Making a hero as a group [2/4 done]

[[H]the_tes]

You would need a tree creating skill to go with the infect/exploding skill.
There was a hero in the excellence contest that created pillars or something (the one with the passive that made them attack). Start from that.

Diseased growth : Place a diseased tree that deals a DoT around it. Has charges. The DoT stacks. No cooldown between placing trees.

It's good because you can also use it to cut people off.
The DoT needs to be strong, because of hatchet and runes. And all the skills that cut trees down.

[Alten]

A hero centered around the idea of infecting and dominating the entire forest gave me the thought of an ultimate designed solely around map control, while also implementing some of the old concepts of Keeper.

Namely, this ultimate, Blight, would spawn nodules of infection onto trees, and they would be capable of being attacked in the same manner as Keeper's old eyes (although they would be inherently invisible). Each application of the ultimate would also have a similarly long CD (and, perhaps, Blight could add a passive to his other tree manipulation skills to apply the corruption).

Blight is themed in a similar manner to undead blight from WC or Zerg creep from SC. Nodules would slowly spread the infection to nearby trees and onto the ground, with a sickly greenish corruption being evidenced in areas under control. Each infected tree would become a unit under control of the hero; they provide sight (but not true sight, except maybe for the nodule tree) and can be remotely destroyed by the hero. Each time a tree is destroyed (including by the enemy), a small damage aoe and slow could ensue. On the destruction of a nodule, the infection stops around it and could slowly recede.

Now, the passive effects of this infection are the main point of innovation. This ultimate is counterable in the same fashion as the eyes, and so, thoughts of many interesting and small accumulative passives attributed to areas of infestation come to the fore. Most prominently, in the strengthening of allied towers, with a small regen/armor buff applied to towers in the infection. Perhaps the buff could also extend to allied heroes/units, with a small speed boost tacked on. Another possibility is the inverse applied to enemy heroes/units. Maybe, just maybe, the effects could increase as the infestation covers more of the map; thus, it becomes even more dire for the enemy to stop its spread.

While a potentially very powerful ultimate, it feels balanced somewhat by the capability to destroy it in such fashions as a bound eye and flying courier. In any case, we have not had any abilities which can establish constantly increasing map control since the removal of keeper's eyes, with the closest being Engineer's mines (and those possess a hard cap). The implementation of a hero that could utilize such a mechanic is very alluring, and I hope that you take this idea into consideration, Drasha.

[WeXaztor]

^i had an idea that this reminded me of.

Infect a tree and an infection will spread over an area
and for every X units a hero walks on it a blightling (blight saporling)
is summoned and attacks nearby enemies.

Maximum of 3 infected trees.

Dunno if this ability is good for anything, guess it works as junglecontrol

[Drasha]

I like the who blight idea i would like to see some more stuff playing around with it.

[Kwanchie]

Tainted Forest
Passive.
Trees destroyed by Infection become Tainted for 2/4/6/8 minutes and release a 150 radius miasma that buffs Infection and damages enemies.
Max of 4/8/12/16 trees. Tainting a new tree restores the oldest tainted tree.

Tainted effect
Tree cannot respawn.
+2/4/6/8 Health Regeneration + 10/20/30/40 Movespeed for Infection.
10/20/30/40 Magic Damage per second to enemy, non-neutral units.

[[RGTG]Green]

Some ideas

Possess Tree
100 Range
Target Tree
30 sec duration
Infection corrupts and possesses a tree. He is untargetable until the tree is destroyed. The corruption slowly spreads to nearby trees as long as he remains inside the tree. Trees stay corrupted for 30 seconds. Corrupted trees give off a stacking aura in a 600 radius that gives them -x armor and -x magic armor.

-Corrupted trees that are thrown via the Q apply the debuff for a duration.

-You can't tango corrupted trees

-The tree he is in looks "eviler" than other corrupted trees


Overgrowth
2 Second Channel
800 Range

Hit once to begin channeling. Click a target location to have a root extend from Infection to the area and violently spear/thrash anyone on the target. Deals magic damage and stuns for 1 second. Takes a 1.25 second delay to reach a target that is 800 away. Near instantly hits a target right next to infection. Has 3 charges at max rank.

[Could remove channeling and just have it be a regular charge based spell. I like the channeling idea though as it forces the hero to stay still which makes sense if it is growing out roots.]

[Hubaris]

Tainted Forest
Passive.
Trees destroyed by Infection become Tainted for 2/4/6/8 minutes and release a 150 radius miasma that buffs Infection and damages enemies.
Max of 4/8/12/16 trees. Tainting a new tree restores the oldest tainted tree.

Tainted effect
Tree cannot respawn.
+2/4/6/8 Health Regeneration + 10/20/30/40 Movespeed for Infection.
10/20/30/40 Magic Damage per second to enemy, non-neutral units.

I really like this. It has some aspects of my little short range gadgets, but has some flavour that blends in with the current "tree exploding skill". I think the buffs seem to be a bit misplaced though; I personally don't like HP Regen and Movespeed combo.

Maybe instead of HP Regen and Movespeed, he can have Movespeed and Tree Walking. Blow up a set of trees, replace them with these, walk through with the bonus speed as you juke.


Tainted effect
Tree cannot respawn.
+10/20/30/40 Movespeed for Infection, lingering 1.5 seconds.
Tree Walking, lingering 1.5 seconds.
10/20/30/40 Magic Damage per second to enemy, non-neutral units.

It can give him much needed mobility to set up the next series of skills, because he seems heavy into positioning.

[[DARD]CptnUtility]

Though i like the idea of the ability "Blight". I think you guys are thinking too far into it. Also there are some inherent issues already with Blight mixing with skill 1

- Blight works via infecting a tree, and spreading via other trees. The ability does not bode well if your first ability is about destroying trees and other trees around it.

- This whole Blight infecting trees then controlling the trees and all this other buisiness.
The best abilities are simple enough to understand (May not be necessarily simple in design), be simple to use and are effective in their purpose.
I feel if you want to go with this blight mechanic, All it should do is spread and boost the hero and maybe his other abilities (Abit like the Blight in Warcraft where the undead can only build on the blight but the blight gives bonus'

[Hubaris]

What I gathered was that when a tree gets destroyed by the hero, it gets replaced by a Blight Tree. Unless I'm not understanding.

Destroying trees and replacing them with evil twins is what I thought he meant.

[[JSD]Koiuy]

Not necessarily continuing the blight idea, though more of the concept in terms of leaving an area of 'blight'. This is an ultimate suggestion:

Ability one and possibly another skill tha destroys path - can leave an area of 'blight' which is permanent. Maximum of xx blighted areas.
Alten (who suggested the blight idea), suggested giving the tree some map control - and we don't actually have a lot of hat (only one that comes to mind is Tremble - and that ability is insane for not being an ultimate).

Upon activation, the hero may choose his destined location with 'Blight' upon the location. After a delay, the hero will appear at the location as well as xx amount of tree units that surround him. The blighted area expands exponentially reaching to a radius of xx. Areas affected with blight, enhance xx blah.

[R0XAS]

Razor Leaves - inspired by Bulbasaur. Everyone knows Bulbasaur is better pick than Squirtle. Jokes.

Infection is capable of releasing razor leaves which can be fired at nearby random enemies. Theres a base of 4 leaves and a max cap of 20 leaves, the higher his Str, the more leaves he produces. Every 0.25 seconds, a leaf is fired, which deals the normal damage of Infection.

Level 1 - Each 11 Str the amount of leaves is increased by 1.
Level 2 - Each 9 Str the amount of leaves is increased by 1.
Level 3 - Each 7 Str the amount of leaves is increased by 1.
Level 4 - Each 5 Str the amount of leaves is increased by 1.

Type: instant Active
Target self
AoE is 400
Casting Time is Instant
Cooldown: 18
Mana Cost: 120

[[Loli]Blueflash]

Blight
Infection leaves behind a miasma of rot and disease which persists for 2 seconds and damages enemies in a line behind him for 10/15/25/40 magic damage a second.

Simple and effective No?

[[TTFR]Chime]

I would love to suggest that instead of a trail of blight, he has rotten flies and mosquitos or whatever they are.

Blightening swarm

Passive: Deals damage around infection every time he attack an enemy. (could be around the target if you decide that he should be ranged) The swarm also slowly corrupts trees around him when he stays in the area for a short time.

Active: Slowly drains infections mana, and makes the insects around him crazy, seeking out enemies and slowly dragging them in the direction Infection is, in the meanwhile infecting trees around the enemies being dragged, dealing additional damage when they stay near a corrupted tree.

Now, what i think about this is that i and others are thinking way to complex, going into a hero that would be way to synergizing (as said before) and having a cookie-butter build, which means a "have to" leveling in skills on this hero, much like Swiftblade or others. It needs to be simple in order to be fun, as i personally dont want to play another silhoutte-like tree positioning hero. I know that you think i am negative when it comes to this, but please think if it would be fun to play another tree based hero.

[Hubaris]

I would love to suggest that instead of a trail of blight, he has rotten flies and mosquitos or whatever they are.

Blightening swarm

Passive: Deals damage around infection every time he attack an enemy. (could be around the target if you decide that he should be ranged) The swarm also slowly corrupts trees around him when he stays in the area for a short time.

Active: Slowly drains infections mana, and makes the insects around him crazy, seeking out enemies and slowly dragging them in the direction Infection is, in the meanwhile infecting trees around the enemies being dragged, dealing additional damage when they stay near a corrupted tree.

Now, what i think about this is that i and others are thinking way to complex, going into a hero that would be way to synergizing (as said before) and having a cookie-butter build, which means a "have to" leveling in skills on this hero, much like Swiftblade or others. It needs to be simple in order to be fun, as i personally dont want to play another silhoutte-like tree positioning hero. I know that you think i am negative when it comes to this, but please think if it would be fun to play another tree based hero.

I like walking trail abilities. I suggested one earlier too, and I think the concept of using your hero as the area and "vector" hasn't been explored enough.

Might need some tweaks (I don't like active/passives personally) but I love flies and vermin moving with him.

[[TTFR]Chime]

Well, just a suggestion. Of course it can be tweaked to do so, but you will need to have an idiotic who runs in your footsteps in order to create any effect, which is just a bad skill when it comes to comp play.

Take a look at this. I think if you plan on using the ability, when do it like this.

[MasterGeese]

Time to throw out ideas:

_Metal mentioned something along the lines of Furion's sprout from DotA. Since that hasn't been ported yet, I'd vouch for that.

As for my own abilities:

Life Sap: Redirects the life force from all nearby trees in a 300/375/450/525 AoE into the targetted unit, destroying them in the process. The first 5 trees to be destroyed heal the target for 10/20/30/40, while every subsequent tree heals for 2/4/6/8. (Assuming we have some sort of infected-tree mechanic Infected trees destroyed will grant the target a tapering 80% slow over 1/2/3/4 seconds on its next attack.

Going by the first ability, we need something that creates trees.

Weeping Willow: Creates a Corrupted Willow at the targetted area, which acts as a tree that slows nearby units for 5/10/15/20% movement speed and 5/10/15/20 attack speed. Grants 400/600/800/1000 Clearvision as long as it remains alive. Maximum of 4 willows may be alive at any time.

[[Flwr]LadyMok6o4]

Plague:

Hero channels for 1.75 seconds, draining 250 health over the duration. If the channel is finished, the hero will stun every target in a 700 radius for 1.5 seconds and take 75 physical damage. If the channel is not complete, every enemy hero in the area will be damaged the same amount of health drained from the caster in mixed damage.

[Alten]

The blight concept is what it is because it is centered around providing traditional map control, which is not really factored into any abilities at the moment. The element of active, constantly expanding oppression is intentional. :/

[Drasha]

I have changed the first ability. It now works as a "mine" that can be triggered by walking in an area. They cannot be stacked on top of each other for instant gibbing. They server as a spreader for corrupted ground. Corrupted ground currently has no use how ever ability suggestions can use the corrupted ground in some manner. (spreading it, bonus effect to people on corrupt ground, makes corruption do some thing, gadget that can only be placed on corruption, ect)

tldr: corruption is the new mechanic for this hero.

[Dacko]

An Idea:

Target an area of trees. Trees will get "alive" which means, if a hero is near those trees, when the spell is casted, he gets knocked out by the trees (with a cool kick or punch animation from the trees :-) ).



Short:
Spellcastime is 1 second.
Target Tree -> Tree gets alive -> Knocking enemy heroes down. (Tree doesn't change position or cannot walk around like Keepers minions)
Stunning the enemy hero for (2,3,4,5) seconds.
No damage applied.
Radius idk.