Combat options

[AyeKantSpel]

I was wondering which would make a 'survival' type map more fun to play, I began to toy with the ideas of heroes each having their own play style, but I'm not sure which I want to implement, I would like to keep a heavily team based gameplay so that each hero can augment the weak points of another, ensuring that not everyone can pick the same hero and then just go curb stomp the enemies as they come.

Defender: Front line hero, main goal is to meet the enemies first and soak most of the damage, play style is to be similar to that of unholy invasion, A to attack, D to defend, when defend is active it reduces the damage taken greatly, I want to emphasie on being able to use stun abilities with him to bridge the gap between the end of the duration of defend and the cooldown.

Sharpshooter: Just the standard point and click dps type hero, provides long ranged damage.

Priest: Support class, has a few healing abilties but can also dish out damage, another standard point and click.

Sorceress: I plan to make this class flashy and full of no target spells but rather require an aiming to abilties, so they either go in a line and hit the first target or are no target aoes that damage enemies around the caster.

Those are my ideas thus far, I would like imput on what to change about the heroes, I'm open to any discussion you might have, thanks!

 

[Chizume]

You could check out my upcoming reworked classes for my map Classic Survival. May give you some ideas or inspiration.

 

[Maldruzard]

Some champion ideas:

Some sort of stealthy character that has high mobility, and can move in and out of the fight dealing huge damage, but has very low defences and is very squishy. Some sort of shadowy blink spell, or shadowstep to appear behind enemies, and one or two spells that stealth the hero. Maybe some passive evasion? Also possible, traps and other things to help set ambushs or weaken hard mobs?

A beast-based class that can summon different animals (only one at a time). Each animal provides passive buffs to the team and has a different attack/combat style: e.g: A bear that is tanky, does little damage, and provides the team with a passive +hp% buff; a wolf that has medium health and medium damage that give a crit strike% buff; a stag that passively heals other members of the team as well as giving a weak regen buff? This guy would go more towards team based combat than the other, I spose.

 

[TheWhiteWolf]

I didn't quite get if you're making a modern or medieval survival. However, here is some piece of advice:
MODERN - do not make completely specified classes; let the player optimize the class using inventory and stats (suppose this is the easiest and the most efficient way), and give each class a couple of active and passive skills. For example:
1.Guerrilla:
Sneak - slows movement speed and becomes invisible
Trap - set up a trap which will slow and damage enemy
Jungleman [passive] - increases movement speed based on terrain (etc. 10% on grass, 20% in water and 30% while in forest)

2.Riot
Gas bomb - slows enemies in an area and gives them a chance to miss
Group Unit - increases damage and defense for every Riot nearby
Shieldman - increases defense gained when having a shield equipped and increases melee damage

and so on...

MEDIEVAL - to be honest, I'm fed up with the general Tank-DPS-Healer system; it exist in every RPG, survival, MMO and most of other types of games. Here is some idea what can you make instead:

1.Beastmaster - has three different auras, but can have only one active at a time; summons various animals to aid him in battle (and I don't mean Summon Bear, Summon Quillboar, Summon Hawk....no, use your imagination to make something like: Crow Flock - summons a flock of angry crows to deal damage in a wave; every enemy hit in a wave will have some crows stuck on him; they will deal periodical damage, and each time they deal damage, they will have a chance to make opponent miss all attacks for 2 seconds - EYEPOPPING!!!)

2.Wasplord - very fragile, has low health, but has some evading abilities (no, not the ordinary Evasion - make an ability that can be turned on and off, and when it's on, it reduces your movement speed, but greatly increases evasion chance) and uses Locusts to attack (again, not the ordinary one, but instead, some spells with various areas of effect - linear, area, area around caster - with DPS as primary effect, and secondary effects such as: lifesteal, decrease armor, slow...)

and so on...
[HIDDEN='Oh yeah and...]

[/HIDDEN]

 

[AyeKantSpel]

Potato powered inspiration,

So MaTiJa97, a hero like this is what you're more so looking for instead of a standard class?

Planeswalker

A traveler of realms, a planeswalker can shift in and out of existence as well as shift to another plane and enhance his capabilties depending on the plane of existence in which he has shifted to.

Ethereal shift: Shifts into the spirit world, becoming almost untouchable by physical attacks but has a very high vulnerability to spells. (This ability does not change)

Astral shift: Shifts the spirit of the planeswalker to another realm of existence, changing his abilities to fit that realm. (Fire, Water, Light, Darkness, Earth, Air, whatever, etc)

Insert handful of abilities that have various effects depending on the current state of astral shift.

 

[TheWhiteWolf]

Good thinking I have some ideas for Astral Shift:
Channeled for up to 3 seconds. It lasts [4x (channeled time)] seconds. It randomly picks one realm and takes you to it. You take no damage while casting it, but when you stop channeling, you get half of damage you should have received (you get attacked 3 times by a unit with 10 damage, and instead of taking 30 damage, you get 15 damage when you stop channeling). Depending on the realm, you get one passive and one active ability (for example: Water - passive chance to evade and slow the attacker, and active wave that slows enemies, deals some damage and has a chance to stun them; Fire - passive which casts a damage-per-second ability to melee attackers and active which deals AoE damage and dps; Wind - passive which knockbacks and slows melee attackers and gives a chance to avoid ranged attacks and active which makes a whirlwind which spins enemies around, does dps and knockback them; etc.)

 

[AyeKantSpel]

Good idea, also here's another hero I unearthed, well an idea that was on my computer in text anyway.

Naturalist

Naturalist:
Agility Hero:
Passive: Avatar of Nature: Based on weather effects
- Rain: Regeneration: regenerates 1% health and mana every 4 seconds(light) 2% every 3.5 (heavy)
- Wind: Crosswinds: Evasion chance is increased by 7% (light) 14% (heavy)
- Fog: Blurred: Invisibility (faster fade time in heavy)
- Sun: Intensity: 8% chance to set the target on fire and burn it over 5 seconds
- Moon: Ferocity: 21% chance to steal life
- Snow: Frozen: Chance to cause frost nova on attack 6% (light) 12% (Heavy) 18% blizzard, 37% increased damage (heavy) 92% increased damage (blizzard)
- Clear: Clarity: 12% chance to critcal strike 1.75x
- Flux: Attacks have a high chance to create a magical explosion at the target, causing damage to it and all it's allies.
Nature's Gift:
- Clear: Blossom: Heals an area
- Rain: Cleansing Waters: Heals the target over 9 seconds (heal is 41% stronger in heavy)
- Sun: Regrowth: Heals target for initial heal then additional health over 6 seconds
- Fog: Shroud: Evasion Buff (creates a spreading debuff in heavy)
- Wind: Gustushes all enemies back from the target unit (deals light damage in heavy)
- Moon: Serenity: Puts the target to sleep and makes it invulerable for 5 seconds, giving it a large heal over time for 5 seconds.
- Snow: Frostguard: Creates a frost shield that adds bonus armor and slows attacking enemies, in heavy snow there is a chance to shoot off an ice shard when attacked, in blizzard there is a chance to shoot off a frost orb in a random direction when attacked and also explodes upon the end of the duration
- Flux: Creates a spell shield on the target which absorbs damage.
Focused Strike:
- Clear: Lethality: Attack with deadly precision and force, dealing massive damage
- Rain: Deluge: Soak the target with a watery attack, slowing it, the damage and effect are greater in heavy rain
- Sun: Sun Strike: Ignite the target with a heavy blast of fire damage, followed by moderate damage over 7 seconds
- Fog: Strangulate: Suffocates the target 12 seconds, dealing light damage that increases each interval with an increasing slow, heavy fog has a much greater effect
- Wind: Force Blast: Strike a target with a high powered burst of wind, knocking it back and damaging, knock back and damage are greater in heavy wind
- Moon: Darkness: Binds the target to the location damaging it over 8 seconds
- Snow: Frost Nova
- Flux: Creates an implosion effect on the target
Shift: Changes the weather
At later levels; has a chance to cause "flux" which changes the weather to dalaran shield, unlocking a special for all abilities.
Natural Protection:
- Clear: Provides damage return
- Rain: High chance to reduce damage incoming
- Sun: Provides an immolation effect
- Fog: Provides a bash effect
- Wind: Provides a knock back
- Moon: Provides an illusion on damaged effect
- Flux: When attacked or attacking has a chance to create a random magical explosion nearby
- Snow: Frost Aura
Metamorphosis: Transform into a very powerful being for a short time (30 s)
- Wind: Turn into a storm wyrm with a chained lightning attack and spikes
- Rain: Turns into a Sea Giant with thick carpace and a summon prawn ability
- Sun: Turns into a powerful phoenix with the burn and rebirth abilities
- Fog: Turns into a hydra with a powerful toxic attack and regeneration capabilites
- Clear: Turns into a spectral wolf with invisibilty and critical strike
- Moon: Turns into an owlkin with a savage cleaving attack and howl of terror
- Snow: Turns into an ice revanant with a slow aura and a frost nova
- Flux: Turns into a powerful war golem with damage reduction, stomp, slam and magic resistance

 

[TheWhiteWolf]

Bro, that is an great idea. Really. Although it will require a lot of work, it will probably serve as an jack-of-all tools class, for solo playing. You could also use weather to change the Planewalker's abilities. In a combination with a weather system, this could be awesome.

 

[AyeKantSpel]

Having the weather effect the potency of abilities or having the weather influence the astral shift?

 

[TheWhiteWolf]

Having the weather influence the Astral Shift. For example: Rain-Water, Wind-Air, Sun-Fire, Night-Darkness, Clear-Holy, Snow-Ice, etc.

 

[cleavinghammer]

An idea for an geomancer-type hero, that uses the terrain type instead of the weather:

Earthchanter

* Earth-mother's Guidance (Passive): The Earth Mother bestows her blessings in many forms, no matter where her servant may be. Different terrains cause different effects.
Rock: Increased armor, increase power of Wrath of the Mountain
Grass: Increased health regeneration
Marsh: Increased mana regeneration, increases power of Marshlights
Desert: Increased attack, increases power of Quicksand
Dirt: Increased movement speed, increases power of Earthworks
Forest: Evasion chance
Snow: Cold attack
Lava: Incinerate attack
Vines: Enemies are slowed
Manmade terrain (tiles, paved roads etc): Decreased movement speed, lowers all stats
Blight: Lowers all stats, health and mana regeneration are halved.

* Fertile Feet (Active): The Earthchanter commands the earth to change to suit his needs.
Changes the terrain in a small area at the caster's feet into one of his choosing. Leveling lowers manacost and cooldown. Manmade tiles and Blight not available.

* Marsh Lights (Active): The spirits of the bogs, swamps and marshes come to the Earthchnater's aid.
Numerous will-o-wisps fly around the caster, draining mana from all enemies. Units without mana are hit with numerous negative buffs.

* Wrath of the Mountain (Active): The Mountain does not forgive trespassers easily.
Hurls a boulder at a single target, doing great damage and stunning it. Units a short distance from the target take damage from the shrapnel.

* Earthworks (Active, Summon): The Earth Mother rises up to protect her champion.
The Earthchanter summons two great earthen walls to halt his enemies' progress. Summons two walls at the target location. (Both walls are at a +/- 45 degree angle relative to the caster's facing and some distance apart, allowing to funnel the enemy for more effective destruction)

* Quicksand (Ultimate, Channel) : The earth beneath the Earthchanter's foes becomes liquid, trapping or drowning them.
All enemies in a large AoE have movement speed reduced to 0, with a small chance of drowning (their corpse only floats up and becomes useable when the spell is done).

Of course, you'd need a boss that can change the terrain type/create blight.

 

[Sin'dorei300]

Moon Priestess


Moon's Blessing - passive
While is night, the moon priestess has increased mp\hp regeneration by x%, increased attack speed by x% and her spell effects are stronger.

Moonlight Bolt - unit target
Throws a bolt of blinding moonlight at a target unit, dealing x damage and making target to have x% chance to miss attacks over x seconds.


Lunar Shield - no target
Creates a shield of lunar energy around the moon priestess, descreasing neabry enemies armor by x and giving them a x% chance to miss attacks. Also, gives a x% chance to priestess to reflect magical\chaos attacks. Lasts x seconds.


Falling Stars - no target
When activated, drains x mp per sec but calls a falling star each x seconds that falls upon the neabriest enemy and deals x damage. Drains mana until deactivated.


[Ultimate]Solar Eclipse - no target
The moon priestess creates a solar eclipse, turning time on night and inceasing hp\mp regen by x%, slowing neabry enemies by x% and increasing attack speed by x% temporary each time priestess attacks. Lasts x seconds.

 

[TheWhiteWolf]

Guys, this is great. I really like the idea of having heroes with a wide range of abilities that will depend on the environment. Keep up the good ideas

 

[cleavinghammer]

And a weather change hero.

The Celestial Mage belongs to a reclusive mountain order, where they learn to to become one with the people of the sky. A mage leaves the earth on completing his apprenticeship, never to touch it again, indeed, its very contact causes him pain. The very elements are theirs to command even from the heavens, and a mage versed in the four schools is a fearsome foe indeed.

Short ranged flying caster. Whenever brought to the ground (Ensnare, Web...) takes 10 damage per second. Takes extra damage from Piercing attacks.

Control Weather:
Solstice: Changes time to noon. Increases power of Sunfire spells, decreases Moonwater spells.
Deluge: Changes time to midnight. Increases the power of Moonwater spells, decreases Sunfire spells.
Black Winds, Howl!: Increases the power of Skyreader spells, decreases Stormfury spells.
Rolling Thunder: Increases the power of Stormfury spells, decreases Skyreader spells.

Cloudstuff: Increases chance of evading an attack by becoming as matterless as the fog.

Sunfire spells
Rain of Fire
Summon Efreet (Infernal, changing the missile to a RoF meteor and making the Infernal bright red)

Moonwater spells
Blizzard
Tranquility

Skyreader spells
Starfall
Tornado (the Celestial Mage turns into a mighty twister, with a cyclone aura that hurls enemies skywards and increased attack speed. However, he is also far more vulnerable to magic.)

Stormfury Spells
Monsoon
Lightning Shield Bounces on multiple allies, giving them the Lightning Shield buff. At higher levels, the shield harm only enemies.)

(Yes, these are almost all standard spells, but even they have their use)

 

[coolyoshi1]

Theres already amillion hero survival maps out there so if u wanna make a survival map more fun to play i think u should try to make some unique heroes like other ppl suggested

Shapeshifter: This guy would not be a hero but a normal unit.

Abilities:
Morph - Morphs the hero into a random unit for 30 seconds. (units could have their own abilities and stats, so some units might be stronger than others) The strength of the random unit depends on the level of the shapeshifter. (Although the shapeshifter isnt a hero, you can use triggers to make a level for him as a unit)

Shapeshift (ultimate) - Shapeshifts the unit into animal form. Mana is drained while in animal form until the mana is depleted. The type of animal depends on the level of the ability. ex:
Level 1 - Shapeshifts into a sheep. +movespeed, +Sprint ability
Level 2 - Shapeshiefts into a wolf. +attack speed, +movespeed, +Leap Ability
Level 3 - Shapeshifts into a bear. +Lots of HP, +damage, -movespeed
Level 4 - Shapeshifts into a wilderbeast. +HP,+dmg,+movespeed,+attspeed,+Rage ability
Level 5 - Shapeshifts into a quillboar. +range
Level 6 - etc..

Upgrade - Opens up a spellbook which contains upgrades for the unit. When the unit levels up, it can pick 1 upgrade. Upgrades could be bonus HP, bonus DMG, increases level of other abilities, etc

Mercenary: This guy would be just a normal villager guy

Abilities:
Weapon Master (Passive) - Allows to hero to gain abilities from the items in his inventory (not all the abilities have to be different. if you have lots of items in your map you can have 1 ability for multiple items)
So if he purchased a claws of attack item, you could make a trigger that detects this and add ability critical strike or something to the unit. if claws of attack is sold then ability is removed.
EX: (Just made up some items here)
Claws of attack - +critical strike
Death blade - +death coil spell that deals dmg based on INT
Boots of speed - +Sprint spell
Iron Shield - +passive deflect ability
Bow - +500 attack range, -25% attack speed, -750 HP, -10 strength
Mithril Sword - +Slash spell
Wand of the wind(cyclone) - +tornado spell that deals dmg based on INT (+2 spells from 1 item!)

Intelligence (Passive)
Gives bonus intelligence to the hero

Strength (Passive)
Gives bonus strength to the hero (would work well with tanky/offence items)

Agility (Passive)
Gives bonus agility to the hero (would work well with offence/bow items)

 

[Dr Super Good]

Front line hero, main goal is to meet the enemies first and soak most of the damage, play style is to be similar to that of unholy invasion, A to attack, D to defend, when defend is active it reduces the damage taken greatly

Defender cannot use such mechanics as latency makes it difficult to time properly.

A good idea instead would be a sort of alternative damage reflect system like a counter attack system. The more damage a defender takes, the stronger his attacks become. The more damage the defender deals out, the weaker his attacks become. Thus the defender becomes a power house when taking lots of damage but is very poor when not taking damage. An Innate ability to taunt would be advisable.

To compliment this you could have a variety of defensive skill. A skill called "Solid Gaurd" could greatly improve the armor and magic resistance of the Defender at the cost of lowering the effectivness of his counter attack system so he will not gain damage as effecctivly and reducing his movement speed. Toggle time would mean care is taken when using this skill. Skill leves will reduce negative effects as well as improve positive.

"Offensive Defense" could be used when the player wants to attack. It grants a movement speed bonus and improves the rate at which damage increases from taking damage as well as providing a continious stream of damage increase. Attacks also have a high chance to curse enemy damage by a large quantity for a long duration. Enemies around the Defender also have reduced movement speed. It comes at the cost of greatly lowering the armor and magic resistance of the defender. It cannot be active at the same time as Solid Defense. Levels decrease negative and increase positive.

A passive "Final Cover" could rush to the aid of allies that receive near fatal damage rehealing them slightly and protecting them for a few seconds by diverting all damage they take to the Defender at an increased rate. Effect can only trigger once every 30 seconds. If the Defender himself or another defender receives near fatal damage, all enimies the involved Defender are stunned for a long time and he is given a huge bonus to armor and magic reduction. Near fatal could be 5-10% life and all damage on the blow that reduces below this definiton is mitigated.

In addition to skills like these, he could be given a team synergy of adding additional armor and magic resistances. The lore behind this would be he allows for superiour defensive formations allowing the team to take less damage as a whole. Such a bonus would stack if more than 1 defender is present but be reduced in effectivness (diminishing returns).

Priest: Support class, has a few healing abilties but can also dish out damage, another standard point and click.

Could be made much more interesting. The priest involves around good and evil. Attacking generates evil and so does using evil skills. Healing allies (with innate heal ability) generates good as well as using good skills. The trick here is to ballance healing with offense as if you become too evil or two good you will weakon the entire team. If you are very Evil all enemy monsters will receive a damage buff to punish you for your sins. If you are very Good all allies receive a damage nerf due to increased pacifisim that comes with being Good. That said your skills only reach full power whenyou are at the extreems of either side. An ability would toggle between Sin abilites and Repent abilities. All repent abilities will be defensive such as summoning a guadian spirit to take damage (but deal only enough to get agro), buffing ally armor and magic resistance or weakoning enemies to deal less damage to allies. All sin abilites deal huge damage to enemies or boost ally offensive power or summoning undead monsters / demons that can not be hurt but deal high damage for a period. A damaging sin ability could also perform reduced friendly fire but in doing so give a good offensive buff. At maximum Good your skills become very powerful at improving survival adding huge armors, reheals, long stuns or almost removing enemy damage. At maximum evil your skills will greatly increase ally damage and deal huge damage to enemies and almost no damage to allies.

Priests effects would stack and not cancel out so having 2 evil priests will give enemies a huge boost in damage and mixing evil and good priests will both lower your damage and buff enemy damage in normal quantities.

Play style would be to remain around the neutral point generally unless the team wants to focuse on a specifc play style in which case you can go one side. Going one side will give you a huge boost in power at a huge cost, the reductions would not be small if good (like 25% damage) and the boost large if Evil (like 33% more damage). As a joke you could change the priests looks as he changes side looking bright with holy lights around him when good and dark with fowl magic around him when Evil.

 

[TheWhiteWolf]

Shapeshifter would be better if he would have differing forms based on weather or current ground.

Merecenary is quite a good idea, I'm actually using something similar to it.

 

[cleavinghammer]

Environment shapeshifter is go:

Forest: Wolf (movement and attack speed)
Snow: Polar Bear (HP, damage)
Desert: Quilbeast (attack speed)
Grass: Horse (speed)
Marsh: Snake (poison attack, amphibious)
Rock: Mountain Giant (HP, damage)

Weather:

Storm: Storm Crow (Chain Lightning)
Blizzard: Snowy Owl (Evasion)
Night: Hippogryph (True Sight)
Day: Eagle (True Sight)
Wind: Owl Scout (Speed)
Fog: Albatross (Phase Shift)

 

[Jolly_jumper]

wow guys, i'm overwhelmed by your creativity here, hero spells that change depending on the weather and ground beneath is something i've never seen before!
I feel this would make the game fun to play again and again and again, cause it would probably take alot of practice getting good with those heroes.
But it would be important that the terrain, weather effects and creep spawns aren't the same every time you play, or else playing with those heroes could easily become just like following a recipe which would be very boring after a few games.

After i read ur OP i was thinking of just suggesting something like a Paladin type of hero which would be able to assist the warrior in the front line with damage link, +HP/sec aura with a very short range, invulnerability(which would cancel damage link ofcourse) and AOE stun.
But this sounds so boring after reading the other suggestions hehe^^