Storm Colossus – Shockhead
A Beastform Design Concept


Welcome to a short mini-series where I discuss some Beastform Concepts that I came up with. Please note that these are solely my personal ideas and concepts, and nothing from this article should be taken as a Spoiler of any sort. With that in mind, let’s take a look at the second Beastform I came up with. Please welcome the Storm Colossus!

If you want a bird’s eye view of how I selected this form to design as well as additional information about Beast Form Design, check out the intro article linked here.

Initial Thoughts


When designing a new Storm Tank form, I knew I had to be careful. Storm has a high 100 DPP for large and medium forms, and with an enormous 525 health, this form can NOT be overpowered. We all know that the Storm Wolf at this moment is quite powerful and I wanted to make Storm Colossus powerful enough so players would try it and teammates would be happy to have him. However, he shouldn’t be so powerful he overpowers everything, booting Ice, Life, and Fire Colossus players off their form. With that in mind, I thought it’d be fun to make a Storm form with more of a support focus.

The Name


Looking at the other Colossus forms, the names are all simple compound words that start with a school inspired noun, and “shock” was a perfect Storm word that no other Storm form’s name had in them. The second part of the compound word for Colossuses was a body part 2/3 of the time, so I picked “head” because… well… it sounded cool! Thus we’ve got Shockhead!

The Spells


Below you will find a collage of the 10 spells, and I will go into them each in depth, but first I wanted to describe overall what I was wanting this guy’s identity to be. First and foremost, this form is a team player. He doesn’t have a ton of spells to do damage himself. As a team player, he gets buffed by anyone on his team having a DOT, has a bunch of blades and other helpful mechanics, and he’s the first form of any school to cast heal charms. You’d think that should be a Life form first, and I can see a future Life form also casting these, but Shockhead has them for a reason.

Lots of Storm’s spells get buffed by having HOTs (Heal Over Times) on them, and as you’ll see throughout almost all my future forms, I am of the belief that Life has been neglected so far and need some help in becoming more relevant via their own spells and other forms’ spells. Life has been helping Storm on a one way street, but with these heal blades, Storm will do a little bit to return the favor. However, one issue that KI has been insistent on is making spells “TOO conditional.” For example, there shouldn’t be spells in the game that players only use 10% of the time because it’s worthless without the condition being met. While heal blades are most useful to Life forms, some others can still use these heal blades to protect other blades from getting stolen and for meeting charm conditions on their spells. Plus, every form can benefit from these in Beastmoon Hunt if they get healing Battle Cards from chests!

Here’s the type of spells that EVERY Storm form currently has, being part of their identity. I will briefly go over each one and why I did or did not include that type of spell into Storm Colossus.

  1. Stun – Storm is the only school where every form has a stun, and I thought that was a great idea to keep it since Ice, Storm’s counter, is pretty fruitful with Stun Blocks. Well actually, not enough forms have Stun Blocks, but in my opinion, that is what needs fixing, not Storm’s stunning, so I think stuns are a good one for Storm to keep. However, I chose to make it conditional on the Colossus like the Storm Krokomummy’s stun.
  2. Blades – The undisputed trademark of a Storm form is its blades. Every form, with Storm Rat as an outlier, has 3 different blade spells, and with Colossus being a support, I knew I had to give him a lot of blades. This time there’s actually 5/10 spells that can potentially blade!
  3. Remove DOTs – As a Fire counter, the Storm forms must remove DOTs (Damage Over Times) from allies and yourself. I think this is crucial, and had to include them!
  4. 2-pip 200 hit (or more) – While all Storms have these, I decided not to include this on the Colossus since I wanted to go full support. Yes, it’s important to keep 100 DPP, and I have that included in his blades, but without a 200 hit, you can only no longer use this Colossus to do a bunch of damage first turn on his own, which I don’t think is super unique to Storm anyway.
  5. 6 or more hitting spells – Storm is known as being a hitter, and I kept that aspect in terms of damage output, but for sheer number of hits, I gave Shockhead a bit less than usual to further emphasize his need for a team.

Same as above, I’ll be going through mechanics that 3/4 Storm forms have and why I did or did not include them.

  1. If you have HOT condition – I found it necessary since I like the idea of Life and Storm working together, so I made sure to add that!
  2. Give pips – There’s a ton of forms that have pip spells, but I thought it a good idea to add one since it’s a normal thing for Storms to do and also plays into the support aspect.
  3. More damage if condition is met – No, it’s not unique to Storm, but I also added this idea to Colossus to give him a bit of an edge since he doesn’t have a lot of hits.

I’ll go into these in detail in the spell specific sections, but the new ideas / mechanics that I added were…

  1. Conditional blade on a hitting spell
  2. If your team has DOT condition
  3. Heal charm casting
  4. If health ABOVE certain threshold

With all this in mind let’s get into it!

Note: Curious about making your own Wizard101 Spells? Check out our spellmaker!

 

Capacitate

You may find this one similar to a certain spell originally casted by a certain Myth Draconian, and while that form is more pip focused than most, as I explained earlier, pips are a Storm thing too! True, no Storm from yet has a specific giving of pips spell that is low in pip cost, but I don’t think that’s a huge issue. Also, the main point of the Draco spell is to remove a trap, which is a Myth thing, and I didn’t transfer that part. Removing DOTs is a Storm thing! I chose the name “Capacitate” since the definition means to enable, which is exactly what pips do, and the word sounds kinda stormy since a capacitor is linked to electricity.

Thunder Kitty

This spell is a 0-pip 50 dmg spell with a condition, which is pretty standard for Storm forms that are medium and large. Its condition is also worth 0-pips or less of value, so it’s not overpowered, especially with the condition of the enemy having a negative charm, which is rare, but it fits as it’s a condition found on other Storm forms like Rat. Overall not super interesting, but with all the blades that Storm Colossus has, this spell can do a decent amount while also building up pips, and possibly even blades! So far, no other form has a blade that casts conditionally on a damage spell, which would be unique to the Storm Colossus, and I think that mechanic could be used in future Storm forms for sure. It’s not the most revolutionary idea, but if any form would be to have this, it’d be Storm!

Cobra Pulse

Possibly the most powerful card that Storm Colossus has in terms of DPP, this snake adds the brand new condition, “if any teammate has DOT” that I felt was needed for the Storm forms. When playing a Fire or Death form, you usually are a little afraid to use a DOT spell on the Storm form specifically, but with this condition and other spells, a Fire or Death form will see the Storm Colossus and be weary to use a DOT on ANYONE on the opposing team. Now obviously, I didn’t make it so that there’s nothing to be done about it. If there are DOTs involved, it doesn’t automatically mean the Storm Colossus will win, but it’ll just do a tiny bit extra damage to you and your friends if you do, which I think is completely reasonable. In general, I’ll tend to have the damage set a bit lower with an easily meetable condition like this, but since it’s one pip, I figured it was okay do have it stay like this.

Double Wipe

Similar to Twin Blades on the Storm Krok, this spell gives a blade to your teammate as well as yourself, or two to yourself if you’d like. This is another way to remove DOTs and while it’s a small blade, it can be useful to do a little extra damage or to meet a blade condition. I came up with 50 for this since Twin Blades was 125 for 2 pips, it goes to reason that a 1 pip version would be about half of that, which is between 50 and 75. I chose 50 since we have the added clear DOT mechanic on it.

Energize

Much like the Storm Wolf, I thought it best to add a 2-pip 200 blade to Storm Colossus’ arsenal. Without having a 200 dmg spell himself, he can use this to power up his team. PLUS it’ll do a little extra if that teammate has a HOT, which is a pretty common condition for Storm to have. Unlike the Wolf, this would not be a separate extra blade, but just a larger blade. There’s not much else to say about this!

Ray Storm

At first look, you may think this looks wildly underpowered, but this heal blade with a conditional damage blade is an AOE (Area of Effect) spell. Still, you may not find this specifically super useful without any Life forms, but as I said above, you could use this to protect other blades, and with the condition, this would be especially helpful after an AOE DOT from the enemy. Especially in Monster Mayhem, this could help. Overall, I fully acknowledge that this spell won’t be used in every battle, but I think it’s a neat conditional that players will be happy to have in their decks and will be able to use sometimes. “Ray Storm” is a bit of a play on sunlight, which has been seen as a theme of heal charms in the past, and adding a storm element to it.

Lady of the Sea

Right off the bat, you’ll probably notice that this spell is actually 75 DPP rather than the usual 100 DPP that Storm spells should be. The reason for this, as seen in other forms across the board, is that forms will sometimes have spells slightly below the normal amount of damage if the condition is very powerful. With this spell, unless the enemy is relentless with removing blades, it’s almost impossible that the Colossus will be unable to have some sort of charm up. With this easily meetable condition, I thought a reduction in health was not only justified, but necessary. This also shows a second case of the new “blade if condition on a hit” mechanic that I added. The Queen Calypso animation is a new one not currently in Beastmoon.

Savage Serpent

Despite being a team helping form, Mr. Stormlossus needs some love in the hitting department, which is where this next spell comes in. Also like the Storm Wolf, this guy has a 3-pip 300 damage spell, which has a stun condition if you have 400 health or more. The health mechanic is semi-new, and should be easy for the developers to pull off. Partially inspired by the Storm Krokomummy, the reason I added this mechanic was because along with being a helpful teammate, this Colossus is a Tank. If I were going up against the Colossus, I would probably focus my attacks on the hitting forms that he’s blading, but with this spell, I’d get punished for leaving the Colossus alone, so I’d have to consider taking him out first or at least getting him below half health. The reason I didn’t use “50%” as the threshold is because Beastmoon is supposed to use only addition and subtraction, and taking 1/2 of 525 could be confusing for players. I also think Storm Krok should replace its “50%” with a flat 200 or 225 as well.

Beacon of Light

The next spell is an AOE blade AND heal blade. When coming up with the value for this blade, I looked to other AOE blades from other Storm forms. Firstly, Storm Elf has a 3-pip 125 AOE blade that also removes negative charms, Storm Rat has a 3-pip 125 AOE blade that removes DOTs, and Storm Krok has a 4-pip 100 AOE blade that also removes DOTs. Now, it is well known that the squishy forms, Rat and Elf, SHOULD do slightly more than medium and large forms, but I personally think Storm Krok’s blade is a little under-tuned in comparison to how they handle other situations like this. With 1 more pip, it should do 125. That being said, I gave this spell 125 for 4 pips along with the added effect of the 100 heal charm. Unlike the others, it won’t clear any DOTs, but I had to think to myself, is clearing a DOT equal to a 100 heal blade? Purely numerically, the vast majority of DOTs do 100 damage or more even after the first tic. Also, you must keep in mind that not many forms can use heal charms. With all this into account, I think this spell is balanced. If KI looked at this and said it was too much, I may suggest bumping it to 5-pips or reducing the heal charm to 75.

Femme Fatale

Lastly, we’ve got our damage AOE. Every form needs one, and I figured I’d add a larger version of Cobra Pulse for this one! At 6-pips, the formula should put it at 300 damage, but again, since the condition is so easily met, the damage should come down a bit. Getting 6-pips is always a struggle, but with the pip gain of this form along with the semi-useful 0-pip hit, I think you will see this spell around. I haven’t mentioned yet, but I chose not to give this form a 0-pip blade since it does have some pretty decent hits, it needs to use some pips to actually gain viable blades. The name “Femme Fatale” for those of you who don’t know, essentially means “dangerous woman” which is exactly what a Siren is!

Storm Colossus Tiers

Tier 1Tier 2Tier 3Tier 4Tier 5

Having these 6 spells I found would be a great start. I want to make it so each tier is worth getting, and while you’re missing a lot here (most notably a 1-pip and 2-pip hit), so that means you only get to do 50 damage maximum until you get 3 pips, and that seems wild, but with the 200 blade on your side, you’ll be able to be a helpful teammate from the start, and you’ll be able to get used to the play style of not hitting yourself as much. As you may know, each form gets 20 cards total at tier 5 with their 10 spells. It’s typical for each spell to have 2 copies with a few exceptions for more powerful spells. Most notably, high-pip AOEs are usually one copy, and without the 1-pip hit, I figured I’d compensate with having 3 of Thunder Kitty. It’s also normal for forms to wait to give an AOE battle card until tier 3 or so, but I found no issue with giving it here at tier 1 since there’s not a whole lot of other hits on here and no method of pip gain yet.

Moving on up, you unlock the Cobra Pulse! This gives you a bit of relief from all that supporting and be able to do some sort of decent damage when you’re at low pips.

Continuing on to Tier 3 you receive that AOE blade and heal charm! This will give you a huge leg up in your buffing efforts and make you a great choice for spiral battles. However, as you may see, you only get one copy. This is common for AOEs like this. More on this later.

To nobody’s surprise, the spell that significantly changes how helpful you are as a support player isn’t available until a much higher tier. Capacitate is a very important spell that all players will want to add to their Colossus.

Also unsurprising is that the spell that is responsible for closing the hole in the Colossus’ weakness, damage, isn’t ready until tier 5. Storm Colossus players would definitely be looking to upgrade him all the way to get this spell, and as you may see, you get 3 copies of it! That’s quite wild for a 3-pip spell, but with the pip gain of Storm Colossus, they will hopefully get used! If this seems a bit much, I can also see him getting a third 200 blade and just getting 2 Savage Serpents.

Conclusion

That’s it for Storm Colossus! I hope this was interesting to think about! I think it could be be an intriguing form that would get played a bunch, but not too much. Having a form that does decent damage while also giving amazing support could be attractive to lots of players. Let me know what you guys think!

Beastform Concept Series

Check back here for more form concept such as the Balance Rat!

Balance Rat

Storm Colossus

Myth Wolf

Life Elf

Death Krok

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