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Posted: Sat Apr 02, 2016 5:12 pm Post subject: Breath 4 Leaks: Combat Classes
Hello everyone,
Today I wanted to share the more formal, finished design for our tier 2 combat class rebuilds. But before I do that, I wanted to preface it with an explanation of some of our design decisions.
We found the matter of trying to juggle balance and flavor to be a very delicate matter. We could go one end of the extreme and focus entirely on balance, making sure everything was comparable and nothing was overpowered... But then things would be pretty much the same. The far extreme essentially does away with classes entirely. On the other hand, if we tried really hard to make everything behave in a very different way, then we end up having a very hard time comparing anything to each other; the balance becomes a totally arbitrary thing that tries to compare things like Advocate Blessing to things like Touch of Corrupted Loyalty. Going too far in making every class work and behave different results in nobody being able to agree on if anything is balanced and trust me, that gets very tiresome.
Obviously, the solution is at neither extreme, but somewhere in the middle. We touched into this a bit with the class roles, and it is our plan to expand on that a little further. With that in mind, we decided to actually go a little bit in both directions at once, when it comes to balanced skills vs different flavorful skills.
The Balanced Skills
We've been calling these the "Core Skills" of a class. We go heavy on the balance side of these and generally they are the sort of "absolutely necessary" skills which everyone is getting, such as a combat buff. You should be able to see direct parallels in most of the core skill set. Although most skills will operate in a slightly different way the end result tends to be the same.
These core skills exist to make up the real meat of the class and the abilities it has. With that, we know this much is well balanced.
The Different Skills
We've been calling these the "Flavor Skills" of a class. This is where we focus on trying to make the class look, feel, and behave different from its counterparts. If more skills end up added on later, they'd be fitting into this category. In general, we wanted stuff that was useful, but not for every build. Something that would actually be handy, but you can live without. Interesting but optional.
The general hope is that by going heavy on the balance of the most important (combat and role related) skills, we can keep the classes reasonably balanced. Balance plays a secondary role when we get into the flavor skills, but since half your CP is actually going towards balanced core skills, we don't have quite as much to worry about when you spend the other half on skills whose primary purpose are to look, feel, and behave different from other classes.
Please keep this in mind while reading our plans for tier 2 combat classes. This proved to be a bigger challenge that we anticipated, but we're eager to see what sort of reception it gets and how well it works out.
Oh yeah, and we're buffing tier 2 damage output. Most tier 2 classes in 3.5 just got 1 or 2 extra damage over a mortal and didn't really feel that much more impressive or dangerous compared to a mortal. So, enjoy that.
Paladin
Lay On Hands (Class Feature)
* For 1 AP and 8 MP, may apply 10 status ticks of Lesser Regeneration on a non-evil target.
> Effect heals 1 HP every tick.
> Paladin gains 1 XP for every point successfully healed in this way. (i.e. no XP if the target is at max health)
>> The purpose of this skill is to front-load some bonuses into the start of tier 2. The Combat Mastery skill is rolled into Strong Attack to free up extra CP (by removing Combat Mastery) and also make the jump to tier 2 a bigger power difference.
ELITE ATTACK (40 CP child of Strong Attack)
* +2 damage
>> General power bonus.
BOLSTER ATTACK (20 CP) (Paladin only)
* 0 AP, 5 MP to activate.
* Gives 30 minutes of the Bolster Attack status effect.
* Bolster Attack effect gives +2 damage
* Every point of damage taken reduces this duration by 1 minute.
DIVINE ARMOR (20 CP) (Paladin)
* Innate Armor
* 2 Soak vs all damage types.
>> Intended to be a bit more desirable than mundane armor. The goal here is to maintain Divine Armor as an important part of being a Paladin, but keep the Divine Herald from having huge soak which the Revenant and Void Walker can't get. Expect the Seraph and the Holy Champion to get skills which further increase their soak, but no more soak for the Herald.
Hand of Zealotry (20 CP)
* Character no longer loses morality for attacking/killing characters of Neutral morality.
* This skill may not be bought if the character already has Alonai's Aegis.
Holier Than Thou (40 CP child of Hand of Zealotry)
* Character no longer loses morality for attacking/killing non-angels with less morality than they have.
* Morality loss for attacking/killing angels with less morality is reduced by half.
* Once you have attacked someone (hit or miss), they may retaliate without MO penalty for the next hour.
Alonai's Aegis (20 CP)
* This skill may not be bought if the character already has Hand of Zealotry
* For 1 AP, the character may apply the Alonai's Aegis effect onto the target non-demon/angel. May not be used on any character with Tattoo of Balance.
> May only protect 1 character in this way.
> For all purposes (morality shifts in combat from either side, HoZ, glyphs, ect.), the target character is considered to have the same morality score as the angel who placed this effect on them.
> This effect persists even beyond death until the angel revokes it.
> Anytime the target would lose morality by performing an action, the angel who placed this effect on them loses twice that amount.
> This effect is automatically canceled if the angel's morality ever drops below 20.
> When the target character does a good deed (i.e. their morality score increases), you get a message about it, saying what wonderful thing they have done. This has exactly 0 mechanical impact.
> Also you should get feedback on who is making your morality drop, too.
Heart of Mercy (40 CP child of Alonai's Aegis)
* You may apply Alonai's Ageis to level/6 characters.
Propitiation (20 CP)
* Character gains the option to respawn for 1/3 their level AP, will spawn in Elysium when spawning this way.
* Regular spawn option remains.
Smite (20 CP)
* Charge attack, costs an additional 6 MP. Adds +4 damage to the attack and converts the damage type to Holy. This attack will deal an additional +1 damage against an evil target, and a further +1 if the target is a demon (i.e. generally a total of +6 damage against demons)
Shield of Faith (20 CP child of Divine Armor)
* 1 AP and 10 MP to activate.
* Gains 30 minutes of the Shield of Faith status effect. While under this effect, the next time the Paladin would take more than 10 damage, the paladin instead takes 0 damage. This displays a message to both parties explaining what negated the damage. This ends the effect.
Myrmidon
Tenacity (Class Feature)
* Myrmidon has a passive 20% chance to negate an incoming hostile negative status effect.
Critical Hit (40 CP child of Strong Attack) (Myrmidon only)
* +30% chance for the Myrmidon to score a critical hit, dealing an additional 3 + Level/4 (rounded down) damage.
Combination Attack (20 CP (Myrmidon only)
* 0 AP, 5 MP
* Gives 15 minutes of the Combination Attack status effect.
* While under this effect, every 3rd hit will gain +6 damage.
Adrenaline Rush (20 CP child of Critical Hit)
* When the myrm scores a critical hit against a non-factionmate, they gain 5 minutes of the Adrenaline Rush status effect.
* Characters under the Adrenaline Rush effect can see hidden characters much like Enhanced Senses.
* If the character already has the Enhanced Senses skill (Rev) they gain the ability to see invisible characters.
* When a character takes damage while under the Adrenaline Rush status effect, the effect will negate damage, costing them 1 minute of the effect per point of damage negated, much like SM negates healing.
* This effect does not stack. A new crit while already under the effects will simply reset the duration back to 5 minutes.
Weapon Care (20 CP)
* Reduce durability loss when using a weapon.
* Decay chance is now 8%
* Amount decayed is now between 1 and 8
Meditation (20 CP)
* As existing skill
> Myrmidon may spend 1 AP and 5 MP to heal 5 HP. This will cure Defiler Poison as well as minor poison effects.
>> Note that this is not a complete list of effects, since "can be cured by anything which cures minor poison" is commonly used to describe other effects.
Focused Attack (20 CP)
* Charged attack, 5 MP. Attack gains +20% Accuracy and +2 damage. Damage type is converted to Arcane.
Agility (20 CP child of Super Reflexes)
* 1 AP and 5 MP to activate. Gains 15 ticks of the Agility status effect, which grants 10% Dodge and 5% Evasion.
Super Reflexes (20 CP)
* Passive +5% Dodge and 5% Evasion.
Armor Proficiency (20 CP)
* Armor has a weight of 0 when worn.
* Furthermore, if the Myrmidon is encumbered, they may still perform GIVE, EQUIP, and REPAIR actions.
Pariah
Explosive Murder (class feature)
* On death, the Pariah has a 50% chance to explode.
>> 75% accuracy AOE doing a max damage per target equal to the Pariah's level, and total damage not to exceed their level * 10 (i.e. existing stats)
>> Damage type maintains a 50/50 chance of being unholy or fire, rolled separate per target.
>> AOE CAN NOT target factionmates.
>> Can not be triggered manually with the base skill.
ELITE ATTACK (40 CP child of Strong Attack)
* +2 damage
>> General power bonus.
Rend Flesh (20 CP) (Pariah only)
* 0 AP, 5 MP to activate.
* Gives 5 minutes of the Rend Flesh status effect.
* +1 minute added to the duration every time the Pariah hits with an attack.
* Adds extra damage in the following way:
** The Pariah's attack does an extra +1 damage.
** If the target has < 66% of their total health, the attack does an extra +2 damage instead.
** If the target has < 33% of their total health, the attack does an extra +3 damage instead.
Lesser Regeneration (20 CP) (Pariah)
* Activated skill. 1 AP, 5 MP. Gains 15 status ticks of the "Lesser Regeneration" status effect.
* Effect heals 1 HP every tick.
>> See note on Blood Taste
Blood Taste (20 CP) (Pariah)
* Much like the existing skill, all attacks will heal the Pariah up to 3 HP per hit. amount healed can not be higher than the damage done.
>> Pariahs are actually expected to pick up either Lesser Regeneration or Blood Taste as a means of healing themselves. If someone wants to get both then that's totally a valid option. So is picking up neither, I guess.
Unrestrained Fury (10 CP child of Explosive Murder)
* The character may now activate the AOE manually for 1 AP and 8 MP. If the character already has this button available from another skill, the cost to activate is reduced by 1 MP.
* Per-target damage is increased to the character's level * 1.5 when activating this skill using the above button.
* Your Explosive Murder AOE can now affect factionmates.
* If you are killed by a another character's Explosive Murder AOE, you have a 100% chance to explode on death.
Focused Revenge (20 CP child of Explosive Murder)
* When exploding on death, your attacker is guaranteed to be hit by the AOE. This supersedes anything that would otherwise prevent it, such as a flat miss chance.
* The character may now activate the AOE manually for 1 AP and 8 MP. If the character already has this button available from another skill, the cost to activate is reduced by 1 MP.
Unstable Hatred (20 CP child of Explosive Murder)
* Your chance to explode on death is increased by 25%
* The character may now activate the AOE manually for 1 AP and 8 MP. If the character already has this button available from another skill, the cost to activate is reduced by 1 MP.
Persisting Flames (20 CP child of Explosive Murder)
* Non-factionmates hit by your AOE now also gain 5 minutes of the "Persisting Flames" status effect. While under this effect, they suffer a -5% penalty to defenses, and suffer 1 point of fire damage every minute.
> This effect can be cured by normal healing. (Anything which heals Minor Poison)
* The character may now activate the AOE manually for 1 AP and 8 MP. If the character already has this button available from another skill, the cost to activate is reduced by 1 MP.
Hellfire (20 CP)
* Charge attack, costs an additional 5MP. Adds +4 damage to the attack and converts the damage type to Unholy.
Destructive Blow (20 CP child of Hellfire)
* Hellfire now deals +5 additional damage to wards and fortifications
Good Intentions (20CP)
* Allows you the option to guarantee spawn in Stygia for AP cost equal to 1/3 your level.
> Normal spawn for 1/2 your level still remains.[
Blood Claws (20 CP)
* Grants innate weapon, Blood Claws.
> Base 100% accuracy, this is affected by all melee dodge, as well as any global combat accuracy buffs such as Strong Attack
> Damage calculation is strange.
>> Damage = 6 base + Any combat bonuses - appropriate soak/resistances from target. After all of this has been calculated damage is multiplied by 0.75 (round down)
>> Damage type is variable.
>> A Pariah has 60% Slashing, 25% Piercing, 10% Impact, and 5% Unholy
>> An IB has 35% Slashing, 35% Fire, 20% Piercing, 10% Unholy
>> A DH has 25% Slashing, 25% Death, 25% Cold, 15% Piercing, 10% Unholy
>> A VW has 25% Slashing, 25% Death, 25% Piercing, 25% Unholy
>> A Redeemed (who has fallen to Evil again) has 60% Slashing, 25% Piercing, 15% Holy
_________________
Last edited by Teksura on Wed Apr 13, 2016 10:20 pm; edited 1 time in total
Joined: Oct 12, 2015 Posts: 1085 Location: The United States of America
Posted: Sat Apr 02, 2016 7:30 pm Post subject: Re: Breath 4 Leaks: Combat Classes
Teksura wrote:
[*]Explosive Murder (class feature)
Okay, I think I might love B4.
_________________ 8:17 PM - BlackHeartKabal: HOW IS 42 KILLS AN A
8:17 PM - BlackHeartKabal: FOURTY TWO
8:17 PM - BlackHeartKabal: FOURTY TWOOOO
8:17 PM - BlackHeartKabal: IS ONLY AN A
8:17 PM - BlackHeartKabal: HOW DO YOU GET AN S ON LEBLANC
Joined: Aug 15, 2010 Posts: 3955 Location: Gehenna (Earth Branch)
Posted: Sat Apr 02, 2016 9:29 pm Post subject:
If you don't buy unrestrained fury you're doing it wrong. _________________
"Oh, sorry, thought I was in a Vault of Enlightenment, not someone's booze cabinet." -Kharn
Is Bolster attack really reduced by damage TAKEN as opposed to damage DEALT? That is, if you're not encountering actives or Aura targets, you'll just get a flat +2 damage bonus for the duration of your hunting? _________________ "I am your Slave
And you will Reward me
For I shall be Faithful."
(That's from Dracula, by Stoker.)
Probably not but it may get a buff later on. We're still not entirely sure. One design philosophy we applied was "It is far easier to apply a buff than it is to apply a nerf." What this means is if we're unsure, we are typically going to intentionally lean towards underpowering something. Once we actually see it in action, we can get a better feel for it and can buff it to be where we want it. Going too far and needing to nerf something which people already have sucks. A Lot. We don't want to have to do that. So if something looks lackluster, it might be intentionally that way with plans to buff it later when we have a better idea how much we need to buff it.
Tomppa wrote:
Can you stack Agility?
Just the duration.
Tomppa wrote:
Is Bolster attack really reduced by damage TAKEN as opposed to damage DEALT? That is, if you're not encountering actives or Aura targets, you'll just get a flat +2 damage bonus for the duration of your hunting?
If the character already has this button available from another skill...
Why is that even an option? Two skills granting the same button seem redundant and I sure as shit wouldn't spend 20 cp for a +25% hit rate and a 1mp savings.
Too many folks are immune to fire or unholy to make this skill worth while.
If the character already has this button available from another skill...
Why is that even an option? Two skills granting the same button seem redundant and I sure as shit wouldn't spend 20 cp for a +25% hit rate and a 1mp savings.
Too many folks are immune to fire or unholy to make this skill worth while.
MP reduction was given to help out the devouted exploder. Since you can't go into negative AP, think about it more along the lines of being able to use more MP during the fight. The MP reduction is also something that wasn't even calculated into the cost to buy the skill, so really, you're getting more "bang" for your CP (hehe).
It isn't +25% hit chance (that would be cray-cray), it's 25% higher chance to explode. That means that while you are sleeping, 3 out of 4 times, your enemy is gonna get hurt, and at level 30, it's gonna hurt A LOT. If you really think about it, you're already saving 40CP by not having to buy EM, so you'll have more free CP.
As for characters who are immune to Unholy/fire: B3.5 had 1/4 of classes who have the immunity as an innate, or situationally. Expect this number to shrink for B4.
One thing you have to understand is that when we balance skills, we balance them on the individual level, and then we balance them on a much larger scale. We make sure they have enough "oomph" to be something that interests ferals, but isn't too crazy for faction play (imagine having to kill 7 EM characters in a raid that do 45 damage to all your squishies). If it turns out impossible, we introduce child skills that branch out to benefit all playstyles. A feral Pariah would love focused revenge for the guaranteed hit, but it wouldn't be a priority for a factioned Pariah. It isn't too visible in T2 skills, but the distinction will be easy to spot in T3.
Last edited by Wozzy on Sun Apr 03, 2016 1:42 pm; edited 1 time in total
As for characters who are immune to Unholy/fire: Cloak of Fire HC and IB have a built in fire resistance, Holy Cloak HC has an expensive timed cloak, and Advocate have 30 of less ticks of Unholy Immunity. NC is easy to solve, just hit him with a non-fire/unholy attack first. That's less than 1/8 of classes that you should probably avoid, and 1/8 that you can manage. Expect this number to stay the same, or shrink.
Just a small correction - Advocates get Unholy immunity passively as part of their free skill. Conduits get it on a triggered skill that basically no one gets. Also,remember that immunities are probably going to be rarer in B4 than they are now.
Edit: Just in case this wasn't clear - this is B3.5 I'm talking about. We don't know what immunities we'll be keeping for B4.
Last edited by Saint_Jimmy on Sun Apr 03, 2016 1:37 pm; edited 1 time in total
I don't understand the purpose of Alonai's Aegis at all though. The caster gets no benefit and puts their own morality at risk, so it's for using on... allied transcendants who've fallen to Neutral but are expected to rise back to good, and that also need to get past a Glyph vs. Neutral? The messaging is cool, but the value seems super niche even by flavor skill standards, assuming I'm not totally missing something like a dumb-dumb.
Last edited by MerlintheTuna on Mon Apr 04, 2016 7:26 am; edited 1 time in total
I don't understand the purpose of Alonoi's Aegis at all though. The caster gets no benefit and puts their own morality at risk, so it's for using on... allied transcendants who've fallen to Neutral but are expected to rise back to good, and that also need to get past a Glyph vs. Neutral? The messaging is cool, but the value seems super niche even by flavor skill standards, assuming I'm not totally missing something like a dumb-dumb.
The current plan is that we'll have a few things that'd only work if you have greater than 40 MO - normally this would mean you'd need to be an angel. This isn't so much a case of you missing stuff, more "this skill ties into T3 design". This would effectively allow you to sneak your transcended factionmates past those restrictions. It also means that you can prevent that 50 MO angel from murdering your good transcended buddies for free. (And hey, there's a possibility that it will end up being super niche and buffed in some way. We'll just have to see.)
As for characters who are immune to Unholy/fire: Cloak of Fire HC and IB have a built in fire resistance, Holy Cloak HC has an expensive timed cloak, and Advocate have 30 of less ticks of Unholy Immunity. NC is easy to solve, just hit him with a non-fire/unholy attack first. That's less than 1/8 of classes that you should probably avoid, and 1/8 that you can manage. Expect this number to stay the same, or shrink.
Just a small correction - Advocates get Unholy immunity passively as part of their free skill. Conduits get it on a triggered skill that basically no one gets. Also,remember that immunities are probably going to be rarer in B4 than they are now.
To clarify:
None of these are even a thing in 4.0 so far. We've not given any of that to any of them. The closest we've done to touching this is we determined Adaption isn't giving immunity, but instead giving soak. Outright immunity will be rare and unusual.Everything you see listed above is only referencing 3.5 mechanics, and all of that is subject to change.
nook wrote:
If the character already has this button available from another skill...
Why is that even an option? Two skills granting the same button seem redundant and I sure as shit wouldn't spend 20 cp for a +25% hit rate and a 1mp savings.
Because then you get the option to activate it by buying any of the childskills you like, rather than being forced into buying 1 specific child skill for the button. If you don't like one of the child skills, fine. Don't buy that one. Buy a different one if you want the option to explode. If you're not interested in exploding at will, simply buy different skills. _________________
Posted: Sun Apr 03, 2016 2:48 pm Post subject: Re: Breath 4 Leaks: Combat Classes
Teksura wrote:
Pariah
[list][*]Explosive Murder (class feature)
* On death, the Pariah has a 50% chance to explode.
>> 75% accuracy AOE doing a max damage per target equal to the Pariah's level, and total damage not to exceed their level * 10 (i.e. existing stats)
>> Damage type maintains a 50/50 chance of being unholy or fire, rolled separate per target.
>> AOE CAN NOT target factionmates.
>> Can not be triggered manually with the base skill.
Cannot be triggered manually with the base skill? It only happens when the pariah is killed?
Posted: Sun Apr 03, 2016 2:53 pm Post subject: Re: Breath 4 Leaks: Combat Classes
Kylinn wrote:
Teksura wrote:
Pariah
[list][*]Explosive Murder (class feature)
* On death, the Pariah has a 50% chance to explode.
>> 75% accuracy AOE doing a max damage per target equal to the Pariah's level, and total damage not to exceed their level * 10 (i.e. existing stats)
>> Damage type maintains a 50/50 chance of being unholy or fire, rolled separate per target.
>> AOE CAN NOT target factionmates.
>> Can not be triggered manually with the base skill.
Cannot be triggered manually with the base skill? It only happens when the pariah is killed?
That is correct. You can buy any child skill to gain the ability to explode at-will. _________________
Focused Revenge (20 CP child of Explosive Murder)
* When exploding on death, your attacker is guaranteed to be hit by the AOE. This supersedes anything that would otherwise prevent it, such as a flat miss chance.
I presume that this means that you're guaranteed to hit your murderer, IF you explode - so even those who buy this (and maybe especially those who buy it!) will find the other skill:
Quote:
Unstable Hatred (20 CP child of Explosive Murder)
* Your chance to explode on death is increased by 25%
really attractive, right?
I have to say that I love how the combat classes look like. I especially like the look of the new explose murder! It looks pretty sweet if you buy all of the skills: 75% chance to deal up to 50 dmg to your killer on death! _________________ "I am your Slave
And you will Reward me
For I shall be Faithful."
(That's from Dracula, by Stoker.)
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