Right now, Xal'atath is both a glorious return for Heroes of the Storm, but also a mismatched mix of problematic concepts and strange rules text. This rework intends to suggest changes, as well as justify those changes.
These are suggestions made with the understanding of trying not to tweak her too much from her current identity. For example herr Void Step ability I would like to completely rework, but I ultimately went with a Mephisto-like mechanic, even if I'd personally rather it be something else.
Overall, I have reduced her siege power and drastically reduced her escape potential, while also adding some baseline enhancements that should help push her more unique aspects and talents.
Combat Trait
1
Void Volley
-Damage reduced by 50%. +Deals DOUBLE DAMAGE to heroes. +No longer costs mana and refunds 1% of Xal'atath's mana on hero hit. *MOST IMPORTANT: The ability now casts using clamping, rather than move-to-target.
Quest rework Quest: Hit enemy Heroes with Void Volley to grant 1 stack per hit and increases Void Volley's damage by .5%. Lose 5 stacks upon dying, but cannot go below her current milestone.
Reward (25 Stacks):
+2 Void Volley Range
Reward (50 Stacks):
-1 Basic Attack required to charge Void Volley. Xal'atath now loses 10 stacks on death.
Mythic Reward (100 Stacks):
Void Volley projectiles deal +25% damage and Pierce all targets.
Justifications:
Right now Xal'atath's trait is breaking a rule of the game: Traits do not cost mana.
The tuning of this ability is alright in the context of hero damage, but its ability to decimate structures, objectives, and waves is too much, so the ability has been adjusted to deal bonus damage to heroes while doing reduced damage to non-heroes. The damage to heroes is effectively unchanged.
The quest path now has a consistent -5 on takedown. Right now the 'lose all stacks before 20' feels arbitrary and just creates a weird skew in how she performs in the early game, since how quickly she gains stacks isn't very consistent. These adjustments make the Mythic Reward the more difficult part of the quest to accomplish.
The first reward is too important to her to lose all progress, and the second is also a huge boon, which is why just making it 5 for those is a fair trade-off for the other effects being nerfed, but for the more significant reward, it will now require the player to stay in fights but still play cautiously.
Xal'atath is no longer being granted additional basic attack damage from the mythic as this rework grants several other talents that benefit auto attacks.
Primary Abilities
1
Shadow Mark
-Cooldown increased by 2 seconds. +Mana Cost reduced by 5. +Basic attacks against heroes reduce the cooldown by .75 seconds.
Justifications:
Applying Shadow Marks currently feels a little too niche due to how few opportunities Xal'atath has to land this ability, this ups her opportunities to apply Dark Mark by lowering its cooldown in Hero fights, at the cost of some PvE power.
Mana cost reduced as this ability can now be cast more regularly under certain conditions.
2
Dark Heart
-Mana cost increased by 20. +Radius increased by 15%. *Now plays different sound effects for heroes vs. minions. Minion sound is subtler, and only plays up to 3 times per damage tick. *Enemy Dark Heart range indicator has a red tint. +Movement speed slightly increased.
Justifications:
Mostly just improved visual feedback.
Mana cost has been increased to account for the changes to Void Volley.
As-is, it's not worth taking Dark Heart talents without the level 1 talent, so some of that effect has been pushed to baseline.
Pushing more power into what is supposed to be a core part of the hero's identity.
3
Void Step
-Mana Cost increased by 10. -Xal'atath now returns to her original casting position when the ability ends or is cancelled. +Bonus attack damage now increases by 20% per teleport. *The visuals now help convey what direction the warps go by having stylized directional arrows on the 'triangle'. *Ability properly flips when playing on asymmetrical maps.
Justifications:
Xal'atath's obscene escape capacity is inappropriate for a high damage, high-mobility hero. I wanted to suggest making the talent circle around her current position or around a heroic target (including herself), but went with something that would largely only impact her chase and her escape without affecting her ability for sudden (but temporary) repositioning.
Escape removal has been compensated with a little bit of extra damage.
Mana cost has been increased to account for the changes to Void Volley.
Heroic Abilities
1
Void Eruption
-Ability now has a .325 second delay before it can be launched. -All damage reduced by approximately 10%.
Justifications:
The addition of the delay adds some commitment to the move, but also makes the move more user-friendly, as it is harder to accidentally insta-launch the ability.
Damage is currently just a bit too high.
2
Void Convergance
*Void Minions no longer rush down lanes and instead roam the perimeter of the move's radius until an enemy is within its range. *Void Portal follows Shadow Mark at a rate faster than the Dark Heart, however they won't travel too close to Xal'atath's other Void Portals if one exists, to keep them spread out. +Void Minions deal 50% increased damage to foes inflicted with Dark Mark. -Void Minion damage reduced slightly.
Justifications:
Skill expression is a difficult thing to achieve with summons, this aims to bring back the original design as area denial rather than an awkward low-risk, low-reward pushing tool.
Ties into the Dark Mark to add more flexibility and fit the character's playstyle better.
Minions are now spread out evenly and predictably, making them a bit harder to down with AoEs.
Removing the free siege element from the base kit.
Level 1 Talents
Talents that help define where a lot of where Xal'atath's power comes from in the long term. Anchored Core's radius is too important to Xal'atath's other level 1 talents, so some of its power has been made baseline.
Rundown:
Unchanged: Void Adept is conceptually fine, no need to do anything but adjust its numbers when or if they became problematic.
Anchored Core nerf: Talent's radius increase is reduced to 25% (to a total of 40%, given the baseline change) so that its coverage isn't just free, and it isn't as necessary to justify later talents.
Cloak of Shadows buff: This talent is fine, but after the Shadow Step nerfs I proposed, the spell armor can be increased to 30.
Level 4 Talents
Talents that add playstyle diversity but have a relatively subtle impact.
Rundown:
Cold Feet adjustments: The talent is too unreliable at the moment given its meager payoff, but that said, it fits in well with Shadow Mark's rework as it helps you keep pace while landing basic attacks. Adjusted to no longer only slow marked targets, but instead apply a fixed 3 second 10% slow to enemies hit in the entire radius of the ability (not just the center), with the slow being increased to 25% in the center. The duration is less than the previous iteration, but the talent is now more reliable.
Dark Barrier Adjustments: Right now it can easily be placed on a minion wave and then let Xal'atath take on sustain-based heroes with little risk to herself, while also not being particularly rewarding for damaging heroes, which is more interactive on both sides. Hero hits now grant 2.5%, and non-heroes only grant 1%.
Void Acolyte buff: This talent is unchanged, but since the 'remove mana cost' is now redundant, that effect has been replaced. Now every hit of Void Volley against a hero now permanently increases her maximum mana by 1, a small improvement to her mana economy and Void Volleys's ability to restore it.
Level 7 Talents
Evenly spread ability augmenting options that don't actively encourage singular devotion to a specific ability talents.
Rundown:
Unchanged: Toxic Mark is a fine reward for landing a hard-to-hit ability.
Silence of the Lamb buff: This is a conceptually awesome talent, but the payoff is underwhelming. The silence duration is being bumped up to 1.5 seconds.
Void Summoner rework: Now summons a minion when Dark Heart expires. Its health is equal to 500 plus 35% of the damage the Dark Heart did to heroes while active, including Shadow Mark explosions. Void Demon loses 100 health per second. As it was, the talent lacked all skill expression, this version at least lets the player be responsible for just how tanky their demon pet is.
Heroic Talents
Seen above.
Level 13 Talents
A hefty rework of a conceptually confused tier. Pulls some concepts out of other talent tiers and focuses them around area of effect abilities that can swing teamfights by bumping damage numbers in your team's favor.
Rundown:
This talent tier is being completely revised for a few reasons.
Pull of the Dark Heart and Dark Heart's Protection require changes that create identity issues.
Dark Heart's Protection breaks a very important rule: Instant-speed Ranged Silences should only exist on Heroics or other very specific circumstances.
Crushing Cascade is underwhelming this far in.
New talent Razed Earth: Increase the outer radius of Dark Mark by 25%. Dark Mark leaves a patch of flames in its radius that deals damage. Enemies standing in the flames have their armor reduced by 15. Flames last 3 seconds. This talent also functionally replaces Fractured Reality at 16.
Pull of the Dark Heart rework: Damaging enemy heroes with Dark Heart reduces all of their damage by 10%, stacking up to 5 times, and lasting for .5 seconds after they leave Dark Heart's radius.
Dark Heart's Protection rework: Activate to grant allies within a radius 40 spell armor for 4 seconds. 250 second cooldown. Cooldown reduced by 10 seconds whenever Dark Heart damages an enemy hero.
Level 16 Talents
This tier focuses on greatly increasing Xal'atath's damage, especially trait and basic attack damage.
Rundown:
Marked Resilience is unchanged, it fits with Dark Mark's rework.
Relentless Whispers rework: Now grants a 33% basic attack speed increase for every basic attack landed against heroes while Void Step was active, lasting for 10 seconds. This makes the ability more practical in long-term fights, especially following the reworks.
Fractured Reality rework: Reduces the fire rate of Void Volley but doubles the number of projectiles fired. To wit, the current version fires 6 projectiles over 1~ second, this talent makes it fire 12 projectiles over 2.5~ seconds. This plays more into the nuances of the ability, as Void Volley continues to fire when interrupted and continues to target the same point when moving, allowing you to bombard a foe while retreating and just generally deny an area. Potential damage, stacks, and mana restoration are doubled with this talent, but it can be a bit harder to land. That said, it does give the wielder more time to adjust their positioning around a foe.
If I had to choose a favourite talent from this rework, it would be this one.
Storm Talents
This tier focuses on greatly augmenting a specific ability, with a theme of doubling their potential. Generally it's not a good idea to create talent options that encourage going 'all-in' on one ability, but when you're waiting for 20 for the big payoff, it's usually more justified.
Rundown:
Unchanged: Harbinger's Consumption is a solidly designed upgrade to the talent, if a bit heavy on visual noise.
Unchanged: Rift Invasion is built on a flawed concept, but can stay as-is for now as a fun little gimmick build.
Dueling Orbs buff: Also causes the cooldown reduction from landing basic attacks to be increased by .5 seconds.
Unstable Core rework: Now causes Dark Heart to double the rate of damage, movement, and cooldown reduction while at least one enemy hero is in its radius. This means all Dark Heart talents effectively apply their effects twice as fast.
Paradox Loop buff: Now adds an Active that lets you stop warping and remain in your current position, rather than returning to your original position, letting it work as a free escape and a functional Bolt of the Storm, giving Xal'atath back some of the original functionality, but at a more appropriate time.
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