The Dota Project - Ancient Apparition
We now transition to the first of the Intelligence heroes, Ancient Apparition. It’s a strange hero, a god-like creature that lives in a void of cold and darkness. I wished it had some teleportation effect through the void or possibly darkness ability. Alas, all our friend has cold-based attacks which will have to suffice. The lore is as follows:
You have been blessed by Kaldr, the Ancient Apparition, an image projected from outside time. He springs from the cold, infinite void that both predates the universe and awaits its end. All at once Kaldr is, Kaldr was, Kaldr shall be. What we perceive, powerful as it appears to us, is but the faintest faded echo of the true, eternal Kaldr. He believes that as the planes age and approaches their final moments, his brightness and power with intensify, and that he, the eternal Ancient Apparition will grow younger and stronger as eternity's end draws nigh. His hold over the power of ice will bring all matter to a stop, and the image of his new form will cast a light too terrible to behold.
Intelligence heroes are usually squishy, but they also have some of the best AOE attacks in the game. A Witch Doctor with aghamin’s scepter and a glimmer cape can wipe out an entire team that bunches up, especially if they have no stuns. Some of the best lane pushers are also found in this group. Anyone who plays the game knows what a pain in the ass both Tinker and Nature’s Prophet are. I like to play a Keeper of the Light to lane push. But we are here to talk about Ancient Apparition, so let’s get started with the Warlock Patron Kaldr.
Ice Vortex
The Dota description is as follows.
Creates a vortex of icy energy that slows movement speed and increases magic damage done to enemies in its range.
Vortex is actually the second ability you have access to, but it made sense to switch it to your opening 3rd level ability. When you first give up your soul to Kaldr, you get access to the ray of frost cantrip, but that isn’t much, so I added the Armor of Ice ability. Since armor of agathys is a warlock spell, I wanted to provide a unique ability, hence an ability that buffs your AC a bit.
Cold Feet
Here’s the description of the ability in Dota.
Places a frozen hex on an enemy unit that deals damage over time, but can be dispelled by moving away from the initial cast point. If the enemy unit doesn't move out of the given range, it will be stunned and frozen in place after 4 seconds.
This is the ability we swapped with Ice Vortex. The Dota description is extremely vague, so I had to come up with something from scratch. You start with resistance to cold. Boring but effective. The meat of the ability is as follows. Get hit by a mean old kobold and you can use your reaction to halve their speed with the power of ice. Not very exciting, especially since they get a Consitution saving throw at the end of their turn. The thing is if the target fails the next round their feet become encased in ice and the creature is Restrained for 1 minute. It’s quite helpful when an owlbear is bearing down on you as it allows you to swing away…or run away.
Remnants of the Void
The renamed Chilling Touch ability is described as follows:
Enhances Ancient Apparition's attack with increased range, heavy magic damage, and movement slow.
Once again, it is extremely vague, so the revised ability gives you two combined powers. First, you can use your action to get the hell out of Dodge and teleport up to 60 feet to an unoccupied space you can see. Even better is what you leave behind/ Centered in the square you departed appears 10-foot radius of difficult terrain swirling ice. When a creature enters the affected area for the first time on a turn or starts its turn there, it must succeed on a Constitution saving throw against your warlock spell save DC or take one level of Exhaustion. An exhausted creature that enters or starts its turn in the area takes an additional level of Exhaustion. The vortex remains in place for 1 minute. Exhaustion never seems that bad at first, but tell that to the poor sap that has 4 levels of extreme tiredness.
Ice Blast
Once again, the Dota description is as follows:
Ancient Apparition launches a tracer towards any location of the battlefield, which must be triggered again to mark the area to be blasted by a damaging explosion of hail. The further the tracer travels, the larger the explosion will be. Enemies caught in the explosion, or who touched the icy ball of hail as it travels, are frostbitten, taking damage and prevented from regenerating or healing. If a frostbitten unit's health drops below a certain percentage, they will instantly shatter.
I tried to stay as close to the in-game ability as possible, so here’s what I came up with. As an action, you can fire a translucent ball of ice up to 90 feet away, where it explodes into a 15-foot sphere of ice. Each creature within the area must make a Constitution saving throw against your warlock spell save DC.
The unfortunate creature that fails their check takes 10d6 cold damage. On a successful save, it takes half as much damage. The sphere remains until the end of your next turn. When a creature enters the affected area for the first time or starts its turn there, the creature must succeed on a Constitution saving throw or take 5d6 cold damage.
But we’re not done. The second part of this ability is where things can get ugly real quick for the bad guys. You can use your bonus action to shoot a solid ball of ice into the existing sphere. Each creature inside the sphere must make a Constitution saving throw against your warlock spell save DC. On a failed save, a creature is Petrified. Being turned into a solid block of ice, incapacitated, unable to move or speak, attack rolls made against them have an advantage, and automatically failing Strength and Dexterity saving throws (whew) all suck. Sure, it has a couple '“benefits” like not aging or that you cannot be poisoned is great, but remember, you are a solid block of ice. On a successful save, they are not Petrified but are Stunned by a thick coating of ice. Being Stunned isn’t much fun either, but it’s way better than being frozen solid. The creature can repeat the saving throw at the end of their turn, ending the effect on a success, but they are probably already dead.
Up next, we transition back to Strength heroes with the Alchemist. No, not the class, but a gnome riding an ogre throwing bombs. Fun times for all.
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