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Pyke

Pyke the Bloodharbor Ripper makes it out of the "support" role in League of Legends to test his strength in the battles of Aether.

He brings his trusty harpoon knife and enough tricks to thrive off of scramble situations and devastating reads.


Pyke prepares his knife, holding it above his head and charging up, preparing to throw. While preparing this, Pyke can jump, shorthop, walk and fall from plats. When you release Special, Pyke throws the knife the direction you are facing, and it will pull in any enemies hit.
This projectile can't combo into any new moves since you are stuck pulling the rope, but it can lead into conditioned scramble situations which Pyke is equipped to punish.

Pyke can press shield to cancel while charging by putting away the knife in endlag.
The damage and travel speed of the knife ramps up for the first bit of charging, but if Pyke charges for too long, he will put the knife away.


Pyke dashes forwards, leaving behind a phantom clone which homes in on you after a delay. There is no hitbox on the initial dash and it leaves you in pratfall if done from the air, but the clone will stun enemies once it follows you, allowing for an easy follow up.


Pyke swims upwards, hitting opponents away. This move can be canceled into a DSpecial to crash down at the end of Pyke's ascent.
This move leaves you in pratfall unless you are grounded during the startup.


Pyke readies himself then dashes forwards, creating his ultimate X at the end of the dash.
Enemies caught in the middle of the X will be brutally spiked, and weakened enemies will be immediately executed.
This execution threshold depends on the enemies' weight, and they will briefly glow and a threatening sound will play when they are vulnerable.
If performed on the ground, you can slightly alter the angle by holding from up to side to down.
If performed in the air, this move will always dash down at an angle.


Bair:
Pyke performs a tiny forwards kick, and a very slow strong backwards kick. You can use each hitbox individually, or try to use them together.

DStrong:
Pyke strikes around him with a phantom clone, stunning those hit instead of knocking them away.
Since you are in endlag, this move can only combo to quick moves. You have a bit more time to work with if you land the back hitbox since you are further through the animation.

UStrong:
Pyke jumps into the air to avoid the jaws of a sea monster, then finishes it off with his knife. This is a slow move, but comboes into the knife spike with some DI at early percent.

FStrong:
A jumping knife strike, only sweetspots near the ground. Best used with momentum.

Dair:
A very weak downwards slash, good at forcing tech chases or stage spike situations. If you hit someone far enough from the ground, you can combo out of it.

Utilt:
Sends slightly backwards, but you can turn this around during startup.


If Pyke lands a killing blow with DSpecial slightly offstage, he will be satisfied with the show of strength and won't even try to make it back.
Save this option for when a trade is worth it!

When Pyke's NSpecial is parried, the enemy takes hold of the Skewer's rope and pulls Pyke in.
When Pyke's FSpecial is parried, the phantom clone still homes in on Pyke but stuns him instead.
Since various moves have different effects when grounded, landing particles are applied if you land during the move's startup to ensure the function is clear and that it feels forgiving to use.

Pyke has a looping dance when you press up + Taunt!
These two taunts are repeatable with the taunt key and cancelable with any button after a few frames, just like in League.

Pyke's enemy variables are stored with Pyke's ID, allowing for multiple Pykes to attack the same target without issues.

Pyke's NSpecial puts him in a self stun state when you land it, so even if the enemy is far away, you can't combo out of the move. This stun state's last 4 frames can be jump canceled and turned around, (when grounded) so aerial and grounded options both are available at the same time, but none combo. This 4 frame jump cancel also applies to dstrong's successful hit endlag, so you can use either fast aerials or grounded options.

During the startup of your uspecial, your movement is retained. There is an exception to this if the movement would send you into the blast zone, so you don't accidentally fall too far while starting up uspecial.

Dair's combo properties would make it too strong against grounded opponents with the untechable popup, so it has a separate hitbox for grounded and aerial enemies.

Press taunt during spawn for a random taunt voiceline.

If you kill someone with your DSpecial, Pyke will speak of their suffering. Context specific voice lines have a chance of playing if the enemy is very heavy, if you suicide with them, kill a teammate, or if you need a comeback.

Did you know that Rivals characters only have a 1 frame window to perform a backwards roll? Normally this wouldn't be such an issue, as you often buffer it out of an attack, but buffering it still makes you turn around and roll forwards.
I wrote a small chunk of code to detect for this, and increase the frame window to 2, letting you buffer it and have variety in your roll animations.
Sadly, rollback isn't so easy

Programming, Design, Art by 7axel7 on Discord
Several attack sprites and smears by ToTheHorizon
Preview, portrait, char select art by Spoocejuice

Made for Horror Jam 2024