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 October 05, 2007, 10:48:28 AM
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Group: Administrator
Posts: 6585
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My idea is that spells and skills for characters are designed and created by players. Here is a very basic intro list -- please feel free to add to it of anything you'd like to see characters do: http://wiki.subcreation.net/game/snsIt is also helpful to review how characters work: http://wiki.subcreation.net/game/characterBasically my core question is: What cool abilities should characters have?
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October 06, 2007, 12:00:45 PM
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Exalted
Posts: 2512
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ABILITIES: my ability names are probably crappy so you can work around them:
*I'm using your stats/abilities from wiki page to create some of these.
Soul-Bind Pacification - The caster pacifies (cannot move/cast/attack) a target for X amount of time. While this spell is channeled the caster himself is also pacified (cannot move/cast/do anything). Breaks upon damage to either the caster or the target. I guess it may also be dispelled I would use this ability on the enemy healer to prevent heals in hopes that my other two can bring down a certain target. CC class
Spell-Steal - A la WoW. Steals a buff from a target and applies it to the caster.
Spirit-Link - A la War3. All incoming damage is shared equally by party members for X amount of damage or X amount of time. Tank ability. Would be great to counter focus fire by spreading out the burst.
Piercing Ward - A buff that makes a target immune to the next piercing attack. Although it maybe a little OPed as it negates a whole attack, you really don't know which type of attack is incoming(piercing/slashing/crushing), so it balanced out by being a guessing game. Healer ability
Slashing Ward - A buff that makes a target immune to the next slashing attack. See above
Crushing Ward - A buff that makes a target immune to the next crushing attack. See above
Energy Shield - A la mana shield. Damage reduces a target's energy rather than health. 25% health, 76% energy? put this thang on and wait for the heals to come in.
Consume Debuff - Takes off 1 debuff off of a friendly target and converts into X amount of health or energy. Healer mana management ability.
Raging Focus - Activates an ability that adds X amount of strength (dmg) every X amount of time so long as the attacker stays on the same target. Should the attacker be CCed the ability begins working the other way and he begins losing the strength he has gained at the same pace: will not drop below what he has started with, will resume increase when he goes back on target. Breaks completely when the attacker switches targets. Enables focus fire tactics. The longer the fight goes the more damage the melee DPSer will do to the target. Countered by CC or the enemy tank's abilities.
Drain/Buff X - A crapton of various combinations of reducing X amount a target's strength, constitution, inteligence, etc for X amount of time. Same thing but in a buff instead of a debuff. CCer and Healer abilites respectively.
HOTs/ DOTs
Delayed Explosion - Does X amount of damage to a target after Y amount of time. This is a burst combination spell. You cast it on someone and it will only do damage sometime later. Thus you synchronize it with another damage spell so that they both land in the same time, therefore dealing a craptone of unexpected damage. Caster DPS.
Chose Your Poison - A debuff that decreases the target's constitution/willpower by X amount for Y time with every attack it makes. CCer ability. Cast it on a melee DPS which will lower his health as he attacks, then switch on his ass and bring him down. Would stack well with a DOT
Enhanced Fury - Buff that grants a chance do deal x150% / 200% damage for X amount of time. Cannot be active in the same time as Raging Focus maybe? Would seem a lil OP depending on how much dmg Raging focus generated.
Dividng Strike - Your next attack is divided into 2 attacks, each divided into 50% of the original intended damage. This is done to counter all the gay buffs that negate the next attack on a friendly target...in essence, your first strike will be negated, while the second one will land. The catch? It's only 50% of the original damage. (there should be a drawback to this ability so people don't just spam all the time...such as more energy than other attacks or the split attacks would be divided into 40%/40% and you lose 20% dmg to begin with.)
Stun - stuns a target for X period of time. Tank/melee DPS ability.
Aleviate Punishment - A buff that reduces the damage of the next attack or the duration of the next debuff on a friendly target by 50%. Healer's pre-emptive heal ability
Resistance is Futile(lolborg) - Increases the damage a target takes from fire/cold/etc by X amount for Y time. (Mezmer/CCer ability), essentially an encouragement for people to try different combos of classes by brining in a CCer with a Caster DPS to compliment eachother.
Meditation - The caster is frozen for X amount of time during which he regenerates Y amount of energy. Low on mana and a window of opportunity to get the energy back? its time to meditate!
Taunting Shout - The ability which makes all damage on party members reduced by 25% while the damage on the tank is increased by 25%. Tank's way to protect his allies, however, should the enemies decide to switch to him they'll definetly be tearing the tank a new one.
(General idea of buffs and debuff) As I go through all the abilities here and on wiki there are some issues that pop in my mind. Depending on their value to predict how strong buffs and debuffs can be, I honestly dont think they should be too powerful as to make or break the game - rather they should compliment the outcome of the game. However, if they are too weak they'd never be used as people would just go for attack/CC abilities. Thus I think it might be a good idea to give buffs a 'wisdom'(increases healing) bonus - the more buffs a target has the bigger the heals that it receives. For example - A normal heal spell heals for 100 hp, but a normal heal spell on a target with 4 buffs would heal for 140hp. This would encourage people to spend valuable time/energy to buff as well as encourage people to spend the time/energy to debuff.
will add more later
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November 19, 2007, 03:52:42 PM
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New
Posts: 14
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I think it is necessary to have some preset classes and abilities for the player base to chose from at the onset. Morrowind has been reviled in this forum thusfar, but I believe that it provides a good basis for the skill system.
Morrowind allowed character created classes, spells and enchantments. However, the character was able to chose from a selection of premade classes and spells at the start of the game. This helps players who are used to traditional RPGs have a sense of purpose. I.e. I'm a priest, I have healing spells and buffing spells, therefore my role is to heal and support. It also helps players understand the game mechanics. I.e. My heal spell heals for x amount and then heals y over the next 5 sec, therefore spells can have both a direct and over time effect.
A player who wants to deal magic damage at range can select the Mage class. He is given the spells Fireball and Icebolt. He then goes into the world and experiments with these spells. He finds that the mage class has it's spent it's ability points focused in intelligence (I don't know how you are handling basic character creation, but these is just some proof of concept examples) which increases his mana pool for his spells, as well as wisdom which increases his mana regeneration rate. The Mage also has deficiency in Stamina which results in low hitpoints, as well as a deficiency in Speed which makes for a slower, more easily hit character.
Through using his spells he discovers that Fireball has a damage over time component. After hitting someone with a fireball they continue to burn, dealing more damage. He also discovers that Icebolt has a slowing component which allows him to stay out of range of his enemies. He notes that Fireball has a high mana cost and a long cast time, but Icebolt is relativly mana inexpensive and can be cast very quickly.
Through play he loots a bow. He uses it briefly and finds that he likes its high fire rate but is dissapointed by the damage.
The player is disappointed in the low hit points of the Mage and doesn't like having to sit in one place casting a big spell to do damage. Armed with his new knowledge of the game play mechanics he is free to reorganize his abilities and skills into a new class Artic Ranger. This new class allows the player to remove gameplay mechanics he doesn't enjoy and replace them with ones he does enjoy. The Artic Ranger has higher Stamina and Speed than the Mage. This allows the character to move quickly, but survive a hit if necessary. The class also has moderate Wisdom to support mana regeneration. The player creates a two new spells to for his Artic Ranger: Cold Feet which only slows the target but casts extremely quickly, and Ice Arrow, a preparation spell, which adds Ice damage to projectile attacks.
This process allowed for a gentle introduction to the class/spell creation system as the player was able to gleen understanding through experience with premade abilities. If the developers do a good job of class and spell design, players will have the choice of maintaining premade classes throughout their entire career.
While I believe it is important to allow characters freedom to create their own content I do not believe it should be mandatory.
I think that Wyv's ideas for abilities are very interesting, but I am concerned about how well they will integrate into a player created spell system. Things like negating attacks, doubling attacks and dispersing damage are very powerful abilities to put in the hands of a user bent on optimization.
Morrowind's system took into account things like, size of aoe, amount of damage, etc. to determine, level of spell and spell cost, but certain abilities are very difficult to calculate for. For example; if a player designed a spell that distibuted 5% of incoming damage on a target to those within 5ft. The magic/gold cost of that spell would most likely be calculated on the low side because of a seemingly limited benefit.
If however the character got 20 friends together, and because of a lack of clipping on characters, was able to stand them all in the same place, then spike damage has been completely negated. Especially if a willey healer designs a similar spell that heals those within 5ft.
Of course those of us with experience in WoW and other games now that developers introduce things like limited number of targets, diminishing returns, etc., but do we want the player to have to read a detailed manual on spell creation before they attempt it, or do we want the player to have an intuitive understanding of the system and a basic interface for accomplishing their goals?
P.S. I hope I haven't been redundant here. I can't access the wiki at work so I don't have a very clear understand of exactly how character creation will work. I just think that these are some basics for character creation you should think about.
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November 19, 2007, 04:25:30 PM
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New
Posts: 14
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Are we talking along the lines of unique abilities for a specific class/race? Or just a core set of actions that each player should be able to perform regardless of uniqueness. Also another question: is limiting other players to having unique abilities really a good thing to do? If so, how and why? If not why?
I personally feel that if you will have a game with user generated content, as taken from your brief list, then perhaps there should be the availability of uniqueness on a per character basis. Perhaps you could then allow them to change this ability through some sort of "learning" process.
As for what kinds of abilities players can have I guess that really becomes left to the creators imagination. :x I would think that a good solution would be to provide achievements/quests which unlock unique abilities. The problem with this is that players with unique playstyles would likely have difficulty finding a special ability that suites them. This could be corrected by allowing the players to unlock the ability to create a new ability that is not governed by the typical spell creation rules, and allow that ability to remain completely editable. So a Fire Mage, who normally suffers from long cast times, could create an instant cast fire spell. Where as rogue who does lots of damage in melee, but is vulnerable to heavy attack, could create an ability that allows him to become invulnerable for a short period of time. If that rogue later decides he wants to be an Archer he can edit his special ability to allow him to instead cast a volley of arrows. This way the character gets to have a unique ability, but also one that retains its usefulness throughout play and is custom tailored to the individual character.
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November 20, 2007, 01:29:57 PM
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New
Posts: 14
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Talking core set of actions available across the entire game. I take this to mean things like: Melee Attack Ranged Weapon Attack Spell Cast Rest Use Item Interact With Object Equip Item Unequip Item These basic actions can then be broken down into the possible effects of those actions: Melee Attack -Hit (deals direct damage and activates on-hit effects) -Miss (deals no damage) -Critical (deals Hit direct damage multiplied by a given amount, and activates on-hit effects) -Resets the Attack Timer Ranged Attack -Hit (deals direct damage and activates on-hit effects) -Miss (deals no damage) -Critical (deals Hit direct damage multiplied by a given amount, and activates on-hit effects) -Resets the Attack Timer Spell Cast -Direct Damage (various damage types i.e. fire) -Direct Healing -Damage Over Time -Healing Over Time -Increase/Decrease Stat -Increase/Decrease Threat -Increase/Decrease Damage Taken -Increase/Decrease Damage Dealt -Increase/Decrease Mana -Teleportation -Change Movement Type (i.e. walking to flying) -Incapacitate (if finer delineation is required, these can be broken down a la WoW into Disorient, Flee etc.) -Create/Dismiss Creature -Create/Dismiss Item -Create/Dismiss Object Rest -Increases Hit Point Regeneration -Increases Mana Regeneration -Cancels on Movement (All four of these following actions could have the effect of a spell cast) Use Item Interact With Object Equip Item Unequip Item (All of these actions could also have the effect of triggering a scripted event so it is possible that even a Melee Attack Miss could have all of the effects of a Spell Cast) Any comments would be very welcome  If i'm just wasting space in your thread let me know.
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November 21, 2007, 09:28:12 AM
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New
Posts: 2
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Arcane Archer All proc-on-ranged-hit spells gain 30% effect Mime All summoned weapons and armor gain 10% effect, and all mind controlling spells and abilites gain 25% strength Master of Elements All element based spells gain 40% damage Shaman All healing spells gain 40% str, mind affecting spells gain 10% str Pseudo-lich All death based effects gain 20% str, Hitman Gains 40% damage on flat footed targets Grunt Gains 10% melee damage Swordmaster Gains 20% melee damage while using swords only Shield master Gains 15% str on any shield based abilities. Sharpshooter Gains 20% ranged damage Swordsage Gains 20% proc-on-hit spell damage Tank Gains 30% damage mitigation on physical damage I know the percentages are all out of sync, but I just threw them out, its early this morning. The concept is, imagine each specialization as a color. Put them all on a color wheel, and you choose your shade in the middle. The only way this works is by the specializations being based on percentage increases, as opposed to abilities. I think it’s a unique way to have multiclassing freedom without have set classes, for example you could have 50% swordmaster and 50% sharpshooter, and gain 10% to melee and ranged. Or 75% hitman and 25% sharpshooter, and have a 30% increase on flatfooted, plus 5% more if ranged. Etc etc, but by having a analog choice instead of choosing one or the other, you can have infinite customization. But at the same time, it prevents you from having the full power of two specializations, while giving you the freedom to mix and match infinitely. Then you can simply design your spells based on your strengths. Another method of this is instead of moving the players position on the colorwheel, move the specializations around the character. Instead of using a colorwheel design, use something like this: http://users.design.ucla.edu/~datadreamer/2daudio/ where each instrument is a specialization, and the center dot is the character. Another option is maybe do away with specializations even, and simply put strengths on the wheel. Make a list such as "20% spell damage" "20% ranged damage" "20% proc-on-hit" and just move them aroudn on the wheel. Also, I agree with b4nth4f3tt about the starting spells, I think each character should start out with a basic set of spells and abilities. for example, they get frost bolt, heroic strike, autoshoot, heal. Another issue, sense of purpose. b4ntha was saying that we needed something that would give the old-timers a sense of purpose, like the base classes do in wow. Perhaps if we had a guild system, like guild of healers, guild of archery, etc (i'd like a different name then guild though) that each one would give a buff of some sort to the character, along with a title. For example, a character could join the guild of healers. That would give him access to special spell componants for unique (not necessarily the strongest) healing spells, along with the option to include a title, i.e. bubba the merciful. The archery guild could give a title like John the Quick Shooter. Lore: Theres a couple of ways you could fit this design in. You could use the "chi energy" method, your strengths depend on where you expend your energy. But that has been so overused it would be cliche. Another way is that the "training college" creates individualized training programs to give you the exact balance of skills you need. B4nth4 was also telling me how basically unlimited respeccing was desired. A method for that could be a spell the player researches to erase their own memory.
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November 21, 2007, 02:42:20 PM
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New
Posts: 14
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Another issue, sense of purpose. b4ntha was saying that we needed something that would give the old-timers a sense of purpose, like the base classes do in wow. I think that base classes fill this role nicely. In this game classes would be defined as developer created ability/specialization/skill sets designed to meet a certain play style. So when a player begins character creation he has the opportunity to select from a list of classes, or create his own class. The preexisting classes would not differ in any way from a class that could be created by a character, but would act more like defaults. If someone wants to play a ranged magic dps character then they could default to the developer created Mage class, but they could also created their own unique class with the same purpose in mind. The key thing here is that the developer and the player use exactly the same tools for class/spell/ability creation, and an inexperienced player can become familiar with those tools by experiencing them through a developer created class. Through this system the player is initially confronted with archetypes with which they are familiar, but are also given the tools to create new archetypes if they desire. Example archetypes were already covered in a different thread if I remember correctly. Perhaps if we had a guild system, like guild of healers, guild of archery, etc (i'd like a different name then guild though) that each one would give a buff of some sort to the character, along with a title. For example, a character could join the guild of healers. That would give him access to special spell components for unique (not necessarily the strongest) healing spells, along with the option to include a title, i.e. bubba the merciful. The archery guild could give a title like John the Quick Shooter. I like the idea of a guild system, however I would suggest different implementation. As I said earlier in this post I don't think that guilds should be the tool for clarifying character role. Once again the underlying goal of the game is player freedom. To that end, restricting them to a guild to fulfill a role is not a good idea. As there could be only a limited number of guilds there couldn't possibly be a guild that was ideally suited for every character choice I would like to see a system where a player if free to join any and all guilds. In this system a guild would be akin to a faction in WoW. Through achievements the character would earn rank with the guild. Rank results in title and privilege. Privileges would be things like access to new vendors and areas. I would avoid having skills or permanent buffs tied to guilds because that would force players to join a specific guild if they wanted to fulfill a certain role effectively. This system would allow characters a sense of belonging to the game world and a way of marking their progress without locking them onto a path, or penalizing them for later choosing a different path. I will give some examples because expounding on an idea endlessly is worthless without something concrete by which to judge it. Assassins' GuildA tight and ritualistic band of murderers for higher. Location: major cities and in scattered remote locations Quest Themes: murdering targets Titles: novice, student, disciple, journeyman, master Unique Rewards: vendors sell poison making materials which otherwise require harvesting from the world Fighters' GuildA group of men at arms that make their way by fighting others' enemies Location: major cities several strategically located forts Quest Themes: eliminating groups of enemies Titles: squire, soldier, man at arms, knight, knight errant Unique Rewards: vendors offer repair services at greatly reduced prices Magi's GuildA society of those learned in the arts of magic Location: major cities a few towers at magically significant locations Quest Themes: gathering rare spell components and performing magical experiments Titles: acolyte, adept, mage, spellwright, archmage Unique Rewards: vendors offer teleportation services Players would have option of displaying any title that they earned over the course of their progression. If a character reached the rank of archmage he could still display the title spellwright if he so chose. Of course the player can join all of these guilds so he could change his title from knight errant to master if he had achieved both of those ranks.
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November 27, 2007, 11:16:48 AM
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New
Posts: 2
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I like how you set up the guild system in such a way that while joining each one would provide you with certain benefits, they don't provide anything that is completely necessary.
So, perhaps using my "drum location" technique, you can use it to design your own classes. Default classes could be:
Mage: Ranged magic DPS. Straight 20% increase to ranged spell damage.
Warrior: Melee physical DPS. Straight 20% increase to melee damage.
Acolyte: Demon summoner. 10% stat boost to summoned demons, and 5% increase to all magic dps.
Archer: Ranged physical dps. Straight 20% increase to ranged physical damage.
Druidic Enforcer: Melee magic user. 10% increase to phyisical dps, 10% increase to melee magic dps.
Mime: Mental effects user. 20% increase on mind affecting spells.
Also, i was thinking about lore for the system. The merchants have set up societies, one for each trade. They were set up during the business wars to protect their trade interests. These societies are independent of political lines. Each one is ruled by a hidden group of shadowy figures, maybe all different, maybe the same body rules all the societies. Perhaps you can discover these secrets once you reach a high enough status in the societies.
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November 27, 2007, 02:39:10 PM
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New
Posts: 14
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This should probably be added to the initial specialization wheel:
Priest: Ranged magic healing. Straight 20% increase to ranged spell healing.
And if we wanted to get crazy:
Surgeon: Melee physical healing. Straight 20% increase to melee physical healing.
This is if we want to have healing abilities that don't rely on magic and instead use an energy system or simply require crafted items like bandages.
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