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Cosmic Crawler by Cuttleboss

15 Votes

Cosmic Crawler

By: Cuttleboss
Last Updated: Mar 7, 2023
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Cosmic Crawler

-A spellcasting hard carry that scales indefinitely-

COSMIC CRAWLER

Introduction:
Cosmic Crawler is the hard carry that I designed way back when I first got into the hero designing with the intention to be the first extremely hard intelligence carry whose late game raw power rivals heroes like Medusa, Spectre, and Phantom Lancer. Crawler was made to give INT heroes their own ultimate late-game dominator that is played in the safelane and farming oriented (as for a very long time INT carries are tempo-based to some extent and mostly played from the mid lane, though as of 7.32e, Nature's Prophet, Lina and Muerta see some play as farming safelane carries)
Crawler is modeled on lovecraftian horrors and built around themes of inevitability and time. It is also built to be a caster-based carry that actually scales as strongly as the strongest right clicker carry. In this sense, Crawler is less of a traditional hypercarry and more of an extreme-scaling version of a caster core like Leshrac or Necrophos. In Dota lore the Crawler is what Outworld Destroyer came here to warn everyone about, which is among the biggest mysteries of the lore.

Every hero has a gimmick and Cosmic Crawler's is Time, Debuffs, The Three Attributes, and Burst Damage. Cosmic Crawler scales with Game Time, becoming more powerful in its attributes as the game goes on and respawning faster and faster instead of gaining respawn time as the game goes on. Crawler uses powerful standard (and not so standard) debuffs to counter all sorts of enemies it may face. Crawler is also specialized towards killing it's enemies as quickly as possible, since it's ultimate only temporarily reduces their health, and another spell will only continuously apply debuffs if the target is low on health.
Goals and Prompt for Design:
Note: This hero was designed before Muerta's release, so some of the prompt may be out of date.
1. Make an extremely hard carry INT hero. A farming core that scales well. Not a tempo hero. This hero cannot carry the same way as any other hard carry or other existing INT carries. It has to be something unique Intelligence based. This hero will be a Nuker, and not a Pure damage orb right clicker like many of the existing INT carries.
2. The hero cannot be one-note and easily executed. In ideal design, INT carries require smarter players than your average STR and AGI carries. There has to be some flexibility in their mechanics. In this case, the skill for the hero will the derived from smart use of selectable debuffs, which itself is akin to an Invoker and offers a lot of outplay potential. The hero also has a complicated but very high impact ultimate that requires some skill to use properly.
3. Despite being an INT carry, make the hero scale better by making them scale well with all three attributes. Medusa in particular derives her might from how well she scales with all 3 attributes (though this applies to a lesser extent with heroes like Faceless Void or Slark, who get a ton of value out of a large mana pool). INT carries are extremely prone to being glass cannons, especially since its the only attribute that does not provide inherent survivability. Pure glass cannons are never the hardest carries, since they easily lose games they are stomping just by being initiated on. This focus towards all three attributes also adds flexibility since it allows the player to choose what path to take in building the hero.
4. The hero is an eldritch horror, the type that would scare Outworld Destroyer. The idea of time running out and inevitable fates is the main idea. Lovecraft frequently used rapid regeneration to show the horrific nature of his monsters, so this hero will incorporate that idea in its respawn reduction mechanics. It also fits with the hero's lore where the Crawler we see (and play as) is actually an avatar of the true multi-dimensional Cosmic Crawler that is constantly growing in power.
Similar Heroes (Gameplay):
Lore:
From beyond, it saw the formation of the universe from the other side, a side of darkness that no one could see. When the early magic users of the world saw it, it was called the Cosmic Crawler. It was a creature from another dimension that only observed from behind the looking glass. It was alone on its side, living in an empty universe of an unknown age. Now it turned its eyes towards a new universe. Eventually, the crawler gained sorcerer followers on this side who were enraptured by it's power. Before long it's avatar was summoned to this brand new dimension. The new body is still weak, but the Cosmic Crawler is highly adaptable, and before long, every creature may be in danger of absolute annihilation. Not even the followers know what it wants with this universe, but it cannot be safe for the inhabitants who live here.
Connected Heroes (Lore):
Attributes:
15 + 1.4 [55 at level 30]
16 + 1.3 [53 at level 30]
*19 + 2.2 [82 at level 30]


Classification:
Complexity ◆◆◆
Carry ◆◆◆
Nuker ◆◆◆
Disabler ◆◆◇

Base Stats:
Health: 200 base, 500 at level 1
Mana: 75 base, 303 at level 1
Armor: 6 base, 8.6 at level 1
Damage: 30-36 base, 49-56 at level 1
Attack Animation (frontswing+backswing): 0.3+0.3
Base Health Regen: 2 base, 3.5 at level 1
Base Mana Regen: 0, 0.95 at level 1
Base Attack Time: 2.1/0.48 att/sec base, 0.55 at level 1
Initial Attack Speed: 100
Range: 600
Missile Speed: 1200
Movespeed: 275
Sight Range: 1800/800
Turn Rate: 0.9
Damage Block: 0
Collision Size: 24
Legs: 8
Gib Type: Ethereal
Voice Actor: Dee Bradley Baker (Also voices Techies)
(This hero does not talk, only makes creature noises)

Level 30 Stats:
Spoiler: Click to view


A visual of the hero's missile, a ball of space / dimensional dark energy:

Cosmic Crawler is reasonably large, though more tall and floaty than massive, as seen in the size comparison far below.
As of this writing, the current version of Dota2 is 7.32e

Primary Abilities

Q
Dimensional Rip
Cosmic Crawler rips a hole in reality at the target location. The rip damages foes and applies a selected debuff to all of them. Deals damage proportional to your Intelligence and applies a debuff based on Dimension Shift.

With Aghanim's Scepter: Upgrades the debuffs of Dimension Shift.
ABILITY
CAST POINT
DAMAGE TYPE
PIERCES IMMUNITY?
: Target Area
: 0.1+0.4
: Magic
: No
DAMAGE
AOE
DURATION
CAST RANGE

PULL SPEED
PULL DURATION

MANA
COOLDOWN
: 3.6/4/4.4/4.8xINT in Damage
: 230/260/290/320 (330/360/390/420 talent)
: Lasts 1.4/1.8/2.2/2.6 seconds
: 500/550/600/650 Cast Range
: (750/800/850/900 talent)
: 0 (175 talent) Pull Speed
: 0 (3 Second talent) Pull Duration
: 80/120/160/200
: 4
The Cosmic Crawler can open a portal to a new dimension with new rules and laws that no mortal can comprehend, creating only a special kind of chaos.



Notes
Spoiler: Click to view

Mechanics Notes
Spoiler: Click to view

Damage Numbers
Spoiler: Click to view
D
Dimension Shift
Shifts the dimension of choice, which changes debuff of Dimensional Rip that is applied when it is cast.
The dimensions are Green, Blue, Purple, and Red, which each coincide with a debuff.
The effects of each dimension are:
Destabilize (lowers the values of any breakable passive by 2 levels, 1 level if its a passive ultimate)
Inflation (-30% Mana Loss Reduction / increases mana cost of spells by 30%)
Slow (slows movespeed by 20%, 60% with Scepter)
Blind (40% miss rate on attacks)

This skill has no cooldown, no cast point, and no mana cost.

With Aghanim's Scepter, the dimensions are altered with new debuffs: Break, Silence, Leash, and Disarm.

Other dimensions have strange qualities, and twist the bodies and minds of those living in this dimension. It's a mystery which dimension suits the Crawler's tastes at the moment.


Notes
Spoiler: Click to view
W
Cosmic Bind
The Crawler focuses it's powers to shower a target area in crippling cosmic energies. When activated, deals damage over time to a target area based on Cosmic Crawler's Strength. Units and heroes below a certain health percentage threshold have the Stellar Shift debuff applied to them continuously.

With Aghanim's Scepter: Upgrades the debuffs of Stellar Shift.
ABILITY
CAST POINT
DAMAGE TYPE
PIERCE IMM?
: Target Area
: 0.1+0.4
: Magic
: No
DAMAGE PER SEC
AOE
CAST RANGE

STELLAR SHIFT THRESHOLD

ARMOR PER HERO DEBUFFED
MANA (ACTIVATE)
MANA (SUSTAIN)
COOLDOWN
: 1.8/2/2.2/2.4xSTR damage
: 450/500/550/600 Radius
: 450 Cast Range
: 29/32/35/38% HP
: 41/44/47/50% HP (talent)
: 0 (7 with talent)
: 85/90/95/100 + 3% max mana
: 11/22/33/44 + 2% of max mana
: 6/5/4/3
Those without the stamina to resist it will soon find themselves crushed under the Crawler's cosmic energies, dominated by it's superiority.


Notes
Spoiler: Click to view

Mechanics Notes
Spoiler: Click to view

Damage Numbers
Spoiler: Click to view

Mana Cost Scaling
Spoiler: Click to view
F
Stellar Shift
Shifts the space energies of choice, which changes debuff of Cosmic Bind that is applied when the targets fall below the health threshold.
The spaces are Green, Blue, Purple, and Red, which each coincide with a debuff.
The effects of each space are:
Destabilize (lowers the values of any breakable passive by 2 levels, 1 level if its a passive ultimate)
Inflation (-30% Mana Loss Reduction / increases mana cost of spells by 30%)
Slow (slows movespeed by 20%, 60% with Scepter)
Blind (40% miss rate on attacks)

This skill has no cooldown, no cast point, and no mana cost.

With Aghanim's Scepter, the spaces are altered with new debuffs: Break, Silence, Leash, and Disarm.

The Crawler finds similar nasty qualities in the cosmos themselves. A weakened body would not be prepared for space and its energies.


Notes
Spoiler: Click to view
E
Spirit Touch
By using its mental powers, Cosmic Crawler empowers its attack to deal damage and mana loss over time based on Crawler's AGI. If Cosmic Bind is active, Spirit Touch will cause Crawler to perform an attack against all enemies within the bind and apply the debuff to every target. The effect stacks fully, but each stack is independent.

With Aghanim's Shard: Causes Spirit Touch to reduce all forms of health restoration by 40%.
ABILITY
DAMAGE TYPE
PIERCES IMMUNITY?
: Autocast/Target Unit
: Magic
: No
DAMAGE/MANALOSS
DURATION

HEAL/REG/LIFESTEAL RED
MANA
COOLDOWN
: 0.35/0.4/0.45/0.5xAGI/sec
: 6 seconds
: 0 (40% )
: 10 + 3% of Max Mana
: 2 (1 with talent)
The Crawler shows how rudimentary the minds of these mere collections of stardust are. With a spectral arm, it can touch souls directly and feed them anguish.


Notes
Spoiler: Click to view

Mechanics Notes
Spoiler: Click to view

Damage and Manaburn Numbers
Spoiler: Click to view

Ultimate Abilities

R
Arrival
The Cosmic Crawler attempts to manifest itself at the target location. It will channel for a short time. Once channeling is complete the Crawler teleports to that location. On arrival to its new destination all enemy heroes in a large area are damaged a percentage of their maximum health and applied a special debuff. When this debuff is active it makes all of Cosmic Crawler's debuffs unable to be dispelled. If the afflicted enemies survive to the end of the duration of the debuff, the damage of Arrival is healed back. All enemy non-Ancient non-hero-type creeps are instantly killed.

Passively the Crawler gains each attribute, movespeed, mana regeneration, and reduced respawn time based on how long the game's timer has been running. Stats and mana regeneration gain over time is uncapped, while speed gain and respawn reduction is capped.

ABILITY
CAST POINT
MS CAP
RESPAWN CAP
BREAKABLE?
DAMAGE TYPE
PIERCE IMM?
: Target Area / Passive Affects Self
: 0.1+0.3
: 160 (maxed 94/80/67 min)
: 80 (maxed 94/80/67 min)
: No
: Pure
: No
CAST RANGE
TELEPORT DELAY
DAMAGE/HEAL
DEBUFF DURATION

ARRIVAL AOE
+1 to all stats every
-1 Respawn time every
+2 Movespeed every
+0.5 Mana Regen every

MANA
COOLDOWN
: Global
: 5/4/3 seconds
: 15/25/35% of Max HP
: 6/8/10 seconds
: (16/18/20 talent)
: 1000/1200/1400 AOE
: 70/60/50 seconds
: 70/60/50 seconds
: 70/60/50 seconds
: 70/60/50 seconds
: 400/600/800
: 90/60/30
The Crawler goes where it pleases and adapts to it's environment, growing strong every second. It is only a matter of time before everything ends.


Notes
Spoiler: Click to view

Mechanics Notes
Spoiler: Click to view

Passive Bonus Numbers:
Spoiler: Click to view

Hero Talents

+10 Second Arrival debuff Duration
25
Dimensional Rip pulls enemies to its center for 3 seconds

+12% Cosmic Bind debuff health activation threshold
20
-1 Spirit Touch Cooldown

+250 Dimensional Rip Cast Range
15
+7 Armor per hero affected by Cosmic Bind debuffs

+100 Dimensional Rip AOE
10
+30 Damage

Pros and Cons

+ Massive teamfight presence if farmed with extreme AOE Nuking, AOE DoT and attack modifier debuff DoT potential
+ Can adapt ability usage for many lineups by adjusting the debuffs that are active
+ Very fast cast point, spells (except Ultimate) come out quickly
+ Can become very tanky late game with the passive strength gained from Arrival and supported by high base armor and some tank-friendly talents.
+ Good for turtling and stalling, is able to hold position very well, and excellent at killing a lot of creeps
+ Can join teamfights at any point or easily move around the map with Arrival
+ High base armor, damage, and regeneration especially for a ranged hero, making it difficult to harass in lane
+ Nigh-unmatched power in very late game; one of the only heroes that scales well with all 3 attributes and spends less time dead late game than other heroes
+ Due to not having to save buyback most of the time, can usually spend entire net worth on items

- Horrifically low natural stats and stat gain that takes a while to remedy and come online with the Arrival passive, which uniquely means the hero relies on time and not just gold and levels to activate; this can potentially destroy Crawler's team's momentum
- Spells are mostly blocked by spell immunity and heavily dampened by magic resistance
- Slow, low hp early in the game and no reliable escape spell; easy gank target for significant portions of the game
- High BAT means that attack damage and attack speed items scale poorly. Also means that the hero is bad at damaging buildings.
- Due to spending less time dead, can be easier to chain feed (and thus throw) with especially later in the game
- Despite needing time, still heavily item dependent
- Very draft dependent, needs good supporting picks and must avoid dangerous counterpicks which can make Crawler into a non-hero

Role and Gameplay

Cosmic Crawler is a unique and unconventional hard carry that is meant to win teamfights with a combination of magical dps, a spell AOE attack modifier, and nuke spamming while relying on a global mobility spell to farm and fight. Playing against it is made to be playing against the clock in a more literal way than most hard carries. It's skills are all built to turn a close or losing game in its favor. The hero is not optimal for ganking due to heavy item dependence (and lack of mobility-based crowd control) but can join fights with Arrival.

CC is an insane AOE presence, and every one of its skills scale into the late game. Both Dimensional Rip and Cosmic Bind offer excellent turtle and teamfight power, and the nukes grow stronger as the game goes longer while Arrival deals percentage damage and makes the debuffs undispellable. Spirit Touch gives it an edge in long battles due to mana burn leaving enemy heroes powerless. Crawler is not made to man-fight due to its relatively slow auto-attack. It prefers to weave around combat with high movement speed, dealing massive damage to many foes with each damaging spell. The combo of Crawler is to use Arrival and Rip to lower their health, then use Cosmic Bind to apply the constant debuff and attack with Spirit Touch the entire time until the targets are dead. It is all about getting enemy's health down quickly, ideally before they are healed back.

Uniquely for a Carry hero, Cosmic Crawler has to play around enemy Black King Bars instead of fighting through them like most carries. Crawler is heavily weakened and countered when enemies get their BKBs, then regains power late game as those BKB durations go down and Crawler's damage and general survivability goes up. Despite this, it is much safer to draft Cosmic Crawler with some physical damage dealers to make up for it's deficiencies.

Crawler is imagined as a hypercarry who goes to the safelane and spends most of the game farming, but because of Spirit Touch's mana burn and high armor and regeneration, it may be possible to run it mid depending on the matchup if Crawler can outtrade it's enemy, like running a Medusa mid. This is of course very risky, much like a Medusa mid. If you are feeling crazy, it is theoretically possible to run this hero as the world's greediest support and only use the debuffs to terrorize the enemy team until the Arrival passive inevitably makes you strong (which is very possible in a pub game). In terms of drafting and gameplay, Crawler would be most like Spectre in terms of global mobility and slow activation, but plays a little more like Necrophos or Leshrac, without the high potential or reliance on snowballing.

It's gameplay leans towards passiveness and low activity. Crawler has all offensive spells with no in-battle mobility or durability and the spells do very little damage until Crawler has farmed up at least a few thousand gold of net worth. This means there is little potential for snowballing and all you can usually do is farm. It is the hero that looks to farm up some items until it is ready to face off against the enemy team and use the spells to defend towers if it comes to it. It will take it some time to activate due to bad stats and gain.
It's itemization favors big stat items because they boost the damage of Crawler's spells and attack modifiers because Spirit Touch + Cosmic Bind allows Crawler to instant-attack multiple enemies. There is also a strong case to be made for Heal reduction due to how Arrival works, it will severely reduce the heal-back at the end of the duration (which you can get with Aghanim's Shard). Eye of Skadi fits all three and makes it an ideal item to buy at some point.
These specializations dissuade it from low or non attribute items such as Moon Shard, Radiance, or Assault Cuirass.

Due to their crowd control and damage however, it is possible to itemize it for earlier game because of it's ability to disrupt enemies with debuffs and deal some damage if it has enough INT early on. Crawler's itemization would also likely depend on which attribute you would value the most based on which allies and enemies you have. If you want more Damage over Time and a frontline Crawler, get more strength items, if you want a stronger nuker that stays back, get more intelligence items. Agility focused builds are mostly impractical due to Spirit Touch cooldown and 2.1 BAT (and Spirit Touch being the spell that does the least damage by a pretty wide margin), so Agility is more of an afterthought or bonus rather than something to build around, unless you want to dedicate yourself to burning mana.

Cosmic Crawler is a difficult hero and requires a lot of practice to play well due to the difficulty of using Arrival, Rip and Bind properly and selecting the best debuffs every moment requires a lot of game knowledge. The hero also requires excellent farming skills to win and deal with the late game situations that the hero excels in and the struggle of the hero's extremely vulnerable early game. The hero can be easy to chain feed with and thus it takes much effort and focus to play the hero properly. Crawler has a medium skill floor and a high skill ceiling.

Items

General Stat Priorities:
High Priority: INT, STR, Mana Regen, Movespeed, Cast Range, Spell Amplification, Spell Lifesteal
Middle Priority: Magic Resistance, Status Resistance, AGI, Cooldown Reduction, Armor, Spell Immunity, Attack Damage, HP Regen, Mobility, Lifesteal, Evasion, Attack Range
Low Priority: Mana, HP, Attack Speed

Early Options:
Magic Wand, Wind Lace, Ring of Regen, Null Talisman, Bracer, Void Stone, Crown, Ring of Health, Fluffy Hat, Voodoo Mask, Falcon Blade, Soul Ring

Early Builds:
Early Activating Caster: Arcane Boots or Power Treads Int> Eul's Scepter of Divinity> Kaya> Force Staff/ Blink Dagger>Any Kaya Upgrade> and then into late game items.
Early Activating Tanky: Power Treads Str> Kaya and Sange> Black King Bar>and then into late game items

Late Game Carry Builds:
Well Rounded / Both Stats: Arcane Boots or Power Treads Int> Eul's Scepter of Divinity> Eye of Skadi>> Wind Waker> Scythe of Vyse> Heart of Tarrasque> Octarine Core/ Manta Style/ Gleipnir
Tanky / DPS / Str Focused: Arcane Boots> Bloodstone> Eye of Skadi> Heart of Tarrasque> Shiva's Guard> Overwhelming Blink
Burst / Nuker / Int Focused: Power Treads Int> Dagon 1> Ethereal Blade> Dagon 5> Arcane Blink> Scythe of Vyse/ Wind Waker> Eye of Skadi/ Shiva's Guard/ Octarine Core/ Revenants Brooch
Long Ranged High Mana Regen Caster / Int Focused: Arcane Boots>Disassemble Arcanes into Aether Lens> Power Treads Int> Scythe of Vyse> Ethereal Blade>> Octarine Core> Arcane Blink> Wind Waker/ Eye of Skadi/ Revenants Brooch

Strange/Goofy Builds:
Pusher Treant Style Build: Arcane Boots> Meteor Hammer> Aghanim's Scepter>then whatever you want or need for your team
Anti-Mage Build: Power Treads AGI> Mage Slayer> Diffusal Blade> Yasha and Kaya>then normal late game items
Anti-Regen/Heal Build: Boots of Choice> Spirit Vessel> Aghanim's Shard> Eye of Skadi> Shiva's Guard

Item Discussion:
Eye of Skadi is one of Crawler's best items not just due to the massive raw stats, but also because Spirit Touch can attack every target in the Cosmic Bind AOE to Skadi the whole enemy team. The Heal reduction also helps with Arrival, since it limits how much the enemies can heal back at the end of the debuff duration.
Bloodstone is good for the spell lifesteal and active which gives Crawler a massive amount of survivability and a powerful scaling heal and mana restoration tool into late game. Unforunately it does not offer any direct damage boost on its own.
Kaya and Sange is useful because it can boost mana regeneration and increases spell damage. The Status resist is also useful because it can make Crawler less vulnerable to chain disables. Useful for generally making Crawler stronger while not specializing in a benefit.
Yasha and Kaya makes Crawler extremely fast with the percentage movespeed which scales well with the flat movespeed of Arrival's passive.
Eternal Shroud an inexpensive defensive and spell lifesteal item, though it does not boost damage of any spells. Helps with being blown up by spells in the early game.
Octarine Core is a good caster item for this hero enabling it to cast more spells from farther away, but unfortunately does not add any attributes, it would be better later in the game when buying attributes for the damage is not as much of a factor. The reduction in the cooldowns of Dimensional Rip and Spirit Touch also boost Crawler's total damage output a lot.
Scythe of Vyse boosts a lot of intelligence, and the synergy with Arrival is that its hex cannot be removed if Crawler casts it. A powerful item late game and extra good on Crawler. It can be bought as a first major item as well because of its high mana regeneration and boost to Dimensional Shift's damage.
Shiva's Guard is a potentially good choice due to providing a huge amount of armor and reducing healing, which weakens Arrival's reversal heal at the end of its duration if the enemies have a chance of living that long. It also provides a huge amount of intelligence and the AOE slow can be very synergistic with Cosmic Bind.
Rod of Atos / Gleipnir Atos is a powerful item for Crawler early, as it helps the hero with the lack of control and the stats are good. Gleipnir also gives useful stats and a strong AOE nuke root which stacks well with other Crawler debuffs.
Ethereal Blade amplifies almost all damage that Crawler does and provides a powerful disable or effective protection from physical damage depending on the draft. It would also be immune to being dispelled by Arrival if Crawler's target has the debuff (except by Spell Immunity). An excellent item all around and most late game oriented Kaya Upgrade.
Dagon 1 to Dagon 5 allows for some nice additional burst and the stats are also pretty good on Crawler. A useful option of the team really does require more burst late game. Pairs well with Eblade.

Abnormal Items:
Daedalus as crits proc on the Spirit Touch's instant attacks, this item is potentially an effective way to deal tons of damage to multiple foes. Not that reliable and the stats are mostly wasted otherwise, as Crawler does not have the attack speed to use it without the AOE attack.
Satanic is potentially good for synergy with Spirit Touch (with Cosmic Bind), which lets Crawler steal life from multiple foes and heal back huge amounts of health and the dispel is nice for silences.
Meteor Hammer the stats and buildup are nice and active makes Crawler a threat to towers and can synergize if Crawler gets Aghs Scepter to get AOE Leash. It will definitely feel like playing a discount version of a good Hammer hero ( Treant Protector in this case) until Crawler naturally activates later in the game.
Mage Slayer / Bloodthorn: With Spirit Touch, Crawler can apply the Mage Slayer debuff to multiple foes. The stats are not bad either. Potentially useful against casters but not a great farming item. It can be upgraded to Bloodthorn, though the item's stats are not a great fit for Crawler, though not too bad if enemies are reliant on spell damage.
Diffusal Blade: Useful for additional mana burn that stacks with Spirit Touch and Inflation. Crawler can also target multiple foes with Bind+Touch. The active inhibit may give a powerful disable for a low cost. Useful against certain foes that are extra weak to mana burn like Bristleback and Medusa.
Spirit Vessel is potentially useful even if the stats are not. The damage over time can potentially burst down key targets and the heal reduction works well with Arrival.

Other Useful Items:
Hand of Midas despite attack speed being the least valuable stat on Crawler, the gold and exp benefits down the line this item offers are actually quite tempting, since this hero does not naturally activate quickly and Midas may actually not delay the hero from activating at all as opposed to almost all other heroes.
Boots of Travel comes up as a natural upgrade to boots, especially after disassembling Arcanes. The extra speed is useful on this hero and the global mobility is very good combined with Arrival, which would boost Crawler to near omnipresence on the map.
Aghanim's Scepter massively expands Crawler's control and disruptiveness by improving the quality of the debuffs, especially the ones that counter carries. Nice if you have extra money late game or in certain matchups where you need higher quality debuffs (like Leash against Mobile heroes or Disarm against a team of right clickers), though it may be better to acquire it from Roshan.
Aghanim's Shard allows Crawler to prevent enemies from healing back much health with Arrival. It is a good pickup to counter regen or heal based opponents in general too.
Black King Bar is good if you need the protection it offers, often a decently high priority item because Crawler can be easily shut down by silences or nukes and like most carries would be a top priority target.
Force Staff] / Hurricane Pike fits into any build as the stats are useful and the push active helps with kiting and staying alive if enemies jump on you.
Eul's Scepter of Divinity / Wind Waker, Manta Style, Lotus Orb, to dispel self if needed. Usually for silences and annoying debuffs. Eul's is extra nice because it grants some invulnerability while allowing Crawler's spells to deal damage on their own and it's upgrade Wind Waker is nice for its stat bonus and ability to bail Crawler out of danger.
Witch Blade / Revenants Brooch: These two items are not a natural fit on Crawler since it is not a real right clicker and has no real issue dealing with evasion and ethereal. But there is a lot of value to the Witch Blade passive's slow and damage as Crawler's INT gets high and the amount of INT points Brooch adds for one slot. Brooch also offers True Strike and can apply to multiple enemies at once with Spirit Touch (though will use up all 5 attacks very quickly).
Blink Dagger can be useful to help Crawler actually chase down and finish off more mobile heroes. Arcane Blink is a powerful Blink upgrade, it grants intelligence and allows Crawler to cast its spells with extra long debuff duration, offering powerful synergy with Arrival. Crawler's fast cast time doesn't allow it to take advantage of the cast point improvement however. Overwhelming Blink is another Blink upgrade for more tanky Crawlers. It allows Crawler to output a large amount of damage and control when it jumps into combat. Don't touch Swift Blink on Crawler.

Neutral Items:
Level 1: Arcane Ring*, Pig Pole*, Occult Bracelet*, Fairy's Trinket*, Possessed Mask, Tumbler's Toy, Seeds of Serenity, Lance of Pursuit
Level 2: Pupil's Gift**, Eye of the Vizier*, Nether Shawl* Vambrace*, Grove Bow, Bullwhip, Specialist's Array
Level 3: Psychic Headband**, Elven Tunic, Paladin Sword, Titan Sliver, Quickening Charm , Ogre Seal Totem
Level 4: Timeless Relic**, Spell Prism*, Trickster Cloak*, Stormcrafter, Flicker, Ascetic's Cap, Havoc Hammer
Level 5: Apex**, Fallen Sky**, Giant's Ring*, Book of the Dead*, Seer Stone*, Force Boots, Book Of Shadows
*Denotes an extra useful neutral item
**Denotes an exceptional neutral item

Skills and Talents

Cosmic Crawler has a relatively flexible skill build. Some of the skills can take priority depending on the nature of the game and the build you are going for.

Cosmic Bind is often the best spell to max out because it is Crawler's best farming spell due to damaging the most creeps for the least mana. It also is useful for defending tier 1 towers if enemies put pressure early.

Spirit Touch is usually maxed second as a carry. Though not as good for farming as Cosmic Bind, Spirit Touch is an excellent laning spell due to the orb walking, low mana cost, and mana burn which neutralizes many lane opponents. Spirit Touch is a lot better if Crawler is laning against one enemy. This is the spell to max first in a solo vs solo lane.

Good as a value point (due to its massively increasing mana cost and getting most of its damage at the first level), Dimensional Rip is useful for quickly applying a debuff (which early game would probably be Slow to try to go for kills, Blind to try to make enemies miss last hits, or Destabilize to farm creep stacks that would normally have Cloak Aura). This spell is usually best to max last.

Arrival is always taken whenever possible. All your useful quirks as Crawler come from this spell and the mana regen makes it easier for Crawler to spam its spells. The active also frees up farming since Crawler can easily jump to farming spots, fountain, or fights if need be (though jumping into fights will expose it to counterinitiation).

Attribute Bonus: Cosmic Crawler may benefit from some bonus early game stats. It has a big problem with fragility early game and the mana cost of each of it's spells grow at a high rate. If the player wants to dump all their stats into Strength, the player can choose to neglect their other skills and go for points into Cosmic Bind and Stats. If the player wants to dump all their stats into Intelligence they can go for Dimensional Rip and Stats. This works best with good support that will stop you from being punished for making such a greedy decision, like with many farm-based carries.


Talent Choices:

Level 10: Dimensional Rip AOE vs Damage. A bigger Dimensional Rip AOE can be very powerful later in the game, since the spell will potentially be able to hit more enemies and more of a creep wave, and the bigger AOE has more synergy with the level 25 Dimensional Rip talent, which makes the Pull about 30% more effective. The Damage is useful even though Crawler has 2.1 BAT because it adds the attack to all Spirit Touch targets which itself can be a big farm booster if the Crawler player is using Cosmic Bind more.

Level 15: Dimensional Rip Cast Range vs Cosmic Bind Debuff Armor. Two very different paths, either Cast Range to allow for safer casting of your nuke from the backline, as well as more synergy with the level 25 talent that allows Crawler to pull enemies in certain directions. The armor for each Cosmic Bind debuff to become very durable based on the number of enemies affected, and it synergizes very well with the level 20 debuff activation threshold talent, since it will allow easier access to those debuffs, which will translate to more armor. This talent depends if you want a caster or tank Crawler.

Level 20: Cosmic Bind debuff activation threshold vs 1/2 Spirit Touch cooldown. The Cosmic Bind talent makes it much easier to threaten the enemy team with the debuffs as it puts it on them when they are below half health. The Spirit Touch cooldown is powerful for more mana burn and sustained damage to multiple enemies. It depends if you need damage/manaburn or if you need the easier access to the debuffs more. The Cosmic Bind talent is much stronger if you have Aghanim's Scepter.

Level 25: Arrival Debuff Duration vs Dimensional Rip Pulls for 3 seconds. Arrival's debuff delay is useful because it slow the enemies healing back their lost health, giving you more time to burst down the enemy heroes. Additional time for undispellable debuffs can also be useful for enemies that are relying a lot on dispels and escape spells. It is overall very useful if fights are going on too long after Arrival is cast and you need more duration. Dimensional Rip with the pull becomes a very strong kiting and mobility control spell on a very low cooldown, especially combined with Aghanim's Scepter's Leash and slow. This talent can make it nigh impossible to escape from Cosmic Bind once a player falls below the health threshold. The Rip talent is also much stronger if the player chose the other two Dimensional Rip talents.

Combos and Counters

Ideal Allies:

Turtle Heroes:
Heroes that can stall out the game and defend high ground easily can help get to a decently strong point with Arrival's passive. Keeper is also an extremely good ally in general for Crawler, which we will detail in this section.

Nuke Boosters:
The Crawler's nukes become extremely strong late game but magic or spell boosting abilities can boost them to absurd levels. Keeper once again is a good pairing because he can instantly refresh Dimensional Rip, and has Solar Bind.

Global Mobility Boosters:
Helps Crawler move around the map and farm or go to fights more effectively. These spells pair well with Arrival to give Crawler very significant global impact or the option to go to fountain and return fully healed.

AOE Crowd Control / Initiators:
Ideal heroes to set up Arrival. These heroes with a good entrance can deal a ton of damage. Also they are good heroes to teamfight with because Crawler before having Scepter has very limited mobility control.

Cores That Can Damage Through Spell Immunity:
Crawler is a carry that cannot damage through spell immunity, unlike almost all safelane carries. As such, it would be smart to draft Crawler with cores that can deal damage to Spell Immune enemies (usually physical but sometimes Pure). It is a reversal of a lot of usual position damage distribution.

Heal Reduction Heroes:
Heroes that can reduce the healback of Arrival are good allies for Crawler. Heroes that buy items like Spirit Vessel and Eye of Skadi (though Crawler itself is a prime contender for that) count here too.

Saving Heroes:
Crawler is easy to kill for much of the game. These heroes can protect such a vulnerable hero very well especially early game. Counterinitiators count here too.

Stat Boosters:
These heroes can improve key attributes for Crawler, allowing it to be a greater threat with it's abilities before it has farm and buildup of stats from the Arrival passive.

Good Against:

High Armor/Evasion/Attack Resistance/Physical Protection Heroes:
As a scaling magical nuker, Crawler is very effective against heroes who do not have protections from magic damage and focus on physical protection in all its forms.

Passive Reliant Heroes:
Crawler is naturally very effective against heroes that are reliant on their passives, even before it has Scepter due to making those passives weaker with Destabilize. Many of these heroes are also vulnerable to Blind/Disarm.

Kiteable Melee Heroes:
Later in the game, Crawler is much faster than these heroes and is very good at restricting them with it's various debuffs of Blind/Disarm and Slow/Leash, especially with the Dimensional Rip pull talent.

Heroes Vulnerable to Mana Loss:
Usually these are tanky heroes who still need to cast spells to do stuff, Spirit Touch can make them into non-heroes by depleting their mana in a similar vein to Anti-Mage so they would be alive but useless.

High Cooldown Heroes:
Heroes that rely on high cooldown spells to fight can face trouble. Crawler's fast respawn can potentially mean that in a normal game where these heroes would use their high cooldown spells to pickoff and kill the enemy carry, it does not have that value here due to how fast said carry (Crawler) respawns. In principle it is similar to the normal way to counter these heroes (buyback) but without having to buyback.

Non-BKB Cores:
Cosmic Crawler is one of those "all cores are getting BKB or we all die" kind of heroes due to its massive spell damage output and control with debuffs. The cores that are not able to use BKB very well will have a tough game against Crawler.

Illusion Heroes:
Crawler plays a favorable game against illusion heroes. Crawler deals a huge amount of AOE damage with its spells, and illusions will quickly fall under the Stellar Shift threshold and have permanent Blind/Disarm. Arrival's damage in its higher levels also allows it to one-shot most illusions.

Heroes that Like to be At Low Health:
Due to how Cosmic Bind works, heroes that like to be at low health will find themselves continuously debuffed, especially by Blind/Disarm or Slow/Leash if they're melee. This is particularly good against carries that rely on Satanic.


Worst Enemies: (There are many of them due to how specialized Crawler's skillset is and how glaring it's weaknesses are)

Stat Thieves:
Crawler's damage comes from stats, so heroes that reduce them will make it much weaker.

Heroes that get stronger for each kill:
It's easy for these heroes to snowball to victory against Crawler who is ill suited to deal with them and will need to rely on allies to protect it.

Global Interrupters:
Due to Arrival's active giving a minimap indicator to all players when cast near enemies, these two can counter the global teleportation from global range. Silencer can use his ultimate as soon as he sees the spell being cast, and Zeus (with Scepter) can use his ultimate and Nimbus Crawler to stop it as well. As such these heroes can prevent Crawler from ever using its ultimate in combat until late game when it has a very low cooldown.

Silence:
Crawler's spells are all active and silences make it into a creep. It cannot impact the game at all when silenced, which will usually force it to buy BKB or dispels.

Gankers / Jump Heroes:
Crawler has no escape mechanisms so gankers who activate early can easily get a lot of kills on Crawler and ruin it's game. Late game Crawler is still weak to being jumped as it may be blown up before casting any spells.

Base Armor Removal/Ignore:
Crawler's armor naturally almost all comes from Agility and the 6 base armor it has naturally and it is not well suited for a majority of the Armor items in the game. Heroes that can punch through base armor it will be able to tear apart a lot of tank Crawlers very easily into late game, and it would be dependent on it's Cosmic Bind armor talent to stay alive.

Instant Healers:
Heroes that in general can restore huge amounts of life quickly will weaken Crawler, as Cosmic Bind needs heroes to be low on health in order to place its debuffs. Fast healers can effectively remove Cosmic Bind debuffs for their allies. Crawler needs to counter this with Aghs Shard, Skadi, or Shivas.

Heal Amplification:
These heroes will massively improve the heal-back of Arrival's expiration, allowing it to massively outstrip the initial damage it did and come back with a lot more health if the targets survive the duration of the spell. Crawler needs to counter this with Aghs Shard, Skadi, or Shivas.

Damage Nullification and Reflect:
Arrival heals the full amount it's supposed to do at the end no matter how much damage it actually deals. As such enemies that nullify damage will end up with more health than before. Because Arrival is so slow and telegraphed, tanky heroes with Blade Mail can easily deal a huge amount of damage to Crawler with it. Nyx can do both, which can be very frightening.

Anti-Mages:
As Crawler is the most pure caster core ever, heroes (and items) that counter INT cores are obviously big problems. Between the heavy mana costs/burns, magic resistance and scaling nuking that gets stronger with Crawler, these heroes pose a massive threat in most phases of the game. The first 2 can be beaten with good use of upgraded debuffs (Some combination of Break, Silence, and Leash) and the Spell Immune heroes can be outscaled late game as they don't carry as hard as Crawler. Nyx basically cannot be neutralized as a threat and will be a massive threat to Crawler all game, especially since he can also block and return Arrival's damage too. Mage Slayers and Bloodthorns will require good positioning to protect yourself from and good use of dispel and Black King Bar.

Story and Cosmetic

(Design by Hae Joon Cho, not made for this concept)


Personality:
The crawler's personality is unknowable as it does not speak, but it seems malevolent. It will still get annoyed at the player if they try to cast spells on cooldown or without mana, and will still attempt to thank players who help or heal it with vague appreciative noises.

Interactions with Other Heroes:
Cosmic Crawler does not talk to anyone, but certain celestial heroes have reactions to it. Demons like Doom and Shadow Fiend are impressed with the Crawler, saying it's like them but somehow more frightening. Enigma claims that the cosmos are not a plaything. Chaos Knight considers it out of it's place and needs to be returned. Weaver shows fear for the Crawler. Zeus is quite confident against it. Keeper of the Light is scared of what may happen to the world now that Crawler's free. Outworld Destroyer says it wasn't supposed to be here yet, which tells it is the thing OD was warning us about. Dawnbreaker also treats Crawler like a monster that she wants to slay from her past.

Lore Strength, Classification, and Comparison:
Gender: Genderless
Age: The True Cosmic Crawler is older than the universe, Avatar body is only a few weeks old
Classification: Interdimensional Cosmic Being, Avatar of Interdimensional Cosmic Being
Powers and Abilities:
For the Avatar Body: Cosmic Energy Manipulation, Dimension Manipulation, Portal Manipulation, Teleportation, Soul Manipulation, Regeneration, Mind Manipulation, Pain Manipulation, Matter Manipulation, Empowerment over time, other light forms of Reality warping, Gravity Manipulation (ARCANA only, when fused with Enigma Eidolons), Chaos Manipulation (ARCANA only, when fused with Chaos Knight Phantasms)
For the True Crawler in it's own dimension: Cross-Dimensional Avatar Creation (Requires aid from the home dimension to complete the process), other abilities unknown but likely similar to it's Avatar but on a greater scale
Stamina: Infinite (due to the Cosmic nature of the Crawler, it has an endless supply of energy)
Intelligence: Unknown, unclear if sentient (Due to its age though, it would be extremely intelligent if it is capable of learning)
Comparable Power Scales:
For the Crawler Avatar: Powerful cosmic beings
Arc Warden, Faceless Void, Dawnbreaker
For Crawler Avatar with ARCANA: Universal scale cosmic beings
The 4 Fundamentals ( Chaos Knight, Io, Keeper of the Light, Enigma), Weaver
For the True Cosmic Crawler: Extradimensional Reality Warping Beings
Ancient Apparition (The real Kaldr, not the "image" of it that is playable), Clasz ( Faceless Void's boss back in Claszureme)

"Voice" Sample:
Similar to the Ultralisk from Starcraft II, voiced by Dee Bradley Baker (a voice actor who is known for his skill in creature noises, and also voiced Techies)
Equipment Slots (3) and Default:
Head: Cosmic Crawler's Head
Arms: Cosmic Crawler's Arms
Accessory: None (Used for cosmetic things that float around Crawler)
Taunt: None

Set Ideas: ARCANA Creature of the Event Horizon


Design is of Darkmantle from Dungeons and Dragons


Head: Mantle of the Event Horizon
Rarity ARCANA
When passing dimensions, the Cosmic Crawler has often run into the other selves of the Fundamental forces being pulled by the horseman and the living black hole. However, various rips and travels by them has destroyed entire dimensions, leaving them as dark and empty places where no light escapes but are full of those various other selves. As Crawler passes through these destroyed dimensions these other selves of the attached themselves to the Cosmic Crawler, transforming it into a manifestation of darkness itself, out to crush and extinguish the light.

When the Mantle is equipped, Cosmic Crawler has its voice and animations altered. The voice though still unable to talk, sounds less animalistic and more refined. The animations are more erratic and less smooth, with glitch-like visual effects. The Arcana grants dark particle effects around Crawler's head. It changes the all icons such as the top icon and minimap icon. There is also an effect when you kill heroes, where they disintegrate into darkness.

The Arcana has an alternate style that has instead of Black with Yellow Eyes, it has skin that is space-like with stars and eyes that are orange and flaming, essentially gaining Enigma's color scheme and Chaos Knight's flaming eyes. This style is called "The Vile Chaos", which is unlocked if Cosmic Crawler gets 200 kills on enemies inflicted with Arrival, with a max of 10 per game.

The Mantle when equipped changes Crawler's ability icons and visual effects accordingly. All Arcana effects are tied to the Head Slot cosmetic.
>Dimensional and Stellar Shift

>Dimensional Rip
>Cosmic Bind
>Spirit Touch
>Arrival

The Arcana alters Cosmic Crawler's missile from the void ball above into more of a spear:

The Arcana also alters Cosmic Crawler's voice responses, making it deeper but still beastial. The voice becomes more like the Brood Lord from Starcraft II.

Arms: Webbed Tentacles of the Event Horizon
Rarity Rare
The newly webbed arms of the Crawler seek to find foes to engulf and crush.

Taunt: Fundamental Moves
Rarity Common
During this taunt, Cosmic Crawler uses its arms and pushes them forward, as if trying to cast Black Hole.
The energies of these eternally dark dimensions only wish to be shared.

Standalone Item: Eye of Skadi
Accessory: Eye of Skadi

Based on the Eye of Skadi item, it is simply the Eye of Skadi item but floating around Crawler like an Invoker reagent. When the player actually has the Eye of Skadi item it glows.
The mystical Eye of Skadi is attracted to the Crawler through it's eons in cold space. Together they form a chilling combination.


Relative Size Comparison:

Conclusion

Thank you for reading my concept. If you enjoyed it, you may enjoy some of my other concepts below:

Galamathet, The Behemoth -A lightning-fast tank and disabler with no fear of mana costs or cooldowns-
Seline, The Aeromancer -A support that excels at re-positioning others in combat-
Fey, The Lash Queen -A very long ranged melee hero with a versatile skillset-
Kurthifa, The Crimson Knight -A carry that weaponizes the power of strength and health-
Pyotr, The Portal Keeper -The Agility Support that controls Mobility and Teleportation-


Additional Reading:

Check out the original forum version of Cosmic Crawler here (under it's old name, Xilixilyl), to see how much this hero has changed.

Some other changes the hero concept has had over time:
Spoiler: Click to view


Credits:
Cosmic Crawler's Design by Hae Joon Cho
Arcana (Creature of the Event Horizon) Design is of Darkmantle (5th Edition Version) from Dungeons and Dragons.

Icons (and other visual aid resources) created by the talented artists at TheHiveWorkshop:
Dimensional Rip Icon by KeLeNoR
Dimensional/Stellar Shift Icon by Pharaoh_
Cosmic Bind, Spirit Touch, Arcana Spirit Touch, and Arcana Dimensional/Stellar Shift Icons by The Panda
Arrival Icon by San
Arcana Dimensional Rip Icon by 4eNNightmare
Arcana Cosmic Bind Icon by 8512590215848
Arcana Arrival Icon by Mr. Goblin

Void Missiles created by Vinz

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1
[-]
St4pps | July 24, 2021 7:05pm
I honestly LOVE this concept keep it up.
1
[-]
Cuttleboss (28) | July 25, 2021 9:19am
St4pps wrote:
I honestly LOVE this concept keep it up.


Hey there. Welcome to the site.
I'm glad you like Cosmic Crawler!
Thank you also for following me on the bird site.
1
[-]
BloodArena (1) | May 20, 2020 10:47am
Hey, if you are making a hero concept and need opinion, just ask me. I am currently making mine too but I am starting first by uncovering really deep patterns behind the existing Dota2 heroes so I have a lot to share.
1
[-]
Cuttleboss (28) | May 18, 2020 11:47pm
BloodArena wrote:
I hate to say this but this hero is very UNENJOYABLE or straight up UNPLAYABLE.
Look at Invoker. The very same combo(for example: cold snap - tornado - meteor - defeaning) will ALWAYS be the SAME keys(QQQR-WWQR-D-F-EEWRD-QWERD) even if you try to do it a HUNDRED times.

I was considering this general stuff when I was making the two spells. I wanted to have Dimensional Rip and Cosmic Bind both able to use a variety of debuffs so that Crawler would have all sorts of tools to defeat it’s enemies if the player was good at using them. I was thinking of which ways to implement it. As heroes get only up to 6 buttons, that limits to 2 icons. This severely limits the options of picking the debuffs without massively complicating the hero ala giving Crawler its own Quas Wex and Exort.

Ultimately, the 4 modes toggle variety made the most sense to me, because there was already Power Treads in the game, so people would be able to figure it out based on that existing mechanic, though it’s a bit more high risk and variety than Power Treads, however, I think you may be overstating the comparison.

Invoker has 10 spells that all have really different effects and targeting systems. Each spell is used differently. Cosmic Crawler’s most complex spells are an AOE nuke and an AOE DPS spell and you’re just toggling the secondary effect. If you were playing Crawler, you’d have a good idea of what debuff you’d be using most of the time, either based on analyzing the situation or just personal preference. You would likely adjust your debuff accordingly before fighting even starts.
Example: If the most dangerous hero on the enemy team is Outworld Devourer you would adjust it to Silence/Inflation
If it was a Sven you would adjust it to be either Slow/Root or Blind/Disarm.

BloodArena wrote:
This 'repetition' is the most important thing about the hero design because it lets players subconsciously execute the combo without too much effort(even more if they go to the practice lobby, try to execute the combo w/o concsiously recalling what keys to press, and do it like a hundred times).
While, your hero will have to press 4 possible key combinations(Q, DQ, DDQ, or DDDQ) to cast the VERY SAME skill(and yeah, different number of letters for each, absolutely destroying the player's rythm). And what's more is he have another 7 skills of EXACTLY THE SAME 4 ways to cast(good thing that the half of those 8 uses W and F instead) creating severe confusion.

I think I disagree in a sense. This hero is not built around big playmaking combos where you rely very much on going into a “rhythm”. This hero only has 2 spells and 1 autocast orb, there’s not much comboing going on, but rather fast adapting. This is a strategic hero where your actions have to change based on what’s happening. Some quick reactions are needed, like if you normally keep your debuffs on Silence because the enemies got a bunch of spellcasters, but you need to act fast to Disarm an enemy right-clicker carry (let’s say Ursa) if they go on you or your allies, so you toggle twice (as it is 2 spaces away in the toggle cycle) and then cast the spell to save yourself or your ally. Being able to do that before you or your teammates die is your rhythm on this hero.
BloodArena wrote:
Yeah, Invoker's 10 skills have unique keys thus 10 unique sets to memorize. But that only makes Invoker longer to master but only slightly harder to combo with once you have already mastered him(compared to lets say he only got 5 skills). And one more thing, while playing your hero, the player will ALWAYS have to look at the hud at some of the most crucial moments of the teamfights, messing up the players concentration and fun.

The rhythm thing is actually pertinent here; I think that like Tread-switching, it is just a new rhythm to learn. Like, Extreme Tread Switching where if you fail you or any ally dies like in that Ursa scenario above. In time a Crawler player would live and breathe the shifting toggles the same way most carry players live and breathe their Power Treads, where you instinctively know what debuff you’re on without having to look at the HUD.
BloodArena wrote:
Though the hero actually got a lot of unique concepts attached on him.

I am glad you think so! No matter how frustrating you think this hero would be to play, it’s good you were able to enjoy something unique about this hero design. Probably the strangest one I have.
1
[-]
BloodArena (1) | May 18, 2020 7:42am
I hate to say this but this hero is very UNENJOYABLE or straight up UNPLAYABLE.

Look at Invoker. The very same combo(for example: cold snap - tornado - meteor - defeaning) will ALWAYS be the SAME keys(QQQR-WWQR-D-F-EEWRD-QWERD) even if you try to do it a HUNDRED times. And this 'repetition' is the most important thing about the hero design because it lets players subconsciously execute the combo without too much effort(even more if they go to the practice lobby, try to execute the combo w/o concsiously recalling what keys to press, and do it like a hundred times).

While, your hero will have to press 4 possible key combinations(Q, DQ, DDQ, or DDDQ) to cast the VERY SAME skill(and yeah, different number of letters for each, absolutely destroying the player's rythm). And what's more is he have another 7 skills of EXACTLY THE SAME 4 ways to cast(good thing that the half of those 8 uses W and F instead) creating severe confusion. Yeah, Invoker's 10 skills have unique keys thus 10 unique sets to memorize. But that only makes Invoker longer to master but only slightly harder to combo with once you have already mastered him(compared to lets say he only got 5 skills). And one more thing, while playing your hero, the player will ALWAYS have to look at the hud at some of the most crucial moments of the teamfights, messing up the players concentration and fun.

Hope you would agree to most of this.
1
[-]
BloodArena (1) | May 18, 2020 7:44am
Though the hero actually got a lot of unique concepts attached on him.
1
[-]
delta17 (22) | June 2, 2019 4:59pm
I do not believe Crawler will outclass many 3-star carries in the game. And it's for the very same reason Outworld Devourer and Storm Spirit will never be a 3-star carry: Spell Immunity. Crawler will suffer the same fate of being a second-rate damage dealer who will only be most effective at mid-late game at most. Late-late game, he's really good at becoming a conveniently rich, debuff support though.

Not mention that Crawler has 0 escape and 0 defensive ability. A perfect combination of dying a lot from ganks in the early game and dying a lot from all kinds of bursts in the late game.
1
[-]
Cuttleboss (28) | June 5, 2019 2:43pm
You make a fair point.

The earliest incarnation of Crawler did not use magic damage but Universal (which has been patched out). I had an idea of him as using Pure (penetrating Spell Immunity) for a while once Universal was gone, but I was advised to make him a magic damage hero, so that he'd be more counter-able. Because of this, if you were to draft him, you'd throw him with some heroes to supplement physical damage like Templar Assassin or Bristleback. So yes, he is less like a traditional carry and more like an extreme damage-scaling version of a caster core like Leshrac, Zeus, or Tinker.

I did give him lots and lots of CC to give him the ability to defeat other carries once they had no more bkb duration. So it likely is more flexible than I am presenting them, but I do think it does enough damage later in the game to be more than just a debuffing utility support, since its DoTs can do 200-500 dps each, and his nuke can do 700-1.4k per cast.
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