Will mages be able to use any weapon and wear any armor?

[Lythe Vodaine]

Hey there!

 

I'm wondering, will a mage be allowed to use any weapon (like swords, daggers, staves) and wear any armor in PoE? There can and should of course come downsides to doing this, like failing more spells in heavier armor or not being able to excell in using a certain H1 weapon.

 

So, the question is, will Obsidian take the "Dragon Age Origins" approach where any class can basically use any arms and armor; or will they take the "Dragon Age II" approach where every class has a clearly defined and very limited set of arms and armor they are allowed to put on?

 

"Skyrim" and "Fallout New Vegas" are two of my alltime favourite RPG's, not only but mostly because of the absolute freedom to define and develop one's player character. In Skyrim, I always gravitate towards a light armor wearing, long sword wielding mage, for example.

[Silent Winter]

I believe they have stated that there are no class restrictions for arms and armour (though a fighter may well be better with a sword than a mage)

[Leferd]

I believe they have stated that there are no class restrictions for arms and armour (though a fighter may well be better with a sword than a mage)

They did. Though I can't recall where I read it.

[Stuttery G]

http://eternity.gamepedia.com/Armor

 

Doesn't have a source, but the wiki might as well be official at this point. There aren't any restrictions on armor or shields that characters can use.

[J.E. Sawyer]

Correct.  Any class can use any gear, though classes often have bonuses with specific types of weapons (e.g. wizards gain bonuses with wands, rods, and sceptres via their Blast passive AoE ability).

[PIP-Clownboy]

Will there be penalties for casting in plate etc?

[Lephys]

Will there be penalties for casting in plate etc?

 

If I'm not mistaken, the current design has the "bulkiness" factor of things like plate armor (that D&D has contributing to things like arcane spell failure chance and such) simply affecting "action speed." Which I believe is, simply put, "cast time" (or... ability-use time, for non-magic abilities).

 

Seems they wanted the effects of heavy/bulky equipment to matter, but not to affect movement speed at all, because that just gets really annoying in all that simply-making-your-way-through-an-area-when-there's-not-even-any-immediate-danger.

 

Not that there won't be anything that affects movement speed in the game, but there apparently won't be "Oh, you're wearing plate, so you travel at half the speed of everyone else...". But you'll probably swing your greatsword more slowly, and/or take longer to cast spells, etc. I'm not sure if the effects will be exactly the same across the board, or if your heavy plate armor will more heavily (see what I did there?) affect some factors while more minorly affecting others.

 

I'm sure Josh can give you a much better answer, and in fewer words at that.

[Lythe Vodaine]

Correct.  Any class can use any gear, though classes often have bonuses with specific types of weapons (e.g. wizards gain bonuses with wands, rods, and sceptres via their Blast passive AoE ability).

Awesome! Thank you Josh, that is exactly what I had hoped for!

 

Personally, I like the idea of getting a bonus for using the "right" equipment and a malus for using the "wrong" one; both adds to my roleplaying experience, since I still can choose freely what my role is, although some roles may be harder to play than others.

[JayDGee]

So anyone can, but the incentive is very much on characters specialisations.

 

I'm happy with that.

[Marceror]

Will there be penalties for casting in plate etc?

I think I remember reading that heavier armors will reduce casting speed.

[rjshae]

Will reduced casting speed mean fewer spells per unit time, or just a lower likelihood of getting the drop on the opponent?

[J.E. Sawyer]

All actions (other than movement) slow down, so you will cast fewer spells over the course of a battle or they will go off later than they would normally.

[Lioness]

All actions (other than movement) slow down, so you will cast fewer spells over the course of a battle or they will go off later than they would normally.

 

Will there be a skill to (partially) mitigate that slowing down ?

[Lephys]

 

All actions (other than movement) slow down, so you will cast fewer spells over the course of a battle or they will go off later than they would normally.

 

Will there be a skill to (partially) mitigate that slowing down ?

 

I dunno about that. I mean, there'll probably be things that increase your action speed. So then, with the same amount of slowed-down-ed-ness (that's totally a word), you're still faster than you were.

 

You know... 5-2 is more than 3-2. So... in a way, I guess it technically would mitigate the slowing down? But, it actually matters in mechanics equations (especially if the slowing is a percentage or something) whether or not you actually change the speed penalty (slow-downing), or just the base values to which that penalty is being applied.

 

Of course, there COULD be talents or something, or proficiencies, that just decrease the penalty, as well. 8P

[Bavarian]

I just hope the negatives balance the positives.  I want a reason for my wizard to wear cloth armor and not just make one big hodge podge jack of all trades and master of them all too type of character.  Boring.  Difficult, game altering choices are a GOOD thing and add a ton of replayability. 

[Jarrakul]

I share the concern over balance here, but I'm honestly pretty happy with the system being proposed. Cast speed tends to be really important (just look at the Robe of Vecna in BG2, and that didn't even break the 1-per-round limit), so having armor reduce cast speed really hurts (which is a good thing). In addition, it helps define what sorts of characters will want to wear armor. Because ability use will, I assume, be primarily offensive, armor will create a tradeoff between offensive and defensive capabilities. For someone who's intending to stay in the back of the party and hurl spells, greater defensive abilities won't be worth the loss of offensive power. For someone who's on the front line taking hits all the time, defensive abilities are probably more important than offensive ones, especially if the rest of the party is focused on offense.

[Walsingham]

Hang on.

 

I accept that in general bulky armour is bad for action speed.

 

But many cultures over history have created 'heavy' armour that allows free movement for specific actions. Archer armour, longsword armour, bomb disposal armour etc.

 

By this logic, suppose the moves for a fireball are the Kansas city shuffle; well then you make heavy armour which lets you make those moves easier.

[JFSOCC]

a kansas city shuffle is when everybody looks right, while you *snaps neck* go left.

[Lephys]

Hang on.

 

I accept that in general bulky armour is bad for action speed.

 

But many cultures over history have created 'heavy' armour that allows free movement for specific actions. Archer armour, longsword armour, bomb disposal armour etc.

 

By this logic, suppose the moves for a fireball are the Kansas city shuffle; well then you make heavy armour which lets you make those moves easier.

Maybe it's simply the distraction/stress of supporting all that armor weight whilst trying to mentally focus your energies for spells?

 

Maybe, even, Strength could affect action-speed penalties from heavy equipment. *shrug*

 

Then, you could make a buff Wizard who guffaws at the seemingly paper-lightness of his plate armor, while almost distraction-lessly casting spells. But then, you're giving up something else for that Strength value, so it's not exactly an "obviously you give your Wizard 100 Strength and plate armor every time" thing.

 

*shrug*

[Syrio]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cVy7YeeqGZQ

 

If Gandalf could do it..