Daredevil
Daredevil is one of the classic hero’s of Marvel storytelling. He fights for justice with his incredible skill and integrity. He is the originator of no fear before it was a T-shirt.
He is the master of martial arts, armed and unarmed combat and an expert tactician. He’s had decades of rich story content that includes many classic weapons, fighting moves and some very iconic allies and enemies.
We kept that spirit in mind when performing Daredevil’s design review. Our top goal was making sure he is engaging to play, has powerful options versus a variety of enemies, and looks good doing it.
Combo System
Daredevil was an early hero design when a lot of newer tech wasn’t available. In addition to buffing Daredevil’s overall power, we’ve added a combo system to give Daredevil players a more interactive gameplay style.
Daredevil now has the "Combo Points" secondary resource, which increase when striking with certain attacks. Finisher moves spend these combo points for advantages, including a single-target attack, an area attack and a self-heal. Daredevil players can use each one based on their tactical situation.
In addition to everything you would expect from a combo point system, Daredevil has two additional interesting notes:
Daredevil has a power than can be used, for free, only within 3 seconds of using a Finisher. Some Daredevil players may opt to use this power.
Daredevil’s new signature power will have it’s cooldown sped up every time Daredevil uses a Finisher power. This is a build option for players who want to focus on Finisher’s and the new Signature power.
On to the specifics:
Club Strike / Taser Club
Design Note: We wanted to add more weapon variety for Daredevil, including more billy club attacks and staff and nunchuk attacks. He now enjoys more clearly defined build options with different choices in basic attacks, each of which showcases Daredevil using his clubs in a different way.
Club Strike - Now provides spirit on hit instead of slowing enemies. It has also been renamed Assault and Battery.
NEW Basic Attack - Nunchuck Beatdown - A rapid attack using both connected billy clubs as nunchucks. This power increases its base attack speed with additional power points, making it lightning-fast at high ranks.
NEW Basic Attack - Staff Strike - A slower, harder hitting attack using Daredevil’s telescoping billy clubs as a staff. This power enjoys increased critical rating and critical damage and has a wider damage radius (the same distance as the lightning effect from Taser Club and effectively replaces Taser Club).
Taser Club - The Taser Club has always been a bit out of step from Daredevil lore, but it was important as an AOE basic attack so we managed to keep it in the game until it could be replaced. It’s AOE functionality has now been replaced by Staff Strike, which is directly from Daredevil lore.
Apprehend
NEW Power - Apprehend - Daredevil throws his connected club, letting it wrap around enemies in front of him before pulling them towards him to deliver swift, brutal justice.
Club Throw / Rebounding Club
Design Note: Rebounding Club has been widely received as the more enjoyable power compared to Club Throw, so we are focusing strictly on Rebounding Club as the go-to ranged power in his kit. To replace Club Throw, we've added a new power to assist in dealing with ranged or retreating foes that reinforces his playstyle as a melee hero, is more fun to use, and is very iconic to the character.
Rebounding Club - Now hits up to 7 targets before returning to Daredevil. The missile speed has been increased. The power now has a brief cooldown, and no longer requires the club to return before activating. The visuals have been upgraded.
Note that since the club is no longer tracked separately as a missile, it will completely remove any weirdness with the club getting stuck or not returning to Daredevil.
Club Throw - Has been removed from Daredevil to focus on Rebounding Club.
Club Sweep / Whirling Club
Design Note: The synergy between Whirling Club and Club Sweep is entertaining and effective, and many players have been enjoying their interaction. We are focusing on the Combo system as the source for Daredevil’s damage bonuses instead of building him around debuffs, but this particular combo will remain as a one-two room-clearing punch. In addition, we're adding a new AoE finisher power to Daredevil's kit that will help him clear rooms more easily.
Whirling Club - Now weakens enemies in addition to slowing them.
Club Sweep - Now deals bonus damage to weakened enemies instead of slowed ones.
NEW Power - Street Sweeper - Daredevil strikes an enemy with a lunging punch. Afterwards, Daredevil will rapidly bounce from enemy to enemy, attacking each one in a blur of rapid hits. This power consumes all combo points to deal extra damage. This is one of Daredevil’s new selection of area attack options.
Spinning Hook Kick / Jumping Strike
Design Note: These two powers are very flavorful and thematic to Daredevil and have a high-impact animation, and thus were perfect candidates to become integrated into the Combo system. Now, these two powers will be highlights of that system, giving them a solid place in Daredevil power rotations.
Jumping Strike - Now consumes all combo points to deal extra damage.
Spinning Hook Kick - Damage has been increased significantly. The power can now only be used after executing a maximum combo finisher. This will bring the power into a unique spot in Daredevil’s rotation, bringing in an extra heavy hit when you fully execute a combo in addition to the finisher.
Radar Ping / Passive Powers / Man Without Fear
Design Note: Daredevil's passives have been re-analyzed to give them direct purpose in certain player builds. Radar Ping, a very iconic power to Daredevil, has been changed and merged into Radar Sense, allowing the effect to periodically activate automatically.
Radar Sense - Now provides minimap visibility, dodge rating, and projectile evasion. When reaching maximum combo points or entering combat, Daredevil gains a chance to completely evade attacks for a short duration, and pings nearby enemies, causing them to become vulnerable. This also serves as a visual indicator for when your combo points are full.
Relentless Justice - Now provides defense, tenacity, attack and movement speed. In addition, Daredevil gains damage reduction for 10 seconds whenever he uses a movement power.
Devil of Hell's Kitchen - Now provides critical rating, critical damage rating, and damage rating to melee powers.
Radar Ping - Has been removed from Daredevil, as its functionality now resides in Radar Sense.
Man Without Fear (now named ‘Born Again’) - Now consumes combo points to restore some health instantly, then grants health over time. No longer restores spirit.
Opening Lunge
Design Note: Opening Lunge has evolved in its gameplay purpose over recent patches, so we’ve upgraded its animation and visuals to match, creating an exciting and unique method of opening into a fight.
Opening Lunge - Now named Sliding Strike, this causes Daredevil to perform a power slide, slipping beneath enemies to reach his target destination. At the end of the slide, Daredevil flourishes his club around him, dealing damage to nearby enemies.
Signature
Test Center Design Note: We’re using some new tech for Daredevil’s Signature, which will allow its cooldown to be reduced through gameplay means. This is something that we’re looking for testing on - signatures are balanced to their cooldown, and this mechanic could prove to be too powerful at the moment.
NEW Power - Devil’s Due - Daredevil uses his billy club’s grappling cable, attaching it to an object and launching himself skywards. After a brief delay, he will drop down at the targeted location, dealing damage to anything in the area.
Ultimate
Design Note: We wanted to give Daredevil a powerful, visually impactful attack as part of his Ultimate, and have improved his team-play by extending the buff he receives to the rest of his allies.
In the end, we also wanted to retain Elektra as part of a large, enemy-clearing segment of this ultimate, as a nod to his classic encounters and relationships with her over the years, across many epic storylines, but we didn’t want her to be the sole focus of the ultimate.
Daredevil’s Ultimate is now called: Man Without Fear
When the Ultimate power is used, Daredevil leverages his the incredible martial arts prowess, inspiring himself and his nearby allies to enjoy a large bonus in their ability to deliver critical hits, greatly increasing the total damage output of the group.
Once this group buff is applied, Elektra appears to perform a devastating synchronized combo with Daredevil, obliterating nearby enemies with martial arts attacks.
Daredevil’s Synergy
Daredevil’s Synergy has been buffed.
Previously, his synergy provided a 2% damage bonus to normal and elite enemies at both level 25 and level 50.
The synergy speeds up a player’s time to clear content and will be extremely useful in raid situations, but is less attractive for players who are tackling normal-difficulty content.
The new synergy now provides a 3% bonus to normal and elite mobs at level 25 and a new 2% damage to melee attacks at level 50. This will also serve as another synergy option for melee heroes.
Other Revisions
Heroic Leap - This power is unchanged.
Action Roll - Has received an updated animation and gives a movement speed bonus on use.
Triple Strike - Now provides a combo point when used, and has new, updated animation.
Swinging Assault - The movement of the power has been altered to make more physics sense, given the new swing animation. The bleed component has been removed, in order to make his gameplay rotations in combat the most fun possible.
Enter the Void - Now has a cooldown instead of a spirit cost, similar to changes to other recently revised heroes, which will eventually be extended to all crowd control breaks.
Unique Items
We did a full tuning pass on Daredevil’s Unique items to ensure they are solid. Here are the changes that results from that tuning pass:
Added more health to his Sweater (slot 2) Changed the +2 to all skills to +1 and +Bonus to his Fighting Focus tree
Added a health roll to his Blades of the Beast (slot 3)
Changed the +skills on his Deathstalker Treads (slot 4) to a +4-6 bonus to his focus tree
