chanters

[Hormalakh]

josh had this to say a while ago about chanters and I wanted to bring the discussion back to it

 

 

 

Chanters don't play music (or sing). That might not seem like a big deal, but everyone assumes otherwise. My hope was that calling them chanters would help distance them from bards, even if they occupy a somewhat similar mechanical role. Additionally, bards have a stigma of being stinky characters, mechanically. We do not want chanters to carry that stigma.

While ciphers are conceptually similar to psionicists, psionicists have had wildly different mechanics in D&D over the years, so there's not necessarily any common ground between them there. "Psionicist" is a really sci-fi sounding name, especially in D&D. Cipher is more a enigmatic name. In our lore, the first identified ciphers were a mystery to animancers because they couldn't figure out how they worked. The fact that these ciphers were also orlans, who are notoriously difficult to read, added to their mystique.

 

 

Basically a chanter:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y13cES7MMd8#t=30s

 

The video reminded me of something that I am fairly well familiar with. Here is an example of real-life chanters that I know about and it'd be cool if different cultures/races/etc had different "chanting styles."

 

 

this dude is reciting a portion of Arabic text (yep, it's the Quran) for a group of people. He isn't singing or anything and a big part of good quranic recitation or incantation deals with the proper "pronounciation" and proper inflections and other rules that one must follow when reading the Quran. These aren't rules that are followed when speaking Arabic in daily activities. They are called "tajwid" rules and this dude is very famous for his "mad chanting skillz." The word al-Quran means the recitation in any case.

 

Here's another one. One thing that is measured is how good you are able to measure your breath when reading the Quran without reading too fast and at the same time following the recitation rules.

 

 

The background "ahhhhh" or "awwws" you hear are people praising him, basically.

 

Here's an interview he had. This dude is basically famous the world over and is a historical hero for many Muslims.

 

 

[Hormalakh]

Buddhist monks chanting. I'm not as familiar with this as I am with the Quranic recitation, but it's similar.

 

[Hormalakh]

Gregorian chant. Christian monks chanting it up. I've always loved how these sound though I've never understood what they've said.

 

 

another one in french. from the movie Of Gods and Men: a very excellent movie.

 

Edited May 17, 2013 by Hormalakh

[Nonek]

The Beowulf recitation reminded me of Ganga Hrolf's little recitation the other day on Vikings, seems much more suited to a battlefield situation:

 

[Hormalakh]

There have always been people who sang songs of war during battle to maintain morale. many great examples and ^ this one is great too. please share if you have or know of some examples.

[JFSOCC]

I like Mongolian throat singing...

 

[Mr. Magniloquent]

I am very excited about the concept preview given of the Chanter class. It makes me think of a flexible, elegant, word or true name magic. I always like the D&D magic mechanic of "Words of Power". It really gave the Divination schools something special, but I can think of one CRPG where it was implemented in a meaningful way. I hope they elaborate on this class soon, so that I can stop wondering.

 

The Mongolian chant reminded me of the Shinto priests at the temples and shrines in Japan. Frankly, as a child, I found them unnerving and somewhat frightening.

[Sensuki]

They have a pretty good deflection bonus as well, 3rd highest of all the classes if the whiteboard screeny from earlier this year is still valid

[Fearabbit]

Bards don't have a stigma!   
Bards are awesome. The problem is that D&D has one of the worst interpretations of them, in such a way that I simply don't like to play them in D&D games, but generally bards are very cool characters. (Especially if they take the "Dashing Swordsman" prestige class later on...)

 

And anyway combat isn't everything. 

 

I actually still don't have a clue how the chanter will be different from a bard. They don't play music and they don't sing, but they recite magical/religious phrases in a very melodical manner? How does that not sound like a character that will stink in combat? Also the class sounds very unappealing to me as a fan of typical bards, because it seems to be more like a cleric who casts his spells by chant instead of by prayer.

[Hormalakh]

i think that all these "magic-based" classes like the cleric, wizard, bard, are pretty much the same in the old D&D systems. They just have a limit on which spells they can cast. Otherwise they all have pretty much the same mechanic.

 

As such, i think the "build-your-own-poem" mechanic as has been proposed previously (not OEI devs) can be interesting for them and can make them stand out from the other classes.

 

So basically, one person (I don't remember who) proposed a system where your chanter knows certain magical words or chants and what you'd end up doing is stringing them along in a "chant" and that this would build specific bonuses to the rest of your team (like what a bard would do).

 

So for example, first level you know the chanting words:

fire, ice, protect, self

 

Then you can string along the words fire-protect-self. and this chant would protect one individual from fire. or you could do ice-protect-self (protection from cold).

 

then as you level up you gain extra words:

group, attack, poison.

 

Now suddenly your chants open up to several different ones:

1-ice-protect-self,

2-fire-protect-self,

3-poison-protect-self,

4-ice-protect-group,

5-fire-protect-group

6-poison-protect-group.

 

Note I didn't use the attack chant because the combinations attack-group and attack-self would be detrimental.

 

third level you get the word:

nearby

and then you end up having to lose a word (let's say self).

 

so now you have

1-ice-protect-group,

2-fire-protect-group

3-poison-protect-group.

4-ice-attack-nearby.

5-fire-attack-nearby

6-poison-attack-nearby.

etc etc

 

then you could play with the words and see if you can come up with all the different possible combinations. perhaps you could start "saving" chants so you wouldn't have to keep reclicking each word individually. and as you pick up more words and drop more words, you options will vary in the game in terms of what chants you could do. you have to decide which words to pick up and which to drop.

Edited May 21, 2013 by Hormalakh

[rjshae]

A thought occurs: for chanters, perhaps acoustics is all important in their ability to wield their power and to project energy where they will it. For this reason, they practice various means of gauging how sound carries in their surroundings. Music and oratory are useful tools for acquiring intuition about the acoustical properties of shapes and materials, so many chanters are naturally drawn to the entertainment professions. Once in battle, a chanter needs to 'attune' themselves to their surroundings in order to gauge their powers to best effect. They may even need to move to different locations in order to apply their abilities in a potent manner.

Edited May 21, 2013 by rjshae

[Fearabbit]

I think I'd rather just play a rogue with a lute. ^^

 

From what we currently know, it seems as if chanters are more like clerics and less like bards... and I don't want a convoluted background story about acoustics just to make my bard character.

 

And the Lego-style poem creation system reminds me a bit of the runes in Legend of Grimrock. I hope they don't do that.

Edited May 21, 2013 by Fearabbit

[rjshae]

I think I'd rather just play a rogue with a lute. ^^

 

From what we currently know, it seems as if chanters are more like clerics and less like bards... and I don't want a convoluted background story about acoustics just to make my bard character.

 

And the Lego-style poem creation system reminds me a bit of the runes in Legend of Grimrock. I hope they don't do that.

 

So play a rogue. If you don't like the background story for the class, don't read it.

[Fearabbit]

So play a rogue. If you don't like the background story for the class, don't read it.

 

 

Didn't mean to offend, I was just thinking out loud. The bard archetype is something that's pretty important to me for some reason and I guess I was a little bit disappointed that there wouldn't be a class for it (at least not in the typical way). But that doesn't mean that I can't play one, so everything is fine.

[J.E. Sawyer]

We're about to implement the chanter, so details may change, but the basics are that chanters start the game with a list of basic phrases.  Phrases are not individual words or ideas like "protect" or "fire", but full phrases like Aefyllath Ues mith Fyr or Thick Grew Their Tongues, Stumbling o'er Words.  Phrases encompass a complete idea that is passively expressed as a magical effect in the area surrounding the chanter.

 

Chanters do not use phrases on their own, only in the context of a player-assembled chant.  A chant is a sequence of phrases.  It can included repeated phrases, but phrases all have a linger duration that is applied after the phrase has completed, so linking the same phrase back-to-back undercuts the potential power of overlapping the durations of different phrases.

 

Additionally, after a chanter has spoken a number of phrases, he or she can use a targeted roar.  This is a special type of phrase, but it is shouted in a cone (always) in front of the chanter and can produce beneficial or harmful effects (sometimes both).  E.g. the roar And Hel-Hyraf Crashed upon the Shield temporarily reduces the DT of all enemies caught in the cone. Roaring interrupts the chant, but the chanter will resume it a few seconds later.

 

Chanters always have one chant selected (they are modal and exclusive to each other).  They will always start chanting as soon as combat begins and always stop chanting as soon as combat ends.

[Lephys]

Definitely succeeded in the "not just copying Bards" respect.

 

What if the shouts produced different effects depending on what phrases were still lingering in the area of effect (the cone)? I know that's pretty vague, as they could do any number of different things. Just a thought.

 

EDIT: I felt I needed to elaborate a tad. I was just thinking along the lines of the shouts "activating" further aspects of the lingering phrases. Almost like a physical manifestation of the effects of rhyming or otherwise tying together phrases and words in a poem or tale, as opposed to simply saying both phrases with no particular connection.

 

So maybe shouting with phrase A lingering could cause multiple foes to immediately be knocked to the ground, whereas the same shout with phrase B lingering could cause them to be merely stunned, and their weapons knocked from their hands. The shout is knocking things, but the lingering phrases would lend influence as to the specific effects of the knocking. Yet another phrase, in conjunction with the same shout, could leave them on their feet, but push them far away.

 

Agh! I missed that you said "after the chanter has spoken a number of phrases." Obviously, that probably determines what manner of shout you gain access to. So, that kind of handles the diversity I was getting at. Silly me...

Edited May 23, 2013 by Lephys

[Gumbercules]

We're about to implement the chanter, so details may change, but the basics are that chanters start the game with a list of basic phrases.  Phrases are not individual words or ideas like "protect" or "fire", but full phrases like Aefyllath Ues mith Fyr or Thick Grew Their Tongues, Stumbling o'er Words.  Phrases encompass a complete idea that is passively expressed as a magical effect in the area surrounding the chanter.

 

Chanters do not use phrases on their own, only in the context of a player-assembled chant.  A chant is a sequence of phrases.  It can included repeated phrases, but phrases all have a linger duration that is applied after the phrase has completed, so linking the same phrase back-to-back undercuts the potential power of overlapping the durations of different phrases.

 

Additionally, after a chanter has spoken a number of phrases, he or she can use a targeted roar.  This is a special type of phrase, but it is shouted in a cone (always) in front of the chanter and can produce beneficial or harmful effects (sometimes both).  E.g. the roar And Hel-Hyraf Crashed upon the Shield temporarily reduces the DT of all enemies caught in the cone. Roaring interrupts the chant, but the chanter will resume it a few seconds later.

 

Chanters always have one chant selected (they are modal and exclusive to each other).  They will always start chanting as soon as combat begins and always stop chanting as soon as combat ends.

 

Sounds really cool. So are the chants meant to be assembled before combat, or can you create new ones on the fly in the middle of combat?

[Hormalakh]

Yeaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh 

 

Can't wait to play a freaking awesome chanter. weeeeeee ROAR

 

i guess it was the Obsidian guys who had mentioned the "phrase building" (kinda sorta?) mechanic. My mistake.

Edited May 23, 2013 by Hormalakh

[Lephys]

Sounds really cool. So are the chants meant to be assembled before combat, or can you create new ones on the fly in the middle of combat?

It sounds like they'll kind of just be patterns of the phrases, as customly assembled by the character. I mean, I'm sure there could be default ones. I don't know if the game's going to force you to go in and actually assemble them, lest your Chanter just stand around in combat muttering the same phrase over and over and over and over... ("You never assembled a chant for me!"). But, it also sounds like the specific sequence of phrases, in conjunction, will enable a specific shout. So, it would actually be interesting to know exactly how that's designed. I mean, Aefyllath Ues mith Fyr 5 times in a row wouldn't be as effective, like Josh said, as 5 different phrases. BUT, what if that same phrase 5 times in a row enabled an immensely potent silencing shout? You could cone-blast a handful of enemy Wizards with that, and BOOM! Any verbal-component spells, rendered useless for like 15 seconds.

 

Oh, the possibilities. ^_^

 

Okay, Easter Egg proposal... Have little piddly, obscure quests to find the words for "Earth," "Fire," "Wind," "Water," and "Heart." And have them summon General Nature.

 

Or, you know... we could throw in a "Fus... Ro-DAHH(ahhh-ahh)!" in there somewhere.

Edited May 23, 2013 by Lephys

[Hormalakh]

 

Sounds really cool. So are the chants meant to be assembled before combat, or can you create new ones on the fly in the middle of combat?

It sounds like they'll kind of just be patterns of the phrases, as customly assembled by the character. I mean, I'm sure there could be default ones. I don't know if the game's going to force you to go in and actually assemble them, lest your Chanter just stand around in combat muttering the same phrase over and over and over and over... ("You never assembled a chant for me!"). But, it also sounds like the specific sequence of phrases, in conjunction, will enable a specific shout. So, it would actually be interesting to know exactly how that's designed. I mean, Aefyllath Ues mith Fyr 5 times in a row wouldn't be as effective, like Josh said, as 5 different phrases. BUT, what if that same phrase 5 times in a row enabled an immensely potent silencing shout? You could cone-blast a handful of enemy Wizards with that, and BOOM! Any verbal-component spells, rendered useless for like 15 seconds.

 

Oh, the possibilities. ^_^

 

Okay, Easter Egg proposal... Have little piddly, obscure quests to find the words for "Earth," "Fire," "Wind," "Water," and "Heart." And have them summon General Nature.

 

Or, you know... we could throw in a "Fus... Ro-DAHH(ahhh-ahh)!" in there somewhere.

 

 

i like the captain planet bit. don't like the skyrim one. 

 

can we get some more info of these guys? is the chanter class meant to be more active or passive what with the modal abilities of chants? can we save these chants? 

 

I really hope the chants give an insight into the history of the world kind of like how king of dragon pass myths were freaking AWESOME

[Lephys]

i like the captain planet bit. don't like the skyrim one.

Interestingly enough, the Captain Planet bit was much less of a joke than the Skyrim reference. 8P

 

I've even got plenty of copyright-dodging names for him:

 

General Nature

Corporal World

Lieutenant-Colonel Gaia

Commandant Humus

Admiral Aedyr

 

^_^

Edited May 23, 2013 by Lephys

[Nonek]

Allright I might not be playing a Cipher first playthrough, this sounds extremely interesting. I wonder what the Chanter is mechanically doing with his recitations? Calling up lingering cultural soul powers, harnessing the remaining power of ambient old souls, uniting the souls of the gathered into a greater whole through points of commonality? Or perhaps more interestingly, he simply does not know.

[DCParry]

As long as I get the "Doom" chant I will be happy!

 

Doomie doom doooooooomm... doomie doom doooooooooom.

 

DOOM!

[Sensuki]

 

 

We're about to implement the chanter, so details may change, but the basics are that chanters start the game with a list of basic phrases.  Phrases are not individual words or ideas like "protect" or "fire", but full phrases like Aefyllath Ues mith Fyr or Thick Grew Their Tongues, Stumbling o'er Words.  Phrases encompass a complete idea that is passively expressed as a magical effect in the area surrounding the chanter.

Chanters do not use phrases on their own, only in the context of a player-assembled chant.  A chant is a sequence of phrases.  It can included repeated phrases, but phrases all have a linger duration that is applied after the phrase has completed, so linking the same phrase back-to-back undercuts the potential power of overlapping the durations of different phrases.

Additionally, after a chanter has spoken a number of phrases, he or she can use a targeted roar.  This is a special type of phrase, but it is shouted in a cone (always) in front of the chanter and can produce beneficial or harmful effects (sometimes both).  E.g. the roar And Hel-Hyraf Crashed upon the Shield temporarily reduces the DT of all enemies caught in the cone. Roaring interrupts the chant, but the chanter will resume it a few seconds later.

Chanters always have one chant selected (they are modal and exclusive to each other).  They will always start chanting as soon as combat begins and always stop chanting as soon as combat ends.

 

Will the words that make up the chants / roars be constantly repeated throughout combat or will they represented by text ?

 

If the chants / roars are VO'd and sound as cool as the spell incantations from the BG / IWD games then that should be fine, I never got sick of hearing those. Repetitive environmental audio etc in games can be really annoying if it's not awesome, so I'm just gonna cross my fingers here.

 

One of the differences between the BG and IWD games was that IWD focused a lot more on the different VO sets for the Player and less on the VO for the NPCs, do you know the direction you'll be going with that at this stage ?

[J.E. Sawyer]

I would like to have the chants spoken continuously during combat but we'll have to test that out to make sure it isn't obnoxious.  Roars will be loud, but phrases may be relatively soft, "charm of making"-style.