Priest?

[Zaive]

I don't really have any ideas beyond healing, healing and more healing, but it's a rather basic class, I'm kinda surprised there isn't one yet.
Although, the uses of a normally supportive class going solo probably aren't that great, but it's in all the other TOME games.

[teachu2die]

different priest classes for the various valar (as in tome 2) could work well. priests definitely don't have to be all about healing...

[Taxorgian]

I don't really have any ideas beyond healing, healing and more healing, but it's a rather basic class, I'm kinda surprised there isn't one yet.
Although, the uses of a normally supportive class going solo probably aren't that great, but it's in all the other TOME games.

The other ToME games are really descendants of Angband (or Z). T4 really isn't one of those, so it doesn't inherit the priests that Vanilla has.
And who exactly would be worshiping in the Fourth Age? The elves know the Valar are as distant as they ever have been. Humans? Let's think how they would perceive the Valar:

• They never allowed any true human to see them, ever. Unless you are part-elf, they show no obvious interest.

• The last time, millennia ago, that Men tried to seek them, they were rewarded by the genocide at Numenor.

• The great "help" they sent recently? A nut in the woods named Rad-something, two people who vanished immediately to parts unknown, this joker who changes clothes every hundred years or so and bosses people like King Aragorn around, oh! and Saruman! What a great help HE was. Oh, and I forgot, some big bird.

[darkgod]

Not very fond of the Valar are you taxo ?
Although I tend to agree they acted as total asses when mankind was concerned :/

As for a priest class, I am not sure what kind of new thing they bring to the table since mages can cure/heal.
Also the gods are indeed very remote

[Kemsha]

They could be more defensive and survivers

Off the top of my head:

Healing strike: Each hit heals you x hp's (more if activated, less if sustained?)
Divine strike: Big hit(light dmg?) and big heal
Holy word: area blind+stun+confuse
Righteous Path: Beam -> light damage and knockback
Divine Intervention: Automatic heal if damage takes the player to less than... 10%? (long cooldown obviously)

I'm sure you guys can come up with more thoughts, I think it could work. Sword & shield if more combat oriented, staves if more fragile

Maybe somehow we discover that the Valar have not forgot us (thus unlocking the class)
They could send a priest to help on a specially difficult quest.
I haven't gone very far on the latest releases so I don't really know the latter dungeons but maybe on one of them, if the player is very hurt there's a 1% chance that a priest appears to help?

[mirrizin]

I think one major issue would be defining the way that mages and priests derive their "energy" (mana, force, prayer, whathaveyou.) There's a danger in making them wizards who depend on prayer rather than mana (superficial stuff.) A priest (speaking as someone who's thinking of becoming a protestant pastor IRL) should be in some senses the exact opposite of a magician. Priests depend on external resources (other-power) rather than internal ones (self-power.) Maybe in that vein, if we're running on a "Mana" system, make their "mana" dependent on external acts rather than passively cultivated via "resting." I think there was something like this in TOME 2, though it was somewhat awkward and I wouldn't blame darkgod for thinking it not worth the effort.

Another idea would be having game-enforced conducts (think NetHack)...say, a bonus against slaying undead but with some kind of "Do not kill wild animals" rule. Given that TOME depends a lot on killing things (moreso than NetHack,) this might be hard to arrange, but may be possible. Not so much a flat "Slay that bear and DIE" as a penalty for X number bears slain. The Old Forest would clearly be a no-go zone for druidic types...

I think (perhaps biased by being a religious sort) that there's more potential in a "priest" class than the old school D&D "token healer" role. What exactly defines the priest isn't so much a desire to heal (crusaders, anyone?) but a sense of telos or goal.

Instead of making priests a mechanical class, perhaps make them more an ethical school, less a matter of being and more of doing. Find certain behaviors that modify the game that, if one takes them on as a conduct, add certain benefits and also certain limitations.

Those are just some ideas. Make of them what you will.

[Gwai]

Thought about while talking to mirrizin as he was posting: Perhaps instead of a class a set of skills. Access to those skills is given as a reward for fulfilling a particular hard conduct for a while where each breaking of the conduct deletes "points" and following the conduct for a while gives a few. Perhaps the skill sets could differ depending on the conduct followed.