New Psionic class: Mimic

[martinuzz]

This class would use it's cunning to adapt to the surroundings, and illusions, mimicry, and the force of it's mind to defeat it's enemies.
Like the Mindslayer, it's primary stats would be Willpower and Cunning
It would start with Telekinetic Grasp, and Beyond the Flesh as well.

It would use the following existing talent trees:

unlocked at birth:
Psionic/Absorbtion (shields)
Psionic/Voracity (leech, insatiable)
Techniques/Combat Training
Cunning/Stealth (Stealth, Shadowstrike, Hide in plain sight, Unseen Actions)

locked at birth:
Psionic/Augmented Mobility (Mindhook, Quick as Thought, Telekinetic Leap, Shattering Charge)
Psionic/Finer Energy Manipulations (Perfect Control, Reshape Weapon, Reshape Armor, Matter is Energy)
Cunning/Survival

New Trees:
unlocked at birth:
Psionic/Mimicry
1) Combat Mimic (semi-sustain)
- target any creature that has STR and DEX as it's primary stats to establish a link
- gain a bonus to your STR and DEX, scaling with talent level, and your WIL and CUN (so the target's actual stat values don't matter, as long as it has STR and DEX as it's primary stats)
- For every turn the link is kept, you gain +3 Physical power, up to a maximum of 15/21/27/33/39
- link is broken whenever the target dies, or the target leaves LOS (think Feed)

2) Spell Mimic (semi-sustain)
- target any creature that has magic as it's primary or secundary stat to establish a link
- as long as the link is active, whenever a spell hits the player, there is a chance that a similar spell will be autocast instantly (without taking a turn) by the player, targeting the target of Spell Mimic
- the reversal spell does mind damage, regardless of the original spell's damage type
- chance increases with Cunning
- for every turn this link is kept active, your Mindpower increases with +3, up to a maximum of 15/18/21/24/27
- reversal spell damage (percent of original spell damage) increases with talent level and Mindpower
- link is broken when target dies, or target leaves LOS

3) Infiltrate (activation)
- target a creature to temporarily change sides to said creature's faction
- all creatures of the same faction that were not targeting you yet will have a chance to treat you as friendly for the duration of the effect
- lasts 2/2/3/3/4 turns
- chance increases with Cunning

4) Shared Grief (sustain)
- whenever a physical or mental status effect is inflicted on you, any creature hitting you in melee will have a chance to get the same status effect inflicted upon it
- the status effects inflicted by this talent will last 1/2/3/4/5 turns longer than the remaining time on your own status effect
- chance increases with Cunning

Psionic/Mindforce
1) Psionic Punch (activation)
- attacks the target for 100% melee damage
- if a weapon, that is wielded telekinetically, hits, it projects a beam of PSI force through the initial target, damaging all who stand behind it
- beam range increases with talent level
- damage increases with Mindpower
- initially does Mind damage. When Attune is sustained, damage type will change whenever the player is hit by any beam or projectile type of damage spell, to that spell's damage type. When Attune is deactivated, damage changes back to Mind
- at level 5, damage type will stick to whatever it's at when Attune is deactivated

2) Attune (sustain)
- while sustained, will allow for the damage type and side effects of your Psionic Punch, Psionic Breath and Psiball talents to be changed
- while sustained, gain resistance to the damage types currently used by Psionic Punch, Psionic Breath and Psiball
- resistance increases with Mindpower
- negates the effects of Illusionary Force (see below)

3) Psionic Breath (activation)
- projects a cone of force in the targeted direction
- initially does Mind damage. If Attune is sustained, damage type will change whenever the player is hit by a cone shaped spell, to that spell's damage type
- damage type will revert to Mind when Attune is de-activated. At skill level 3, damage type will not revert when Attune is de-activated
- at skill level 5, when Attune is sustained, a status effect can be added to the attack, whenever the player is hit by a cone spell that inflicts one. (think Flameshock, Bloodspray, Sand Breath). This effect will remain attached to the attack when Attune is Deactivated
- cone range increases with Talent level
- damage increases with Mindpower

4) Psiball (activation)
- fires a projectile that explodes in a ball of force at the targeted location
- initially does Mind damage. If Attune is sustained, damage type will change whenever the player is hit by an AoE spell, to that spell's damage type
- damage type will revert to Mind when Attune is de-activated. At skill level 3, damage type will not revert when Attune is de-activated
- at skill level 5, when Attune is sustained, a status effect can be added to the attack, whenever the player is hit by an AoE spell that inflicts one (think Bane of Blindness, Circle of Warding, Ice Storm). This effect will remain attached to the attack when Attune is Deactivated
- range increases with Cunning
- ball radius increases with talent level
- damage increases with Mindpower

locked at birth:
Psionic/Illusions
1) Illusionary Wall (activation)
- creates an illusionary wall at targeted location
- enemy creatures cannot see, or target through the wall, but you can
- range increases with Cunning
- duration increases with Mindpower
- cooldown decreases with talent level
- note that blinded creatures firing in a random direction can still shoot through the wall. They only can't see, or target but the wall isn't really there to stop any projectiles from passing

2) Döppelganger (activation)
- switch places with an enemy
- said enemy gains the döppelganger status effect for x turns
- after switching, every creature that is closer to the döppelganger than to you, will target and attack it, as long as it is affected
- range increases with Cunning
- duration increases with talent level and Mindpower

3) True Mimicry (passive)
- removes the need for LOS for Combat Mimic and Spell Mimic. The link now only breaks when the creature dies, or you leave the level
- duration of negative physical effects on you is decreased by x percent when Combat Mimic is active
- duration of negative magical effects on you is decreased by x percent when Spell Mimic is active
- x scales with talent level

4) Illusionary Force (sustain)
- gain resistance penetration for the damage types currently used by Psionic Punch, Psionic Breath and Psiball
- extends Psionic punch to normal, non-telekinetically wielded weapons, albeit at lower damage than the damage added to the psi weapon beam
- is negated when Attune is being sustained
- Psionic Punch damage added to normal weapons increases with talent level
- damage penetration increases with Mindpower

[jotwebe]

The mechanics look pretty good to me.

One thing I'm not sure of is starting out with mind damage and using talents to "upgrade" to the damage type your enemies are using against you. Why would you want to do that? Mind damage is very rarely resisted, I think, while it's common for monsters to resist their main damage types.

Spell Mimic's targeting seems like it could be problematic when the spellcaster is standing close to the mimic and uses an AoE spell it is immune to: the mimic would just hurt itself twice. Maybe the mimic could instead temporarily gain the talent in question at the level it was used or the mimic's level in spell mimic, whichever is lower. The appriate resource would also have be temporarily gained, enough for one casting (with an allowance for fatigue?).

Oh, and it's Doppelgänger, not Döppelganger, unless you're intentionally spelling it differently.

[martinuzz]

The mechanics look pretty good to me.

One thing I'm not sure of is starting out with mind damage and using talents to "upgrade" to the damage type your enemies are using against you. Why would you want to do that? Mind damage is very rarely resisted, I think, while it's common for monsters to resist their main damage types.

Because it also gives you resistances to damage types you 'upgraded' to, when Attune is active, or resistance penetration, with Illusionary force. If Punch, Breath and Ball all have the same damage type, this should give a pretty decent resist / penetration total.
The way I envisioned the class, it would constantly need to strike a balance between offensively preparing the right damage types + status effects for the Mindforce talents for specific dungeons beforehand, and defensively using Attune to gain resists to damage types encountered.

Spell Mimic's targeting seems like it could be problematic when the spellcaster is standing close to the mimic and uses an AoE spell it is immune to: the mimic would just hurt itself twice. Maybe the mimic could instead temporarily gain the talent in question at the level it was used or the mimic's level in spell mimic, whichever is lower. The appriate resource would also have be temporarily gained, enough for one casting (with an allowance for fatigue?).

That would be a situation where you do not want to sustain Spell Mimic. Situational use of a talent isn't that bad. On the other hand, since the returned damage is always Mind, the reversal spell would hurt the target as well as the player, even if the target was immune to the spell's original damage.

Oh, and it's Doppelgänger, not Döppelganger, unless you're intentionally spelling it differently.

Heh, I wasn't sure. I saw both variants on the netz. I picked the one that phonetically sounded the most like the Dutch equivalent, "dubbelganger". I assumed doppelgänger to be an irregular plural of döppelganger. Thanks for correcting me, it's been 15 years since I did exams for the German language.

[Sharzyl]

When I see a Mimic class, I think about spell steal.
You see a spell / ability casted by enemy, now you can use it (there should be a radius limit or the number of spell that can be stolen though to balance this).
What do you think ?