Class and Skill Updates

[Nayru Al-Saiduq]

Oh look, Nayru with another long winded suggestion, what a surprise! Today we've got a three-parter, all based around the same concept - the three sections are all linked together.

SHOP SKILLS
Summary: Split current set into three categories - Physical, Magical, Universal. Add magic-specific skills so mages have something to buy other than tomes and Celerity to add customization options. 

Physical: Smite (massive burst of strength), Adept, Counter, Pavise

Magical: Swiftcast (minimize/skip chargeup), Momentum (cast advanced magic while moving), Dispersion (magic gets better AOE but not power), Doublecast (cast two spells simultaneously at the cost of individual power)

Universal: Celerity, Daunt, Imbue, Sacrifice, Shade

I'd also like to rewrite the topic entirely if/when we decide on a final list of skills - many of them could use a little more clarity since they simply don't work quite the way they're written (ex. Celerity). If anyone has suggestions on skill updates/reworks/removals/additions, this could be a good time to bring it up as well!


ELITE CLASSES
Summary: remove universal weapon options from 500 post characters. Add 1 weapon type on promo to Elite class. Mastery skill classes (Warrior, Halberdier, etc) still gain 3/maybe all 4, to give them a continuing reason to exist after the gold advantage stops being relevant.

Tentative: allow custom class names (pls) or at least dedicated uberclass names (ex. Swordmaster->Trueblade, Hero->Vanguard, Sage->Archsage, Druid->Archdruid/Dark Druid, Bishop->Exalt, etc)

Reasoning: Kenshin, Richter, Clair, and Jya have NOTHING in common as warriors aside from "is good at fighting." They shouldn't all have the exact same weapon choices and same class name. I get that on release there were so few 500+ post people that it didn't matter much, but nowadays we just have too many champions and soon-to-be Champions and Archsages that I think it's time to re-examine the subject.

CLASS SKILLS
Summary: It's not fair that only 1 class (Bishop) has an insanely overpowered skill, but dropping Bishop to everyone else's level (read: boring) isn't a good answer. My solution is to give all normal classes a skill instead, and try to tune them to similar-ish power levels, with a mix of stronger actives and weaker passives to help emphasize class choice beyond JUST weapon options.
You can still play your character however you want, but if we're going to bother having classes at all, we might as well try to differentiate them a little more than just names.

Some of the abilities aren't necessarily finalized, for example I'm not sure exactly which of the Sage options are best. I've been working at these for a while and I figure opening it up to general discussion from members and mods might help work them out better than I can alone!

Mechanics:

• Most skills are earned at X (300 or 400?) post count. This gives humans a meaningful pitstop between 250 and 500
• Mastery is gained immediately on promo (usually 200 posts, 300 for trainees, on creation for prepromos)
  
• Actives can be used only once a page at no cost, similar to shop skills.
• Passives are always on, but generally weaker, and usually related to a class's unique advantage.

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Actives

Bishop - Slayer (can imbue an attack with incredible power against monsters/arum)

General - Great Shield (basically advanced barrier, but self-only)

Paladin - Aegis (ranged/magic resistance)

Great Knight - Luna (a massive armor cleaving/piercing blow, makes it much easier to cut people in half. Basically super Smite)

Swordmaster (Astra), Lancer (Impaler), Berserker (Ravage)
-Uber Adept (up to 5 hit combo; represents mastery of weapon far beyond what Adept can offer)

Sniper - Prescience (perfectly land a single shot, regardless of conditions)

Druid - Vengeance (supercharge magic for 1 post, but minor/no casting next post)

Sage - maybe pick 1 of 2?
- Avatar - temporarily take the cap of mixing elements from 2 up to 5
- Ignis - supercharge 1 element of choice for 1 post (boring I know)
- Ignis alt: create a superelement from two normal ones (ex. fire/thunder=plasma, fire/earth=LEGIT full power lava, etc?)

Assassin - Pass (can move almost invisibly for a post, but alert foes can still react)

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Passives
Halberdier, Hero, Warrior, Yeoman, Bandit - Mastery
- Gain a 760-1000g weapon of choice in both weapon types at promo
- Can use new weapon types at full effectiveness immediately
- At 500 post, gain additional weapon proficiencies compared to other classes

Rogue - Acrobat (can parkour up improbable surfaces)

Mage Knight, Valkyrie, Seer, Nomadic Trooper, Ranger
- Canto (can cast/shoot at speeds of up to a trot while mounted)
- That's the only skill they get
- Screw them they have a mount

FLIERS DO NOT GET UNIQUE SKILLS.
- Screw them they can fly
- Ok fine whatever, Flight is their skill

Dragons/Taguel
- Screw them too, being a f**k**g dragon is your skill

[Shara Tiinedra]

You already know my thoughts on these. Unless I take another look at them again and see something I somehow missed, I approve of all of these.

[Nathaniel]

I'm down for all of these except the third tier classes. 500 posts should be enough to earn freedom from being restrained to the class system, and for the most part, you should by that point know what you're doing when it comes to roleplaying adaptation and growth. A newly made Champion who's never used a bow can't hit a target from 100 yards away every shot, if at all, an Archsage who's never used a Stave can't heal someone's life threatening wound with little taxation on their body.

The name thing wouldn't bother me, though I'd prefer custom names over set third tier ones if we switch from the current system.

[Nayru Al-Saiduq]

Jan 18, 2017 11:34:22 GMT -6 Nathaniel said:

I'm down for all of these except the third tier classes. 500 posts should be enough to earn freedom from being restrained to the class system, and for the most part, you should by that point know what you're doing when it comes to roleplaying adaptation and growth. A newly made Champion who's never used a bow can't hit a target from 100 yards away every shot, if at all, an Archsage who's never used a Stave can't heal someone's life threatening wound with little taxation on their body.

The name thing wouldn't bother me, though I'd prefer custom names over set third tier ones if we switch from the current system.

Hm, interesting. So rather than 500 being the ultimate evolution of previous classes, you'd rather see it be a push away from classes? Would you mind explaining why? It's an intriguing idea but I don't quite follow.

[Ito]

Jan 18, 2017 14:32:43 GMT -6 Nayru Al-Saiduq said:

Jan 18, 2017 11:34:22 GMT -6 Nathaniel said:

I'm down for all of these except the third tier classes. 500 posts should be enough to earn freedom from being restrained to the class system, and for the most part, you should by that point know what you're doing when it comes to roleplaying adaptation and growth. A newly made Champion who's never used a bow can't hit a target from 100 yards away every shot, if at all, an Archsage who's never used a Stave can't heal someone's life threatening wound with little taxation on their body.

The name thing wouldn't bother me, though I'd prefer custom names over set third tier ones if we switch from the current system.

Hm, interesting. So rather than 500 being the ultimate evolution of previous classes, you'd rather see it be a push away from classes? Would you mind explaining why? It's an intriguing idea but I don't quite follow.

If I'm understanding correctly, I think I agree. I think that it makes sense that once someone reaches the legendary Champion status, they would (should) be experienced enough in all forms of combat to discard their former class's limitations regarding weapon expertise and pick up and use a weapon that they've both supported and defied in battle hundreds of times. In other words, you fight lots, you learn lots. Kinda like the Yeoman or similar promo classes picking up another weapon type for utility's sake, why wouldn't the ultimate combatant understand how to use every weapon type available?

Now, my question. Early on in the suggestion, you mention a "gold advantage". What is that? I may have missed something in my brief few weeks' leave, but since then I've never heard of it.

[Nayru Al-Saiduq]

Jan 18, 2017 15:19:38 GMT -6 Ito said:

Now, my question. Early on in the suggestion, you mention a "gold advantage". What is that? I may have missed something in my brief few weeks' leave, but since then I've never heard of it.

The Mastery passive idea for the hybrid weapon classes would give them a significant gold advantage early on to allow them to dual-focus easier, but at 900 posts you don't really give a f**k about 100 posts worth of gold, hence why the idea is that those classes would get more versatility from Champion promo as well.

Characters and classes that focus on single weapons don't really need or care about a bunch of extra weapon types from promo (do you see Kenshin* and Kisaragi swinging an axe around?), whereas a Halberdier who already used a bunch of sword/lance (ex. Selene) can much more easily explain also picking up axes and bows. Thus, Mastery was an idea to give THEM the universal focus they might want while simultaneously making it more meaningful - if a swordmaster hits 500, it doesn't really make sense to give them 3 more weapon types, MAYBE +1 as a subfocus, and fliers already have enough advantages without also getting bows and absolute weapon triangle dominance (imo). Whereas for a Hero or Halberdier, sure they may be more focused on a single weapon type than true universal use (ex. Selene uses both lances/swords but is significantly better with lances) but they have both a reason and an incentive to actually USE that advantage.

I'm all for player choice and 500 meaning something - I just think it's important to qualify what the idea of Mastery is. Free gold, extra weapon types, and absolute weapon triangle advantage is a pretty significant advantage even if you plan to mostly use swords. Is it as exciting as Vengeance, maybe not, but it's SIGNIFICANTLY stronger overall since it's always on and gives a huge advantage everywhere with no downsides at all regardless of your playstyle.

...Though now we're getting into the concept of 'invisible power' and how that can be difficult to balance since people don't realize how strong something is unless it's a flashy active or an INSANELY overtuned passive, BUT I digress.

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*I know kenshin has a bow but A. he's a special mod only class, B. he's mediocre at archery, and C. he strongly prioritizes swords. So I kinda used him as a pseudo swordmaster example, shoot me. <3

[Bryn]

I won't go into detail about Shop Skills or Class Skills, since I'm not old enough to know how to balance skills and the shop. What I can (and still am probably under-qualified to) talk about are 'Champions' & 'Archsages'.


Champions (and Archsages) chaffed me a bit. They're a bit too 'one size fits all' and depending on the Character in question, they can have varying degrees of success.

For example, An Assassin or Sniper knows only their weapon of choice for all of their career... and then suddenly has the ability to wield all of them. The players probably won't choose more than one new weapon since their character has long since been defined, but they'll probably still pick up one because of the novelty. Reverse that and talk about say, a Hero or a Warrior and we can accept much more readily that they learn multiple weapons because they've already had precedent for picking up a new weapon.

Now let's talk about Mounts. If Champions are the great equalizer, does that mean a Berserker who goes champion can 'with some training' Equip a bow and shoot off of horseback just as well as a Nomad? Or could a General ride a Pegasus and challenge a Swordmaster with a blade?

As per Nayru's thoughts, I think an additional weapon after 500+ is a fine reward initself. Heck, being able to trade that weapon in for a mount would be amazing as well. Now be a Berserker on the back of a Bernese Charger, or an Assassin able to Zorro-jump from his horse to yours and dismount you.

Archsages are much the same, especially if you are under the assumption that to summon Light spirits for spells is entirely different from summoning Anima spirits or to draw upon the Nether. Honestly for these folks, I'm not entirely sure if they need a milestone. Their 'big ability' is they're able to make Magic Weapons and Ritual Cast their tomes, both of which they don't need to have 500 posts for.

[Xanthos]

When I chose a class for a character I chose that class carefully. There is a reason why that person fights that way. Now some times that could be heritage, it could be the style there teacher fought with, or it could be there lack of professional training. That class defines a bit about the character. It shines a light on there motives and who they are. When you lose that class as Champion you become a bit more, how do I put it, empty. That person no longer has that definition on them. They no longer belong to that group of people in the world. I for one would like to have third tier classes, like Marshall, True Blade, and Vanguard. It shows that the user is at the top of there craft, but it also shows that they are a part of a specific type of people in the world.

Now as for skills, I am up for more skills. Skills are the bomb.

[Kenshin]

I'm saying this as a member so it has zero influence on how anything goes.

Nayru almost hit on a point I wanted to make about duel weapon classes. Most people focus on a single weapon type so double dipping slows you down quite a bit. I had a choice to make on Kenshin not too long ago; focus on building my magic weapon or getting a better bow. To touch up on what Nayru said about his class, his "mod only" was in name only but was based on Myrm->Yeoman. While I like the idea of the mastery skill, giving them a silver, regal, or magic may be going too fair.

Mod clarification: As far as Champion/Archsage goes, you're locked into mount status upon promotion. This thread could be used to change that. As far as the subject about 'custom names' for them, Nayru is the only one that I know that has dealt with this. For every new custom name it requires a new group to be created, we've got a ton of groups as of right now so (Don and Il knows this pain) scrolling through a large list to find it will become annoying once we hit our 10th champion. Honestly I would love to have my class be "Ranger Champion"(based on DnD and our Champion class), but if I do it I have to let you guys do it.

[Shara Tiinedra]

Since I can't scroll through groups myself, I uh, don't exactly know this pain myself. But if even YOU want the different names for third tier classes, I think it's at the point where we should just give the people what they want lol.

I can't speak for everyone, but most people that have voiced any opinion on that particular matter have been in favor of at LEAST going through with a changed names. But the fact that hitting 500 automatically puts you at mount status is...absurd lol. It kind of just goes to show the whole absurdity of Kenshin, Clair, and Richter all being the same class. Morrigan as an Archsage, for example, would be a very different Archsage from Remus. Elias would be as well.

I understand that it worked once upon a time, when there were extremely few Champions. Even now there are few active 500+ characters/accounts, but that seems to be changing soon enough, and it it just doesn't fit.

[Nayru Al-Saiduq]

Kenshin Mastery as I pitched it only grants stuff like Brave, Killer, and Silver, not Magic or Regal. YMMV on whether Silver is too good to include.

Groups are a fair point, but as I recall WotW's group page needs MAJOR reorganization in ACP anyways lol. Putting the commonly needed classes at the top instead of having to scroll through a bunch of admin/mod classes would make the group thing a lot easier, there were times I almost accidentally gave someone a mod-only version of the class since those popped up first in ACP. Considering how few active 500+ people there are (Nayru, Kenshin, Orcleous, soon to be Remus), and that Nayru is fine with DD anyways though Dragon Jesus would be hilarious, I honestly don't think that a couple extra groups at the bottom of the list would be a big deal.

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I personally do not like the idea of gaining mount at 500, either by choice or by force. Frankly, I absolutely dislike ALL mounted classes in RP, even limiting them to Canto still gives them an enormous advantage in RP that we have been lucky people aside from clair haven't abused too much. Particularly mounted fliers; being able to freely maneuver in 3 dimensions AND immunize themselves to their only weakness (Delphi Shield) is just silly. At least winged humanform dragons have the downside of flying making their nature obvious, but no one gives a crap if you're riding a pegasus.

HOWEVER, I think that it's fair to have it as an alternative to +1 weapon at 500 promo, so for example if Bryn wanted to go Shaman(Dark) -> Druid(Dark/Anima) -> Archdruid(Dark/Anima, Mounted) that would be doable. Again, I personally dislike it, but mounts are here to stay whether I like it or not, and that way we at least make people 'pay' to get one. As Bryn noted, an Assassin could get a horse that they don't use much and just have the option there, it's not a huge deal. You could even have a little reward for people who don't pick up a weapon type (ex. Swordmaster, Assassin) like some extra free gold or something? Dunno if that's necessary, just a thought, but for example Kisaragi for one will never use ANYTHING but swords and even the mount would be wasted.

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As a more general statement, I find it absolutely fascinating there's such a split between "defined" and "custom" classes, regardless of the mechanics. I honestly assumed people would be arguing about skills instead lol, accusing Sniper of being OP or bitching about Berserker getting a multihit. Not to belittle the discussion at all, I'm having a blast reading these posts, just didn't think there would be such general acceptance of the skills but a bitter split between custom/constant T3 classes.

I think Xanthos actually did make a pretty good point about how classes can be used to help (not solely) define a character; not all Swordmasters are Sacaen, but all Swordmasters should (in theory) be really friggin' good with a sword. I can't help but wonder if we couldn't compromise by doing both; if someone likes Trueblade or Archsage they can use the official class name, if they want to be a Nightblade (uber assassin) or Exalt (uber bishop) or Divine Blade/Sword Saint (uber swordmaster with a Light weapon), that's not really a big deal either, as long as the custom class name works for the character. Folks who actually stuck all the way to 500 deserve that much imo, though admittedly that is putting a little extra work on mods.

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Finally, a sincere thank you to everyone who posted. Getting to discuss this stuff is always fun. <3

[Vincent]

I just got caught up on all of this and here is my take. Champion is eh and Archbishop is awesome but way too broken.

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Standard champion has access to all four weapons, that's cool but how many of us are going to dedicate to them? As Kenshin stated previously, did he want a better bow or an upgrade on his magic sword? To say nothing of single weapon classes like swordmaster who go 500 posts of one dedicated weapon a novice -> Hero is already 300 of just a sword. I would like to pick up skills and max out my magic sword which is already hundreds of posts to do still. I will likely be at that champion level by then and I will still not have touched on my axe capabilities at all before adding in two new options all of a sudden.

On the side of magic its a little easier to mix and match as it is all the same at the core, magic you cast to varying effects. Weapons are entirely new techniques to train rigorously to improve. Yes the argument can be made about new tomes too but without an enforcing system its far harder to justify when at 250 you can access the advanced magic.

Also as previously mentioned Bishops are awesome with the slayer skill. In the long run they become the single strongest Archsages since everyone still gets the same tome access but only they get the super skill. There is already a lot of debate on how to balance a mage to a weapon user and giving them all the tomes and staves is not very fair.

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I think it could get messy if everyone had a unique tier three class but I think a standard one per previous class would be good. Vanguard sounds awesome. JS. Plus the previous argument on flyers with a bow rears its head this way. A dragon lord champion with a bow is still just as broken as a young plucky squire riding a flying mount with a bow, if not more so. Regardless of whether you think they earned that right with 500 posts or not. If Vincent did not pursue a magic blade for example and reached 500 at the same time as a flyer his bowmanship will suck, same as a flyer. But the flyer will have far more advantage in the scenario and Vincent would be ill suited to the task.

[Argus]

I just have to say. I agree with Vincent in my (very limited) understandings of the systems. But yeah I like this idea.

[Bryn]

My talk about Champions gaining mounts was more me talking incredulously, since it seems to me like Archsages and Champions were initially created to 'equalize' the classes once they got high enough. (Apparently, text doesn't convey tone very well. Who knew?) I didn't think about Bishop's Slayer skill carrying over to Archsage, but mounts are basically the equivalent to that. They're a weapon/utility that you can use in conjunction with your existing skills.

To try and resummarize my jumbled rant, all the mounted 500+ members still have an edge over their unmounted compatriots, even with access to every weapon type. If 'balance' was the goal, the class missed it's mark and should be reworked.


Nayru Al-Saiduq I think gaining a mount is a cool addition to a character, but at the same time it definitely is much more instrumental and important than a simple weapon proficiency. (And that's putting BS fliers to the side, or legendary mounts that can beat actual players without PC interference) Personally I'd be fine with requiring classes who aren't initially furnished with a mount to have to pay for one. We don't get exotic weapons for free, so why should a living breathing one be any different?

Though that's probably game-changing enough to warrant a suggestion all it's own.

[Selibas]

I guess I do sort of see 500+ outside of the class system. I believe the roleplayer who reaches it should be able to play growth effectively like I said, but the ceiling on them should be taken off. Selibas can't use a lance right now, it's against the rules. If for some reason I wanted to RP him using a lance for a few posts (badly) he couldn't, because that's the rules. When he hits Champion, Selibas stops being a novice, mercenary, or hero, and becomes just a dude who's fought a ton (not because he's a Champion obviously). Sel's free to do whatever I see fit from that point as long as he does it within reason of what he's done so far, and I don't want to lose that freedom.