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Rework Idea: Yorick Mori should be more than just a ghoul bot

Indorfin·10/5/2015, 6:04:29 AM·11 votes·1,376 views

I realize that the ghouls are a huge part of Yorick's identity, and I don't intend to get rid of them. However, playing Yorick has never felt fun. Even when he was strong, he simply didn't feel like a fun champ to play because all of his power was in his ghouls/ranged abilities, and none in his close-ranged brawling, despite being a melee sorta-tank. I think I might have found a compromise; by having Yorick's damage dealt heal his ghouls, and making the ghouls less easy to summon, Yorick players would have to use his close-ranged damage to keep his undead army healthy.

Passive: Unholy Covenant

Every X seconds (probably start around 15 seconds and decrease with level), Yorick's next ability will summon a ghoul. The summoned ghoul is empowered by the ability used to summon it. Ghouls heal for a small percentage of all damage dealt by Yorick (including all ghoul's damage). Each ghoul's health decays, slowly at first, but increasingly the longer it is alive.

Yorick and his ghoul's basic attacks reduce the cooldown of Unholy Covenant; this effect is increased against champions.

Q: Omen of War

Yorick gains increased movement speed towards enemy champions, and his next basic attack deals bonus physical damage. Yorick gains a small, decaying movement speed buff after attacking.

If Unholy Covenant is available, this attack will summon a ghoul with increased attack damage and speed. While the ghoul is alive, Yorick's movement speed buff is doubled.

W: Omen of Pestilence

Yorick gives himself an AoE that deals magic damage and lightly slows all nearby enemies for several seconds.

If Unholy Covenant is available, Yorick summons a ghoul at his cursor's location (within 600 range) that carries the Omen of Pestilence AoE. Omen of Pestilence's slow is increased while the ghoul is alive.

E: Omen of Famine

Yorick targets an enemy, reducing their armor. Yorick gains lifesteal for several seconds. Yorick gains an additional on-hit heal when attacking champions.

If Unholy Covenant is active, Yorick will summon a ghoul on the targeted enemy, dealing damage and healing Yorick for a percentage of the damage dealt. Yorick's ghoul also gains the lifesteal and on-hit heal. While the ghoul is alive, Yorick gains attack speed.

R: Omen of Death

Yorick summons a controllable revenant of himself or an allied champion. The revenant has a percentage of the target's base health and AD. The revenant's health will decay, slowly at first, but increasingly the longer it's alive. After 15 seconds, the revenant will die, healing the targeted ally for any HP it has left. The revenant is healed for a small percentage of the damage dealt by itself and Omen of Death's target.

If Omen of Death's target dies while the revenant is alive, the revenant is sacrificed to reanimate the target with full HP for 10 seconds.

17 Comments

CreationFlaw10/5/2015, 12:33:02 PM5 votes

Who's Yorick Mori?

Meep Man10/5/2015, 11:24:09 AM3 votes

I don't know. As stated before, we have a lot of guys that are good at close range brawling, but not a lot of necromancers. I feel like any new kit for Yorick should focus entirely on his ghouls and try to abandon the current Brawler Summoner hybrid he is currently. Plus, his main problem wasn't his ghouls or ranged abilities (most probably being how simple they were making themselves boring by default), but his sustain with all that. This E doesn't seem to solve that problem.

Big Lincoln10/5/2015, 4:49:27 PM2 votes

imo the problem with yorick is that his ghouls are an afterthought to his current kit -- they don't really.. interact with themselves or him.

it would be neat to see his spells being more about, say, utility for the ghouls to function and give him strong carry power, similarly to how AD Malzahar likes to work.

something like; soft/delayed hard CC to trap people, a spell to sustain ghouls to keep them going, and something for damage that also functions as a 'targeting' mechanic so you can control who your ghouls face when dealing with multiple opponents, possibly on a low CD or with a stack function so he can split his damage between more than 1 target

Smithney10/5/2015, 4:01:09 PM2 votes

Nice idea. The abilities themselves could use some tweaking, but the basic concept looks really promising. :) I'm not a Yorick player myself, but I can see them liking the rework idea of yours.

Now some tweaking ideas:

  1. The ghouls could perhaps work as Elise's spiderling: adding damage while in melee range, but mostly act as buff carriers and meatshields.
  2. Q – I think Yorick shouldn't get the after-attack MS buff unless he has the ghoul summoned (by attacking with the ability), but he should retain the buff for as long as the ghoul is alive. [The Q-ghoul could be a high attack speed, medium damage, low health, low persistence variant]
  3. W – I think the actives should get homogenized: the empowered active should be a point-blank AoE centered around Yorick as well to avoid confusion. In addition to that, the slow could be stronger while the ghoul is alive, or perhaps the ghoul (or yorick himself) could apply a stronger slow on enemies it attacks. [The W-ghoul could be a low attack speed, low damage, high health, medium persistence variant]
  4. E – I dislike the armor reduction, there sure are fairer effects to use. I suggest that Yorick should get a passive self heal from the damage his ghouls do to champions. The active could be a steroid which gives Yorick bonus AD and lifesteal for a duration. [The E-ghoul could be a medium attack speed, high damage, medium health, medium persistence variant]
  5. R – When it comes to Yorick's ult, I think the ghoul could perhaps follow the target like a meatshield and assist its attacks similarly to Lulu's E (including being ranged). The damage scaling shouldn't be so prominent, as I feel like the ultimate's main caveat should be its utility. Perhaps the ghoul's damage could be stronger when aiding his master. [The R-ghould could be a low bonus damage (higher if assisting Yorick), very high health, high persistence variant]

I feel like Yorick fits the juggernaut archetype overall, which means he should specialize in extreme-close-range combat, more than his live iteration. Therefore I think his ghouls could reflect that instead of being a pain-in-the-arse for the chased enemy. My ideas focus on him getting into the combat quickly and surviving there, possibly prolonging his effectivity through death with his ult. However, if Yorick players feel like that wouldn't fit his fantasy, feel free to comment on that!

Kaeblen10/5/2015, 9:56:02 PM2 votes

I've read a lot on the attempted reworks of Yorick in the past, and... Riot doesn't seem to like him much.

One of the things I really agree with them about, though, is that the quickly decaying health ghouls have is toxic to playing against them. Especially with your idea here, having the ghouls remain for 10+ seconds would definatly benefit his gameplay.

Maybe, after their first 4 seconds of life, they lose 10% of their max health per second? That way the healing from Yorick's damage would increase each ghoul's duration substantially. Making their health decay faster the longer they survive would actually be counter to that goal, not to mention being frustrating to enemies trying to last hit them.

TwoD10/5/2015, 8:27:55 PM1 votes

They will not remember Yorick Mori

Bright Turtle10/6/2015, 1:29:27 AM1 votes

I like the idea but I do have a question of whether or not you would add a limit to the number of ghouls he can have out at one time. Depending on the mana costs of the abilities, a full CDR Yorick with the ghouls activating his passive to make more almost endlessly is a bad thought that comes to mind.....

Chespin201310/5/2015, 1:18:33 PM1 votes

Needs a 3 hit effect in there to be passable