This is Ariel Hanson a Bio-Genetics expert and a scientific genius from the Agria colony that suffered from painful zerg attacks and a case of infected from the Hyper Evolutionary Virus before partially curing it, made this for the CDC7 to try for a Gamechanger design with a Research mechanic a sort of Pseudo Talent tree alongside the actual Talent tree that’s used via the trait and Research Materials that put into Researches bit by bit to make your forces stronger in the long run but because of this she is weaker overall and has to rely on her abilities to support allies in combat.
Alignment: Chaotic Good
Roll: Ranged Support
Strengths:
- Sieger
- Wave Clear
- Empowering Support
Weaknesses:
- Complexity
- Low Health
- Mobility
Trait: Bio-Genetics Researcher (15 second CD): Activate to create a Research Facility (resembles a SC2 Tech Lab addon) at the targeted location that lasts until reactivated or destroyed, the Research Facility can be interacted with to research upgrades for allied non hero forces as well as Ariel herself as a pseudo second talent tree using Research Material, Research Material is a stackable resource (similar to Probius’s minerals) that is gained when enemy minions die which give her 2 material, mercenary camps give her 4 material while enemy controlled ones giver her 5, bosses give 8 and enemy heroes give 10, a marker above her bottom left portrait shows research for the highest one progressed, it cannot be built inside bases until level 16 for balance reasons, if the Research Facility is destroyed Research timers will stop until rebuilt, see below for Research notes.
Q: Hyper Evolutionary Virus (10 second CD): Toss a sample of a Virus at the targeted small aoe location to leave a patch of Herp Evolutionary Virus on the ground for 3 seconds, enemies that walk through the Virus contract a dot for XXX amount of damage over 2 seconds with damage coming at 0.5 second intervals, traveling through the Virus patch on the ground more then once refreshes the dot.
W: Anti-Bacterial Medication (25 second CD): Cleanse a target of any form of crowd control effect except for Mind Control and positive crowd control effects, cannot target self.
E: Scientific Endeavor (20 second CD): Ariel talks around herself reading from her notes causing her to generate 10 Research Materials immediately while healing herself for 10% of her total health.
R1: Mobile Science Facility (60 second CD): Ariel Hanson calls a Science Vessel from her Research Facility to replace her for 25 seconds, while active Ariel Hanson gains 500 health and 10 armour overall while also gaining 0.5 range on basic attacks (stacks with Pulse Rifles range bonus), can be activated again to target an enemy hero to hit them with Irradiate to surround them in a cloud of radiation that deals XXX amount of damage to all nearby enemies with 50% more being done to minions/mercenaries, the target of the Irradiate takes 50% less damage from it, Irradiate lasts for 3 seconds and Irradiate has a cooldown of 5 seconds, cooldown won’t start until the Science Vessel finishes, while Mobile Science Facility is active all Researches are 15-20% faster.
R2: Outbreak Survivor (Passive): Reduces the duration of crowd control abilities (stuns, slows, roots everything except mind control) by 25%, each time Ariel is hit with a crowd control effect within 1 second of each other the reduction is increased by 25%, if she isn’t subject to a crowd control effect within 1 second the reduction counter will reset, slows actually have a 1.75 second interval for reduction increase, she also passively gains 3 Research Material whenever subject to any form of crowd control.
Talents:
Level 1:
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Pulse Pistol: Ariel Hansons basic attack now fires 30% slower but it fires in a burst of three and deals 10% more damage to minons.
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Agria Native Bacteria: Collecting regeneration globes reduces the cooldown of Anti-Bacterial Medication by 1 second, collect 25 regeneration globes to permanently lower the CD of Anti-Bacterial Medication by 5 seconds.
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Active Sample: When Ariel Hanson is standing in Hyper Evolutionary Virus while enemies are also within it, she’ll gain 1 Research Material per 0.5 seconds they’re standing within.
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Research Grant: Instantly give Ariel 30 Research Materials and the first Research timer is 40% finished automatically.
Level 4:
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Intellectual Speech : Scientific Endeavor will also give nearby allied minions will gain 10% attack speed for 1.75 seconds.
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Research Team (Active): Alongside Research Material drops gold tokens which stack up to 80, using 20 instantly defeats a mercenary, unlocks a research that grants 10 stacks when completed.
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Volatile Reaction: Enemies that stand within the Hyper Evolutionary Virus patch on the ground for more than 1.5 seconds till take a medium burst of XXX damage.
Level 7:
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Cellular Restoration: If Anti-Bacterial Medication removes a stun the target will also be healed for 5% of their total health, also passively increases Scientific Endeavor’s selfheal by 10%.
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Alien Materials: Each time a weapons research is completed a bonus 2 damage is added to Ariel Hansons basic attack damage.
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Security Guard (Passive): Ariel Hanson has a Security Marine following her around protecting her when not mounted, has 20% less health then a melee knight mercenary and deals 50% more damage than Ariel Hansons basic attack damage, unlocks a Research.
Level 13:
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Zerg Virus: Hyper Evolutionary Virus that kills enemy minions causes them to turn into a cacoon for 1.5 seconds after which an Infected will hatch, Infected are half as strong as melee minions but take 50% less damage from ranged attacks (25 with structures), also unlocks a Research.
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Bacterial Reinforcement: Anti-Bacterial Medication also gives the target Unstoppable for 2 second.
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Bunker Room: Ariel Hanson can enter the Research Facility as if it was a small bunker to protect herself, stops access to research and the bunker can only release Ariel Hanson at the targeted side of the Facility, while inside the Facility she heals herself for 10% of her health per second.
Level 16:
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Breakthrough: Regeneration Globes will instantly complete 1.5 seconds of the current Research.
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Expensive Shoes: Each research completed relating to minion and mercenary upgrades (siege weapons don’t count) it will also increase their movement speed by 1%.
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Focused on the Notepad: After Scientific Endeavor has been used minions and mercenaries who die near Ariel will drop twice as many Research Materials for 5 seconds.
Level 20:
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Swords, Ammunition and a little bit of Magic: Unlocks tier IV Weapons Research and Siege Weaponry Research.
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Didn’t Die that Time: Unlocks tier IV and V Armour Researches.
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Healthy as Can Be: Unlocks tier IV Health Research and Magic Aura Research.
Researches (aka bonus talents):
How it Works: All Researches act like supportive talents for your teams faction more then your allies heroes, it mostly involves spending her Research Materials towards any Research at the time putting 10 per click into each one until its unlocked, there’s a symbol above her bottom left portrait that shows the highest progress Research, to start Research input you need to activate her Trait to place a Research Facility then click it at any time (Ariel does not need to be there but needs to be alive) and then click any Research to throw Materials into it before it unlocks, Researches with there own tier numbers require the previous ones to unlock prior, each Tier has a Research Timer which shows above the portrait to inform the player of its progress.
Tier I: Unlocks at level 2 Unlocks at level 2, takes 45 seconds to research each.
- Weapons Research I: Costs 50 Research Materials to increase melee and ranged minions damage by 4.
- Armour Research I: Costs 30 Research Materials to increase melee minions armour by 3.
- Health Research I: Costs 40 Research Materials to increase all minions health by 50.
- Armaments Training: Costs a hefty 250 Research Materials to increase the range of ranged minions (not caster) basic attack by 0.75-1 (cannot outrange a tower/keep/fort).
- Reinforced Stonework I: Costs 25 Research Materials to increase the armour of towers, gates and walls by 10 towards non heroic attacks.
Tier II: Unlocks at level 6 Unlocks at level 6, takes 65 seconds to research each.
- Weapons Research II: Costs 75 Research Materials to increase melee and ranged minions damage by an additional 4 up to 8.
- Armour Research II: Costs 55 Research Materials to increase melee minions armour by an additional 3 up to 6.
- Health Research II: Costs 65 Research Materials to increase all minion’s health by an additional 50 up to 100.
- Backroom Bribery (Repeatable): Costs 25 Research Materials to instantly gain 10 stacks of gold tokens.
- Explosive Compositions: Costs 50 Research Materials to allow caster/specialist a cleave burst attack to there primary target for XXX damage once every 15-20 seconds.
Tier III: Unlocks at level 14 Unlocks at level 14, takes 80 seconds to research each.
- Weapons Research III: Costs 100 Research Materials to increase melee and ranged minions damage by an additional 4 up to 12.
- Armor Research III: Costs 80 Research Materials to increase melee minions armour by an additional 3 up to 9.
- Health Research III: Costs 90 Research Materials to increase all minions health by an additional 50 up to 150.
- Feral Strain: Infected spawned by the Zerg Virus can leap towards enemy minions and structures dealing 50 damage on impact.
- High Class Security: Upgrades the Security Guard to a stronger one that deals 50% more damage and has 10% less health then a knight mercenary now.
- Reinforced Stonework II: Costs 50 Research Materials to increase the armour of towers, gates and walls by an additional 10 towards non heroic attacks.
Tier IV and V: Unlocks at level 17-20 , takes 90 seconds for IV and 100 seconds for V to research each.
- Weapons Research IV: Costs 125 Research Materials to increase melee and ranged minions damage by an additional 4 up to 16.
- Siege Weaponry Research: Costs 250 Research Materials to increase the range on a Siege Weapons by 1 and increases there damage by 10.
- Armour Research IV: Costs 100 Research Materials to increase melee minions armour by an additional 3 up to 12.
- Armour Research V: Costs 50 Research Materials to increase melee minions armour by an additional 3 up to 15 (purposefully low cost).
- Health Research IV: Costs 115 Research Materials to increase all minions health by an additional 50 up to 200.
- Magic Aura Research: Costs 125 Research Materials to give caster/specialist minions an aura around them that gives all nearby allies a spell shield like the mercenary camp.
- Biomechanical Steel: Costs 175 Research Materials and requires Reinforced Stoneworks II to give your teams core health regeneration for a small XX amount that ticks every 1.25-1.5 seconds.
Synergies:
Good:
- TLV: Her research coupled with the Vikings pushing capabilities without having to be near each other makes them a dead combo
- Abathur: Not only does Symbiote keep her alive pre-emptively against dangerous assassin enemies but his Symbiote put onto a research upgraded allied minion makes pushing far more dangerous.
Bad:
- Butcher: He can almost outright kill Ariel Hanson without pre-emptive support from heroes like Tassadar or Morales.
- Tracer/Genji: Due to lack of any mobility and a low health pool Tracer like many other assassins can kill her before she can escape.
Skins:
- Normal Skin: Ariel Hanson from SC2 duh, her weapon would probably just be a notepad or something while the Pulse Pistol talent would be a science designed weapon that shoots blue projectiles at the targets.
- Infested: This is the path B outcome for Ariel Hanson and non-canon option in Starcraft 2 and wouldn’t really require much theming outside her bodyguard talent looking like an infested slightly like Tychus.
- Wasteland Scholar: Based on the road warrior themed skins like Raynors and Deckard Cains in which shes a researcher with records of the old world similar to Deckard with theming only to look more scrap based.
- Celestial Scholar: Based on the Celestial beings from WoW such as Alagon where her body is completely see-through and her abilities are themed to be more cosmic and celestial in nature such as Infested being Cosmic Zombies effectively, alternate skin would be a Nexus version like the Nexus mounts.
Quotes:
Raynor:
- Ariel Hanson: Howdy cowboy ready for another trip to the colonies?.
- Raynor: Anytime darling, but first let’s get this business done.
. - Raynor: Hey Doctor glad to have you helping us over Stettman.
- Ariel Hanson: He was too scared to push the boundaries of research to truly help people.
Extra Notes: The idea came up during a talk with other concept writers and we all got ideas basically to move forward with this design, my take on it is to have it work in unison alongside the talent tree while creating a weak hero to counterbalance upgrade your sides army, I’m currently stuck on how many materials per cost for Research’s and will be trying to add it up any help there would be appreciated.
For the CDC7 here CDC #7 - Calling the Gamechangers - #66 by Damian-1581
Patch Notes:
Update 1:
- Nerfed the Weapons Research talents to try and balance late game pressure problems.
- Buffed Intellectual Speech with a radius increase then radius expansion and bonus Research Material gains till a proper change can be made.
- Added the Explosive Compositions, Reinforced Stonework I/II and Biomechanical Steel Research options.
Update 2:
- Intellectual Speech has been removed and replaced with Scientific Endeavor, Inspired Speech is now Intellectual Speech with an altered effect, Focused on the Notepad has been changed.
- Pulse Pistols old effect is now baked into her kit and altered as a talent.
- Alien Materials has been altered away from minion improvement to self-improvement.
- Moved E to Q and vice versa.
- Cellular Restoration has been updated.
Update 3:
- All Researches are now subject to a duration timer to unlock per tier level.
- Mobile Science Facility has been slightly changed to reflect the new research durations, Outbreak Survivor buffed to compensate.
- New Research Duration talents such as Research Grant and Breakthrough have been added while Spell Shield has been removed.
- Bonus skin idea added, Celestial Scholar.
![:smiley:](https://d3rakab8gpdsa3.cloudfront.net/en/heroes/images/emoji/twitter/smiley.png?v=6" ":smiley:")
did want to say there was about to be a more interactive way the enemy team could interact with her when i was trying to work in a research timer to her kit but it snowballed out and i had to go back half a weeks worth of work to fix it then the dog passing on Tuesday morning didn’t help either ![:frowning:](https://d3rakab8gpdsa3.cloudfront.net/en/heroes/images/emoji/twitter/frowning.png?v=6" ":frowning:")