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Fiddlesticks Rework Concept / Discussion

OneNightStan·12/21/2018, 2:00:52 PM·8 votes·4,143 views

Fiddlesticks, the Crow Stalker: Rework Concept.

If you're just here for the abilities, scroll down.

So Fiddlesticks is on Riot's rough Top 10 for updating, with Tryndamere, Pantheon, Kayle, Morgana, Shaco, Mordekaiser, Nocturne, Mundo and Volibear. I know next to nothing about updating champions, this is just what I personally would be looking for in his rework. I'm also interested in responses and criticism and so on because I'm wondering what people actually want in a Fiddle update. I also looked at other recent Fiddle rework concepts to see, which is why this might look familiar.

LORE: Fiddle has fairly basic lore right now; just a condemned man resurrected by crows who feed on him. This could be redone entirely, or it could just get expanded on - eg, some spirits forced into the bodies of crows who feed on scarecrows to animate them as a stronger form. Alternatively they could tie him in with someone else; eg, he and Shaco were a scarecrow and a jack-in-the-box created by the same person before some evil spirits possessed them - this could also lead to a Shaco rework at the same time. Riot is definitely better at lore than the players, though, so I don't think anyone needs to worry.

CONCEPT: Fiddle's concept is a demonic scarecrow who controls crows and scares enemies away. He's not immensely powerful, he's just the kind of enemy to retreat from. He's good in the jungle mainly, but he can go in Mid fairly easily, and can go Support or Top if the player is competent. These are the things Riot tends to keep. One thing a lot of people seem to be suggesting is effigies, to keep players in relative fear about where Fiddlesticks is and whether they're about to be attacked. I've tried to use that.

TITLE: There's nothing wrong with "The Harbinger of Doom" right now; it doesn't really fit with his kit or his limited lore, but it doesn't clash with them either. If the lore is updated and changed away from this (say, to my crows controlling scarecrows idea) it could be changed to "The Crow Stalker", or if the lore links him to another character like Shaco, it could be changed to "The Demon Scarecrow". It really doesn't matter much. I don't think anyone will complain about "The Harbinger of Doom" unless his lore doesn't support it at all.

VISUALS: He looks ridiculous, has a strange walk animation and his voice lines don't convey the demonic nature he has like the Twist of Fate laugh he has does. If his model, animations and voice lines are updated, that alone could increase his popularity. Maybe. I'm not a Rioter and I'm not the playerbase.

BASIC ATTACKS: I don't know what Riot plans, but from every rework concept I can find, it seems Fiddle would be more popular as a melee champion, slicing with his scythe instead of firing those weird wavy things (what are they? Does anyone know?), so to me it looks like the players want him as a melee champion. Hopefully Riot reaches the same conclusion.

Right, on to my personal ideas based on all of that. Don't take mana costs, cooldowns or attack damage too seriously, they're just to give a rough idea of how these could be used.Thanks to Elite4Runner for helping me nerf these.

Passive - Scarecrow: When Fiddlesticks has not moved for five seconds, he becomes an inanimate scarecrow (his name and health becoming invisible) until he moves again. He will lose resistancy while in this state, although being attacked will not reveal his name or health. Teleporting, dashing, recalling, entering brush and dying create identical inanimate scarecrows that cannot be destroyed and wither away after ten minutes. While they are active they grant a small area of vision around them specifically for Fiddlesticks. He can have up to 5 effigies in brush. This gives Fiddlesticks a great advantage in the jungle and sometimes lanes, as enemies will not know whether they have just encountered a grave or recall site, or whether they are about to be attacked. Fiddle can also escape into a crowd of these effigies and his enemies won't know which one he is, giving him time to recover. The brush thing is spammable but that's so he can actually hide among the effigies.

Q - Murder: Mana: 45, Cooldown: 16/14/12/10/8 PASSIVE: When an enemy minion, enemy champion, enemy pet or monster dies near Fiddlesticks, he has a chance (50% to 100%, depending on what it is) of raising a crow from their corpse that hovers around him and attacks enemies if they are close enough. Crows have as much health as a small monster and deal more damage if their targets are below 30% health. Fiddlesticks can have up to five crows. ACTIVE: Fiddlesticks sends all his crows to a target, which they will attack for five seconds before returning to him. The active is weaker because the passive is permanently active. This ability will help give Fiddlesticks the identity of a crow master.

W - Drain: Mana: 60, Cooldown: 16/15/14/13/12 Fiddlesticks tethers himself to an enemy, becoming untargetable and draining their health for five seconds into his scythe. This will end early if the target casts an ability or one of Fiddlesticks' crows is attacked. Once the tether ends, Fiddlesticks can either cast Drain again to heal himself for the damage dealt, or attack normally and fire the energy as a ranged attack. This is an iconic ability of Fiddle that I think should be kept, and just altered slightly to make it actually matter by having him untargetable, and by giving him the option of a ranged attack just to honour the years where he was a ranged champion.

E - Harbinger of Doom: Mana: 80, Cooldown: 50/45/40/35/30 FIRST ACTIVE - Prison of Sticks: Fiddlesticks raises a new effigy within the range over X seconds for 40 mana. SECOND ACTIVE - Dreaded Arrival: Fiddlesticks can optionally cast this ability again for another 40 mana, giving his crows extra health and speed and directing them to any effigy on the map. Fiddlesticks becomes an effigy upon recast and Fears all nearby enemies for 0.5 seconds. The crows cannot be slowed but can be attacked and killed. If all crows die, Fiddlesticks' old body reactivates with 25% of his current health. Once the crows reach the effigy, it becomes animated and the new Fiddlesticks, and all enemies nearby also gain Fear for 0.5 seconds. Fiddlesticks loses 20% of his remaining health for each crow killed. This gives Fiddlesticks a nice way of moving around. Although nowhere near instant if cast on a global scale, it's still global scale. However it's not an easy escape.

R - Crowstorm: Mana: 100, Cooldown: 120/110/100/90/80 Fiddlesticks unleashes a swarm/murder of crows at the target nearby scarecrow (he is eligible as a target) that will all fly outwards in a circle, dealing massive damage and Fear. If a scarecrow was selected, Fiddlesticks will possess it after 2 seconds and leave his body as a scarecrow. Five crows will return to Fiddlesticks regardless of how many he had with Murder, and the others will swarm around enemy champions for three seconds before flying away. Another iconic Fiddlesticks move, it just needs changing to fit with Murder and Scarecrow.

I am genuinely very interested in what thoughts are on these, whether they're good or bad, what should be added, removed or changed, and what Fiddlesticks' rework should involve.

14 Comments

Elite4Runner12/21/2018, 4:49:56 PM6 votes

Actually, I really like this, especially the idea of him creating inanimate scarecrows. I think this really fits his theme and works as a jumps-scare tactic which would be fantastic.

One problem that I see with his E is that it requires a scarecrow to jump to. This would require that he had previously died, teleported, or recalled, based on the way you described his passive. If he hadn't done so yet, this ability would essentially be unusable. It might be better to have this create a scarecrow at a short range, or be used to travel to an already existing scarecrow at a longer range. I don't know how I feel about this being a global-range ability, so I think you might need to take that into consideration. I understand that you are using the travel time as a way to balance this, and it does help, but global-range is a pretty big deal.

Edit: Here is an idea to consider with his E, A ground-targetted ability with a 600 unit range that creates an animated clone of Fiddlesticks that does not attack, but moves to the targeted location and will become a scarecrow. The clone will walk the shortest distance around terrain to reach the targeted location. The clone CAN be attacked, displaced, and killed. If killed it will leave a scarecrow at that location. When the player has their mouse over an existing scarecrow within 400 units, this ability changes to allow Fiddle sticks to begin a channel, sending his scarecrows to the targetted scarecrow. If the channel completes he arrives at the new scarecrow and fears surrounding enemies.

I also feel like kit has too many situations where he can become untargetable. You mentioned in his passive that if he is attacked as an "inanimate scarecrow" his name and health bar will not become visible, but you didn't specify if he actually takes any damage. He should take damage in this case, ... in fact, I think it might even be good to give him a vulnerability while in this form. Maybe he takes additional damage, or has reduced resistances. This would actually give enemies an incentive to attack scarecrows that they suspect might be the real Fiddlesticks, but if they are wrong they are simply wasting time as the scarecrows are indestructible by any means other than time. I personally don't like the idea of his Drain making him untargetable, UNLESS he has a VERY short tether range. And returning to his Dreaded Arrival, his current position should remain targetable for the duration of the travel time of the crows so the channel can be canceled, .. otherwise this would become a VERY strong escape ability.

So take these things into consideration and maybe release an updated version with ranges, cooldowns, mana / resource costs, damage numbers .. and I think you might have something good here.

Mr Voidling12/21/2018, 5:16:35 PM5 votes

Pretty sure W is absolutely broken. Having a 5 second Zhonya effect? "becoming untargetable and draining their health for five seconds" that paired with an E follow up is ridiculous. And W normally had a very short cd to help with jungle sustain. I like the idea of playing mind-games with extra scarecrows, much better than just bush jumping ult, but some of the abilities need tweaked. On the note of extra scarecrows, I think it'd be better to make them more like Rek'Sai's tunnels. Destroyable and all over the place. Having like 3-4 on each side of your jungle, and one in Gank Bush down bot. Make them give minor vision, and of course indistinguishable from Fiddle. Max of about 10 at one time? This would allow 4 in jungle, and 2 in each lane late game, if they don't get destroyed. And then make Fiddle turn scarecrow after 2-3 seconds, to actually allow him to fool enemies around corners or bushes, as 5 seconds won't fool anybody chasing you. Also the Q name "Murder" is fantastic :P

Elite4Runner12/21/2018, 7:15:39 PM3 votes

Slightly different idea to add to my clone suggestion. .. If there are no scarecrows within XXX units of Fiddlesticks, a clone splits from Fiddlesticks and moves to the targeted location. If there is a scarecrow within this range, it will reanimate into a clone and move to the targeted location. Doing either of these should still have a long cooldown so that you aren't controlling clones like Shaco does, but it would give him the ability to be more deceptive.

Imagine seeing a Fiddlesticks walk from one bush to another, attacking it a few times, it doesn't move so you assume it is a fake, ... then after a minute you see it walk back ... now is it the real Fiddlesticks, or did he just command his clone to move again? Either way, he is nearby, but not necessarily in that bush.

This would also help to limit the number of scarecrows that he can place within a given space over time. A general assumption for the enemy would be, if you see two scarecrows in XXX units, .. one of them is the real Fiddlesticks.

FlameHalbrdOkido12/30/2018, 5:08:37 AM3 votes

an idea to help with the global ranges in the kit is to just give the global abilities a very large range like Bard, Xerath, Sol, Tahm ect

lov this by the way hope Riot does something similar