BahamutKaiser
07-25-2006, 11:38 PM
There are a few Samurai Suggestions out there, so this really isn't an introduction, but more of a thinking space. Here are some of my more recent ideas for a Samurai Class, and if you have some new ideas, or alternate ideas, or related ideas, feel free to post yours too.
Anyone else who has imput or ideas for a Samurai class can pitch in. I know my post is long, so if you don't want to read it that is fine, just pitch in your 2 cents, if you have something simular that is just fine, it just means we agree on certain features.
I was just thinking about a working weapon type and skill types which would be original and interesting, as well as attributes which would be diverse and skills that would be fun to use.
The idea I came up with recently is instead of having a single "weapon", the Samurai would equip a set of blades. A Katana, Wakisashi and a Tanto, all including sheaths. When equipped the blades would be in a defined manner, blade up, in their sheaths instead of in the wielders hand. Instead of holding the Katana in their hand, any character equip with these Blade Sets would have all 3 blades set in their sheath, until they targeted an enemy for attack causing them to unsheath the Katana for normal attacks. These Blade Sets are a 2 handed weapon. After the character disengages his target, he holds the Katana in a poise until the character automaticly returns to a calm state, where he would sheath his Katana again, these are the same poises that all classes have when they are in combat, but when wielding a Blade Set the calm state would trigger the sheathing of the Katana.
With certain Stances in one of the attributes the Wielder can hold the Katana in one hand and the Wakizashi in the other, either attacking with both in some fashion or using some sort of deflecting technique. Other skills would draw the Tanto for a quick piercing attack, and there can even be stances which cause the wielder to sheath his swords and fight with the just the Tanto, or just the Wakizashi, or other combinations of 2.
The Blade Set would have 3 damage figures, one for the Katana (slashing), one for the Wakizashi (slashing), and one for the Tanto (peircing w/50% armor penetration). The normal attack would only involve the Katana, a slow yet powerful attack, either as slow or slower than hammer (the number of attacks over time not how fast the blade is swung), and have simular damage. The damage figure for the Wakizashi would be lower than the Katana, about the same as Warrior Swords, and the Tanto would be weaker than a dagger attack, it has very low attack and very high armor peircing, both of these can only be used with certain skills or stances in the Samurai Attributes, and attack speed for stances with 2 weapons drawn can vary by skill.
I also dabled with the idea that the swords could be magically forged, or the sheaths had some sort of function which explains why they are neccessary, but I don't have time right now to develope something.
One of the unique skills used with these Blade sets are Counters which sheath the weapon and retaliate on the first person to attack them, or on players around them the next time they are hit with an attack. These counters last for only a few seconds, and stop an incoming attack with an attack of their own, sacrificing a period of normal attacks. All of these counter skills would have critical damage and some good figures, being the best attack counters in the game. As well there can be skills which cause the Wielder to sheath his blades, then other skills which do high damage if done with their weapons sheathed. These quick draw attacks would all be in one attribute, pick a name, quick draw is fine for me for all I care, Anet would make their own name up anyways if they did it.
The totaly unique skill type that I had in mind where the Dash attacks which I mentioned in my Samurai Concept before, and the Shinobi Concept before that. The Dash attack is a supreme movement technique which thrusts the character in one direction at high speed dealing damage to targets in his path. It is essentially simular to a projectile, which hits all targets in its path, but the projectile is the character. The character moves at a speed about 150%-200% faster than normal toward a target or in a straight line in front of them for a set number of paces. The number of paces (actual distance in steps) would increase with added points in the skills attribute, as well as attack damage. The idea I had for this class is skills which cost Adrenaline and Energy. This means the Samurai would have to build up Adrenaline and have energy available to execute strong attacks. I will elaborate further on Dashes further down because they alone are very complex. These are mainly in the (generic Katana Wielding attribute) and also use the Blade Sets, but there would be 1 or 2 dash skills in his other attributes.
There also needs to be a self preserving attribute, a simple skill which offer some defense and some healing. I think most of the defensive skills should be in the Dual Draw attribute if there is one, but if not they can be mixed here, or the dual draw and healing skills can be mixed for one attribute. In this attribute there should also be skills which pump adrenaline, like a signet or energy cost skill, which allows the Samurai to prep adrenaline for attack skills before engaging. And it should also have at least one decent healing skill which cost adrenaline.
And perhaps one more secondary attribute which focuses on stances which draw 2 blades at once and attack with both or block attacks, and other skills which are dual blade oriented (Dual Draw).
The primary attribute I was thinking about was Accuracy, also from my previous concept. This attribute could have a few skills in it, but it is pretty good by itself too, each point in Accuracy would grant a 3% or 4% chance to hit the enemy reguardless of any evasive, blocking or countering skill they are using, and even any hex, condition or ward imparing your accuracy. Accuracy gives the Samurai a chance of hitting no matter what. It is a very useful but circumstantial attribute which would work wonders if the enemy is trying to blind you or evade your attacks, or do nothing if they are just depending on their armor and healing to survive.
With the Blade set, the Samurai actually has 2 or 3 attributes which all use the same weapon set, and all improve their use in a different way. The dash attribute would increase the damage of attacks with the Blade Set, by a higher ratio than other weapon attirbutes, but not increase critical attack, 25% or 50% more, you do the math and tell me what percent it is that would be the same damage as other weapons over time with critical attacks, that is how much more damage it would add to the Blade Set. The Quick Draw Attribute increases the Damage of Katana attacks very little, about 25% as much as normal weapon attributes, but it would increase the chance of critical more than other weapon attributes and the damage of critical by 0.2 for each point in this attribute (normal criticals are 1.4, quick draw adds .2 for 2.6 critical damage at 12 points). And the Dual Draw attribute would increase something else.... related to dual drawing skills, you figure it out.
This provides a very useful weapon attribute for secondary use, unlike Warrior or Assassin who have a primary attribute which further increases their damage, Samurai has 2 secondary attributes which increase their weapons damage, so any class can use Samurai as a secondary and pump 2 attributes for effective damage, that way they can actually deal damage with a melee weapon. And because this Class focuses on seldom yet powerful attacks, and movement based attacks, it makes it even more affordable for a caster to step in with a Samurai attack, and then step out, instead of getting schooled on their armor level. This class also offers some very valuable skills to Assassin and Warrior. The ability to dash into combat almost as fast as a teleport (although it requires a direct path). Most Dashes have a Delay, so if the enemy catches you using it he may have time to flee, but if they don't than you may surprise them with your sudden Dash toward them. The other thing that Warrior and Assassin would greatly benifit from is an Adrenaline based healing skill, with this the Assassin especially can use the adrenaline gained in battle to keep healing himself. And with Samurai adrenaline pumping skills, Warrior can prep his attacks before he gets to the enemy, making the Samurai Defensive attribute highly valuable even if a Warrior likes his sword and shield more.
And now for the in depth explaination of Dashing attacks. The distance is measured in Paces, a normal step distance, and the amount of paces as well as other factors would go up with whichever attribute described. Just for a general measurement guide, an attack which hits adjacent foes is approx. 3 paces in diameter, nearby is 5 paces, and area is 6, these do not hit in an area, but in a narrow line (about as wide as the character) along the path of the dash. Dashes would have more or less paces depending on function, some Dashes move "up to" X number of paces to target enemy or allies location, these would range from 3-5 paces in distance, perhaps 6 if they cost alot, these would be used to advance or escape wile doing damage. The second more prominent (and talented) form of dash would be the untargeted dash, which executes a movement directly forward, these would typically have longer distance, 4-7 paces, perhaps 8 for expensive or elite skills.
The Samurai I have in mind would have skills which cost Adrenaline, skills which cost Energy, and some which cost both, mainly dashes. Because most Dashes combine a movement skill with a damaging skill it would have to cost at least as much as 2 simular skills combine. Furthermore, Dashes have delay times and recast times, unlike many adrenaline skills, they suffer the difficulty of adrenaline skills and energy skills together. Dashes, and some other Samurai skills would also have a new "Delay" on them; like some spells which deal damage after a short period of time, some Dashes (primarily the ones with high damage) would have a delay. During the Delay the attack can not be interrupted, because it isn't a cast time, and the player can still move around (Delay time would be 1-3 seconds depending on skill damage). As an added tradeoff, if the skills need more cost to compenstate for their effectiveness, during a delay you attack is restrained and you cannot activate other attack skills. Movement penalties (hex or condition) reduce the distance of a Dash by percent, a Dash which moves 6 paces would be cut to 3 paces by Cripple because it reduces speed by 50%, and a dash which moves 9 paces (if there is one) would only move 3 paces under the common ice hex which is 66%. So there is a very effective shutdown for Dash skills in hex and condition form. Furthermore, speed boost can improve the dash distance by X% as well. The only way to stop an enemy dash is to Knock them down, if they are knocked down when the dash would have executed, it is canceled. And since Dashes are actually on the ground, they cannot go through barriers or circumvent them like teleports to get the difficult to reach targets, a few of these do go further than any other attack, including the distance of teleports, but they require a straight path, because you cannot turn during a dash.
This Samurai I have in mind would not have much if any Increased movement speed skills, instead it would use dashes, including a generic dash which simply propells the player in one direction 3-7 paces doing no damage. Like Assassin who naturally has higher attack speed with Dual Wielding and has almost no IAS skills, Samurai would have nearly no increased movement speed skills, but could benifit from a secondary with them to boost his Dash range.
The armor would be just a hair weaker than Warriors in defense, well maybe a bit more, at about 80 armor and 10 or 20 more armor wile (in a counter stance, preparing for or during a dash, other ideas, or 10 armor vs physical or elemental). It would have no energy regeneration, but +5 energy on the leg and foot armor. This is because, like Warrior, Samurai can use adrenaline skills, although his dash skills cost energy and adrenaline, he would also have adrenaline only and energy only skills. This further prevents Samurai from peeling out Dashes repeatedly, because he needs to build adrenaline before using dash skills, and wait for energy regeneration for a long period of time. Since this class only has a 2 handed weapon, and can't use an energy focus (like Assassin, a bleak oversight in weakness IMO), this class should have adrenaline gaining skills in his defensive attribute (whatever it be called) and maybe in accuracy as well, this allows him to pump up his adrenaline for a start out Dash before engaging into combat, allowing Dash players to evade melee combat and instead opt to pump their adrenaline with these skills.
The concept of a Dash would have to be added to the game, the only thing simular to it in the engine is projectile attacks. Like projectile attacsk, Dashes move very fast (faster), but cannot turn. But instead Dash skills would have to be qued to hit all enemies in the path of the dash, and be blocked by any ground surface barrier as well as wall surface barrier (although an elite dash which moved over ground surface barriers would be great). This new feature would also be great in the addition of new skills for other classes as well, including movement dashes for other classes, and attack skills which deal damage in a straight line as well. For example an elementist skill which deal damage in a line, Ritualist heals in a line, or even a hex/enchantment, which effects enemies or allies in a line to and/or through a target.
If you have a Samurai idea other than mine feel free to post it here, I intend for this to be more of a glob of samurai ideas and interest instead of a particular samurai idea. And if you have some creative juices going or some more insite on Samurai functional attribute names, please help, cause I don't feel like doing it.
P.S. if your going to make skill lists, only include skills which are examples of new skill types, not all the filler in skills which are simular to other classes.
Anyone else who has imput or ideas for a Samurai class can pitch in. I know my post is long, so if you don't want to read it that is fine, just pitch in your 2 cents, if you have something simular that is just fine, it just means we agree on certain features.
I was just thinking about a working weapon type and skill types which would be original and interesting, as well as attributes which would be diverse and skills that would be fun to use.
The idea I came up with recently is instead of having a single "weapon", the Samurai would equip a set of blades. A Katana, Wakisashi and a Tanto, all including sheaths. When equipped the blades would be in a defined manner, blade up, in their sheaths instead of in the wielders hand. Instead of holding the Katana in their hand, any character equip with these Blade Sets would have all 3 blades set in their sheath, until they targeted an enemy for attack causing them to unsheath the Katana for normal attacks. These Blade Sets are a 2 handed weapon. After the character disengages his target, he holds the Katana in a poise until the character automaticly returns to a calm state, where he would sheath his Katana again, these are the same poises that all classes have when they are in combat, but when wielding a Blade Set the calm state would trigger the sheathing of the Katana.
With certain Stances in one of the attributes the Wielder can hold the Katana in one hand and the Wakizashi in the other, either attacking with both in some fashion or using some sort of deflecting technique. Other skills would draw the Tanto for a quick piercing attack, and there can even be stances which cause the wielder to sheath his swords and fight with the just the Tanto, or just the Wakizashi, or other combinations of 2.
The Blade Set would have 3 damage figures, one for the Katana (slashing), one for the Wakizashi (slashing), and one for the Tanto (peircing w/50% armor penetration). The normal attack would only involve the Katana, a slow yet powerful attack, either as slow or slower than hammer (the number of attacks over time not how fast the blade is swung), and have simular damage. The damage figure for the Wakizashi would be lower than the Katana, about the same as Warrior Swords, and the Tanto would be weaker than a dagger attack, it has very low attack and very high armor peircing, both of these can only be used with certain skills or stances in the Samurai Attributes, and attack speed for stances with 2 weapons drawn can vary by skill.
I also dabled with the idea that the swords could be magically forged, or the sheaths had some sort of function which explains why they are neccessary, but I don't have time right now to develope something.
One of the unique skills used with these Blade sets are Counters which sheath the weapon and retaliate on the first person to attack them, or on players around them the next time they are hit with an attack. These counters last for only a few seconds, and stop an incoming attack with an attack of their own, sacrificing a period of normal attacks. All of these counter skills would have critical damage and some good figures, being the best attack counters in the game. As well there can be skills which cause the Wielder to sheath his blades, then other skills which do high damage if done with their weapons sheathed. These quick draw attacks would all be in one attribute, pick a name, quick draw is fine for me for all I care, Anet would make their own name up anyways if they did it.
The totaly unique skill type that I had in mind where the Dash attacks which I mentioned in my Samurai Concept before, and the Shinobi Concept before that. The Dash attack is a supreme movement technique which thrusts the character in one direction at high speed dealing damage to targets in his path. It is essentially simular to a projectile, which hits all targets in its path, but the projectile is the character. The character moves at a speed about 150%-200% faster than normal toward a target or in a straight line in front of them for a set number of paces. The number of paces (actual distance in steps) would increase with added points in the skills attribute, as well as attack damage. The idea I had for this class is skills which cost Adrenaline and Energy. This means the Samurai would have to build up Adrenaline and have energy available to execute strong attacks. I will elaborate further on Dashes further down because they alone are very complex. These are mainly in the (generic Katana Wielding attribute) and also use the Blade Sets, but there would be 1 or 2 dash skills in his other attributes.
There also needs to be a self preserving attribute, a simple skill which offer some defense and some healing. I think most of the defensive skills should be in the Dual Draw attribute if there is one, but if not they can be mixed here, or the dual draw and healing skills can be mixed for one attribute. In this attribute there should also be skills which pump adrenaline, like a signet or energy cost skill, which allows the Samurai to prep adrenaline for attack skills before engaging. And it should also have at least one decent healing skill which cost adrenaline.
And perhaps one more secondary attribute which focuses on stances which draw 2 blades at once and attack with both or block attacks, and other skills which are dual blade oriented (Dual Draw).
The primary attribute I was thinking about was Accuracy, also from my previous concept. This attribute could have a few skills in it, but it is pretty good by itself too, each point in Accuracy would grant a 3% or 4% chance to hit the enemy reguardless of any evasive, blocking or countering skill they are using, and even any hex, condition or ward imparing your accuracy. Accuracy gives the Samurai a chance of hitting no matter what. It is a very useful but circumstantial attribute which would work wonders if the enemy is trying to blind you or evade your attacks, or do nothing if they are just depending on their armor and healing to survive.
With the Blade set, the Samurai actually has 2 or 3 attributes which all use the same weapon set, and all improve their use in a different way. The dash attribute would increase the damage of attacks with the Blade Set, by a higher ratio than other weapon attirbutes, but not increase critical attack, 25% or 50% more, you do the math and tell me what percent it is that would be the same damage as other weapons over time with critical attacks, that is how much more damage it would add to the Blade Set. The Quick Draw Attribute increases the Damage of Katana attacks very little, about 25% as much as normal weapon attributes, but it would increase the chance of critical more than other weapon attributes and the damage of critical by 0.2 for each point in this attribute (normal criticals are 1.4, quick draw adds .2 for 2.6 critical damage at 12 points). And the Dual Draw attribute would increase something else.... related to dual drawing skills, you figure it out.
This provides a very useful weapon attribute for secondary use, unlike Warrior or Assassin who have a primary attribute which further increases their damage, Samurai has 2 secondary attributes which increase their weapons damage, so any class can use Samurai as a secondary and pump 2 attributes for effective damage, that way they can actually deal damage with a melee weapon. And because this Class focuses on seldom yet powerful attacks, and movement based attacks, it makes it even more affordable for a caster to step in with a Samurai attack, and then step out, instead of getting schooled on their armor level. This class also offers some very valuable skills to Assassin and Warrior. The ability to dash into combat almost as fast as a teleport (although it requires a direct path). Most Dashes have a Delay, so if the enemy catches you using it he may have time to flee, but if they don't than you may surprise them with your sudden Dash toward them. The other thing that Warrior and Assassin would greatly benifit from is an Adrenaline based healing skill, with this the Assassin especially can use the adrenaline gained in battle to keep healing himself. And with Samurai adrenaline pumping skills, Warrior can prep his attacks before he gets to the enemy, making the Samurai Defensive attribute highly valuable even if a Warrior likes his sword and shield more.
And now for the in depth explaination of Dashing attacks. The distance is measured in Paces, a normal step distance, and the amount of paces as well as other factors would go up with whichever attribute described. Just for a general measurement guide, an attack which hits adjacent foes is approx. 3 paces in diameter, nearby is 5 paces, and area is 6, these do not hit in an area, but in a narrow line (about as wide as the character) along the path of the dash. Dashes would have more or less paces depending on function, some Dashes move "up to" X number of paces to target enemy or allies location, these would range from 3-5 paces in distance, perhaps 6 if they cost alot, these would be used to advance or escape wile doing damage. The second more prominent (and talented) form of dash would be the untargeted dash, which executes a movement directly forward, these would typically have longer distance, 4-7 paces, perhaps 8 for expensive or elite skills.
The Samurai I have in mind would have skills which cost Adrenaline, skills which cost Energy, and some which cost both, mainly dashes. Because most Dashes combine a movement skill with a damaging skill it would have to cost at least as much as 2 simular skills combine. Furthermore, Dashes have delay times and recast times, unlike many adrenaline skills, they suffer the difficulty of adrenaline skills and energy skills together. Dashes, and some other Samurai skills would also have a new "Delay" on them; like some spells which deal damage after a short period of time, some Dashes (primarily the ones with high damage) would have a delay. During the Delay the attack can not be interrupted, because it isn't a cast time, and the player can still move around (Delay time would be 1-3 seconds depending on skill damage). As an added tradeoff, if the skills need more cost to compenstate for their effectiveness, during a delay you attack is restrained and you cannot activate other attack skills. Movement penalties (hex or condition) reduce the distance of a Dash by percent, a Dash which moves 6 paces would be cut to 3 paces by Cripple because it reduces speed by 50%, and a dash which moves 9 paces (if there is one) would only move 3 paces under the common ice hex which is 66%. So there is a very effective shutdown for Dash skills in hex and condition form. Furthermore, speed boost can improve the dash distance by X% as well. The only way to stop an enemy dash is to Knock them down, if they are knocked down when the dash would have executed, it is canceled. And since Dashes are actually on the ground, they cannot go through barriers or circumvent them like teleports to get the difficult to reach targets, a few of these do go further than any other attack, including the distance of teleports, but they require a straight path, because you cannot turn during a dash.
This Samurai I have in mind would not have much if any Increased movement speed skills, instead it would use dashes, including a generic dash which simply propells the player in one direction 3-7 paces doing no damage. Like Assassin who naturally has higher attack speed with Dual Wielding and has almost no IAS skills, Samurai would have nearly no increased movement speed skills, but could benifit from a secondary with them to boost his Dash range.
The armor would be just a hair weaker than Warriors in defense, well maybe a bit more, at about 80 armor and 10 or 20 more armor wile (in a counter stance, preparing for or during a dash, other ideas, or 10 armor vs physical or elemental). It would have no energy regeneration, but +5 energy on the leg and foot armor. This is because, like Warrior, Samurai can use adrenaline skills, although his dash skills cost energy and adrenaline, he would also have adrenaline only and energy only skills. This further prevents Samurai from peeling out Dashes repeatedly, because he needs to build adrenaline before using dash skills, and wait for energy regeneration for a long period of time. Since this class only has a 2 handed weapon, and can't use an energy focus (like Assassin, a bleak oversight in weakness IMO), this class should have adrenaline gaining skills in his defensive attribute (whatever it be called) and maybe in accuracy as well, this allows him to pump up his adrenaline for a start out Dash before engaging into combat, allowing Dash players to evade melee combat and instead opt to pump their adrenaline with these skills.
The concept of a Dash would have to be added to the game, the only thing simular to it in the engine is projectile attacks. Like projectile attacsk, Dashes move very fast (faster), but cannot turn. But instead Dash skills would have to be qued to hit all enemies in the path of the dash, and be blocked by any ground surface barrier as well as wall surface barrier (although an elite dash which moved over ground surface barriers would be great). This new feature would also be great in the addition of new skills for other classes as well, including movement dashes for other classes, and attack skills which deal damage in a straight line as well. For example an elementist skill which deal damage in a line, Ritualist heals in a line, or even a hex/enchantment, which effects enemies or allies in a line to and/or through a target.
If you have a Samurai idea other than mine feel free to post it here, I intend for this to be more of a glob of samurai ideas and interest instead of a particular samurai idea. And if you have some creative juices going or some more insite on Samurai functional attribute names, please help, cause I don't feel like doing it.
P.S. if your going to make skill lists, only include skills which are examples of new skill types, not all the filler in skills which are simular to other classes.