[Puppet Master] - Remake / Rework [Whiplash / P. Hold]

[[ITB]krucifix]

Puppet Strings

Puppet Master forces his strings on a target location, damaging, snaring and severely reducing enemies attack and cast speeds.

Action > Target Position Type > Enemy Units

Type: Magic
Range: 500
Radius: 400
Cast time: 0.5 seconds
Mana cost: 125 / 145 / 165 / 185
Cooldown: 11 / 9 / 7 / 5 seconds

Activation
Deals 1.25 / 1.5 / 1.75 / 2.0 x the targets damage value in Magic damage and applies Strung Up to all units in a 350 radius for 5 seconds.

Maximum damage possible to any single target is 350 Magic damage.

Strung Up
5% / 10% / 15% / 20% Movement Slow
-15% / -20% / -25% / -30% Attack Speed
-15 / -20 / -25 / -30 Cast Speed

Notes:
- Attack speed debuff is a %, meaning it scales to late game.

- Is cast on the ground like Glacius' Tundra Blast, but deals damage based on each individual heroes stats.

- Damage is based on enemy heroes damage value, meaning as the game goes later and later, the nuke deals more damage.

Puppeteer's Hold

The Puppet Master ties up a target enemy with puppet strings. The strings damage and restrain the enemy's movement.

Action > Target Entity Type > Enemy Units

Type: Magic
Range: 500
Radius: 400
Cast time: 1.0 seconds
Mana cost: 115 / 140 / 165 / 205
Cooldown: 14.0 seconds

Activation
Applies Puppeteer's Hold to target for 2.75 / 3.0 / 3.25 / 3.5 seconds. Target is constantly pushed toward the position he was at when Puppeteer's Hold was applied. If the target moves too far from this location, it will be forced back to the original position.

Deals 50 / 90 / 130 / 170 Magic damage to target.

Puppeteer's Hold can also be cast on a location, and drag clicked to be applied to Magic immune targets.

Notes:
- Attack speed debuff is removed, as it's now on Puppet Strings.

- If you click on the ground, the initial location you click is the main point for the strings, and as you click drag in a direction, the strings stretch out and grab the first target they come in contact with.

These changes take Puppet away from the carry route, and more to the nuke route.

His run speed would need to be reduced to 290-295 for these changes to be implemented.

[Zato]

It souns interesting, It would be nice if something like this happened as the role of puppet will be more clear. I would like also to see how much it will scale late game and then balance puppet show if necesary.

[[Sav2]Qwernakus]

I dont like it. The 2 spells that puppet have currently are very unique and fun to use, i dont want their concept changed. You should balance around those skills instead.

[[ITB]krucifix]

I dont like it. The 2 spells that puppet have currently are very unique and fun to use, i dont want their concept changed. You should balance around those skills instead.

Puppet's passive is in no way unique. It is another abomination of a spell. I'll refer you to a post in the Puppet Master balance thread:

It's not unique, in the way that it's possible to code in DotA very easily. It's just not in DotA, because on a ranged hero, it's insanely overpowered.

I mean, it's just a ranged splash mixed with 1/5 crit. There's nothing special about that.

I mean, if you think that's 'unique and interesting' then you'd obviously believe a random mix of any other passives would be the same, right?

Increases attack speed by 24%.
Every 3rd attack deals 1.5x damage, and bounces to 3 extra units.

That's not interesting or unique, it's just a random conglomeration of current in-game passives, same as Puppet's.

How about, we add this to it:

The last bounce will deal an extra 1.5x damage, in a 450 AoE around it's target

Nope, still not unique, just adding more of the same on to it.

It's also simply overpowered if you look at the numbers in a different way:

I'm pretty certain it's not.

Consider 100 attacks of 100 base damage. You deal 10,000 damage total.
Consider 100 attacks of 100 base damage, with Whiplash. You deal 12000 damage, (+20% passive), with +2400 damage from Whiplash procs on top of that, for a total of 14,400 damage. 14400/10000 = 1.44, so it's a 44% increase in damage. Swiftblades critical, Way of the Sword, is only 36%, and he's melee, and this doesn't factor in the fact that Whiplash procs splash in addition to crit, and that Whiplash is more reliable then Swiftblade's critical.

That's not perfect math (the +20% passive won't add up to 12000 damage exactly) but it does show how stupidly OP it is.

===

These changes give Puppet a clear cut anti-carry role and removes his overpowered carry ability.

Which part of that could you disagree with being a good change?

[[ITB]krucifix]

Also, I may change the first spell Puppet Strings, to be based on the targets damage, rather than main stat.

Most heroes start at ~50 damage, and carries can easily end at 200+ damage, so balancing the numbers will be relatively easy.

e: done

[FlyingPantsu]

275 damage and a four second disable?

[[ITB]krucifix]

I'll pull it down to 3.5s (but remember it's not a disable, just an immobilize for most heroes).

Is 275 damage still too high? (remember, he has no carry abilities now, it's all castable nukes for him)

[[ITB]krucifix]

thoughts?

[rickdeckard]

Your wrong, Puppet and all 4 of his abilities are COMPLETELY UNIQUE in hon. Puppet has a unique roll, as the only carry/disabler in the game why would you wanto remove this role? Whiplash is unique as it is the only charge based splash proc in the game, the way it functions is also one of a kind. Puppet is S2's best original hero imo, they have filled a role that wasnt previously and have kept him balanced with smart disables. Neither is a total disable and one is heavily situational.

As said your math up top isint 100% correct and youv taken it out of context ( in your average gang puppet would be lucky to get off 8 attacks ). In a 1v1 situation puppets abilities are imbalanced, but so are luna's and swiftblades. When you consider that in 99% of situations he is highest priority just like any other fragile disabler (even more so as a potentially viable carry) you start to see how he is balanced in the big picture. If he chooses to go dps then he will be lacking survivability/escape ( noob glass cannon build ) and should go down in seconds to even the weakest burst. If he goes for support/surviability ( the correct build ) then the dmg output of whiplash isint going to be a problem.

Wanto know why puppet is imba?

His ulti deals superior magic damage that bypasses immunity such as charm/shrunken. I also beleive it bypasses magic armor. This is the only area I can see that needs attention. Thats both thumbs down for your remake ( butchering ).
/endrant.

[[ITB]krucifix]

Well his ulti doesn't deal superior magic, and doesn't bypass magic armor.

If you actually watched competitive games, you'd notice his ulti hardly gets used. His ability to, in the laning phase, keep the opposition laner pinned down, allowing for easy mode ganks from roamers, or simply self kills is unparalleled by any other carry.

Watch some competitive games rickdeckard, and closely analyse them, you'd see there's far more problems with Puppet than you assume.

[Omnom1]

For clarification, Puppet Strings would replace Whiplash, Puppet Show stays the same, and Hold is now tweaked?

EDIT: if so, the damage loss from whiplash is 13dmg at level 7 with no items, level 25 it's 30dmg with full stats. obviously you would get more from it with items, but you wouldnt be building carry items on him without whiplash so there isn't much lost there, although a 14 damage range is quite annoying.

if strings is currently 2xhero's current attack damage, then i think it needs to be reduced to at most 1.5x or even 1.75x and a cd of at least 10.
it's essentially a 400-600+ reliable damage nuke endgame (on carries, 350-400 on support/nuke heroes) that's every 5 seconds. only thing i can compare that to is defiler with wave for 300dmg with 5 cd?, although the negatives applied with the rest of puppet skills do pale compared to a 6 second silence.
An extra 10 or so mana on the spell even if nerfed to 1.5x or 1.75x and 10 cd would be justified imo.
The part about voodoo puppet with strings also seems like almost forced synergy, promoting a playstyle where to get maximum effect, you need to be at melee range to drop the ult so to get the double effect from strings. This is at odds with where a nuker tends to want to be, which is at range, making the most of that distance buffer.
Your notes for strings also have typo's saying "stats" instead of damage.

On top of this, hold dealing damage is a bit of a no-no in my books. leave the hold as you have it, take off the damage and maybe have it reveal, silence, or disarm the target. one of those 3. (personally, i'm favouring disarm as it adds a layer of complexity to the choice to use puppet show, or hold, but this could also be a bad thing, idk)

My initial thoughts.

[[ITB]krucifix]

Yes, that's how the spells would work, omnom.

One thing I think you need to realise omnom, is that he still contains 'late game effectiveness' it's just not through scaling now.

Yes, 400-600 reliable nuke end game, will be common, but what you must realise is that it's damage is now almost totally null (comparatively) early game. I directly ripped the idea from the newly remade DotA hero Visage. He is capable of a nuke that deals 380 damage, on a 4 second cool down, but this damage will only be possible late game.

I guess what I should do, is add a top end cap on the damage possible. Maximum damage of 350? I decided to make the max damage smaller than Visage, due to it's ability to hit multiple targets, and also the fact that it has other benefits to the spell.

Great point about the forced synergy on the ulti, I will change that to be cleaner, allowing him to be a ranged hero at all times.

Lastly, Hold has a long cool down, so I think the minor damage is still worth it. I will however reduce the damage even more, something much harsher.

I've also decided to reduce the range again on the nuke, to 500.

[Omnom1]

The damage cap makes a lot more sense than my suggestion. I wasn't sure whether you wanted a nuke that would scale endlessly, so I was thinking about limiting it a little so it isn't comparable to heavy single-target ultimates like pyro/witch/deadwood every 5 seconds at any point late game. 500 range is probably for the best as well.

With strings being as mana intensive as it is, and with how it scales, you'd see a max out in hold/show first up, with maybe a point in strings for the debuffs. This is a definite change in play, making Puppet more of a hybrid between pre-Fervor Pyro and Succubus, which would be a nice niche to fill with more than just Witch Slayer.

Still not sold on the idea of damage on the hold (personal preference, i guess. he only has one fairly crap nuke early on so it makes sense), and possibly the % of attack speed reduced.

Synergy with frostwolf's skull for 60%? in an aoe would be better than even someone like Demented Shaman, not that you'd get it on Demented in a serious game.

[W1S3B0Y]

I like it alot, I really think that this new spell would make puppet master's play more interesting.

Although replacing the passive with a 185 mana cost spell means he will need a HUGE mana pool to set off a 4 spell combo.

[[JR]neft]

Your remake suggestions are absolutely unnecessary. Both electrician and puppet's skills are very well designed and synergistic.

[[ITB]krucifix]

Your remake suggestions are absolutely unnecessary. Both electrician and puppet's skills are very well designed and synergistic.

And Electrician is still a useless hero, and Puppet Master is currently insanely OP.

Go figure.

[[420]]

Isn't puppet master's ability (splashed range) just a remake of the Storm Panda's ability from DotA?

I like the ideas but I'm not sure if the balance is right.

[[ITB]krucifix]

Isn't puppet master's ability (splashed range) just a remake of the Storm Panda's ability from DotA?

I like the ideas but I'm not sure if the balance is right.

Well, Storm Panda's passive only works when after he casts a spell, and it deals +static damage (+75), not +%, which means in itself it doesn't scale in late game. It also doesn't occur on every X swings, it procs after Storm casts a spell.

So, there's a few key differences there, mainly the whole % thing.

[[lMBA]RedJustice]

The only thing that worries me is that now to go along with his 2 cc's hes gonna have a snare... I think I would like this if his stats were reworked so that he was a ganker/disabler cause I think this would only help his harkons domination if he now had a slow to go with everything

[CRAB_STEAK]

Keep in mind that the base damage increase and splashing crits from Whiplash are not applied anymore, and thus his harkons domination gets a severe kick in the balls.

I like this. It's a definitive role for Puppet to play, as clearly the "Carry with pseudo-disabling potential" experiment has failed so far. He has the ability to keep multiple heroes in one concentrated space for a very long time, which means he will have excellent synergy with a lot of heroes, and the ability to hold through head and force one unit to attack another will give him great anti-carrying abilities.

Much, much better than the ridiculous carry we are currently dealing with. Thumbs up.