Shaco, The Darkin Mask: A Rework Concept
Shaco, The Darkin Mask
My friend KingTrez and I have been working on a Shaco rework. Here's what we came up with.
Enjoy. :)
1 Comments
I personally disagree with the phrase that Shaco is a hybrid champion, as hybrid implies you're building both at once. In my opinion, Shaco is just a champion with two possible, very distinct play styles. That's probably what you meant, though, which makes it rather semantic. Useless point aside, here are my thoughts:
I love the idea of giving Shaco ties to the Darkin story; it ties in perfectly with his personality, as well as giving him an actual, comprehensible lore. Darkin are chaotic and relentless, much like Shaco himself. It's a perfect fit.
I don't have much issue with the passive, outside of the slow being basically nonexistant. The rest of the kit is where many issues arise, however.
The Q changes are something I'm not incredibly fond of; the delay will just make it feel a tad clunkier, without adding much to telegraphing-- after all, it's rather easy to tell when Shaco has disappeared, considering you can't see him anymore. That small bit aside, I'm not too fond of the fact that you moved the blink to during invisibility; it just makes him more slippery, since he can stealth and not use it, or blink over a wall after entering stealth instead of having to walk up to it first, which many players will be unhappy about. This especially becomes a point since, in my opinion, playing against Shaco is also grounds for a rework (as well as him not offering much to a team fight).
I do very much like the idea of your screen darkening while nearby a Shaco trap. However, while it's interesting that your W applies the fear after you've upgraded it, I don't think this is very good. You're effectively gutting his only early game crowd control (obviously ignoring the slow hear, since it's nigh-ignorable), and on Shaco, early game means a lot.
However, that aside, I feel like your new E is interesting, but also pushes you too far focused on your traps, which are, effectively, possible to entirely avoid. I like the idea that they have a silence on them, but the same silence may also lead to instances where their mage, which specializes in clearing minions, cannot clear Shaco's minions.
Before I get to ultimate, I'm just going to put out a point that you scoffed at the idea of an auto-based Assassin, yet your only damage that is actually engaging to use (meaning ones that you actively use and take initiate with, rather than something reactive or situational), comes from auto attacks.
Onto the ultimate; the Delusional effect is, honestly, incredibly unfair and unfun to play against without contest. While it DOES technically put power into your team fighting, it can lead to disruptive moments for the enemy where they have no clue is happening because suddenly there are ten enemy champions on their screen. Additionally, you've effectively gutted the interesting bit of Shaco tech from it, where you would become untargettable for a fraction of a second upon activating your current ultimate.
In summary, while you have interesting mechanics at play, you're no longer an Assassin (you can't burst anymore, and considering all your abilities are trap-related, you have no reason to be diving onto people or on top of them). It's also harder for him to capitalize off of many mistakes, since the only real mistakes he can capitalize off of are people walking into traps, which moves him into more of a slippery zone/control mage gameplay. You've also taken away all of his ganking power, and he has no more burst. While Shaco's power for ganks does come from his Q, without crowd control or active damage outside of auto attacks, you're effectively useless, and you've lowered the APM incredibly. Lane-wise, you're very similar to Yorick, in that a large portion of your damage doesn't actually come from you, which is upsetting to play against.