Hero Concept - Starling (Triad Assassin)

[Ibbick]

Background: I'm not sure yet. I'm certain she would be an assassin, whether independently or for a triad-like organization. Personality wise, I think Starling would be like Übel from Frieren: Beyond Journey's End; i.e., she's someone who enjoys a battle and doesn't mind killing, but is also fairly sly and reserved.

Weapon: Three eyes, a staff with a three-barrel hand cannon attached to it. Inspired by the san yan chong, used during the Ming dynasty (pictured below). Primary fire shoots each barrel in a burst, alt fire fires all three barrels simultaneously with increased spread. Intended for mid to long range fighting.



Ability 1: Qi Feathers

• Starling throws a barrage of Qi feathers (something like blade barrage from Destiny 2), dealing per-feather spirit damage and applying a per-feather healing reduction (e.g. throws 15 feathers, eachapplies 2% healing reduction; stacks additively). There's a maximum amount of healing reduction that can be applied to a hero, but the cap scales with spirit. Feather damage also scales with spirit.
  • T1: Tighter feather spread
  • T2: Increased healing reduction per feather (e.g. 1%)
  • T3: You may re-active the ability again within a short duration of its initial use.
• Comments:
  • Unless I'm forgetful, there are no abilities with inbuilt heal reduction in the game yet. This provides unique and useful early/midgame utility while teammates haven't bought healbane or spirit burn yet.

Ability 2: Updraft

• Starling spins her staff, generating an updraft of air that launches her into the air and pushes enemies back, dealing spirit damage and stunning them briefly if they're thrown into a wall. This ability is charged, and damage scales (minimally) with spirit.
  • T1: The updraft created by Starling is usable by allies for a short duration after casting. Duration scales with spirit.
  • T2: +1 Charge
  • T3: Increased knockback and stun duration.
• Comments:
  • Teammates and enemies will be able to see where the updraft was created, but only allies will be able to use it. I don't believe it needs to be available globally (like Holliday's jump pads) because it only provides a vertical boost.
  • Functionally, I'm imagining something like Horizon's grav lift from Apex Legends.
  • Mainly intended to synergize with Starling's Glide passive (below).

Ability 3: Glide

• While in the air, Starling can activate this ability to transform her staff into a glider, holding onto it with her left hand while detaching the gun portion and holding it in her right hand. While glide is triggered, Starling's damage is amplified, she has increased air control and falls more slowly, but has a reduced fire rate and cannot use stamina. Damage amp scales with spirit.
  • T1: Enter/exit glide more quickly
  • T2: Small boost to damage amp.
  • T3: Fire rate penalty removed.
• Comments:
  • Become a mosquito. Bzzzz.
  • I'm imagining the glider to look something like the one Aang had in Avatar: the Last Airbender.
  • Controlling glide would be like the gliders in Fortnite (but you'd conserve any momentum you had upon activation).
  • I'm unsure if a fire rate penalty is enough to offset the mobility you gain in return. Then again, since it's a movement ability, there are already slows and movement debuffs in the game making it easy enough to disable (slowing hex, knockdown, silence wave, etc.).
  • If Glide is too oppressive, it could be limited in duration (and maybe T3 removes the duration cap instead).

Ability 4: See No Evil, Hear No Evil, Speak No Evil

• Starling dives to the ground, slamming her staff and releasing a radiating wave of spectral starlings. Hit enemies are silenced for a short duration, and (for a longer duration) their minimaps are disabled and all non-ultimate audio is replaced with bird chatter. Does no damage, but the silence duration scales with spirit.
  • T1: Shorter cooldown
  • T2: Minimaps and audio are disabled for longer
  • T3: Upon hit, enemies are held in the air for a short duration (like Mirage's tornado, duration scales slightly with spirit).
• Comments:
  • What I mean by "minimaps are disabled": affected enemies' minimaps are blacked out, and anything they see (i.e. you and your allies) is not displayed on the minimaps of unaffected enemies. This essentially cuts them off from their team, allowing an isolated fight (if the enemy team is uncoordinated).
  • The perfect tool for an assassin-style character. The tradeoff being that, unless they're already low-ish, she doesn't have enough damage to finish the kill within the ult duration. So it's more of a setup for your team, giving them a period of time to initiate without being contested by the enemy team.
  • I know that the adage "See no evil, hear no evil, etc." is commonly associated with monkeys, and sure, you could substitute the wave of starlings for an AOE with monkeys around it, but it feels a little out of character. Then again, the dev team gave Raven, a Russian spy, an Anubis doll as a relic, so maybe it would work.