miniguide to transformation based spells

[antiweltteilchen]

Guide to Transformation based spells

Table of contents

1. Types of Transforations
2. Spells using Transformations
3. Properties
4. Transformation Time
5. Chemical Rage as fail coding
6. Interaction with mirror image based spells
7. Hp change upon transformation
8. Other stuff

1. Types of Transformations

The Wc3 engine provides quite some number of abilities you are able to change the actual unit with.
The ones used in DotA so far are the following:

• Bearform [Abrf]
• Chemical Rage [ANcr]
• Metamorphosis [AEme]
• Burrow [Abur]

2. Spells using Transformations

• Alchemist: Chemical Rage
• Batrider: Firefly
• Dragon Knight: Elder Dragon Form
• Keeper of the Light: Spirit Form
• Lone Druid: True Form
• Lycanthrope: Shapeshift
• Medusa: Split Shot
• Scarab: Burrow
• Soul Keeper: Metamorphosis
• Troll Warlord: Berserker Rage
• Undying: Flesh Golem
• Gyrocopter: Flak Cannon
• Sven: God's Strength

3. Properties

Chemical Rage[ANcr]:
Based on: [ANcr]
Duration: 25 seconds
Manacost: 50/100/150 mana
Cooldown: 45 seconds
Hitpoint bonus: 0 (hitpoint bonus is granted over the alternate unit's base hp)
Morphing tag: not interruptable
Transformation time: 0.35 seconds

Firefly[A19Z]:
Based on: [AEme]
Duration: 15 seconds
Manacost: 100 mana
Cooldown: 40 seconds
Hitpoint bonus: 0
Morphing tag: not interruptable, immediate takeoff, immediate landing
Transformation time: 0 seconds

Elder Dragon Form:[A03G]
Based on: [AEme]
Duration: 60 seconds
Manacost: 50 mana
Cooldown: 115 seconds
Hitpoint bonus: 0
Morphing tag: not interruptable, immediate takeoff, immediate landing
Transformation time: 0 seconds

Spirit Form[A11T]:
Based on: [AEme]
Duration: 40 seconds
Manacost: 100 mana
Cooldown: 80/70/60 seconds
Hitpoint bonus: 0
Morphing tag: not interruptable, immediate takeoff, immediate landing
Transformation time: 0 seconds

True Form[A0AG]:
Based on: [Abrf]
Duration: permanent
Manacost: 25 mana
Cooldown: 0 seconds
Hitpoint bonus: 0 (hitpoint bonus is granted over the alternate unit's base hp)
Morphing tag: not interruptable
Transformation time: 2 seconds

Shapeshift[A093]:
Based on: [AEme]
Duration: 14/15/16 seconds
Manacost: 100 mana
Cooldown: 100/70/40 seconds
Hitpoint bonus: 100/200/300
Morphing tag: not interruptable, immediate takeoff, immediate landing
Transformation time: 1.45 seconds

Burrow[A1GC]:
Based on: [Abur]
Duration: permanent
Manacost: 0 mana
Cooldown: 0 seconds
Hitpoint bonus: 0
Morphing tag: not interruptable
Transformation time: 0 seconds

Metamorphosis[A1RI]:
Based on: [ANcr]
Duration: 30/40/50/60 seconds
Manacost: 125/115/107/100 mana
Cooldown: 180/165/150/110 seconds
Hitpoint bonus: 1/50/100/150
Morphing tag: not interruptable, immediate takeoff, immediate landing
Transformation time: 0 seconds

Berserker Rage[A0BE]:
Based on: [Abrf]
Duration: permanent
Manacost: 0 mana
Cooldown: 0 seconds
Hitpoint bonus: 0 (hitpoint bonus is granted over the alternate unit's base hp)
Morphing tag: not interruptable
Transformation time: 0.1 seconds

Flesh Golem[A15J]:
Based on: [AEme]
Duration: 30 seconds
Manacost: 100 mana
Cooldown: 90 seconds
Hitpoint bonus: 0
Morphing tag: not interruptable, immediate takeoff, immediate landing
Transformation time: 0 seconds

Split shot[A1C0]:
Based on: [Abrf]
Duration: permanent
Manacost: 0 mana
Cooldown: 0 seconds
Hitpoint bonus: 0
Morphing tag: not interruptable
Transformation time: 0.1 seconds

Flak Cannon[A1TX]
Based on: [ANcr]
Duration: 15
Manacost: 50
Cooldown: 20
Hitpoint Bonus: 0
Morphing tag: not interruptable, immediate takeoff, immediate landing
Transformation time:0

God's Strength[A1WH]:
Based on: [ANcr]
Duration: 25 seconds
Manacost: 100/150/200 mana
Cooldown: 80 seconds
Hitpoint bonus: 0
Morphing tag: not interruptable
Transformation time: 0.3 seconds

4. Transformation Time

The transformation time together with the uninterruptable flag produces quite some lulz. Like the name says a unit is immune to stop commands and other disable in this time.
This includes:

• stuns
• aerial shackles
• ensnare
• stop
• sleep
• pause in case of chemical rage

Note that entangle can't target transforming units.

Because of that all units with a transformation based skill can't use it under the effect of a spell listed above (only important for ensnare and entangle).
Note that any damage is applied normally.
In the transformation time the units is almost like paused and can't do anything else. No movement no spellcasting no items.

5. Chemical Rage as fail coding

Chemical Rage behaves a little bit different in some cases then the rest of the transformation based skills. this is due to the fact that it is the only non-permanent transformation spell which uses a transformation time more than 0.
As you all know Chemical Rage changes the base mana regeneration of the unit, no matter the direction (from normal form to chemical rage or the pther way around).
Now if you aquired an item which percentually increases mana regeneration, it applies to the base mana regeneration when it was picked up. That means if you buy a void stone in normal form and then use Chemical Rage lvl 1 you won't have a manaregeneration of 3+3 but of 3+0.01 .
It gets reset to the proper amount it SHOULD regen if you change your intelligence or if at any moment in the transformation time the unit has full mana.
Another interesting fact is that the backtransformation doesn't suffer the pseudo-pause effect i mentioned earlier. you can do anything you want in this time, like attacking, using items or moving but have the full effect of the unstoppable transformation time.
That means you can even attack allied units in this time because the non-ability of this which is normally the case is implemented via a stop command in dota which won't work in the transformation time.
The transition time of windwalk based spells are skipped when used in the backtransform time when the transformation time ends

6. Other Stuff

Note that the change of the unit itself doesn't lead to the fact and you can evade any projectiles. The unit ID changes but the pointer is still the same.
The ID change is implemented in an easy way. Every transformation based spell has a field where the original unit's ID is written down and logicallya field for the unit it should transform into. With that you can basically change anything which is editable in the unit fields itself. That includes model, damage, BAT, movespeed, HP, HP and mana regen etc etc.

At the moment there are 4 items which care about the wielder being ranged or melee. These are PMS, Stout shield, QB and EoS. It is decided the moment you build them/pick them up whether you have a ranged or melee variant of this item and using transformation based spells won't change that. Note that you can benefit from that but also renember that a ranged skadi won't work at all on melee units.

Interaction with cyclone: if a unit is cycloned in the transformation time some stupid graphical stuff will appear. After the transformation time is over the death animation of the transformed unit will be shown and the non-transformed unit graphics will be shown as the unit which is cycloned. when cyclone finishes the transformed unit is at the ground again. Note that it is always the original unit which is shown in the cyclone, so for example a sylla which changes to true form and is cycloned will result in death animation of the bear+cycloned sylla which is shown and a true form changing to sylla will show a cycloned sylla+death animation of sylla.

If a unit is added an ability by triggers and you transform afterwards it will be gone, simply because the items and skills are updated. an example would be that you lose the shadow word debuff if you transform because it's based on a slow aura ability which is added to the target. Nevertheless you still lose the health because the damage is triggered.

7. Interaction with mirror image

Metamorphosis based spell are dispelled when using a mirror image based spell when used in a normal way and you get nontransformed images.
You can shiftqueue metamorph with mirrorimage to stay metamorphed and get metamorphed images though. Using mirror image while in chemical rage will remove the transformation timer and you won't see when you change back because of this.

8. Hp change upon transformation

When transforming with Hp change there are 2 cases: the hp is changed with the base hp of the unit or it's done with the skill itself like shapeshift.

In the first case the percentage of your max hp stays the same before and after the transformation.
In the other case the bonus health is directly added when transforming and it isn't lost at transforming back as long as it doesn't exceed the nontransformed units max health.

I might add more stuff if you want me to, at the moment i can't think of anything important though.

[SoletLuna]

\o/ \o/

Well, actually Cranium Basher cares whether the owner is melee or ranged, too, though it dynamically adapts.

[antiweltteilchen]

that's why i didn't list it. effects are all i care about.

[Phoenix]

\ ( ' ' , ) /
Organized Knowledge

[Akiyo]

Learned alot, thanks for the great guide.

[Cáno]

Punctuation! ;o
Resolves any doubts, good work.

Greets
Cáno

[Foede]

What's "immediate takeoff, immediate landing" ¿?

[antiweltteilchen]

actually no idea. i played around a bit with it in the WE but didn't find any differences yet with or without these options.

[Foede]

Something to do with how long it takes the unit to take off (ground unit -> flying unit, like druid of the talon on ladder), and to morph back perhaps?

[antiweltteilchen]

i tested this but didn't make any difference.

[Cáno]

Originally Posted by Foede

What's "immediate takeoff, immediate landing" ¿?

Why did you ask that question?! I'm trying to find that out for at least an hour. It seems to me that it causes absolutely no difference, I've also searched through whole Internetz and found nothing.

It makes no difference in Demon Hunter's/Medivh's/Druid's morph skills.

The only thing I found out is that Blizzard messed up 'Duration - Normal' with 'Casting Time' on Metamorphosis...

Edit: Got it! It causes a slight change in how Medivh's/Druids morphs work (don't know exactly what does it change since it works in pretty strange way - casting uses both 'Duration - Normal' and 'Casting Time'). Has absolutely no effect on Metamorphosis.

Greets
Cáno

[antiweltteilchen]

it may also be that these options don't do anything at all. quite common ^^

[p811025]

Again, nice guide.

[Elune]

Medusa: Shapeshift

a mistake in typing...
I doubt whether Split shot is a Transformation skill, coz I didn't see a unit like that in the slks from the map.

[Trysaeder]

The wonders of blizzard...

Medusa just turns into Medusa.

[Robzor]

Originally Posted by Elune

a mistake in typing...
I doubt whether Split shot is a Transformation skill, coz I didn't see a unit like that in the slks from the map.

It's based on Bear Form.

Normal Form Unit; H00V
Alternate Form Units; H08D/H08C/H084/H08B

The alternate forms has the Barrage ability which makes them shoot several arrows as well as a Defend ability which reduces the outgoing damage.

[mDREAMm]

Excellent guide,though by saying "Now if you aquired an item which percentually increases mana regeneration, it applies to the base mana regeneration when it was picked up.",do you mean ONLY mana items or f.e. HoT?So,in other words,getting HoT while in Chemical Rage will grant you higher hp reg compared to when you pick/buy it in a normal state?

[Jotain]

It doesnt affect hp regen at all because there is no such thing as increased base regen. If you get ring of regeneration then you still get the same +2 hp regen. It doesnt affect heart of tarrasque at all because its compleatly triggered to increase your current health by 2% of your maxium health and has nothing to do with normal regen

[antiweltteilchen]

fixed typo, thx.
percentual hp increase is unaffected.

[DonEsteban]

Here is a video for your guide if you want

Has alchemist dodging rhasta shackle

YouTube - Alchemist/Transformation bug, Dodging rhasta shackle