Curse

Mercury Angel · Feb 15, 2006, 11:49 PM // 23:49

Intro:
Yes! Another epic bard thread to regale you for ages, and fill you with mirth and laughter!
While actually a repeat in that sense, though the names are the same, each suggestion for a bardic profession in the past has been a bit different in each iteration. And while a rose by any other name might smell as sweet, anything called a rose would not necessarily. In short, though they bear the same name, their differences make them unique.

My Bardic profession was created because I was... Well, I've been really pumping out the creative works lately, and that's what caused this.

So, without further ado...

===
Bard:

The bard is a strange character; Born of necessity, cultivated by harsh city life. In order to get by from day to day, a bard must learn to be part thief, part fighter, and part musician. A bard's most noble talent is their ability to memorize and sing, while they earn their label as 'riffraff' from their underhanded fighting techniques, picked up from street brawls. While travelling, they weild crossbows to defend themselves.

Primary Attribute:
Vocalization - Increases range of AoE skills by 3% per point
Through long practice and mastery of voice techniques, the Bard has learned to project their voice farther away than anyone else, making their shouts, songs, and encantations that much more effective.

Developer's Note: Primary attributes are generally supposed to be flexible so that the profession can do other things with it, like Expertise or Fast Casting, but also to enhance the own profession's skills. Seeing as one of the main things we want our bard to do is sing, we have this to increase the range of their songs, enabling them to catch more enemies or allies in them.
As to questions of balance for other skills from other professions, you have to bear in mind that to use this, it means giving up a superior rune, a headgear, and whatever primary attribute skills that profession would normally have.
So an Earthquaking Bard could knockdown a larger area, but the Exhaustion would seriously crimp their style, as opposed to an Earthquaking Elementalist.

Secondary Attributes:

Crossbow Mastery - Increases damage with a Crossbow and the chance of a critical hit.
Crossbow skills go here, silly. That's all there is to it.

Song Mastery - No Inherent Effect.
Various bardic songs fit in here. See below for the explanation of their mechanics.

Street Brawling -
Mainly touch range lesser control skills exist here.

Song Mechanics:
A song is similar to a maintained enchantment, in that there is an icon indicating that it is in use, and a loss of a pip of energy regen. A song can not normally be removed, but ends if the singer has no remaining energy and negative energy regeneration, if they are knocked down, or if they die. A singer can only maintain a single song at a time.

Crossbow Statistics:
There is only one crossbow type, with various skins.
Damage: 15-20
Refire Rate: 1.75 seconds
Range: 60
Flight Time: .6 seconds

===
Sample/Concept Skills:

Vocalization-

Resounding Echo - 5 en, 0 cast, 15 recharge
Skill
For the next 5+(X/2) seconds, the next time one of your skills is interrupted by an opponent, it recharges immediately and only costs 3+(3X/4) less Energy to cast (Minimum of 3 Energy).

Soothing Words - 10 en, 1 cast, 10 recharge
Skill
Target foe loses 1+(X/2) strikes of adrenaline.

Distracting Shout - 15 en, 0 cast, 25 recharge
Shout
Nearby foes are interrupted, and their skills take an additional 1+(2X/3) seconds to recharge.

Voice Projection {E}- 10 en, 3/4th cast, 15 recharge
Elite Enchantment
For the next 5+(X/2) seconds, target other ally is enchanted with Voice Projection. Your range for targeted spells is now that ally's instead. If you are out of range of yourself at any time, this enchantment ends immediately.

Crossbow Mastery -

Envenomed Bolt - 10 en, 15 recharge
Crossbow Attack
If Envenomed Bolt successfully strikes target foe, that foe is poisoned for 3+(3X/4) seconds.

Repeating Shot - 5 en, 1 recharge
Crossbow Attack
If Repeating Shot successfully strikes target foe, if the next skill you use is Repeating Shot, you deal an additional 5+(X/2) damage. If Repeating Shot fails to hit target foe in combat, Repeating Shot is disabled for 20 seconds.

Triple Shot - 10 en, 8 recharge
Crossbow Attack
Fire 3 bolts at target foe simultaneously. Each bolt has a 66-(2X)% chance to miss.

Rapid Fire {E} - 25 en, 1 cast, 20 recharge
Elite Crossbow Preparation
For the next 8+(3X/4) seconds, whenever you strike a foe with a bolt successfully, your attack speed is increased by 10%, up to a maximum of 50%. All of your attacks have a 15-(2X/3)% chance to miss. If you fail to strike a foe in combat, Rapid Fire ends.

Song Mastery -

Battle Hymn - 15 en, 45 recharge, 1 energy regen to maintain
Song
All nearby allies gain 1+(X/4) AL, deal an additional 1+(X/8) damage in combat, and have an extra 3% chance to deal a critical hit.

Requiem of Shadows {E} - 15 en, 45 recharge, 1 energy regen to maintain
Elite Song
Whenever a creature in the area is killed, allies in the area gain 10+(8X/3) health and 1+(X/8) energy.

Winter's Nocturne - 15 en, 45 recharge, 1 energy regen to maintain
Song
All attacks by nearby allies deal Cold damage and deal an additional 1+(X/3) Cold damage. Adjacent foes take 1+(X/8) Cold damage each second.

Aria of Lightning- 15 en, 45 recharge, 1 energy regen to maintain
Song
All attacks by nearby allies deal Lightning damage and have an additional 1+(X/3)% armor penetration.

Wildfire Sonata - 15 en, 45 recharge, 1 energy regen to maintain
Song
All attacks by nearby allies deal Fire damage and have a 5+(4X/3)% chance to set the target on foe for 3 seconds.

Quicksand Minuet {E} - 15 en, 45 recharge, 1 energy regen to maintain
Elite Song
All attacks by allies in the area deal Earth damage and enemies struck by their attacks have a 5+(7X/4)% chance to move 15% slower for 3 seconds.

Street Brawling -

Misstep - 10 en, 3/4th cast, 12 recharge
Skill.
Touch target foe. For the next 3 seconds, if target foe attempts to attack, that foe takes 12+(3X) damage and is knocked down instead.

Taunt - 10 en, 20 recharge
Skill
You and target foe move 15% faster for up to 4+(X/2) seconds. If that foe is ever outside of the area of your location, that foe is knocked down and Taunt ends.* This skill has half the normal range.

Note: A shorter summary - If target is not in the area anymore, they are knocked down. In the area being a range classification.

Toe Stomp - 15 en, 3/4th cast, 20 recharge
Skill
Touch target foe to deal 13+(2X) physical damage and inflict Crippled for 1+(X) seconds.

Eye Gouge {E} - 5 en, 3/4th cast, 10 seconds
Skill
Touch target foe to deal 12+(3X) physical damage and inflict Blindness for 8 seconds.

===
Short concept explanation:

Ok, since there's been a bit of a misconception about how I'm presenting this Bard class variant, I'd like to explain it a little better as its taken shape. (Though it isn't as I had initially planned it.)

This Bard is basically what a Ranger would be if instead of living a naturalistic life, they grew up in poor cities, scrimping to make it by.
Ok, picture a ranger, and we'll say he's male for the sake of gender specificity.
This bard wanders from city to city to be able to earn the money and food he needs to live each day, consuming what he has to until finally people bore of him, and moving on with the rest to his next destination.
The people tell stories of musicians and singers who performed for kings and queens, who always had money, and their pick of even courtiers with lesser titles.
But the reality is, they treat him like dirt. He's just a no-good ragamuffin who is unfit for an honest day's work, in their eyes. All he can do is beggar himself out on the streets, and they toss him coins and bread not for his superb performances, but out of pity.
After a hard day's performing, he finds he hasn't eaten nearly as much as he should, so he has to resort to common thievery, sweet talking people with money and picking their pockets. Sometimes this turns into a street brawl. Or maybe that day, the other performers and beggers became envious of his earnings, or just didn't like strangers taking away their business, and he needed to teach them a thing or two.
On the roads to different cities, monsters pop up here and there, such as annoying devourerers, and thus he had to quickly learn a weapon trade if he wanted to be able to travel.

Street Skills wasn't orginally brawling. It was going to encompass some more interesting and unique skills, such as scrambling the weapons a player has equipped, but in the end... Such things are more complicated and less effective than they're worth. Thus, rather than the wisdom founded on the streets, it's the fighting style picked up in the cities by the lower class.
===
Edit: Fixxed typos, added clarification to some skills, and elited Shadow Requiem.
2nd Edit: Renamed Street Skills to Street Brawling
3rd Edit: Added concept explanation

Rogmar · Feb 16, 2006, 12:06 AM // 00:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mercury Angel

And while a rose by any other name might smell as sweet

Romeo and Juliet

I like this idea as its an innovative class that's different from the rest, like the difference from an Ele spellcaster and a Mesmer.
I don't think the song should suffer the -1 energy pip penalty as that is what they bring to the table that is new. But the song thing would be something that could not be removed and affects all party members, allies and minions. Maybe a skill like "Projected Voice" that lets only Bardic songs to come through and disables all shouts in the area. As for crossbow...I'm not big on these class things but that doesn't sound like it goes together.

benmanhaha · Feb 16, 2006, 12:09 AM // 00:09

I like it. I don't understand why a bard needs street skills though. But I guess I'm probably thinking of more medeval bards, the steroetype. I like the skills but I don't understand the whole 3+(x+4/5). Does the / stand for division? Any way, I also think distracting shout should be elite. That skill could really do alot of damage to an ele spiking team. I also don't get voice projection. Does it mean that the ally has your range for aoe? And how can you be out of range of yourself? That one blows my mind. Its an out of body experience.

But overall I really like this class. I think we really need a class that has a lot of buffs. I must say you have a flair for class write ups.

Mercury Angel · Feb 16, 2006, 12:15 AM // 00:15

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rogmar

Romeo and Juliet

I like this idea as its an innovative class that's different from the rest, like the difference from an Ele spellcaster and a Mesmer.
I don't think the song should suffer the -1 energy pip penalty as that is what they bring to the table that is new. But the song thing would be something that could not be removed and affects all party members, allies and minions. Maybe a skill like "Projected Voice" that lets only Bardic songs to come through and disables all shouts in the area. As for crossbow...I'm not big on these class things but that doesn't sound like it goes together.

Yeah, the energy degen mechanic was kind of thrown in there, and on a 4 pip regen class, though I failed to mention that, that would line them up with rangers, which is why I'm really feeling like I've trod on Ranger's toes, due to the high similarity of the crossbow.

Bards are traditionally less-skilled archers, and the crossbow was used in the history because it took less time to train people to use them. Thus, I thrusted a crossbow into their hands, gave it a faster attack rate than any bow, dropped its range and damage, and left it at that.

The problem is, there's really not much to choose from to stick them with. The other options would be to hand them a dagger, staff, or musical instrument. The first of which would allow them a focus from a secondary profession, the second of which just doesn't fit the skills, and the last of which would be... um... a bit disturbing as an actual weapon.

But yes, once again, I have to say that the crossbow was the least preferrable of all of the attributes.

Edit: I was a bit slow!

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