Curse

Giddeanx · Nov 24, 2006, 05:50 PM // 17:50

When I think about class concepts, I come up with an idea and then try to find a purpose for the character. I assembled this list so I would try not to overlap with exsisting characters. I wanted to share and perfect it (with your help) as it may be a useful tool.

Class and Purpose

Warrior-Single Target Melee, Tanking
Assassin(Earth)-Single Target Melee Spiker
Dervish(Holy, Wind, Earth, water)-Multiple Target Melee

Paragon-Mulitiple Target Buffer, Single Target Ranged
Ranger-Single Target Ranged, Area Buffer/DeBuffer

Ritualist(Air)-Single and Multiple Target Buffer, Single Target Spiker (intended use for channeling, hardly put into practice), Minor Healer
Elementalist(Earth, Fire, Air, Water)-Multiple Target Spiker and Debuffer, Single Target Spiker
Mesmer(Chaos)-Single Target Buffer, Single Target Debuffer.
Monk(Holy)-Single and Multiple Target Buffer, Major Healer, Single Target Spiker
Necromancer(Shadow)-Single Target Debuffer, Single Target Spiker, Tanking (via Minions)

lyra_song · Nov 24, 2006, 07:27 PM // 19:27

Dont forget Necromancers maybe?

Necromancers - Shutdown, Corpse Control,

actionjack · Nov 24, 2006, 08:16 PM // 20:16

wonderful list
very helpful

rabbitXcore · Nov 25, 2006, 03:18 AM // 03:18

Quote:

Originally Posted by lyra_song

Dont forget Necromancers maybe?

Necromancers - Shutdown, Corpse Control,

An MM can also be used as a bufferer if they can put enough junk on the field.

Giddeanx · Nov 25, 2006, 03:42 AM // 03:42

Darn I knew forgot something. Your right necro is tricky to place. Ill update you decide if it is correct.

rabbitXcore · Nov 25, 2006, 04:56 AM // 04:56

I think everything's pretty okay but each person will disagree slightly because there are many variations of what any given class can do. This is a good general outline of what the MAIN purposes are though and i think you should make that clear. This is by no meens a total sum of any given classes usage merely what the class was designed for and a few inovations that GW has allowed through the newer chapters.

lyra_song · Nov 25, 2006, 05:29 AM // 05:29

well think about specialties of the various attributes:

Warrior:
Strength - Survivability, Offensive Stances
Swordsmanship / Axe - Spiking, Conditions
Hammer - Knockdown
Tactics - Self/Group Buffs, Heals, Defensive Stances

Ranger:
Expertise - Defensive stances, Utility Skills
Beastmastery - Pet attacks, Nature Spirits
Marksmanship - Bow Attacks
Wilderness Survival - Traps, Survival Stances, Healing, Spirits

Mesmer:
Fast Cast - Um...duh
Illusion - Anti Non-Caster (warrior, ranger, etc)
Domination - Anti-Caster
Inspiration - Energy management

Necromancer:
Soul Reaping - Energy Management
Blood Magic - Direct Damage, Self healing, Wells
Death Magic - Corpse control (teleportation, minions, wells)
Curses - Shutdown, Degen hexes, Self healing

Monk:
Divine Favor - Increases effectiveness of healing
Protection - Buffs, damage mitigation
Heal - Direct healing
Smiting - AoE Direct damage, single direct damage

Elementalist
Energy Storage - Energy management
Fire - Aoe damage
Water - Movement hexes
Earth - Wards, damage
Air - Single Spike damage

Made In Ascalon · Nov 25, 2006, 07:35 AM // 07:35

With ritualists, I don't believe you thought about spirits such as pain/bloodsong. Also, ones such as wanderlust/dissonance/dissenchantment should can't as debuffers.

I think it's pointless to fit classes into cookie cutters. It doesn't matter what they do, so much as how they do it.

System_Crush · Nov 25, 2006, 10:55 AM // 10:55

Nice list, but asking individual players you might come with less used builds, I have a necro backup healer(blood Fountain) for instance if I can't go MM for some reason(only works as N/Rt).

Mesmers can be single target spikers(-10 health degen = 22 damage per second, plus energy burn-archane echo-energy surge allow them to spike)

necros can be multiple target debuffers/spikers SS and burdon of fear and many curses.

Ritualists have spirites such as wanderlust, and shadow song that allow them to be debuffers(not really on multiple targets)

also Interupter is a entire function in itself, and its reserved for mesmers and rangers mainly.

Heres my list, it relies on oldfasioned MMO Archetypes, its a bit basic so yours is more likely to be usefull, but I'm still hoping to be of help to someone.

Tank
- Warrior
- Minion Master
DD melee
- Warrior
- Assasin
- Toucher Assin/necro/ele(/mesmer)
- Dervish
Pet Class
- Beastmastery Ranger
- Smiting Monk Pet based
- Minion Master
- Paragon Pet Commander(PM:Pokemon Master, theres more of them each week)
DD ranged
- Paragon
- Ranger
- Fire/Air/earth/water Elementalist
- Blood Necromancer
- Comuner/chaneler Ritualist
- Smiting Monk
- Mesmer
Healer
- Healing monk
- Protection Monk
Support healer
- Blood fountain
- Restoration Ritualist
- Hex(/condition) controller is a GW special type
  - Mesmer
  - Monk
Buffer
- Earth elementalist
- Communer Ritualist
- Protection Monk
- Paragon
Debuffer
- Water elementalist(movement mostly not much else, they are not really worthy of the title debuffer)
- Curse/Death Necro
- Communing Ritualist
- Mesmer
- Ranger
- For GW inteupters are a major type too but they are still a sub type of debuffer
  - Ranger
  - Mesmer
  - Hammer warrior
- Enchantment Remover, another GW only type
  - Mesmer
  - Necromanser
  - (Ranger)

I intentionally put the same configurations in there multiple times, as you can go either way with them and most likely a combination of both.
Also I don't think there is a ranger that uses his spirits as his main function they are too spread out for that, however crippeling shot, apply poison choking gass are skills that allow them to be effective debuffers, and interupters.
And agin My list is far from perfect either, there are tons of builds that can do the most suprissing and most effective combinations.

From the list I make up we need more tanks and more healers as we have only limited chioces for both.
[EDIT]Silly me should practice what I preach, added mesmers to rangend DD and communers to debuffers

Made In Ascalon · Nov 25, 2006, 05:03 PM // 17:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by System_Crush

[*]Support healer

Restoration Ritualist

Restoration magic is confusing. Weapon spells and binding rituals make ritualists more similar to protection monks. But, if you whip out attuned was songkai and just cycle between mend body and soul/spirit light/soothing memories, you can easily heal as well as a monk I've discovered. Sometimes even better, because your energy barely goes down for 45 seconds with these skills.

Crom The Pale · Nov 25, 2006, 05:14 PM // 17:14

Your lists are very nice but they realy only give you the most popular uses of each class rather than every possible build.
Ive use my war/ele as a caster ranged damge dealer and my monk as a 55 tank.
Ritualist should be added to your healer list as should dervish, they both have good heals for other players.
Since we realy want new classes to be balanced a simple break down might be:

Melee attacker - warrior, assasin and dervish(for primary use)(pets/minions)
Ranged attacker - rangers and paragons(any wand/staff char fits here as well)(minions/spirits)
Magic user - monk, mesmer, elementalist, ritualist and necromancer

IF you try and break it down using every possible build and secondary profession the list becomes to complex to really help people out.

lyra_song · Nov 25, 2006, 06:08 PM // 18:08

Its not about the "most popular" builds. Its about what they are originally built for and what most of the skills in their attributes can do.

Basically.....i consider function based on what ELITES they have.

Warrior - has Tanking skills as elites.

Sure you can use a warrior for casting, but are the skills designed around it and elites part of the warrior line? No.

A monk can tank, but are those elites skills built in? No. The elites of a monk center around healing and protection.

Arri · Nov 25, 2006, 08:15 PM // 20:15

I believe most people are pretending smiting prayers don't exist for a purpose >_>

lyra_song · Nov 25, 2006, 09:38 PM // 21:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by arri

I believe most people are pretending smiting prayers don't exist for a purpose >_>

i pointed it out .-.

Quote:

Originally Posted by lyra_song

Monk:
Divine Favor - Increases effectiveness of healing
Protection - Buffs, damage mitigation
Heal - Direct healing
Smiting - AoE Direct damage, single direct damage

BahamutKaiser · Nov 25, 2006, 11:18 PM // 23:18

I agree with you on this one, vehemently, recognizing what each class speciallizes in and recognizing their unique abilities is the first step to finding something different for a new class.

Truthfully, you can be overly general, or overly technical, trying to list every advantage each class has utilizing each skill is silly, yet overlooking overall functions isn't appropriate either. I will contribute my perspective on the classes.

Warriors role, melee combat, survivability, continuous pressure, and group support/sabatoge (with shouts). The warrior is prevalent on dealing heavy damage on one target, wile deflecting much har with his higher armor.

Rangers role, ranged combat, trapping, beast familiar which provides a cheap source of melee damage, interruption, Environmental Manipulation, energy management. Ranger is adept at dealing damage from the safest distance, and placing obsercals in the way to keep that advantage, also, beast mastery also allows ranger to deal many of the attacks a melee combatant would without putting himself in harms way, which gives ranger the overall distinction of safety combat, fighting from a safe distance.

One thing I would distinguish from your description is AoE buff and debuff, Spirits with such large radius of effect are environmental effects, and it isn't really buffing and debuffing, because it applies a universal difficulty or advantage to everyone, it is more like envirnomental manipulation, rather than buffing. This distinguishes it from Ritualists spirits which provide environmental radius buffs.

Also, all attacking classes W,R,A,P and D, all deal conditions and interrupt type moves, but since melee combatants cannot assail a ranged foe and interrupt in the span of most spells, melee interruption is more part of pressure rather than a true interrupting class.

Elementists role, heavy spell damage, group spell damage, location buff and debuff (in the form of DoT and Wards), Snaring damage, Energy Pool and overall diversity. Elementist role is damage and generally offensive support, as well as location control. Elementist has very few defensive buffs that he can share with his allies, but he does have location support, and has a deep mesh of hexes and conditions along with damage in his attacks.

Mesmers role, interruption, sabatoge, countering, energy manipulation, and manipulation in many other forms (also including snaring). Mesmers role is pretty straight forward, counter the enemies function, and all of his abilities revolve around stopping or punishing enemies actions in one way or another.

I will also mention that every class has a healing skill, outside of those which provide healing support, or are significantly more proficient, bringing up their healing skills is a mute point.

Necromancers role, weakening, lifestealing spells, corpse manipulation,(providing locational effects and minions), energy support, and also sabatoge. It is important to notice a significant difference between necromancers cursing and mesmers hexing. Much of necromancers hexing revolves around weakening the enemys attack, or weakening their defense, and it is also more proficient in group effects rather than single targets. Another significant distinguishment is that minions do not provide the ability to deal comprehensive melee damage like a pet, they provide blocking support and melee damage, but almost no additional melee combat abilities which makes pets vastly different.

Monks role, support healing, support buffing, support damage, and healing advantage. The role of a monk is support, flat out, even their offensive smiting spells are geared toward dealing extra damage if the enemy is attacking, and the most potent nukes for monk revolve around punishing enemies offending an allie.

The original 6 classes nail very different roles with little in common beyond general effects like self healing, condition application, snaring, and obviously damage. The expansion classes deal with very unique facets of previous roles, and as they are a standard of how different a new class idea should be, it is important to recognize how much difference there is which makes it unique enough to place as a totaly different class and not just a minor alteration of a class or combination of exsisting abilities into one class.

Assassins role, preemtive damage, mobility, sabatoge, escape, swift melee damage. The role of an Assassin is distinguished by his lack of armor and ability to place all of his attacks immediately, than escape. His stabatoge elements are a combination of necromancer and mesmer hexing, with a very minor twist to suit his situation.

Ritualists role, Environmental Support and sabatoge, location support familiars (in the form of offensive attacks), secure buffing, and coordinating spike. Notice here where I mention Environmental again, but with Ritualist spirits, the support effects only help allies, and the sabatoging effects only disable enemies. Also, with Ritualist, their familiars are immobile, so they serve to add damage to a location. As well, Weapon Spells are unremovable, which is why their buffs are secure, and often more potent, due to their sigular limit, this is a minor difference to monk enchantments which can be removed. And lastly, Channeling magic, which is not very potent, but features abilities which support and damage, delay for coordinated damage, and offer abilities which can boost damage for their spirits.

IMO, Factions classes were not good enough, and one word spells their difficulty. Mobility.
Ritualist has most of the advantages and troubles of any class, but the immobility is entirely to restrictive. Because they lack effective abilities to drag their spirits along with them as they go, they do not function well in high mobility situations, a serious flaw which debilitates them in a very common part of combat.
As for Assassin, their mobility skills are second to none, but their advancing teleports are not good enough. It is not Assassins place to charge into battle, yet advancing quickly has nothing to do with that, the first will go first if you let them, the importance of having effective, economic (low energy cost), and most of all, frequent mobilitiy skills lies in being able to get to and from your enemy not just quickly, but regularly, in order to avoid the excessive damage delt on the front line. All situations noted, Assassin needs the mobility, and some of his key advancing techniques are purely defective, lack of frequency may as well be disuse, as an Assassin needs to energy combat more than every 45 seconds. On a minor note, Assassin is perhaps the least supportive class in the game, focusing on dealing maximum damage by himself, which is a very significant weakness in a game which revolves around group play.

Dervishes role, Multiple target damage (a limit of 3), adjacent spell damage, enchantment management, survivability (through enchantment management), and Ascention. Dervish is basicly a multiple target version of Warrior, developed to put presure on more than one foe in melee combat wile attacking, and deal elemental damage on adjacent foes as well, which diversifies their damage output by combining elemental and physical damage, as well as allowing them to switch up damage types in battle. The most original not is Dervishes ability to manage their energy and health with enchantments, the class itself features the unique aura spells which are enchantments that function as PBAoE spells and conditions, but its exemplary proviciency with short enchantments from other classes gives it a survival technique which rivals, even mocks Warriors. And also worth noting, their ability to take on god forms gives them an outstanding advantage for an extended period of time, which outmatches any one ability.

And Paragons Role, offensive and defensive support, and ranged attack. Paragon has an attack, but truthfully, it is probably the weakest among the attack classes, his role is soundly placed in the support section, prividing a very unique form of support from monk in the form of shouts instead of healing and enchantment. Paragons Chants and Shouts are truely a redefinition of Warriors shout abilities, but truthfully, Warrior only has a few key shouts, where Paragon has 3 attributes full of them, and their support abilities stress offensive boosts, and has very little healing support compared to monk. Paragon is support done right, where Ritualist is support done wrong, the mobility and frequency of their role makes them supremely more attractive, wile Ritualist will have his advantages, the overall role and gameplay of a Ritualist just doesn't impress like Paragon. The balance is in Paragons high synergy requirement, not with just their own skills, but with their teammates. But hero options, synergy is easier than ever, and the combine bonuses of buffs, sustained by other buffs, and defense sustained by damage and degen on your opponent mock ritualists 5 seconds of invulnerability.

A survivable melee class and mobile support is what makes Nightfall classes vastly superior to Factions classes. Paragon may have much less effectiveness if it were not for the synergy available thru Hero use, but none the less, it outshines Ritualist briliantly. And wile Assassin still provides some very potent roles, the Dervishes advantage in survivability make for much easier gameplay on a party as a whole, simply put, an Assassin shines in his area, but not enough to outmatch his weaknesses.

Beyond that, some other things that will help develope a good class idea is developing around an attractive identity which draws players, new abilities and functions can be added to anything, any new class, or even exsisting classes, enjoyment lies in providing something that exsisting players will enjoy, and will attract new players to the game. Starting with an attractive and original class identity, than developing unique and enriching abilities are the primary guidelines when you make a class idea, the better you are at those, the better your class idea will be.

Giddeanx · Nov 26, 2006, 12:20 AM // 00:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arri

I believe most people are pretending smiting prayers don't exist for a purpose >_>

Your absolutely right I completely missed this like I missed the entire necro class. I believe ritualist's channeling gets almost the same treatment.

To be honest with you I shouldnt mention healing at all due to the fact that it too is a buff (health instead of skills or ability).

Warriors endure pain, and alot of the stances make tanking seem implied.

As far as crosses go they are not the focus of this because we are talking about classes not builds. But I agree they completely blow this apart. ( I have a Rit/N MM)

Ele, Memer, Rit, Necro, and Monk should not be considered ranged damage because they have no skills to back thier ranged attacks

BahamutKaiser · Nov 26, 2006, 03:47 AM // 03:47

I wouldn't even call Warrior a tank, reason being, in most games where there is an actual tank, the role is for the tank to absorb damage in the softer players stead. In GW, there is no way for Warrior to draw the damage onto himself, the Warrior is a survival class, it can survive and withstand a great deal of damage and attacks, but in the end, that just pushes them to last priority and attacks get directed toward the support players in the party. In PvE, Warriors can go in first and the enemy will likely start attacking them instead of passing to attack other units, but in real combat (what I call PvP), players simply bypass the Warrior and take out his support. I believe the word tank is taken from certain MMOs where "retaining agro" is a intregal part of battle, wile in actuallity, Warrior is equivalent to Barbarian in D2, and such titles as tank are misnomer.

The reason I point this out is because there should be a tank class, and though forcing enemies to target you is not appropriate for this game, abilities which allow a certain class to block attacks and share damage dealt on adjacent allies could greatly evolve the way our softer characters are protected. I think a class that excells at charging, and breaking enemy charges would add some diversity to melee combat, giving us a class with equal or more armor than Warrior which involves punishing oncoming foes and defending allies would reshape the way softer characters are defended, and also increase the value of shadowsteping abilities which allow Assassins to warp past blockades, and reach weaker units.

This is the point of defining the roles of exsisting classes, once you define them thoughoughly, you recognize the abilities and techniques lacking in the game, and the opportunity to add something new to the game which isn't already there.

Made In Ascalon · Nov 26, 2006, 08:14 AM // 08:14

I hate how badly ritualist channeling gets booted. The addition of elites in NF which don't do any better damage doesn't improve matters.

FYI, I played a guild team once that almost won HA with a ritualist team, two (one being me) using channeling magic and owning. Didn't have enough mobility though, which truly does suck about being a ritualist, and is why we eventually lost.

System_Crush · Nov 26, 2006, 09:44 AM // 09:44

Bahamut actually nailed one of the problems we have Tanking Explained, THE GUIDE

There are so many people that somehow believe AI is perfect and can not be fooled in any way.
Even if its masterly programeed by Anet an AI is still ret... not smart, you can fool them and thereby make sure mobs attack you.
The guide is good but forgot 1 major tactic, as a MM I know the human wall is exelent for tanking, a mob will also attack you when is discovers it can't/will not path around you, this is easy to manipulate with 2 warriors doing their best to be in the way fo a mob, strafing infront of him helps(it works even better with more tanks, and is unfailable with a 5+ melee minions)

But although its not direct to the point you can most definatly tank, don't worry I used to think there where profession speciffic aggro listings, that said which profession of mob attacks which profession of player, as it seemed that way because asssasins-monk-elementalists-mesmers tend to get attacked in that order, but the guide explaines bridging and stuff to make that order quite logical, as their nearness to a foe and armour rating would have a mob look at them in that order.

BTW, using armour of earth for insance or spirit of symbyosis can seriously confuse mobs, to either not target you, or the person you are enchanting, asside from that the survivability boost from those abiletys is good too.

Crom The Pale · Nov 26, 2006, 02:43 PM // 14:43

Any new class that is introduce in GW will have to be balanced. You can not have a purely defencive class. This would lead to a very limited class that would have everyone using the same skills. *note forced targeting is just not possible in pvp so only through magic/shouts can a tank be created and this is more the realm of a protect monk or ritualist even the paragon and war can to some extent limit damage to allies.

All of the existing classes without exception can be played as either defencive or offencive chars. The effectiveness of each vary a great deal and that can be implimented in a new class but it must still allow for both options.

There will always be room for new classes but when you concider all of the possibilities now in GW, Faction and Nightfall you can see that there is a very good balance that covers most all play styles. Picking out a niche that needs to be filled can be done but the class will have to overlap somewhere in order to maintain its balance.