[Gameplay Update] Vi, The Piltover Enforcer
Hello, Concepts & Creations!
I'm a big fan of doing gameplay updates as a design exercise, and today I've revisited some old work I did on Vi, The Piltover Enforcer.
The goal of this gameplay update was a bit multi-faceted:
- Add more opportunities for both failure and exceptional success to Vi's gameplay.
- Reduce Vi's reliance on simply auto-attacking in favor of more interactivity.
- Move Vi away from an assassin-like pattern by making her the sustained brawler her thematic implies.
- Retain Vi's high points, adding more where possible.
- Double down on Vi's theme as a powerful, brutal puncher.
- Ensure Vi mains keep as many of the elements they loved about their champion as possible, while giving them new things to be excited about.
With that in mind, let's dive in.
https://i.imgur.com/GtYayUJ.png
#Back Alley Brawler [Passive]
Ability Description: Vi’s auto-attacks apply Denting Blows to targets struck, stacking up to three times. At three stacks Vi consumes the stacks, dealing bonus physical damage and gaining attack speed for a few seconds. Each subsequent Denting Blows against champions or large monsters window deals increased damage, up to a +100% increase. This value resets when Vi has been out of combat with champions or large monsters for 10 seconds.
Design Notes: Shifting Vi’s old W here (and back-loading the damage) allows us more freedom to give Vi a bruiser-like damage profile and some interactive abilities.
https://i.imgur.com/GtYayUJ.png
#Vault Breaker [Q]
First Cast: Vi begins channeling for up to 4 seconds, increasing Vault Breaker’s range, damage, and speed over 1.25 seconds. Vi can move while channeling, but is pacified and slowed by 15%.
Second Cast: Vi dashes in a line in the target direction, dealing damage to enemies struck and stopping at the first enemy champion hit, displacing them. Enemies damaged have a stack of Denting Blows applied to them.
If Vi dashes through terrain, she additionally creates a wide line of rubble as she exits the terrain, dealing bonus physical damage and stunning targets struck for 0.75 seconds.
Design Notes: This ability is Vi’s signature basic ability and has the most skill expression of her current kit. As a result changes were kept minimal, although the benefit for dashing through terrain gives Vi some cool interactions with jungle pathing and allies with terrain placement abilities. This helps give Vi one of the "unique things" that help to define League characters: that thing she can do that no one else really can. Between this and her ultimate we start to really capture the punch-through-everything feeling of her kit, while letting her use her dash to set up some cool plays if she positions well.
https://i.imgur.com/GtYayUJ.png
#Knuckle Down [W]
Active: Vi dashes a very short distance to the target location, gaining a shield for a portion of her maximum hit points and slamming her gauntlets down in a short line that deals physical damage to targets struck, applying a stack of Denting Blows.
If Vi damages an enemy champion or large or epic monster with this ability the shield value is increased by a large percentage.
Knuckle Down’s cooldown is reduced whenever Vi triggers Denting Blows, increased against champions and large or epic monsters.
Design Notes: Vi’s shield is moved to an active feature to give her more control (since her previous design only has a single non-targeted ability you can use to access the shield), and gains a little bit of sustain and skill expression here with a short reposition that rewards her for striking targets and sticking to them. In-lane it can be used to weather some harass, but it thrives in combat where Vi can repeatedly proc Denting Blows and get larger shields off of high priority targets. If necessary minion damage can be tuned to ensure Vi doesn’t farm too efficiently with the Q+W+E combo.
https://i.imgur.com/GtYayUJ.png
#Explosive Force [E]
Active: Vi charges her gauntlets, causing her next attack to deal bonus physical damage in a cone around the target. The primary target has its armor reduced by X% for several seconds. Additional applications refresh the duration of the armor shred.
Explosive Force stores up to 2 charges, and resets Vi’s auto-attack timer.
Design Notes: Moving the armor shred to this ability creates some choices in whether Vi wants to burst or increase her sustained damage in any given fight by having more armor reduction uptime. It also means that you have to be willing to give up a bit more of your dueling power if you want to efficiently clear waves, which should make lane Vi take more into consideration.
https://i.imgur.com/GtYayUJ.png
#Assault / Battery [R]
First Cast: Vi dashes to the target enemy champion, dealing physical damage and knocking them up for 1 second. Enemies along the way are knocked aside and take 50% damage. While airborne she may recast this ability. If the time elapses, Vi recasts the effect at her current location.
Second Cast: Vi moves herself and her victim to a target location within range and slams them down, dealing physical damage to her target and stunning them for 0.5 seconds. Other enemies struck take 50% damage and are slowed by a heavy amount for a very short duration.
Design Notes: Lowing the damage on this ability gives us room to add some more depth. Letting Vi do some minor repositioning potentially sets up bigger Qs and Es, and lets her bring villains back to her team for “questioning” if her team is close enough.
