User:Minionman/Witch Doctor

General Description
Witch doctors are an idea for a new healing class. This class would revolve around wards, either casting them, improving them, or otherwise using ward powers to cast abilities in battle. Witch doctors could fill healing, buffing, and damaging roles. The witch doctor is a class that would build up slowly, but get stronger as time went on.

Backstory
Before the third war, the witch doctors of stranglethorn were, outside the troll communities in the jungles, merely a scary rumor. Stories told of mysterious magicians that used wild and dangerous animal powers to invisibly influence others for good or harm. Many of these stories were untrue, but the witch doctors did in fact exist, performing unusual rituals with animal parts, mysterious concoctions, and a strong control of the spirits inhabiting the world.

Immediately before the third war, the witch doctor Sen'jin received a vision of a disaster befalling his island, and green skinned strangers who would arrive to save the darkspear trolls from it. Soon afterward, the orcs arrived on the island, helping to drive off marauding humans, and carrying the darkspear tribes off the islands to escape a volcanic eruption triggered by a sea witch. The new darkspear leader Vol'jin allied the darkspear tribes with the orcs, starting the formation of the new horde that exists today. The witch doctors proved invaluable in the third war, their healing and other spiritual abilities helping the orcs defeat Grom, fight the battle of Mt. Hyjal, and after the war to drive off the attacking forces of Admiral Proudmoore. Witch doctors were exposed more fully to the world at that point, allowing the outside world their first outside glimpses of these mysterious figures.

In troll society, witch doctors are often community leaders, using their concoctions and connections to the spirits to predict the future, or otherwise gather information from enemies. Witch doctors tend to spend long apprenticeships with experienced masters of the art, before becoming full fledged practioners, though some can gain the skills rapidly. A small amount of orcs have in recent times taken up the art as well, though only the most spiritually gifted have achieved any level of mastery in the few years they have had to train. Formed Night elf druids and Draenei prophets or shamans have also taken up the art after seeing the troll's abilities, though they have come nowhere near close to the skills of long time troll practioners. Night elves and Draenei often use a mix of their of powers as well, while attempting over time to gain mastery and, perhaps, find a troll willing to teach them the finer points.

Witch Doctor Mechanics
Races:
 * Orc
 * Troll
 * Night Elf
 * Draenei


 * Cloth Armor
 * Weapons: Wands, staffs, daggers

Witch doctors use three "skill resources":


 * Wards slots: A witch doctor may have up to 6 wards of any type.  Wards are cast instantly, with no global cooldown, and no other cost, until the witch doctor reaches 6.  (No special reagents are needed like with shaman totems).  Wards are immune to AoE spells, and have a 95% chance to avoid direct spells and attacks, but have low hp.  Any aggro wards would normally produce instead goes to the witch doctor.  Once cast, Wards would have their own icons similar to pet icons to show the witch doctor the effects on the wards as well as what they are.


 * Spirit Energy: This resource builds all the time like rogue energy, and is used to improve wards.  A number of ward improvement spells exist, to make wards more powerful directly, make them last longer, add unusual effects, etc.


 * Spirit Power: As the totem perform their function, spirit power is built up.  Spirit power can be used for many powerful direct effect spells.

Animalism

 * Fire Ward: A snake-like ward the shoots fire at a single enemy. (Think the shadow hunter spell from warcraft 3)


 * Spitting ward: A totem that shoots poison that damages over time.  Stacks up to 6 times, each witch doctor gets their own stack on an enemy.


 * Snake ward: A totem that spits a healing material at nearby allies.  Prioritizes allies who are taking the most damage.


 * Ward of Locusts: A totem that drains the life of enemies and provides it to allies.  he locusts fly out, deal the damage, than fly to allies to give them health.  The locusts will heal any damaged party member, but will not prioritize damage and will provide equal healing over time to any damaged party member.  They will similarly not focus on any one enemy bit will spread out over several enemies.


 * Ward of the Tiger; Adds extra Strength to party members.


 * Ward of the Monkey: Adds extra Agility to party members.


 * Ward of the Raptor: Increases the intellect of party members.

Preparations

 * Sentry Ward: Provides vision of targeted area if the witch doctor activates it. (The witch doctor would get a buff, that if clicked on, would provide vision from the sentry ward's point of view.)  Also provides a 3% increase hit chance and critical chance with attacks against nearby foes.


 * Voodoo Ward: Causes damage over time to the nearest enemy.


 * Ward of Fear: Causes nearby enemies to miss with attacks or spells 25% of the time.


 * Healing Doll: When the nearest ally falls below certain amounts of health, they are healed for a large amount.


 * Healing Mist: Provides healing every second in a small area around the ward, and removes poison/disease effects.


 * Grim Ward: Scares away enemies that walk too close


 * Ward of Drowsiness: Causes enemies near the ward to attack slower.  The effect is more powerful to enemies closer to the ward.


 * Ward of the Mind: Increases the intellect and spirit of nearby allies.

Spiritualism

 * Healing Ward: Heals all allies for a percentage of their max health every second.


 * Protective Ward: Reduces damage taken by close by allies by a percentage.  The percentage increases the more damaged the ally is.  The closer the ally is to the ward, the higher the damage reduction.


 * Stasis Trap; Stuns all enemies in the area after a short "activation" time.  Enemies are immune to another stasis trap stun for a long time afterwards, and the ward has a long cooldown.


 * Ward of Rage: Damages and slows the closest enemy to the ward.  Damage increases the closer the enemy gets to the ward.


 * Ward of Energy: Regenerates a small amount of rage, energy, mana, etc. every second to allies.


 * Ward of Spiritual Protection: Removes curse and magic debuffs every few seconds.


 * Ward of Anger: Damages any enemies that damage an ally in the ward's area.

Witch doctor Ward Improvement spells

 * Ward's Power; Directly increases the effect of the ward.


 * Lasting Ward: Causes the ward to last longer.


 * Ward's Reach: For wards that cause effects in an area around the ward, increases the area.


 * Side Effects:If the ward's effects are single target, gives them a some AoE. (this would be more "splash damage" type AoE than "full effect in the area" AoE.)


 * Spiritual Inspiration: Any ward that buffs allies (Except healing), buffs some related effects as well, though to a smaller extent. 9A strength ward would add extra stamina, armor, and agility, for example)


 * Interfering Wards; Wards that slow, stun, cause miss chance, etc. to enemies causerelated effects as well. (so a movement slowing ward would slow cast and attack speed by a smaller amount, a stunning ward might silence an enemy, etc.)


 * Cleansing Wards; Wards that remove harmful effects increase resistance to those effects somewhat as well.

Spiritualism

 * Healing blast: Heals the target for a large amount of health.


 * Spirit Strike: Damages an enemy for a large amount.


 * Stun: Stuns a target for a medium amount of time.  Targets cannot be stunned too much in a period of time.

Animalism

 * Summon Snake: Summons a snake that poisons enemies and attack them in close combat.  Lasts a short time.


 * Summon Tiger: Summons a tiger that deals melee damage.


 * Summon Swarm:  Summons an insect Swarm that steals life from enemies for itself, and reduces enemy move and attack speed the more damage it does.

Preparations

 * Mind Bending Haze: Throws a preparation that creates a poison cloud in the area that reduces casting speed and hit chance of enemies that get caught in it.  The effects are larger the closer the enemy was to the targeted ground.


 * Firebomb: Throws a preparation that explodes and sets enemies on fire in an area. (Based on the Witch Doctor diablo 3 ability)


 * Healing Concoction: Heals allies over time in the target area.  Allies closer to the ground targetted are healed for more.