_N_
Member
Wraith King has Skeleton Warriors, Undying DOES have Zombies, Graves has Ghouls which are zombies and Victor is Frankenstein's Monster but...
Left 4 dead 2008 and Dawn of the Dead 1978's Zombies
Weapon and Stats:
Fire / Zoom
I decided to use Drifter's weapon as a weapon reference since it made the most sense to me to easily copy for now.
no big changes to vitality, it's Mcginnis's.
Alternative fire for a chargeable shot to release blood vomit could work but..
Abilities:
1)Soul Rip
Soul Rip Dota 2
Damage per Unit: 14/26/38/50
Heal per Unit: 14/26/38/50
Cooldown: 26s
Targets: 1 min - max 12
Cast Range: 25m
Search Radius: 45m
Damage to enemy heroes is lethal, health taken from heroes is not.
2)Dead's Leap
Drifter's Air da- Silver's Wolf form lea- Hunters Pounce! Left 4 Dead 2, Open Wounds Dota 2
Strikes: 4
Melee damage: 40
Spirit damage: 45
Cooldown: 18s
Range: 15m
Radius: 10m
Bleed duration: 5s
Zombies within radius will also focus your target.
3)Infection
Eldritch Summoning Dota 2, Thirst Dota 2
Infection Duration: 35s
Deathlust Health Threshold: 20%
Deathlust damage increase: 30%
Deathlust slow and dash distance: 25%
Deathlust movement speed: 35%
A3 is global
A3 Health Threshold starts: min 65% to 25% max
A3 Max move speed per Enemy: 50%(?) (might be too strong? lots of nerfs around movement speed over the months)
A3 Unlocks movement speed limit
Train to Busan 2016
Infection debuff does nothing on it's own, only activating on death of the player while under the effect.
Jojo Bizarre Adventure Vento Aureo and Stone Ocean: Notorious B.I.G, a stand that only activates upon death and Limp Bizkit that controls the dead but also persists when the user dies.
Zombie heroes do NOT shoot(?), will always attempt to light melee once in range. (?: dont know if they should.)
Can parry zombies.
Any health taken within Soul Rip's radius causes Infection ally or enemy.
Allies within Dead Leap's blood radius will receive the infection debuff.
Zombies do not revive when killed and cannot be reinfected.
Zombies, Zombie heroes, and Infected can only refresh or cause infection, players who have infection cannot spread it through any actions.
Not a delayed death for players like cheat death or Wraith King's old ability to ressurect heroes. Dead players are NOT resurrected to play the zombie version of themselves when dead.
Players with any active spells (Kedzu Connection, Last Stand, Full Auto, Goo Ball) when killed will still be in use when risen if the duration is still active.
When the hero Infected uses items such as Healing Nova, Divine Barrier, Healing Tempo, Heroic Aura Active, etc, will cause infection on teammates.
Heroes under the effects of infection debuff but have Rejuvenator or Victor's Shocking Reanimation up will not spawn a zombie.
4)Direct Control
Consume Dota 2, Collector Mass Effect 2 2010
Cooldown 95s
Cast range: 18m
Explosion damage: 300
Explosion radius: 8m
Can Direct Control a allied zombie hero (Allowing this hero to be able to play either or)
Zombie heroes become highlighted to pass through walls and surfaces to take control.
Cooldown timer begins when inside zombie enemy hero. Infected's abilities and items on cooldown will also continue to count down while inside the zombie.
Controlled zombies can use abilities, following cooldown timer rules. Cooldowns timers will still presist when the hero respawns.
Infected's natural regen will trigger inside the zombie hero. Cannot heal or target Infected directly.
These controlled zombies are SUPER zombies, they gain all the effects of the hero from abilities to items. Attack and abilities also cause infection, effects to allies from this controlled zombie will also cause Infection.
Heroes like Paige (Plot Armor) and Ivy (Kedzu Connection) will infect allies.
Heroes like Shiv that provide a passive for Rage will still persist for the controlled Zombie version.
Controlled Zombie Heroes without an alternative fire are given a chargeable shot to release blood vomit, using up ammo.
Zombie vomit attack Metal Slug, Brimstone Binding of Isaac
Thoughts and finishes:
I originally wanted to use Morphling's Morph
from Dota 2 as my reference ability to create this hero for some time. Taking some time away from the forums to focus on life and deadlock, I am amazed to see how many people have contributed. It's a lot of ideas going around, maybe someone has made a similar concept and I haven't ran into it yet.
Personally, I found myself watching a lot of Horror Films and I re-stumbled back into the zombie horror genre. Actors love playing the zombie roles, for the fun and roleplaying of a mindless eating zombie and I would love to also be turned for the fun thrill of chasing people (not in real life of course!!!!). Stubbs the Zombie led me to the idea of controlling a zombie character who can turn people into zombies and allowing the possess type of ability to have control over an "npc" that isnt a zombie.. yet.
Dawn of the Dead 1978 and 28 Days Later 2002
Stubbs the Zombie in Rebel without a Pulse 2005
Having a hero who can control the enemy (or ally) hero without interfering with a players gameplay is what I wanted to solve for myself. When Dota 2's Ringmaster was announced, a lot of people suspected Puppet Master and controlling enemy heroes. Was it too strong? Too weak? An itch to figure out an alternative for why we couldnt have a "mind controlling hero" is how i came to this idea.
Mind control is a direct but invasive ability where the opponent loses control. No one likes losing control like that i think, especially if they can put your abilities on cooldown or just ruining gameplay in a certain manner that isnt a stun. It is maybe a flat out "unfun" ability. "Just use your BKB or Unstoppable!" some would say, it's a touchy game mechanic (anyone remember wow classic mind control? there are probably tons of other good and bad examples from other games or ideas showing the issues in a player vs player environment, but also the fun)
With Infected, players being dead and having a npc zombie version of themselves rise up to take their place allows this hero to take control of that hero, allowing use of the character's natural growth and abilities, without disrupting the Dead player during gameplay. The dead can only watch the horror of what they unleash upon friend or foe. I personally never played Abathur in HOTS and really had in mind of the Mass Effect 2's Collectors when they control their own in battle.
Soul Rip as a copy paste, taken because I dont think there is a lot a zombie can do on their own.. scratching my head over the same ideas, spewing vomit or guts, calling a horde, taking of their head off, screaming.. maybe i couldnt find a creative alternative for this hero. I didn't want him to feel like a necromancer, but a zombie part of a group that can grow, but nothing like Broodmother or my weird Wereraptor. Letting him spread Infection to both sides without the need for items directly and without real hard gameplay interference was very important. Direct Control was also something to think about, since it was the main reference it took a while to figure out how to stitch up this kit to feel okay together.
Originally, Direct Control made YOU lose control of your hero, running as a aimless zombie controlled by npc as you take control over a zombie hero and could jump between bodies, sort of like Rem's Tag Along.. But i dont think it was such a good or thought out idea for myself. I heard old tales of Drifter's old passive being like Thirst and being changed to what it is today. I also vaguely recollect Shiv having an Infest like ability before Tag Along.
Wraith King ( or rather Skeleton King for me) has Skeleton Warriors, Undying DOES have Zombies, Graves has Ghouls which are zombies and Victor is Frankenstein's Monster but... I wanted to be the zombie itself causing the chaos. Undying is a very fun hero to play as and for the Zombies, he is still very zombie like of course.. Graves being more of a necromancer while allowing her to give an "outbreak" feel.. There is nothing wrong with more ""summoners"" or minion heroes. Graves is one of my favorite heroes to play because of all this, but maybe she already solves this heroes kit. Playing Victor for some time, he can easily be played as a Zombie like from Left 4 Dead, to me, which helped give more ideas for this hero. When playing Victor for the first time on his release, I played with increased ms, large aura, and just run at people with your body. I guess that's what most did, but personally I have a zombie mentality when doing it, i still do this today and I hope i put the fear into the enemy players when doing it "he's just running at me mindlessly!". What do you do unprepared against a Werewolf Silver and a Victor just running at you and using their body while not caring and dealing damage to you? It gives off the feeling of being surrounded and on the floor from Left 4 Dead.
There are two online epidemics I witness and one I experienced. Both originating in WoW, first happening back in 2005, a debuff Corrupted Blood got out of hand from a programming error, some players saw through this and caused quite a interesting story behind it. Much later, from that unexpected event, the company recreated a similar live event called Zombie Infestation to celebrate the newest expansion of 2008 where a zombie outbreak happened and players were turned into controlled zombies who could spread the disease to other players. Both are interesting stories from fun to "awful" and leading to real live epidemic researchers to study the corrupted blood event as a model, which was also brought up during Covid-19.
Day Z is a great game that recaptures alone, cooperation, zombies, and the horrors of actual people in a outbreak environment. Left 4 Dead also is a wonderful game against zombies. There are a lot and some I haven't personally played that are out there with different ways and stories of survival. Again, this has all been a focus to be a zombie.
I hope it was a fun and interesting read that helped motivate or inspire. Another over the top hero. Errors and oversights might have occured. It is never easy coming up with abilities that synergies, heroes, or just abilities in general. Thanks for reading and thank you to all working on Deadlock.
Extra
The zombie hero itself could be a rotation of zombies, like nyx assassin, there is not just one and when one dies they are replaced when respawning iirc. Voicelines, hero wheel chat text and text written by enemy hero or allies in chat is replaced with groans and zombie speak.
Left 4 dead 2008 and Dawn of the Dead 1978's ZombiesWeapon and Stats:
Fire / Zoom
I decided to use Drifter's weapon as a weapon reference since it made the most sense to me to easily copy for now.
no big changes to vitality, it's Mcginnis's.
Alternative fire for a chargeable shot to release blood vomit could work but..
Abilities:
1)Soul Rip
Soul Rip Dota 2| Rips health away from all nearby creeps and heroes to uses it to heal an ally, or damage an enemy dealing spirit damage. A1+10m range A2 +12 healing and spirit damage A3 -20s cooldown |
Damage per Unit: 14/26/38/50
Heal per Unit: 14/26/38/50
Cooldown: 26s
Targets: 1 min - max 12
Cast Range: 25m
Search Radius: 45m
Damage to enemy heroes is lethal, health taken from heroes is not.
2)Dead's Leap
Drifter's Air da- Silver's Wolf form lea- Hunters Pounce! Left 4 Dead 2, Open Wounds Dota 2| Enter a crawling stance that allows you to move, attacking or re-using the ability causes you to leap forward, immobilizing the first enemy hit and releasing multiple strikes that deal melee damage for the duration while releasing blood in radius per strike, dealing spirit damage in a radius. If Dead's Leap is dispelled in any way, the target will receive a bleed dealing % spirit damage. A1 +4m range A2 -6s cooldown A3 +4 strikes, ally hero damage, zombies, and you heal a % of damage dealt during the duration or for the remaining bleed. |
Strikes: 4
Melee damage: 40
Spirit damage: 45
Cooldown: 18s
Range: 15m
Radius: 10m
Bleed duration: 5s
Zombies within radius will also focus your target.
3)Infection
Eldritch Summoning Dota 2, Thirst Dota 2| Passive Weapon, melee, items, and abilities always leave an infection. Whenever a creep or hero dies under the effects, an uncontrollable zombie version is spawned in their place to fight along side you, and move towards the enemy base while attacking creeps and prioritizing enemy heroes. Zombies last till killed or if the hero is revived, they also cause infection. Infection is removed upon all effected on Infected's death. Uncontrolled zombies have the Deathlust passive, which causes their attacks to slow with reduce dash distance of the target, and if the target reaches below a certain amount of health, increases the attack damage and movement speed of the zombie. Zombies of creeps or heroes are instantly revived with 75% of their health, 15% gun resistance, 15% spirit resistance and take 35% extra critical hit damage to the head. A1 +15% revived zombie health A2 +20% Deathlust threshold A3 Infected gains bonus movement speed when an enemy hero's health falls below a certain threshold, with the bonuses increasing as their health falls further. |
Infection Duration: 35s
Deathlust Health Threshold: 20%
Deathlust damage increase: 30%
Deathlust slow and dash distance: 25%
Deathlust movement speed: 35%
A3 is global
A3 Health Threshold starts: min 65% to 25% max
A3 Max move speed per Enemy: 50%(?) (might be too strong? lots of nerfs around movement speed over the months)
A3 Unlocks movement speed limit
Train to Busan 2016Infection debuff does nothing on it's own, only activating on death of the player while under the effect.
Jojo Bizarre Adventure Vento Aureo and Stone Ocean: Notorious B.I.G, a stand that only activates upon death and Limp Bizkit that controls the dead but also persists when the user dies.Zombie heroes do NOT shoot(?), will always attempt to light melee once in range. (?: dont know if they should.)
Can parry zombies.
Any health taken within Soul Rip's radius causes Infection ally or enemy.
Allies within Dead Leap's blood radius will receive the infection debuff.
Zombies do not revive when killed and cannot be reinfected.
Zombies, Zombie heroes, and Infected can only refresh or cause infection, players who have infection cannot spread it through any actions.
Not a delayed death for players like cheat death or Wraith King's old ability to ressurect heroes. Dead players are NOT resurrected to play the zombie version of themselves when dead.
Players with any active spells (Kedzu Connection, Last Stand, Full Auto, Goo Ball) when killed will still be in use when risen if the duration is still active.
When the hero Infected uses items such as Healing Nova, Divine Barrier, Healing Tempo, Heroic Aura Active, etc, will cause infection on teammates.
Heroes under the effects of infection debuff but have Rejuvenator or Victor's Shocking Reanimation up will not spawn a zombie.
4)Direct Control
Consume Dota 2, Collector Mass Effect 2 2010| Infest into a zombie hero, taking control, restoring a portion of both heroes health, while gaining it's item effects, attacks and basic abilities/passives. Death of this zombie, ending early, or end of the duration causes you to exit, creating an explosion from within and dealing spirit damage to enemies within the radius. A1 +17m cast range A2 -35s cooldown A3 Allows use enemy's active items if available and reduce zombie hero ability cooldowns by 15% |
Cooldown 95s
Cast range: 18m
Explosion damage: 300
Explosion radius: 8m
Can Direct Control a allied zombie hero (Allowing this hero to be able to play either or)
Zombie heroes become highlighted to pass through walls and surfaces to take control.
Cooldown timer begins when inside zombie enemy hero. Infected's abilities and items on cooldown will also continue to count down while inside the zombie.
Controlled zombies can use abilities, following cooldown timer rules. Cooldowns timers will still presist when the hero respawns.
Infected's natural regen will trigger inside the zombie hero. Cannot heal or target Infected directly.
These controlled zombies are SUPER zombies, they gain all the effects of the hero from abilities to items. Attack and abilities also cause infection, effects to allies from this controlled zombie will also cause Infection.
Heroes like Paige (Plot Armor) and Ivy (Kedzu Connection) will infect allies.
Heroes like Shiv that provide a passive for Rage will still persist for the controlled Zombie version.
Controlled Zombie Heroes without an alternative fire are given a chargeable shot to release blood vomit, using up ammo.
Zombie vomit attack Metal Slug, Brimstone Binding of IsaacThoughts and finishes:
I originally wanted to use Morphling's Morph
from Dota 2 as my reference ability to create this hero for some time. Taking some time away from the forums to focus on life and deadlock, I am amazed to see how many people have contributed. It's a lot of ideas going around, maybe someone has made a similar concept and I haven't ran into it yet.Personally, I found myself watching a lot of Horror Films and I re-stumbled back into the zombie horror genre. Actors love playing the zombie roles, for the fun and roleplaying of a mindless eating zombie and I would love to also be turned for the fun thrill of chasing people (not in real life of course!!!!). Stubbs the Zombie led me to the idea of controlling a zombie character who can turn people into zombies and allowing the possess type of ability to have control over an "npc" that isnt a zombie.. yet.
Dawn of the Dead 1978 and 28 Days Later 2002Stubbs the Zombie in Rebel without a Pulse 2005Having a hero who can control the enemy (or ally) hero without interfering with a players gameplay is what I wanted to solve for myself. When Dota 2's Ringmaster was announced, a lot of people suspected Puppet Master and controlling enemy heroes. Was it too strong? Too weak? An itch to figure out an alternative for why we couldnt have a "mind controlling hero" is how i came to this idea.
Mind control is a direct but invasive ability where the opponent loses control. No one likes losing control like that i think, especially if they can put your abilities on cooldown or just ruining gameplay in a certain manner that isnt a stun. It is maybe a flat out "unfun" ability. "Just use your BKB or Unstoppable!" some would say, it's a touchy game mechanic (anyone remember wow classic mind control? there are probably tons of other good and bad examples from other games or ideas showing the issues in a player vs player environment, but also the fun)
With Infected, players being dead and having a npc zombie version of themselves rise up to take their place allows this hero to take control of that hero, allowing use of the character's natural growth and abilities, without disrupting the Dead player during gameplay. The dead can only watch the horror of what they unleash upon friend or foe. I personally never played Abathur in HOTS and really had in mind of the Mass Effect 2's Collectors when they control their own in battle.
Soul Rip as a copy paste, taken because I dont think there is a lot a zombie can do on their own.. scratching my head over the same ideas, spewing vomit or guts, calling a horde, taking of their head off, screaming.. maybe i couldnt find a creative alternative for this hero. I didn't want him to feel like a necromancer, but a zombie part of a group that can grow, but nothing like Broodmother or my weird Wereraptor. Letting him spread Infection to both sides without the need for items directly and without real hard gameplay interference was very important. Direct Control was also something to think about, since it was the main reference it took a while to figure out how to stitch up this kit to feel okay together.
Originally, Direct Control made YOU lose control of your hero, running as a aimless zombie controlled by npc as you take control over a zombie hero and could jump between bodies, sort of like Rem's Tag Along.. But i dont think it was such a good or thought out idea for myself. I heard old tales of Drifter's old passive being like Thirst and being changed to what it is today. I also vaguely recollect Shiv having an Infest like ability before Tag Along.
Wraith King ( or rather Skeleton King for me) has Skeleton Warriors, Undying DOES have Zombies, Graves has Ghouls which are zombies and Victor is Frankenstein's Monster but... I wanted to be the zombie itself causing the chaos. Undying is a very fun hero to play as and for the Zombies, he is still very zombie like of course.. Graves being more of a necromancer while allowing her to give an "outbreak" feel.. There is nothing wrong with more ""summoners"" or minion heroes. Graves is one of my favorite heroes to play because of all this, but maybe she already solves this heroes kit. Playing Victor for some time, he can easily be played as a Zombie like from Left 4 Dead, to me, which helped give more ideas for this hero. When playing Victor for the first time on his release, I played with increased ms, large aura, and just run at people with your body. I guess that's what most did, but personally I have a zombie mentality when doing it, i still do this today and I hope i put the fear into the enemy players when doing it "he's just running at me mindlessly!". What do you do unprepared against a Werewolf Silver and a Victor just running at you and using their body while not caring and dealing damage to you? It gives off the feeling of being surrounded and on the floor from Left 4 Dead.
There are two online epidemics I witness and one I experienced. Both originating in WoW, first happening back in 2005, a debuff Corrupted Blood got out of hand from a programming error, some players saw through this and caused quite a interesting story behind it. Much later, from that unexpected event, the company recreated a similar live event called Zombie Infestation to celebrate the newest expansion of 2008 where a zombie outbreak happened and players were turned into controlled zombies who could spread the disease to other players. Both are interesting stories from fun to "awful" and leading to real live epidemic researchers to study the corrupted blood event as a model, which was also brought up during Covid-19.
Day Z is a great game that recaptures alone, cooperation, zombies, and the horrors of actual people in a outbreak environment. Left 4 Dead also is a wonderful game against zombies. There are a lot and some I haven't personally played that are out there with different ways and stories of survival. Again, this has all been a focus to be a zombie.
I hope it was a fun and interesting read that helped motivate or inspire. Another over the top hero. Errors and oversights might have occured. It is never easy coming up with abilities that synergies, heroes, or just abilities in general. Thanks for reading and thank you to all working on Deadlock.
Extra
The zombie hero itself could be a rotation of zombies, like nyx assassin, there is not just one and when one dies they are replaced when respawning iirc. Voicelines, hero wheel chat text and text written by enemy hero or allies in chat is replaced with groans and zombie speak.
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