Bardic Class: The Chanter

[Torokasi]

The Chanter is a supportive caster that dabbles in the arts of the divine and the arcane with an emphasis on the musical arts that the East has generated over the years. Chanters are the teachers of the divine musics to the other two classes; in addition, they possess supportive songs to keep them alive alongside their anorithil and sun paladin brethren. Their final realm of mastery is over one of the most prominent elemental sounds - that of the rumbling thunder that provides the bass line, the harmony to the melody of the sun and moon.

Expalanatory text behind theme and design below.

Code: Select all

A few design notes and stylistic notes:

On the wide variance of resources at base: Bards in a lot of settings are "jack of all trades" - capable of a bit of everything. While this wasn't the aim here (the base Bard is definitely a mage at heart, even if its skills are more easily viewable as a "support" skillset), the wide resource pool reliance was consciously chosen in part to reflect the "jack of all trades" concept.

On the Celestial resource pools: This has two arguable roots in the story as it stands. It could simply be what was discovered of the Celestial arts in the West, or the Bards could be integrated into the East as the support specialists - you have the Sun Paladins as frontal offense, Anorithils as mage blasters, so Bards make a good support group to the two, I feel. The latter element is what I'd like to work with - the East is mostly empty right now compared to its size, so having an event where you save the Bard (or his remains) to unlock the class would be fitting.

On the lack of a signature weapon/an instrument weapon: While we're perfectly willing to let someone else design this, it felt outside the scope of this idea. As the small coterie who worked on this hashed out, the bardic and musicial tradition is probably much more of a vocal tradition in this world. There's not really any groups that seem that they'd be dedicated to bringing back musical tradition in other forms when the world's just now crawling back from the brink.

Rhythm: Sustaineds cost this; user starts with 10/10. Some items may boost this. Skills use remaining Rhythm for bonus effects. In other words, the more Sustaineds you run, the lower the effect of each skill will be - so it's meant to be a conscious tradeoff between getting neat support effects versus powerful ones. With most sustaineds, this dynamic isn't present (it's a binary "can I afford to have this on y/n") which, while understandable, doesn't use the system to the fullest. Neither does this! But hopefully it gives people ideas.

Stats: Cunning is the baseline stat for Bards - it's what unlocks (almost?) all the Song trees. By their nature as multi-trick beasts, they're also reliant on a lot of stats. Bards require Mag/Cun and some Con, Storycrafters run Str, Mag, Cun, and Con at minimum, and Rescorers want Dex, Wil, Cun and Con. While some of this can be alleviated, the stat problems are a decent cost for the opportunities the classes give. And yes, Storycrafters and Rescorers are further Bard ideas that will hopefully also see implementation.

Bard:

Class:
Spell - Storm (Lock)
Spell - Phantasm
Song - Thunder Call (new)
Song - Melody of Light (new)
Song - Dark Harmony (new)
Song - Performance (Lock, L20) (new)

Generic:
Spell - Divination
Song - Wandersong (new)
Song - Hearthsong (new)
Celestial - Chants
Celestial - Hymns
Cunning - Survival (Lock)

Song - Thunder Call (1.3) (Bard) (Class) (Mana)
L1: Thunderclap: Offensive song, Nova targeting, silences. Rhythm improves radius.
- Damage split evenly between Lightning and Physical elements in radius [1+talentLevel()/3+Rhythm/4]. Can silence based on spell power for talentLevel()-1 (min 1) turns.
- Formula: 35 base, 150 max, result added to s.power*talentLevel()/10.
L2: Rumbling Bass: Offensive song, beam targeting, stuns. Rhythm improves stun duration.
- Damage split evenly between Lightning and Physical elements in beam length [6+talentLevel()/2]. Stun chance is based on spell power, lasts for talentLevel()+Rhythm/2 turns.
- Formula: 50 base, 180 max, result added to 50/min(10-talentLevel() or 0.5)
L3: Charged Ballad: Sustained, adds Spellshocked to offensive spells, adds Spellpower based on remaining Rhythm.
- ~150 mana sustain, 20%/40%/60%/80%/100% spellshock option, gives (talentLevel()*Rhythm/1.5) Spellpower.
L4: Stormy Virtuoso: Increases duration of crosstier effects caused by lightning spells, and improves lightning resistance cap. At L4 raw, also improves duration of crosstier effects for other spells (but at a much lower rate).
- Duration improved by ceil(talentLevel()/3) (so 1/1/2/2/3), lightning resist cap increased by (5*rawTalentLevel()), at L4 adds floor((talentLevel()-1)/3) (so -/-/-/1/1) duration to non-lightning spells

Song - Wandersong (1.2/1.3/X) (Bard/Storycrafter/Rescorer) (Generic) (None)
L1: Traveler's Tune: Sustained, adds movement speed and trap detect/disarm. Rhythm improves trap detect/disarm. At L4/5, gives a small action speed boost.
-talentLevel()*6.5% movement speed boost, <crib from trap skill> detection/disarm, also give max(talentLevel()-4.2 or 0)*4.3% action speed bonus.
L2: Brave Beat: Sustained, adds m.save and s.save. Rhythm improves both saves.
-use combatTalentSpellDamage() formula, Cunning instead of SpellPower, base 8, max 45, add talentLevel*Rhythm/4 to result.
L3: Roaming Road: Passive, adds HP, Mana regen, Stam regen, and Paradox reduction(?) (if the relevant resources are possessed), based on Rhythm remaining.
- X*talentLevel()*(Rhythm+floor(talentLevel()/2)), X is 0.05 HP regen, 0.02 for Mana regen, 0.025 for Stam regen, 0.03 for Paradox reduction.
L4: Return Home: Sustained. When activated, the user places a Mark in range [talentLevel()*1.2], and gains a Return talent (see for reference how the Anorithil Jumpgate works). When Return is used, if the user is more than [60-5*talentLevel()] tiles away, they warp to within [9-rawTalentLevel()] tiles of the chosen location. At talent level 4+, the user can place the mark outside of LoS (on attempt to place within wall or notele zone, Return Home goes on cooldown); at talent level 5+, user may teleport targets to the point chosen.

Song - Hearthsong (1.3/1.1) (Storycrafter/Bard) (Generic) (None)
L1: Healing Thrum: Defensive song, heals HP in radius 1 zone and also adds regen effect. Rhythm improves healing/regen effect. No cost.
- (50*talentLevel()+Cun
L2: Meledy of Memory: Sustained, reduces duration of non-physical status. Rhythm improves duration reduction.
- (max (talentLevel()*max(Rhythm-3 or 3)*1.5 %, (talentLevel()+1)%) duration reduction, max 100% (for ID)
L3: Plowshare Song: Sustained, boosts phys resist and grants evasion. Rhythm improves phys resist. Dex improves evasion.
- (talentLevel()*2.5*(Rhythm/2 round up)% phys resist, 5+talentLevel()*getDex(6) evasion)
* Willing to move this to 4 if considered too powerful as a consistent ability.
L4: Vitalizing Notes: Sustained, boosts healing effect%, disease res%, poison res% and bleeding res%. Rhythm improves resistances.
- (talentLevel()*3% +healing effect%, (10+(Rhythm))*5*talentLevel()) disease/poison/bleed res%, cap 100%)

Song - Melody of Light (1.3) (Bard) (Class) (Pos)
L1: Light Staccato: Offensive song, does light damage, line target, applies a status that can Stun randomly. Rhythm improves status' chance to Stun. Gives Pos.
L2: Luminoso: Passive. Grants a small amount of light/darkness resistance and spellpower. At L3, also makes all Light spells illuminate their targeted area.
L3: Chromatic Canon: Offensive song, does light damage, bomb radius, applies the Chromatic Canon magical status (inflicts Chromatic Canon's damage randomly) on afflicted target. Rhythm improves damage. Gives Pos.
L4: Starry Finale: Offensive song, does light damage, nova radius, rolls to remove each status individually (pos/neg) on target and does additional damage for each removed. Rhythm improves removal chance. Costs Pos.

Song - Dark Harmony (1.3) (Bard) (Class) (Neg)
L1: Dreamy Nocturne: Defensive song. Boosts spell save for ten rounds and heals slightly. Rhythm improves boost to spell save and heal. Gives Neg.
L2: Pitch Black: Offensive song, does darkness damage, nova radius, applies a status that can Blind randomly. Rhythm improves status' chance to blind. Costs Neg.
L3: Silent Coda: Offensive song, does darkness damage, bomb targeting, 2 radius, applies a status that can Silence randomly. Rhythm improves status' chance to silence. Costs Neg.
- -15 negative energy
L4: Symphony: Passive. Permits additional Chants/Hymns to be activated; buffs Chants/Hymns by a small amount.
- (+talentLevel()*2 damage, +talentLevel()% buff to primary effect, talentLevel() additional Chants or Hymns usable)

Song - Performance (1.3/1.2/1.0) (Bard/Rescorer/Storycrafter) (Class) (None) (Unlocks at L20?)
L1: Largissimo: Passive. Increases duration of status from songs.
- (+talentLevel()*3% added duration.)
L2: Crescendo: Passive. Basically modified Bloodlust from Reavers.
- (+talentLevel() S.Pow/target, reduces by 1 raw point per turn)
L3: Libero: Passive. Grants daze and silence resistance.
- (+ [talentLevel*7] %daze, [talentLevel*14] %silence resistance)
L4: Virtuoso: Passive. Increases max Rhythm.
- (Rhythm +[talentLevel()]).


A spreadsheet I use to help me get damage estimates here. Requires knowing the inner code workings a bit but is productive if you do.

[edge2054]

I'm not in much of a brainstorming or ideas mode at the moment so I hope this doesn't come off as harsh but here's my feedback on the talents.

L1: Traveler's Tune: Sustained, adds movement speed and trap detect/disarm. Rhythm improves trap detect/disarm. At L4/5, gives a small action speed boost.
-talentLevel()*6.5% movement speed boost, <crib from trap skill> detection/disarm, also give max(talentLevel()-4.2 or 0)*4.3% action speed bonus.

This is trap handling but better (much much better).

L4: Return Home: Sustained. When activated, the user places a Mark in range [talentLevel()*1.2], and gains a Return talent (see for reference how the Anorithil Jumpgate works). When Return is used, if the user is more than [60-5*talentLevel()] tiles away, they warp to within [9-rawTalentLevel()] tiles of the chosen location. At talent level 4+, the user can place the mark outside of LoS (on attempt to place within wall or notele zone, Return Home goes on cooldown); at talent level 5+, user may teleport targets to the point chosen.

Jumpgate was nerfed to have a minimum range because it was the best escape spell in the game. You'd lay it on the stairs and have a fail safe teleport to the safest location on the level. Something to keep in mind while designing this talent.

L2: Crescendo: Passive. Basically modified Bloodlust from Reavers.
- (+talentLevel() S.Pow/target, reduces by 1 raw point per turn)

Considering the class I'd modify this a lot. Make it so the number of successive songs you use determines the spellpower boost.


Overall I don't personally like the idea of Cunning being substituted for spellpower. For one it bypasses tiering. For two it doesn't play well with all the spellpower boosting talents you plan to use. For three spells run off spellpower. (see my argument against this here.

If you'd like some more ideas on a bard class, someone had started an interesting one a long long time ago. Talents are here. Grey also had some ideas for a bard class, here.

Personally I'm more a fan of Skalds (like the D and D kit). But I think this idea has potential (especially if you're coding it ).

[Torokasi]

I'm not in much of a brainstorming or ideas mode at the moment so I hope this doesn't come off as harsh but here's my feedback on the talents.

L1: Traveler's Tune: Sustained, adds movement speed and trap detect/disarm. Rhythm improves trap detect/disarm. At L4/5, gives a small action speed boost.
-talentLevel()*6.5% movement speed boost, <crib from trap skill> detection/disarm, also give max(talentLevel()-4.2 or 0)*4.3% action speed bonus.

This is trap handling but better (much much better).

Woops, yeah, I think this was designed before the merge of the skills. I'll probably switch this around some.

L4: Return Home: Sustained. When activated, the user places a Mark in range [talentLevel()*1.2], and gains a Return talent (see for reference how the Anorithil Jumpgate works). When Return is used, if the user is more than [60-5*talentLevel()] tiles away, they warp to within [9-rawTalentLevel()] tiles of the chosen location. At talent level 4+, the user can place the mark outside of LoS (on attempt to place within wall or notele zone, Return Home goes on cooldown); at talent level 5+, user may teleport targets to the point chosen.

Jumpgate was nerfed to have a minimum range because it was the best escape spell in the game. You'd lay it on the stairs and have a fail safe teleport to the safest location on the level. Something to keep in mind while designing this talent.

I think we were thinking ~6 Rhythm, which would be most all the entire tree. This might still be too powerful as it stands, though. Definitely one of the spells I'm concerned about, yeah.

L2: Crescendo: Passive. Basically modified Bloodlust from Reavers.
- (+talentLevel() S.Pow/target, reduces by 1 raw point per turn)

Considering the class I'd modify this a lot. Make it so the number of successive songs you use determines the spellpower boost.

Only issue I see here is that a lot of the songs are passive boosts. But the idea's neat - might very well be worth shifting that way for this, yeah.

Overall I don't personally like the idea of Cunning being substituted for spellpower. For one it bypasses tiering. For two it doesn't play well with all the spellpower boosting talents you plan to use. For three spells run off spellpower. (see my argument against this here.

There's only one major instance of this, and it was because it's meant to be a shared bardic skilltree - but none of the bards are intended to share the same power type. This being said, switching it to rely on spellpower or mindpower (whichever's higher) should work fine, so. (Songs aren't intended to be spells, really, so.)

If you'd like some more ideas on a bard class, someone had started an interesting one a long long time ago. Talents are here. Grey also had some ideas for a bard class, here.

Personally I'm more a fan of Skalds (like the D and D kit). But I think this idea has potential (especially if you're coding it ).

Yeah, I saw those! They look great - but neither was quite where I wanted to go with this. The bardic charm stuff would be cool for another class, but it doesn't quite thematically jive with where I wanted to go (there's no one wanting to charm the Orcs, e.g.) The wilder one seems cool - may "borrow" a few of those ideas for Storycrafter - but that was also not the thrust here. Storycrafters are closer to Skalds in style, may be more interesting to you when we get that far.

[SageAcrin]

Did someone call for a Storycrafter?

Or a Skald?

Well, it's kinda like a Skald. Maybe. Except less nordic and more Ziguric.

Storycrafter:

Fluff:

Chanters are-or, rather, were-not merely an Eastern phenomena.

Chanters, or something much like them, has lived in both continents for centuries untold, keeping the wisdom and knowledge of the ages, and using their magical abilities to help preserve both their knowledge, and themselves.

Then the Spellblaze happened.

Some say that the Chanters in Maj'Eyal nobly gave up their magic in sheer horror at the terrible carnage.

Others say that those Chanters, relatively weaker mages than many, made easy targets for the wrath of angry and fearful people, and denied their magical heritage out of fear.

Regardless, the Chanters instead delved into their deep knowledge of non-magical techniques to defend themselves, gave up their spells, and avowed to never let such horrible misuse of magic ever occur again.

No longer content to simply record the stories as they went past, they took on a new name; The Storycrafter.

While the modern Storycrafter are not, as a group, completely against magic, they are at the forefront of both preserving knowledge, and lives, and are definitely not for allowing mages free reign either. They are self-styled heroes as well as bards, in essence, and while their motivation to craft their own stories-To help others, or merely to help themselves have a well-known name-varies, their combat knowledge, thanks to their deep records, is impressive.

The Storycrafter is capable of using practically every non-magical technique-physical combat, nature's wrath, and mental skills-to some degree, but their own songs and tales are their primary weapon, to rouse themselves and others, nature its self, or even their own mind-or to shut down the minds of their opponents.

Gameplay:

The Storycrafter is essentially a combat type Bard. Capable of using nearly any weapon, their own natural inclination is towards Slings and Mindstars.

Their primary statistics are Strength, Willpower and Cunning(+4/+3/+2). Their Life Rating is +1.

Their general playstyle is spectacularly defensive-somewhat poor Stamina based weapon options relative to physical fighters, fairly high reliance on the rather restrictive Psi/Equi resources, and relatively low non-situational mults make them not an offense class. Additionally, they only a few options for natural heals/teleports, meaning their tanking and escapes are unorthodox, and they rely on a lot of stats-Strength, Willpower and Cunning are required to use their skillsets, but while they have the ability to get by without Con and Dex, they are still very useful stats for such a physical-heavy class.

However, they have excellent utility offense, and very good defensive skills-Absorption on a non-Mindslayer is obviously very powerful despite the low ranking, some basic Summoning ability allows them meatshield abilities, and they have an incredible amount of flexible sustain skills and utility abilities on top of that. I can't say they'd be totally balanced off the bat, some tweaking may be required, but I think it sounds good on paper.

Class:

Two-Handed Offense(Locked, 0.9)
Shield Offense(Locked, 1.0)
Dual Weapon Training(Locked, 1.1)
Archery - Slings(Unlocked, 1.2)
Archery - Utility(Unlocked, 1.2)
Summon - Melee(Unlocked, 0.9)
Psionic - Absorption(Unlocked, 0.9)
Performance(Locked, 1.0)
Song - Ballads of the Mind(Unlocked, 1.3)
Song - Nature's Record(Unlocked, 1.3)

Generic:

Combat Training(Unlocked, 1.0)
Mindstar Mastery(Unlocked, 1.3)
Harmony(Unlocked, 1.2)
Finer Energy Manipulations(Locked, 1.0)
Wandersong(Unlocked, 1.3)
Hearthsong(Unlocked, 1.3)

Addendum:

-We probably need to change Roaming Road's Stamina regeneration to Equilibrium(Same amount?).

Song - Ballads of the Mind(Cunning statistical requirement):

L1-Chronicle of the Id. 10 Psi, Range 1, 8 Cooldown. Attempt a normal physical attack with all applicable weapons. If this successfully hits, deal normal melee physical damage, as well as (0.2, 0.4)*(1+(rhythm*0.1) weapon multiplier in Mind damage. If Talent Level=>3 and current remaining, post-sustain Rhythm=>5, attempts to confuse the target at 50% power for (2+(Talent Level/2)) turns as well. (Mindpower vs Mindsave.)
L2-Mindfarer's Chant. Sustain(2 Rhythm). Gives the user universal ESP of range (2+talent level).
L3-Shattering Call. 20 Psi, Range = (4+(Talent Level/2), 15 Cooldown. Requires an archery capable weapon(Probably a sling, in this case). Fires a single shot/arrow, which shatters into a sonic-speed cone of shards. Deals (0.4, 0.8)*(1+(rhythm*0.05)) weapon power damage in a cone.
L4-Story's End. 40 Psi, Range 1+(Talent Level/3), 25 Cooldown. Attempts to shatter an enemy's mind and body. If Talent Level=>3, this skill can draw enemies to you from a short distance(ala Mindhook). Deals a (0.8, 1.3) multiplier critical hit attack with all weapons, with accuracy boosted (Talent Level*8). If the target survives, it will then attempt to: If rawtalent=>2, and Rhythm>3, this will attempt to Slow an enemy by (Rhythm*2.5)%, as well, with a Mindpower vs Mindsave check, for 4+(Talent Level/2) turns. If rawtalent=>4 and Rhythm=>6, will additionally attempt to Stun an enemy, with a Mindpower vs Mindsave check, for 2+(Talent Level/3) turns. If rawtalent=>5, this has a (Rhythm*4)% chance of attempting to shatter an enemy's mind, ala Dominate Will, using a Mindpower vs Mindsave check and with the same limitations applying.

-Addendum: Probably should make Story's End check that Dominate Will first, as stunned/slowed mindslaves aren't as useful as normal mindslaves.

Song - Nature's Record(Will requirement):

L1-Taloned Carving. 5 Equi, Range 1, 6 Cooldown. Deals (0.6, 1.1)*(1+(Rhythm*0.04)) damage in a frontal arc.
L2-Tranquil Rime. Sustain(2 Rhythm). Calms and focuses the mind, increasing Psi Regen by ((Talent Level*0.04)*Rhythm) and Accuracy by ((4+(Talent Level*(Will/24))*(1+(Rhythm*0.1)).
L3-Nature's Rousal. 15 Equi, Range 8, 22 cooldown. Deals (20, 60) TalentMindDamage Nature damage over time, as a riot of plants choke and grapple the enemy, over an effect area of (2*Talent Level/2), for (5+Talent Level/2) turns. Additionally, every turn that an enemy is within the effect radius, they have a (Rhythm*TalentLevel) chance of being Pinned or Silenced for three turns. (50-50 chance of either. Mindpower vs Physical Save save chance.)
L4-Grimoire's Erasure. 20 Equi, Range 1, 40 Cooldown. Turn the full force of nature against your target's magical capabilities. Deal (1.7, 2.4) weapon power multiplier Manaburn damage with a physical attack, and attempt to Silence the target for (2+Talent Level) turns on a successful hit(Mindpower vs Mindsave). At Talent Level=>5, additionally drain (Rhythm)% of the target's Mana, Vim, Positive and Negative energies on a successful Mindpower vs Mindsave check, and deal an equal amount to the total drained as Arcane damage(Bosses and up take halved draining, and hence damage, from this).

So, yeah, any feedback is definitely welcome. I think it may work out well, but it is definitely an odd build, and I literally cannot decide if it is powerful or weak from look to look, right now. Which may mean it's balanced, but it certainly feels unique, which is frankly more important to me. Values can be tweaked, but neat playstyle can be hard. :)

[Sirrocco]

Problem on your balance thoughts for the storycrafter - equilibrium and psi are only really restrictive for classes that only get one pool. For example, the mindslayer does sometimes have to make interesting choices about sustains vs casting pool - but that's just because all of his sustains and his entire casting pool are coming from the same pool of psi.

Further thought... if we do institute a rhythm pool, I think it might be cool to have a wardancer character, primarily str/dex, probably working either two weapon or weapon and bare hand, who runs off of rhythm and stamina, or perhaps just rhythm. You could even have rhythm-based active powers. Their effectiveness would be based on the amount of rhythm you have not locked up in sustains, and they'd each ahve a minimum rhythm level to use. Make the class defenses heavy on the sustains (with at least moderate cooldowns, but no disengage time), and give it some really juicy attacks at high rhythm levels - forcing you to decide at any given moment whether you want protection or power more. Any time you like, you can drop your sustains and unload with some pretty seriously mighty attacks - but once you're done your defenses are gone, and they won't come back for a while. Hope you did enough damage to make that a survivable proposition.

I'd say further than fatigue ratings for armor would subtract from the rhythm pool. These characters are dancers, after all - they should really be going as light on the armor as they can afford to.

[SageAcrin]

I'm aware of that.

However, you'll notice that their only way to restore any resource is natural regeneration, and that their combat abilities consume quite a bit of Psi/Equi-even the low cooldown abilities are designed that way(For reference, for example, Ice Claw consumes 3 Equi.). The Psi first skill is more reasonable, but the higher end ones are less so.

A better point is that they can unlock Finer Energy and get a source of burst Psi regeneration that way. But then again, that is a locked category, and they may very well want three categories unlocked(Performance, a weapon and Finer Energy...and that's assuming you don't want any world skillsets or Antimagic. Though, most people won't, since they have a ton of skillsets already.), so they have to decide how much they want that.

They're still not particularly restricted on any given resource, I will admit, but it's easy for one of them to go lights out, since they cycle through all of them. At least, in theory. I would have to give one a spin to see if their resource costs need to be heightened, but these seem like good first approximations.

Edit:

Neither class-nor the planned third-has any dance theming planned at all, and there's no real point in making Fatigue impact a class that has single digit values in a resource. That would kind of be like having Fatigue impact Necrotic. Not that I'd have a problem if someone else wanted to make a class like that, mind.

[Sirrocco]

Psi/absorption is *totally* a resource-gaining tree. Other than that... well, they do seem tuned for antimagic, which gives you a equilibrium-gainer up just for signing up, and another option with a relatively small investment in the fungus tree.

The point of having fatigue impact rhythm (at least for wardancers) would be to make them make some pretty hard choices about what armor they were willing to wear. I'm not sure how well I explained it, but my idea was that it would reduce the max pool, rather than affecting individual costs. Someone who had 100% fatigue, for example, would be running around with a rhythm pool half the size. Figure, most people who went rhythm-heavy would wind up losing a point or two off the top, and that's what things would be balanced around. People who avoided fatigue altogether (either by wearing only the lightest of armors, or equipping gear that reduced fatigue) would actually have a point or two more than normal, but they'd pay for it with a lack of durability. People who decided to pump up defenses through armor would find that their ability to handle rhythm powers would suffer. I was trying to create a situation where you wouldn't just say "Oh, I'll just ignore the rhythm-based defenses, focus on the now-awesome attacks, and get my defensive beef with equipment".

[SageAcrin]

Absorption only really grants a few Psi per hit tops, outside of spiked barriers(Which are good, but generally not something you're going to blow solely to obtain Psi.). It's more of a Psi regen.

Antimagic Storycrafters is an option, but I'm not sold that it's a good one. Not necessarily something you can't do, but you would end up playing something very different as an AM Storycrafter. I won't say it's not better, but they don't really have Category Points or Generic to easily spend on things without losing other options, so it's a complete sidegrade.

[bricks]

A few thoughts: A class should not use four resources, for balance and ease-of-play reasons. I think a new class is more likely to be seriously considered if it neatly fits into an existing metaclass. Adding new resources is probably OK, as long as it offers some meaningfully specific function (like Necromancers have). Even if a class uses "mind power" it doesn't need to have Psi as a resource - this is true for both Afflicted and Wilders.

I like the idea of a Celestial-styled Bard most, since it fits with the current Chants/Hymns.

[SageAcrin]

The point of the Bardic classes we've come up with is specifically being a metaclass whose purpose is utilizing multiple resources in synergistic and thematic fashion. That is, in fact, the common bond between them, as well as the Rhythm resource, and in general, in other media, Bard and bard-like classes are usually the place to see that sort of middle-road gameplay.

I've heard a lot of people talk about how they wished there were more hybrid types in the game, but simply slamming together random categories can make incredibly unbalanced classes. Planned building of a class is much more likely to produce a self-consistent, interesting play style.

As to ease of play...Bardic metaclass will definitely not be ease of play friendly, as they can definitely cause a new player to be overwhelmed and make poor life decisions when it comes to builds. However, neither is, say, a Mindslayer. As long as the unlocks are later in the game, there's nothing wrong with having a few complex classes with multiple possible builds.

[bricks]

I've heard a lot of people talk about how they wished there were more hybrid types in the game, but simply slamming together random categories can make incredibly unbalanced classes. Planned building of a class is much more likely to produce a self-consistent, interesting play style.

I've seen this too, and I don't really understand what the desire is. There are, of course, a number of ways to interpret this, but by my count there are six warrior-ish classes, eight mage-ish classes, and seven hybrid classes. (And I somehow missed one...) You don't need to use a bunch of different resources to create a "hybrid" class, either. Lots of physical-heavy classes don't use stamina, and Wilders/Afflicted can successfully use mind powers without psi.

As to ease of play...Bardic metaclass will definitely not be ease of play friendly, as they can definitely cause a new player to be overwhelmed and make poor life decisions when it comes to builds. However, neither is, say, a Mindslayer. As long as the unlocks are later in the game, there's nothing wrong with having a few complex classes with multiple possible builds.

Complexity in design gives way to simplicity in application, and vice-versa. With a bunch of different resources in play, the player can just touch on a few skills for each for optimal play. With only a single resource, every single action can be weighed against the others. If you introduce talents that cause interaction between resources, you effectually make them into a single resource. Anorithils in particular have this dynamic and it's rather tedious.

That's all I'll say. I understand that it can be fun to try to combine two different metaclasses, but I think a tighter focus and an emphasis on new, unique skills is ultimately best. There might not be tremendous build diversity in ToME, but considering how many classes there are, I think there are ample ways to approach the game.

[SageAcrin]

Complexity in design gives way to simplicity in application, and vice-versa. With a bunch of different resources in play, the player can just touch on a few skills for each for optimal play. With only a single resource, every single action can be weighed against the others. If you introduce talents that cause interaction between resources, you effectually make them into a single resource. Anorithils in particular have this dynamic and it's rather tedious.

Exactly.

You have hit upon why this concept interests me, though apparently you think it's entirely a bad thing.

With differing resources comes new ways you can restrict the resources from their original form, and in new strategic ways. Storycrafter has one single natural Equi regen skill naturally, despite having summoning and raw offense skills running off of it. Summoning with no Slimes, and as a support measure, lest you run out of Equi quickly in combat. Psi, not as a massively restricted resource, but as a source of support skills, (hopefully, this may need tweaking. I suspect that, based on the comments I've seen so far and my own thoughts, I may up the Psi costs.) quickly blown if you don't keep an eye on it. Stamina as an element of the game that you can never rely solely on, but always have as a fallback.

Chanter is...well, I haven't talked that over with Toro as much on the resources, but I believe it's less meant to be constant exchange and more separate utility resources with careful management for Positive/Negative, without exchanging, then Mana as the main fallback. Just because you have a Positive class or a Negative class doesn't mean you can't restrict both resources.

Varying parts of their playstyle can close down depending on how you manage your resources, and unlike Anorithil, this isn't meant to be a circular, constantly sustained effort, but instead actual resource management.

Carefully managing the complexity in design can indeed lead to simplicity in action... without being overpowered. Several classes have, in practice, no real resource issues, but they don't break down into game-breakingly overpowered for it. A class where the resources overall are plentiful, but designed to individually run out with neglect, certainly should be fine if carefully managed.

While I respect your opinion on this, I'm going to have to say that it's more or less just that; An opinion. I find Anorithils enjoyable to play, and Arcane Blades, and Shadowblades. (Well, in concept I enjoy Arcane Blades. I'm looking forward to b41 there. :))

Edit: Oh, and Wyrmic. And Sun Paladin. And most anyone that uses AM, of course, but that's more of a playstyle decision than it is a class.

Really, there's a lot of classes that use more than one resource...

[SageAcrin]

Rescorer:

Fluff:

A long time ago, a few young Chanters in Var'Eyal had, as one might expect of a history-seeking breed, stumbled upon some things that they perhaps should not have.

It started innocently enough-Some of these young historians happened upon an injured Paradox Mage who, in gratitude, taught them some of his secrets, creating what should have been an amazing blessing-A historian that could actually see history before and after it would happen. Tasked to secrecy, they failed to share their findings with the rest of the Chanters-perhaps saving them all.

You see, they foresaw something else, too. The creation of Blight.

More than half of the small clique of Chanters died in the few short, bloody days that followed, as the small group turned on its self. What came out of this combat was the Rescorer.

The Rescorer of modern times has a simple goal-perhaps due to sheer insanity, or due to sheer evil, or even out of a measured and concious desire to improve the world even when the methods are distasteful, whatever the reason, they seek to bring corruption to the world. And they are willing to use their abilities of time manipulation to make one possible future become the true one.

A Rescorer's ultimate goal would be to reconstruct time its self to bring about their goals-Corruption, from the beginning of time-and the world is lucky indeed that such powerful Paradoxes are not known, let alone to chronomantic neophytes like the Rescorers. But they'll take reimagining the current world as quickly as they can, as a substitute. Their view of Corruption may vary on the Rescorer, from improvement of all life and making stronger, happier people, to complete conversion to something new, but they all roughly share the same goal.

Gameplay:

The Rescorer is a heavy artillery mage type Bardic subclass, specializing in Vim and Paradox. Their primary statistics are Cunning, Magic and Willpower(4/3/2). Their life modifier is -3.

Rescorers have the strongest resource limitations of the Bardic subclasses-Vim and Paradox are not, in general, the easiest resources to keep control of, and Rescorers are inordinately poor at recovering either-No simple answers for bursts of resource like Static History and Bloodcasting, and much fewer ways to heal both resources in general. And they, like Paradox Mages, rely on fairly passive defensive measures, despite low HP. On the other hand, their damage output is fairly high, and they have a strong-though quirky-support skillset to go with it.

Class:

Corruption - Blight(unlocked, 1.0)
Corruption - Vim(locked, 1.2)
Chronomancy - Age Manipulation(unlocked, 1.1)
Chronomancy - Speed Control(locked, 1.0)
Song - Fearscape's Hymnal(Unlocked, 1.3)
Song - Kept Time(Unlocked, 1.3)
Song - Performance(Locked, 1.2)

Generic:

Corruption - Curses(unlocked, 1.0)
Chronomancy - Chronomancy(unlocked, 1.1)
Chronomancy - Energy(locked, 0.9)
Song - Wandersong(unlocked, 1.1)
Song - Blighted Score(unlocked, 1.3)

Song - Fearscape's Hymnal(Cunning based):

L1-Demon's Notation. 16 Vim, 6 Cooldown, range 8. Deals (20, 280) Spellpower-based Shadowflame damage as a fast(1500%) bolt. At Talent Level=>5, this instead becomes a radius 1 projectile.
L2-Compressed Sacrifice. 15 Vim, 20 Paradox, 15 Cooldown, range 6. Commits a magical ritual sacrifice upon the target to increase the user's power, utilizing the power of time manipulation to cause the process to happen in a moment. Deals (15, 220) Blight damage to the target, and boosts the user's Magical Power by (TalentLevel*.4)*Rhythm for 10 turns. If TalentLevel=>3, this additionally heals (Rhythm*(Talent Level*.6))% of the damage dealt as Vim.
L3-Blood-Inked Staff. Sustain(4 Rhythm). Increases Blight and Temporal damage by (8, 20) combatTalentSpellDamage. At TalentLevel=>5, decreases spell cooldowns by (Rhythm*2)%.
L4-Legion's Score. 40 Vim, 30 Cooldown, range 10. Creates (2+TalentLevel/2) slow (400%) explosive bolts of (25, 180) Spellpower-based (Randomly Blight or Shadowflame) damage. If Rhythm=>6, these bolts will explode in radius 1.

Song - Kept Time(Willpower based)

L1-Half-Time Beat. 20 Paradox, 12 Cooldown, Range 8. Instant. Deals (20, 160) Spellpower-based Paradox-modified Temporal damage in 2000% speed bolt form, and slows the target by (Rhythm*3)% for (2+TalentLevel/2) turns.
L2-Bladed Sharp. 15 Vim, 10 Paradox, 15 Cooldown, Range 10. Generates and dimensionally teleports a small mass of bone shards into the target, which erupt painfully from them. Deals (30, 270) Spellpower-based Paradox-modified Physical damage, and Cripples the target(not sure of values for the Crippling power) for 5 turns. If TalentLevel>3, also causes Wounding for (Rhythm/2) turns, equal to 1/5th of the initial damage each turn.
L3-Degenerate Quaver. 30 Paradox, 24 Cooldown, Range 8. Unevenly and destructively speeds up time in the target area. Deals (30, 280) Temporal damage, and inflicts (15, 125)Temporal damage on all targets with radius (3+TalentLevel/2) for (Rhythm/2) turns, but while the damage effect is continuing, the global speed of the targets is raised by (40-(TalentLevel*2)%. If TalentLevel=>6, this has a (Rhythm*5)% chance of netting no speed gain for the targets, instead dealing a normal Wasting effect on the target for the same duration/damage, as the out-of-synch-with-time areas of the body are isolated enough to provide no benefit to the creature.
L4-Timeless Rest. Sustain(5 Rhythm), 25 Cooldown, instant. Reduce all damage dealt by 80%, but temporarily boost Global Speed by (50, 120) SpellDamageModifier, Movement Speed by an additional(80, 160) SpellDamageModifier, and temporarily grant (Rhythm*.3) Paradox Regen.

Song - Blighted Score(Magic based)

L1-Crystalline Scale. Passive. Grants the Rescorer a thin layer of nearly-invisible crystalline armor. Provides ((1+Rhythm*0.1)*Talent Level) Defense and Armor. (I may retool these values to scale more with stats, but that will require some experimentation, I think.)
L2-Blackened Key. 20 Vim, 30 Cooldown. Generate Radius (2+TalentLevel/5) magical darkness around you, and deal (20, 200) Darkness damage to all enemies in that radius. At Talent Level=>3, this can also blind targets caught in it for (Rhythm/2) turns. (Though, it may be better to make this a temporary field, rather than an actual magical darkness, which I believe last indefinitely. That might be abusable, though then again, you can't see through it either...)
L3-Blazing Mode. Sustain(3 Rhythm, 30 Vim), 20 Cooldown. Create a Radius (1+TalentLevel/3) Demonfire damage zone around you, dealing (10, 50) Spellpower-based Demonfire damage to all enemies within the radius, and raising your Fire resistance by (Rhythm*0.05)*TalentLevel%.
L4-Revised Sheet. Passive. Reforms the body to create a superior being. Each level of this consumes 4 Vim capacity permanently, as a small part of your talents are used to keep your improved body running. Raises All Resistance and All Damage by 1% per level, and improves physical traits(Strength, Dexterity and Constitution) by +1 per level. At rawtalent=>3, you also obtain (Rhythm*0.1) Life Regeneration. At rawtalent=>5, you become demonic enough to feed off the suffering of your opponents when needed, and gain a permanent life draining effect on all of your offensive skills, equal to (Rhythm*.5)% of the damage dealt.

[Sirrocco]

The entire skill set is fairly heavily weighted to "rhythm does awesome things for me, but this doesn't cost me any rhythm". At the same time, the rhythm sustains that *are* there (far outnumbered by the passive gainers) are fairly high cost. Most of the rhythm effects are boosts to attack powers, though Blighted Score does a bit of rhythm-based defensive boost.

The Rhythm sustains are as follows:

Blazing Mode: Sustain 3: Gives you area effect demonfire damage and rhythm-based fire resistance/immunity (assuming I'm reading it right. If I'm not, then it gives a nearly meaningless quantity of fire resist).

Blood-Linked Staff: Sustain 4: Increase Blight/Temporal damage at the cost of Rhythm, with a rhythm-based spell cooldown. I'd have to see it in play, but my first reaction is that this is somewhat self-defeating for a rhythm-heavy character. Of course, you could also choose to largely ignore rhythm-dependent powers, in which case this becomes solid gold. It doesn't feel like a particularly interesting interaction in any case.

Timeless Rest: Sustain 5: act fast, move faster, recover paradox, and cuts your damage by a lot. You'll take a hit from the defense buffs in Blighted Score, and that might sting a little, but you don't use this power unless you're done trying to kill the enemy and you just want to live. As far as time for running away and firing off runes/infusions go, it's great. It's also something you can do to burn off a bit of paradox, which is nice, especially as it makes the Chronomancy escape powers a bit more available. So, yeah - huge Rhythm cost that doesn't actually matter.

Basically, the fact that Rhythm shows up in tons of places that are not Rhythm-based sustains, and at the same time, Rhythm-based sustains are generally fairly cool even without a lot of Rhythm seems to undercut the intended behavior for Rhythm. I dunno. Maybe I'm just confused.

[SageAcrin]

There are three Rhythm based sustains that they get from Wandersong. (Though we're talking about changing up Return Home, possibly.)

So yeah, you're partially missing the fact that they're borrowing some stuff from Chanter. Not that I'm arguing your point-I think you're right, and that the initial Rhythm estimates for some of those might be high, especially Timeless Rest(I was thinking that the cost would be its "effective" cost-you must have this much Rhythm available and not tied into other sustains to use it. On reflection, I don't think it needs that heavy of balancing.). However, Blazing Mode is a sustained area damage effect for rather cheap. I don't think that's a problem, just the other two.

However, the point is choice, with Rhythm-You choose to make your actives stronger, at the cost of less passives, or vice-versa. And the less Passives you run, in some cases, the stronger an individual Passive will be.

I've been mulling this over while Toro works on Chanter, and I'm considering adding more categories of sustains to Rescorer, as sustaining self-improvement fits very well. That way, they don't end up having to be expensive to make this choice notable. Of course, this brings its own problems, as you can easily make a class that is too good simply by having so many options.

There's nothing much set in stone-I'm going for a first estimate so I can see, in practice, what actually looks good when I go for coding. This is going to be a hard concept to balance-If the actives end up too good, people will simply use the active benefits and ignore the passives, and vice-versa. I have no illusions that this'll be perfect the first time.