Content
Please note that these changes are not final yet and are more plans than actual changes. If you want to know what is already in, check out the balance section of this news.
Magic damage modifiers ✓
Corruption: Reduces a targets defense and magic resist by X. (permanent!)
Divine: The spell deals holy damage (3x damage vs Demons)
Ambient: Deals addition damage based on its casters current mana
I chose to add those to bring back a certain balance between the physical and magical attack modifiers. (Remember: magic attack did not have any modifiers and don't work with mana or lifesteal.
The second reason behind this is, I can now add those modifiers to certain classes like the Holy Clergy will gain 100% chance for holy damage right of the start of the game since all his spells dealt holy damage anyway. It is also possible that Heroes Imbue will now grant a certain chance as well, as it was always stated in its old tooltip.
Sorceress ✘
Her R ability will be a toggle-able aura with two states.
Slow state: will slow enemy units the closer they are to the Sorceress.
It also gives a chance to freeze enemies periodically, which both can be modified.
Lightning state: will periodically shock random enemies in the area and damage them. It has a faster 'recharge' rate and higher trigger rate than the freeze effect.
I think this adds really nice to her other abilities and gives a little more spell synergy.
Shaman ✘
These are the first thoughs for a new and improved Shaman class. Not everything might be added to the final class, but I think I could share it with you anyway and get some feedback in advance. It is a de-buff specialized hero, capable of controlling enemy hordes, but dealing rather low damage.
Q: Shrink Curse - Reduces the size of one target slowing it. Maybe also Silence and or DoT.
W: Ward Trap - Surround an enemy with snake wards so he can't move. The Wards will have ranged attack.
E: Pacifism - AoE disarm (unable to attack).
R: Passive - A % chance to proc chain lightnings on attacks. Not sure if that is actually possible.
D: Mega Totem - Place a giant totem on the ground that stuns enemies periodically (about 200-250 AoE) and deals magic damage
Items ✓
Some items will have attachment models, which means you can visually see if you equip an item like a cloak or a helmet.
There are currently 85 equip able items, about 10 different ones for every Inventory slot. They also have quite an even rarity distribution.
Posting the exact numbers right now wouldn't mean a lot because I will add more items and then release a new test version.
Balance
Monsters ✓
Monsters will have a more balanced damage distribution across the four difficulty settings and their dps values are adjusted to match their type: core, support, heavy or boss. It is now a bit less harder on higher difficulties.
Monsters don't have the uber damage dice bonuses anymore, but I plan to add more hard CC abilities to them, so the game gets harder in another way and not only by simple and boring monster scaling. Any type of monster can now be elite, where it will gain additional stats or abilities.
The chance for spawning elite monsters are difficulty dependent and their bonuses are player dependent.
A full party will attract more elite monster (and more monsters in general) and they will also have a slight bonus to hp for every player to match the difference in damage output compared to low or single players.
Heroes ✓
After checking the monster dps, I calculated the maximal HP for every class and their effective HP after damage reduction, magic resist and dodge.
It was pretty surprising that their stats were actually pretty balanced, except for sorceress, which is not yet released anyway.
I further investigated the Druid summons and had to nerf their base HP, but I increased the HP bonus they get from upgrading Guile. The first level summons could tank up the Murloc King with no problem, which is very problematic in my opinion, as it was no real challenge anymore. It should be harder now, but not impossible, like with other classes.
Some Images used in this post belong to Blizzard Entertainment.
