Vladimir, the Crimson Reaper (Immobile Mage "Health" Update Proposition)
With all the recent discussions about the Mid-Year Immobile Mage Updates I wanted to throw in my own two-cents on Vladimir. By adding strategic gameplay elements to Vlad's kit I hoped to keep his overall concept intact while introducing meaningful "counterplay vs. reward" themes. I purposefully left out as many hard numbers as I could from this concept so that the proposition would be more focused on concept rather than balance. Hopefully you folks like it! Any comments, questions, or suggestions are encouraged!
 **Vladimir, _the Crimson Reaper_**
General Concept:
Vladimir’s identity as a sustain-mage is unique and exceptionally fun to play, but the uncharacteristic tankyness that his passive and [w] provide make him dreadfully frustrating to play against given his high damage potential. The purpose of this champion-update concept is to accentuate Vladimir’s ability to steal a massive amount of health from enemies during prolonged fights while providing his opponents with meaningful ways to mitigate some of his extreme burst-damage. Vladimir’s abilities still cost health, keeping him as a resource-less champion, but they now cost flat health and % bonus health (this would be numerically represented on the tool-tip). This synergizes with his new passive and maintains opportunities for counter-play even as he scales into the late-game.
Passive - “Crimson Pact”: • Vladimir’s abilities deal an additional (x)% of the target enemy champion’s maximum health as magic damage if they were above 90% health within the last (x) seconds. • Vladimir gains bonus health based on the highest amount of damage dealt to a target during this duration once he returns to his base (calculated after resistances). • Vladimir gains ability power based on the highest amount of health stolen from a target during this duration once he returns to his base (calculated before heal-boosting effects).
“Crimson Pact” was previously a vehicle that allowed Vladimir players to buy health-based items without fear of losing potential damage output. The new version of the passive serves the same purpose, but requires more performance in exchange for potentially infinite scaling.
Enemy champions who are above 90% health will have a visual marker for Vladimir and his allies, actively informing the team that Vladimir may want to initiate a fight so that he can take advantage of his bonus damage. The duration of his passive would ideally be about as long as it would take to complete a perfect full-combo, but not long enough to multiple times. The % health damage would be balanced for this as well; if Vladimir hits an enemy with all 4 of his abilities he could deal, as an example, 8% of their maximum health at level one.
The secondary parts of his passive present Vladimir players with a constant challenge to beat their previous “high-score” so that they can continue scaling upwards in small increments. A Vladimir player who focuses on health items will have a larger health-pool that that they can recover during a fight, allowing them to passively build up damage. While a Vladimir player who focuses on ability power will be able to deal the burst damage necessary to recuperate the bonus health that they’re neglecting from their item purchases. This cycle could theoretically continue forever although his abilities would cost more and more health as he develops his passive.
The bonus health and ability power is awarded after Vladimir returns to his base so that he doesn’t gain an unfair advantage during a fight (This may be disabled for the ARAM game mode since you typically return to base after you die and can’t recall).
[Q] - “Transfusion”: • After a brief delay Vladimir forcibly draws the life force from the target enemy, dealing magic damage, and shoots it towards himself as a bolt of blood, dealing additional magic damage to all enemies hit. Vladimir then recovers health based on the total amount of damage dealt.
Instant on-target abilities may be frustrating to play against, given that their only counter-play is keeping your distance, but their reliability is exceptionally important to champions that need them. “Transfusion” is still an on-target ability but a portion of its strength has been shifted to the new “bolt of blood” that results afterwards. With good positioning and a wealth of potential “donors” the new Transfusion can have a considerably higher damage output than the old one (and thusly more health stolen). However if you are the target for the ability and you are aware of your surroundings you could maneuver and try to prevent Vladimir from gaining more health then he spent by casting the ability.
[W] - “Sanguine Pool”: • Vladimir sinks into a pool of blood for 2 seconds becoming untargetable for the duration. While in this form Vladimir can pass through units and all enemies who stand above the pool are slowed for (x)% and take (x) magic damage per half-second. Vladimir then recovers health based on the damage dealt as he rises from the pool.
This ability is core to Vladimir’s kit as it allows him to take a brief respite from battle, like Zhonya’s Hourglass, and has remained largely unchanged. The initial burst of movement speed has been removed, making the ability a little more difficult to use as a free-escape tool. The slow that is applied to enemies is conversely stronger, allowing you to catch-out enemies a little easier. The health is recovered just before Vladimir is targetable again so that the timing of the ability is more meaningful when trying to optimize Crimson Pact’s bonus ability power.
[E] - “Tides of Blood”: • Vladimir surrounds himself with a ring of blood and unleashes it after a brief delay, dealing magic damage to all enemies hit based on their current health. The ring then contracts back to Vladimir dealing magic damage to all enemies hit once again based on their missing health. Vladimir recovers health based on (x)% of all damage dealt, doubling in effectiveness with each stack of Empowered. > • Each cast of Tides of Blood empowers Vladimir for 10 seconds, up to 4 times. Each stack increases both the damage and cost of his next Tides of Blood by 25%. While at 4 stacks Vladimir recovers an additional 10% health from his abilities (does not affect Crimson Pact).
“Tides of Blood” was Vladimir’s primary method for consistently dealing damage to enemies in a crowded environment, and this remains true. The initial delay for the ability would draw a radius around Vladimir and would allow both Vladimir and his opponents to position effectively, similarly to Darius’ [Q] “Decimate”. Overall, the new Tides of Blood’s damage would still resemble the old one but it would put an emphasis on dealing damage while the ring is expanding so that more damage is dealt when it is retracted. The stacks of Empowered remain about the same, although the self-healing, regeneration, and spell-vamp boost has been removed for the sake of clutter (the healing effectiveness would still exist).
[R] - “Hemoplague”: • Vladimir infects all enemies in an area with a virulent plague that causes them to take an additional (x)% damage from all sources other than Vladimir and causes all damage they receive for the next (x) seconds to be stored as red-health on their health bar. Enemies are still affected by the bonus damage from Crimson Pact if their red-health keeps them above 90%, although red-heath is still treated as missing health for all other abilities. • After (x) seconds, infected enemies begin expending all of their red-health and take magic damage based on their red-health lost. • The plague will end prematurely if Vladimir dies while it is active.
Vladimir’s ultimate is a very robust way of letting your allies know that you’re starting a fight, and allows them to follow-up effectively by pouring on as much damage as possible. The red-health system serves as a visual way of showing the enemies just how much this plague is going to hurt when it ends as well as allowing Vladimir to boost up his bonus stats from his passive. The duration of the damage-amplification and red-health-generation is based on ability-level, but the extra damage at the end would only occur after Vladimir’s bonus passive damage would no longer apply.