Lephys

Their teeth are gonna get dull if they keep using those axes.

A small dose of superpowers and a huge dose of superpowers are not the same thing. Both are pleasant, though. See, I can arbitrarily make comparisons, too, ^_^. Now, if you could just point out how level-scaling = poison, your "different doses of a bad thing are still doses of a bad thing" statement would be relevant. See, that's why I respond, when people say "what's the point?". Just because Valorian already knows everything doesn't mean everyone does. I don't respond to be right. I respond to better understand the issue, via analysis of opposed viewpoints. And often this benefits others who get to analyze and understand more, as well. Even if no one else but Fearabbit enjoys my dissections, they're still worth it. If they ever weren't doing anyone any good, or were impeding comprehension of the topic at hand, then I'd gladly stop.

I really like this idea. Within reason, of course. No "a maul has a 50% chance of missing, while a dagger has only a 3% chance" or anything, heh. But, yeah, the speed of attacks and frequency with which a weapon strikes are quite similar factors, as far as the results are concerned. Also, a lighter weapon (like you said) is easier to swing more quickly (the actual attack stroke, itself, is quicker, and not just the frequency of attacks) than a maul, so you'd think Dodging versus a maul would be easier, in general, than Dodging versus a dagger.

^ For what it's worth, I'm not saying your dudes charging everything that's hostile and visible isn't a problem. I'm just saying that I think that's something that should be controlled by behavior/AI options and not by a command-queue. The command-queue would kinda be a middle man. You'd control their "come at me bro!"ness rather heavy-handedly by always making sure they had some other order that prevented them from executing the "Come at me bro!" order, rather than altering their default order in the first place. At least, that's how it seems to me. o_o

I believe the most important factor is 2, since all the game's code is binary.

It's very much a double-edged sword. I just can't get over how inadvertently awkward a complete lack of dialogue-style setup could possibly get, so I'm trying my hardest to figure out a way to incorporate that, whilst maintaining the integrity of player ingenuity. The very specific example I happened to think of was "assume you want to set up an ambush for an assassin by making him think he has in no way been detected." So, in such a specific example, it seems like just manually setting everything up would be a bit awkward, because the characters are going to know more and more easily make plans than the player can. OR, you could always just play through to the point at which the assassin strikes, then re-load the game, manually move someone up into the balcony to stand RIGHT beside the assassin, then prevent the whole thing from happening (because the player will know what the characters are not supposed to at all). Obviously, that enters the realm of "nothing is making you do that," but it's along those "You happened to do something either WAY WORSE than the characters inherently would have or FAR BETTER than the characters could possibly have done." That's kind of a bad example, though, as it only touches on what I'm trying to get at. So, forget about the intentional meta-gaming, and I'll try to think of an unintentional meta-gamey thing. But, the other thing (again, with this specific type of situation) is that the assassination attempt is going to happen while you're "distracted" and speaking with someone in the courtyard, not the moment you enter the courtyard and the assassin has a clear shot. The less that's going on around you, the more quickly people will notice the shot and seek its source. Also, knowing this, I see no advantage in manually timing the casting of the protection from missiles spell, since there's no way in hell A) Your Wizard is just going to forget he's capable of casting such a spell, against an assailant everyone KNOWS is going to be attempting assassination with a missile-based weapon, and B) He's not going to accidentally cast it too late, or too early. Not that I think it would be a problematic thing, timing it properly (on the player's part). It's just that, there's absolutely no advantage to that. Your characters are quite capable of doing all that. But, the plan would only include preparations, and it would be up to the player to control the characters in such a way as to acquire as much info about the assassin as possible, BEFORE making the preparations. Therefore, in this particular type of scenario, I don't feel that having a "I'll go and speak to Lord Blargle in the courtyard, and you shield me from missiles just before I enter the courtyard, then make your way to the location we discussed" would be in any way giving something away. IF you have the spell already, with a character, etc., and you have a decently Intelligent character. But, you'd have to have a plethora of options for the placement of people to prepare for the ambush. But, there'd still be preset location options (although many), so you couldn't just manually position people to be standing around in the middle of the 2nd floor to be seen immediately by the assassin approaching from almost ANY direction, because, again, your Ranger isn't going to agree to stand out in plain sight in order to ambush an assassin. Yet, it's still up to the player to get all the info he can (maybe you never know exactly where the assassin's going to set up his shot, but you find out which entrance he's coming through, and/or which route of escape he'll likely use, so you can set people up to be able to cut him off once he's located, or to go straight for where he's most likely to be, etc. Plus, you don't know if he'll be magically concealed or not, so you have to decide WHO to send where, etc.) I don't mind scripted options when they're based on character knowledge, because, at that point, leaving it up to the player would be kind of ridiculous, if the character would never have not-done something you fail to do. In other words, "I'll just waltz out into the courtyard naked, and no one take up strategic positions anywhere, and we'll totally ambush this guy!" is not even a feasible plan. I think at that point, despite your main character's dialogue/scripted choice, one of your companions would chime in with "That's preposterous. If you're going to be an idiot, I'M going to lead this ambush plan, and we'll do whatever we damn well please without your consent." That's all that's bugging me about not having a form of scripted-options dialogue/preparation thing for non-dynamic situations (events that are set in stone, and you simply have a variable, limited knowledge about their details.)

Way to be a jer... oh, sorry. (I jest). These are valid concerns, Odd Hermit. And there are a few other threads regarding this, as of recent times, if you'd like to do a search on "resting" (that should work). I think the most recent one is This One, if you didn't know about it and would like to read it.

Hear hear! Utility variance for the different animal sub-forms! More than just "The bear is a tank, the Leopard is a DPS." And, definitely a yay on the rich plethora of animal forms to take, in lieu of the tiny list of 3-or-so.

Love isn't something that necessarily defines the entire story, or has its own story. It's simply a force with which the characters must deal. Maybe it is embraced, or maybe it is an obstacle. Maybe both. It's no different from daylight, or darkness. "Hey, it's bright out here... we're easily visible, so we'd better stick to the denseness of the forest so that we're not seen." "Hey, it's very dark here. We're going to need to stick close and move carefully." Rogues like it to be dark, and maybe Rangers like it to be light, but to have means of physical concealment not dependent upon light. They're all just factors, and love is yet another factor that affects situations and character decisions and struggles and actions.

Yep. Now it's about 300, and all the hidden significance within movies, and the effects of human psychological tendencies upon storytelling and historical accuracy.

My concern was that the Wounds mechanic might BE the only mechanic. Meaning that, if you're not taking damage, you're just doing what any other character can do that isn't class-specific (thwacking things with your hands and/or leveragey objects of some nature). You make a valid point, about not needing a fireball or special attack to kill a Goblin. But, my concern remains that a Fighter or Wizard has the option of doing something Wizardly or Fighterly before subjecting himself to damage (which is a negative thing for ANY class, even though it's a negative-with-a-perk for the Monk). Basically, I don't want to see a Monk and Damage function like the Wonder Twins. You know, they can't do anything unless they're in contact with one another. Otherwise they're just the Mediocre Twins. Like you said, maybe there's something that has limited use but can provide some sort of boost before actually subjecting oneself to damage (even if it's something that instantly provides some amount of Wounds for "free," and you still immediately suffer the DOT effects of the Wounds until you spend them). Or, maybe Monks possess a repertoire of Monkish things that don't rely specifically upon Wounds. *shrug* I don't mind Monks relying upon incoming damage and Wounds to be at peak effectiveness for their class mechanic, but it seems a bit strange if they're the only class who has 0 class-specific resources at their disposal until they first suffer initial damage. I don't mind the damage suffering after that (because it's going to occur), but it's almost like "Okay, enemies. You always get the first move against me, but THEN I'll be really good and scary!"

Well, to be honest, your behavior was enough to cause me to use my already-created account and write an inquisitive post as to the nature of your behavior, as it seemed (and still seems) quite unwarranted. A lack of assumption as to the tone of his simple, text-only suggestions based upon his limited knowledge would also have gone a long way. *shrug*

I quite literally cannot find anything even resembling the notion that everyone has to wear plate (much less the notion that you said it), anywhere within the textual block of mine that you quoted. I'm 100% serious. I have absolutely no idea what you're even talking about here. o_o So... no magic forcefields. Got it. Wizard's Veil, out. Magical chainmail bikinis? Completely out of the question. Rings of Protection? Holy CARP those are like 1/100th the size of a chainmail bikini! So they're 100 times further out of the question. Glad we cleared that up. I feel better now, knowing. Which, of course, never happens. I mean, that's why, historically, NO one's ever lost a battle. Because one side or the other's formations/ranks don't ever break, leaving the ill-formed soldier groups at the mercy of a 15,000 manpower locomotive of death. See, that breastplate covers soldiers backs, as well, simply because the never-ever-breaking-rank soldiers behind them just like to look at the designs on the back. That's why you don't want gaps/flaws in your plate (and why this discussion thread even exists in the first place), because you're never actually going to get attacked from anywhere except where you expect it and can control the incoming attack. THAT, ladies and gentleman, is why full-plate was ever invented. 'Cause it's pretty. Well, if lies make you feel better, "You understand my point perfectly, and are ultra-correct. Thanks for pointing out that I had everything wrong, thinking armor protected the wearer from all manner of attacks, and was much more important in large-scale battles where these attacks were more likely to occur than in small, party-on-party fights that rely upon extremely small-scale tactics." There ya go. Glad I could help.

I have no idea what you're talking about. Turn off or change your party AI, perhaps? Yeah, sounds like behavior to me. *shrug*

As it is a predominantly melee-oriented class, I don't see how the Monk is supposed to go into melee combat against various foes with the goal of "Don't take any damage." As I see, it, the only difference in a Monk and a Fighter is that the Fighter says "Well, I'm going to get hit, so I better wear a bunch of awesome armor, so as to prevent the incoming blows from setting me back in my focus on the use of my martial weapons and such to take down the enemy," while a Monk says "Well, I'm going to get hit, so I better convert a portion of the incoming blows into energy that I can harness and reidirect back at the foes in a variety of ways. Basically, their ability to divert their own pain/wounds IS their defense, AND their offense. If you fight a Troll, as a Monk, and it's doing 70 damage swinging a big log at you, and you convert 20 of that to Wounds every time, and it fills up your Wounds with each swing, then you get to redirect THAT much energy THAT often back at that Troll. Whereas, if you're fighting a Goblin, it might only give you 2 points of Wounds damage per swing. That doesn't mean that "Stand here until this Goblin hits you 10 times, THEN retaliate" is the first tactic you can think of. It's just like how Rangers/ranged characters are more effective at range, against slower enemies, than they are in melee range or against extremely fast enemies (that can close the distance and dodge a lot). The Monk is best when the damage he is receiving is both not too low and not too high. It's a very controlled scope. I wouldn't say it's like a Rage counter, because those are typically "The higher the better." You're at 10% health? Your rage is causing you to do +400% damage! Whereas, Wounds, with the Monk, are all about control. All that being said, I do think that maybe there's some room for some kind of balancing aspect to the mechanic. Maybe the longer you maintain efficient Wounds management (kinda like a sweet spot), the greater the percentage of incoming damage that becomes diverted into Wounds. Or, maybe even a whole 'nother resource, all-together. Calm, perhaps? I dunno... It does seem a bit like there could be something to temper the "actively taking damage is a good thing" aspect to it. Well, that and the "You pretty much don't have any utility until you start getting hit" thing. That's the only thing that bugs me a little, really. I don't think any other class will start with 0 class resources, and build up as they fight. A Wizard doesn't have to go hit 5 enemies with his staff, successfully, before he can cast a spell. He starts with all his spell ammo up-front and uses it up as he goes. I think they need to draw inspiration from this from the Cipher. The Cipher isn't fully effective unless maintaining focus on the same enemy for a duration, but she doesn't have to go without using abilities entirely until she builds up that focus for that duration. Like I said... maybe some kind of balance aspect to the Monk would be welcome. Maybe offense builds one thing, and "defense" (getting hit) builds Wounds, and only in the proper mixtures can they produce the most potent effectiveness. *shrug*

I was pretty sure "the point" (at least the one to which you were responding) was that, if dragons are sapient, you'd think they'd react to things in ways beyond simple emotion/instinct. And if you're adding on "Don't forget that it would depend on the individual in question, since different sapient individuals react to the same thing in different ways," then that's cool, too. But, you kinda breezed past that whole "Yeah, that's true" or "Nope, that's false" acknowledgement phase of the reply process, just for what it's worth. Also, I think the specific point was quite confined to the reaction to your armor as a result of it being the body parts of the creature in question's species, not being shiny. I think creatures reacting intelligently to the shininess of your items is pretty low on the priority list, to be honest.

As spudud said, you seem to have "sapient" and "sentient" confused. But, all Flintlock is saying is that, if you walk through a field wearing leather, a cow (whatever word you want to describe it with) is in no way going to stop chewing its cud when it looks upon you, in alarm, and think "Wait a minute... that leather armor is made from the SKIN OF MY KIN!", then charge your ass in a fury because of that deduction. However, a dragon (which is often depicted as intelligent and sapient) COULD do so (if it were depicted as intelligent and sapient.) Which is true. You'd think a speaking, pondering dragon would have such... "human" reactions to things, when other animals (such as cows) would not.

To each his own. You're not wrong to have a preference about this. But, for what it's worth, it seems like it's less "I'll just run into swords head-on and beat my head against rocks to build up soul power!" and more embracing the simple fact that, in conflict, you are not going to avoid all pain. Instead of avoiding pain, they embrace and channel the unavoidable physical trauma that comes from their foe, straight back at him. Part of it, at least. As much as they can. I don't think of it so much as "Monks don't try to dodge," as I do as "Monks welcome their failures to dodge." It's a very focused, disciplined fighting principle, if you ask me. Even self-flagellation and such wouldn't so much be a quick-use thing in-battle, as much as it would be a sort of meditation a la mortification of the flesh. You know, kinda like how Daniel-san waxed all those cars, painted that whole fence, and sanded that whole pier/deck to condition his muscles into making karate-form motions in the Karate Kid. Monks might "practice" taking physical trauma, by causing it to themselves, and practice embracing and harnessing that, to build up their tolerance and hone their skill. But when they get into battle, they don't just go planting daggers in the ground and leaping upon them, just to charge their batteries. Well... some crazy sect might. But, that seems a little on the extreme side of things. After all, if you can get 3 hits in on your foe BEFORE he strikes you and charges you up a bit, why not do that? Why hurt yourself from the get-go? (Because, again, ALL the physical trauma isn't absorbed. Only a portion). Only crazies would intentionally allow themselves to fall into horrible physical fighting condition, just to build up some soul energy, unless it was an extreme circumstance. So, yeah... embracing the unavoidable is what it seems like to me.

that's easily fixed by having a timeout for wounds after they're used. so, use ability, wound can't reload for x seconds. higher levesl means faster recharge. Not to mention that only a % of damage is converted to Wounds. So, your Monk would be taking most of the DOT damage the whole time, THEN the DOT damage from Wounds, gradually, (as you "held onto" the Wounds to keep your passive bonuses from the DOT status), then, once his WOUNDS were full, would be taking FULL damage from the poison, and all incoming blows, AND the Wounds. I'm not really sure that's the master strategy you thought it was. I guess if you can keep him alive, that could work, but it still doesn't really seem very efficient. Lots of extra work kinda cancels out the benefits provided. It's work that could've just been spent more effectively in the first place (like putting the poison on the enemies you're trying to kill, and letting the Monk simply take some damage from enemy attacks, then hold onto his Wounds so that the DOT from those can fuel his passive "holy hell" unleashing). *les shruggles*

Crap. I was sure it was actually the story told by a still-living Spartan. That's why I simply stated it was historically 100% accurate, instead of inquiring as to the actual practices of the Spartants of old. It's not back-stabbing I'm worried about. It's multi-directional stabbing. Try as you might, you can't really control which of the 14,999 people around you fall, and when, and if the 5 guys around you take arrows to the neck, or spears to the shoulders, or horses to the face, methinks your armor isn't going to do you much good against 10 other soldiers of the hostile persuasion. There are quite literally more sources of striking in a large battle, thus the armor statistically is more likely to protect you. When you're fighting one-on-one, you KNOW the guy isn't going to hit you from the side, or from behind, or above, or suddenly ride in on a horse, or launch arrows from a distance. Once again. True, you just won't go "Okay, cool" when I make a point. You have a mighty need to misconstrue it, like I said anything about backstabbing being the leading cause of death among historical melee soldiers, much less stressed that. Curses! Foiled yet again! Because I said "since something's going to happen, we might as well make sure we in no way moderate it!" I'm just going to start pretending your arguments are actually valid replies directly to the things I was saying. Maybe it'll work like reverse psychology, and, in an effort to side-step what you perceive as my argument, you'll sidestep the pretend one and actually address the real one, inadvertently. Yeah, and we might all be in the Matrix right now, thinking it's real life. Were there any real world accounts of people starting out as lowly peasants, getting caught up in World War II, stealing a German U-boat, liberating Britain, then fighting all the way through Europe to ultimately take down Hitler? Nope. People have done some really amazing stuff in real life, and it STILL doesn't even come close to comparing to the sum of the main characters' accomplishments in 90% of RPG storylines. Touche. But the fact remains that there are those who practice fighting SPECIFICALLY in very light armor and never wear heavy armor, and those who do the opposite. And there are those who wear no actual armor. Do they run out into the frontlines of combat and not die? No. They don't do that. Just like an archer doesn't charge the frontlines in battle. He's not stupid. He's just fulfilling a certain combat role, at the cost of not filling others. Someone who wears no armor in the first place isn't any less stupid than someone who wears no-armor-that-happens-to-be-in-the-form-of-a-specific-aesthetic-style-that-they-personally-place-value-upon. It IS a party-based game. One character could rely upon another to "tank," while the first only strikes at opportune moments, in opportune ways. Also, since it was brought up that something as functionally useless as a chainmail bikini could be enchanted to actually provide, say, the same level of armor as full leather or chainmail, I don't see how that person should "pay for their stupidity" of happening to go through the trouble to provide their body with protection that just happens to come in the form that they prefer in a purely subjective fashion. In short, no one said anything about not paying for being stupid.

Fair enough. I'd like to think it's more like mastering juggling, only not with your arms. More of a mental thing. I don't know how I move my arm. I just move it, and it moves. My brain takes care of that. So, going from there, I then must work really hard to master juggling 3 balls, using my ability to move my arm. Then, I might move on to 4. Then 5. It's going to take a while. And I can only practice SO much, so, I can't learn to juggle 3 balls AND master the throwing knife in the same week. Granted, an explanation would still be nice, like you said, for coherence in the lore, and that still doesn't address multi-class type scenarios. As you could feasibly master juggling 3 balls, THEN focus on mastering your aim with throwing knives. But, my point was, you're using your arms for both skills, but they're different skills that take different practice and different efforts and movements to master/perform. So, soul energy is probably kind of like arms. You can do lots of different things with it, but they're all really different ways of using it, rather than entirely different energies. Or, rather, the energy can be thought of as the end result of the effort with the tool (arms). With juggling, you end up with a ring of spinning balls in the air. With throwing knives, you end up with accurate knives stuck in targets at a distance. You can't use juggling skill/practice to suddenly be able to hit a target at 30 feet with a knife, and you can't use knife-throwing practice to suddenly be able to juggle 3 balls perfectly, even though your arms do both. 8P *shrug*. Just my take on it.

Ahh. I haven't really read any of the 4th Ed stuff yet. Didn't know I was describing it, . I was just thinking, it's a good method of making the ability unique. The problem with just-plain summoning reinforcements (even temporarily) is that it's almost the same thing as an ULTRA-powerful buff. Someone else casts a spell or uses an ability that lasts 30 seconds, they get +2 to attack rolls or +5 damage for the duration. You summon a creature, you get an entire 'nother entity on your side of combat, and all the utility, hitpoints, and damage that come with that, all while you're going about your business with using other spells and abilities with your caster, since the summon was performed and now requires none of his concentration. That's the problem to be addressed. So, you've either got to keep the summoned creatures relatively weak (to represent the fact that they're just one of your abilities affecting the battle for a duration), OR you've got to make them quite strong while giving them a trade-off. It's almost like... if you use a two-handed weapon, you lose your shield, since both hands are on the weapon. Yet, it remains different from a shape-changing/transformation ability, because the controlled, summoned creature is still a separate creature from your caster. Maybe it has its own abilities, even, that are unique to it, and is quite strong in ways DIFFERENT than those of your caster. And, if the creature dies, you don't die, because it wasn't you. You've just sort of wasted some mana/a spell there, if you don't make good use of it and keep it alive long enough for it to be effective. Obviously, we don't HAVE to have powerful summons. But, I think the whole "They kind of only work effectively whilst you directly control them, thus preventing you from tag-teaming everything alongside them" thing works pretty well to balance that, mechanically. It fits into lore, too, because, how is it that anything's a challenge for you anymore if you can summon a freakin' frost dragon AND have it do your bidding, all with a simple spell cast, then just forget about it? It's not like you phoned a friend. You're SUMMONING this creature, so it's understood that you're controlling it via magical force (or intimidation, at the very least). And if it's intimidation, then why doesn't everything else you come against simply bow down to you in fear of your awesome might? It just seems like if it's as easy as channeling for 10 seconds, then you've got a huge, awesome ally for a minute or two WHILE you help it fight everything like normal, then how is anything else difficult? No matter how magic works, it seems like you're pretty much omnipotent at that point.

Exactly. The first human to discover how to make sparks and start a fire may not have understood friction and combustibility, but he knew how to make fires. Then he knew that fire isn't fun to touch, but that it provides heat and light (though still not why). Then that it burns things up (though not exactly how). If a Monk chooses to draw power from redirected physical trauma, maybe the makeup of that energy is different from the makeup of a Wizard's energy. The effect of what a Monk does is the effect of what a Monk does. It hardly relies upon an explanation of HOW that happens. The bigger question of WHY it happens, can never be answered. Why does lightning occur? We know HOW it occurs, but not why charges and particles do what they do and form a bolt of lightning. It just does. So, if someone figured out they can rub their socks on the carpet and then touch someone to produce a tiny lightning bolt, then they can do that. They can even trial-and-error into a much greater knowledge of how to control it more (how many foot rubs against the floor, what type of socks work best, etc.), without comprehending how electricity, itself, works. Sure, it'd be kinda nice to know how soul powers work, in a way. But, they hardly demand explanation.

Awesome idea, JFSOCC! I think I missed that one! (Might've been before I was super-active here, 8P). I really like the idea of roads/paths being a valid "I want to play it safe and/or just avoid delays" option, AND for Wilderness-Survival-type skills to affect the navigation of non-road/path... well, wilderness. Especially the ability to basically cut your own path through the wilderness to varying degrees of effectiveness (a path probably wouldn't be as safe as the main road, but it could make future navigation/travel through that area a little safer, and a lot speedier). Another thing I've thought of regarding this matter that would be awesome (I think) is the whole "sense heading" ability being incorporated in. For example, if you've got a map, perhaps, and you're out in the middle of nowhere, your character might attempt to orient the map. This might even orient your minimap (or, your view of your map, even if it's not a traditional always-down-in-the-corner video game minimap) accordingly, so that you THINK you're heading north. But, really, you're not. You won't know until you account for your traveling on the map, and fail to run into a road/landmark that you "should" be at if you were actually going the direction you thought you were. At which point, you could then re-attempt to figure out which direction is which. I haven't really thought about how this would translate into an actual, works-with-the-rest-of-the-game mechanic, but I just thought it was a cool idea regarding exploration and the ability to get lost, etc.

You could always try both, 8D! It's true. Want more evidence as to the Creator's sense of whimsy? I was born on April Fool's Day. True story. (Sorry for the brief derailment, but I feel like an occasional 50ccs of humor is good for forum morale. Also... I can't seem to help myself. Besides... a momentary derailment is just a figurative train doing an awesome trick, right? Like the X-games... but for figurative trains.)