Hero's Sacrifice T4 Vitality Support Item

[boredpanda]

I have noticed that endgame support items are somewhat limited, and support items in general also feel limited in variety. As someone who likes to play support, it would be nice to have more options.

My favorite thing about Deadlock, and games like it, is the ability to be creative and break away from the meta of simply copying everyone else’s builds. With more variety in support items, the game could feel much more fun and expressive.

I thought an interesting Hero item for support could be one that involves sacrificing yourself for another player in order to save them. In a nutshell, it would let you transfer all damage a hero would take to yourself for a short time, with a separate self-cast option that transfers 50% of all damage your team takes within a 25m radius to you instead.

If you would die while under the effects of this ability, your respawn time would be reduced by 50%.

Thank you for reading, let me know your thoughts.

Hero's Sacrifice contrast to Cultist Sacrifice
$6400

+300 Bonus Health
+10% Spirit Resist
+10% Bullet Resist
+2.0 Move Speed

Active | 95s Cooldown

Target Ally:
For 4s, redirect 100% of the damage that ally would take to yourself instead and Increase the targeted allies move speed by +2m .

This works through walls and floors.

Self Cast:
For 4s, redirect 50% of all damage taken by allied heroes within 25m to yourself instead.

Redirected damage keeps its original type.
You take 15% increased redirected damage.

If you die while this effect is active, your respawn time is reduced by 50%. You and the targeted ally or allies receive a heal based on the total damage you took while the item was active up to 25% of your total health and a barrier for up to 10% of your total health.

The healing effect of this item is not effected by Healing Reduction.

45m Cast Range
25m Radius
4s Duration

 

[lordbeanthev]

on the idea end of things, i like it for the most part (more options for supports than just raw HP in the form of barriers/healing or whatever specific flavor of curse you want is a pretty damn welcome addition to the current suite of support items)

but there might be some overdesigned elements that make it a bit too strong (no line of sight targeting, unaffected by healing reduction)

i don't think this item needs the self-cast (or at least maybe a different one)
it kind of seems insanely broken with cheat death

 

[ReportingBugs]

on the idea end of things, i like it for the most part (more options for supports than just raw HP in the form of barriers/healing or whatever specific flavor of curse you want is a pretty damn welcome addition to the current suite of support items)

but there might be some overdesigned elements that make it a bit too strong (no line of sight targeting, unaffected by healing reduction)

i don't think this item needs the self-cast (or at least maybe a different one)
it kind of seems insanely broken with cheat death

What I can suggest is a Knight's vow (League item) into Deadlock. In fact, the passive stats themselves could just be copied over.

6.4K Vitality Item. Tether to an ally (2s cooldown). When nearby (25-30m) the tethered ally, before resistance, redirect 12% of the damage going towards the tether ally directly onto you as pure damage. When they do damage, heal for 12% of the damage they do, after resistances are calculated. It should stop working when you go below 30%. For a cheeky interaction, it can make it that the damage you take (only the redirect) does not break you out of combat.

This means:
1) The tethter-er guy benefits from getting extra chonky resistances, but also being able to heal up themselves as well (to suck up some of the damage).
2) The tethered benefits from building raw damage, and weapon shred. Getting a bit of resistances can also help your tank last a little more longer as well, in the case the tank is another carry.

Situations:
Tank tether, carry tethered - classical

Tank tether, tank thetered - efficient econ if the tether gang approaches in a specialised manner (i.e: the thetered is really vulnerable to spirit, as he is trying to tank gun carries. However, the tetherer is vulnerable to gun carries, as he is built for spirit. Hence, thetered absorbs gun damage, whilst the tetherer isolates the spirits and zones them off. Even if the tethered gets hit with the odd spirit, the damage redirection will make coordinate plays that more efficient, saving on resources).

Carry tether, carry tehtered - Pure aggression works well. Especially if opt a bit of defense.

Support tether, carry tethered - Harder to kill carry, with crazy peel, but risks losing in extended fights (support hurts themselves in a wider team setting).

Carry tether, support thetered - Carry who needs their support to be alive, as they already do quite a distant amount of damage and sustain - but requries the carry to burn harder. Candidate for wraith, blood tribute, etc.

Tank tether, support tehtered - Tank who realises support is very important in team fight setting, and wants them alive. Quite safe option.

Support tether, tank tehtered - Team is squishy, but the tank is best bet. However, some anti-tank is built, and the support desperately tries to keep tank alive to be the front line.

Support tether, support tehtered - Stall. Funny, silly. Can be useful for a bait situation, especially for urnn gameplay, or sieging.

 

[boredpanda]

on the idea end of things, i like it for the most part (more options for supports than just raw HP in the form of barriers/healing or whatever specific flavor of curse you want is a pretty damn welcome addition to the current suite of support items)

but there might be some overdesigned elements that make it a bit too strong (no line of sight targeting, unaffected by healing reduction)

i don't think this item needs the self-cast (or at least maybe a different one)
it kind of seems insanely broken with cheat death

I get what you mean, and I actually agree on a few of those points. The no line of sight part is probably one of the strongest parts of the idea, and I can see how that could push it too far if the rest of the item is also strong. My thought process there was mainly from playing support and constantly having moments where someone is technically close enough to save, but they are slightly below you, around a corner, or behind a building, so you just cannot do anything in time. I liked the idea of an item that lets you buy a few seconds to actually get to them.

That said, I do think there are ways to balance that part out, like shortening the cast range, shortening the duration, or making the transferred damage more punishing to the user so it is still a real commitment instead of a free save.

On the healing reduction point, my thinking was that for an endgame item with such a huge condition attached to it, potentially dying, having the payoff nullified by healing reduction felt a little too harsh. Especially since the whole fantasy of the item is sacrificing yourself to save someone else. But I can also see the argument that making it completely unaffected by healing reduction might be too much, so maybe the better middle ground is that healing reduction is only partially ignored instead of fully ignored.

I also think you are probably right that the self cast version may be too much, or at least that it would need to be something different. The single target sacrifice idea is the part I care about most anyway. The self cast was more of an extra idea than the core of the item.
And yeah, Cheat Death synergy is definitely one of the biggest balance concerns. Even though stacking both would be a massive investment, it could still create some pretty unfair interactions. So that is probably a good reason to either remove the self cast entirely, prevent the item from triggering certain death prevention effects, or just tune the item more around the single target save fantasy instead of letting it do everything at once.
At this point I think the healthier version of the idea is probably a more focused one: single target, shorter range, shorter duration, and fewer extra rules. Just a strong support save item with clear risk attached to it, instead of trying to make it cover every situation.