Hero Skill System

Design a character kit that reads on screen and plays in the hand.

What a kit is

A kit is four or five abilities that together express one idea about how this character fights. The idea comes first — she wins by never being where the hit lands, he wins by making the ground unsafe, they win by giving their own health to allies — and every ability is a facet of it. A kit without an idea is a list of damage numbers.

What the user gets

What the user has to do

1. Name the character and say one thing about how they fight (or just describe them; the skill proposes the idea).
2. Pick a style by letter if the project has none.
3. Approve the one-page kit.
4. Pick takes by number.

The kit template

# <Name> — <one-line fantasy>

Role: <marksman / assassin / tank / mage / support / bruiser>
Core idea: <one sentence — what does winning look like for this character>

## Passive — <name>
Trigger · effect · why it expresses the core idea

## Q — <name>        (basic, low cooldown, the button pressed most)
Targeting: <skillshot line / skillshot cone / point-and-click / self / ground AoE>
Cost · cooldown · range
Effect · consequence
Counterplay: <what an opponent can do about it>
Visual: <shape, colour, 0.3 s wind-up tell, contact effect> — distinct from auto-attack

## W — <name>          (utility, defensive, or setup)
## E — <name>       (mobility or the "reposition")
## R — <name>          (ultimate; changes the rules for 3–8 s)

## Combo
The intended sequence and why it works. The intended counter.

## Visual grammar
Palette (2 colours + 1 accent) · shape family (arcs, shards, rings, threads) ·
sound family · how the ultimate differs in scale from everything else

Rules this entry enforces

• Normal attack is the baseline. The ability board always shows the auto-attack in one panel so the abilities are visibly more: bigger stance, bigger light, bigger consequence.
• Every ability has a targeting type. Skillshot, point-and-click, ground AoE, self. This decides how it is animated and how it can miss.
• Every ability has counterplay. Something the opponent can see and do. An ability with no counterplay is a cutscene.
• Telegraphs are drawn. 0.2–0.5 s wind-up with a visible tell, on the board and in every prompt.
• Consistent grammar. All five abilities share palette and shape family. A kit with five unrelated effects reads as five characters.
• Ultimate changes the rules. Duration, area or the character's own movement changes for the window. If the R is just "a bigger Q", redesign.
• Physics from film-action-combat. Anchors, wind-up/contact/follow/consequence, causality, momentum.

Related entries

• boss-battle — the enemy these abilities are designed to counter
• character-model — 3D model of the hero
• vfx-effect — standalone VFX assets for each ability