New Afflicted Class: Broken

[Seian Verian]

So, while laying around, I got a random idea that I think might be sort of interesting. What if there was a class who revolved around things simply degrading around them? Or at least, that being a major component of it. Things simply fall apart around them. They may not simply fall apart before their eyes, but slowly but surely, everything becomes dust before them, worn away. They cannot hold relationships, for those they are close to become sick or critically injured within a matter of weeks at best. In combat, those affected by their aura might take more damage from attacks, detrimental effects might have extended durations and greater power, and at advanced levels they might even rapidly decay while within the Broken's aura.

Perhaps it could use both Hate and Paradox, actually, the degradation being connected to the ravages of time as well?

[snoop]

I like it. There's no "corrupted/evil" version of Chronomancy yet, this would fit in nicely. So I'd push that aspect of it. Hate and Paradox as the resources, doing Temporal and Blight damage.

[Zonk]

Sounds a bit like the regular Cursed with a somewhat altered Gloom aura to me, though. Not sure Paradox is a good fit, considering how...odd the resource is.

Perhaps this might work best as a new tree that relies on improving your Gloom significantly? Level 10+ tree, requires you to have Gloom first.

Edit: you might add some limitation in that you CANNOT turn this 'extra gloom'off, unlike the regular one..which would make travelling summonable allies and escorts well...awkard. Which might be fitting.

[Sirrocco]

I am totally a fan of giving the Cursed back their ability to kill things by standing nearby.

On the flip side, a non-ally-friendly constant AOE that you cannot turn off is gamebreaking in bad ways. Among other things, you can never talk to NPCs again - getting close to them will hurt them, and cause them to be hostile and thus nontalkable.

For that matter, having a non-ally-friendly aoe as a sustain that you might forget to turn off is also bad news - it's far too easy to forget to turn it off, and hork yourself over pretty badly while wandering around town. Suggestion would be to make it so that allies in the field cause your hate to drop rapidly, as you strain to keep your aura from assaulting them.

[Zonk]

I
On the flip side, a non-ally-friendly constant AOE that you cannot turn off is gamebreaking in bad ways. Among other things, you can never talk to NPCs again - getting close to them will hurt them, and cause them to be hostile and thus nontalkable.

For that matter, having a non-ally-friendly aoe as a sustain that you might forget to turn off is also bad news - it's far too easy to forget to turn it off, and hork yourself over pretty badly while wandering around town. Suggestion would be to make it so that allies in the field cause your hate to drop rapidly, as you strain to keep your aura from assaulting them.

Can't disagree with that - but it sounded like a way to make the class fit more with the OP's concept, and thus more extreme than the regular Cursed. One way to make it work would be to make it weakened and not-cause hostility(so just debuffs rather than actual damage), but still be noticeable. And ideally, discussion text changes, but that's a lot of work.

[HousePet]

Agent of Entropy.

Age Manipulation would fit well.

[Faeryan]

Interesting idea. Just remember to take the sheer killing power of Cursed away from this class making it rely more on the degrading effects to deal with stuff.
Maybe it could have close ties to some specific weapon type to make it stray away from Cursed playstyle a bit more, for example mindstars to strengthen the effect or range of the effects.

[Sirrocco]

You could go with some sort of "their touch brings only destruction" thing and make them an unarmed class. It's the only weapon type other than exotics that doesn't have a significant number of users.

I remember an idea I had a while back about a grappling-focused Hate-based character who was big on slapping crippling effects via attacking grabbed opponents, and who had a gloomlike aura that would spread those same effects to any enemies under the gloom. That might fit in reasonably well - "Even my touch kills and destroys - and I wish to use this to defeat my enemies" seems like the sort of thing that might work really well with a grapple focus.

Actually, one way to do it would be to have the Gloom radius apply various debuffs and damage effects - and have those be significantly intensified in power and likelihood on any grabbed enemies.

[The Revanchist]

Having a generic gloom, a secondary gloom, and a melee/grapple supergloom?

What sort of gloom boost is that? +30 to all Gloom effects?

[Sirrocco]

Oooh - I've got a shiny idea for a schtick. The Broken can hold back the destructive power of their aura for short periods - but only by turning it on themselves. General aura damage is ally-friendly, but the Broken takes damage for every ally int he aura (and also gains Hate, because that stuff *hurts*. Having aura damage (both to enemies and to the Broken themselves) be hate-based might be appropriate as well.

[Gatewalker]

I would LOVE another unarmed class, it being an Afflicted would both make sense and be really fun I think. Not sure what specifics to suggest, but I think the "their touch brings only destruction" or entropy angles could work for doing their damage through DoT effects rather then big hits.

[overgoat]

It would be neat to have another class that used gestures. My doomed don't get in melee enough to really use it.