Patron's favor, the most expensive item in game

[Lagaum]

Well, I was thinking about how I love Aghanim's Scepter and shard and wanted something similar but maybe better(?) than it in Deadlock.

Patron's favor would be an item that cost 9k, maybe 12k. It doesn't give any status. It gives one new upgrade point called Patron's Favor that works differently. All skills would have a patron's favor upgrade, but you can only do it once per match.

I was thinking about Lady Geist when I was thinking about this, so here goes an example of how it would work:

Essence Bomb:

When upgraded by Patron's favor, the bomb would work differently; the first bomb would have a smaller explosion area and damage, but when exploding, it releases a cluster of smaller bombs that, when exploding, they'd do damage and also cover their areas with poison from her third upgrade, which has a smaller duration but the DOT would be faster.

Life Drain:

When upgraded heroes around the first target would with X radius would also be drained by a smaller amount (maybe 30% of the original drain?) and also apply silence from her third upgrade to the target and anyone inside the area.

Malice:

When upgraded, the hero hit by malice is the target of the next skill used. If you press essence bomb, instantly an essence bomb is stuck on them. If you cast life drain, it targets you with no max range or vision block. If you cast ult, you change life with them with no limit range.

Soul Exchange:

If upgraded, the skill is changed for a new skill called "Soul Share." It would have a bit longer range, where the enemy you target would be linked to you for a period of time (maybe 5 seconds?). A % of the damage you take is shared with them, and while they are alive, you can't die.

So yeah, he's my idea for an "Aghanim's scepter" like item.

 

[SingularityMaw]

I see the vision, but 12k for what's essentially a Tier 4 upgrade might be excessive, have you considered lowering it, but costing an item slot, or simply having a small amount of stats attached?
Also, thoughts about having it not be once per match? I can think of some heroes that would want just a few core purchases and might be willing to trade stats for a more specialized form of utility.

 

[Lagaum]

I see the vision, but 12k for what's essentially a Tier 4 upgrade might be excessive, have you considered lowering it, but costing an item slot, or simply having a small amount of stats attached?
Also, thoughts about having it not be once per match? I can think of some heroes that would want just a few core purchases and might be willing to trade stats for a more specialized form of utility.

I was debating with a friend and he gave an idea of making it cost 6200 taking an item slot and you could pay 6200 again to consume it and get the slot back and I do like that idea

 

[technicalwaffle]

I was just thinking about something like that yesterday. I also see the vision but I think having a modification for each ability is a little too much overhead realistically. It should probably instead function more closely to shard or scepter in the way that it's just a modification or new ability. But I do think this game has a lot of room for an item like that. A lot of hero abilities only need slight tweaks to completely change their optimal use case, so I think it could be really interesting to have some sort of ags item that isn't a direct buff to an ability, but instead a tweak to it that enables completely different build paths. That seems more in line with the kind of player agency design direction that this game (and I) loves going for.

For example, one selfish wish I've always had was being able to use Lash ultimate to just fling someone to next weekend instead of using it as a multi-man engage tool. I think the fling distance scaling off spirit is super sick, but it's often suboptimal to just use it on a crucial carry to remove them from the fight by flinging them from Greenwich to Broadway. But what if an item existed where you could cast it to modify your next Lash ultimate to only be able to target one person, lock on slower, but have a reduced cooldown? That could mean that Lash's ultimate now has two optimal use cases and might open up some new tactics.

 

[joeinky]

It's funny because they kind of already do have a built in system for this with the way some items allow you to choose an ability to imbue with additional effects, and it's actually one of my favourite additions to the Dota/Moba formula that Deadlock has brought in, so it seems obvious that this games version of Aghs would be an item that allows you to pick any ability to imbue with unique properties.

I do think the development overhead on giving every ability an upgrade is a bit much though, and this game already gives new effects to abilities when levelling them up, rather than just being straight up damage or duration increases like in other games, so an item that does the same thing but slightly different might seem less special.

I think we will get something like this down the line at some point, even if it's just a smaller version where it's similar to aghs in that it upgrades a specific ability everytime, but I don't think it will be till closer to release when every heroes kit is nailed down more, as things are still fluid currently.

Maybe a general idea like this would be better served by just creating more types of imbuable items? As they would be hero agnostic so wouldn't need to program unique effects for however many heroes they end up with.

 

[pakshin55]

Well, I was thinking about how I love Aghanim's Scepter and shard and wanted something similar but maybe better(?) than it in Deadlock.

Patron's favor would be an item that cost 9k, maybe 12k. It doesn't give any status. It gives one new upgrade point called Patron's Favor that works differently. All skills would have a patron's favor upgrade, but you can only do it once per match.

I was thinking about Lady Geist when I was thinking about this, so here goes an example of how it would work:

Essence Bomb:

When upgraded by Patron's favor, the bomb would work differently; the first bomb would have a smaller explosion area and damage, but when exploding, it releases a cluster of smaller bombs that, when exploding, they'd do damage and also cover their areas with poison from her third upgrade, which has a smaller duration but the DOT would be faster.

Life Drain:

When upgraded heroes around the first target would with X radius would also be drained by a smaller amount (maybe 30% of the original drain?) and also apply silence from her third upgrade to the target and anyone inside the area.

Malice:

When upgraded, the hero hit by malice is the target of the next skill used. If you press essence bomb, instantly an essence bomb is stuck on them. If you cast life drain, it targets you with no max range or vision block. If you cast ult, you change life with them with no limit range.

Soul Exchange:

If upgraded, the skill is changed for a new skill called "Soul Share." It would have a bit longer range, where the enemy you target would be linked to you for a period of time (maybe 5 seconds?). A % of the damage you take is shared with them, and while they are alive, you can't die.

So yeah, he's my idea for an "Aghanim's scepter" like item.

Then you will have to do two times amount of job, because of one item. If it upgrades only one ability, that devs chose for it. Some will benefit too much while others will not. Item is inherently bad design. It shouldnt remake your ability in any way. You have upgrades for that. It might come in future as game system enhancement like talents in dota or map objectives in lol. But now its really bad. And i would personally like to keep it simple at it is now, without enhancements as they regularly do in moba games, making the core gameplay more complex and annoying.