Malfurion rework, unleash the Druid

Hero and Skin Suggestions
1

Greetings.

Malfurion was the first mortal taught Druidic lore by Cenarius himself… Suffice it to say that Malfurion feels bad in HotS. Whitemane and Deckard are way better alternatives in almost all situations and Malfurion barely even plays like a Druid. Where’s all that versatility that Druid’s are known for?

As a WC3 player, WoW player, and HotS/Moba player, I’ve come up with the following ideas - numerical values would need balancing of course.

The Rework:

Malfurion Stormrage, the Archdruid
Ranged/Melee Multiclass Hero

Strengths:
-CC
-Sustain
-Poke/Peel

Weaknesses:
-High Mobility Enemies
-Silences

Trait: Shapeshifter - Malfurion can shapeshift into different melee forms, gaining new abilities and no longer using mana:
NumKey 1: (Cat) Feral Form - 5% faster movement speed, 25% faster attack speed
NumKey 2: (Bear) Guardian Form - 15% increased maximum health and damage
NumKey 3: (Humanoid) Balance Form - Trait (D) can cast Innervate on allies

Abilities work as you might expect. In Balance Form, Malfurion is more or less the same as he is now. Cat form and bear form are the big changes:

(Cat) Feral Form:

Q: Swipe - Casting Swipe builds combo points and each Swipe does more damage to the same target, at 3 combo points the next Swipe cast becomes Thrash, resetting the combo points - 2.5 second cooldown.

Thrash - Damages all enemies in a small area in front of the Feral Druid and does less base damage than Swipe - Thrash has no cooldown.

While under the effects of prowl, Swipe/Thrash slow targets by 25% for 0.75 seconds.

W: Rake - Rake does small base damage and applies a powerful scaling bleed damage by spending combo points generated by Swipe - 8 second cooldown.

While under the effects of prowl, Rake applies additional bleed damage.

E: Prowl - Enter stealth mode and gain bonuses to Feral Form abilities.

(Bear) Guardian Form:

Q: Maul - Damages and stuns the target for 1 second - 4.5 second cooldown.

W: Roar - Fears targets around the Druid for 0.75 seconds - 8 second cooldown.

E: Barkskin - Gain 25 armor for 3 seconds - 12 second cooldown.

Heroic abilities are where the Druid specializes as a multiclass, similar to Varian having to decide what to focus on. The Druid chooses from 3 distinct options at level 10:

Ferocious Bite - Feral Form heroic ability, the Feral Druid damages the target based on missing health. Ferocious Bite has no cooldown but needs to spend 3 combo points to be cast.

Ironfur - Guardian Form heroic ability, the Guardian Druid gains 75 armor, stacking with barkskin, and is Unstoppable for 5 seconds - 45 second cooldown.

Tranquility - Balance Form heroic ability, heals nearby allied Heroes, same as it is now.

And finally…

Z: Travel Form - The Druid transforms into a stag instantly, gaining 20% movement speed.

Additional Thoughts: Twilight Dream was cut for a few reasons, it doesn’t really fit the lore, it’s unnecessary in this rework, and it could still be part of a talent choice. The talent would swap Balance Form for Moonkin Form, resulting in Malfurion becoming a Moonkin, Regrowth being changed to some new version of Solar Wrath from WoW and Tranquility would be replaced by Twilight Dream as an option at level 10 or even retroactively. The healing tree form could also be tied in to Tranquility as a level 20 talent. Activating with Tranquility for a set time or until switching forms.

Regardless of my suggestions, I really hope we get a Malfurion rework that allows him to fulfill the role of a multiclass Druid like he should. You know it’s the right thing to do Blizzard.

2 Likes
2

uh oh.

Multiclass and specialists are going away when they change the classification of hero roles.

3

I don’t get how that’s a bad thing.

4

But your idea is for a multiclass hero?

5

I feel like a shape shifting druid could be better explored as its own hero or two rather then a multi-class rework. The kits you’ve come up with are neat but i feel trying to mesh all of them in to one kit would make things overly complicated and it would be difficult to create talents that would be a boon for all 4 druid forms.

I feel the same way about balance, if i cant drop the moon on someone its just not worth it to me XP

2 Likes
6

i think its mostly a problem for ranked play

7
  • This is my idea of a Archdruid Rework that was trapped in the old forums, but sadly even this one was strongly disagreed, made some minor changes, that hopefully it made it, some what better and acceptable.

Malfurion

Hero Trait

  • Clarifying Innervate: Grants himself or an allied Hero 20% of their maximum Mana and Primary Ability cooldown (except Hero Traits and Heroics) recharges 15% faster. Cannot be used on Heroes that don’t use Mana, Passively Malfurion and Ally Heroes is affected by Thorns Aura which reflects Damage by 15%.

Primary Abilities

  • Wild Regrowth: Heal/Damage a Targeted Unit by 180, and Brands them which last for 10 Seconds. It has a 10% chance to spawn Four Treants instantly that does 20 (+2% per level) Damage per sec. and lasts for 5 seconds.

  • Moon Glare: Deal 85 damage to enemies Reveals and Stuns them for 1.5 Second, it can be targeted in an area anywhere on the map, providing Vision and last for 4 seconds, Reactivate to Teleport to its targeted area after a 0.75 Second Delay.

  • Entangling Roots: Roots enemy Units in an area dealing 40 Damage per second, and Buffs/Debuffs passing units all of their Speed by 10%. The Affected area persists for 4 seconds.

Heroic Abilities

  • Tranquility: Heal/Damage nearby Units 55% per sec. for 10 seconds. Reactivate to put himself in a Invulnerable Stasis, even if the Spell itself still persists that only last for 1 Second.

  • Twilight Dream: After 0.5 Sec. delay, deal 300 Damage in a large area around Malfurion, Silencing and makes them unable to use Abilities for 2.5 Seconds and has 8 Armor Reduction to Enemies while Allies gains 8 Armor instead.

8

I could go for a druid of the claw type hero.

It’s like greymayne, but youre swapping from night elf to bear.

1 Like
9

Yup, that’s what we’re using today.

If you care that much then just replace Multiclass with Utility. Problem solved.

Talents would need to be geared around specialization of a form’s abilities rather than boons to the whole kit. The player could split talent choices and sacrifice maximized potential which is no different than most builds.

Perhaps it would be better to just create a new shapeshifting Druid, maybe work it in as a Tauren Druid. That’s the original direction I was going in but Malfurion deserves to be THE Druid if you know the lore. I doubt they’d have any problems balancing it, they’ve got some really unique class designs as far as Moba content goes and a ludicrous amount of data to pull from.

I like the idea a lot. It would be perfect for a new warrior hero, which we definitely don’t need right now XD

10

I support this idea. Just add a moonkin form too

11

I don’t know what the heck they did with his last rework (hadn’t played him in ages until a couple days ago), but I absolutely do not care to learn his new “spinning plates” style. I hope Blizzard gives him another rework at some point, but I gotta put him on the back burner in the meantime.

12

That’s my exact idea for Broll Bearmantle :grinning:

13

We just need another Night-elf Broll type of druid with those kind of shape-shifting prowess