New Design for Voltron? Now also Syph and Luci

[Remixer]

Edited post:
Added the description image and image of the new items.
Second Edit:
Added Noxious design.
Third Edit:
Added Lucidious.

[Burn]

1) You can only view that link once you've logged into hiveworkshop, and I can't comment on your pastebin.

2) Needs screenshots to spice up the post.

3) Also, better tooltips.

4) Less words, more stats. Besides that, good post.


E.G.

Spoiler!

############################

Shock



Passive: Slows enemies and boosts Voltron's move speed.

Enemy slow: 30%
Enemy slow duration: 2

Voltron speed increase: 10%
Voltron speed duration: 2

########################

More examples: http://www.dota2.com/hero/Spirit_Breaker/

(Note, the green descriptions in DotA2 ability descriptions are only shown when alt is pressed to reduce tooltip clutter)

-Burn

[Remixer]

Yes, I just wrote that pretty fast - of course some stats are subject to change, and indeed in Warcraft 3 of course have different format than in Hive workshop. I did not realize that you cannot see my pastebin, well let me take more images....

Edit: Now the entire pastebin should be covered with images =)

[Burn]

Yes, I just wrote that pretty fast - of course some stats are subject to change, and indeed in Warcraft 3 of course have different format than in Hive workshop. I did not realize that you cannot see my pastebin, well let me take more images....

Edit: Now the entire pastebin should be covered with images =)

I can view your patsebin, I just have to log in to do it. I can't comment on it, however.

Also, it seems you have removed your link from the first post.

-Burn

[Remixer]

Yes, I just wrote that pretty fast - of course some stats are subject to change, and indeed in Warcraft 3 of course have different format than in Hive workshop. I did not realize that you cannot see my pastebin, well let me take more images....

Edit: Now the entire pastebin should be covered with images =)

I can view your patsebin, I just have to log in to do it. I can't comment on it, however.

Also, it seems you have removed your link from the first post.

-Burn

Yes I removed it as it had no point being there - entire pastebin is visible more clearly in images. Also, you cannot comment on pastebins, just view them (and download attached files).

[Neco]

It would be good to change Voltron, I'll keep an eye on this thread.

[Remixer]

Good to hear you agree, Neco. What is your / others' opinion on boosting abilities via items? Also, off topic, but Neco, I asked in the terrain section if it would be possible to get the newest version of the used terrain? We all know that for example top-mid needs fix, but at the moment public has no tools to play around with it.

[Neco]

The current ability system supports boosting abilities from items, and it's something I've been thinking about for a long time. My idea was more along the lines of a single item (your Ankh?) that you upgrade in a special shop that boosts abilities. I'm sure there are issues with that idea though.

I'll look into the terrain thing soon, still working on separating out various aspects of the map into readable formats which when complete will allow for an up-to-date download of the map's terrain.

[Remixer]

Added Noxious, new design for Sypherious below the Voltron's one.

[Lynx]

I find uniqueness to be in the content of the abilities not in the visuals.

Lucidious and Sypherious are within current limitations unique, even though I'd like to see some ability changes and some changes that changes at what level you can choose an ability.

Spoiler!

(limitations being that every titan has nuke123(1,3,5) heal123(1,3,5) scout1(1) escape1(1) unique12(5,8) slow1 ultimate1(12))

The titans that should be re-worked in my opinion, because of their current shit-tier status are: Bubonicus, Voltron, Glacious, Terminus, Breezerious, Fossurious.

Lucidious, Demonicus Moltenious, Sypherious are inherently superior to the other titans because chain healing and chain nuking is extremely better than any of the other nuke or heal variant. Especially when they deal similar damage. A way to balance this would be to tweak values between them, or preferably brainstorm other creative ideas to replace the standard ones, for example instead of Terminus' invisible healing ward he builds a healing tree which can be attacked with towers and heals rapidly.

[Remixer]

I find uniqueness to be in the content of the abilities not in the visuals.

Lucidious and Sypherious are within current limitations unique, even though I'd like to see some ability changes and some changes that changes at what level you can choose an ability.

Spoiler!

(limitations being that every titan has nuke123(1,3,5) heal123(1,3,5) scout1(1) escape1(1) unique12(5,8) slow1 ultimate1(12))

The titans that should be re-worked in my opinion, because of their current shit-tier status are: Bubonicus, Voltron, Glacious, Terminus, Breezerious, Fossurious.

Lucidious, Demonicus Moltenious, Sypherious are inherently superior to the other titans because chain healing and chain nuking is extremely better than any of the other nuke or heal variant. Especially when they deal similar damage. A way to balance this would be to tweak values between them, or preferably brainstorm other creative ideas to replace the standard ones, for example instead of Terminus' invisible healing ward he builds a healing tree which can be attacked with towers and heals rapidly.

Yes, well of course, it's not about the visuals but lets be honest here, there is no reason for having Syph and Luci as different titans. Syph's only unique thing is the water elemental summoning thing, pretty much without that he's not-special. Then again Luci has nothing special, absolutely nothing, even his unique is lame as can be "chance to do extra damage on hit - to buildings".

My intentions were to revamp one of these titans, but I figured out that I'd hit two flies with one hit. Or even more - as things made more sense in the way that I revamped them. (Honestly I found Noxious kit unbelievably interesting (same with Volt kit)). Then again, Syph kit was one of the most working there was (having strong AoE heal, summons and long ww + good minion synergy), sadly, that needs to be with every titan (good kit). Lucidious on the other hand was (at least I feel so) very similar to Moltenious in a way: very average titan in every way, without any real con or superior pro, standard bouncing nuke and heal, long ww - VERY standard, and I think there should be maybe one titan to fit that spot, if any.

The ability level restrictions have good and bad sides. It creates more standard lines the game follow, then again, it would increase uniqueness if they were removed. For example I'd prefer if there was 2 levels for ulti as well, but some of the current ultimates just wont fit that style.

It's sad but true that Titans are very unbalanced as they are right now. I think that is for a few reasons: a) They are all very similar and thus, if one is slightly better statistically it is better than the others and b) Some of the kits and abilities have literally no counter-play or it is very inefficient. You named one example: Terminus' heal.

The problem with Terminus heal is that it either a) gets countered (hello rad hunter) and is plain useless, or b) does not get countered and is op as fuck. Same problem exists with for example, Moltenious Phoenix, Moltenious Ultimate, Syph summons and some game mechanics that shouldn't ever exist (for example Luci Ult + Ethereal Mirror).

Then again, we have some kits and abilities that are way too easy to counter as they have no other purpose or the counter-play is way too easy. Such abilities or kits are: Voltron ultimate (his kits supports nothing else of it but actually blinking INSIDE a base), Demonicus ultimate (lets be honest here, his ultimate has one purpose and one purpose only - keep him perma invis, and sadly there is simple way to counter his "glorious ultimate" - Gnoll Tracker.

My opinion is that healthy gameplay can only be achieved as long as both sides have counter-play up to a certain point. The kits I created do have that and if I'd continue further I'd increase it. But lets keep this thing on-topic for now and lets not go there.

[Lynx]

I agree that the Titans are too similar. I've discussed this here.

I feel as though titan should have an ability to destroy buildings from a far. Such as Sypherious' water minions. I believe a large factor as why games are volatile (either hard wins or hard losses for builders) is because the titan wins if he acquires an early minion and loses if he doesn't. I believe titan should have an increased chance of winning if he acquires an early minion but he shouldn't lose if he fails. Something inbetween of being a minion and a not being a minion should be added. I'm brainstorming here but it could be something like a global nuke that only hits walls, a mercenary available to be trained in mound etcetcetc.

In my opinion every titan should be remade to be more flavourful. This should be a community effort, similar to the top mid competition. Example:

Week 1: Vote for the titan that should be remade with options being: All titans currently available, breezerious, fossurious, new titan, no titan needs a rework
Week 2: Everyone interested creates a titan concept and submits it.
Week 3: Vote for competition entries
Week 4: Balance topic of winning concept is created to help Neco balance
Week 5: Implement
Week 6: Repeat until the vote "no titan needs a rework" wins.

Obviously @Neco and the community would have to support this.

[Haunt]

As much as I like that idea Lynx, I don't think it's going to work. The community is too small, and players would get bored after a while.

[Lynx]

Bored of what? Reading? Creating concepts?
Concepts will definitely come, the option to vote for the current titan will obviously remain.
People will most likely make their concepts easy to read so people read and vote for them.

Voting seems to be active enough.
viewtopic.php?f=244&t=86964
viewtopic.php?f=166&t=93484

[Remixer]

Personally I don't think it's such a great idea to make large polls about Titans etc. to rework. As a mapper myself I know how frustrating it is to re-create something over and over again, so we need a plan that we can strictly stick to, and thus we can't vote for completely different Titan ideas and maybe even re-re-revamp them.

But indeed the map currently lacks something win/defeat -connected, since most of the games are, like Lynx said, hard wins or hard loses. And sadly, almost every single game is either a) Builders over running Titan at mound or b) Titan just suiciding at a base after trying a while or in case titan starts to win c) He crushes the weakest base first and then continues snowballing and sadly, there is nothing Titan can do about it.

Maybe we could implement some kind of "End Game Call" structure for the builders, meaning that each of these buildings started a timer, which on reaching 0 would win the game for the builders. This would cause a couple of things a) Titan actually needs to go for the basers, as he can't just farm on walls or waste time on weak bases so that he can surely kill the superb base b) Titan would take risks - and die to those risks. The current situation sadly is that Titan has NO reason to take any unnecessary risk, as he can basically stall the game forever and wait till builders make a mistake.

So in order to make it actually work the following conditions would be required:
a) Building "End Game Call" requires high amount of resources so that builders will only do it if they are sure their base can hold the Titan.
b) Build time of "End Game Call" is long, for example 5 minutes, preventing the builder from gaining more power while building it and also, preventing builder from building it quickly.
c) When construction of "End Game Call" starts Titan gets a ping warning on the map and the building is revealed for him, so he knows it's getting started.
d) The formula which creates the timer should take following things in consideration: amount of builders, amount of minions, titan's level and so on... Not sure if this is necessary.

Basically building a End Game Call would require a base that can hold the titan for for example 15 or 25 minutes (long enough time to be fair for the titan but short enough to prevent titan from farming and snowballing off the weak bases first).