PlaneShift
Gameplay => General Discussion => Topic started by: Kiva on June 11, 2003, 12:22:35 am
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Wizards and Paladins... Two classes, along with many others in this big world, full of RPGs, fantasy stories, etc. But what is it that makes a spellcaster able to call himself a wizard? What is it that makes a swordfighter able to call himself a paladin? I\'ll try and answer that question with my ideas, thoughts and experience, mixed with a bit of imagination. :)
[Note - These ideas are also ideas for PlaneShift] :)
Imagine the middle-age life. A peasant and his family sending out their younges son in search for a better life. That is usually where many middle-age games start. Maybe not with the peasant family and you might not happen to be a son, but you just start as a nobody, and with nothing. Here, it would be stupid to say that you are either a wizard or paladin, nor anything else. Those are titles you have to earn. So, what is the most obvious thing to do? Well, if it is just a game, you would of course set out to kill some monsters, find items to sell and make some coins, but how?
Most people know how to swing a sword. It\'s not really that difficult. Just grab it, and go crazy, hitting the monster as hard as possbile. That\'s where your walk down the warriors road start. You kill and you grow stronger. However, one day you meet 1) a tall man dressed in a shiny white robe or 2) a tall knight wearing a golden armor or 3) a completely diffrent person. This is where the first breakpoint is.
Model #1
. . . . . . . . . . . . ---- Spellcaster
. . . . . . . . . . . /
Peasant --------- Paladin
. . . . . . . . . . . \\
. . . . . . . . . . . . ---- Other Class
[The point with the story so far is - You don\'t start out either as a paladin, wizard or something else. You earn the title.]
Choosing to follow one of these men/women (depending on whoever you meet), you become an apprentice, doing jobs for them, and in return, they share their experience. The paladin might need you on a quest, therefor he has to train you in the art of healing and fighting as it is what paladins do. Already now, your path has changed and you\'re moving towards becoming a paladin, or maybe the wizard lets you read his magic books, so you gain knowledge in the magic arts, that you practice and master.
However, if we look at a book which I suppose everyone has read (if they haven\'t, they should do it), it is possible for me to say that becoming a warrior is definately easier than becoming a spellcaster. In the book Lord of the Rings, we meet a total of three wizards, but how many warriors? Many... I\'m saying this as it would be more realistic, even for fantasy games/stories to keep wizards and spellcasters at a limited amount, so meeting one is like meeting a celebrity of some kind, just as it is seen in the LotR movie (I love the idea about Gandalf being a special person just because he\'s a wizard).
Now that you are still young and learning, it is up to the master to decide whether or not you are ready to go out in the world to make a name of yourself, do quests on your own, etc. So let\'s just pretend that we\'re following a newly trained paladin who has just parted with his master, in search for glory. The paladin still has much to learn so he decides to do some quests for the local townspeople, in order to earn the peoples trust, and to get some fame, or maybe the young paladin goes to the King\'s castle and joins the royal army and becomes a knight.
[A new breakpoint - The paladin/wizard departs with the trainer in order to search for the better life I was talking about in the beginning]
Model #2
. . . . . . . . . . . . ---- Other
. . . . . . . . . . . /
Paladin ------------- Knight
. . . . . . . . . . . \\
. . . . . . . . . . . . ---- Paladin
. . . . . . . . . . . . ---- Wizard
. . . . . . . . . . . /
Wizard ------------- Healer/Priest
. . . . . . . . . . . \\
. . . . . . . . . . . . ---- Other
Now, by looking at the two models, it is easy to get an idea of how I think it should all be. Not just some \"Create Character\" - I w4ntz t0 b w1ZzaRd - \"Class Wizzard\" and then you know already enough to start spelling monsters. However, as I stated somewhere earlier, the amount of wizards is to be kept a big deal smaller than the amount of other types, which is done as I explained, by the use of restricted training. Old people train a few new people, and the amount grows slowly as the amount of new people to the game grows, or it could in some way be done like with Star Wars Galaxies. If there\'s a game which has a class that\'s hard to become, it would be SWG. Getting to be a Jedi isn\'t really easy. Only very few have what it takes, and I\'m not talking skill-wise or stats-wise, it\'s something when you create your character, you have a 0.1% chance of having The Force, but first you gotta realise that you have The Force, and then you gotta find another Jedi who actually wants to train you and stuff... Anywho I\'m running off track here...
Now - Of course the wizard can tend to use a sword as well as his magics, therefor transforming him into a Battlemage, he could go by the ways of religion and be a Healer/Priest, he could just stay a Wizard, or he could turn into something completely diffrent, which would be very dumb because learning all those spells would\'ve been a waste then... Of course, the wizard could also decide to join the royal army and become a royal wizard, however that isn\'t usual as real wizards tend to be travellers and not puppets who obey orders from a silly general ( pff :D ).
Anywho, I might add some more at some other time, but it\'s getting late now, and I have to get up early tomorrow. Anywho, I hope you enjoyed reading the lot, but if it was just one big mess then tell me... I sometimes have trouble getting the ideas on my mind written down... :D Well, that\'s all for now, so take care everyone. :P
[To make a long post short - Nothing should be picked at character creation except appearances, race, name and all that yidder. Everyone should start out as equals and develop their character along the way instead of when it is created.]
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That\'s a very interesting post but I don\'t agree with a certain amount of things.
First, your definition of a palladin. For me, he\'s someone affiliated to an organisation (church, guild or local king) and do the best he can to serve it. For example, try to avoid the darkness (or goodness for evil palladins), command army of his king during battles, ...
It\'s a sort of affiliated fighter who can have a few others capacity like healing (given by his god) but not necessary.
The other point I disagree is the necessary of a trainer. We\'ve some examples of self-learning palladins or wizards (more difficult). I think of thoses two as jobs, nothing else ... and do you know someone who do the same job all his life ?
Ok, just back a few. In planeshift, magic is everywhere. Now, magic seems very marvelous but not in this universe because it\'s something natural, like water or animals. As you can use water to produce electricity, you can use magic to make light.
If gandalf is a really fantastic character it\'s just because it\'s needed in the story (must I remember you that in lotr, no human can do magic).
But I agree that the number of wizards must be limited by a natural way, like making them not to strong or rendering the magic really long and difficult to learn.
It\'s important every job is attractive to egalize the number of each one in the game.
I hope you will answer to have a good speak on this ;-)
P.S. : I\'ve seen you\'re not putting the quests on the planeshift bible but will you put some other type of help like where to found an item, what\'s needed to smith something ? I hope not, this will destroy every attempt to enhance roleplaying.
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Evil Paladins? Never heard of such a thing.
The original Paladins were the holy knights who fought in the name of god. It was simply priests who, instead of spread the word in a peaceful way, picked up a weapon and with great bravery and knowledge spread the religion.
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That\'s right in the historical form (which is a bit borring in a game). But in a more AD&D form, there are evil palladins which are exactly the opposite like the sith in star wars.
For example, if a palladin has an aura of luck, the evil(dark) palladin has an aura of bad luck, he can inflict damage by touch and other things ...
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Umm I suppose you\'re referring to the \"Death Knights\" from Warcraft3...
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I like your ideas Grono. I think that you shouldnt just pick a class, and then go out slashing. Perhaps you should only start with a training sword/staff/dagger/whatever. Then you go to some sort of academy, and once you complete your training, you get a basic sword/staff/dagger/whatever.
Umm, am I just talking jibberish? Im kinda tired...
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They are actually called anti-paladins. They are pretty much like death knights only they are alive.
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Yes, but the death-knights doesn\'t have to be dead. Arthas wasn\'t undead, he was cursed. 8)
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Originally posted by Fanomatic2000
Yes, but the death-knights doesn\'t have to be dead. Arthas wasn\'t undead, he was cursed. 8)
Didnt he become undead? I mean.. he looks kinda scary..
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Yes, but that\'s because he pulled out the cursed sword \"Frostmourne\". The sword ate his soul and therefore he went mad.
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I know all about that.. but lets get ontopic instead. Start a w3-topic if u want to discuss it.
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We are not having classes at all in this game.
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I\'m only using \"classes\" for people to have something to relate to... I mean, any decent mmorpg player knows that a battlemage / tank mage is some high-dex mage capable of taking a bunch of hits and still attack, and a wizard is someone who relies fully on spells and nothing else... And even though there wont be implemented specific classes in PS, they\'ll be there no matter what you say or do.
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Isnt a mage or wizard who combines magic with physical fighting called an archmage or something like that?
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No, archmages are exeptionally powerful mages. Mages who fight are called battlemages, spellswords, or warlocks (my favorite name :) )
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Anyways, back onto topic, the problem with what your saying in the way life progresses is that you cant start a game as a very young teen, it would make no sence. How many games actually have age as a factor in them? Not very many. However what your saying has some point to it. It needs a little modifying but it could work pretty well.
During life you as a person and the people around pretty much have some idea where there going. Also the family they grew up in also is a large factor in what they want to become. ie. you want to be a doctor so you study a bit of biology, you want to be a lawyer you take law, your dad was in the army so during your entire life you looked up to him and wanted to be just like him. This isnt always true but these are just examples. So what im saying it have a few basic classes and the ability to pick from these classes.
Say warrior, mystic, and priest. Seem narrow? Really they arent. A warrior can become many things, he can find the light of god, become a theif, work for a king ect. The Mystic studies magic, he can aproach magic from many basic angles, be it nature, or holy, or even a dark art. The priest belives religion is the key, he perhaps feels that it is his duty to protect the word of god becoming a monk or even a paladin, he may feel he should preach the word and have god cover his back. The fact of the matter is, if you allow a character to branch 2 many times you get a mest up game unless properlly balance.
Here is an example. Lets say were playing mikes magic rpg of doomp, and pertend were a wizard. Throughout each level i keep gaining newer and newer spells from a variety of things. In the end i have all the spells in the game and can kill most monsters in under 3 hits.
Now think of the logic in this, who, in there right mind, and being human, would have enough time to study every form of magic, be it in the art of nature, the light or holy arts, the dart arts and so far. Perhaps what would happen is that you feel the art of nature is more of what you like best. So you start studying the basic fundamentals of it. You learn some basic spells from all forms of nature, water, ice, rock, lightning and so forth. Then you realize, wow, i really like how lightning works, so you begin to study the lightning form of nature magic, as study you learn powerful and powerful spells of these and the spells you allready know get more and more useful and stronger. No spell would be useless to you because whats the point of even making a useless spell? (ie diablo II, uhg some of the skills/spells, totally no point in having singleplayer or b.net).
Now the name mystic still applys to you but you are so much more, you are extremely skilled in the art of nature in the form of lightning. Sure, you come upon a monster who is immune to lightning in all shapes and forms, but there is where the \"P A R T Y\" system is usefull. It allows players to specialize and work together as a team.
As for a warrior, you belive that strength, your wits, and your will, in all situations will bring you through. Its a cruel world and if you cant stand up for yourself no one is going to. But lets say the whole \"law thing\" just aint working for you. You beging to not listen to anyone, look out for only yourself, steal things, you become in a sence a \"petty\" thug. Whether you continue down this path or not, it doesnot matter, what matters is the skills you learnt from doing this stick with you, so if you develope them further you become more of a skilled thief than a petty thug.
Well as you can see the whole \"class change\" thing really doesnt apply to this. YOU develope your character as in how YOU would think YOUR character would act in the game. You wana be a thief? Steal! You wana study magic? Study magic for gods sake! Belive in god? Become a priest!
Not saying that each basic \"class\" (warrior, mystic, priest) should be allowed to perform certain actions. It should actually be encouraged. How many mystic theives do you think there are? (well none now but its not a question to be answered :p) problem is there is almost no oppertunity to do that in any games that i know of prolly some. What im actually saying is that being a warrior gives u the bonus of starting with the basic skills to become a theif or a knight, and that the mystic has the basic skills to become a wizard or sorceror or even a druid, and that the priest has the basic skills to become a monk or a paladin or a shawman...
In this way each character can develope his/her own personallity...
Try to make sence of this i know it must be garbled.
And remeber! This is in all entirity \"MY\" opinion.
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Originally posted by Dwin
Isnt a mage or wizard who combines magic with physical fighting called an archmage or something like that?
Like ParaSect said, they are called Warlocks. In PS, I think there are both battle-mages and warlocks, I may be wrong though..
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Anyways, back onto topic, the problem with what your saying in the way life progresses is that you cant start a game as a very young teen, it would make no sence. How many games actually have age as a factor in them?
That\'s the reason this game should have it.
In Anarchy online you started with parents. They took care of you until you were strong enough to leave home, they got killed or you killed them. (!)
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and that is the simple reason why i put the nice little word \"N o t\" and the other nice little word \" V e r y\" and the final even nicer word of them all \" M a n y\'
A thank you
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No reason to be rude. He just didnt see it, could happen to the best of us :).
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Oh, sorry, let me correct that.
Anyways, back onto topic, the problem with what your saying in the way life progresses is that you cant start a game as a very young teen, it would make no sence. How many games actually have age as a factor in them? Not very many.
That\'s the reason this game should have it.
In Anarchy online you started with parents. They took care of you until you were strong enough to leave home, they got killed or you killed them. (!)
Happy now?