Aris and Hedra - the Entwined Souls
Yep, one of many multi-unit "pet theme" champions. Ah whatever, it seemed to be kind of popular here lately, so I figured I would toss an old concept of mine into the mix and see what happens. The format will probably be a bit poor and it's going to be entirely text based because I can't visual arts very well.
Aris and Hedra was a concept I had for a dual unit half mage, half support style character. Aris is the Vacuous Soul, focusing on the negatives of the soul and its deep longing, on the flip side Hedra is the Fulfilled Soul, focusing on the positives of of the soul and its ability to connect with and help others. So without further ado, let's get started.
Aris
Passive- Empty Rage Aris builds up stacks of Empty Rage while far enough away from Hedra, at 100 stacks Aris's next spell will apply "Emptiness" to the enemy. Emptiness is a debuff that causes the affected unit's vision radius to decrease slowly over the course of a few seconds and reduces healing received from allies by a percentage, he will also speak directly to the unit afflicted, similar to Illaoi, but much less kind natured. Additionally if Hedra dies Aris will fly into a rage for a brief time before also dying, gaining movement speed towards her killer, and gaining ranged attacks that cost a percentage of his HP to deal the same amount of bonus damage.
Aris as inferred by the last portion of his passive is a medium sized melee unit, mostly shades of grey and black and partially transparent, who attacks by pummeling his foes with his bare hands. While Empty Rage is in effect he grows in size and his eyes begin to glow red while he tears off portions of himself to throw at enemies as he fades into mist. He also uses health as a resource to cast abilities, unlike Hedra who uses mana.
Q- Drain Hope Aris briefly roots himself as an ethereal hand shoots forward from his chest, if it contacts a minion/non-epic monster it will drain HP based on rank and Aris's missing HP. On contact with a champion Aris will tether to them keeping himself rooted in place, the tethered unit will be slowed by an increasing amount while facing Aris and will have their attack damage lowered by a flat amount, after 2 seconds of facing him they will be briefly feared and Aris will gain a decaying movement speed buff for the next few seconds.
W- Decay Aris's next auto attack will apply a damage over time effect dealing %current HP damage with a minimum amount that can be dealt per damaging instance.
E- Hunger Passively Aris will heal a flat amount for every unit that dies within a small radius around him. Activating this ability causes him to gain increased resistances and briefly absorb enemy projectiles that pass within a small ring around him (He still takes the damage that the projectiles should deal, but it negates any piercing effects the projectile might have otherwise)
Hedra
Passive- Soul Link Hedra will bond to an ally after they remain near her for a period of time. While bound to an ally they will have an increase to healing recieved from Hedra, and will regenerate mana faster by half of the difference between the ally's mana regeneration and Hedra's own. If the linked ally dies Hedra receives the "Righteous Vengeance" buff granting her abilities additional effects for a brief time.
Hedra is a ranged unit of medium size, similar to Aris she is partially transparent, however she is mostly bright shades of yellow, orange, and light red. When Soul Link is active a golden beam will attach the two units affected, when Righteous Vengeance is active her colors darken and animations become more energetic and jerky.
Q- Renewal Hedra targets an allied unit, healing them for a flat amount + a percentage of the damage they have taken in the last few moments. Righteous Vengeance- Hedra is able to target enemies with this spell dealing a flat amount of damage + a percentage of the targets missing HP.
W- Uplift Hedra reinforces the targets will, granting them temporary resistances and removing crowd control on cast. Righteous Vengeance- Hedra uses nearby enemies to fuel the strength of the spell, draining their resistances on cast and adding them to the resistances her ally receives.
E- Inspiration Passively grants allies near Hedra movement speed while they are out of combat. Activating this ability causes nearby allies to gain a burst of attack speed that decays over the duration. Righteous Vengeance- Allies also gain a slowing affect on basic attacks, Hedra herself gains a larger slow.
So far I have not explained the ultimate, and that is because they both share the same ultimate, and both of them must still be alive in order to cast it. Keep in mind that Hedra does not die if Aris is killed, but she will receive the benefits of Righteous Vengeance if she was linked to him on his death. Aris maintains a standard respawn timer, however in the event of Hedra dying first they will respawn at the same time. If Hedra has not been slain then Aris will respawn next to her, however if Hedra dies after Aris he will not respawn until she does.
Stats from items are shared between both units, but not equally so. Aris 75% benefit from health 100% benefit from health regeneration Mana and mana regeneration of course does not affect him since he has no mana 100% benefit from attack damage No benefit from ability power as he only has health scalings or no scaling on abilities 100% benefit from critical strike
Hedra 50% benefit from health 50% benefit from health regeneration 100% benefit from mana and mana regeneration 50% benefit from attack damage 100% benefit from ability power No benefit from critical strike
Both receive full benefit from armor, magic resistance, cooldown reduction, and movement speed. Item passives will affect both Aris and Hedra, such as Warmog's Heart so long as they both meet the requisite health pool, however active items share a cooldown between them both, no double Zhonya's or pulling your entire team out of a Sejuani ultimate because you have Mikael's and don't feel like well used CC should mean anything.
Drum roll please. [slayer-pantheon-popcorn]
R- Soul-er Flare Aris and Hedra dash to a target location, forming into a single unit while channeling for the next 2 seconds, after the channel they break apart again to catastrophic effect, stunning enemies in a wide radius briefly while healing allies and damaging enemies based on missing health values. For the next few seconds Aris cannot be crowd controlled and takes reduced damage, while Hedra gains range on all abilities and a burst of movement speed.
Yes, that was an awful pun, you're welcome. At this point I'd like to take a moment to thank everybody who has read all of this up until this point. I've been retyping this and trying to format this to be somewhat presentable for no joke the last 3 hours straight. Originally the ultimate was going to be called Soul Fuse, but I'm exhausted and the sun came up as I started to write up the ultimate on here so I just went with it, hopefully someone found it as funny as I did and I at least got a few cheesy smiles. Unfortunately I am not yet done with this as beyond very brief visual descriptions I've given next to zero personality to these characters, and I want to do them justice. If you don't particularly care for that just scroll on down to the comments and tell me what you think about the ability concepts and interactions here, but if you do then be my guest as I try, through pure text, to convey some emotion here.
Potential character quotes
Aris;
Movement "Another bleak battlefield" "I move ever onward" "Never any rest" "Can't stop, we both know I'll never start again" "Another forgotten landscape"
Movement towards Hedra "Always so cheerful... gives me a headache" "She makes them bloom, I... I make them rot" "A light in the distance"
Attacking "My hunger compels me" "The thrill of killing... almost makes me feel... alive" "They will know this suffering"
Attacking an enemy who is facing away "Where do you think you're going" "They always try to run" "Turn around and face your death, at least for you it will be the end"
Heard by enemies with "Emptiness" debuff "They cannot save you now" "Another soul unfit for this world" "You're mine" "Embrace death, he is more kind"
Upon landing Drain Hope "Look me in the eyes, I want to see the last light fade" "Poor thing, still thinks it has a chance" "Stand witness fools" "I cannot be stopped... even by myself" "There is nothing left in my wake"
Upon gaining HP from Hunger "I take all that remains" "Leave nothing for the crows"
Activation of Empty Rage "That will be your last mistake mortal" "I am compelled to avenge" "Nothing will remain of you, even if the same fate awaits me"
Death "Finally... rest..."
Hedra;
Movement "Of course" "I aim to please" "I wonder who we'll meet today" "I'll be there soon" "A step in the right direction" "I guess we're done smelling the roses then?"
Attacking "Oops, sorry about that" "I don't want to hurt you, but I will if I must" "Please don't make me hurt you" "I guess when diplomacy fails..." "I really don't like this part"
When Aris reaches 100 stacks of Empty Rage "Where did he get off to?" "Where have you been all this time?" "I was worried you got lost, please try to stay close next time" "There you are, you had me worried"
Renewal "Don't worry, I've got you" "Who did this?" "You're safe with me"
Uplift "You can do this" "They'll never hold you back" "Be free of your fear"
Inspiration "If they will not accept peace then we have no choice" "At least make it quick" "They will not suffer for long I hope"
Righteous Vengeance (much deeper more "demonic" tone) "You shouldn't have done that" "That was my friend" "Blood begets blood" (When Aris was linked) "Rest well friend, I will punish these dogs in your stead" -Renewal on enemy "Stop struggling" "If you wanted a fight be prepared for casualties" "A cleansing fire" -Uplift affecting enemies "You're weak" "Your time has come worms" "More fuel for the pyre" -Inspiration "Slaughter them all" "None shall escape my wrath" "Bear them down if they will not fall" -Attacking "You will pay for what you've done" "You had your chance" "I will destroy you if you will not yield"
Death "Aris... Forgive me"
So there you have it, up to 4 hours now, and I'm calling it quits because I feel like it's decent enough to get some feeling for the way the characters think and view things. Hedra has a lot more there, but she's just generally a lot more talkative, so I figured it would be alright. If you made it to this point thanks a ton, seriously, it means a lot, maybe I'll write up some lore for these two in the future if enough people are interested. If you have any suggestions on things I could change up or switch around let me know, like I said this is a concept I thought of a couple of years ago that I thought was pretty cool at least in my head. I avoided any real numbers here beyond the stat list and a couple of duration related things because honestly I have no idea how to balance out characters, especially when there's this much going on. Thank you once more for your time, and I hope you have a good day. Good luck on the Fields of Justice.