ToME: the Tales of Maj'Eyal

Yeah, I spend too much time thinking up new classes... Anyway, the idea behind this is the justify the reference to "Death Wilders" in the Grand Corruptor's letter. Also, it's to make a cool new Wilder class which is centred more around normal combat than Wyrmics and Summoners. In playstyle it is more akin to Berserkers and Cursed, based on pure brawn and attacking many enemies at once, but with some cool nature abilities in support.

Death Wilders cannot be played by Undead, Shaloren or Yeeks (well, maybe the latter should be allowed). They start in Zigur and already belong to the ziguranth faction, with the anti-magic tree installed, and all the anti-magic restrictions from the very start. Their first quest is an arena trial (a light version of the Zigur test) and once this is completed they get a request from Myssil to kill a local necromancer who is terrorising local villagers and stealing the bodies of their fallen loved ones. This necro will turn out to be the same from the undead starter quest, with his bone giant buddy, and the player will start at the top of the dungeon and go down till he finds the two bosses at the bottom.

The unlock is to kill the Grand Corruptor with an anti-magic character.

Class description:

Not all of nature is nice. Deadly venoms, piercing fangs, raking claws - these all play their part in the circle of life. Some of the most elite and dedicated Ziguranth have long studied the arts of death, and the force of death in nature. In the name of protecting the world from those who abuse it with magic they have come to master death in its natural form.

Death Wilders use weapons as an extension of their body, and call upon the powers of nature to both protect their flesh from harm, and rend their enemies in battle. They are vicious and merciless warriors, and with their will can call upon the natural forces of death to strike down their foes.

Locked chargen screen hint: In the purity of nature we find the greatest power to fight our arcane foes - we are one with death.

Stats: +4 St, +1 Dx, +4 Wi, 12 Life per level
Starting eq: Greatmaul, leather armour, regen infusion, wild infusion

Talent trees:

Wild/Death (1.3)
Wild/Predator (1.3)
Wild/Instinct (1.2)
Wild/Anti-magic (1.2)
Wild/Harmony (1.2)
Wild/Call (1.2)
Tech/Combat Training (1.2)
Tech/Combat Veteran (1.0, locked)
Tech/Combat Techniques (1.1, locked)
Tech/Combat Field Control (1.0, locked)
Tech/2H Weapons (1.1)
Cunning/Survival (1.0)
Tech/Dirty Fighting (0.9, locked)

The new trees:


Death (will-based class tree)

Every creature is fated to die, and those who master the winds of death can bring their enemies' fates closer. Note that these abilities sometimes work differently on those who are already dead.

1. Sterile Blow (activated, melee, 4 Eq, 7 cooldown)
Strike your prey for (80-140)% weapon damage, cutting off their natural regeneration and their ability to use infusions for (5-12) turns. Undead regeneration is unaffected.

2. Wither (activated, range 2+t, 6 Eq, 10 cooldown)
Call on fate to wither your opponent, inflicting (50+Will*t/2) nature damage and pinning them for (2+t) turns. Creatures in a radius of (2-4) of the victim may become scared and flee. Undead do not receive any of these effects, but may become dazed.

3. Call of Death (activated, 15 Eq, 18 cooldown)
Concentrate your will into a terrible force, pulling all enemies in a radius of (2-5) towards you and attacking them for (50+t*10)% weapon damage.

4. Reaper (activated, 25 Eq, 30 cooldown)
Become nature's reaper, cutting the life threads of all enemies in a radius of (1-4). Those who fail a check against their Willpower are instantly slain, whilst those who survive have their regeneration multiplied by -(2-10). Undead are unaffected, but may be turned mad by the force, losing all allegiance to their masters and attacking everything wildly.


Predator (will-based class tree)

It's the eye of the tiger, it's the cream of the fight! Risin' up to the challenge of our rival.
And the last known survivor stalks his prey in the night, And he's watchin' us all in the eye... of the tiger!

Ahem... Predators stalk Eyal in the search of their prey, and the abilities of a predator have been honed by nature to perfection. Those who master the killer in their souls can become unmatched in battle.

1. Maul (activated, 3 Eq, 5 cooldown)
Viciously attack your prey for (100-160)% weapon damage, causing them to be stunned, confused or dazed for (2-7) turns. (Equal chance of each status.)

2. Ferocity (passive)
Your attacks carry the wild vigour of a predatory animal, giving you +(t*15)% critical strike damage and +(t*2) APR.

3. Pounce (activated, 7 Eq, 9 cooldown)
Leap to a square up to (3-8) squares away and attack all adjacent enemies for (75+Will)% weapon damage.

4. Stalker's March (sustained, 35 Eq, 20 cooldown, insta-activate)
You walk with 20% slower movement speed, but each turn you move you automatically attack up to (1+Will/20) foes adjacent to you for (50-100)% weapon damage.


Instinct (will-based generic talent tree)

You approach battle with the instincts of a wild animal, your reflexes reacting to your surroundings faster than thought.

1. Deflection (passive)
You turn away incoming blows instead of dodging them, reducing their impact. Incoming attacks have (t*5)% less chance to be critical and your natural armour hardiness is increased by (t*4).

2. Keen Senses (activated, 5 Eq, 18 cooldown)
You sense the presence of creatures up to (8-18) away for (4-8) turns. At talent level 3 this will include stealthed and invisible creatures. At talent level 5 it also has the passive effect of making visible any creature that fires at you from outside your sight range.

3. Battle Reflexes (passive)
Your natural reflexes give you an edge in battle, improving your physical saving throw by (8-30) and your accuracy by (5-20).

4. Spelldodger (passive)
Your quick reactions give you a (10-35)% chance to dodge or avoid the effects of spells aimed at you.


Any thoughts? I might try and actually code some of these some time.

Looks like a pretty good class overall, some comments on the skills:

Grey wrote:1. Sterile Blow (activated, melee, 4 Eq, 7 cooldown)
Strike your prey for (80-140)% weapon damage, cutting off their natural regeneration and their ability to use infusions for (5-12) turns. Undead regeneration is unaffected.

The stop infusion effect wouldn't be too powerful against enemies, but could very easily lead to inescapable death for the player character from adventurers.

Grey wrote:4. Reaper (activated, 25 Eq, 30 cooldown)
Become nature's reaper, cutting the life threads of all enemies in a radius of (1-4). Those who fail a check against their Willpower are instantly slain, whilst those who survive have their regeneration multiplied by -(2-10). Undead are unaffected, but may be turned mad by the force, losing all allegiance to their masters and attacking everything wildly.

I don't like effects/mechanics that punish you for having better stats (the negative regen multiplier), but that's up to you.

Grey wrote:1. Maul (activated, 3 Eq, 5 cooldown)
Viciously attack your prey for (100-160)% weapon damage, causing them to be stunned, confused or dazed for (2-7) turns. (Equal chance of each status.)

Duration longer than cooldown could lead to stunlock if they have no wild infusion.

Grey wrote:2. Ferocity (passive)
Your attacks carry the wild vigour of a predatory animal, giving you +(t*15)% critical strike damage and +(t*2) APR.

Greatmauls have 0 (or 1?)% crit, the critical damage bonus would require +critrate items (or not a greatmaul) to be effective.

Grey wrote:4. Stalker's March (sustained, 35 Eq, 20 cooldown, insta-activate)
You walk with 20% slower movement speed, but each turn you move you automatically attack up to (1+Will/20) foes adjacent to you for (50-100)% weapon damage.

Extremely powerful two or more enemies, it would be more effective to walk back and forth in front of them rather then attack. Could be made even more powerful with invigorating boots and nimble armor, depending on what "turn" is defined as.

Hmm, some valid points. I'll reply by ability:

Sterile Blow - Well, there would be a physical save, and there are plenty of non-infusion abilities around. Also I'd suggest that Death Wilders shouldn't appear randomly, since they wouldn't make thematic sense in a lot of place (especially if generated alongside mages). Does anti-magic appear on these random adventurers?

Reaper - The multiplication was just to make it slightly more interesting against trolls. Otherwise there aren't many creature who have above average regen. Still, the ability works just as well as a straight deductor.

Maul - Little chance of stunlock when the status is random each time. Also this is an equivalent ability to Stunning Blow.

Ferocity - The class isn't hooked into using Greatmauls, nor any specific weapon at all in fact (they start with a greatmaul because... well, no one else does!) They have the 2H tree but it's up to the player if he wants to use this or something else. I've not given them shields to make them more aggressive. Also there's plenty of ways to increase crit rate, so I don't see this as a big problem. This skill would invite people to try for high crit builds.

Stalker - Hmm, valid point. But it does mean deliberately moving next to multiple opponents, which is far from optimal gameplay normally. The idea is that it's best used on weak creatures. And the high Eq sustain amount makes it difficult to use other defensive Eq abilities. But the movement cost is a bit too easily countered with the right shoes...and in fact abused to have quicker attacks. Would be better if it could set the movement speed without any modifiers allowed. Perhaps the penalty should instead be a constant Eq cost?

Grey wrote: Does anti-magic appear on these random adventurers?

Yes. Yes it does. I fought an Antimage adventurer yesterday.

I'm sure orc mage-hunters would LOVE to see this class get implemented. Heheh.