Druids, Monks and Rangers - Issues

[Alexjh]

As these are the three classes which haven't really been talked about by Obsidian, I thought I'd bring them up for discussion, particularly as to some degree I think they are all classes which have had conceptual problems in some games, so more or less just opening this up to have a place to debate a bit at what these classes are about/how to fix the problems.

 

MONK

 

Issue 1: Monks as the loot-poor class.

I think this is perhaps the most pressing issue of the class historically in D&D as far as IWD2, NWN and NWN2 had it - because the whole point of monks was that they are a class which relies on their own body as a weapon they don't really get to partake in looting in the same way as all the other classes. This can be fixed to some degree by having robes for their armour slot, but I found many of the robes from the Neverwinter games not very exciting, finding a robe with resistance to 1 point of slashing just isn't even the same as finding, say, a +1 suit of chainmail. You obviously don't want them to become too similar to fighters as part of their appeal is that they are so different. This is also putting into account that Obsidian have stated that they want to be able to have anyone wearing any armour if they want to. The weapon thing is similar. So how do you make them be able to get loot (which I consider a cornerstone of the genre) without ruining the class concept?

 

Issues 2: Monks as a low choice/linear class.

The other big problem I see with monks is how they were handled in the D&D games had very little "give" in their levelling up/character creation. You would level up and though there were certainly feats you could use, there weren't really any designed for them. You got lots of cool abilities but you didn't have any say over them. How do you inject some player input into the design of a monk, without either breaking the class concept or going the opposite end and becoming overly "move" based?

 

DRUID

 

Issue 1: Druids, wildshape and spellcasting.

I think one of the biggest problems with any class is that Druids are a two focus class, and those focuses don't really mesh well in combat - a cleric can go whack someone with a mace on the front line and then cast a spell the next, but when you have wildshape it doesn't gel well with casting. Yes, there is the NWN2 solution of giving the player a feat to cast spells while in animal form but that didn't quite work for me - it felt a bit silly to have a wolf stop in the middle of combat to cast a traditional spell, and if you are going to do that it should have been built into the class rather than having to take a feat to make the basic premise of the class useable. So, how to balance shapeshifting with wildshape?

 

Issue 2: Wildshape becoming redundant

At this point I'd like to clarrify, I really feel like wildshape is something that really makes druids stand out as a class, sure wizards can do it too, but not to the same degree. However, I do think the focus should generally be on versatility - in the 3rd edition games there was a bit of an issue where really, only the most recent shape you learnt was actually useful, the rest became gradually more redundant. This especially felt a bit of a shame when you progressed onto the elementals, which although technically less powerful, felt less cool than turning into, say, a polar bear. Is there a way to keep the wildshapes relevant throughout?

 

Issue 3: Wildshapes outside combat

This has never really been addressed in any of the IE games/NWN, but one thing I feel hasn't really been done is use of wildshapes outside of combat. Even if it were limited to anonymously scouting as a fox or eagle or something that wouldn't arouse suspicion (with some risk of being detected from other spellcasters perhaps so as not to be too useful) or to reach a certain place quickly using the form of some fast animal, it's never really been explored.

 

RANGER

 

Issue 1: Making Rangers stand out.

I do feel rangers have been sometimes treated as a bit of a generic hybrid between rogue and fighter, but how do you make them more unique compared to those two? This was done in D&D by use of favoured enemy, spells and animal companions, but are these things you want in the class? Could they be elaborated on more (having favoured enemy options including classes perhaps?) or is there some other feature that you think would fit the archetype?

 

Anyway, I do have my own ideas on these but for the mean time I mainly wanted to see what everyone else's thoughts on these were?

Edited November 14, 2012 by Alexjh

[Osvir]

I really only have an input on the Rangers for now. I would like to gain a favored enemy through the course of playing the game, instead of choosing it right off the bat. If I made a Ranger in Baldur's Gate (mind you he's been living in Candlekeep his entire life) how could did he decide when he read some old history book that "I really hate Undead!!!!" and just naturally becomes stronger at taking them down?

 

Minsc favors taking down Gnolls, but he did favor killing them before Dynaheir was captured?

[Sacred_Path]

I think wildshapes and favored enemies don't have much value except for DnD nostalgia. With the priest being closer to a paladin in PE, the druid could be the principal (de)buffer. I'd like to see abilities that improve archery or their movement/ stealth outdoors. I'd like the ranger to be primarily an outdoors scout. Some basic crafting using wood would be nice for the ranger to have too.

[Alexjh]

I really only have an input on the Rangers for now. I would like to gain a favored enemy through the course of playing the game, instead of choosing it right off the bat. If I made a Ranger in Baldur's Gate (mind you he's been living in Candlekeep his entire life) how could did he decide when he read some old history book that "I really hate Undead!!!!" and just naturally becomes stronger at taking them down?

 

Minsc favors taking down Gnolls, but he did favor killing them before Dynaheir was captured?

 

I like that idea actually, even if it was literally just the game kept track of what creatures you'd encountered in ticklist form and you could choose one from the one you'd "ticked" when the appropriate level up came around. On a similar note, a favoured enemy should really be something plausible for someone who is patrolling the wild orcs or undead? Fine. Werebeasts or humans? Great. But realistically unless you are in a very specific setting rangers aren't going to be tracking golems or dragons across the wild with enough regularity to gain them as a favoured enemy.

[ReyVagabond]

I think the point here is that I PE is not D&D, and it should not aspire to be D&D that way you can work around D&D flaws and make the classes how they (Obsidian) want them to be.

 

The D&D skill, Atribute and feats System, i think is not that fun for a PC game. D&D with dead levels and unclimatic leveling up is awful in my honest opinion.

 

As far as PE i hope it has a Armor= damage reduction y Defence is a mix a block, dodge.

A system where you dont get hit much but when you do get hit its letal.

 

Monks.

In D&D the armor class is like the main problem with the class. Taking away D&D, and going yo the roots of the Shaolin Monk. You have a highly spitirual, trained, compentent character.

Shaolin monks Can and should use all kind of weapons. and be grate with them including unarmed combat.

Now with armor they should not wear any amor, Robes and clothing is cool. but for that the should have natural defences and high dodge rating so they dont get hit.

Also they could have some Spell like buffs for himself and/or the party.

 

 

Druids.

 

Again If we stop thinking about D&D we can think of how the Druid is diferent from from a Cleric that he dosent worship gods, or the mage that taps into magic.

Druids are about life and nature. changing shapes its always bad in every game because the new forms are usualy realy bad in the end game, Good gear is way better that any new form bonuses.

 

So i personaly it should be more like a cool ability intead of a full ficture. Example, instead of having a shape change where you are a wolf for X time you have a skill or spell that is called Wolf Fang, when you cast that spell, instead of having a casting time the spell turns you into a wolf you charge the oponent you knockdown the target and you bite them, after that you turn back to your nomal self.

 

If the Druid can have spells/skills like that then it has flavor, it has uses, for example in wolf form during the skill you move fast so it and knocks down the target grate or closing gaps and helping frieds under presure.

 

So with a focus like this we can have all kind of crazy efects. istead of a tangle spell you can have something like spider web, the Druild turn into a Spider and sends his Web. and turns back.

Same efect but Way cooler if you ask me.

 

Ranger.

 

As far as im conserned a Ranger is the woodsman warrior with an animal companion a good selection of outdorsi skills and skill caps.

And its a fine adition to any party. I dont want him casting spells. But in the other hand i want all classes to have skills so they more fun and engaing to play with, what can i say the point and atack system of BG is not that fun in my taste, i had plenty more fun micromanaging my casters that pointing and clicking what to atack with my fighters.

 

But thats just me.

Edited November 14, 2012 by ReyVagabond

[Alexjh]

While I'd certainly agree with you on the subject of "dead levels" I do like the the very basic principle of skills, attributes and feats, as in having various things to chose from in several categories at each level, you could easily change the regularity at which things occur so as to never have dead levels.

 

For monks I semi agree, but I do think perhaps here should be some limitations on what weapons are considered "monkly". The most obvious pair would also be guns and crossbows as their premise is exactly opposed to the concept of the monk - ie. weapons which a peasant with little can use to kill anyone, whereas monks are all about honing skills to perfection. I'd also say that while a longsword or any polearms or a single handed mace are suited for monks, the big bulky two handed swords, axes, hammers and maces don't really work for me as they aren't "nimble" weapons that suit the archetype. One of the options I considered while making this topic was perhaps your monk has to pick a "school" at some point or creation or leveling which give different bonuses, one might focus entirely on unarmed fighting, one might encourage weapon use/specialisation and one might have short range chi blast projectiles.

 

For the Druid thing I'm not entirely keen on that as a replacement, if it was as well as that'd be fine, but without the option to spend time as an animal and gain benefits for doing so, that attack on its own seems a bit "preprogrammed" for my taste. While the ability to bite someone is certainly a good ability, if someone could turn into a wolf, they'd want to use that for the other bonuses: enhanced speed, stealth, tracking, night vision etc, rather than just a single bite rather than just a single brief attack. Similarly with the spider thing, I'm happy to have a druid be able to cast web naturally, but I'd rather that they made that spider-form useful in several ways (poison bite? immunity to enemy webs? increased AC?). I definitly agree with the endgame problem, but I think that could probably be fixed so the forms scaled more in line with actual characters.

 

For the ranger thing I agree on the spells thing to a degree, tho I wouldn't mind if he could take an ability to learn them later, but it doesn't fit with my normal image of the class. I can certainly imagine some rangers learning some basic druidic utilty spells like heal, disease or repel animals, but when your rangers can learn how to summon vines from the floor or summon flame strikes its getting too far from what the class is about. If Aragorn is the class codifier, you can imagine him having learnt a tiny bit of elven magic or having a wolf or dog with him, and certainly having learnt all the ways of hunting orcs as a favoured enemy, but not so much doing attack spells...

[Agelastos]

I just hope they won't make the Ranger a Fighter/Druid hybrid, like in D&D. One of the things I really dislike about D&D, at least 3rd ed. & 3.5 (I know little to nothing about 4th ed.), is that every class (except for Fighters) seem to have some kind of spell-like abilities. A Ranger should be a warrior scout whose skills are geared toward wilderness survival, reconnaissance, and skirmishing rather than conventional warfare. They should NOT be able to cast spells, unless they multi-class, and they should not be forced to worship nature deities.

[maggotheart]

Monks could be like 'mystical ninjas' with their own signature spellcasting ability - throwing out smoke screens, teleporting across the battlefield and unleashing lightning fields to stun groups of enemies. They could also use all kinds of different unorthodox weapons, (chain and sickle, jointed staffs, etc) or even turn everyday objects into deadly weapons (ancient martial artists could kill with a coin). Perhaps there could be different schools of martial arts that focused on them (weapons, unarmed and mystical energy)

 

For druids, how about instead of turning into an animal straight up he takes on properties of animals as a special ability - for example, his arm turns into a tentacle to grab distant enemies or objects, skin takes on a chameleon like quality so he can camoflage himself, or his hands become sticky like an iguana so he can climb sheer surfaces. This way, he gets all sorts of useful abilities without having to worry about how to incorporate a wolf with spellcasting and whatnot - it would also eliminate the redundant forms.

 

Rangers are harder because they are basically just a 'woodland warrior'. I think the key here is to make travelling through wilderness actually difficult - you have to find water, trap animals to eat and avoid dangerous terrain like quicksand and so forth. If these hazards were in the game and actually mattered, then having a Ranger around would be very useful - he can find food for the party, make travelling take less time and guide them through dangerous areas with his woodland knowledge.

 

I never much liked the concept of a 'favoured enemy' because it was just so minor and situational, yet was supposed to be one of the defining elements of the class. How to fix it? Maybe broaden the categories and reduce the overall number of choices - so have 'humanoid', which gives bonuses against ALL creatures that are humanoid in shape, regardless of whether they are undead, infernal or what have you. The other choices could be 'beast' (covering all other animals and monsters) and 'formless' (like will o the wisps, slimes and other non-formed creatures). This way the Ranger gets the bonus against at least 1/3 of all the monsters that may be encountered, making it a lot more useful.

[Jojobobo]

All pertinent issues, a well thought out thread on the whole.

 

For monks, well there's plenty of unusual weapons that shaolin monks have used historically (source: Deadliest Warrior of course) so despite them being a traditionally unarmed class maybe now is the time to let them make the transition to using unusual and specialist weapons. Or, if they're still an unarmed class, give them katars and the like. That would make them a bit more looty, in conjunction with nice robes as you said. I think for feats, just don't have auto-acquisition of monk specific feats on level up - then you still have all the regular monk options but more options besides that (well, maybe - as this might result in giving the monks an extra feat on some levels - perhaps not an ideal solution).

 

For wildshape, I'm not convinced shape changing should be druid (or any class) specific; more like a quest reward or some such. Druids having wild shapes is a D&D hold over, so it is maybe something they'll change in P:E - though this doesn't really answer what role would druids have without wildshape and honestly I couldn't say; their spellcasting abilities have always been a bit weak on their own. For rangers - I have nothing worthy to contribute, but I'd like to imagine the devs do have something more to offer than just a rogue/fighter hybrid. Here's to hoping they'll have a juicy update soon that'll answer some or all of these questions.

[Alexjh]

I think that broad specialization is perhaps a bit too vague for my liking as it doesn't imply the same sort of focus, particularly when there is such a range of behaviour between, say, a zombie, a wizard, a minotaur and an angel for instance, there wouldn't really be that much in common between them that would form unified learning. I do agree they need to be structured in such a way as to make them useful throughout, but I think perhaps slightly more broad categories. If "human" "dwarf" "elf" etc were categories, they'd be worthwhile investments, as would probably a "wild animal", "goblinoid" (orc/goblin etc), undead, and depending on the story and setting, something like werecreatures or reptilian humanoids might be worthwhile and so on. What you really want is a situation where a favoured enemy will either be of use throughout the game, or, it'll very useful in one act.

 

So for Icewind Dale 2 it was something like:

Trolls and Undead were fought throughout, so were good choices.

Goblins and Orcs were fought loads in chapter 1 when you were weak, so again fine choice.

Hook Horrors were literally fought on only one medium sized map and as a very occassional summon, so bad choice.

 

So in the case of this, if there was again a single area of not-hook-horrors-for-copyright reasons, it'd perhaps be better to bunch them with "invertibrates" so when you are fighting spiders, giant maggots and not-ettercaps it'd be a regularly useful skill.

 

To make it a bit more powerful/worthwhile as a class feature, you could also add in extra benefits like increased crit threat range, bons ac vs that creature or in a a case like that invertibrates one, a special ability that'd make sense for someone who specialised like that to learn like immunity to web / resist poison.

[ReyVagabond]

While I'd certainly agree with you on the subject of "dead levels" I do like the the very basic principle of skills, attributes and feats, as in having various things to chose from in several categories at each level, you could easily change the regularity at which things occur so as to never have dead levels.

 

For monks I semi agree, but I do think perhaps here should be some limitations on what weapons are considered "monkly". The most obvious pair would also be guns and crossbows as their premise is exactly opposed to the concept of the monk - ie. weapons which a peasant with little can use to kill anyone, whereas monks are all about honing skills to perfection. I'd also say that while a longsword or any polearms or a single handed mace are suited for monks, the big bulky two handed swords, axes, hammers and maces don't really work for me as they aren't "nimble" weapons that suit the archetype. One of the options I considered while making this topic was perhaps your monk has to pick a "school" at some point or creation or leveling which give different bonuses, one might focus entirely on unarmed fighting, one might encourage weapon use/specialisation and one might have short range chi blast projectiles.

 

For the Druid thing I'm not entirely keen on that as a replacement, if it was as well as that'd be fine, but without the option to spend time as an animal and gain benefits for doing so, that attack on its own seems a bit "preprogrammed" for my taste. While the ability to bite someone is certainly a good ability, if someone could turn into a wolf, they'd want to use that for the other bonuses: enhanced speed, stealth, tracking, night vision etc, rather than just a single bite rather than just a single brief attack. Similarly with the spider thing, I'm happy to have a druid be able to cast web naturally, but I'd rather that they made that spider-form useful in several ways (poison bite? immunity to enemy webs? increased AC?). I definitly agree with the endgame problem, but I think that could probably be fixed so the forms scaled more in line with actual characters.

 

For the ranger thing I agree on the spells thing to a degree, tho I wouldn't mind if he could take an ability to learn them later, but it doesn't fit with my normal image of the class. I can certainly imagine some rangers learning some basic druidic utilty spells like heal, disease or repel animals, but when your rangers can learn how to summon vines from the floor or summon flame strikes its getting too far from what the class is about. If Aragorn is the class codifier, you can imagine him having learnt a tiny bit of elven magic or having a wolf or dog with him, and certainly having learnt all the ways of hunting orcs as a favoured enemy, but not so much doing attack spells...

 

-D&D Rules: Yeah i know that the intercation with Feats, Skills, Stats, its indispensable for the RPG we want, the only thing is that i dont like how D&D has done it, Its a Good system for PnP but not for a PC game.

For example If you are going to level up character of the same class we all know witch feats were good and it was hard to move away from that model.

I want Obsidian with PE to make grab something from everything and push the bouderis of the consept of Abilities(spells or otherwise), Skills, Stats, to be something awesome.

 

 

-The Monk, thinking about Some Shaolin monks or Kung Fu Movies and what not, they used swords and sword like weapons, they used staffs and lances, they used crushing weapons, darts, i have seen seremonial axes in museums, etc. considering this principle we can say Monks use many kind of weapons, because of that we can say monks in The PE seting, could use most weapons that our adventure party can get their hands on.

 

-Druid, Is still think the Shapeshift as part of the "spell visual effect" it could be grate, not much polimorf part of the bodie because you need to create custom parts of the bodie, but for example.

 

For stealth a spell/skill called Shadow Raven, you turn yourself into a raven, and you are considered "invisible", untill your next action (like most invicibility spells in most games).

 

Mixing this kind of polimorfing spells with regular could create some cool scenarios (visualy at least) where in combat the Druid is a wolf one moment to help a companion then a Raven to create some room and be far away from battle to sumoning a Bear then some one catches the Druid and start fighting with a weapon and then turining into a bear to create a Fear to have some room to end it with a Spell blasting with A Lightling.

 

A mix and match of this could turn A druid into a sight to be hold in the battlefild. Using standard resourses of the creatures of the game, and adding spells like effects that are stable of the D&D Druid.

[maggotheart]

To make it a bit more powerful/worthwhile as a class feature, you could also add in extra benefits like increased crit threat range, bons ac vs that creature or in a a case like that invertibrates one, a special ability that'd make sense for someone who specialised like that to learn like immunity to web / resist poison.

 

How about having the favoured bonus transfer to the entire group - so for example, the Ranger is great at fighting cyclops, the group encounters one and the Ranger starts calling out 'go for the eye! They're weak on their left sides!' and so forth and everybody in the group gets a bonus against that creature. This would make having a ranger around a much more useful role for the entire party.

[Alexjh]

To make it a bit more powerful/worthwhile as a class feature, you could also add in extra benefits like increased crit threat range, bons ac vs that creature or in a a case like that invertibrates one, a special ability that'd make sense for someone who specialised like that to learn like immunity to web / resist poison.

 

How about having the favoured bonus transfer to the entire group - so for example, the Ranger is great at fighting cyclops, the group encounters one and the Ranger starts calling out 'go for the eye! They're weak on their left sides!' and so forth and everybody in the group gets a bonus against that creature. This would make having a ranger around a much more useful role for the entire party.

 

That could work, though I'd perhaps have the rangers advantages stay a little higher than everyone elses just as experience at doing something beats being told how to do it, you could also potentially add in automatic debuffs to sentient creatures after a certain level as they've heard of your reputation as a man/demon/vampire/goblin/ewok slayer.

[wanderon]

Will the Rangers have the William Tell Overture as background music?

[Karkarov]

The problem with all three of these classes is there is no real reason for them to exist.

 

A Fighter who chooses to specialize in unarmed combat can literally get 90% or more of the same skills as a Monk.

 

A Ranger is just a Fighter who specialized in either duel wielding or bow use and spent all their skill points on rogue skills. Oh and an animal follows him around.

 

A Druid is just a Cleric with different armor/weapon restrictions that has chosen to worship nature and focus all their spells on having a nature theme. Literally. Other than Wild Shape a nature dedicated Cleric could do all the same things.

 

That is why they always felt sort of half done in D&D. So my advice would be to totally ignore the entire D&D system and just do something new. Which is exactly what they are doing.

[Tsuga C]

Which is exactly what they are doing.

 

Truth be told, we don't know what they are or are not doing with regards to these classes yet, so this statement is a bit premature.

 

* * * * *

Edit:

 

I'll leave the monk to others as I've never cared for the class at all.

 

The druid needs to concentrate on a more primal relationship with the natural world and shouldn't worship a Forgotten Realms-type nature deity per se; rather, they should have a spiritual link with the lands, waters, flora, and fauna itself. To a druid the various gods and goddesses are artificial constructions of demi-humankind and represent an unnatural imposition of an anthropomorphic gestalt upon all of creation.

 

Let the ranger be more or less what it was in AD&D and 3.X, a hit-and-run wilderness warrior with a number of non-magical skills/feat, a handful of magical tricks up his sleeve (spells or powers), and an optional companion of some sort. Archery, tracking, and using terrain to best advantage should be their forte. Dual-wielding a la the 1992 film The Last of the Mohicans would be fine, too, and not necessarily to the exclusion of being a superb archer. The Favored Enemies concept is fine with me and I'd want to choose the enemies, not have them forced upon me.

Edited November 14, 2012 by Tsuga C

[Alexjh]

The problem with all three of these classes is there is no real reason for them to exist.

 

A Fighter who chooses to specialize in unarmed combat can literally get 90% or more of the same skills as a Monk.

 

A Ranger is just a Fighter who specialized in either duel wielding or bow use and spent all their skill points on rogue skills. Oh and an animal follows him around.

 

A Druid is just a Cleric with different armor/weapon restrictions that has chosen to worship nature and focus all their spells on having a nature theme. Literally. Other than Wild Shape a nature dedicated Cleric could do all the same things.

 

That is why they always felt sort of half done in D&D. So my advice would be to totally ignore the entire D&D system and just do something new. Which is exactly what they are doing.

 

I can see where you are coming from on the ranger and druid, which is kind of why I made this topic on their behalf as thematically they are good class concepts but need a bit of coaxing out to be more fulfilled. Monks I'd strongly disagree with you on though, as of all the classes they probably have the most unique set of abilities. You could certainly make a fighter who wore no armour and fought with his fists but the difference between than and a (D&D) monk is really big - stunning attacks, wisdom to AC, chi attacks, hands as magical weapons, quivering palm, that thing where they heal themselves, flurry of blows, the thing where they stop aging etc is mostly unique to the monk. I don't think all of that needs throwing away, although obviously you want to produce P:E's own "flavour" of monk, but I'd certainly argue that traditionally, after the "big 4" monks are one of the most distinct of the classes.

 

As for druid, thinking about it, perhaps trying to make them into something of a stealth based caster relative to clerics who are very much in your face. Clerics from the description sound very much in your face, smiting and healing on the front lines, whereas you can imagine people being killed by druids without actually ever seeing them after entering a protected wood.

[FlintlockJazz]

One thing I would have thought would be great for Rangers was the idea that, instead of a 'Favoured Enemy' they got bonuses against, the instead got the ability to study enemies. Like the Witcher, they could slowly learn the weak spots of an enemy the more they fought them and the more they studied them in books and in the wild and such like.

[Alexjh]

One thing I would have thought would be great for Rangers was the idea that, instead of a 'Favoured Enemy' they got bonuses against, the instead got the ability to study enemies. Like the Witcher, they could slowly learn the weak spots of an enemy the more they fought them and the more they studied them in books and in the wild and such like.

 

I like that idea a lot!

 

Perhaps when choosing your characters backgrounds (which I think were mentioned as being in the game?) it might give you a starting bonus for a certain selection of enemies to get you going, if you'd been an arctic ranger you might start off with a headstart against bears, wolves and giants or if your origin was tropical perhaps against snake-men and poisonous spiders.

[Karkarov]

Which is exactly what they are doing.

 

Truth be told, we don't know what they are or are not doing with regards to these classes yet, so this statement is a bit premature.

Actually no, we know exactly what they are doing. This thread is based on the idea that these three classes will be lifted from D&D, there is one problem 90% of the posters on these forums still don't seem to get though. This game is not based on D&D. I can only assume you misunderstood my last three sentences, so what I am saying is this.

 

The OP's problem with these classes is 100% based on problems those classes had in D&D. More specifically, a series of computer games created on the basis of the D&D rules. Thing is, this game, is not using D&D rules. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever to believe any of these issues will exist in the game. Most of these issues are also a byproduct of D&D class design, and again, not D&D so it is unlikely to suffer from the class design issues of D&D.

 

EDIT: I will go one step farther. Later on down the line it is very possible these classes, and others, may run into design issues. As of right now though we know basically nothing about character design in this game except that you have stamina and HP. That really isn't enough to start theory crafting on ranger design flaws. Now months from now when they start releasing details revisiting this thread may make for a viable discussion. Right now though it seems sort of silly since this game is not going to be using the ruleset that created these issues in the first place.

Edited November 14, 2012 by Karkarov

[Sacred_Path]

One thing I would have thought would be great for Rangers was the idea that, instead of a 'Favoured Enemy' they got bonuses against, the instead got the ability to study enemies. Like the Witcher, they could slowly learn the weak spots of an enemy the more they fought them and the more they studied them in books and in the wild and such like.

 

Not exactly the same idea, but I'd like to see a mythology or monster lore skill finally done right, and that could be the ranger's domain (not exactly humble woodsman stuff though). But that would require some randomization in the monsters' attributes and resistances or else this skill is moot/ useful only once/ made redundant by online monster statistics

[Agelastos]

Which is exactly what they are doing.

 

Truth be told, we don't know what they are or are not doing with regards to these classes yet, so this statement is a bit premature.

Actually no, we know exactly what they are doing. This thread is based on the idea that these three classes will be lifted from D&D, there is one problem 90% of the posters on these forums still don't seem to get though. This game is not based on D&D. I can only assume you misunderstood my last three sentences, so what I am saying is this.

 

The OP's problem with these classes is 100% based on problems those classes had in D&D. More specifically, a series of computer games created on the basis of the D&D rules. Thing is, this game, is not using D&D rules. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever to believe any of these issues will exist in the game. Most of these issues are also a byproduct of D&D class design, and again, not D&D so it is unlikely to suffer from the class design issues of D&D.

 

I don't think anyone here believes that the classes of P.E. will be identical to their D&D equivalents. We're using the D&D classes for comparison (since the base concepts are still the same), trying to figure out where D&D went wrong (in our opinion) and what P.E. could do differently. At least that's what I think we're doing...

Edited November 14, 2012 by Agelastos

[-Zin-]

Okay... In BG 1-2 and IWD monks weren't that powerful from my understanding. That was fixed in in newer DnD rules and NWN1-2. Monks are capable of having great gear (Robes for armor), and kick ass feats. I didn't much care for the loot drops in NWN 1-2 though, but I did PvP a lot. I built a lot of overpowered characters in the toolset, but I did so within a set of rule restrictions. I stuck to legal item restriction limit. My level 20 monks had gear common that was equivelent for a level 20 to own. In the toolset, you had an automatic measurer which kept tab on how powerful an item was. Certain servers wouldn't let you enter if your gear was above that measurer. This made it impossible to make items that had maxed out AC, resistance, absorbation, true sight, haste, access to infinite numbers of all spells in the rulebook. You could make an item like that, but that would be a level 100000 item. But my point is this. A level 20 monk with level 20 gear was easily on par with any other level 20 class with level 20 equipment in terms of PVP/Combat. In fact, monks have rediculously high save roles and are great anti-mages, provided the mage isn't controlled by another player who knows a lot of pvp tricks and is already buffed up. But monks have many strengths and can dodge/survive/resist all kinds of spells unlike a fighter/barbarian/rogue who are very vulnerable to mind-spells. Monks eventually gain full immunity against mind spells, even though their resistance for those kind of spells are already higher than most other classes.

 

But yep.. In-game loot for monks could still be muuuuch better though. Too little, and too poor selection. No real imba items to be FOUND, but could be made easily in the tool-set.

[Alexjh]

Which is exactly what they are doing.

 

Truth be told, we don't know what they are or are not doing with regards to these classes yet, so this statement is a bit premature.

Actually no, we know exactly what they are doing. This thread is based on the idea that these three classes will be lifted from D&D, there is one problem 90% of the posters on these forums still don't seem to get though. This game is not based on D&D. I can only assume you misunderstood my last three sentences, so what I am saying is this.

 

The OP's problem with these classes is 100% based on problems those classes had in D&D. More specifically, a series of computer games created on the basis of the D&D rules. Thing is, this game, is not using D&D rules. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever to believe any of these issues will exist in the game. Most of these issues are also a byproduct of D&D class design, and again, not D&D so it is unlikely to suffer from the class design issues of D&D.

 

EDIT: I will go one step farther. Later on down the line it is very possible these classes, and others, may run into design issues. As of right now though we know basically nothing about character design in this game except that you have stamina and HP. That really isn't enough to start theory crafting on ranger design flaws. Now months from now when they start releasing details revisiting this thread may make for a viable discussion. Right now though it seems sort of silly since this game is not going to be using the ruleset that created these issues in the first place.

 

I don't think that this game is D&D, however, given that the whole point in Project Eternity is that it's the spiritual successor to a set of D&D based games suggests there will be some significant influence, as does the fact that bar one, the class lists for this and core 3.x are very similar. This thread isn't about fixing up D&D rulesets, its about looking at what has been done with these archetypes before, seeing what didn't work for them and coming up with ideas for them that might be fun to have in this brand new ruleset. They might not have favoured enemies, wildshape or anything, but theres a fair chance one or two of these things will carry over.

 

We do also know that monks will function unarmed and unarmoured though from the concept art of the NPC whose name currently escapes me. (The ranger and monk ones I'd add aren't even specific D&D problems generally, but fairly common in the genre of fantasy games in general.)

[Osvir]

The OP's problem with these classes is 100% based on problems those classes had in D&D. More specifically, a series of computer games created on the basis of the D&D rules. Thing is, this game, is not using D&D rules. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever to believe any of these issues will exist in the game. Most of these issues are also a byproduct of D&D class design, and again, not D&D so it is unlikely to suffer from the class design issues of D&D.

 

It is however very inspired by D&D. I know nothing of D&D except the little I've researched (that I had to research to be honest, to understand Baldur's Gate. For me it was a lot of "out of game" research to even begin to understand it, which is why I think its one of the greats).

 

I don't think anyone here believes that the classes of P.E. will be identical to their D&D equivalents. We're using the D&D classes for comparison (since the base concepts are still the same), trying to figure out where D&D went wrong (in our opinion) and what P.E. could do differently. At least that's what I think we're doing...

 

True. But not only D&D, other games as well, we can grab something from a non-D&D game and do that differently too.

 

This is something I wrote up in another thread, about magic usage mostly though:

 

Staff

1. As a Magic tool, Druids would prefer it more than Wizards?

I say yes, personally. A Wizard with a Staff could be an excellent Elementalist, whilst a Druid is more of a Naturalist, both being Elemental magic but the Druid would use it differently.

 

2. Is the Staff 2-Handed?

Gandalf uses a Staff and Sword, does this get complicated or could it be a possibility? Magic could get weaker if you use a sword, a dagger (for Blood Magic+Staff) heck even Grimoire, the potential power of the spells gets weaker by having an off-hand item with a Staff. Low to Mid-Range Magic would be the strongest with a Staff, but with a Grimoire you would be able to cast the highest level spells (the most ritualistic ones).

 

3. Monks channel the Staff differently?

Yes. If the Staff is a tool to use Elemental magic, could the Monk hit the earth (instead of an enemy) and bend the Earth, or cast a strong wind when slashing. Perhaps breathe fire with a flask of oil or hard liquor. Monks could use the elemental aspects of the staff physically, up close and personal. Also being able to use their bodies in this way, differently (unarmed combat).

 

EDIT: Toph

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ewZbOgImn0