(KF Archer Spell) Arrow Barrage. Archer racial support ability.

Arrow Barrage
Effect: Area Effect 2: For 4 turns, affected spaces become Barrage Zone (enemy champions and relics in Barrage Zone receive 2 physical, 2 magic, 2 frost and 2 fire damage. This damage ignores DEF. This spell can be further empowered by Volley Support: X abilities)
Artwork: A series of differently enhanced arrows is coming down upon the terrified Draksars, who stopped mid-charge in fear after seeing the incoming doom.
Flavor-Text: "Godwin needs our assistance - prepare to fire! Let the minions of Akakios feel the sting of elven bows!" - Archer Captain M'alresse to her squadron.
Nora Cost: 45-55


New Archer Racial Ability
Nora Cost: 2-3
Volley Support: Fire (While in play, this champion increases the fire damage dealt by Barrage Zone by 1 and causes it to apply charred. The duration of charred increases based on amount of units with Volley Support: Fire in play, up to 4 turns.)
Volley Support: Frost (While in play, this champion increases the frost damage dealt by Barrage Zone by 1 and causes it to apply slowed. The duration of slowed increases based on amount of units with Volley Support: Frost in play, up to 4 turns.)
Volley Support: Magic (While in play, this champion increases the magic damage dealt by Barrage Zone by 1 and causes it to apply illuminated. The duration of illuminated increases based on amount of units with Volley Support: Magic in play, up to 4 turns.)
Volley Support: Physical (While in play, this champion increases the physical damage dealt by Barrage Zone by 1 and causes it to apply eviscerated. The duration of eviscerated increases based on amount of units with Volley Support: Physical in play, up to 4 turns)
Update to ability: Volley Leader (All friendly archers within 5 spaces of this unit gain a rank of Rain of Arrows. While in play, this champion increases all damage dealt and duration of all conditions applied by Barrage Zone by 1.)

The goal behind this spell is to give Archers their special, theme-only damage ability that would let them deal with high-DEF and arrow eater champions without being a brainless option due to steep nora cost. You'd also need to have a fair bit of archers out to cause the effect to be deadly by itself.

However, champions like Archer Commander would boost the spell a lot as they'd grant +4 dmg total. It would act as either a strong area denial, giving you some time to prepare yourself or a powerturn that'd help you kill an otherwise unstoppable champion.

 

This is kind of awesome. Volley Support would have to be an upgrade or else it would be a minor sandbag on certain archers. A powerful and expensive theme spell would be a refreshing change from the number of low cost support spells KF has been getting. Good job!

 

That was my line of thought. I'd most likely add it as upgrades for a few archers who currently have lacking ones (like Elven Archer or Solstice Marksman who is missing a 3rd upgrade in one of his paths) or place it on some archers and make a nora cost adjustment for the ability. (like on Arrowsinger or Bowmage for example)

 

If cast on an enemy, does the damage trigger on your turn and then again on the opponent's turn? That may be a bit too much damage, but who knows?

Also, does the damage happen when a champion moves from one barrage space to the next or, rather, just once when entering the entire zone?

 

1. Happens on your turn as the enemy technically enters the area, same as with Living Vines spell. That's 24 damage from one spell, true. The spell can be always changed to do it at the beginning of your turns, so it doesn't hurt the enemy in this case. Edited to make it happen at the end of opponent's turns.
2. Only upon entering the area - it's like reverse Tendrils of the Deep, which deal damage only upon leaving the area.

 

Bump - wanna hear opinions of peeps outside of KF.

 

As a spell, I like the ideas for having a very 'tribal' flavor, even if it is Class rather than Race, and stuff like that is much to my liking regardless of actual efficiency. As a workaround against Arrow Eater I can just scratch my head as I have no real opinion about it.

For having an Elf-centric focus/flavor/concept I find it ABSOLUTELY DISGUSTING.

 

I like it but it will be abused with Judgement

 

For such a nora cost I'd say that's a smart choice while designing a BG rather than an abuse. Also the only champion with judgement is Judge Torien.

 

Bump, since more people are browsing the forums these days and feedback is always appreciated.

 

Bump.

 

Rain of Arrows has always been physical damage. I would assume the Barrage Volley would represent that. Change it to 6 Physical damage, eviscerated 5 and movement speed slowed by 40% for 5 turns. Damage ignores defense. 35-40 nora. (Thorn trap is 25 nora and that's what you're basically doing). Doesn't last for 4 turns.

Another option is make it similar to Tortun Cannon Barrage, except the effect is determined by the amount of Archers you have.

Either that or take out magic damage and illuminated (Nature's Wrath already deals magic damage and lowers defense), take out slowed and add Chilled 2 instead. But apart from the picture, flavour text and name, need to realise the spell itself has little to do with Archers. You're just bombing the opponent with a persistent elemental AoE similar to Gekaal's basic attack. Combined with Volley Support and Volley Leader, you have an AoE 2-4 dealing 12-20 damage that lasts for 4 turns. Then all you have to do is use another spell to Entangle them, or a split faction spell to impair their movement another way. Not that hard to have 2 Archer Commanders on the field.

 

The idea of mutli-damage type of spell comes from 3 factors:
1. Archers are likely to use ignited arrows, which is where the fire damage came from as the idea.

2. As Elves are the masters of bows, I also went for frost and magic damage types to reflect their abundance of magic damage archers and to make a nod towards frostcall quiver. They also suffer heavily vs high-DEF monsters and having at least a single spell to help them and them only.

3. The biggest issue of archers is lack of a powerturn / area denial spell they can reliably make use of as reclaim is no longer half as good as it used to be and living vines also tend to be ignored by most. Archers don't have a reliable spell they can use to nuke with compared to all other themes, so this spell could serve a double purpose.

4. 2 archer commanders would be +8 damage total so that's an investment of - at its lowest - 134 nora to drop a 45-55 nora spell on your opponent. Archer commanders on their own have next to no board presence as they're a support unit, so you're essentially sacrificing your board to empower the spell in a situation it won't do much.

5. The idea behind the spell was to make it into something unique that ties all archer damage types together, which isn't what your suggestion accomplishes. If we wanted a thorn trap, we'd just play it instead of asking for a spell form of it that would push thorn trap out and make the spell splashable outside of archers. The AoE of the spell does not increase, so I don't know where you came up with "AoE 2-4". The spell deals its damage upon entry and by the end of opponent's turn so it's in full control of the enemy.

 

1. Use Fire for Effect.
2. Frostcall Quiver adds Chill not Slow to the attack. Nature's Wrath can stop high-DEF monsters. As it stands, Arrow Barrage does not even speficially help archers more than any other ranged unit, it just has arrow in the name. It's like saying Bullseye only helps Archers because it has a picture of arrows on it. But it helps all ranged units.
3. Well, Bullseye used to be considered a powerturn. And it helps ranged units, not specifically archers. As far as a reliable spell to nuke with, you will be giving KF as a whole a spell to nuke with, since Arrow Barrage actually has nothing to do with archers, it's just a nuke combined of various damage types. You could very well call it 'Nature's Wrath' since it's made up of different elements, and no one would be the wiser.
4. It depends who has Volley Support. I'd assume Archer commander has it, so each one brings +8, two Archer commanders would boost the spell to +16 damage. If not, then who knows how many units are going to get the Volley Support option, and who knows how high the damage potential could be.
5. The spell doesn't tie to archers. It's just flavor text and pictures. One of the options I suggested at least includes 'Archers' in the actual spell, to actually link to the class. I misread the AoE part. I thought Volley Support increase the area of effect not the damage.

You still need to show what the spell has to do with Archers. All of the other 'themed' spells actually include a race or a class. This is what you're asking for.

Can KF please have an AoE 2 spell that does 2 physical, 2 magical, 2 frost, 2 fire damage, Eviscerated 2, Illuminated 2, Slowed 2, and Charred 2 upon entry and at the end of the opponent's turn. Make the damage ignore defense. Oh also call it Arrow Barrage and put a picture of some arrows on it, because it's for my Archer deck. But, Fairy decks and stuff can still use it, because you don't need Archers to use it, it's just an area denial spell. But for Archers.

I'm not against the Spell. But you can't say it's Archer Themed. It's just a KF area denial spell. That other factions are going to use, whether they have Archers or not. Whether they are elves or not. I would love to combine this with Frigid Barrier. Man, that would ruin someone's day. I'll run a KF/ST BEAST deck with NO archers, drop a Frigid Barrier and Arrow Barrage, watch as my opponent takes 14 frost damage, then deal more damage to them at the end of their turn. Would work just as well with Fiery Ambush. Or Bog Trap. Or Grim Well. Heck I'll use it with my Tortuns.

Nothing to do with archers though. You're just inventing a new spell that you will use with your Archer Themed deck. If you're going to make it a power turn for Archers, at least have a side effect of 'Archers gain +1 damage this turn'. Heck, even Fire for Effect gives all Archers +1 AP, that's more themed than this spell.

Otherwise I could say Sabotage is a Ranger themed spell, because the quote in the flavor text is from a Ranger.

 

1. Already using, serves a different purpose.
2. Arrow Barrage is designed to synergise with archer units only through the class racial - splashing it outside of them will not be half as beneficial compared to other BGs.
3. Bullseye's damage is highly dependent on the damage of your ranged units and we had a systemic drop of ranged damage across the whole Pox. I also fixed its duration last patch so you cannot stack it anymore.
4. Where do you keep getting these insane numbers from? Two Archer commanders would be a total of +8 damage as they boost each damage type by 1, to a total of 4. 2 archer commanders would be +8 so the spell goes up from 4 x 2 to 4 x 4.
5. The spell ties to Archers through the class ability they would receive. As I wanted to make both the spell and the racial simple, I frontloaded the spell itself but I could easily move all the condition effects to archers themselves so you couldn't splash it the way you're thinking of.

That last sentence was really unnecessary.

Spell edited: moved the conditions from the spell to the class ability to discourage split abuse, meaning the spell on its own deals just 8 damage.

 

4. Because before you had Volley Support increases all damage dealt by 1. Volley Leader also increased all damage dealt by 1. The original spell did 4 instances of damage. I wrote:

"It depends who has Volley Support. I'd assume Archer commander has it, so each one brings +8, two Archer commanders would boost the spell to +16 damage. If not, then who knows how many units are going to get the Volley Support option, and who knows how high the damage potential could be."

If Archer Commander has Volley leader, it will add +1 to each instance of damage. So it would be 2 + 2 + 2 + 2. If the Archer commander also had Volley Support, it would be another +1 to each instance of damage, so 3 + 3 + 3 + 3. If there is a second Archer Commander on the field with Volley Support and Volley Leader, that's another +2 to each instance of damage. So it becomes 5 + 5 + 5 + 5. So 20 damage. The initial damage did 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 which is 4 damage. So "two Archer commanders would boost the spell to +16 damage". 20 minus 4 is 16. So +16 damage. That is where my insane numbers were coming from. You have altered the spell and abilities now, however, so it's irrelevant.

The change now is pretty good. And ironically it was similar to the idea I'd jotted down last night to remember today. All you had to do was make the damage dependent on how many Archers you had on the field to determine how much damage it dealt that turn, or something similar, your racial abilities are basically the same. The only reason I've gone on about it is most 'theme' spells are fairly good but require you to actually play the theme. Mass Webs, Anthropod Frenzy, useless in anything but spider decks. Bond of Vashal, only as strong as the amount of Vashal you have. Rally the Herd, centaur only.

You already know well enough that when adding something new, need to consider how it will be used past its indended use. Boundless Enthusiasm has a picture of goblins and flavor text of goblins, but no one is going to say, man I don't use goblins so I better not use this spell. In the same way no one is going to look at the original concept of the spell and think, this is a picture of arrows and talks about elven archers, I don't play elven archers so I won't no the spell. Instead there would be a whole lot of shenanigens.

Fascinate dragging them into the area. Unit with constrict holding them in place, same for clamp (since it doesn't hurt allies). On the FW map since deployment zones are so close, could abuse it by placing the area on their shrine zone so make them have to deploy further away for 4 turns. Bowmage Imbue stun to keep them in the area, etc etc.

The changes you've made now mean tactics like that and more won't be as devestating, and I can't just use it as a KF area denial for my Tortuns. I technically still could, but would only punish the opponent 4 damage at most for moving in and/or staying in the area. It's a theme spell that rewards the player for investing in the theme.

Even though it doesn't have anything to do with this particular spell, another one I thought of is:

Overwatch
Effect: Target: Friendly Archer gains Defensive Strike, Detection 3, and Precision for 4 turns.
Nora Cost: About 40 I guess? Defensive Strike is 5 nora, Detection 3 is 3 nora, Precision is 4 nora. Call it an even 10 x4.

Either way Arrow Barrage is looking better with the changes it has undergone.

 

@Ioden Just as a note I want to point out that Volley Support wasn't +4 damage total, but +1 to a specific one, so maybe that's what confused you. Volley Leader is the version of Volley Support that boosts all damage types by +1, to a total of +4. Perhaps writing Volley Support in one line instead of as 4 separate entries is what confused you when doing the maths.

To further reiterate: If Archer Commander had Volley Leader and Volley Support: X, she'd increase all damage by 1 and then damage of X type she had Volley Support of by 1. It'd be a total of +1 damage to each damage type and +2 damage to type X that she had a Volley Support of.

 

Perhaps barrage zone could also be implemented as an abillity (but a one time hit?), so that the theme abillities don't depend on the spell too much for them to be efficient.

 

For now I'd just like to see it added as a spell to see how it'd perform before it goes anywhere else.

 

That is what probably confused me then. I read it as +1 damage to each element, not one specific element that they were Volley Support of.