[HCC] Serena, the Matchmaker

Serena

The Matchmaker

lore

There is a kingdom call Merdia known for its military power, but also for a great and ancient tradition in astrology. Never the rulers of Merdia doubt the power and wisdom of the sages, whom had great esteem and status in the society. Among the sages was a woman by the name of Serena, but was better known for the title given to her by the people of Merida, The Matchmaker. An appropriate title, since Serena was an astrologist specialized in the maters of the heart, renowned for never have failed in finding the other half of anybody, and there was a legion of happy couples to give testimony to her talents.

Having heard of Serena, one of the princes, known for his capacity as a soldier and commander but also for his bad temper and bitter personality, decided to try the services of Serena. Never one to shrink before a challenge, Serena made use of all her knowledge and point the prince to the "lucky" maiden who was selected by the stars as his true love. To nobody surprise, a wedding was held not very long after that, and the new couple joined the court, where everybody could tell by just looking at the prince and the now princess, that the matchmaker was right one more time. What was a surprise to everybody was the short duration of the marriage. Not to many years after the wedding the princess was already sick of the selfishness and inconsideration of her husband, and run away of the castle, many say in the hands of another man. The prince was furious, and humiliated, and blame the matchmaker, accusing her of making a mistake. Serena, a very proud women and confident in her own capacities, replied to him that: "Love is like a flower, no mater how beautiful it is, or how strong it may seem, if left unattended in a dry desert, it will witter away. And anybody could see that you my prince, are not, and never will be, a fountain willing to give its water to those who most deserved it". Of course this infuriated the prince even more, and tried to sentence her to death for insulting the royal family. Luckily for Serena there was a great number of men and women that had the Matchmaker in great esteem, even among the royal family. Their pressure convince the prince to commute the sentence, but not willing to spare her life, instead of the guillotine, the prince sentence her to serve as common soldier in the army, a death sentence to a women who have never wield anything sharper than a tarot card.

And that’s how the Matchmaker end up in the field of war, under surveillance by the men of the prince so she could not relinquish her military duties. And she still survives with the few sword techniques that she was able to pick on the fly, and reading the stars to tell the worried soldiers how their love ones are doing at home. But there are still those who follow the kingdom’s army, and risk entering the battlefront to seek the advised of the Matchmaker.

Stats:

Faction: Radiant
Primary Attribute: Agility
Attack: Melee
Roles: support, disabler, initiator
Strength: 20 + 2.2 per level
Agility: 30 + 1.5 per level
Intelligence: 20 + 1.2 per level
movement: 240
armor: 5
damage: 40 - 55

Abilities

Healing circle

"Not being a great warrior, Serena tried to help in the fight in other ways"

Gives hp to ally heroes around her, and also decrease the coldowns of their abilitys. The coldown reduction do not affects her own abilitys.
Hp: 100/150/200/300
Coldown reduction: 4/8/12/16
Coldown: 30
Radius: 400
Notes:

• It has a relatively high coldown, so it can only be used once or maybe twice per team fight

Cupid’s strike

"Serena was a sage and a master astrologist, but after helping countless couples she become also a master in the game of seduction"

Enchant an enemy, that runs towards her position until the duration ends. The enchanted enemy cannot attack or cast any ability for the duration of the spell.
Enchant duration: 2/2.5/3/4
Radius:200/300/400/500
Coldown: 30/25/20/15
Notes:

• Think of it as an inverted form of savage roar of Lone druid, that force enemies to run towards their fountain.
• The enchanted enemy can only move normally, not over cliffs or obstacles.
• The purpose of this ability is to disrupt the enemy formation, you can cast it over an enemy, then attract him to your allies
• You could use force staff over the enchanted enemy to move it further away of his team, or over yourself to flee safely after casting.
• Aghanims upgrade: Cast Cupid’s strike over a random enemy in a 600 radius every 12 seconds. This can further disrupt the enemy team fight.

Heart connection

“Serena read the stars, to look inside her enemies hearths”

Gain true vision over all enemy heroes, but in return enemy heroes gain vision over her.
Passively grants increased movement speed when there are allied heroes nearby. The bonus stack per
allied hero.
Vision duration: 6/9/12/15
Coldown: 40
Bonus movement speed: 20/30/40/50
Movement speed radius: 600
Notes:

• A spell designed to help making incursion into enemy territory
• To counter invisibility heroes like Slark or Riki.
• Since the enemy also gains vision over you, the intelligent player could use it to lay an ambush

Red string of destiny

The matchmaker first select two unit to be bonded, once the two has been selected, the firs unit selected is dragged all the way to the position of the second one (more or less like the vacuum abilty of Dark Seer), and then the two unit are bonded together with a red string that can not be broken, unless one of the units dies. The two units bonded can only move a certain distance around each other, and can not separate further.
String duration: 5/7/10
String max distance: 400
Bond timer: 10
Coldown: 100/70/50
Notes:

• Casting this ability is similar to cast ice blast from Ancient Apparition. You need to cast this ability twice to have an effect. Once over every unit to be bonded.
• The two units need to be bonded before the timer expires. The timer stars counting when the first unit is selected, and if expires, the ability is canceled without entering coldown. You can cancel the ability any moment before selecting the second target. The distance between the unit bonded does not matter as long as the two are selected within the time.
• The units bonded can be enemies or allies.

How you use this ability:

• If the two heroes bonded are two enemies, this ability is pretty straightforward. First apply the vacuum effect and then the string. The two units can not drag one another, except if someone use force staff over one of them, meaning that if one of them is stunned or rooted, the other one can not move either, more or less like the leash from Slark leap ability.
• If one of the heroes is an enemy and the other one an ally (including you), your ally can stay put, and then the enemy will no be able to move freely. The two units can not drag one another, except if someone use force staff over one of them.
• If the two units are allies (not you included), you could seriously cripple them, but if one of them is being rooted or stunned and is out of range for force staff, you could create the bond with an ally, and then the vacuum effect would drag your disabled ally to the position of the second unit selected, potentially saving them.
• Special case: If one of the units is an ally and the other one is you, this ability could be use as a form of flaming lasso from Bathrider. Is only in this case that you are able to drag an ally. You could use it to bond with a disabled allied and then drag them back to safety.
• The vacuum effect if always applied, dragging the first unit selected to the position of the second one. This means that you could potentially move an ally from a disadvantageous position by first selecting your ally and second yourself to drag them back to safety.
• The vacuum effect could be use to return to the battlefront an enemy that flees. First select the fleeing enemy, second another unit, enemy or ally, and then the first enemy would be dragged back to the battle. This could be use against enemies like Queen of Pain or Antimage. This effect works the same even if the first enemy selected use a Town portal scroll or Boots of Travel. Units under the effect of the red string cannot blink further than the distance allowed by the string
  
  

  Talent Tree

  
  +50 agility <---25---> Affected by coldown reduction
  12 % evasion <---20---> Red String apply 1 second stun at the end of duration
  +20 movement gain per ally hero <---15---> + 1 second Cupid’s Strike
  +5 armor <---10---> + 300 mana
  
  

  Playing Style

  • This hero is designed with the idea of team fights, since does not have any hard disables or great attack capacities on her own, depends heavily in your allies to cause damage.
  • It have good strength gain and hp regeneration, since her spells don’t have a great cast range, and need to be in the center of the fight to make better use of them, specially Healing Circle
  • This hero is very vulnerable to silences, and although gains a lot of movement speed when is around her team, is slow when is alone.
  • With the Aghanims upgrade and the right talents, Serena could become an acceptable right clicker.