Hey there,
I noticed that Anvil was lacking as a Hero, even under his perfect circumstances. After running him into Castellan + heavy shielders, Butter, Phalanx, Kobold, etc. He didn’t really do what I believe he should’ve. Not only that, but he lacks far too much damage and utility to be useful for either or both.
SO here’s my idea on how you should buff him!
Bronze: Scramble Grenade
Anvil fires a grenade that releases a charged gas in a small area. This ability deals Elemental Damage Per Second (unchanged), and all enemies within the area are Silenced and Disarmed. This effect lingers on an enemy for a brief moment after they leave the area.
Anvil’s Bronze is probably his best skill. It does its job well, but I think it should do slightly more just to bring him in line with some other characters. That being said, if you do make this change, I would make the AOE smaller, and make sure the disarm remains for a moment after they switch covers. Also, I imagine this ability would be pretty annoying, which will make him more of a faceless menace.
Silver: Arc Blast
I have two ideas for this ability;
Silver: Arc Beam
Anvil focuses an energy beam on a targeted enemy, dealing Elemental Damage Per Second. This beam permanently shreds elemental armour unless cleansed and deals 1.5x damage per second to shields.
Silver: Arc Blast
Anvil shoots an energy blast at the targeted enemy, dealing half Elemental half Physical Damage.
If the enemy is shielded, all the enemy’s shields are instantly overloaded, dealing a blast of Elemental Damage in a huge area based on a % of either the health of the combined shields or the strongest shield applied to the target.
I feel like this ability should be his strongest but is the most lacking. In his intro, you have him sweeping a giant laser beam over the camera. In game, it tickles enemies weaker than him in terms of power. Since it’s his selling point, it should be more impactful. The combined shield health damage might be too strong, though.
Gold: Counter Charge
I think Counter Charge can either be left unchanged or nerfed, depending on how you leave his base stats. Since Anvil is incredibly fragile, if you leave him this way, Counter Charge should stay how it is. If you buff his baseline toughness (which I will talk about soon), Counter Charge should be nerfed, as such:
Whenever Anvil damages a hero, he gains a flat shield for a quarter of his HP.
This ability has a 20 second cooldown, and if Anvil is already shielded, it is only refreshed.
Platinum: Arc Rounds
Anvil’s weapon deals additional elemental damage, multiplied by 1.5x versus shielded enemies.
Lots of heroes have passives that are just “You deal shitloads of elemental damage.” Anvil should be no exception, but he should keep his unique modifier.
Another idea for this is to make his weapon trigger the shield explosion in his Silver skill, let me know if you’d like me to expand on that.
Miscellaneous changes:
I think Anvil’s baseline is too out of place how it is. He’s an extremely fragile midliner with a shotgun hand cannon, and a DPS Ruby skill. I know that the change to his Plat will make him way stronger if his weapon remains a shotgun, so if you do that I suggest you change his weapon to be a traditional, bullet hand cannon, similar to Kurtz’. And if you keep his weapon as a shotgun hand cannon, you should buff his HP slightly, both Armour types by a reasonable amount, and give him the support Ruby skill, so as not to overload his gun with damage steroids, and make him reasonably tanky.
So, yeah! Those are my ideas. Thanks for reading, and let me know what you guys think.
Be excellent to each other!