Imacious, The Telepath

Imacious, The Telepath

Radiant Intelligence
"Nothing is immovable in the face of a Telepath."

Base health

: 530

Base mana

: 273

Base damage

: 50

Base armor

: 4

Attacks per second

: 0.7

Range

: 500

Movement speed

: 300

Vision range

: 1800/800

Strength

: 20 +2

Agility

: 16 +1

Intelligence

: 21 +2.4




Lore:
Born as an only child, Imacious started life largely ignored by his greedy parents, who were spending most of their time gambling away their family fortune. He was taken care of by an elderly midwife, who pitied Imacious' lonely existence. The midwife taught Imacious letters, words and basic math. She also played many interactive games with him, which he enjoyed greatly. The midwife often tended to his many wounds, which were usually inflicted on him by his drunken parents the night before, and advised Imacious to stray away from the path his parents were taking.
One night, while Imacious was playing with the midwife in the house, his parents came back home, heavily intoxicated as usual, and sent the midwife outside. As they swung their cane and belt at the helpless child, the midwife barged through the door and quickly put herself in between the aggressors and the victim, taking every single hit that Imacious should have sustained. Finally, her aged, worn body could take it no longer. Bludgeoned and exhausted, she breathed her last and fell motionless onto the ground. Snapping out of the trance, Imacious' parents dropped their weapons and were shocked at what they had just done to the frail old lady in their drunken stupor. Imacious was first filled with grief, but fiery rage had overcome it. A huge tremor shook the entire house, lifting objects, breaking bowls and cracking plates. Screaming violently, the very tools that took the life of his loved one turned against its users, whipping and crackling at his parents. Imacious held both his hand out, and his parents' necks began to constrict. They tried to escape, but moments later, their struggling had ceased. He calmed down, the levitating objects in the house slowly drifting back down. The house had become unrecognizably tattered after the ordeal. Imacious walked out of what was left of the door and found himself being taken in by a wizard who had witnessed the horrific event from outside the house. Imacious trained long and hard under the wizard's supervision, and he promised himself that he would not become the monsters his wretched parents were.




Q: Telekinetic Shift
CHANNELING - The Telepath uproots a tree and smashes it onto the target location, dealing AoE damage and stunning enemies that are hit. The speed of the tree will increase every second. The tree can be released before it reaches its target by moving. Getting hit by a spell ruins his concentration, causing him to stop channeling, and the tree will fall harmlessly onto the ground. Leveling this skill creates 2 subskills, both sharing the same cooldown.
- 200 tree speed
- 250 radius
- +50/75/100/125 speed per second, with a maximum of 600 movement speed.
- 80/160/240/320 damage
- 20/17/14/11 second cooldown

Q1: Uproot nearest tree
Type: Target-Point
CHANNELING - Uproots the nearest tree within 400 range of the center of the target location and launches it to the target location. Cannot be used if there are no trees around within 400 range of the center of the target location.
- 80/160/240/320 damage
- 130/150/170/190 mana cost

Q2: Uproot farthest tree
Type: Target-Point
CHANNELING - Uproots the farthest tree within 800 range of the center of the target location and launches it to the target location. Cannot be used if there are no trees around within 800 range of the center of the target location.
- 80/160/240/320 damage
- 130/150/170/190 mana cost

Imacious' psychic power that could once only lift plates can now pluck huge trees from their roots.

Notes:
This is a good follow-up initiation skill.
Can destroy trees.
Issuing any command while channeling will break the channel.




W: Psychic Strangle
Type: Target-Unit
Damage: Magical
CHANNELING - The Telepath uses his psychic powers to hold a target at its current location, dealing damage over time and preventing it from attacking or casting spells. Also steals mana based on the intelligence of the target unit.
- 500 range
- 3/3/4/4 second channel
- Mana steal based on 20/30/40/50% of the intelligence of the target unit
- 15/20/25/30 damage per second
- 130/135/140/145 mana cost
- 30/25/20/15 second cooldown

He uses the very technique he used to murder his parents against his enemies.

Notes:
Issuing any other command while channeling will break the channel.




E: Mind Pulse
Type: No Target
Damage: Pure
CHANNELING - The Telepath releases waves of pure energy around him in an area, damaging enemies that come into contact with it and revealing invisible foes. Also grants vision over the fog of war. Passively releases a wave whenever The Telepath is hit with magic damage.
- 400 radius
- 1 wave released per second for 4 seconds
- 40/50/60/70 wave damage
- 140/160/180/200 mana cost
- 25 second cooldown
- 2.5 second true sight time

Imacious' mind holds powerful secrets.

Notes:
Does not destroy trees.
Issuing any command while channeling will break the channel.




R: Focus
The Telepath puts himself into a trance, heightening his senses. He cannot attack while in the trance but all of his spells can be channeled at the same time while in the trance. He can also move around while channeling his spells, and nothing can interrupt his channeling except for a hex. The Telepath also gains additional mana regeneration for a limited time.
- 2.5 second channel to activate meditation
- 10/15/20 mana regenerated per second
- 15 second duration
- 100/130/160 mana cost
- 60/55/50 second cooldown

Upgradable by Aghanim's Scepter
- Cooldown reduced to 50/45/40
While Focusing:
- The subskills of Telekinetic Shifts share separate cooldown
- Increases duration of Psychic Strangle by 1 second
- Increases Mind Pulse radius by 100/150/200

Through a simple meditation technique his master taught him, he learned to control his rage and improve his powers.

Notes:
Use this ultimate to perform the all-channel combo.




The Telepath has an array of powerful skills. His Telepathic Shift is a high-damage semi-spammable stun, his Psychic Strangle is a strong disable and his mind pulse does a ton of damage if enemies eat all the waves. However, since all these spells are channeling spells, he cannot cast them together, which balances out his early-game power. However, his ultimate, Focus, is the game-breaker. This lets him cast all his spells at once, and also gets rid of the mana regeneration needs of this hero with the insanely high mana regeneration while in Focus. The combo is Psychic Strangle first, then Mind Pulse, and finally stuff a tree in their face with Telepathic Shift. In teamfights, this hero has huge potential to ruin the other team's chances, and must be quickly focused down before he gets out of hand.

The Telepath is quite flexible in lane allocation, and he can work in a dual-lane, tri-lane or even a solo-lane. A mix of Tangoes, Salves, Mantles of Intelligence and Iron Branches will make you set for the early game, while a Tango and 3 Iron Branches will let you survive mid to rush a bottle. Arcane boots are a must as this hero is usually starved for mana. A Force Staff should be gotten next for the active ability, which lets you get in on a fight and cast all your skills. Bloodstone is situational, as his ultimate already gives him mana regeneration, but it is still good for the reduced spawn time and AoE heal. BKB can be gotten to totally negate spell damage and gives you extra survivability in teamfights. Other possible items are Rod of Atos, Linken's Sphere, Scythe of Vyse, Shiva's guard, Ethereal Blade and, of course, Veil of Discord. If you find yourself playing the support role, buy the courier try to squeeze in a few wards here and there, but avoid getting a Bloodstone unless you're really fat, as it has not much supportive value in it. Arcane boots should still be gotten. A Mekansm or Pipe of Insight is good for negating oncoming enemy attacks, and Scythe of Vyse and Shiva's guard is still good if you can afford it.




Balance Changelog:

10/5/2013:

Telepathic Shift
- Rescaled mana cost from 190 to 130/150/170/190

Mind Pulse
- Rescaled mana cost from 200 to 140/160/180/200

Focus
- Upgradable by Aghanim's Scepter.


16/5/2013:

Telepathic Shift is renamed to Telekinetic Shift

Telekinetic Shift
- Cooldown reduced from 25/23/21/18 to 20/17/14/11
Telekinetic, not telepathic :D

Psychic Strangle
- Duration decreased from 4/4/5/5 to 3/3/4/4 seconds
- Now drains mana based on 20/30/40/50% of the target's intelligence per second in addition to dealing damage
- Damage has been reduced to 15/20/25/30
- Cooldown reduced from 30/26/22/18 to 30/25/20/15
This skill has become a more disable-oriented spell, and might even prevent the opponent from casting spells after the mana steal. Also helps to sustain the high mana-cost of your spells late-game

Mind Pulse
- Gives a small area of sight as it passes through an area
- Now reveals enemy heroes for 2.5 seconds when hit by a wave
It might have been a bit underpowered the last time given its small range, huge mana cost and long cooldown, not to mention you can't move while channeling this skill without your ultimate.

Focus
- Removed decreased skill cooldowns
- Changed Aghanim's Scepter upgrade
- Lowers cooldown to 50/45/40
- When Focusing:
- Increases radius of Mind Pulse by 100/150/200
- Increases the duration of Psychic Strangle by 1.5 seconds
- Telepathic Shift's subskills share a separate cooldown
To make the Agahnim's Scepter upgrade a little more worth the cash.




Thank you all for reading, please leave some feedback :)

Very powerful caster hero but he is not overpowered because he is balanced by his high-manacost spells. In fact, I think the manacosts are too high. Make his Q's manacost scale, like 130/150/170/190 or something. Same with his E, 200 manacost at the very beginning is to high. A 140/160/180/200 manacost is good enough. His W and ultimate are fine, I guess. This hero would become very powerful with a Bloodstone, but then again he still has low attribute gains, so he's still fairly balanced. Nice idea and keep up the good work.

Thanks for the feedback and yeah, the mana cost is a bit too high. Will fix it soon :)

I love this hero idea. Seems very well balanced as well.

Thanks for the feedback, I appreciate it :)

I think you have Telepathy mixed up with Telekinesis. Telepathy is reading others minds Telekinesis is moving objects with the mind. I'd expect a Telepath to have spells like true sight or being able to see an enemies movements stuff like that.

I think you should call the midwife the nurse or nanny or something like that midwives don't tend to stick around after birth. Or perhaps she had a reason to stay, like she was his true mother?

Quite true, I mix then up quite often, as shown here. :P
Maybe I'll just add a part in the Lore saying that the midwife somehow has a "Special attachment" to little Imacious.

Edit: Can you comment on the gameplay aspects of this hero a bit?

Game-play-wise at first I thought he looked a little OP but on further reflection he is very nicely balanced. My only concern would be the duration of Psychic Strangle. A 5 second disable at level 5 would be absolutely devastating for most heroes early/mid game providing your lane partner wasn't completely incompetent. I mean it's the same duration as a maxed out chronosphere. If I'd suggest any change there it would be to perhaps reduce the duration but compensate by increasing the damage slightly. The only other thing is maybe the cooldowns are a little long. But yeah all in all well balanced but an early game beast if the player can get enough mana.

I wouldn't compare Psychic Strangle to a Chronosphere though, as it does only affects 1 target. Plus, its a channeling spell. Still, 5 seconds is quite a long time, so I'll reduce it to 4. My next "Balance Patch" will reduce the cooldowns of all his skills and remove the cooldown reduction from Focus, so that won't be a problem. Mind Pulse will also reveal invisible enemies, as the fact that its range is short and requires channeling will prevent you from doing all the potential damage (which is quite high).

This hero would be great when teamed up with Magnus or Enigma after a successful Reverse Polarity/ Black Hole. But I'm a little bit concerned about his Q as its uses gets more and more limited as you go closer and closer to the enemy base(assuming you've been winning teamfights) as there are very few trees that can be used to lift. Maybe allow it to lift creeps as well, or will it become OP? What do you think?