New hero idea: Helena, the soul hunter.

[IgorNL]

Name: Helena, the Soul Hunter
Primary Attack (M1) - Soul Shot
Description: Helena fires long-range soul energy projectiles that deal moderate damage.
Spirit: Increases movement speed.


Skill 1 - Soul Blade
Description: Helena throws a soul blade that deals immediate damage and applies a DoT for 4 seconds. Each subsequent hit refreshes the DoT duration and increases its damage.
Damage: Moderate on hit, with DoT increasing with each hit.
Special Effect: If the target dies while under the effect of the DoT, Helena recovers 5% of her maximum health.
Cooldown: 18 seconds.
Upgrades:
Additional Charge: Adds an additional charge and reduces the cooldown by 6 seconds.
Vampiric Souls: Increases damage and grants +20% Spirit Steal.
Shadow Renewal: Heals +10% of your maximum health upon killing an enemy that is under the effect of damage over time.


Ability 2 - Huntress' Charge
Description: Helena quickly dashes in the target direction, dealing damage to enemies she passes through.
Damage: Moderate when passing through enemies.
Cooldown: 15 seconds.
Range: 13m
Updates:
Shadow Dash: Reduces the cooldown by 4 seconds and deals bonus damage.
Shadow Dance: Dashing now reduces the CD by 2 seconds for each enemy hit (maximum 6 seconds).
Deadly Echo: After dashing, Helena leaves a shadow that repeats the dash, dealing bonus damage.


Ability 3 - Veil of Souls
Description: Helena envelops herself in shadow souls, creating a shield that absorbs damage for 3 seconds. While the shield is active, Helena also gains +2 movement speed. Secondary Effect: The shield explodes upon expiration, dealing damage based on the damage absorbed.
Cooldown: 20 seconds.
Updates:
Fortified Veil: Increases the duration of the shield by 2 seconds and reduces its cooldown by 5 seconds.
Shadow Reflection: The shield now reflects 15% of the damage absorbed back to enemies that attack Helena.
Devastating Explosion: The explosion upon expiration of the shield deals additional damage and stuns nearby enemies for 1 second.


Ability 4 (Ultimate) - Aura of Death
Description: Helena summons a large shadow zone around herself for 6 seconds, draining the health of all enemies within the area. During the duration, enemies within the area take continuous damage and are slowed. Additionally, Helena heals based on the damage dealt, and for each enemy that dies within the zone, she extends the duration of the ability by 3 seconds.
Damage: Deals continuous moderate damage to all enemies within the area.
Secondary Effect: Heals Helena for 50% of the damage dealt and applies a 30% slow to enemies.
Cooldown: 90 seconds.
Upgrades:
Augmented Aura: Increases the radius of the zone by 20% and the slow applied by 15%.
Deadly Harvest: Enemies that die in the zone explode, dealing area damage to other nearby enemies.
Ravenous Shadow: For each enemy that dies in the zone, the cooldown of the ability is reduced by 15 seconds.


Helena, the Soul Hunter is a close-to-mid-range combat character focused on draining life and controlling enemies. Her abilities make her dangerous in melee combat, where she can capitalize on her DoTs and quick mobility.

Gameplay Overview
Primary Attack (M1) - Soul Shot: Although a projectile, Helena uses this mid-range attack to pressure enemies. Her shots don't have the greatest range, but they are agile and help keep enemies under pressure.

Skill 1 - Soul Blade: One of Helena's main tools for short confrontations. The Soul Blade is thrown to inflict initial damage and a DoT, perfect for close combat. If the enemy dies under the effect of the DoT, Helena recovers health, which gives her great sustainability.

Skill 2 - Huntress' Charge: A quick, short-range dash, ideal for Helena to approach enemies or escape from tricky situations. The damage caused by passing through enemies makes the dash aggressive and versatile for initiating combat or escaping.

Skill 3 - Veil of Souls: Focused on defense, this skill envelops her in a barrier that absorbs damage for a short period. In addition to increasing her movement speed, the explosion at the end of the barrier deals damage based on what was absorbed, being extremely useful in close combat.

Ultimate - Aura of Death: A great differentiator for Helena. This ability creates a drain zone that only hits enemies within its immediate radius. Within this area, enemies take continuous damage and are slowed, while Helena heals herself based on the damage dealt. This makes her a powerful force in shorter, tighter fights.

Helena’s Strength
Helena shines in close combat, with her ability to heal herself, inflict DoTs, and reduce enemy mobility. She excels at pressuring enemies with her dash, dealing continuous damage with her Ultimate, and draining the life of downed opponents.


Final Balance
Overall, Helena appears to have a kit that fits well with her soul hunter theme, offering a good mix of damage, mobility, and sustainability. However, her success in gameplay may depend on how these elements are balanced against other heroes and the pace of the game.

Helena’s effectiveness may also depend on how the game integrates with other characters and strategies. Testing in matches and adjusting based on community feedback can help ensure that she remains balanced and competitive.

 

[sam.louro.monteiro]

I am not here to dunk on your idea but you just created a 2nd shiv with seven ult

1-medium range weapon that does good damage (what is moderate? if its close should it not hit like it?) its ascatter gun, lane boss like every other and shiv.

2- Soul blade is serrated knifes with built in lifesteal so you can skip an item on the spell spammer path. Or be more obnoxious, and ofc without mana in this game spam on creeps to heal. this is a easy fix that is only heroes.

3- Huntress' charge = slice and dice

4- While numbers are not something to even really look at. Only thing that matters is if there's over lap of abilities and to see how the kit flows. As it stands you can have perma Veil of souls with just duration and cooldown extenders, add another spirit cdr item and and you dont have downtime on, as of what you posted, a full damage absorb and reflect. This can exist but for desing purposes it needs to be hard capped on ammount or time. For example: Nemesis 3, retribuition from Smite. It was at first a very low duration (i dont remember if it was .5 or 1s) and full reflected and healed. now its hard cap ammount and its removed on cc with a bunch of different factors of return and heal. having a pure uno reverse is extremely frustrating to fight and needs to be put in carefully. since you can always hold that card for the enemy cc open (haze or wraith cc's into triple mag dumps for example)

5- thematic problem, why would a nimble assassin stop to channel hades ult? how different is this from 7.

The theme is ok. makes sense to have something fully related to souls. Everything else is a re hash of existing characters.

 

[IgorNL]

I am not here to dunk on your idea but you just created a 2nd shiv with seven ult

1-medium range weapon that does good damage (what is moderate? if its close should it not hit like it?) its ascatter gun, lane boss like every other and shiv.

2- Soul blade is serrated knifes with built in lifesteal so you can skip an item on the spell spammer path. Or be more obnoxious, and ofc without mana in this game spam on creeps to heal. this is a easy fix that is only heroes.

3- Huntress' charge = slice and dice

4- While numbers are not something to even really look at. Only thing that matters is if there's over lap of abilities and to see how the kit flows. As it stands you can have perma Veil of souls with just duration and cooldown extenders, add another spirit cdr item and and you dont have downtime on, as of what you posted, a full damage absorb and reflect. This can exist but for desing purposes it needs to be hard capped on ammount or time. For example: Nemesis 3, retribuition from Smite. It was at first a very low duration (i dont remember if it was .5 or 1s) and full reflected and healed. now its hard cap ammount and its removed on cc with a bunch of different factors of return and heal. having a pure uno reverse is extremely frustrating to fight and needs to be put in carefully. since you can always hold that card for the enemy cc open (haze or wraith cc's into triple mag dumps for example)

5- thematic problem, why would a nimble assassin stop to channel hades ult? how different is this from 7.

The theme is ok. makes sense to have something fully related to souls. Everything else is a re hash of existing characters.

I was inspired by Shiv to make it, so it's similar to Shiv, but it has aspects that make it unique, similar but different gameplay.

1. Her weapon would be something similar to Yamato's weapon, even though he's a short-range character, his weapon is medium-range.

2. The spiritual steal upgrade was really strong and could be exchanged for something else since she already has the healing when killing the enemy that is under the effect of the dot, but she's an assassin with life steal, that's the focus of the character.

3. Huntress' charge is similar to slice and dice because both are dashes, but saying they're the same is the same as saying that Haze's and Shiv's knives are the same, both are dashes but have different effects.

4. Shiv also has an infinite ultimate if he kills the enemy with it and I don't see this as a problem, Helena reduces the CD by 15 seconds for each enemy killed, the ultimate has a 90s CD, she would have to kill 6 players to reset the CD completely and killing the 6 enemies would increase the duration by 18 seconds, with a higher cooldown her ultimate would be 61 seconds, so she would have to kill 4 players to reset the CD, but a limit can be added to make it more balanced, but the idea is for her to be rewarded for her kills and just like Shiv to have her gameplay around her ultimate, but as I said we need to do tests to balance it.

5. Her ultimate is not channeled, it would be something like Warden's ultimate that he activates and can still cast skills and shoot, or like Abrams' 1 that creates an aura that keeps absorbing life.

6. The game has 21 characters, it is difficult to create something that does not have some similarity with other characters, we have characters that create turrets, throw knives, summon a rain of lightning, create auras, explode poison, shoot lasers, so of course there will be skills similar to other characters, it would be impossible to create something totally unique.

I appreciate the feedback.

 

[IgorNL]

One change that could solve this issue of her having an infinite ultimate is to swap Ravenous Shadow for Soul Collector.

Soul Collector: When you kill an enemy within the radius of the Aura of Death, you receive 600 souls.
It would be similar to the third level of the Vindicta ultimate, which gains 850 souls when killing players, and the Soul Collector makes sense within the Soul Hunter theme.

 

[IgorNL]

I used AI to generate some images of what I imagine Helena would look like.

 

[sam.louro.monteiro]

i understand that there's inspiration and extremely similar spells. like all the grenade ones. kelvin grenade and viscous goo is basically a projectile aoe slow one lingers on you the other on the ground. they are in fact very similar. the knifes being that similar is fine, one is ramping the other is just static damage. they are not the same, but its just the overhaul where the character is a ditto of the other

3. Huntress' charge is similar to slice and dice because both are dashes, but saying they're the same is the same as saying that Haze's and Shiv's knives are the same, both are dashes but have different effects.

from your description its literally the same, its a dash that does damage on passthrough with cd refund on enemy hit and double delay strike. it could have something different. this one doesn't.

The ult being more like warden does paint a different picture of what i thought it was. like a death cloud chasing you. slow on it is a strong stat.

the veil feedback was just a cautionary thing to look out, but does bring this ditto idea where you can have similar spells to each other i think the most right now is vindicta and talon: a snipe, a space control projectile, airborne with auto enhancer and funny enough they both have a bird spell.
I am taking these to show how they are slightly different in ways were it feels like they are different vs the risk League has where why pick 2011 bruiser champion when 2022 bruiser champion exists with nearly the same tool kit just better numbers.

the fact a spell moves to the ult slot it suddently has to become the most overloaded version of that type of skill, the best example is Riki from dota that has had permanent invis (before cloak and dagger), blink strike and tricks of the trade all being his ult. And for each of them swaping slots they gained and lost power and effects. blink had more charges more range lower charge time more damage. cloak had bigger factor on backstab or longer cloak time when not an ult. tricks hit more than one, hit all of them or hit twice as fast just one. all these depending if its ult or not.

This means while they both have snipe vindicta's better in range damage, effects (assassination and execute threhold are massive bonuses), grey needs to arm to fire and is slowed, vindicta can shoot sooner with less damage but that can give it flexibility and is hitscan and is now slowed. Conversly their ults are birds that do damage on impact, the ult stuns is aoe and can execute (similar to vindictas) here there is overlap and it can be a question of flavour of which type you rather have but their effects serve different purposes, vindictas being to snowball really fast and beat you with money with its assassination bounty.

their trap differenciates as one is reactive and the other is pro active you dont use it the same way at all. so talon can set up control to wear you down and finish with a homing nuke that is hard to dodge while vindicta is a lot less mobile but on aggression or with a +1 can block a team from following through an initiation. These nuances are interesting.

The issue I see with Helena is that it would just be if her numbers are better then pick it, ofc shiv execute is a big deal but most mid game he is a monster because his 3 makes him hard to kill while he is dashing and bleeding you. So it becomes is it better to block the damage or regen it? and that difference is not as interesting to me to choose from.

If Helena was in the game and shiv was pitched, i would be saying that why does shiv have a 2nd strike dash, its more Helena thematic to have it. I just want to pick your brain to see if there's something more unique we can find, at 1st i thought that the bleed could be extended with consecutive hits so if you keep hitting them. So if it ramps up, this could be a feature, meaning that perhaps her upgrade on dash could apply this soul blade bleed.

 

[sam.louro.monteiro]

One change that could solve this issue of her having an infinite ultimate is to swap Ravenous Shadow for Soul Collector.

Soul Collector: When you kill an enemy within the radius of the Aura of Death, you receive 600 souls.
It would be similar to the third level of the Vindicta ultimate, which gains 850 souls when killing players, and the Soul Collector makes sense within the Soul Hunter theme.

The full reset thing didn't seam off to me personally. Both the collector or ravenous make sense thematically. its more the package.

 

[IgorNL]

i understand that there's inspiration and extremely similar spells. like all the grenade ones. kelvin grenade and viscous goo is basically a projectile aoe slow one lingers on you the other on the ground. they are in fact very similar. the knifes being that similar is fine, one is ramping the other is just static damage. they are not the same, but its just the overhaul where the character is a ditto of the other

from your description its literally the same, its a dash that does damage on passthrough with cd refund on enemy hit and double delay strike. it could have something different. this one doesn't.

The ult being more like warden does paint a different picture of what i thought it was. like a death cloud chasing you. slow on it is a strong stat.

the veil feedback was just a cautionary thing to look out, but does bring this ditto idea where you can have similar spells to each other i think the most right now is vindicta and talon: a snipe, a space control projectile, airborne with auto enhancer and funny enough they both have a bird spell.
I am taking these to show how they are slightly different in ways were it feels like they are different vs the risk League has where why pick 2011 bruiser champion when 2022 bruiser champion exists with nearly the same tool kit just better numbers.

the fact a spell moves to the ult slot it suddently has to become the most overloaded version of that type of skill, the best example is Riki from dota that has had permanent invis (before cloak and dagger), blink strike and tricks of the trade all being his ult. And for each of them swaping slots they gained and lost power and effects. blink had more charges more range lower charge time more damage. cloak had bigger factor on backstab or longer cloak time when not an ult. tricks hit more than one, hit all of them or hit twice as fast just one. all these depending if its ult or not.

This means while they both have snipe vindicta's better in range damage, effects (assassination and execute threhold are massive bonuses), grey needs to arm to fire and is slowed, vindicta can shoot sooner with less damage but that can give it flexibility and is hitscan and is now slowed. Conversly their ults are birds that do damage on impact, the ult stuns is aoe and can execute (similar to vindictas) here there is overlap and it can be a question of flavour of which type you rather have but their effects serve different purposes, vindictas being to snowball really fast and beat you with money with its assassination bounty.

their trap differenciates as one is reactive and the other is pro active you dont use it the same way at all. so talon can set up control to wear you down and finish with a homing nuke that is hard to dodge while vindicta is a lot less mobile but on aggression or with a +1 can block a team from following through an initiation. These nuances are interesting.

The issue I see with Helena is that it would just be if her numbers are better then pick it, ofc shiv execute is a big deal but most mid game he is a monster because his 3 makes him hard to kill while he is dashing and bleeding you. So it becomes is it better to block the damage or regen it? and that difference is not as interesting to me to choose from.

If Helena was in the game and shiv was pitched, i would be saying that why does shiv have a 2nd strike dash, its more Helena thematic to have it. I just want to pick your brain to see if there's something more unique we can find, at 1st i thought that the bleed could be extended with consecutive hits so if you keep hitting them. So if it ramps up, this could be a feature, meaning that perhaps her upgrade on dash could apply this soul blade bleed.

Skill 2 - Huntress' Charge
Description: Helena quickly dashes towards the target, dealing damage to enemies she passes through.
Cooldown: 15 seconds.
Range: 13m
Upgrades:
- Reduces cooldown by 4 seconds.
- Increases damage and range.
- Causes enemies to bleed for 3 seconds, Helena heals for 8% of max health if the enemy dies while under the bleed effect.


Skill 4 (Ultimate) - Aura of Death
Description: Helena summons a large shadow zone around herself for 6 seconds, draining the health of all enemies within the area. During the duration, enemies within the area take continuous damage and are slowed. Additionally, Helena heals based on damage dealt, and for each enemy that dies within the zone, she gains 250 souls.
Secondary effect: Heals Helena for 50% of the damage dealt and applies a 30% slow to enemies.
Cooldown: 90 seconds.
Upgrades:
- Increases the radius of the zone by 20% and the slow applied by 15%.
- Enemies that die within the zone explode, dealing area damage to other nearby enemies.
- Increases souls from killing enemies by +600.


I think these would be good changes for Helena.

 

[IgorNL]

Helena's idea is the same as Vindicta and Gray Talon's. She's a similar version of Shiv but with small differences. Her dash was actually the same as Shiv's. I hadn't even noticed. I think the changes I've made have made it better. The idea is for Helena to be an option for those who like Shiv's gameplay, but Helena will be more focused on life stealing, since you can heal yourself by killing your enemies, and also on collecting souls, since you can gain souls by killing enemies with her ultimate. Resetting the CD didn't really make sense for her. I think the ideal is for her to gain souls by killing her enemies, since she's a soul hunter. Helena will be an assassin focused on survival, killing and healing herself with her kills, and receiving souls when she eliminates them with her ultimate.

I appreciate the feedback. You've been a great help in improving Helena.

 

[IgorNL]

Another ultimate that I thought would be very interesting would be Fury of Souls:
Description: Helena enters a state of rage for 8 seconds.
During the rage she receives: +50% cooldown reduction, +50% spiritual and ballistic steal. Killing enemies during the rage grants +300 souls.
Passive: Killing enemies grants soul stacks (maximum of 3) each stack grants +8% souls from all sources. (Lane, Jungle, Ultimate). If you die, you lose all stacks.
Cooldown: 90 Seconds.
Upgrades:
- +0.8m/s Movement speed and +4 spiritual power per soul stack.
- +2 Soul stacks.
- +100 souls per assassination per soul stack.


I think this ultimate would suit the character better and make his gameplay more unique.

 

[IgorNL]

Note: The Passive would be like Shiv's rage bar, you gain the soul stack even if you kill the enemy without the ultimate active.

 

[IgorNL]

An interesting update for Fury of Souls:
Each soul stack increases the duration by 1 second.
You can combine it with the second upgrade:
- +2 Soul Stacks and increases the duration of Fury of Souls by 1 second per stack.
or
- +2 Soul Stacks and each stack reduces the cooldown of fury of souls by 10 seconds.

 

[IgorNL]

Another interesting and unique ultimate would be the Power of Souls:
Description: Killing enemies grants soul stacks, up to a maximum of 3, each stack grants: 0.9m/s movement speed, 8 spiritual power, 8% cooldown reduction and adds spiritual damage to your bullets, dying makes you lose all stacks.
Upgrades:
- +2 Souls Stacks
- Killing enemy heroes grants +200 souls per soul stack.
- Upon death, you will have 60 seconds to kill an enemy hero and keep your soul stacks. (time starts counting when you respawn)

This ultimate is not an active skill, but a passive one.

 

[arcsymus]

There are aspects of this design that I like. Helena seems like a straight-forward bruiser-type assassin. The elements that I'm liking most that are contributing towards this role are the first ability and the third ability. First ability, an aimed nuke that applies a DoT, refreshing when you continue to hit them. So there's an incentive structure there; I don't know if you need the DoT to have ramping damage. The first two effects seem like enough to me--it's simple, and there's purpose to it, which I like. The second ability is too simple, and I think it gets in the way of the far more elegant third ability--a shield that ends in a burst, that offers movement speed. There's your mobility ability right there, and it gives the character a little bit of a melee edge. You already have the sword skill in there for theme, then you have a bursting shield with movement speed that gives you a push towards closing into melee and throwing that melee attack out there.

As far as pushing your design from here, I think you should look at the second and fourth abilities again. I don't have the fourth ability--something that I like about it is that it refreshes on kill. I think there's something that you can do there with that ability, but I think you should get creative with it and see what you can come up with.