This has been a concept that I've been excited to share for months now and it may be one of my most radical ideas yet. The idea behind this champion is to create a champ whose abilities and actions completely change based on the person playing them.

Last time, we looked at Flynn, the Trailblazer: A rugged trapper who specializes in field control and uses his myriad of traps and stealth to toy with his opponents. Check him out here:
http://na.leagueoflegends.com/board/....php?t=2840595

8. Effrem Doran, the Exalted Blacksmith (the Legend of the Forge) *****UPDATED 05/10/13*****

Overview:

Doran is a hybrid fighter that specializes in extreme versatility, utilizing a variety of weapons that changes his play style to match the battlefield.

Role: Fighter, Melee, Ranged

Stats:

Health: 1925
Mana: 0
Movement: 350
Armor: 65
Magic Resist: 42
Range: 125-525

Description:

Doran has the appearance of a middle-aged man with light brown hair and a scruff of beard. He wears a blue-green tunic and pants. Doran carries no physical weaponry but wears a set of enchanted rings on his fingers. A silvery blue aura emanates from him. He fights by summoning ethereal weaponry, which shares that silvery blue glow. His default weapon summon is a pair of medium length blades.

Abilities:

An oddly simple passive for what is to be a pretty complex champion. However, the complexity is in its simplicity. The idea is to give Doran the ability to swap items in the store with much greater ease than other champions, having bonus resell as well as a purchasing discount.

UPDATE: Reduced the discount percentage to bring it a little more in line. The bonus is meant to be more noticeable with more expensive purchases, so this change will keep that same feel without making tier 1 items too easy to come by.

Probably my favorite ability of his. It just ties all of his abilities together so well despite being rather simple in concept. The weave mechanic seems like it could set up for some really cool plays by giving him a unique style of mobility. I left the weave direction (right or left) ambiguous because I thought it would be cool if it changed based on his positioning or maybe even be random, increasing the difficulty of its use. Still, in my mind, I generally see him weaving to the right.

UPDATE: Just some clarifications

This is the ability that makes Doran as versatile as he is.Each weapon wildly changes how he plays from being a fighter to a tank to a ranged champion. It literally allows him to conform to any situation, but at the same time, he can fit to one's personal style.

UPDATE: I took the weapon time limit out simply because the weapon selection system seemed clunky if I kept it. I decided against the TF PAC mechanic simply because Doran needs instant response when choosing his weapon and his choice is a lot more integral to his gameplay than TF's is. The changes to each individual weapon is geared toward getting rid of free stats. If Doran want to focus on or take full advantage of a particular weapon, he now has to gear for it.

This ability gave me the most trouble. I just couldn't figure out what type of ability I could give him that would remain relevant across all of his weapons. That's when the idea struck me, "why not a different ability based on his weapon?" This ability effectively adds another layer of versatility to Doran's repertoire by giving him a new tool to use in each form.

UPDATE: Again, trying to move away from free stats. Someone brought up that Doran should have more control while in shield form, so I moved the stun from Targeted Strike to Ardent Defense. I revamped Ardent defense as a whole to make it engaging without being completely broken.

Yet another layer. Instead of a new ability based on weapon, Doran can enhance his summoned weapon with an element. What's really cool is that these elements act different for each weapon. As with his weapons, players might find themselves leaning toward a certain element more than the others based on their play, weapon choice and team composition.

UPDATE: Major change here is to Earth, which has been revamped to make it a little more manageable to deal with. If a target was knocked up by the initial effect, they were pretty much guaranteed a 55% slow for the next 10 seconds unless they blew cooldowns. Now, the ability still keeps that positioning control it was designed for while still letting enemies counteract it. The increase to the cooldown also makes choice more significant.

Well, there it is. I'm so excited to finally be getting this concept out and am anxiously awaiting your critiques. In a game that can get really homogenzied, I think a champ whose strength lies in versatility is most welcome. Tell me what you think. Until then, cheers.

Next time: Mole, the Menace from Below
http://na.leagueoflegends.com/board/...2#post35197862
A melee assassin who is unique in that he spends most of his time being untargetable, leaving his enemies playing a serious game of "whack-a-mole" (pun intended)

And don't forget to check out my other champions and send me reviews for champs of your own.

Dragi's Champion index
http://na.leagueoflegends.com/board/...5#post32018055

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I like the idea of Doran being a champion in the game that is very cool. I'm liking the idea of a versatile champion. The only thing is his passive. If he is supposed to be able to change weapons it seems to me he would have to be making a LOT of gold. so he would have to excel as a carry. If not just go ahead and give his passive 100% re-sale value. I don't see anything op about changing items at will. in fact having a champ that could do that to fit any situation is pretty novel to me. Perhaps his passive could affect teammates in some way?

here is my latest if you wouldn't mind?
http://na.leagueoflegends.com/board/....php?t=2907558

I considered having it affect teammates in an early incarnation of the ability by having it reduce all purchase costs by 200g.However, that quickly become OP because nearly all consumables are free or close to it. Also, I couldn't justify him having such a powerful passive and keep his kit as versatile as it is.


The idea for the current version is to give him more ease in making use of the shop but not to just swap at will. Why? Because it essentially makes all items free. In most games, players will only be finishing one or two major items. If Doran reaches a certain gold threshold, say Trinity Force, he can buy any item and more from the shop. Sell that Tri-force and buy a Wit's End and Aegis, an atma's or a phage, or any concept of T2 items. This gets even worse if he surpasses the Tri-force threshold.

So, I kept the benefits of being able to get better deals in the shop, but purchases are still meaningful in that you better know what you want. It keeps him versatile but not totally limitless.

Passive -- Awww, I was hoping for something that would make an all dorans item build work :P; not bad though

Q -- I would like it if you could control the direction of the turn, I feel that would make the ability quite a lot more useful; I'd have it bring up a targeting display like crescent blade (not a skill shot, just to show you where you'd end up) and have it change to hook left or right around targeted oponent depending upon the position of the cursor.

It would help to have a description of what weave does as opposed to roll

W -- Lance will do a phenomenal amout of damage considering he gets two auto attack resets from his q; not sure if it will be overpowered or not

Shield is overpowered; heal 400 damage every 6 seconds, and if not gain it as max health? +105 resist? most regenderative abilities grant a third that amount, and don't have other actives. Futher all other health granting abilities are of that approximate amount, and are champion ultimates. This needs a serious nerf. Cd on this needs to be 20-25 seconds, and the heal amount/health buff should be closer to 200, with the armor/mr buff closer to 50 at max ranks.

glaive -- I'd almost rather have this be some version of vorpal spikes where he gets a line of effect auto attack.

e- stat boosts are really high for an ability with these actives; I'd reduce the ap to 40 at max ranks, and the ad to 20-25 at max ranks. Alternatively granting some % Armor and Mr pen might be nice.

Lance -- It would really help if you started looking at similar abilities to give you an idea of damage and cd; this is Pantheon's Aegis of Zeona, except it has a passive steroid instead of shield, does more damage, scales off AD, and has half the cd and isn't a short range jump. I would make this bonus AD at the least, and double the current cd at max ranks, triple at early ranks. Also consider; he's already got 2 auto attack resets in his q, he doesn't really need another one here.

shield -- LOL OP, most spell shields are on a 20 sec cd at max ranks. 3 is rediculous.

glaive - instead of having people take reduced damage from being struck multiple times I'd just make it so that you regain it once every 8ish seconds, or upon picking up the glaive (sort of like Olaf's axe) damage seems fairly appropriate, but this does have the potential to be overpowered.

Ult -- Q does well over 2000 damage if the ad scaling damage does not crit, OP
W -- % spell vamp/lifesteal values appropriate for season 1; should be 20% at max ranks for season 3(10% rank 1)
E -- AOE of effect?
R -- nice escape mechanism, cd is way too low; something like this should be at least 1 min.

general comment: 20 sec cd, 10 sec duration; will this ever not be up? if so you need to nerf everything considerably (max cdr it literally can always be up). At max ranks cd should be 45 secs-60 secs with some nerfs I think the kit would be balanced for that.

EDIT: The passive is nice, but I'm not sure it would be very good past about mid game, and it's underpowered in lane. Maybe make it global, so your entire team benefits? Would help everyone win early.

Thanks for the critique and as always numbers that I use are more or less arbitrary and designed more to give a sense of what the ability does. Numbers can always be changed.
Now, onto you points:

Passive: In my very first version of the champion I did have it grant a special bonus for each Doran's item equipped as well as had a unique item that built out of all 3. May or may not go back to it. But as I explained in an earlier post, it is designed to give him more of an option to swap out items that most champions do not have. The discount doesn't seems like much until you start actually selling items back.

For example, we'll use Trinity Force again:
- the buying discount allows you to buy it for 3663g (saving 407g).
- You can sell it back for 3234g instead of the usual 2940g (a 294g bonus)
- Taking both of these into account you get an effective 3641g back if you choose to resell Trinity Force. So you only lose out on 429g by reselling it as opposed to 1130g.

That 3641 can then be used to by whatever else and those items are also discounted. So, Doran's gold can go alot farther than other champions. I want smart players to be able to play the item shop in ways that other champions can't. And I think that's a major strength for Doran because it becomes increasingly difficult to build against him especially because he has magical and physical damage elements.

Q: I might consider having him weave in the direction of the cursor, but I'm most likely gonna stick with him weaving to the right in all cases. The ability is supposed to give him consistency in a kit that is constantly changing. The Weave and the Roll are the same thing, just different words used for clarity. Because he's ranged with Glaive, for him to weave around his target would require some serious footwork on his part, so I put a roll in for animation reasons.

W: (Lance) I probably could ease up on the damage a little, but I don't really mind it triggering at the end of Skirmish, considering he'll only be able to do that twice per summon and chaining the summon locks him out of the rest of his kit. (Shield) It's not a heal, it works the same way as Nasus' ult adding that health and him losing it when he swaps weapons.

E: Considering removing the passive all together. (Lance) Again, numbers are arbitrary. . However, I originally had it reduce armor, but that was before I changed his ultimate so I might change it back. (Shield) Meant to be nearly broken. Doran's dealing 90% reduced damage from all sources while his shield is active and he compensates for this by being incredibly difficult to kill. So the comparison to other spell shields is kind of moot. However, I may consider fixing the CD at maybe 6 seconds so he'll have 2 uses per summon instead of 3. (Glaive) Remember that his weapons are ethereal and not physical. He throws the glaive but it doesn't come back to him; it vanishes. I put in the damage reduction because he'll be spamming Onslaught 3 times a summon (more if he chooses to chain summon it). He's resourceless so there needs to be some limit there.

R: (Fire) Not sure where you're getting your number from because he would need 500+ bonus AD to reach those numbers. (Water) I'll probably fix the LS/SV values since the heal is strong enough. (Earth) Yes this is an AoE slow pulsing every second. (Wind) The knockback isn't like Janna's. He only knocks enemies back within the radius. What this means is that enemies in Doran's face will be knock to the edge of the radius, while those at the edge already will be affected minimally.

I'll probably bump his ultimate's CD up to 30-40 seconds since I want all 4 choices to be meaningful and I don't like the idea of them being on different CDs.

cool, other than the fact if he had no strong point, he would be a jack of all trades, master of none. He would most likely lose many lanes or be ridiculously op.

Kind of what I'm playing at. He's not meant to be particularly spectacular in any given role just able to fill it adequately. The strength is supposed to come in that versatility, having some sort of answer to almost anything even moderately so. However, as we've seen with champs like Jayce, there's a fine line that needs to be managed.

A clarification on abilities which augment max health temporarily; I'll use nasus lvl 6 as the example.

Nasus is at 200 hp in lane, dueling w/ someone so he ults. He gains 300 temporary max hp, and 300 hp. He wins the duel without taking any more damage or healing from any other effect. When his ult ends, he's at 500 hp. (Try this)

Max health augments are rather overpowered because they can't be mitigated by ignite or other similar effects, and the health gained from the effect stays after the temporary boost ends (assuming the total would not put them over their lower max health value).

This is the reason riot has only hitherto released such abilities as ultimates, or long duration potions.

I might also add that mitigating the dps of someone in tank stance is not nearly as frustrating to a tank as the resistances would be to their laning opponent.