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Plagueis, the Shadow of Death

darkdill·1/17/2019, 9:04:53 PM·8 votes·5,194 views

It's been a while since I've worked on my Dracolich concept, so I felt I'd give it another shot.

#Plagueis, the Shadow of Death

https://i.imgur.com/fFkgNBE.jpg[] Source: https://www.deviantart.com/andrewdobell/art/Zombie-Dragon-120743842

#Background

One of the first dragons of Runeterra, the dragon Vulfeynnax was a denizen of the Blessed Isles for centuries until the Ruined King came and unleashed the curse of undeath, changing the land into the Shadow Isles. Vulfeynnax was transformed by the catastrophe into a Dracolich, an undead dragon of untold power and with a hatred of all life. Now known as Plagueis, he now bides his time on the Shadow Isles, waiting to scourge Runeterra of all life and turn it into a land of undeath.

General Concept

Plagueis is a melee mage-bruiser who must charge up his attacks to inflict their full effects. While his charge-ups cannot be interrupted, they slow him down and make him fairly predictable, but with proper planning and execution he can be a devastating force in team fights. Between his sustain, durability and ability to reduce enemy damage output, Plagueis can be exceptionally hard to kill. However, because he cannot charge up more than one ability at a time, one must plan out a play carefully in order to use his powerful arsenal properly. Due to his reliance on wind-ups, he can be outmaneuvered or preempted by faster-acting opponents.

To alleviate his constant need for charge-ups, Plagueis generates a new resource, Hatred, by dealing and taking damage to/from enemy Champions and large/epic monsters. When at maximum Hatred, he is able to consume it to skip the charge-up on his next basic ability, letting him use it at full charge instantly. Proper management of Hatred will let Plagueis compensate for his otherwise slow kit.

Additionally, whenever Plagueis dies, he leaves behind a ghost that can move around the battlefield, able to scout positions without reprisal and apply a minor slow to enemies. This ghost mechanic allows him to maintain surveillance on those who slew him, and once he reaches level 11, it even lets him respawn at the location of his ghost, allowing him to maintain a persistent threat in late-game.

#Abilities

(highly subject to change)

NOTE! - Plagueis does not require any resources to use his abilities.

P - Undying Hatred

All of Plagueis' basic abilities can be charged to increase their power and, when fully charged, add bonus effects. Plagueis can still move and perform other actions while charging, but reduces his own movement speed while doing so. Plagueis can only charge up one ability at a time, but his charge ups cannot be interrupted.

Whenever Plagueis deals damage to enemy Champions or large/epic monsters, or takes damage from enemy Champions or large/epic monsters, he generates Hatred. At 100 Hatred, Plagueis' next basic ability will consume his Hatred and will be cast immediately at full charge. Hatred will rapidly fall off if Plagueis is out of combat.

Lingering Soul Upon dying, Plagueis releases a wave of death energies all around him that slow nearby enemies, while Plagueis becomes a ghost. In Ghost Form, Plagueis has a fixed movement speed and cannot use Summoner Spells or items (except for item 3107). During Ghost Form, Plagueis has access to Ghost Breath, which can briefly slow enemies.

Upon reaching level 11, Lingering Soul becomes Unlocked, allowing Plagueis to respawn at the location of his ghost when his respawn timer finishes.

Q - Death's Breath

Plagueis charges up a breath attack, increasing damage as he charges up. Upon release, Plagueis releases a dark breath attack in a wide cone, dealing magic damage to all enemies hit. Half of the damage is dealt immediately, while half is dealt over 3 seconds. If fully charged, 25% of the total damage is dealt as true damage. Plagueis is healed for X% of the damage dealt to Champions by Death's Breath.

Q2 - Ghost Breath

Plagueis breathes a cone of ghostly energies, slowing all enemies hit. Only usable while in Ghost Form.

W - Roar of Terror

Plagueis charges up a demoralizing roar, increasing the radius as he charges up. Upon release, Plagueis deals magic damage to all nearby enemies and inflicts Dismay on all enemies struck, causing them to deal X% reduced damage for a short time. If fully charged, Roar of Terror also stuns all enemies hit for 0.75 seconds.

E - Barren Flight

Plagueis charges up a powerful dive, increasing range as he charges up. Upon release, Plagueis flies unstoppably to the target location, damaging and knocking back all nearby enemies upon landing. If fully charged, Barren Flight gives Plagueis bonus resistances for each enemy Champion struck.

R - Reign of Death

Three seconds after activation, Plagueis releases a devastating death nova around himself. Enemies struck by the nova take heavy magic damage over 4 seconds. For each enemy Champion struck by Reign of Death, Plagueis is healed for a percentage of his missing health over 4 seconds, and he generates additional Hatred over 12 seconds.

Champions who Plagueis synergizes with

Leona - Leona would normally be loathe to aid a Dracolich, but the two make a deadly combination. Leona's Solar Flare can give Plagueis a target to engage on, while Sunlight is easily triggered by the DoT on Death's Breath and Reign of Death. It helps that Leona will easily be able to follow Plagueis in on his dives.

Thresh - A very nasty combination, as Plagueis can charge up far from a battle and then use Thresh's Soul Passage to get up close to the enemy in an instant, thus mitigating his speed penalty during charge-up. Thresh can also do a good job disrupting the enemy, allowing Plagueis plenty of time to set up for the kill.

Sona - Sona can heal Plagueis after he takes some damage, boost his speed, and her Crescendo will lock enemies in place for Plagueis to unleash his abilities on. The only thing she can't really do is follow him into a dive, which may make it harder for her to tag him with her auras.

Champions who Plagueis struggles against

Akali - Plagueis' charge-ups make his attacks avoidable, and Akali excels at hit-and-run attacks. She'll be able to easily dance around his ponderous abilities and then strike after he misses. Her Twilight Shroud can also be used to trick him into bad dives with his Barren Flight.

Illaoi - The Kraken Priestess is an enemy of death, and this is particularly the case for Plagueis, who will generally have trouble bursting her down. This means that she will generally win duels with him, and take advantage of his slow speed with her tentacle attacks while sustaining through whatever damage he deals.

Tristana - Tristana has all the tools needed to foil Plagueis' plans. She can easily get away from him with Rocket Jump, and blast him away from her or her teammates with Buster Shot, which can completely derail him if he's trying to land Reign of Death on multiple targets. Then she can pick him apart at range while he's recharging.

I'm still ironing out the kinks for this one, so any help would be appreciated. Just no flaming, shaming, etc.

15 Comments

Alzon1/17/2019, 9:12:38 PM8 votes

It would be such a tragedy if this concept went to waste. Riot would be wise to implement some of these mechanics.

nyakasgoods1/18/2019, 12:08:14 AM5 votes

Not a champ concept the Jedi would tell you

Quáx1/17/2019, 9:16:11 PM1 votes

only issue is that you made a dragon champion melee

Gilgayu1/17/2019, 10:37:21 PM1 votes

I feel like he should have stronger cc than just a slow. He can only unleash his full potential if he charges his ability, but his ms will be impaired while charging, making it very hard to hit.

I think it would be cool if his q can be a "small" cone, meaning it should have the range of a skill shot (1100-ish), but with a cone shaped hitbox. It is kind of what people would imagine when they think of dragon's breath, and it dealing damage in a wide, short cone.... is kinda weird?

His q also seems to be too long. 3 seconds is a fairly long time to not move (unless you want him to move, which changes everything I said ^) What if you shorten it to 1.5 seconds? If you actually want him to deal damage over seconds, letting 50% of the damage dealt right away is probably way too much. So much so that there wouldn't really be a point of waiting those 3 seconds (if you have liandry's and ralyai's, however, that's a different story).

Another way to make an unique q is to make it "toggle on/off," but not the usual ones. What I'm suggesting is:

Toggle On: Plagueis charges up a breath attack, increasing damage as he charges up. Upon release, Plagueis releases a dark breath attack in a wide cone (60 degress, 700 range, which is slightly better than Rumble's), dealing magic damage to all enemies hit. x magic damage is dealt immediately, and he will do y magic damage per 0.25 second until it is toggled off. If fully charged, 15/17/19/21/23% of the total damage is dealt as true damage. Plagueis is healed for z% of the damage dealt to Champions by Death's Breath.

X = 20/40/60/80/100 (+5/5/6/6/7% of your bonus hp)(+25% AP) Y = 8/16/24/32/40 (+15% AP) Z = 5/7/7/9/9% (+1% for every 80 AP)

Cost: (Starts ticking after finished charging) 25/35/45/55/65 first cast, and 10/15/20/25/30 (+1.5% current hp) for every second after. Cooldown: 6 seconds after toggled off

Note: Upon casting, you will do X+Y damage, so it actually is a lot if you go full AP. At rank 5, Death's Breath can do 160(+60% AP) per second after the initial cast damage. Plagueis can move when Death's Breath is toggled on, but the cost will be doubled.

This allows him to become a melee mage-brusier as you wanted, since he can keep this throughout the fight for a considerable cost even if he went brusier (since it has such a high base damage, I wanted to add that current hp scaling so full tank Plagueis isn't always chosen). Tell me what do you think of this "revised" version of q.

I also feel like his ult is a bit too strong. It certainly is a very good ult, and it fits his kit perfectly. But just imagine: Plagueis casts ult, 2 secs later, he uses the already fully charged e, ult pops. Like... how to you miss that?

Personally, I think he doesn't need the big aoe damage on his ult (I feel like that mechanic isn't really necessary for your concept), but rather have it grant Plagueis:

  1. increased ms (70-ish?)
  2. automatically charged abilities for all of his abilities in the next, and perhaps give his abilities some sort of cdr (maybe -1 sec cd for every enemy champion hit?)
  3. some other effect that can be used when Plagueis is in ghost form, since right now he can't do much...

Well, that will be it for my opinions. I know that I might have suggested a lot of things that you don't want as part of Plagueis's kit, but I think my suggestions are... reasonable.

Please tell me what you think of these.

Necro Warrior871/18/2019, 3:56:21 AM1 votes

I think he's a bit too over reliant on death to be useful, perhaps during Reign of Death he goes into ghost form for a few seconds? that way he could be more useful (e.g following it up with the W slow.)

Also I'm getting some serious "Oh shit my entire army is dead from that level 10 lich." Warcraft 3 Vibes on that R son.

EDIT: by death I mean "Being dead" not as in... like your entire concept is bad, I Actually really Like the theme and the gameplay idea.

nasu0101/18/2019, 5:32:00 AM1 votes

Hey i remember this. I see you made changes but you kinda removed a lot from the previous, so he can no longer cast while flying? That's too bad was a good idea you just needed to change how his flight worked. Hmmm.... So many nerfs, expected bur as if too many? I see your sticking to the wow dragon theme but you restricted it to 1 breath. OK

I've got more to say but am out for now