[Hero Feedback] Lich

[Softmints]

At this point in RoW's history, some heroes are close to finished, while others have barely started. For those closer-to-finished heroes, I'd like to gather some opinions so I have an idea of what to work on for their final polish. Here's my current stance on Lich:

• Dark Ritual: For a global gift of mana, I rarely see this being used. Should it give more mana? Scale better with levels? Target something other than allied troops?
• Triumvirate: Strong nukes early, but do they fall off late game?
• Necroward Shield: The Necrosis debuff seems all but ignored. Is distributing onto enemies too annoying? Would a shield that helps allies more be welcome?
• The Black Rot: I like this, though it doesn't get used with allies much. I think Walter said it interrupted the hero's flow before, but I also like that the spell can be interrupted.
• Enshrine: Rarely used due to uncoordinated teams. Good potential though.

[Walter]

Black rot: It still breaks flow. I rarely ever see it used anymore since the change, and it rarely even hits when used. Most Lich players rely on triumvirate for damage. Lich used to have a sort of tempo to him with using his abilities then using black rot, all the while throwing out normal attacks. The "interruptability" only really serves to make this ability annoying to cast and ultimately not at all useful or worth the risk in situations where it used to be. You might be lucky to see it deal damage maybe 3 times in a full game.

Dunno what you mean by "use with allies." You mean using an ally's inflicted conditions for the damage?

Triumvirate: I find it strange that this ability doesn't deal sharp damage (Wouldn't really want it to either). One of the few abilities that can still push without being mostly a waste before the late game. Makes the Lich a very strong laner. 

Dark Ritual: It's fine, though it'd be easier to use in a global context if we had the luxury of having a GUI that showed allied mana. Oh well, engine limitations etc...

Necroward: Well, when I play Lich I factor its status ailment in. Especially since it's so visible on enemy heroes. For the ability itself, kind of dull and klunky to use since it hits targets in an AoE. I feel like it could do more interesting things, like dropping the target style and having it only shield damage when the target is below a certain amount of health (Threshold could even be stat based), maybe even at 1 life. As it is now it kind of makes laning against Lich feel like going through shield after shield, especially worse with voids nearby to heal any real damage taken. When playing Lich, using it on allies is really just a hassle with how erratic movement their can get and the targeting required.

Enshrine: More of a stock ability that could go on any hero. The map's also not as big as it once was and with the sky cradles giving even more drop-in points for heroes to go to, it's not really a huge boon for a team to be able to create its own. Personally I think it should be dropped in favor of something else. It's just not that good of a reward with the coordination required when the map is this size and sky cradles are readily available.

[Softmints]

• Dark Ritual: Try using -h? I think voidmasochists/wells are probably too good at refunding mana in general; I wonder when's the last time I saw an Adelaster...
  
• Necroward Shield: I'll think about this some more.
• The Black Rot: I can remove the channelling, but I feel I would have to nerf something because Lich is already powerful. Suggestions?
• Enshrine: It could go on any hero, but Lich had an empty slot and was the best fit. Also it accelerates teleports and can be used with Lightning Rod, so I don't think it's without potential.

[Grumbletok]

Looking at Lich's abilities quickly in a single player just now (I don't play him normally myself), I think

Enshrine: Enshrine should cost way less mana. It's mostly a utility spell that is useless without other people also investing in it. I wouldn't place it above 50 mana. After all, what are you going to do with it unless you got an ally to jump in to you with it?
You could possibly add an additional effect on it, to motivate the high mana cost, like enemies within a certain radius loose % life while it's active or something like that. Maybe make it so that Lich will buff himself when he breaks it, if he channeled for enough time? Something like that.

Dark Ritual:  Well... I see it's purpose, but I don't see people use it that much. Probably because Masochists do the job better, without killing your own unit and forcing you to go close to units to pick something up? How about just letting it target either yourself or an ally on the map (globally), and if you target an ally, you give them some of your Mana. If you target yourself, you gain some mana back for each creep that dies nearby within a few seconds. Both friendly and allied, of course.

The Black Rot: Hrr... Well, I have seen it being used well, and it Is good when it does, but it might just be a bit to unwieldy. How about, if the target doesn't have any conditions, The Black Rot will inflict a/a few stacks of the Condition that Triumvirate is currently on?

Necroward Shield: I remember this ability being way to strong before, and I like it being watered down like this... However, if people feel it's a bit to unwieldy, you could always make it prioritize yourself, always giving you a larger chunk of shield than others.

Triumvirate: Currently one of the more interesting skillshots in the game, IMO. If Lich should get some changes, I think they should be focus around more synergy with Triumvirate, like my idea for The Black Rot.

[Dracula]

Honestly, I think Lich is in a pretty good place right now. Black Rot/Necro do feel somewhat unwieldy sometimes, but he's still got a pretty solid damage output even without consistently landing Black Rot, so I'm personally fine with that necessary sacrifice - the ability to essentially chase while using Black Rot was probably too good.

As for Enshrine, I guess I'll be the dissenting voice. The map (well, any game that tries to be balanced for "competitive" play, really) is balanced around skilled players/playstyles, not bad ones. Unfortunately, Enshrine won't do terribly much in a pub game for this reason - whereas most other spells in the game require only the caster to understand where the spell fits into the flow of battle, Enshrine requires the entire team to understand and coordinate. There's currently little incentive to use it right now if it's not used to the optimal level possible, which is understandable.

On the other hand, in an inhouse, I'd stake a non-negligible amount of money that Enshrine would probably be the strongest spell in the game. The ability to teleport your entire team right next to an enemy tower without their team being able to react quickly enough to meaningfully defend has dire implications for the Elves - even with two defenders, a tower will still melt to a five-person onslaught extremely quickly. The Elves will have little choice but to try to defend, because the five Legion players can simply continue to push in the lane if they don't come - five players will push in a single lane far, far more quickly than two or three players split across two lanes will push. This puts the Elves in a bad spot.
A: The Elves don't have Nexuses. They have to run all the way across the map and lose their current progress in lane.
B: The Elves have Nexuses...which probably won't count for much, because you really don't want to teleport to your tower when five enemy heroes will all be waiting with a nuke pointed at your exact point of entry into the area.
Best case scenario for the Elves, they incur a casualty or two and the tower takes moderate damage.
Worst case scenario, they lose an outer tower and probably get pushed all the way back to the inner tower, if not farther.
This can happen surprisingly early in the game, considering Enshrine is up at level 7. The fact that towers/troops do not follow the traditional aggro mechanics of most lane-pushing games makes this strategy absurdly strong.
Throw in an Ivory Band for everyone and it's pretty much uncounterable.

That being said, I'm pretty convinced the last thing Enshrine needs is a flat buff across the board. If it's going to be buffed, the buff needs to address the problem instead of going the way of Abraxxus where we just randomly tweak stats that aren't related to the problem.

The problem is, as I perceive it, that there's very little incentive to use Enshrine outside of inhouse or situational scenarios right now. In other words, Enshrine isn't really worth it when only one or two people (< half of your teammates) intend to teleport in. I can think of three possible buffs that address this, specifically:

A: Alter the teleport speed bonus, introducing a bias toward people who teleport to Rage earlier during his channeling than others.

Example: Instead of there being a flat 125%/150% bonus to teleport speed, the first person who issues a teleport order to Rage would teleport at 200% speed, the second would teleport at 175% speed, the third at 150%, and the fourth at 125%. This would make Enshrine a more viable option if Rage suspects a small teamfight is approaching, as reinforcements could be constantly arriving over the channel period to distract enemies, making it harder for them to interrupt Rage's channel. Even if only one or two allies come, they'd still get there pretty expediently.

(As Lightning Rod is an instant teleport and Enshrine buffs teleport speed, it might make sense to confer some alternative bonus to someone who teleports to Rage with a rod. Perhaps the rod doesn't expire or is transferred to Rage instead of expiring?)

B: During a given instance of Enshrine, the first ally to teleport to Rage receives a substantial buff (or gains an aura that debuffs nearby enemies). What this buff could be is highly open for debate - Rage himself could also gain a buff too if it seems appropriate/reasonable.

C: The first ally to teleport to Rage arrives instantly. Rage deals moderate damage to any enemies in a radius around both where said ally was standing and that ally's destination.

[Gahn]

Triumvirate - The minimum cast range for Triumvirate (Ice) is a little frustrating when dealing with melee heroes, but I understand why it's there. The ability is pretty awesome and mana hungry, but the Str scaling on fire & the Agi scaling on Poison does make them feel a little weak late game, considering that they have the same ratios as Ice.

Dark Ritual - Void Masochists do make the ability a bit unnecessary. What I find weird about the ability is that it targets only allied creeps, yet still has a cast delay and a targeting mechanism. It seems a bit unrequired considering that creeps have very predictable movement, and all it opens up is the possibility that you might hit a Tortured Soul instead of a Felhound.

Necroward Shield - It doesn't feel as if the enemy cast for Necroward shield is necessary anymore. The Removal of his old Black Rot Innate, the minimum cast range on Triumvirate and the fact that Necroward shield now has a set duration, means that his ability to deal with enemies who get up close is significantly less than it was before.

Black Rot - The cast time is what really kills this ability for me, along with the fact that it has no base damage. Hitting a target with only 1 debuff feels very lackluster, and the debuffs (aside from poison) donèt usually last long enough for it to be an effective sniping tool.

Enshrine - This ability feels a bit weird because it's one of those abilities that either falls flat or completely sets the pace of a game. What I dislike about it is that it absolutely requires gold expenditure on the part of your allies in order for it to be used, and that it has the ability to determine the flow of a game, in a manner similar to what Drac mentioned in his post above.
This ability seems as if it would either be absolutely broken in the hands of an organized team, because it would grant them mobility that the Elves would not be able to match, or absolutely worthless when playing with pubs. That seems to be a bit extreme in terms of ability potential, and I'd rather see an ability that isn't so hit-or-miss.
One possibility would be to make it teleport an allied player to Rage (with at least a channel duration on Rage's part), but that could lead to abuse cases because you're giving Rage the ability to pull allies from across the battlefield into possibly sticky situations, or away from potential kills

[Gahn]

A thought for Triumvirate(Ice):

What if the shockwave were changed so that it started from the edges and moved towards the cast location instead of the current form where it moves from the cast location outwards. This could allow for the removal of the minimum cast range, because it would no longer be a guaranteed hit.

[Walter]

Sept 23, 2013 18:11:49 GMT Gahn said:

A thought for Triumvirate(Ice):

What if the shockwave were changed so that it started from the edges and moved towards the cast location instead of the current form where it moves from the cast location outwards. This could allow for the removal of the minimum cast range, because it would no longer be a guaranteed hit.

I think the minimum cast range is a good thing. It gives Rage an exploitable weakness in melee. Also there'd be some abuse with casting it perpendicular to the intended target if the attack started out that far.

[Gahn]

I'm not sure I agree with you that the perpendicular casting would be an issue, but in the event that it were, damage from Triumvirate Ice could be changed so that it decreased the further away from the cast location the effected units found themselves, or you could even make it so that the ability dealt additional damage at the point where both shockwaves met. Either of those would reduce the impact of abuse cases by making them less optimal in terms of either damage and/or slow duration.

[Softmints]

Sept 18, 2013 18:36:30 GMT Dracula said:

Example: Instead of there being a flat 125%/150% bonus to teleport speed, the first person who issues a teleport order to Rage would teleport at 200% speed, the second would teleport at 175% speed, the third at 150%, and the fourth at 125%. This would make Enshrine a more viable option if Rage suspects a small teamfight is approaching, as reinforcements could be constantly arriving over the channel period to distract enemies, making it harder for them to interrupt Rage's channel. Even if only one or two allies come, they'd still get there pretty expediently.

Much as I wish I could design for a competitive environment, it's not gonna happen anytime soon. This seems like a good solution for now.

Sept 23, 2013 18:11:49 GMT Gahn said:

A thought for Triumvirate(Ice):

What if the shockwave were changed so that it started from the edges and moved towards the cast location instead of the current form where it moves from the cast location outwards. This could allow for the removal of the minimum cast range, because it would no longer be a guaranteed hit.

Well he's hardly going to hit anyone with Tri-ice in melee when you can see the two waves converging and have at least a second to move. The issue I see is that despite being a tricky shot, the first few blasts will be unavoidable if Rage is good enough. Maybe that won't be an issue in-game because they happen too far away for Rage to properly capitalise on the slow? Or maybe people will find it too difficult to land.

I will try this for a version and see if it works. It'll be interesting if nothing else.

Necroward Shield: Fundamentally this needs to do a different thing. First, distributing onto enemies isn't a good fit right now, so that might go. I'm thinking of having the shield do what mana shield does, and absorb x% of incoming damage. x can be determined by current life, so at max life x=25, below 25% life x=100. The Necrosis effect seems to be largely ignored (not by Lich but by elves) so I don't know whether to keep it. Will do some more thinking about this.

[alyssandra]

I don't like Rage's current setup because you can get by with just learning Trium, autoattacking, and leaving the rest of your skillpoints unused.

I would like to see a more balance of power within his skillset. I think a nice change would be sharp damage on Trium, with Black Rot being put back to an older variation (one that didn't "disrupt the flow")

Necro Shield is fine as is, although the debuff it has feels a bit unnecessary and tacked on. Between allied debuff potential and applying 3 debuffs himself, I feel necrosis is over the top.

I can't comment on his ultimate, as I have literally never seen it used once. Although looking at it, it does indeed have potential to be one of the best spells in the game if used with a coordinated team. We should schedule an IH this weekend or in the near future!

Dark Ritual just seems like a mediocre skill in terms of usefulness, and sometimes it's a skill you don't want to use if lanes are being pushed by Elves heavily.

[Softmints]

0.69p changes:

• Dark Ritual: Mana from 30%/40%/50%/60% to 30%/50%/70%/90%
• Triumvirate: Sharp damage, costs more mana at lower levels, Tri-ice now converges
• Necroward Shield: No longer applies Necrosis
• The Black Rot: No longer channelled
• Enshrine: Bonus teleport speed applies only to the first ally to teleport, bonus increased from 130%/150% to 140%/180%.

I still think Ritual and Necroward need work, but hopefully this revision of Lich will be more fun and dynamic to play.

@alyss: Pushing is a way to put pressure on Lich now, because he can't blast waves down with Triumvirate as easily, and relies more on Ritual. I don't know how it'll play out in practice.