[Item Suggestion] Soulstealer's Sabre

[Sabre]

Forged by the soulstealer to aid a legendary warrior of the Hellborne in their war against the legion, the Soulstealer's Sabre behaves much like its creator, using the souls of those it kills to hone its edge. It was lost in an early battle, and has been resurfacing in the hands of many capable warriors since, on either side of the war.

Item: Soulstealer's Sabre

Components:

Bastard Sword 1400
Soulscream Ring (150 + 185 + 125) 460
Recipie - 950
Total: 2810

Benefit:

+21 damage
+6 Agility
+3 Strength
+3 Int
Soulstoring - Passive
Soulsmashing - Passive

Soulstoring:
The Sabre stores the souls of those it kills, and loses the stored energy on enemy heroes it strikes.

Every non-hero kill a hero gets while he has the Sabre adds 1 charge to the sabre. A hero kill adds 3 charges.

For each charge, the Sabre adds an additional 3 damage to the hero.

Max 4 charges

Death causes all of the charges to be lost.

Soulsmash:
When the Sabre strikes an enemy hero, it causes one of the stored souls
to collide with the spirit of the hero it strikes, consuming the soul in the process, leaving the affected hero shaken from the blow.

Soulsmash is an attack modifier and does not stack with other attack modifiers

When striking a hero not affected by Soulsmash, the enemy hero is slowed by 15% and their armour is reduced by 2.

The duration of soulsmash is equal to the number of charges on the sabre.

Every instance of soulsmash reduces the number of charges by 1 (after the duration is calculated).

*******************************************

Goal: I wanted an item that would help junglers and carrys out by giving them a (somewhat) cheap source of damage and that also gave them some utility (in the form of a slow) while they were farming away. The game currently lacks a cheap slowing attack, for obvious balance reasons, and most of the slows are currently vested in stats, making them more ideal for some and less for others. The soulscream ring is more of an homage to Soulstealer and

This item instead adds pure damage to the hero, with a token amount of stats for flavor. A slow with a diminishing return that does not stack or overlap with itself, I feel balances out the idea of an early, cheap slow. The lack of overlap (i.e. every attack does not reapply the slow) gives heroes struck by it windows of opportunity to get away while still giving a useful slow early game to chasing heroes.

I think the soulstealer motif is also a good addition, letting the item become one of momentum in a fight- getting kills mid-fight allows the sabre to recharge and become an effective slow again. The concept feels like a poor man's frostwolf skull and shieldbreaker wrapped in one. This cheap slow would also act as a strong counterbalance against rampaging int dps heroes like pyro, TB or defiler, and boost the effectiveness of many of the lagging agility carries.

Who would get this? Heroes who need to farm/lasthit early and could do with a slow, and who don't nessecarily want to get a nullfire blade or hack due to low attack speed.

Heroes who came to mind were-

Predator
Soulstealer
Scout
Valkyrie
Magebane
Wildsoul
Zephyr
Armadon
Hammerstorm
Blood Hunter
Dark Lady
Pharoh
War Beast


Thoughts?

[Mentality1]

Does Soulstealer himself "go to 37" souls with this? For the purposes of his Ult specifically.

[Sabre]

I don't think having special interaction with his ult is warranted, the item works very well for soulstealer as it is.

[Mentality1]

I guess this is where I'm struggling with your suggestion. Overall I like it, but most players will expect it to synergise with Soulstealer's skills, and be frustrated if it doesn't. Which could cause balance problems if it does. But it's unintuitive if it doesn't. And the flavor is pretty strong and you don't want to lose that. It's hard to say.

[Sabre]

I don't think people expect Behemoth's Heart to synergise with Behemoth's skills in some extra special way, and the same should apply here.

[Mentality1]

Behemoths heart is just the name in similar. This has the name, and gives souls in the same manor as his skill, which give practically the same benefit.

[[BARS]Frog100]

Wouldn't be any point to get this on Soulstealer anyway since it wouldn't stack with Frostwolf or Sheildbreaker

[Sabre]

But the idea of this is that it is a 'budget' version of those items, so if a soulstealer was having financial problems this would become an attractive option.

Also- loving the no's without posts. Great job guys, way to help the community/

[[EHE]rockchalk]

Sounds plausible.

[[EHE]PeterLance]

Yes, but:

A name change would be nice. Suggestions:
Howling Sabre
Wraith Sabre
Seelesauger Sabre (German for soul-sucker)
Soulspliter's Sabre
Peter's Lance - I mean, what?

Edit: Sabre of the Soulcleaver?

[Hippie]

Lol. Peter's Lance.

Interesting idea, tentative thumbs up.

[[G43]SpudJebus]

i think this item would kind of make things really difficult to balance, it should be harder to charge it at least. maybe making creeps give 1/2 a charge? getting a battlefury would mean that a hero would get most of the charges from one creep wave

its still a really good item idea though

[Sabre]

I truly understand that this sort of inexpensive slow would be difficult to balance, but I don't think the damage that this does is really a concern. The -2 armour and 15% slow I think is much more likely up for debate.

Though considering this further I lowered the max charge amount to 4 and increased the damage per charge to 3.

[[HGFU]KorbenDallas]

I kind of like it, could be super imba though man. Lower the charge amount or increase cost..?

[[BETA]Anghkor]

Sorry man, have to turn 'ya down.

*Maybe* if it was a general modifier instead of an attack mod... but that definitely killed it for me. I'd go into detail, but truthfully I'm too tired right now for a decent write-up. Again, sorry.

Edit: Ugh, had to write a bit before sleep. Potentially giving +33 damage, in addition to granting stat bonuses, a hit-by-hit snare, and armor reduction... all of that for only 140 gold more than the price of a Slayer (Demon Edge), which ONLY gives +36 damage. Never mind this item takes up your only available Attack Modifier instead of being able to grab a Shield Breaker (Stygian Desolator) or a FrostWolf's Skull (Eye of Skadi). Both of which are MUCH better attack modifying items to get, albeit more expensive as well.

Meh.

[Sabre]

I think the reasoning for it being an attack modifier is exactly as you said, it overlaps with frostwolf's skull and shieldbreaker very strongly, and if both were used in concert it would be too powerful.

I can see what you mean on the pricing, but thats just a matter of increasing the recipie cost more appropriately.

[Nordoix]

[Sabre]

Increased recipe cost to 950, removed the bonus stats

Also, Nordiox thats awesome.

[livmew]

Nullfire Blade costs 3300. How do you feel this item would hold up against it? The purge is amazing, the mana leech ain't bad and if you go Geometer's you get 150 mana burn/attack + well-needed HP.

Seems like a cool item, but not sure how good it would be compared to its competition. I like it, though.

[Sabre]

I think it would hold up fine? Especially for heroes who aren't agility. I think the final cost is probably going to be finnicky, but its obvious the balance is between 2400 (slayer) and 3300 (nullfire). I suspect that 2810 is just about right.