Hero concept: The Shade

[samthefab]

An enigmatic figure cloaked in shadow, nobody is sure what exactly The Shade even is, much less its goals or desires. Appearing instantly from seemingly nowhere, and disappearing just as swiftly, The Shade spreads terror in its wake in the pursuit of some unknown goal.

Primary weapon: throws a black glob of shadows
Bullets per sec: 2.3
Bullet damage: 7.6 + 0.6 per increase
Ammo: 12

Vitality: 550 + 31 per increase
Regen: 2
Move speed: 7 m/s
Sprint speed: 0 + 0.05x spirit
Stamina: 3

Ability 1: Wave of terror
The Shade launches a shadow in a line directly ahead, damaging and terrifying all enemies it comes into contact with. Terrified enemies are slowed and forced to move away from the Shade.
Damage: 70 + 0.3x spirit
Terrify slow: 35%
Terrify duration: 1.5 seconds
Cooldown: 15 seconds
Charge cooldown: 10 seconds
Width: 2m
Range: 12m
Upgrade 1: +1 charge
Upgrade 2: width +2m
Upgrade 3: Enemies hit by the wave take + 10% more damage for 6 seconds

Ability 2: Umbral step
The Shade jumps into a shadow, traveling along walls or floors for several seconds. While inside the shadows The Shade is immune to bullet damage
Duration: 10 seconds
Cooldown: 60 seconds
Upgrade 1: +5 m/s sprint in shadows
Upgrade 2: -15 seconds cooldown
Upgrade 3: heal for 5% of maximum health when entering or exiting the shadows

Ability 3: Hallucinations
The Shade creates a haunting image of itself behind all nearby enemy heroes. Hallucinations will follow the hero they spawned behind, dealing occasional damage. The Shade can recast this ability to swap places with a Hallucination, destroying it early.
Duration: 4
DPS: 25 + 0.3x spirit
Range: 15m
Upgrade 1: Swapping with a Hallucination triggers all remaining damage instantly
Upgrade 2: DPS + 15
Upgrade 3: Swapping with a Hallucination reloads your weapon and adds +25% fire rate for the magazine

Ultimate: Shadow rip
The Shade rips out the shadows of all enemy heroes within range, dealing damage to them. For several seconds the shadows will persist in place, transferring 25% of damage they receive to their owners. This damage cannot be fatal, and the shadows cannot redirect more than 25% of the owner's maximum health.
Damage: 100 + 1x spirit
Range: 10m
Shadow Duration: 5 seconds
Cooldown: 120 seconds
Upgrade 1: shadows last 5 seconds longer
Upgrade 2: cooldown - 30 seconds
Upgrade 3: curse all enemies for 1.25 seconds on hit.

The Shade is designed to be a hard to pin down assassin, able to weave around fights by entering shadows or swapping places to appear behind opponents without warning, then quickly hit them with wave of terror to push them out of position.

 

[arcsymus]

I really like the first three abilities and think this would make for a solid hero. I love the idea of travelling as a shadow and possibly evading detection. Definitely have to consider removing the Shade from the minimal while casting.

For the ultimate, I want to see something that will capitalize on Hallucinations, because I think it's a great ability, and the fantasy of it is, your enemies can kill the copies to try to keep the Shade away. I want to see a good reason why players would want to keep the Shade away from them, and an effigy skill definitely doesn't do it, nor does it synergize with Hallucinations.

Perhaps something related to the Shade's mysterious goals or origins.

I think the first ability is really good, too. Very simple, but unique and effective.

 

[samthefab]

I thought that the ult made sense as a follow up to using the 2/3 as an initiation tool, where you get into the middle of a team by swapping behind them or using the shadows to stealth into the middle, then ult to deal a bunch of damage and increase the damage they take for the next fight.

The other ideas I thought were thematic was a Nocturne(lol)/Xbalanque(smite) style ultimate, where the enemy have reduced vision beyond a certain point and can't see each other or enemies on the minimap, so using the 3 to jump around and the 1 to force people to run away from their teammates would spread chaos in teamfights, especially when they can't tell where you are or where you're coming from due to all the darkness. Or alternatively some kind of mix between Terrorblade's Metamorph(dota) and Cthulhu ult(smite), where you and your hallucinations all grow in size and gain a bunch of buffs to basic attacks.