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Miandara, The Psyche

ItsYaBoi·4/10/2018, 12:37:41 AM·3 votes·1,652 views

-- Appearance --

Miandara has pale skin, short white hair and deep blue eyes - to represent her Freljordian heritage and upbringing. She is of relatively normal height for a young woman of her age though, her stance and stature suggest a higher level of maturity. She does not walk on solid ground, but rather steps on invisible "plates" created of kinetic force, giving her the illusion of walking on thin air, though the animation does show slight ripples in the space beneath her feet when she walks. She is fairly well built, with decent musculature and a healthy physique.

She wears a long dark blue flowing "jumpsuit"-type outfit, that is actually two separate pieces of clothing, cinched together tightly at the waist, with a simple black leather belt with a glowing purple gemstone at the centre. The legs are separate but are spacious around her legs. The arms are more of a robe style, with long arms cloths and the cloth extending vertically as well at the wrist. She wears simple silver boots. On each of the back of her hands, extending by a thin silver metal strip from inside her flowing robe's arms, she has a small silver circle with a smaller purple gemstone at the centre. Her most notable adornment consists of a grand silver crown, adorned with one large central purple gem, and two small blue gems, one at each side. The adornment looks like a normal accessory, but when Miandara touches it - when using auto-attacks, abilities or in general motion or voice line etc. - the metal resonates with a purplish glow and lines of purple energy flow through and around the crown.

-- Abilities --

Miandara, The Psyche, is a ranged AP tank, who focuses on applying CC effects and applying considerable damage reduction to herself. Miandara must carefully utilize her abilities carefully, to lockdown fleeing enemies or decide when it is time to retreat herself.

Her basic attack animation consists of Miandara raising her hand to her temple and her crown glowing momentarily before the target is surrounded by shaking kinetic force and then hit by a curved string of kinetic energy originating at Miandara's position.

Miandara wields a unique form of "magic" that she gained over many years of strenuous Freljordian training of the mind (more about this in lore). Her "magic" often referred to as "Psyche Magic" is actually a very disciplined and controlled magic that utilizes the full focus of Miandara to be able to manipulate mental and kinetic force for a plethora of effects.

Passive - Mind Over Matter - Miandara has endured in the presence of many foes, and is a presence of wisdom amongst allies. When near allies, she gains bonus mana regeneration and gives allies the same amount. Mana regenerated by her team is also transformed into a bonus shield for Miandara up to a maximum percentage of her maximum health. When near enemies, she gains bonus armor and magic resistance (a base amount increase and an increase based on a percentage of her current armor and magic resist).

Q - _ Psyche Wave_ - Miandara sends out a conal wave of mental kinetic energy that deals 90/120/150/180/210 (+40% AP) magic damage to all enemies hit. The wave then returns to Miandara upon reaching max range, where it knocks up any enemies that are still in the area of effect.

W - _ Psyche Displacement_ - Miandara creates a localized zone of kinetic pressure. After 1.5 seconds, it activates, dealing 100/120/140/160/180 (+45% AP) magic damage to all enemies hit. Enemies hit are then tethered, being pulled together and being stunned for 1.5 seconds. Miandara can reactivate this ability within 3 seconds when enemies are hit to move to their location.

E - _ Persuasive Redirection_ - Miandara channels briefly to create a barrier of mental kinetic energy in front of her and then push it forward, turning all enemies in the opposite direction they are initially facing, and destroying projectiles by distorting them with volatile kinetic force. This works even when enemies are dashing.

R - _ Fortress_ - Miandara levitates, legs crossed, and brings her hands together simultaneously to summon the Fortress. Upon doing this she taunts all enemies around her for 1.5/2/3 second(s) and gains 50/60/70% (+1% per 100 AP, 50 Armor or 50 Magic Resist) damage reduction for 2/3/5 seconds.

-- Lore/Backstory --

An orphan raised in the Fortress Temple of the Freljordian Mountains, Miandara was no stranger to both physical and mental discipline by the monks who lived there, wanting peace outside of the civil wars between the Freljordian tribes. She was a loud girl and the monks often thought she would draw too much attention to the temple.

One particular monk, however, the one who resisted feeding her to the wolves, the one who brought her in in the first place, paid particularly close attention to Miandara as she endured the punishments the monks would give her. She knew full well that she was a loud girl, but she also knew that she needed to endure the harshest conditions in order to be strong enough to fight for her land.

The monk visited her one night and sought to teach her in a long forgotten fighting style, the "Psyche". Excited at the prospect of being gifted to fight for her people, she accepted.

But the monk was silent every time she would go to him, and he would simply meditate in front of her. Many sessions were wasted watching him until she decided to join him in meditation. Upon doing so, she heard a wise voice inside of her head, the monk's, revealing what the "Psyche" was: a mental form of combat, utilizing the full mental focus of the warrior, to generate a force that seemingly came from nowhere. Miandara was intrigued and began trying to learn straight away.

Naivety was the better of her. She spent hours prancing around her quarters focusing on trying to move an urn or trying to smash an ornament with a brush of air. When she returned to the monk the next day, he made her endure the same punishments she was so used to receiving from the other monks, apart from one. She was given the worst punishment of all by the monk teaching her. He implanted a vision of Freljord in flames, the Queen's bow rent in twain by demonic and frozen hands alike. Fear overcame her briefly.

But she realised. Focus. Endurance. She regained her mind and began to feel the presence of the "Psyche". And then she understood. Her desire to fight wouldn't drive her will to learn. It was her desire to protect what she called home; Freljord.

After many years of training with the monk in the ancient ways of the "Psyche", till eventually, she was the master that overtook him; a legend was born in Miandara. A steadfast, peaceful and protective guardian, Miandara will use all of her willpower to protect Freljord from any who meant to harm it - even from those who lived in its regions.

-- Personality --

"Your lack of endurance, both in body and mind, will be your downfall."

Miandara is a headstrong, wise and humble warrior, who knows her own power and understands the morals and principals she must continue to live by to honour and use them correctly. She often speaks as though she lacks empathy, but be warned, she always knows everything going on inside someone's head.

-- Voice Lines and Special Interactions (Examples) --

  • When picked in champion select - "The monks at the Fortress will be pleased to know that this is where my quest begins."

  • When banned in champion select - "What's going on inside your head that made you dislike me so much?"

  • When spawning - "Freljord... I will protect you."

  • When re-spawning after death - "The Fortress was built on sturdy mountains. It still stands!"

  • When casting Ultimate Ability - "Feeble minds are no match for Freljordian might!"

  • When using joke near ally Ziggs - "What's going on in your head... Oh! Oh dear!"

  • When taunting enemy Lissandra - "I see right through your icy shell. I see your darkness."

  • When taunted by enemy Lissandra - "You do not scare me. The monks of the Fortress could do worse."

  • When casting "Persuasive Redirection" on a dashing champion - "Not so fast."

  • When casting "Fortress" near an ally Ashe - "The Fortress holds steady for the Queen!"

-- Gameplay --

As an AP tank, Miandara relies on health, armour, magic resist and a bit of AP to deal effective damage and be able to soak up damage too. The interesting CC in her kit means that Miandara has to use her abilities timed-wisely, to ensure the full effects are carried out.

Her passive - Mind Over Matter - is a useful team ability, which rewards Miandara for staying close to her team and rewards her for getting stuck in to the midst of enemy teams. The bonus mana regen and shield gained from regen will be beneficial in making sure Miandara can consistently use her abilities and soak up extra damage. The extra armor and resistances close to enemies means that she won't get slated as soon as she gets close to enemies. Deciding when it is time to leave allies and engage enemies will be crucial in getting the best bonuses from this passive.

Her Q - Psyche Wave - is an ability that is most probably best used in the heat of battle when enemies are more focused on fighting than trying to dodge the backlash of the wave, which will result in the knock up that it supplies. In lane, the wave will be useful in slowing down fast pushing enemies like Irelia and will make it more difficult for mobile enemies to escape. It is her bread and butter damage ability, so it has a vital role in the laning phase in particular.

Her W - Psyche Displacement - is her quintessential mobility/engage tool for fights, to be able to get in the midst of an enemy team for her ult. Correct timing and placement means that Psyche will get the best engage with this ability, hitting multiple vital targets at the same time.

Her E - Persuasive Redirection - is a really unique ability. Though it does no damage, the potential for this ability is incredible. However, the small charge up will mean that timing and position, will be crucial, to try and catch out slippery dashers and to try and destroy.

Her R - Fortress - is a very useful ultimate for a tank and in a team fight. The taunt makes it easier to lock down foes and the damage reduction means that she won't be punished too hard for using it in the middle of a whole enemy team - especially in the unfortunate event that Miandara is the only one there at the present time. However, the difficulty with this ability is trying to get in the position where her ult is most effective, meaning that Miandara will have to rely on either her own displacement effects or the lock down of her team.

Generally, the focus for levelling abilities will go as follows, maximising in order of importance: R > Q > W > E. Obviously, ranking up her ult at the appropriate levels will be crucial in gaining extra taunt time and damage reduction for team fights. The Q then will be the first basic ability maxed as it is crucial for laning phase with wave clear and champion trade offs. The W is also a nice damage ability and will be focused second for its strong initiation potential. Finally, the E, because its sole purpose is for redirection and projectile destruction, will be maxed last - which will reduce its cooldown and mana cost primarily.

A typical combination of her abilities would be E > W > Q. The E would make sure that enemies aren't too quick to escape her area of effect lock down and may be useful in keeping enemies within the area of "Psyche Displacement". The stun from her W will then be helpful in getting both hits from her Q wave.

With her ultimate, a combo may consist of E > W > W > R > Q. The E may be useful in trying to claw back any escaping stragglers so that she can lock down the maximum number of targets with her W. Then, the W recast will get Psyche in the right position to unleash her ultimate. The Q wave might just be helpful in dealing final ticks of damage to surviving enemies. Her ult gameplay relies much more heavily on her teammates to deal the damage than her.

Overall, Miandara is a very durable champion, with a good mix of interesting CC that works nicely together to control enemy teams. Miandara's main focus will be to lock down enemies long enough using AOE CC for her damage dealers to fire away uninterrupted and for Miandara to control her own position in the heat of battle.

-- Champions that she works well with --

Bard - Bard's ultimate and tunnel ability might make the perfect tool for Miandara to use to flank enemies for a perfect and well-timed use of "Fortress". Also, a combination of his and her stuns can lock down enemies for a noticeable amount of time together.

Orianna - Orianna's ult will work really nicely with both "Psyche Displacement" and "Fortress" as the consistent grouping of enemies by both Orianna and Miandara will make enemies locked down and more vulnerable for longer.

Braum - Braum's range of CC and projectile stoppers work in sync with Miandara's own. His knock up in his ult and the huge area of effect slow will make a good opportunity for either a "Fortress", "Psyche Wave" or "Psyche Displacement" from Miandara.

-- Champions that work well against her --

Yasuo - Though a "Persuasive Redirection" may put an abrupt stop to Yasuo's dashing, as it is classed as a projectile, his wind wall will be able to block it and he can continue to dash through and around Miandara so she gets a pretty bad migraine.

Morgana - Morgana's single target lockdown and CC immunity spell can be nightmarish for Miandara, stopping her from recasting "Psyche Displacement" and stopping it even grouping enemies in the first place.

Kassadin - Kassadin's blinks make it easier for him to dodge her CC spells and it completely bypasses her "Persuasive Redirection". Also, the temporary magic damage shield he gets from his own Q will be a nice little counter shield to Miandara's damage.

Thank you for taking the time to read my character creation, a lot of time has gone into creating this and I really hope you like it, please comment what you think of it and upvote it so Riot possibly sees it!

9 Comments

Morotikiasis4/10/2018, 9:02:47 AM2 votes

I really didn't want to say anything, but I can't stop myself. I see multiple things that just don't work.

Ranged tanks don't work all that well. Their kits are better suited for melee where they can body block. A ranged tank can't defend as well as a melee tank. If the enemy adc has a item 3085 and your right next to the allies that you're suppose to be protecting things go wrong fast and that's not even mentioning aoe mages. You have to be the wall between the enemy and your ranged allies. Shen counters this with his w, but this champ doesn't have anything like that. Being ranged also means your base stats have to be lower since you have safety in distance.

I didn't see that the champ was a ranged tank until after I read the abilities, but when I read the abilities I got the vibe that other than the q and the passive the kit felt like a melee kit.

Passive - For a long range artillery mage this would work very well, but not for a tank. Losing mana for a shield isn't bad, but the number is way to low too matter. I did rough estimates and the best shield your getting is from 400 to 500. This shield isn't good for two reasons. You have less resistances than most tanks because it took item 3027 , item 3040 , item 3025 , item 3001 , and item 3800 . Your defensive stats aren't high enough to make the shield last very long. And you need that item 3800 to get close to the enemy. I'll explain why later. That shield is gone before you even get into a good position and you have to blow seraphs right away so that you aren't shredded like butter.

Q - The thing about a blitz hook is that it pulls that single target to the team and places them far from their defensive line. In Smite there is a tank with this very same ability. Your champ doesn't isolate the enemy and you have no mobility unlike Smite's tank. If the enemy tank blocks the spell, the back line suffers nothing. If you somehow do hit the back line, you're in the front lines and have negated your ranged stature, but like I mentioned with the passive you have no real resistances if you maximized your mana. Sure you have your W to perform that knockup, but you are also right next to the enemy tank and can get cc'd. Your q isn't stunning for very long and you aren't dealing damage to make it even worth being so far from your team. Pick potential is good against one or two enemies, but a full team fight and it becomes useless since you have no way to quickly reposition.

W - I don't see how this ability is timing based. Sure in the midst of chaos it works well, but it's a cone, so it's bound to do well. However, your only lock down from a distance is your q which can be body blocked. To get the most out of it you have to flank which is a slow walk unless there's a ward for teleporting. It's otherwise useless if it doesn't travel fast enough so that it can't be outrun or if it's range is any shorter than 500 units which is the shortest adc auto attack range. Against melee it isn't all that effective as cone abilities can be sidestepped more easily when the enemy is in your face. This ability is basically an anti engage and possibly an anti disengage in the best of cases.

E - Reflecting projectiles is a cool idea, but turning enemies and redirecting dashes is hard to pull off. In a game like league, turning an enemies position means nothing since players constantly click to reposition themselves and if the barrier constantly turns them away, it might as well be a wall. Turning an enemy dash around requires a fair amount of timing to pull off and you're not going to throw an enemy dashing away back into your team unless the fight was won without you and you could walk behind the enemy who probably would just flash past you or would dash some other way, the E not even being the real deterrent. This spell is just useful for redirecting projectiles, but that runs into a problem as well. You can't redirect a targeted attack. That's why Braum and Yasuo destroy the projectile. The lux q is bouncing away, but that kog'maw's autos are still going to reach the target.

Ult - This is basically Galio's w combined with Alistar's Ult's dmg reduction. It's cool, but you have no way to reliably get close with your other spells. This is why I mentioned item 3800. Without that, or a sivir/kled ult, you aren't getting close enough to ult the enemy before dying. It's otherwise not bad and the dmg reduction is sorely needed since you put priority into the passive shield. The mana comes out to about 9-12 percent additional dmg reduction, so it's pretty bad without all that base reduction.

You abilities also deal no damage to ever feel effective. IMO tanks shouldn't deal damage, but as things stand you kinda need damage to feel effective. What this brings to the table is brought by other champs and is executed better. Ori wants a ball carrier like malphite or zac to engage. Once that happens you aren't needed as follow up since the ball carrier normally has the cc for follow up. If there is an ori, you are probably a support as you'd get fucked in top with that weak damage meaning that you don't have the gold to build like a tank or a mage. You have to be mid to be gold efficient, but that means no Ori. You would work well with a Braum since he can knockup and slow the enemy, but he too needs some help to get a good position for his ult and his barrier makes your obsolete. To be honest, a Galio would work much better in mid than you would. He has engage and follow up plus can go top for an ori to be mid and then a braum could be bot with a j4 jungle. Replacing anyone with your champ makes things fall apart since you bring no damage and are only good for single target lock down without your ult. If you were the only tank, your team would have no engage or defensive line if you play to your kit's ideals. Other tanks just do it better and work more efficiently with other champs. At best you're only anti-engage and disengage meaning you really only work with siege comps and skirmish comps, both of which don't seem to be the intended team setup that you envisioned. You're good against assassins, but a good assassin waits for isolated enemies or enemies who already blew their spells.

My advice would be a stronger passive ratio and a more range focused idea. Immobile tanks can exist, but as it stands your champ doesn't bring anything to the table with this kit. A body blocked psychic falls apart in theme and playstyle fast. If you altered the kit to be more about displacement (messing with enemy position) you could pull off a defensive support style that doesn't deal much damage but can allow for safe retreat or make it so enemies can't easily disengage when they already have some distance. If you still want to stick with the melee abilities, then you have to think about how a psychic would use their power to bring enemies to them.

I love that you poured a lot into this concept. I love making concepts too and I think psychics can be really cool when done right. I hope you don't see this as rude because I want to see you pull off something even better. I just see too many weakness and a lack of uniqueness that keeps Miandara from being an effective and fun tank that players would like to play on the regular. Please don't hate me for this and just consider a rework to achieve your vision of a psychic tank.

10001101110110114/10/2018, 8:21:22 PM1 votes

I love the idea of a mental mage! Riot has really gotten pigeonholed into the hextech mindset that smart people build stuff; smart people should be able to be mages too! The idea of discipline and control/focus seems more in line with Ionia's theme of balance and compassion than with freljord's stark life-or-death theme, but frost themes do fit the idea of a control tank. That said, when I think psionicist I picture a control mage, so there is are some small thematic disconnects there, at least for me.

Passive: This reminds me a bit of old soraka (mana regen to allies, and grants bonus resistances). This is a tank ability for sure, but it's not a very interesting ability since it's entirely passive. I think that planning out ability interactions, and figuring out the best way to utilize active effects adds a lot of playability to a champion, and so I'd recommend revamping this into something along those lines. Perhaps when an ally hits a champion she has cc'd they regain a percentage of their missing mana for example. The other point I'd make about this ability is it has a lot of 'ands' it grants some bonuses, and grants bonuses for getting those bonuses, and gives you bonuses for bringing those bonuses into situations where you'd want to use those bonuses --- you want to kind of break up synergies across a kit so that the champion feels incentivized to adopt play patterns instead of mindlessly just hovering around people. Abilities are objectively better if they have a strong central idea to them, and do that one thing very well, then you build the rest of the kit so that the abilities accentuate one another and it becomes fun to figure out new combos and decide the best play pattern for a fight. Look to the reworked Swain for an example of a well-designed (if somewhat straightforward) AP tank. My other thought is that this is a really good support ability, and an ok teamfight ability, but terrible if she's alone, such as in a top-lane or jungle role (places tanks tend to shine).

Q: This makes me think of Swain's new w, except it's stronger since it's better cc and doesn't end on first champion hit. Description should clarify whether it deals damage on the way back or not. Personally I'd like some sort of 'mark' ability here which would set up some of the rest of her kit although perhaps this too is too close to the reworked swain.

W: Vision of empire with better cc and a gapclose, honeslty this would have been an interesting direction for the reworked Swain. I do think this is like the passive though, where it has a few too many 'ands.' I also think providing both hard cc from a tether, and a gapclose on the same ability is overpowered.

E: I think some form of terrify ability would work here? it's similar to what you're describing, and could easily fit the idea of a psychic mage. This is a buffed version of Yasuo's windwall, so I'd probably change it a bit to have a more focused/psionicist flavor.

R: I like the imagery, but it reminds me a lot more of an Ionian champion than a Freljordian one. Too similar to old Galio's ult, she needs something that's themaic of her. I think she needs a theme overhaul to give her a better focus/closer underlying theme, and after that it'll be easier to come up with something interesting and unique to fit her flavor.

Stacona4/10/2018, 9:05:30 PM1 votes

P - A lot going on here: ~ The mana regen thing will not feel appreciated by the user or allies and the way it is set up makes it invisible power. I would rework this honestly to something the saves the core concept:

EXAMPLE:

Mind Over Matter (Passive): Range: 400 / 800 units Casting an ability will destroy enemy projectiles immediately near you. Restore 6 - 24 mana for every enemy projectile destroyed, 50% of the restoration for nearby allied champions.

Something like this offers a skill mechanism and makes a mana regeneration effect more appreciated since it grants mana in an stance rather than mana over time. Since this is a defensive mechanism it needs no bonus resistances.

E - This is making things more complicated than they need to be and being unique for the sake of being unique, just make it a stop and terrify (fear) for a duration. This will accomplish the exact same thing without needlessly making it more complicated that it needs to be.

R - Cool ability. Just make it linear scaling i.e. 1.5/2/2.5 seconds taunt duration and 2/3/4 seconds of damage reduction. Ratios you can make it (+2% per 100AP) (+2% per 100Armour) (+2% per 100MR), it is okay to have three different types of ratios, but base value may need to be something like 50% at all ranks as it has scaling.

Everything else for the ability kit. You can include a few more detailed numbers like the abilities' costs, cooldowns and range. Also her attack range and movement speed could be important things to say what they are.