -- teamfight starts, you don't have shadows up (because you've been using them). If you want to apply a Shadow and your team is next to you, they initiate on you and you have no shadows up, you're useless once again. If you want to apply a Shadow and your team isn't next to you, they initiate on and kill you easily because you have no survivability tools and because you had no lane presence you have no items.
If you went for the second method (of waiting with your initial shadows), you blow them once, perhaps win one teamfight because of it, and then you're stuck in the same situation. And you've literally given up level 1 through level 14. Literally. Given. Up.
Now lets say somehow you survive to late game. YOU ARE NOT FARMED. Let me repeat. You will never, ever, ever, be farmed at late game with the awful kind of presence this hero has in lane. He is literally a joke easy gank, and all he can do is detonate all his shadows (ruining his setup) or add a shadow to an enemy, perhaps detonate a snare that he's placed and move the enemy a whole 400 units (ooh great escape WAIT NO). He probably is -3 levels from everyone else with a pair of boots and a bracer. Great. So how is he going to farm late game? Oh right that uber ultimate. OH wait because he's a nonfactor with no items he dies easily to disables because there's no way he's going to farm a BKB. That is assuming that your team has enough AoE to Diffuse enough damage or you detonate enough shadows to do enough damage to actually build up your ult.
Overall, the hero is just plain bad. Sorry =/.
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