User blog:Manafai/Beatrix - The Coordinator

Abilities=

=The Girl In The Junkyard= Zaun and Piltover, cities that experiment and study to no end. How many experiments occur in the span of a single day? a week? a month? What do they do with all the failures, broken parts and accidents? Of course, they toss it all away, only to end up in the junkyard, home and birthplace of Beatrix.
 * -|Lore=

Her mother was a teacher from Zaun. She was not afflicted with the madness of discovery at all costs but could not say the same for her students. Her father was a fairly successful mechanic in one of the districts of Piltover and was assigned to test a multi-tool wrench invented by the renowned Jayce, which he has kept to this day. Both had their place in their respective cities and yet they decided to leave that place, wanting a life different, but not far away. That is when they decided to claim ownership of the junkyard, located slightly outside of the cities' borders and build their lives there. Just barely one year later, the couple had their first child.

From the first moments of her life, Beatrix took a deep interest in her fathers garage. As a former mechanic, the man knew his way around machines and built all sorts of interesting gadgets to keep his daughter entertained. She absorbed more and more knowledge by watching him work until one day she astounded her parents by reanimating a decommissioned robot at the age of 10. Her mother decided to take it upon herself to nurture Beatrix' curious nature and home school her while her father decided to pass on his accumulated experience. The childs curiosity was apparently boundless and with each passing day, through trial & error in her fathers garage and the home schooling provided by her mother, Beatrix became more adept in the field of mechanics and robotics.

The Undercity
When Beatrix had reached adulthood, she felt as though she had learned all she could from her parents and the junk around her. Despite her mother's warnings, in her naivete Beatrix decided to try and enroll to an academy in Zaun, hoping to reach new heights in the field of automation in machines. Her interviewers, impressed with her mechanical prowess despite a lack of formal education, accepted Beatrix as one of their students. Despite the city's poor condition, having grown up with nothing but junk around her made it easy to adapt and at first, she enjoyed learning and tinkering with brand new equipment that was never accessible in her father's garage. It wasn't long, though, before the true nature of Zaun's scientists dawned upon her. She was exposed to the horrible sights of human augmentation, weaponizations and illegal experiments that were rampant throughout the city and yet her fellow classmates acted as if this were the norm. As time went on and the assignments given to Beatrix grew more horrific and revolting, she refused to follow them, eventually leading to her expulsion. Now seeking somewhere else to expand her knowledge, Beatrix set her sights to Piltover.

New Heights
The difference was apparent the moment Beatrix stepped outside the elevator. An illustrious city, machines in every nook and cranny running it as perfect as clockwork. Everywhere was brimming with light, merchants were in abundance, and yet something felt off in her heart. Apparently, her countryside demeanor was very much out of place. Despite feeling the stares of the surrounding Piltovans, Beatrix was determined to apply for a college nonetheless. With the knowledge she gained in Zaun and her accumulated experience since childhood, Beatrix was just barely accepted. At first, being able to study with a guilt free conscience greatly motivated Beatrix, but the longer she stayed the more she stuck out like a sort thumb among her fellow students, not to mentioned without proper formal education she simply could not keep up with her studies. This situation lasted for nearly 8 months before there was no other choice but to expel Beatrix due to a mixture of prejudice and poor performance.

The Bastion Is Born
Now, just like the junk, scrap and her parents, Beatrix headed the junkyard, rejected by both Zaun and Piltover. Though she felt this failure weighing heavily on her heart, the moment she stepped back into the junkyard, it was no longer the place she knew as a little girl. The piles of metal and wires didn't seem like worthless trash anymore, instead brimming with potential she never saw before and a sudden surge of emotions and thoughts flooded her mind like never before. Barely greeting her parents with her return, Beatrix immediately took to work. Taking her fathers trusted multi-tool wrench with her, she locked herself in the garage for nearly 4 days straight, only coming out when more pieces needed to be gathered. On the fourth day, her parents stood outside and called their daughter to come back out. As they did, the door slowly raised, revealing inside not just their daughter, but an additional 5 robots alongside her. Beatrix wore a smile so victorious on her face it it was like her spirit recovered and then grew tenfold. Now accompanied by nothing short of a small army of her owned creation, made of junk no less, Beatrix set out to show the world that it doesn't take reckless morals or fancy education to become a scientist, just a spark of passion and the willpower to follow it.

{{#tag:tabber| Post-Rework =
 * -|Strategy=

Past Mistakes
Two of my biggest ideas for Beatrix were interactivity and single player team force. I stated before that support champions are inherently boring because they either repeat the same crowd control combo or just cast 'heal-shield-cooldown-repeat' throughout the entirety of a game. I attempted to make Beatrix a different kind of support by giving her a plethora of things to do while playing in order to make her active and engaging.

How I implemented this by giving Beatrix the ability to summon a multitude of robots, each having their own role - Jorgen the tank, Drones as fighters and Carlotta as the support. With the creation of the Scrap mechanic which replaced mana, I thought I could make Beatrix interactive by having her spend Scrap to repair or boost the robots, but instead it created a situation where you just summon your robots, let them do their thing, and occasionally spend some Scrap for a menial labor rather than meaningful gameplay or boosting just one of them while the rest just stood there.

Another minor aspect to Beatrix was that when the robots are destroyed, she could pick up their cores to boost herself to become relevant. This was a poor design choice because once the effects of the cores wore off, Beatrix without her robots was basically a meat shield until their cooldowns finished counting down and she could summon them again.

A Step Back
When it has been brought to my attention how passive Beatrix' actual gameplay is, I decided to take a step back and see where it all went wrong. Turns out, it was pretty early, back when I decided she would be a tank. This role is innately passive because what they do is carry the burden of damage intake and sometimes disrupt enemy teams, but nothing much beyond that. Inadvertently, I ended up doing the same thing, just through summons instead of Beatrix herself, which just made it worse.

When I realized this, I decided to take a look at some of the more active and flexible support champions in the game, like Sona and Karma, which have more plentiful gameplay options at their disposal. That's when it hit me that I need to make Beatrix a caster support and completely overhauled her position from Tank/Support to Support/Mage.

This shift in roles allowed me not only to achieve greater flexibility with Beatrix, but it also allowed me to break free of the shackles that confine modern support classes to inherent boring gameplay. Support should be more prominent than their heals and shields, utilizing an assortment of crowd control and stat buffs to really hit home their strengths and contirbutions to the team. Beatrix is a jack of all trades in a sense that while she does carry a shield ability, that is the only traditional support ability she has. Her most prominent features are the ability to buff her teams damage output and disrupting the enemy team with her multitude of crowd control and zoning.

The Coordinator
Along with Beatrix's new role came a new title - The Coordinator. One of the biggest flaws in the Junkyard Bastion was that the robots were not playing as like teammates but rather as just normals buffs. They were either static in place or just following a target ally and that's what I sought to fix first.

To acheive this, I completely scrapped (*ba dum tss*) the ultimate ability Junkyard Overdrive and replaced it with Shift Mode, which switches the a single robot between offensive and defensive behavior while also granting a small passive buff to Beatrix. Naturally, with this new mechanic also came a huge change to the robots. They now have new names, their own health bars and are subject to all combat behavior that applies to minions. Each robot also has different form of movement controls to make them feel a little more unique and alleviate the hassle of too much micro management.

Meet The New Crew
Jorgen has been replaced with Odin. He does not move at all unless commanded to.

Axel, Butch and Crash have been replaced with Loki, who follows close by you unless commanded otherwise.

Carlotta has been replaced with Freyja, which follows ahead or behind you and cannot be issued movement commands.

As an exception, staying a large distance away from your robots for 90 seconds will cause them to abandon their position and teleport back to you, after which they will follow you until commanded otherwise.

Artillery Mode
This is the offensive mode, giving the robots more aggressive abilities and making Beatrix lean more towards the mage role.

Odin acts as a mortar cannon. He is rooted in place and fires shells at a long distance, knocking enemies away if they are close enough to the center of the blast. Odin can only store a finite number of shells and requires Beatrix to reload and operate him in this mode. This mode allows you to disrupt the enemy team from a fairly long distance, but shells travel relatively slow, giving quicker enemies time to react. While not very powerful against one or two enemies, in a team fight where 3 or 4 enemy players are clustered together, the ability to disperse them could make or break a fight, shifting your teams focus to an isolated enemy champion and turning the tides.

Loki follows close by Beatrix, attacking enemies within a short range. Beatrix can command Loki to fly in a straight path, dropping bombs along the way and a nuke at the end of his flight for extra damage. This also leave a fiery path that deals magic damage over time.

The flight range is permanent, which means it puts Loki at a risk of being destroyed while bombing. It takes Loki just over 2 seconds to finish his flight. Loki can fly over terrain and reveals the area around him, which means this skill is especially useful under the cover of brushes or the fog of war for scouting ahead.

The trail left in the wake of his bombs also has high damage potential over time, which creates a zone your enemies will want to avoid walking through, especially the squishy ones. The nuke bomb is especially a menace due to it's ridiculous damage output, however with a time of nearly 2 seconds until it is actually dropped, enemies that see Loki incoming will be able to easily avoid his path.

Freyja will automatically move slightly ahead of Beatrix, periodically marking enemy champions to increase their incoming damage for a period of time. Spending scrap allows her to boost teammates AD and AP, making her especially effective in the heat of a team fight but also a likely target to be destroyed first among the three robots.

Siege Mode
This is the defensive mode, giving the robots more protective abilities and making Beatrix lean more towards the support role.

Odin becomes a movable barrier and passively generates up to 3 charges. When Odin is commanded to move, he quickly dashes to the targeted location. Upon reaching his new location, he deploys a barrier that blocks all champion projectiles for 1 second and completely negating them. While on relatively short cooldown, charges take a static 10 seconds to reload, so it is important to know when to block with Odin. Reaction time is also important for this skill because barriers are only deployed when the dash ends.

Loki becomes a like heavy cruiser in this mode. He is capable of firing at multiple targets who enter his patrol range, applying the same slow-slower-stun combo the previous drones would have cast. The huge difference here is that at level 5, Loki is capable of firing at the entire enemy team individually, so sending him out to the middle of clustered enemy champions of 3 or 4 could potentially have devastating results if they do not leaving his range immediately.

Freyja will follow slighty behind Beatrix. In this mode, she grants a shield which refreshes if no damage has been taken for a long time. The shield has two unique features - it is relatively weaker than common support shields and can be boosted. As long as you remain in Siege Mode, you can activate Freyja's ability to convert Scrap into bonus shield, up to 3 times. Changing into Artillery Mode removes the bonus shield gained from Scrap and returns it to base power.

With enough patience and planning, Freyja can provide shielding for your teammates similarly to Locket of the Iron Solari. If you actually build LotIS and let Freyja;s shield build up, you have what is probably the strongest team shielding potential in the game when you use both together. Since the shield only returns 12 seconds after not taking any damage, it is powerful enough to defend a team but does not refresh so often that it breaks the game.

Hopefully Done Right
With this new design, I hope to have created a champion that is far more active as a support, whether it's through Artillery Mode's long range harassment and damage output or Siege Mode's supportive and defensive effects. By giving each of the robots a different form of movement control, I hope to solidify the core idea that Beatrix is the leader of a single champion team and by supporting your robots with your scrap investments and proper coordination you indirectly support your teammates as well.

Pre-Rework =

How Is Beatrix Unique?
Beatrix is my own take of a utility tank. One of the biggest problems with supports today is that they're outright boring. Even as initiators, you just do the same repetitive and predictable combo. In order to solve this problem I decided to make Beatrix a very flexible and active support, giving you an assortment of playmaking options without giving you that "well, time to wait for this ability to cooldown" too much. I'll explain how this is implemented shortly.

What Is Scrap?
Beatrix utilizes a unique resource. Instead of mana, she collects Scrap from any dead minion or enemy champion she helped killing. Scrap plays a huge part in Beatrix's kit because it is both a source of scaling as well as an expendable resource for certain skills. A defensive Beatrix can stay back and collected Scrap only from her own minions, keeping her relatively safe, but a Beatrix that dares to also collect Scrap dropped between enemy minions waves will be rewarded by having higher scaling on her abilities due to the extra Scrap.

Staying Active
Now that I've covered her most basic mechanic, I want to address how I implemented an anti-boredom "wait for cooldown" play style. One of the first robots I designed was Jorgen, who's purpose is to defend a single ally by absorbing some of their incoming damage. As a mechanic, Beatrix can expend a certain amount of Scrap and repair Jorgen, restoring his health. Another form of expenditure is maintaining Scrap at 20% or higher in order to passively spend some of it to gain a drone stack. By constantly having to play between gathering and expending Scrap, there's almost never a dull moment for you, especially in the early game.

Working Together
The other problem I addressed earlier, boring skill combinations, is addressed via the workings of her active and innate abilities. All of Beatrix's active abilities give initiation power to her ally more than herself. By placing Jorgen to absorb damage and a drone to dish out damage on a single ally, as well as a drone on yourself, your ally is likely the one to confidently charge in head-first into combat instead of you, with good reason. However, that is not to say Beatrix doesn't have any engaging potential herself. When one of her robots is destroyed, she can pick up the core left behind the same way she gathers fallen Scrap. These cores grant Beatrix a shield, a heal or a stun to her next basic attack, depending on the core she picked up.

The One Fatal Decision
Upon reaching level 6, your true potential shines. Your ultimate means you are no longer limited to the Scrap dropped by others and gain 1% max Scrap per second. This is to counter the inherent problem of Scrap being reliant on dead things to gather, which won't happen as often during the mid game where the focus is objective control. Additionally this skill can be as powerful as you decide. It costs 50% max Scrap to use, but keep in mind Scrap is not just a resource, it is also a source of power for your skills, meaning the more patiently you wait and gather Scrap, the more powerful your next boosted ability will become.

}}


 * -|Quotes =

On Champion Select
''Y'all ready? Dun fall apart on me now!''

On Champion Ban
Heh, ya dun know what yer missin' out on.

On First Movement
''They dun' call me 'Queen Bea' for nutin Giddy up, now! Let's show 'em what we got!''

On Movement
''You see junk, 'ah see potential Wonder what doohickey imma get mah hands on today. Any chance ya got a vector rectifier? I aint much for places without metal an' grease, when do I go home?''

On Attack
''Gunna pound 'em good! Time to wrangle them in! This here wrench would probably hurt 'em.''

Joke
''Ah bet ya'll don't even know what a tridiminio...tri, tryndame... dangit what's it called again?''

Taunt
''Me and what army? Yer about ta find out, darlin'. The cold, metal, hard way. It aint about power or skill. I just want to beat you more than you do me. That's all I need.''

Summoning Jorgen
''Rise an' shine big boy! Hope yer awake, it's time for war! Keep 'em safe for me, won't ya?''

Summoning Drone
''Mornin' Axel! Hey Butch! C'mere Crash! Soooooeeeeyyy!!! (on consecutive summonings)''

Summoning Carlotta
''Golly am 'ah glad to see you! Ah promise it won't take long this time! Yer a sight for sore eyes and other body parts!''

On Casting Overdrive: Jorgen
''Keep it steady big boy! Don't you die on me now!''

On Casting Overdrive: Drone Brothers
''Oh look, the whole family's here! It's already time for the reunion? Time for a good 'ol fashion hoedown!''

On Casting Overdrive: Carlotta
''Aw comeon, I know you like it! CARLOTTAAAA oh, there ya are.''

On Jorgen Removed
''You've earned yer rest. Take five big boy. That'll do.''

On Drone Removed
''Say hi to yer brothers for me! Don't be a stranger, now!''

On Carlotta Removed
''Thank ya, hun. You da best, sugarcube. Toodles.... ugh, never saying that again.''


 * -|Update Log=

Dec 12th, 2016

 *  About Damn Time! : Added base stats, ratios and cooldowns to all skills.
 *  Oooh Shiny : Added new skill  Command: Jorgen .
 *  A Weight Off : Drones per ally reduced to 1 from 2.
 *  Fast Delivery : Drone Ready stack recharge time reduce to 5 seconds from 20.
 *  Rusting Away : Drone duration reduced to 20 from 30.
 *  Magnetic Personality : Carlotta can now pull in Scrap near her.
 *  Learned Some New Tricks : Added new skill  Reconfigure: Carlotta .
 *  Does It Really Matter? : Changed ultimate name to Junkyard Overdrive from Junkyard Mastermind.

Dec 21st, 2016

 *  Tell Me A Story Grandpa : Added lore!
 *  Know Who You're Dealing With : Added Jorgen Base Stats.
 *  Can't Take The Heat : Changed  Overdrive: Drone Brothers . All active drones will be destroyed when the effect ends.
 *  Where Did She Even Keep Them All? : Reduced the amount Drone Ready stacks from 3 at all levels to 1/1/2/2/3.
 *  Basic Stuff : Added Drones attack speed stat.
 *  Newer Is Better : Due to new Scrap interactions, slightly changed the tooltip description of One Man's Junk.

Dec 22nd, 2016

 *  Repairs Are Expensive : Reduced healing of  Command: Jorgen  from 6% his max health to 5%.
 *  PewPewPew : Changed damage scaling of  Call: Drone Brother  from 3% your max health to 2% your bonus health plus 15% current Scrap.
 *  Might Need Glasses : Set drone range to 200 units.
 *  Not All At Once :Drones now have a cooldown of 1.5 seconds between casts.
 *  She Gets Bored Easily :  Call: Carlotta  is no longer a permanent summon and lasts 8 seconds.
 *  How Does Metal Heal You?! : Changed the healing scaling of  Call: Carlotta  from 2% your bonus health to 15% your current scrap.
 *  Aint Yo' Momma : Carlotta will not gather Scrap for Beatrix anymore.
 *  One Track Mind : Removed  Reconfigure: Carlotta .
 *  Nothing Is Free In Life : Using Junkyard Overdrive new requires at least 50% Scrap to use.
 *  Stay Out Of The Kitchen : Using  Overdrive: Jorgen  now destroys him when the effect is over.
 *  Repairs Are REALLY Expensive : Using  Overdrive: Jorgen  now prevents the use of  Command: Jorgen 
 *  She's A Fragile Maiden : Using  Overdrive: Carlotta  now destroys her when the effect is over.
 *  A Shield For Your Shields Shield...Shield : Reduced max health scaling of  Overdrive: Carlotta  from 10% your max health to 5%.

Dec 23rd, 2016

 *  Core Mechanic : Added new game mechanic to One Man's Junk.
 *  They're Not Licensed For This : Healing Jorgen using  Command: Jorgen  is now done by clicking on Jorgen instead of his bonded ally.
 *  More Efficiently Redesigned : Reduced Scrap used for  Command: Jorgen  from 20/17.5/15/12.5/10 to 14/13/12/11/10.
 *  Take It Easy : Reduced attack speed of drones from 0.67 to 0.5.
 *  The One,Two Punch : Drones now have a three hit passive that activates when two or more drones are close to each other.
 *  Now With Glasses! : Increased attack range to 300.

Dec 26th, 2016

 *  Extra Life : Since Carlotta is no longer a permanent summon, using  Overdrive: Carlotta  no longer destroys her when the effect is over.

Dec 27th, 2016

 *  She's Her Own Woman : Added Beatrix's base stats.
 *  High Mentenance : Reduced the cooldown of  Command: Jorgen  to 3 seconds from 8.
 *  Had A Rough Start : Increased Jorgens starting health, from 100/150/200/250/300 to 200/250/300/350/400.
 *  Summer Is Coming : Reduced the attack speed reduction debuff of Jorgen from 25% to 15%.
 *  Fair Trade : Carlotta's healing will be calculated with 0 Scrap after using  Overdrive: Carlotta .
 *  That Thing Was Heavy : Reduced the Scrap scaling of  Overdrive: Carlotta  from 100/125/150% to 100/110/120%.

Dec 29th, 2016

 *  Speak Up, Sonny! : Retooled several skill descriptions for clarification.
 *  Not So Minor Details : Added cast and effective range to all skills.
 *  Partnership : Increased Jorgens bonus health scaling to 50% of Beatrix's max health from 25%.
 *  Attachment : Jorgen now deactivates if too far away from Beatrix and self destructs if this lasts for more than 1 minute.
 *  For Better Or Worse : Jorgen now has crowd control interactions.
 *  Walk It Off : Reduced the duration of Jorgens attack speed debuff to 1 second from 2.
 *  High Stakes : Casting  Command: Jorgen  on Jorgen now costs 10% of your current Scrap.
 *  Rest Between Rounds : increased the cooldown of  Command: Jorgen  to 7 seconds from 3.
 *  Certified Mechanic : Casting  Command: Jorgen  on Jorgen now heals him for 15% his max health.
 *  Hidden Compartment : Increased the amount of Drone Ready stacks Beatrix can have to 3 from 1/1/2/2/3.
 *  Can't Make Something From Nothing : Beatrix now readies a drone by keep her Scrap bar over 20% full.
 *  Get Well Not So Soon : Reduced the increased healing effect of Carlotta to 0.5% per 1% missing health from 1% per 1% missing health.
 *  Can't Move With All This Protection : Reduced the bonus armor and magic resist of  Overdrive: Jorgen  to 50% of the Scrap used on cast from 100%.
 *  Tight Controls : Casting  Overdrive: Carlotta  while Carlotta is active will reposition her before activating the shield effect.

Dec 30th, 2016

 *  Still No Plot Twists, Though : Slightly reworked the lore.
 *  UPGRADE!!! : Drones' attack speed now scales with ability level.

Jan 5th, 2017

 *  Needs To Start Dieting : Using  Overdrive: Jorgen  now slows the selected ally by 5%.
 *  Know I Now My ABC's : fixed errors and slightly polished the lore.
 *  Give :  Call: Carlotta  now has an additional health scaling.
 *  Take : Reduced the Scrap scaling of  Call: Carlotta  from 15% your current Scrap to 10%.
 *  Put That Thing Back Where You Found It : Increased the bonus healing of  Call: Carlotta  from 0.5% per 1% missing health to 1% per 1% missing health.

Jan 12th, 2017

 *  A Slight Miscalculation : The Scrap drop rate and maximum capacity of One Man's Junk now increase at levels 7 and 13 instead of 6 and 11.

Jan 13th, 2017

 *  Dear Lore'd : More lore updates.
 *  Better Public Speaker : Revamped Beatrix's verbal breakdown.
 *  Her 10 Seconds of Glory : Using  Overdrive: Carlotta  extends Carlotta's active duration by 4 seconds.

Jan 26th, 2017
=Massive Overhaul=

Beatrix

 *  Career Change : Beatrix no longer plays as a tank, instead her main role is now support and her secondary role is mage. Her stats have been changed accordingly to reflect this.
 *  New Title : Beatrix is now titled  The Coordinator  to better reflect her play style.

Innate

 *  Out With The Old! : Removed  Core  from  One Man's Junk . This mechanic had no room with Beatrix's transition into the mage-like support role.
 *  In With The New! : Added new passive mechanic  Teamwork . Now Beatrix's robo-friends all start the game with her. They are the source point of her skills and should they be destroyed, Beatrix temporarily takes their place as the source of their respective skills without suffering from any related drawbacks such as costs or negative effects.

Ultimate Ability

 *  Quantity Over Quality? : This ability has seen the biggest change and drags the entire kit along with it.  Junkyard Overdrive  has been replaced with Siege/Artillery Mode, an interchangeable skill that switches the robots between defensive and offensive behavior while also granting a small passive effect to Beatrix and themselves.

Jorgen

 *  No Longer Cold : Jorgen has been replaced with Odin.
 *  Bastille : In Siege Mode, Odin is capable of blocking enemy champion projectiles.
 *  Mortar : In Artillery Mode he is rooted in place and can be operated by Beatrix to launch mortar shells at enemies.

Drone

 *  Mk. II : The stacking drones have been replaced with a single drone named Loki.
 *  Patrol : In Siege Mode, Loki patrols an area as commanded by Beatrix, attacking any nearby champion and causing the same effect as the previous drones did when they were within range of each other.
 *  Bomb Run : In Artillery Mode, Loki stays near Beatrix until she commands him to move, bombarding an area in a straight line and leaving behind a blazing trail that deals additional periodic damage.

Freyja

 *  Early Retirement : Carlotta has been replaced with Freyja.
 *  Shieldmaiden : In Siege Mode, Freyja grants a shield that refreshes if you have not taken damage for a certain amount of time. Spending Scrap increases the base shields power as long as you stay in Siege Mode up to a certain amount.
 *  Valkyrie : In Artillery Mode, Freyja marks enemies, causing them to take increased damage. Activating this ability spends Scrap to temporarily boost your teammates attack damage and ability power.