Colossus by Broloth

The Colossus is one of my favorite units in StarCraft II, and I wanted to capture it in Heroes of the Storm from a top-down approach: the fantasy of an immense war machine demolishing structures and annihilating waves of enemies. 

With that in mind, I also wanted to capture the simplicity of the unit. Unlike Phoenixes, Medivacs, and Nydus Worms, the Colossus is a relatively simple unit. 

Since it has an extended attack range, the Colossus can safely fry everything in its path from behind safety while being able to easily navigate difficult terrain. It doesn't have abilities or cooldowns that need to be managed.

Let's get started with the design goals behind its abilities starting with its mount.

Much like other large or vehicular heroes, The Colossus can't mount standard mounts. My initial idea for the hero was to make its mount "passive;" but that doesn't really work well for how mounts exist. So I turned into an activatable ability with a cooldown. 

The Colossus' (Z) is Cliff Walk, this lets it navigate over obstacles with its long legs. It can use this ability to move over walls or patches of blocked terrain, like the hedges in the Garden of Terror. It can also be used to move past other heroes so it can't be body blocked as easily. With how its health works and no other escapes, this is the only manuverabiltiy the hero has.

Its trait is Null-Flux Generator. Protoss units are unique in StarCraft 2 in that they don't regenerate health like the zerg, and can't be healed or repaired like the Terrain units. Instead, they have a shield that regenerates quickly when out of combat. 

Null-Flux Generator splits The Colosuss' health in half. Half is a quickly regenerating shield and half is its health health. 

The other thing this trait does is prevents the Colossus from passively regenerating health like all other heroes can. It can be healed by other heroes, health globes, and healing wells, but its passive health regen is always 0. 

Next, we have its abilities. This is where the simplicity of the SC2 unit comes in. The Colossus' abilities all change how the auto-attack behaves. It doesn't shoot rockets or have sprints or jumps like other units, it just knows how to mow things down as efficiently as possible. 

(Q) activates Extened Thermal Lance. It lasts for 5 seconds and has a 10 second cooldown and increasese the unit's attack range by 90%. I want this CD to be up whenever a new wave shows up. 

(W) turns the Colossus into an Engine of Death by changing the auto attack's animation. Instead of a beam shooting out, two beams will shoot out and cut everything in front of it (just like it's SC2 counterpart). With a 14 second cooldown, The Colossus will be able to cleave for 7 seconds. Everything that gets hit by the beams takes damage from its autoattack.

(E) is Endless Destruction. In StarCraft II, the Colossus unit's animations when it's retrating is interesting because its legs will start moving immediately even if its head is still shooting. Then the head turns around to be in the direction of the unit. 

Endless Destruction ties into that in that the unit can move in any direction while its head stays stationary while it attacks enemies. With an 8 second cooldown, The Colossus' auto-attacks will continue to fire while its moving. This functions similarly to Sylvanas' Quivering Arrow in that it will prioritize enemy heroes over minions or mercenaries. 

For this hero's ultimates, the first idea I had was warpping in units to fight along-side The Colossus, as this hero rarely fights solo. 

Originally, the talent warped in two Stalkers, two Zealots, and a Sentry to fight. All of the units would be controllable like Raynor's Raiders (one click changes all of their targets.) The Stalkers would ranged attack, the Zealots would charge and melee attack, and the Sentry would put occasional shields on friendly units (prioritizing the Colossus, then other heroes, then minions/mercenaries.) They would last until either the Colossus or units were killed and the cooldown wouldn't start until then. 

While this definitely accomplished the goal I wanted, it still didn't capture the fantasy of The Colossus being behind a wall of defense while it blew things up. 

I've since changed (R) Warp Reinforcements to only last 15 seconds with a 60 second CD (causing the CD to trigger instantly) and summon 5 Immortals to fight for the Colossus. The Immortals can attack while moving and will position themselves so that they are in front of The Colossus's "front" (based on the character's actual front) and have collision to give the Colossus a layer of defense while they blow stuff up. The Immortals can be killed, but are pretty tough to take down.

The second ult ties more into the "engine of war, machine of death" fantasy. Disintegration Beam super charges the auto attack's damage by 500, causes it to be channeled as a beam and allows The Colossus to move while it's being channeled. 

This ultimate is strong in that it can be coupled with Extended Thermal Lance and Engine of Death. Extended Thermal Lance just increases the range, and Engine of Death causes it to affect everyone within a conal range of The Colossus' front. 

I plan on posting Talent options in the coming few days, but wanted to get this base hero out as soon as I can for feedback! Let me know what you think.

From a character design perspective, I wanted to give the character a few fun skins that take the character in a different direction. Being able to be creative with a character is just as important as designing the character itself. Without being able to push boundaries or enhance a character's base character design beyond what it is, there's little room for growth.

With that being said, I'd want to see if have some sort of zerg skin, bringing the creature to life: http://i.imgur.com/dIEFkmp.png

I also wouldn't see some cross-IP stuff with things like the fen strider (similar to Murkablo!) http://i.imgur.com/mk22sg4.png

For its Master Skin, I'd want to improve on the idea of its immense technology and maybe add two massive rail gun-style cannons to one side of its head to give the unit a bit of asymmetry and flare. 

1. Death from Afar (Q): While your Extended Thermal Lance is activated, you do 10% more damage to long distance enemies.

2. Total Annihilation (W): While your Engine of Death is activated, your Basic Attacks do increased damage to minions and mercenaries. 

3. Shield Regeneration: Increase Shield Regeneration by 4 per second. Every Regeneration Globe gathered causes your shield to cover more of your total health and increases this bonus by 1.

1. Energy Siphon: Basic Attacks restore your shield for 15% of the damage dealt to the primary target.

2. Live, Die, Live Again (Q): Decrease the Cooldown of Extended Thermal Lance by 1 second for each enemy killed. 

3. Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger (Q): Increase the range of Extended Thermal Lance to 110% but increase its cooldown to 12 seconds.

4. Power Overwhelming: Passively grants 5% Basic Attack Power while under the effects of your Basic Abilities. Each Hero takedown increases this bonus by 2% to a maximum of 15%. This bonus Basic Attack Power is reset to 5% on death.

5. Independence Day (W): Increase the size of your beams by 50% while under the effect of Engine of Death.

1. Mercenary Lord: Siege and Bruiser Mercenaries near your hero deal 50% more damage.

2. Tactical Retreat (Z): After your Cliff Walk ends, your shield recharges for 25% of its total.

3. Ultra-violent Ray: Enemies hit by your Basic Attack while under the effect of Engine of Death take an additional 10% damage over 5 seconds.

1. Warp Reinforcements (R)

2. Disintigration Beam (R)

1. Double Trouble (E): Your Basic Attack hits two targets while under the effect of Endless Destruction.

2. Truly Endless (E): Each minion that is killed while you are under the effect of Endless Destruction reduces its cooldown by .5 seconds.

3. Spell Shield: Upon taking Ability Damage, reduce that damage and further Ability Damage by 50% for 2 seconds. Can only trigger once every 30 seconds.

4. Relentless: Reduces the duration of silences, stuns, slows, roots, and polymorphs against your Hero by 50%.

1. Stoneskin: Cooldown: 60 seconds. Activate to gain 30% of your maximum Health as a Shield for 5 seconds.

2. Blood for Blood: Cooldown: 60 seconds. Activate to steal 15% of target enemy Hero's Max Health and slow its Movement Speed by 30% for 3 seconds.

3. Exploit Weakness: Each consecutive hit against an enemy while under the effects of Endless Destruction does 15% more damage. 

4. Divert Power (D): Activate to double the regeneration rate of your shield for 10 seconds.

1. All She's Got (R): Your Disintegration Beam slowly increases in damage for its duration, up to an additional 500%.

2a. Truly Immortal (R): Your Immortals no longer take damage.
2b. Truly Immortal (R): Your Immortals now last until killed.
(I can't decide which of these two I like more.) 

3. Bolt of the Storm: Cooldown: 40 Seconds. Activate to teleport to a nearby location.

4. Fury of the Storm: Every 5 seconds, your next basic attack will deal an additional 20 (+9 per level) damage to the target, and 20 (+24 per level) damage to all nearby Minions and Mercenaries.

I feel the talents for Colossus are pretty straight forward. There were two things I wanted to keep on track for its talents in particular. 

The first was I didn't want there to be a lot of talents that activated abilities. While certain classes like Brightwing having a max of 6 or so extra abilities that can be used is cool, it's something that wouldn't really make a lot of sense for the Colossus, given its simplistic combat design.

The second thing I wanted to keep in mind was to make sure not to give the hero Giant Killer at level 13. While specialists can have Giant Killer, the fact that the Colossus' abilities focus on its Basic Attack, giving it Giant Killer would've made the character too broken.

That being said, if anyone has any questions about a talent in particular or is confused on how one works or why it's there, feel free to comment on it and I'll ansewr you!