The Plaguebearer

The Plaguebearer was once no more than an ordinary human, living out his ordinary life in unspectacular but comfortable conditions... until he became the host to a new strain of virus. His body steadfastly fought back against the invader, subjecting his internal body to a never-ending war while also giving birth to multiple deformations, both inside and out. The pain drowns him in madness while the virus itself lends to his bloody ways to spread, increasing his aggression to new heights.

Stats :

Strength : 29 + 2.6
Agility : 22 + 3.1
Energy : 9 + .8

Primary Stat : Strength
Range : Melee
Base Armor : 3
Base Damage : 8 - 11 (37 - 40 with base)
Movement Speed : 350
Model : Ghoul

The Plaguebearer's role is to decimate the enemy, up close and personal, with support from his infected minions. He is not stealthy at all, thanks to his aura, but he is not meant to be -- he is meant to rush the enemy to finish them off quickly and continue chasing until the kill is confirmed. His rabid fervor is more of a "emergency" skill, to be used when escape is impossible and you want to cause some damage before you die.
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Skill 1:
Contagion (passive, aura and on attack effect)

The Plaguebearer's virus has managed to increase its resistance to the environment outside the body, making it possible to spread to other organisms.

Aura :

Enemy units (350 + 50[level]) distance away from the Plaguebearer will be placed under the effect of "Contagion level 0". If a unit remains inside the aura for five seconds (at all levels), the buff will increase by one level. The buff deals 2 + 2(level of skill) damage per second per level of the buff, up to a max level of 3 / 3 / 4 / 4. Slows by 5% per level of the buff.


If a unit remains outside of the aura's range for a full 10 / 10 / 15 / 15 seconds, the buff will be completely removed, regardless of the level. This skill is not fatal.


On attack :

Deals 12 + 2[level] every second, slows by 3%, and reduces armor by 1 for 6 seconds. Stacks up to 4 + 1[level] times. This skill *is* fatal.

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Skill 2:
Modified Composition (passive)

The virus pushes the body to its very limit, causing irreversible changes to the body's internal composition. Such a mutilated structure, though typically very painful to the recipient, also bestows the advantage of providing more difficult fatal targets for its enemies.

When the Plaguebearer is attacked, there is a chance to negate a large portion of the damage. This chance increases the more damaged the Plaguebearer is. This does not apply to self-applied damage.

Has a 25% + 5% for every 10% of life missing to prevent 40/50/60/70% of the incoming damage. If the damage that is left over would still be fatal, instead of dying, health is reduced to 10 and the skill is disabled for two seconds. This skill does not activate when damage is being dealt to shields.

At 100% life -- 25% chance.

At 80% life -- 25% + (10%) = 35%

At 10% life -- 25% + (45%) = 70%

If I have 100 health and am nuked for 800 damage, and this procs, I am left with 10 health.

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Skill 3:
Rabid Fervor (active)

The Plaguebearer is driven into a frenzy, temporarily increasing his drive to attack without heed to the damage to his body.

Increases movespeed by 20% / 25% / 30% and attack speed by 35% / 50% / 65% and takes 50% reduced damage for 20 seconds. After the fervor wears off, he takes damage equal to the full amount he took while in his fervor (150% total) and 20% of his attack per attack he made.

Cooldown : 45 / 40 / 35 / 30 seconds

Damage received is applied first, then damage taken thanks to his attacks. The first *is* fatal, the second is not. Modified Composition does not apply to the damage following.

If I have 160 health and am hit with a 180 damage nuke, I will not die as the skill is active, because I would only take 90 damage from that skill, leaving me with 70 health left. After the effect wears off, however, I will take the rest of the amount (180), which would kill me because the damage is fatal.

If I had 360 health and was hit with the same nuke, leaving me with 270 health and I slapped somebody 10 times with 60 base damage, I would take 180 damage (from the nuke) and 120 damage (from my attack). 270 - 180 = 90. Even though the leftover 120 damage is greater than my health, this damage source is *not* fatal and I would be left with one health.

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Ultimate :
Learn Adaptability (passive increase to Contagion skill) + (Active)

The virus the Plaguebearer carries is incredibly deadly and, more often than not, results in either the death of its victim or is harmlessly contained. In fact, it seems as if the Plaguebearer's is the only body in which it can survive for any length of time. In order to combat these limitations, the virus begins to mutate in order to increase its control over new hosts.

The Plaguebearer infects a unit with a special strain of the virus. If used on a non-hero unit, after fifteen seconds or if the unit dies, the unit will become a Plaguecarrier minion. These Minions are controllable by the Plaguebearer and have a very weak poison sting which deals 5 damage a second for 8 seconds and slows by 10%, non-stacking and have 40/60/80% as much (stat) health as the original Plaguebearer does with 25/50/75% of its (stat) attack damage. Their movement and attack speeds are set to the same speed as the Plaguebearer.

Cooldown : 60 / 45 / 30 seconds

Max of 1 / 2 / 3 minions.

I like, but spell 3 would have to be heavily modified; the hero seems really easy to do good with and giving him AI controlled summons is like noob heaven.

The summons should be limited to 2 or 3 and very weak.

Cokemonkey11 wrote:I like, but spell 3 would have to be heavily modified; the hero seems really easy to do good with and giving him AI controlled summons is like noob heaven.

The summons should be limited to 2 or 3 and very weak.

They're not exceptionally strong, really. The requirements to make a "perfect" minion are high and the minions have no shields to speak of, meaning even a "perfect" one will typically die quite often on the field. They also do not gain pure damage from items (only bonus stats), which makes their usefulness scale down after you begin to focus on elite items.

But, I do see from where you are coming from. If he *does* get four perfect minions, then he will be essentially have a +400% damage increase in terms of the regular attack.

I really like the AI controlled summons though -- it gives a sense of "these things are here to help you out but only because they're crazy like you are". You're their pack leader, and they respond to your actions -- that's it.

Perhaps make this skill the ultimate instead and change the current ultimate so that he doesn't have any real disable? Without his disable, his use will be limited to whacking the enemy and hoping they'll die as opposed to knowing that they will be stuck for you.

What if they were given a passive degen so that they will eventually die by themselves and become easier to kill over time? Make it so they aren't healed by the fountain? Have a decay on their stats so that they will grow less powerful as time goes on?

All of these are possibilities, and I'm more than open to suggestions. I'm glad you like the hero. I'm rather steadfast in my decision to keep the skill, though.

The problem is that i'm worried because you could easily micro weak units to get a ton of weak minions set up quickly, and then slowly start attacking stronger and stronger creeps until your minions are maxed out.

To get a full set of perfect minions all you'd have to do is farm and run when u see an enemy, then when you're ready, they have a massive disadvantage.

Modified the hero. In order to keep track of these changes, I will post the old skills if they are changed drastically in order to keep track of them for future reference. Any modifications to skills that are kept will be posted in the summary below.

I feel this is much more efficient than simply editing the main post. This way, people can see the progress + the old ideas so that they can say "hey, I kind of liked the old one better" while the main post still shows the current hero.

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Skill 3:
Adaptability (passive)

The virus the Plaguebearer carries is incredibly deadly and, more often than not, results in either the death of its victim or is harmlessly contained. In fact, it seems as if the Plaguebearer's is the only body in which it can survive for any length of time. In order to combat these limitations, the virus begins to mutate.

If a unit dies while afflicted with either Contagion or Infectious Swipes, it will turn into another plaguebearer. The strength of the new plaguebearer is dependent on how much of the virus is inside of the unit as it dies. These units will be uncontrollable but will surround the main plaguebearer and move and attack as he does. Should the Plaguebearer switch Personas, all of his units will be switched out and, when switched back, you will have one less plaguebearer minion. If the main Plaguebearer dies, the small Plaguebearers will relentlessly attack all enemy units that they see (will issue the attack commands on all enemy units within a certain range and continue following them they die or sight is lost). There is a limit of four of these plaguebearers, and if a stronger one is born, the current weakest will be removed to make room. Mini plaguebearers do not gain Infectious Swipes or Contagion, do not gain pure damage given by items (though they do gain damage given by bonus stats). Attack speed is directly based on the original plaguebearer and is not influenced by the % calculation (item increases do not increase attack speed on these units. Only the agility stat has sway). Movement speed is set to that of the original.

The Plaguebearer (and his minions) will also explode on death, dealing level*[strength] damage to units within 400 distance away from him. Plaguebearer minions will deal, at max, half as much damage.

To find how powerful the new Plaguebearer unit will be, the following calculations are made.

(Level of Contagion) * 2 = x
(Level of Infectious Swipe) * 3 = y

[(x+y/30) / (5-level)]% of stat damage and health [original plaguebearer's max shields are added to the unit's max health, also].

If x + y is greater than 30, then it is set to 30.

This means that, if they have level 6 contagion on them and level 1 infectious swipe, and this skill is level 3, the new unit will have [12 + 3 / 30] / 2 = 25% stats of the original. The damage done by exploding is also modified by this %. It is ([100 / (% stats of the original)]/2). This means that the above example, with 25% of its stats, will do 12.5% of the explosion damage.

As a cosmetic affect, if possible, the mini-plaguebearer's look is also based on this %. The size will decrease with decreasing power and they will be blacker with decreasing power. At 100%, they will look exactly like the original plaguebearer and at 5%, will be completely black and about 25% of the original's size.

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Ultimate :
Rabid Leap (active)

The Plaguebearer is driven into a frenzy, causing him to leap at the nearest enemy within range. When he hits, the unit will take minor damage and be immobilized for a 1.2 seconds. If there are multiple plaguebearers, all of them will be driven into a frenzy, with one second between leaps and priority given to those not already targeted (though it is entirely possible to target the same unit repeatedly if there are none others). If Infectious Swipes is learned, the unit will also be given 2 levels of the buff per hit, regardless of which plaguebearer hit him (even the mini ones will give the buff). The mini-plaguebearers will also not choose a target more than 500 units away from the unit the original chose.

Deals [.5 * normal damage + 40] * level and has a range of 800 units away from the main plaguebearer.

Cooldown : 40 seconds

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Yes, I combined swipes and the aura together. It makes sense to me. To counter this, I also gave the aura's buff a definite time in which it will be removed. I feel that the attack is semi-weak as it is, thanks to its low duration and relatively negligible effects, so I left it as it was.

I also decided that I would focus on the hero's killing ability (what I had wanted it to be mainly for) and to keep disabling abilities out of it. This should hopefully balance his dangerous single-hero killing ability with a lack of any reliable means to either engage, escape, or to otherwise keep the enemy within his grasp. He should be *dangerous* to fight, but if he attacks alone, you won't be forced to fight him.

I think I like this concept, but again it is overly complicated. Can you clean it up some? There's no reason to have 12 levels of a buff, for example. I've also noticed that a lot of your ability ideas tend to have a chance to do something in a certain area and then another chance to do something more complicated, etc. etc...just decide what you want the effect to be and give him a simpler way of achieving it.

Also, an ability summary would be really handy for me. I'm not a simpleton and can figure out what your abilities are intended to do, but I would simplify them anyway and it would be useful to know what parts you care most about. And...yeah, it would make my life easier too, lol.

Bengal_Tigger wrote:I think I like this concept, but again it is overly complicated. Can you clean it up some? There's no reason to have 12 levels of a buff, for example. I've also noticed that a lot of your ability ideas tend to have a chance to do something in a certain area and then another chance to do something more complicated, etc. etc...just decide what you want the effect to be and give him a simpler way of achieving it.

Also, an ability summary would be really handy for me. I'm not a simpleton and can figure out what your abilities are intended to do, but I would simplify them anyway and it would be useful to know what parts you care most about. And...yeah, it would make my life easier too, lol.

As I said in another topic, it really doesn't seem too complicated to me. I mean, all of the specifics could be overwhelming for a new player, but you can play without the specifics, just as you can drive a car without knowing how it works.

Plaguebearer for Dummies :

Skill 1 : Passive Skill. Aura that gives a poison buff, and on-attack that gives a different poison buff. I compare it to Necrolyte aura mixed with, let's say, Venomancer poison?

Skill 2 : Passive on-death AoE effect that gives a poison buff. I compare it to Techies Suicide with Venomancer poison gale.

Skill 3 : Standard steroid spell. I compare it to Mask of Madness and reverse lifesteal.

Skill 4 : A weaker version of Geomancer's ult (copies the main hero), and Dirge's summon zombie spell (how they aren't controllable and target the nearest enemy). The more poisoned they are, the better the summoned unit.

Basically, if I were to write a guide to these heroes that are overly complicated in how they work, I don't believe it would be hard to do so unless it is a hardcore guide.

Skill 1 : Passive Skill. Aura that gives a poison buff, and on-attack that gives a different poison buff. I compare it to Necrolyte aura mixed with, let's say, Venomancer poison?

Then that's what it will be, you see? I'm not going to make some complicated-ass system with 12 buffs to do what you just described when I could do, well, what you just described. That's my point here. If you can make the ability simpler and keep the gist, BY ALL MEANS DO IT. Which I shall. Your description of the basics of the ability allows me to know what parts of it aren't just fancy fluff.

Skill 2 : Passive on-death AoE effect that gives a poison buff. I compare it to Techies Suicide with Venomancer poison gale.

This ability won't be implemented. On-death is very shitty.

Skill 3 : Standard steroid spell. I compare it to Mask of Madness and reverse lifesteal.

Yep, unless you are talking about the cloning spell. Not sure which is more current.

Skill 4 : A weaker version of Geomancer's ult (copies the main hero), and Dirge's summon zombie spell (how they aren't controllable and target the nearest enemy). The more poisoned they are, the better the summoned unit.

Kind of boring, to be honest. I'm not sure I see anything special about this hero now that the um, trappings, are gone.

Bengal_Tigger wrote:

Skill 4 : A weaker version of Geomancer's ult (copies the main hero), and Dirge's summon zombie spell (how they aren't controllable and target the nearest enemy). The more poisoned they are, the better the summoned unit.

Kind of boring, to be honest. I'm not sure I see anything special about this hero now that the um, trappings, are gone.

Trappings?

Hmm, second-skill isn't liked. Fourth skill isn't liked. Specifics of first skill isn't liked.

Not a problem. Not at all. Those are all easy changes.

More specifics as to why you dislike the fourth skill, though? What makes it boring? Is the concept ok, but there is something you don't like?

Also, just how bad are the numbers of the first skill? Do you dislike how many buff levels there are, only? Or do you also dislike how the buff is applied and removed?

Tempest wrote:More specifics as to why you dislike the fourth skill, though? What makes it boring? Is the concept ok, but there is something you don't like?

Well, summons you can't control are just a bit...well...they're creeps. Let's put it that way. Your spell makes more creeps. I want a spell I control, not a spell that controls me.

Also, just how bad are the numbers of the first skill? Do you dislike how many buff levels there are, only? Or do you also dislike how the buff is applied and removed?

Both. It's needlessly complicated. If you keep the method of how the buff is added and removed, you'd need to make sure it fit with a drastically reduced number of buff levels, or you could literally just make the whole ability much simpler.

Yes, yes.

I can definitely see your point. Now that it's been a time since I visited this hero, I am definitely wary of just how many levels there are for the aura. >_>

Expect the hero to be modified quite a bit XD.