Concede vote call cooldown (for a particular player) increased from 2 minutes to 3 minutes.
Although we want the majority of the players on a particular team to be able to decide when they want to concede after 15 minutes, some players were repeating their concede vote calling too frequently, which may eventually aggravate the team enough to pass the vote out of frustration. The increased concede vote cooldown aims to ease this frustration factor.
Methodology for the 30 minute mark changed slightly: now rounds up to the nearest integer of 70% of the remaining players left on your team to determine the concede vote threshold.
The following scenarios now occur when looking at the number of players left on your team:
5 players: Concede threshold after 30 minutes requires 3 players (unchanged from before)
4 players: Concede threshold after 30 minutes requires 3 players (instead of 2 players)
3 players: Concede threshold after 30 minutes requires 2 players (instead of 1 player)
2 or less players: Concede threshold after 30 minutes requires 1 player
The 30-minute concede threshold for 3 players was never meant to skew the vote requirements towards the minority for teams that have 4 or 3 players remaining. These changes simply remedy that issue.
Base Attack Time Changes for Heroes[ | ]
Certain heroes had Base Attack Time values other than 1.7, which allowed them to scale better or worse than every other hero (lower values mean they scale better with Attack Speed). Changing them all to be the baseline value of 1.7 will maintain consistency on Attack Speed scaling for all heroes. Balance on the following heroes can be adjusted in the future if required.
Exception: Pebbles with skill points placed in his Enlarge skill will still increase his Base Attack Time, as he gains a substantial amount of Attack Damage in return.
Magic Damage increased from 100/175/250/300 to 100/175/250/325.
Defiler is currently underperforming. This seemed like a good opportunity to fix the first ability's levelling inconsistency while providing a power boost.
Damage per 100 distance travelled decreased from 15/20/25 to 10/15/20.
Maximum Damage decreased from 300/400/500 to 200/300/400.
Doctor Repulsor has received some indirect buffs through the recent changes to Hellflower and Null Stone. Combined with his previous buff this has pushed him a bit over the top, so he is being toned back down accordingly.
Staff of the Master only: Now reduces damage taken by 50% instead of applying Ice Imprisonment to self for the duration of the channel.
This keeps the ability almost exactly the same without it having to rely on Ice Imprisonment.
The vast majority of the time Ice Imprisonment's secondary "ally" effect goes off, it is not to protect an ally but an accidental mistake. 99% of the secondary effect uses result in frustration. Furthermore, the ability to immobilize and protect an ally already exists in a much better and direct (and actually used) way on another hero - Monarch.
Changes to the Staff effect leave the ability in almost the same state, with the added counter-play of now being able to cancel the ultimate with a Tablet of Command and the added ability for Glacius to use Assassin's Shroud during the channel after acquiring Staff.
Tarot used to be able to do well against heroes with Stealth in lane via her old Far Scry ability. However, she also had 3 point-and-click abilities, making this hero be tedious to play. Finally, the old Far Scry secondary target functionality was rather unintuitive, forcing Tarot to attack another target to maximize her overall damage output instead of focusing her main target directly upon marking them.
Rather than reverting Far Scry back to how it was before, Bound by Fate gains the strong utility against stealthed heroes from the old Far Scry ability.
Impact delay increased from 1 second to 1.2 seconds.
Meteor has been exceeding expectations on its efficacy of giving Tempest players an option to make Portal Key a non-mandatory item pickup.
It was performing a little too well (particularly in the early game), so its power has been toned down to let the Tempest make wiser choices in their early game skill build.
Hellhound Damage increased from 15/25/35/45 to 25/35/45/55.
Recent changes to War Beast's first ability aimed to be a nerf, compensated with the new ability to keep Hellhounds around forever. It seems as though permanent Hellhounds did not add as much power as we had anticipated, and combined with the recent item and gameplay changes have left War Beast in a weaker state.
While Wildsoul's power level is adequate in the jungle, he performs incredibly well (too well, even) when played in the lane in the role of a more traditional carry. He should still be performing very well in lane after these changes, so we look forward to players figuring him out.
Visual glow colour on its active effects has been changed from yellow to red to differentiate it from the Shrunken Head visuals.
Activation sound has been updated to be more prominent.
Barbed Armor is naturally frustrating to play against because it's generally not a recognizable effect until it's too late (particularly in fun modes like Mid Wars).
Rather than nerfing it in Mid Wars, we made its effects more recognizable to more clearly deter players from damaging a target with Barbed Armor active.
Changes to Striders are part of our on-going goal of improving early-game options for Supports to keep them relevant against farmers who recently got a creep kill gold increase to help them.
Block value applied to other allies on its activation lowered from 70 to 40.
Block value for self remains at 70.
Ultor's Heavy Helm's active effect was granting a little too much Physical autoattack protection for the bearer's entire team, so the block values on other allies have been reduced.
Public Beta Test (PBT)[ | ]
Map has been changed to Caldavar (PBT), with Ranked Pick mode.
New Hero available for testing: Genesis (PBT)[ | ]
Genesis is a Legion support hero that has extra survivability compared to most supports. Her Reboot ability drops her Core Crystal to the ground upon her death, and she will revive after a short delay at that location if the Core Crystal is not destroyed.
She is also the first ranged support hero that will gain a shield to help win trades during the laning phase, as well as having an offensive-oriented impact with her kit throughout the game.
Target a location to send out a small ball of condensed ionic matter which travels at 750 speed in the that direction. The matter starts out at a 250 radius and grows by 60 radius each second that it travels.
Upon second activation or reaching the destination, the matter stops and explodes after a 0.5 second delay, dealing 100/160/220/280 Magic Damage to enemies in the area and Immobilizing them for up to 3.5 seconds, based on distance traveled, with a minimum duration of 1.5 seconds.
The matter grants 800 Clearvision at the final destination before it explodes.
Passively grants 2/4/6/8 Armor and 1/2/3/4 Health Regeneration to Ally Structures on the map. Grants this bonus to your Core Crystal as well.
When off cooldown and you die, your Core Crystal becomes dormant, inherits 50% of your Max Health, and begins to Reboot over 5 seconds. Destroying the Dormant Core Crystal will cancel the Reboot and truly kill you.
If successful, the reboot fully revives your hero and refreshes the cooldowns of Core Blast and Offensive Defense Matrix but puts this ability on cooldown.
Target an area to fire a Core Crystal that implodes after 1.5 seconds, dealing 300/400/500 Magic Damage within the area, instantly killing enemies that fall below 5/10/15% of Health.
Enemy creeps are killed instantly, while neutrals are untouched.
After another 1.5 second delay, heals all allies in the area for 5/10/15% of Max Health.
Destroys trees in the target area.
Hero Reworks (PBT)[ | ]
Nitro (Reworked)
Nitro's fire-while-moving mechanic is conceptually broken/imbalanced and frustrating to deal with in this game, making her high-highs too distinct from the other levels of performance.
The rework maintains her hit-and-run mechanic and makes her kit much more fun overall, but allows both the Nitro player and other players in the game to interact with her more fairly.
Now has default auto-attack behaviour.
Stats
Strength: 18 + 1.5 per level
Agility: 22 + 3.5 per level (Primary)
Intelligence: 18 + 2.2 per level
Attack Range: 600
Movement Speed: 280
Starting Armor: 2.08
Starting Attack Damage: 40-47
Abilities
Blast Off (Reworked)
Mana Cost: 110/120/130/140
Cooldown: 15 seconds
Target a cone area to blast all enemy units backwards with an explosive shell over 1 second, Stunning & displacing them 600 units away from Nitro, dealing 70/140/210/280 Magic Damage and applying a 25% Movement Speed Slow for 1/1.5/2/2.5 seconds after.
Ballistic (Reworked)
Range: 600
Mana Cost: 10
Causes attacks to spawn 3 shrapnel behind the target for up to 8 seconds. Shrapnel explodes when touched by an enemy unit, dealing 10/16/22/28 Magic Damage.
Passively gains a bonus 40/60/80/100 Movement Speed when there are no enemies within 300 radius.
Overdrive (Reworked)
Mana Cost: 100/125/150
Cooldown: 100/80/60 seconds
Target an enemy to focus on them for up to 20 seconds.
While focused, you will continuously attack the target with 400 bonus Attack Speed, even while moving, but deal 50/40/30% less Damage to it. Activate the ability again during the effect to stop shooting the target.
Heroes (PBT)[ | ]
Pestilence
Flight
Secondary activation fly range reduced from 1200 to 450/700/950/1200.
This prevents Pestilence from being overwhelmingly powerful until he invests more points into Flight.
Grants: +3 Strength, +3 Agility, +6 Intelligence, +5 Health Regeneration.
Range: 6000
Radius: 600
Mana Cost: 25
Cooldown: 120 seconds.
Active: Applies Rally's Edict to non-hero units in the target area. The buff lasts until they die.
Rally's Edict: +150% Attack Damage vs Non-Hero units, +100% Attack Damage vs Structures, Effects are halved if within 600 range of an ally hero.
Rally's Edict is an item that is meant to promote split-pushing without having to invest a significant amount of gold, making it a good option for pusher heroes.
Grants: +7 Strength, +7 Agility, +10 Intelligence, +50% Mana Regeneration
Mana Cost: 50
Cooldown: 20 seconds
Activate to gain Magic Immunity and Disarm self for 3 seconds.
This item contains an Activation Modifier. Using this item disables other items with this modifier for the duration.
Ophelia's Pact (New Supplies Item)
Costs 200 . Can only be purchased once per player.
Upon being purchased it is instantly consumed and creates a one-time passive quest for the player: Stack 6 neutral camps, place 3 File:Wards of Sight.jpgWards of Sight, counter a Ward of Sight once.
Upon completion of the quest the player is offered 3 choices (and can only pick one) as a reward: +20 Attack Damage / 700 / +6 to Strength, Agility and Intelligence.
Grants: +7 Strength, +7 Agility, +10 Intelligence, +50% Mana Regeneration
Mana Cost: 50
Cooldown: 20 seconds
Activate to gain Physical Immunity and Disarm self for 3 seconds.
This item contains an Activation Modifier. Using this item disables other items with this modifier for the duration.
Arcane Nullifier & Void Talisman aim to provide support heroes an early, cheap defensive option against a particular type of damage.
Nome's Wisdom
Reverted to the regular mode version.
Items - Other (PBT)[ | ]
Armor of the Mad Mage
Can now activate to grant yourself 60 Armor that tapers off over 6 seconds.
Armor of the Mad Mage lacks incentive for a particular set of tanky Intelligence heroes that like to stay in the middle of a fight to pick up this item. The former Ultor's Heavy Plate active has been transferred onto this item to fill this need.
The Blade of Spades excels at disrupting the balance of power among the four suits by using his tremendous strength and resolve to overcome seemingly more powerful sets of adversaries. He's always looking for ways to draw -- or drag -- his opponents into confrontations in which they think they are guaranteed victory, only to realize too late they are woefully outmatched. They are lucky if he gives them the opportunity to fold -- most victims end up losing their cards, chips, and heads.
Burn Club Pyro despises hackers and cheaters of all kinds -- bottom dealers, colluders, mechanics, muckers -- and while her preferred method of dealing with them may seem extreme to some, burning down entire decks, tables, and arenas does prove quite effective. A lot of mischief can be avoided by simply burning the top card on the deck, but sometimes a proper message needs to be sent to the troublemakers and other suits to make sure they don't even think about trying any funny stuff.
Though they bring different playing styles to the table, these two wild cards are both infamous for being ready to go all-in, day or night. When the sun is up they use a more defensive strategy to get a feel for their adversaries and prepare to exploit any weaknesses they uncover. But then, once the sun goes down, it's time to strike. That's when they really raise the stakes and push for a final hand, and there is no doubt they hold the sharper cards.
Bug Fixes & Optimizations[ | ]
General[ | ]
Channelled abilities that can be used while moving without breaking the channel now get cancelled properly when the target becomes invulnerable. Skills affected are:
Heavenly Vault will no longer automatically cancel channeling on its own.
The target's channel spell has a max channel range, then displacing the unit past that max channel range from the target will still break the channel, as that is a separate channel break mechanic.
Now properly credits the gold to the owner of a nearby Ward of Revelation (if available) if multiple damage sources kill an enemy Ward of Sight on the same frame.
Wave of Death
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