Eldritch Tactical Solutions PMC Commander

[Sayuyu]

I wanted to design a character that's loosely inspired by DOTA 2's Broodmother and Bounty Hunter heroes, while making him fit in to the game's lore.

Short and sweet summary is that he's a Fairfax PMC commander who's personality is a bit like a mix of Full Metal Jacket's Drill Sergent and also CoD MW2's Captain Price - a dry and serious personality. He'd be seen followed around by his two strike unit members Griggs and Sheckley who would have more lighthearted jovial personalities similar to ones from a certain Episodic franchise.

I envision that him (and his boys) would make use of Fairfax weaponry designed by McGinnis, which was what helped design his abilities to somewhat resemble her's too. The 1 is a deployable "turret", the 2 is a healing thing with buffs, the 3 is another deployable that disrupts the enemy and blocks vision. The 4 is kind of a wildcard ability that's unique to him, just so he isn't a 1:1 copy of McGinnis.

All of his abilities synergize with each other to create his playstyle of targetting enemies and dropping his boys in suddenly to burst them down. He could probably also be built kinda supporty since his 2 scales with spirit and can be spammed.
I didn't put much thought in to the exact values of his stats, it's something that'd probably need playtested.

 

[Sayuyu]

More Details:

"The Commander"
Eldritch Tactical Solutions PMC Commander
Lore
Born in England, he made his name in the English army - however he was discharged for misconduct while deployed. Recognizing his talents, he was enlisted in Fairfax's PMC, Eldritch Tactical Solutions, and quickly climbed the ranks to become one of their top commanders. Most know him as Fairfax's attack dog, he is by all accounts a war criminal who operates with little morality. He isn't cruel, but he does not flinch at performing his duties.

Griggs and Sheckley are his top boys. Their jovial nature sometimes iritates him, but they are loyal to a fault.


Appearance
A somewhat intimidating military-esque man. He wears the ETS PMC uniform and combat armour. Styled to be somewhat tacticool but with the twist of Fairfax-esque technology. Everything on him was designed by McGinnis.
Griggs and Sheckley wear similar clothes with less armour, also having smaller frames so that there's little confusion as to who's in charge.
I imagine they'd all use some kind of standard issue Fairfax brand rifle. The Commander's being a heavy calibre fully automatic weapon, while Griggs and Sheckley are using lighter fully automatic weaponry.


Abilities

Slot 1 - Griggs and Sheckley
His BOYS!!!
A mirror to McGinnis' turrets, they'd likely use the standard bot AI. They can be set to follow around the Commander, or told to hold a spot (although maybe it'd be more like they travel to the nearest lane objective and hold position there - I imagine making them camp a spot in a lane to fight lane creeps would be kinda lam). On their own they likely aren't very smart, they probably won't be able to expertly track the Commander's position if he starts doing advanced movement tech, but I imagine they'll do fine following as well as they can. They'd definitely try their best to form ranks and hold position behind him.
Their role is to be his primary damage ability while offering him some tankiness. Taking one or both out should absolutely punish him, but also shouldn't be the easiest task in the world either.
They'd scale with gun damage, which makes sense to me. They use guns too after all. I'd thought about something like "what if they had weakened versions of The Commander's items?" but that might be too much. For now, just turrets.

Slot 2 - Combat Stim
Versatile tools that can heal and buff. Use them to engage, use them to escape, use them to keep Griggs and Sheckley healthy while you farm... I envision them to be kind of versatile enough to where playing support Commander would be potentially viable.
I've also thought about how to make Griggs and Sheckley interact with it. Would they use a copy of it on themselves whenever the Commander used it? Or should the Commander have to apply it to them himself (but significantly buffed since minions aren't quite as valuable as your allies).
Either way, building in to them would allow you to just rapidly inject someone with loads of drugs to make them perform stronger.

Slot 3 - Shock and Awe
This is an ability that would likely piss off a lot of people - just like McGinnis' wall! It doesn't linger around too long, but it'd just create a thick wall of smoke that just disrupts everyone. You can use it to try and escape, or you can use it to engage.
It has another feature in that it would immediately teleport Griggs and Sheckley to the smoke's location to seamlessly bring them in to combat. I imagine it'd be a good way to keep them wrangled just in case one of them gets stuck on a random corner somewhere across the map due to some AI jank. Specifically it'd only teleport them if they weren't set to hold position, and they're not actively engaged in combat.
Also, it'd take the form of a cool looking rocket launcher thing on his back. He'd whip it over his shoulder and go blam. It doesn't do damage on its own, although maybe adding some to a direct hit could make for some funny kills.
This is also what Broodmother inspired in his design. He creates a somewhat large area of safety where him and his minions can start attacking you from stealth. It's not perfectly safe though, there's plenty of AOEs that could be dropped in it.

Slot 4 - Designate Target
The ability that wraps his kit together, and is quite literally just Bounty Hunter's track that synergizes with the rest of The Commander's kit while remaining somewhat simple.
Griggs and Sheckley will focus target whoever is designated the second they're in range, including being able to pick them out through smoke.
I'm not sure how strong it would realistically have to be. I thought about something like "enemy takes +10% damage" or "gives souls to allies who help kill" - so I left it kinda simple. The idea is there, the balancing is something that would simply need to be playtested.

 

[Sayuyu]

Relationships

McGinnis
They're aware of each other, but don't have much history. A lot of their conversations would be surface level break room style small talk you'd expect between two employees from different company divisions that have just met each other for the first time. They would share some degree of camaraderie from being dubious morality high ranking officials in Fairfax Industries, but that's the extent of it.
I imagine if The Commander killed McGinnis, he'd probably make a comment like "It's a damn shame this was how it ended" or "The war's going to be very interesting now".

Pocket
In a humorous twist, The Commander would not recognize Pocket. Everyone else seems to know who they are, but in this case The Commander would likely see Pocket as havings the makings of a "fine young soldier"... except for when Commander kills Pocket, to which he'd say something like, "Another generation of failing living up to your father."

Maximilian Fairfax
His boss. He's loyal. Doesn't speak ill of him. However, I imagine there could be some intrigue in having him respect Maximilian's late father more. Possibly to the extent that, should the interaction ever arise to where he'd be fighting against Fairfax, he'd be in the ritual for the sake of resurrecting Maximilian's father.

Calico
They'd be curt and rude with each other. He'd refer to her as the failed assassin, and she'd refer to him as the Fairfax attack dog. I imagine they'd have something of a cat and dog rivalry to some extent.

Apollo (and any Ixians really)
Apollo would hold a strong one sided hatred for The Commander. Very much in a "one day you will answer for your crimes against my people" retorted with a "I don't even know who you are" kind of deal. I've also toyed with the idea of Griggs or Sheckley being an Ixian conscript, which could further create intrigue.

Doorman
While I don't think they'd have any significant interactions, Doorman would likely taunt him in the Baroness with a line like "The world would have been a far better place if you had just died in that plane crash - and you know it."

 

[volkgang]

I like the image of the character

I like the idea of a squad commander. Would his 1 synergise with Rem's helpers?

I like the idea of him not recognising Pocket at all. With McGinnis, I can see him compliment her for her weaponry. He can thank her for her tech for saving his life.

With Griggs or Sheckly being a conscript, wouldn't it be interesting if one of them was South Ixian and joined Farfax? The war is the North, so Apollo acts surprised when an Ixian is working with Farfax. The Commander tells him off for thinking it's black and white.

 

[Sayuyu]

Thanks!

Would his 1 synergise with Rem's helpers?

I'm gonna say no since McGinnis' turrets can't. It'd probably be kinda OP if they did.

He can thank her for her tech for saving his life

Absolutely, there'd definitely be a conversation like "Oh is that the SR-22? Now that was a classic, I can see you have good taste" sort of deal.

With Griggs or Sheckly being a conscript, wouldn't it be interesting if one of them was South Ixian and joined Farfax? The war is the North, so Apollo acts surprised when an Ixian is working with Farfax. The Commander tells him off for thinking it's black and white.

That'd be pretty good, it'd definitely create an interesting dynamic.