Yin Yang Karma Idea
"I wonder how Karma would be if her ult wasn't an 'empower' spell but a toggle. Going from offensive, aggressive damage mode into protective defensive peel mode or something. There's your duality right there." Silven (EUW).
In the above thread, Silven came up with this idea. It's brilliant, and it's something I want to highlight and explore further. The consistent complaint about neo-Karma is the lack of duality in her kit, so using Silven's idea as a basis I'm going to attempt to design a Karma that might appeal to fans of old and new Karma alike.
The basic idea here is to have a Yin state and a Yang state, which is on a toggle using her Mantra ultimate. This would be available at level 1, like Jayce and Nidalee. All of her Q, W, E skills would be the same in terms of basic mechanics regardless of form, but depending on whether she was in Yin or Yang mode, they would have different bonus effects.
Passive: Gathering Fire: The next time Karma switches states, her next basic spell will apply both the Yin AND Yang effects. This ability is on an X second cooldown, but this cooldown is reduced by Y seconds every time Karma switches states.
Q: Soulflare: Karma fires a ball of energy that detonates on hitting an enemy, dealing magic damage to the first target hit and surrounding enemies. Champions hit are marked with a Yin or Yang symbol, based on Karma's current state. --Yin: If an allied champion hits a marked target with a basic attack, they are healed for a small amount and ignore unit collision for 1 second. --Yang: If an allied champion hits a marked target with a basic attack, the target is briefly slowed and is dealt additional magic damage.
W: Focused Resolve: Karma attaches a tether to an enemy champion for 4 seconds. Allies that pass through the tether receive a small Armour and MR bonus for 2 seconds, while enemies that pass through the tether receive a small Armour and MR penalty. If Karma is able to maintain the tether for the full duration, the target is briefly rooted. --Yin: Allies that hit the target with basic attacks receive a short boost to their Health and Mana regen. This effect can stack. --Yang: Allies that hit the target with basic attacks deal a small portion of Karma's ability power as bonus magic damage.
Note: This skill brings back some of the nuance of the original Karma tether and has a lot of power in its armour/mr bonus/reduction, but this is balanced by the fact that her enemy is equally in control of where the tether moves, which could lead to some interesting interactions, where Karma and her target do a little dance where Karma tries to maximise the tether effect while her target tries to make it affect as few people as possible.
E: Inspire: Karma shields a target ally for 4 seconds. (Note: this skill would have a notably longer cooldown than it has currently, as the effects are more powerful). --Yin: Karma's target and all nearby allies receive a movement speed boost. --Yang: All enemies around the target receive moderate magic damage.
R: Mantra: Karma switches states, from Yin to Yang, or Yang to Yin, causing her basic spells to take on different bonus effects. This skill is available at level 1. Additional ranks of Mantra reduce its cooldown. (Note: lowered cooldown with means that her passive can be procced more frequently at higher ranks of Mantra, and promotes use of both states).
The idea of this skill is that at early levels, Karma is locked in to one specific state for a reasonable amount of time (20 seconds maybe?), but as she levels up, Karma becomes a lot more capable of switching between states more freely (showing her increasing mastery of her duality). I was thinking 20/16/12/8 second cooldowns would be reasonable. This would require Karma to make more meaningful choices at an early point in the game (especially as a support).
So what do people think? Does this appeal to fans of both old and new Karma? Does it represent the idea of duality well, and give Karma a healthy mix of offensive and defensive ability? Let me know!
