Class Recommendation for Playstyle?

[Xodarap777]

A long time ago, I played through quite a few hours (15-20?) of this game and I had tried out the Alchemist, as I love a good tank-summoner/wizard. But it hit a wall pretty hard around then, and I think I want to try something more straightforward to level and get the hang of the game, first, then move on to either Alchemist or Necromancer as a summoner-type.

The other kind of character I normally play is a life leecher, either an in-your-face, high-hp warrior-type with some means of leeching life on hit (by percentage if 2H/slow, by chance if fast attacks) - or a dotter-hotter (a DoT+HoT is as good as a leech DoT to me) at a distance, with some tricks (like damage-bubbles/shields or escapes) if surrounded badly enough to outpace the HoTs/leech.

I don't see any (many?) life leech skills. Is there either (a) a warrior who can fight and either self-heal or leech (no real difference, there), or (b) a mage who can self-heal and has enough life to also be generally noob-safe? (I prefer healing over avoidance because I prefer to be able to be stupid sometimes without getting squashed.) Or e.g. does a Thalore + Berserker work better to combine those abilities?

[visage]

I love a good tank-summoner/wizard.

Well, there's a beta in progress for a complete rework of the Necromancer. When that's done, you may want to try the reworked class. Also: Temporal Wardens aren't really wizards, but they're a magical ranged class with really tanky summons, and Annihilator is another ranged class with strong summons.

Is there either (a) a warrior who can fight and either self-heal or leech

Demonologist, Sun Paladin, and Wyrmic can all be played as tanky self-healers. (Really, any tanky class not built around damage-shields has at least a bit of that feel to it thanks to regeneration inscriptions, but those are the ones that most feel that way to me.) If you want to start with a lot of hit points, it's hard to beat Wyrmic (especially Krog Wyrmic). Reaver inherently leeches, but is not actually very tanky in practice.

(b) a mage who can self-heal and has enough life to also be generally noob-safe? (I prefer healing over avoidance because I prefer to be able to be stupid sometimes without getting squashed.)

Most mages in ToME start squishy even if they turn into vast reservoirs of effective hit points later on. However, Oozemancer may fit the bill, here. Paradox Mage may be the actual mage who gets tanky fastest... and they do get quite tanky.

EDIT: a few more thoughts:

a dotter-hotter (a DoT+HoT is as good as a leech DoT to me) at a distance, with some tricks (like damage-bubbles/shields or escapes) if surrounded badly enough to outpace the HoTs/leech.

A perma-stealthed throwing-knives Rogue could fit your DoT+HoT category, but is really dependent on getting a prodigy at lvl25 that's kind of awkward to meet the requirements for.

Cultist of Entropy would be a mage dotter-hotter that ends up very tanky, but starts off really squishy.

...and I'm working on an addon class that'd fit your dots + bubbles + escapes description, but that's not ready for release yet.


Bottom line, based your description, my suggestions in approximately decreasing order:
1) Wyrmic, ideally Krog, for a character that starts with lots of tankiness, only gets more over time, and has some synergies for self-heals.
2) Demonologist, for a tanky character that has a very strong self-heal sustain.
3) Paradox Mage, as probably the tankiest of the mages.
4) Adventurer, because they can do anything you want.

[whitelion]

To add to the above, while it's not exactly healing, paradox mage has a lot of "get out of a bad situation" buttons: Temporal Reprieve to hide for a while and recover, multiple ways to teleport away if things get rough, one of which is instant, Contingency to automatically heal or shield when you get low on health, Time Stop can be used defensively for free turns in an emergency. You can also get a steady stream of small heals from Attenuate. As far as recovering from mistakes, paradox mage is one of the most forgiving classes. Plus paradox mage has a pretty good hp pool for a mage and good damage reduction skills with Reality Smearing and Energy Decomposition.

[Xodarap777]

I had just discovered the trees on Wyrmic and thought them a good fit when I came back here to check on the thread. I see some good self-healing capabilities, some cool Mind tricks, looks like some neat defensive abilities to keep myself alive, and most of all, some elemental resistances.

But I don't know how the game will morph in the teen-levels and twenties, and I have been one-shot even as a Bulwark 14 who I thought was invincible to same-level enemies (okay, I won't think myself invincible again).

I noticed that in general, my barb actually fared better than my bulwark because he killed stuff faster, thereby getting hit less. So if I want a "safe," tanky, self-healing Wyrmic warrior who can also dispatch enemies quickly enough to not have to stand too long in the heat, should I go 2H or shield? What are some good survival skills, especially useful passives for a pretty "lazy" playstyle?

I went Cornac so that I could open up the bottom healing skill tree, but is there a (much) better race pick for safe-and-lazy?

[visage]

I noticed that in general, my barb actually fared better than my bulwark because he killed stuff faster, thereby getting hit less. So if I want a "safe," tanky, self-healing Wyrmic warrior who can also dispatch enemies quickly enough to not have to stand too long in the heat, should I go 2H or shield?

Either is fine, but I'd lean towards saying you should go ahead and use 2H for the extra oomph. (An awful lot of Wyrmic abilities include a shield bash these days, though.)

What are some good survival skills, especially useful passives for a pretty "lazy" playstyle?

For passive / autocast abilities, the Fungus and Harmony categories have plenty of good stuff. Also Icy Skin. For more active defensive options: Ice Wall is amazing; Burrow + Lightning Speed is an excellent escape; and many of your attacks have disabling side-effects.

I went Cornac so that I could open up the bottom healing skill tree, but is there a (much) better race pick for safe-and-lazy?

You unlocked Harmony at level 1? That helps with your survivability early on, but in the long term that's a wasted category point -- you'll get that category unlocked eventually without needing to spend anything on it. A better choice would be to spend that category point on another inscription, or on Survival, or to have gone with a different race. Personally, given your focus on early-game surivability and a lazy playstyle, I'd recommend going with Krog -- starting with Antimagic helps a lot on that front, and Krog racials are excellent. Another race with useful passive/autocast defensive abilities is Dwarf.

[mckwack]

Another race with useful passive/autocast defensive abilities is Dwarf.

This.

I'm playing a Dwarf Wyrmic at the moment.

It has a horrible build, as I originally intend to use this character to unlock Cryomancer (1 million of cold damage, oh my.. ) and Krog both (Antimagic, anyone? ). I decided to go shield-bashing instead of 2H-assaulting for the same reason visage mentioned already (lots of Wyrmic skills that also attack using shield). Not to mention that I used to play Bulwark before, so shield-bashing is something I'm used to already.

Surprisingly, it's quite tanky, as long as you remember to use the shield skills from time to time to complement the drake-related skills. Also got lucky and saved the Defiler escort twice to help unlock the Psionic / Feedback tree and even got a bonus point in Resonance Field early for extra damage mitigation (PS on escorts: use your Nature's Touch on them whenever they're dangerously close to dying).

So far I managed to clear all T1 and T2 dungeons and most of the vaults within without much problem (leaving only 1 'Giant Citadel' in Daikara), with the Weirdling Beast of Yiilkgur posing the only problem so far.. all without dying even once.. (usually I died at least once or twice while fighting the Weirdling Beast, even on Normal).

Nothing to write home so far actually, just want to confirm visage's post that Dwarf Wyrmic might be quite the 'lazy playstyle' you're looking for.

[Xodarap777]

I ended up going Thalore for the regen heal-mod thingy, but I guess mostly for flavor. Just figuring out the game.

I got to level 16, and I like it okay, I ended up going kind of "jack of all trades" and have a ton of breath abilities to always have something off cooldown, then put points into the self-heal ability and the big confusion wave ability.

Then I started to wonder if Sun Paladin might be more what I'm looking for. I rolled up a dwarf SP to play around with, but at this stage, he kills stuff so slowly that his defensiveness is moot.