Ideas for Class Powers for Chaos Knight / Duelist classes

[Joe]

I'll give it a try too

Duelist
Start out with a rapier, gauntlets + boots and shiny clothes of some sort. Stat bonuses to appearance and charisma (+3), dexterity and perception(+2), learning and strength(+1). Penalties to toughness, willpower and mana (-2). Experience modifier of 1.25(?). Lawful tendencies (Neutral races start like L- and chaotic like N).

Skillset:
-Alertness
-Athletics
-Concentration
-Dodge
-Find Weakness
-Law

6 - Can not use 'coward' tactics anymore. Cannot attack non-hostiles (code of honour). Positive modifiers on other tactics increased by 10%.
12 - Increased chance on critical hit when adjacent to a single enemy.
18 - Can challenge any NPC or (intelligent) monster in the game to a duel without alignment change (making them hostile).
25 - +10 speed, +5 perception. You are granted an everburning torch by some weird inventor.
32 - Your fame earns you a sword of sharpness, given from a well-known smith.
40 - +5 dexterity, charisma and appearance.
50 - Your king grants you a blessed ring of djinni summoning for your service.

[Aielyn]

Let me get this straight about Chaos Knight plotline suggestions:

You slaughter 5 powerful chaos beings, taking artifacts of balance, corrupted by chaos to prevent heroes reaching D:50. Then you use said artifacts to remove chaos barrier (restoring anomalies), than you kill Fistanarius, guardian of Chaos gate and destroy the handles which obviously were left in place for some target - otherwise they'd long be dust. And then you present yourself to Andor Drakon and he says "Good job, bro! I appoint you my personal combat buddy!".

Original C hero saving the world is already pretty silly. I can only tolerate it with Ancardian chaos gods not wanting AD to spread his influence, but this explanation doesn't really hold.

Now, what do you think of adding a suggestion to ADoM tracker to replace Chaos/Order alignment with Evil/Good (which is what it actually is)? Too radical?

A few key observations:

1. Nothing says you're meant to slaughter the Orb Guardians in order to reach D:50 as a Chaos Knight. Perhaps the Chaos Knights obtain quests from the Orb Guardians, rather than having to defeat them (undecided on what happens in terms of their minions - do those minions attack the Chaos Knight? It would make sense if it were interpreted as a test of strength prior to its real quest). It would certainly change up the gameplay. I'm thinking that a natural approach to this would be to have the elemental altars provide an additional purpose for Chaos Knights, perhaps as a teleportation point to some elemental location "opposite" to the current one (ToEF altar would lead to some place with extreme coldness, for instance). I'd similarly suggest that, while other beings on D:50 would be hostile, Fistanarius wouldn't be. He probably wouldn't allow you to enter the gate until the handles are destroyed, though (you would talk to him before or after).

2. The question of why AD would have handles there to allow some adventurer to close the gate isn't really resolved, by your reasoning. If they were fake handles, I'd understand. I prefer to think that the gate is how Andor Drakon (prior to becoming a god) managed to get to some sort of Plane of Balance, which he proceeded to corrupt - the beings protecting the gate don't know that the handles control the gate, they aren't in direct communication with AD, so they just leave them as is.

3. Original C hero saving the world makes sense if you think of it as the original pantheon of gods having an agreement that allows them all to remain in power, and prevents the forces of Order from forming an army to destroy the forces of Chaos, and vice versa (the gods of Balance prefer it with the balance maintained, of course). The god of Chaos wants Andor Drakon destroyed because his skewing of the balance towards Chaos invites the wrath of Order, which may be the smaller contingent, but their organisational skills are unequalled, and of Balance, which represents nature itself.

4. It's not Evil/Good. There's a strong similarity between Evil and Chaotic, but they're not the same thing. It's just that evil acts tend to create more chaos. I would, however, suggest that "corruption" is evil as well as chaotic, hence drawing the distinction between the Chaos gods and Andor Drakon.

The question is, is the Chaos Knight aligned with Andor Drakon, or with the original chaos gods? It makes sense for them to be aligned with Andor Drakon at the beginning of the game, although they can choose to turn traitor to either the chaos gods or the balance/order gods.

Now, keep in mind that, in order to depart D:48 (after using the orbs) and return to the surface to win in the regular way, you must have the gate held shut indefinitely. The moment that you switch one of the handles, it would make sense for Fistinarius to become hostile. Given the nature of the situation, I would expect a rather nasty reaction from Fistinarius.

For the various chaos god endings, you have to obtain the chaos trinity or the two parts plus the trident of the red rooster, either of which require you to slay certain important Chaos creatures - this would necessarily create hostility from both Fistinarius and Andor Drakon, so it makes sense in that context. Then there are the alternate endings for Chaos Knights. One I'd like to see is a rather... twisted ending in which you manage to convert your Chaos Knight to Balance or Order, and join Andor Drakon to form the beginnings of a new, corrupt (read: evil) pantheon.

For the Lawful variant of that ending, perhaps you need to obtain the Platinum Girdle - quite a feat for a Chaos Knight, given that it either has to slay lawful creatures to satisfy the orb guardians, or has to slay the initially-friendly orb guardians themselves, both acts normally "breaking the law" and thus invalidating the Platinum Girdle. So there would have to be some third, more difficult choice.

For the Neutral variant, perhaps you still need the Trident of the Red Rooster, but not the other requirements - then, you need to destroy the handles and jump into the gate.

In both cases, you find yourself transported to the plane of the original gods - you must defeat all three of the race-aligned gods, at which point you become the god of NeUtRaLiTy/OrDeR, or something. I don't know, I'm just coming up with ideas for possibilities to make for a more varied experience for the Chaos Knight.

[Grey]

Original C hero saving the world is already pretty silly. I can only tolerate it with Ancardian chaos gods not wanting AD to spread his influence, but this explanation doesn't really hold.

Now, what do you think of adding a suggestion to ADoM tracker to replace Chaos/Order alignment with Evil/Good (which is what it actually is)? Too radical?

The is a differentiation between chaos and ChAoS. I imagine this new knight will sit in the middle. Embracing corruption to an extent, but still part of the self-serving side of chaotic behaviour. The forces of ChAoS threaten everyone, including the chaos knight's own interests in becoming an evil tyrant.

[_Ln_]

snip

That will require loads of modifications which are not supported by resurrection campaign.

Ok, I agree it's not totally Evil/Good, but there are a lot of features which I don't know how to place in Chaos/Order scale and which are in it in-game. Saving cute dog/Khelavaster, feeding beggars, giving money to Ruun for example.

The is a differentiation between chaos and ChAoS. I imagine this new knight will sit in the middle. Embracing corruption to an extent, but still part of the self-serving side of chaotic behaviour. The forces of ChAoS threaten everyone, including the chaos knight's own interests in becoming an evil tyrant.

If it is in the game, it's kinda strange. Consider:

You have to be a crowned champion of your chaos deity, but suddenly trying to pray there causes greater balors. This can be explained by Andor's influence over ChAoS PlAnE.
However, if it's totally his place and your link to your deity is severed, why would you need to be a crowned champion to pass through? Chaos knight who guards this check serves both ChAoS and chaos?

Why can't you sacrifice orb guardians, which are apparently more useful than you? Your deity helps you to kill them with healing, PP restoration and stuff, but still consider them more useful? Or ChAoS is apparently strong enough to block your attempts to sacrifice it?

Hmm, actually while typing this and thinking about other arguments, I'm starting to get the hang of this whole thing.

[Al-Khwarizmi]

While it's good to discuss these philosophical issues, I don' think they need to be immersion-breaking.

Take for example Christianity. Christianity has a common set of values (written in the Bible) but there are different ways to be a Christian. Some people follow the organized religion, and may be monks, priests, or even run for Pope if they're Catholic. But there are also Christians that don't care much for the organized religion, they follow the teachings of Christ in different ways: for example, they may go to third-world countries and help the poor, or whatever.

With ChAoS it's the same. You can be a chaotic person and join the cause of Andor Drakon ("organized chaos") to take over all Ancardia, or you can be a chaotic person and just enjoy running around killing children and goodwives and doing stuff like that, but not caring too much about Andor Drakon and his cause, or maybe having your own ambitions to replace him (or not: killing goodwives and spreading chaos around may be enough for you).

If you see it that way, it's not so contradictory that your chaotic deity is giving you a pickaxe to go and kill an orb guardian. Maybe that deity is not directly aligned with Andor's army, although he respects it enough not to accept one of its guardians as a sacrifice directly.

It's chaos we're talking about, men! I'd expect the creatures of Order to more or less stick together and help each other. But chaos is chaos.

[Grey]

Hmm, actually while typing this and thinking about other arguments, I'm starting to get the hang of this whole thing.

Heh... The "there's a difference between chaos and ChAoS" line is something I've heard TB himself say in the past, in response to why chaotics close the gate. Of course the new class I imagine would stray the line a bit, since I assume it would embrace corruption to an extent.

[BlitzerkidSix]

Here goes:

Duelist

6 - +DV from weilded weapon (parrying)
12 - Ability to challenge intelligent monsters (key NPCs decline)
18 - Bonuses against challenged monster
25 - Ability to disarm (possibly a generic penalty, given the state of monster inventories)
32 - Ability to lunge (increased energy cost, +Crit% for single attack, DV penalty for turn)
40 - Lunges have a chance to penetrate armor (synergy with Smithing skill?)
50 - Highest weapon skill increases to Grand Mastery

Chaos Knight

6 - Speed bonus based on level (chaos things seem quite fast)
12 - Increased corruption effects (all)
18 - Reduced negative corruption effects
25 - Increased corruption capacity (delays purple j)
32 - IMMEDIATE, single chance to summon a black unicorn mount, which reduces wilderness travel time, costs Toughness (life force) and Mana
40 - Black unicorn becomes greater black unicorn. Alternatively, stat bonus.
50 - Ability to withstand the ChAoS plane

Mount is a flavor word; I am not actually suggesting some cumbersome horse-riding mechanic for a single class. The level 50 Chaos Knight power would probably create a distinct ending. Whether it's worth it is not up to me. The idea of the mount is to reduce overall corruption exposure, but it would probably only be used if 7LBs were less common. I intentionally left out corrupting melee attacks because it would be pointless; creatures with HP to absorb lots of corrupting attacks are usually already very corrupted/chaotic.

[FantomFang]

I'll give Duelist my own whirl:

Duelist

A duelist emphasizes physical and mental acuity, and precision in all things. Thus, the ability to accurately perceive their surroundings, and gracefully move through it, along with an appreciation for the fine arts that help separate them from their more thuggish contemporaries. They rely on the swiftness of their strikes and their agility to keep them safe from harm. Duelists differ between races however - while a high elven duelist might elegantly skewer his opponents with a rapier while darting through his defenses, a trollish duelist's idea of precision might be the simple fact that their size, reach, and strength allows them to lunge at their opponent from an amazing range and smash them over the head before they can respond, while their mental acuity might be the simple zen of knowing nothing but the clubbing, letting nothing interfere with their "art".

Equipment - 1H weapon (based on race), gloves, gauntlet, musical instrument (racial)
Stats - +3 Dx/Ch, +2 Le/Wi/Pe, -1 St/To, +0 Ap/Ma

Skills - Alertness, Athletics, Climbing, Concentration, Dodge, Find Weakness, Literacy, Music, Stealth, Swimming

Class Powers

LVL1 - Dueling Stance - As long as they are utilizing a single 1h weapon of their choice with their off-hand free, they gain a +atk/dmg bonus equivalent to their weapon skill with the weapon used. (weapon skill / 2?)

LVL 6 - Parry - The duelist's dueling stance allows them to swiftly parry blows that would otherwise strike true. The duelist gains a DV bonus equal to their (weapon skill? lvl/x?). Additionally, this DV bonus is treated as if it the duelist is utilizing a shield, allowing the duelist to gain further DV bonuses from the shield skill (perhaps renamed the parry weapon skill?)

LVL 12 - Throw Down The Gauntlet - The Duelist may challenge an opponent to a duel. Doing so gives the duelist additional bonuses (atk/dmg/dv) against the challenged monster, while suffering -DV against other targets while the challenged opponent still lives. Ends automatically upon monster death or using the stairs.

LVL 18 - Precision Strike - The duelist gains the ability to perform a special penetrating strike, ignoring enemy PV = Duelist LVL, at an additional energy cost (number?)

LVL 25 - Is That All You've Got? - The Duelist gains the ability to enrage even the sternest of foes. This skill utilizes Find Weakness [mental] and causes the enemy to lose their calm in battle. This results in a penalty of # to their Attack and # to their DV as they angrily flail about. Only works on enemies who can hear the challenge.

LVL 32 - Swiftness of Thought - The Duelist's mental focus has begun to allow him/her to surpass the boundaries of his body. The Duelist gains a permanent bonus of # Speed and # Dexterity. In addition, he/she no longers suffers any penalties when Throwing Down the Gauntlet, as his/her focus expands to include all those in his/her presence.

LVL 50 - You Killed My Father, Prepare to Die! - The Duelist's supernatural focus allows them to ignore wounds that would otherwise bring them down, allowing them (?) number of turns to strike their foe down before they themselves would fall. (limited usage of some sort).

EDIT: I'm unsure exactly what some of the numbers should be, but the one thing I definitely would like is a very strong lvl 50 power. They don't get much time to shine in most games, so a lot of the lvl 50 powers are just plain underwhelming because they're a simple numeric increases. Ideally, I think all classes should have something at LVL 50 that's just awesome and unique, as by endgame, melee is pretty much the same as other melee, and caster the same way. In that regard, necromancers with their "Oops! Still Alive!" power are the sort of thing I like. And as much as I like monks, their lvl 50 power is the epitome of boring.

[Joe]

Aah, yes a true duelist should definitely posses some music skills!!!

[sqrt-1]

snip

I also like the idea about duelist being skilled in music. Also as we have several new items coming, rapiers should definitely be included. In fact I really like the general idea you have got here. It seems that in general these could be bit on powerful side as these class power go, but I don't know how concerned we actually are about game balance. It seems to me that as long as there's no ridiculously overpowered classes, it's fine to have some variation between the classes.