Why no Earth/Necromancy Specialist?

[Tantarus]

I think you're either reading or responding to something that isn't there; all I said was that earth casters haven't changed, nor has the rules philosophy governing them, in basically ever. They've literally always been healers first, despite attempts to play them otherwise, and no one should feel surprised or blindsided by that now.

Yes they have not changed much, but celestial has. Before they added high magic/wands/golems, earth and celestial where on part for offensive. So sure earth has not changed much, but the balance has changed dramatically. So your statement strikes me as very misleading.

As for the "rules philosophy governing them" has that been publicly stated? I admit I don't follow everything and have not made a new character in some time, but I don't recall reading that earth is expected to be a healbot. I do recall reading "Be all you can't be" you know like a battle cleric or a Paladin style class. Which earth templar worked great for around 10 years or so when I started.

Whatever, now that i know this I will just seek a forge or wait for 2.0 so I can bail on earth after 2oish years of being an earth templar most the time. Celestial templar paragon is amazing compare to earth or generic templar anyhow. Message is recieved earth is for shutting up and sitting in the back to heal others, by intent of the owners.

 

[Eldor]

I'm happy to whip out my pedigree as well if that helps, but it feels unproductive and more than a bit tacky.

Had the intention been to display pedigree, that would be true, yet the intention was to preface, a frame of reference. (i.e. 20 years)

An argument could also be made that all you need to do is remove the touchcasting limitation from one or more of the Healer abilities.

That would take changing the touchcasting requirements of Healers resolve, as well as "Healer". Yet that would in fact be an effective way to allow for a chaos paragon without adding a paragon. A few other tweeks would also need to be made, so all the abilities gained under "Healer" were reversible as well, but all minor in scope.

 

[Inaryn]

*shrug* The game has and always will be what you make of it. As a high level earth templar myself, most of my healing goes to me, and no one really argues that. I wanted to be able to have more options, so instead of sacrificing my healing to do so, I picked up scrolls and alchemy. I have one of the most inefficient builds there is, but that doesn't bother me.

When I played an earth scholar, my build was completely streamlined as a healer. And that's what I was expected to do... to the point where y'all got yer panties in a twist when I Deathed a chaos cow at 8am cause no one else was getting up to deal with it. And that was like 15 years ago at this point. So I'd dare say that 20+ years of the game treating and expecting good-guy earth casters to be healers is accurate.

I don't think all the paragon classes are that great. I'm eyeballing the spellblade or the specialist (if I go full caster) but not with any sort of salivary response... more of a "yeah, I'll probably do that, eventually, when I finish fleshing everything else about the character out." And my other character is an artisan that currently doesn't have a paragon specialty available, and may not for all I know. (scrolls/potions)

So I guess I'll just repeat that: The game has and always will be what you make of it. I go to have fun and will have that fun within the rules of the game. And if the game ever stops being fun or not what I expected, then I'll just go find myself something else to do.

 

[Tantarus]

I don't get the mentality of arguing against something simply cause you would not use it but others would. Would it break the game to give chaos lovers a paragon. Or earth casters a more battle style role? Sure you might not choose to use it or play that way. But others could. Would that hurt the game for you? Cause it seems it would certainly improve the game for others.

 

[Eldor]

Right there with you on the paragons not being that great.

Yet that is the point of these rules discussions, to try and make them better, so that when they do become the rules of the game they are better rules for everyone, and in turn make the game better for more players than it does now.

 

[ASFDan]

Would it break the game? Unlikely. Is it one (2? 3?) more set of rules I'd have to learn in order to play the game? Yes, absolutely, and that's problematic to me. Trying to build rules to account for every minor play style crushes games.

 

[Eldor]

Under that logic, paragon in their current form should be removed entirely and we should get back to focusing on making the core rules more streamlined. A prospect I am for 100% for.

It would be far better to have paragon abilities such as what is listed in many paragon powers available to be purchased with build by anyone who meets a set of appropriate requirements, then we can all buy whatever abilities we want within our class to match our character concepts and play style. No one will be limited by the confines of a few paragon paths, yet it would still add the diversity that paragon seeks to add at the high levels.

 

[ASFDan]

You could certainly make that argument, yes. However, the owners decided they wanted this, so your efforts are probably better spent making the best of what we've been provided to work with.

In that spirit, let's say you want to add Earth/Necro to Specialist. How do you rectify the reversible nature of those schools vs the wording of the rules in Specialist? (Example: It makes no sense for your Earth Stop-Asking-Me-To-Be-A-Healer to treat Healing carrier attacks as Normal, Necromancers aren't going to want Cloak/Bane Necromancy, etc)

 

[Tantarus]

An undead earth caster would want cloaks healing and take healing as normal though...

Also just cause you are a necromancer does not mean you are undead and to living necros banes/cloaks chaos are useful against other banes/reflects.

Or you can just rebalance a bit. As this is during the playtest

 

[Eldor]

You could certainly make that argument, yes. However, the owners decided they wanted this, so your efforts are probably better spent making the best of what we've been provided to work with.

I am, that is why I brought up the idea of modifying the Specialist path. If the concern is that Specialist is not set up to deal with reversible spells, then just add Earth and Necro separately. Allowing the earth caster to Specialize into either earth or necromancy. Thus they only receive the benefits of one side. Yes, they get a little benefit, as they can still cast their spells as earth or necro, but they only get the paragon benefit based on the specific specialization they choose.

Now it could be argued that being able to separate out one side of a reversible spell goes against the rules or something, to that I would say a fair portion of the Paragon abilities bend and or break the current game rules as they are. Also separating Earth and Necro for the Specialist Paragon Path only brings more credence to the Specialization of it.

The whole point of these playtests and rules changes are to make tweaks and changes so the final rules when they come out are easier to understand and use. I want to add a few words, to an existing paragon path that in return creates a viable necromancer path and an earth battle caster path into the paragon system. Changes that will make the game better for many and does not add any significant complication.

If the owners were so solidly set to release the 0.9 rules as they are , they would have without playtest or discussion. Thankfully most realize that the game only gets better when they listen to the opinions of their players.

 

[Muir]

Earth and Necromancy are already separate effect groups anyway under 2.0, the sole change necessary to make Specialist work is determining where using the opposite effect group makes more sense in the wording.

 

[Draven]

Personally, I feel it would only be appropriate to allow a Healer/Necromancer as a singular focus. I mean, we already have the "Every Earth caster could be a secret necromancer" theme in our game. Why not take it up a notch? "Every Healing Specialist could secretly be the worst Necromancer ever?"

I think separating the two would hurt the concept thematically.

 

[Pantzike]

posted in wrong thread. whoops.

 

[mikestrauss]

I finally read Specialist. As written, it would be terrible to take for earth.

Unless I am reading it wrong, an earth specialist would effectively get no benefits at level 1, minimal benefit from 1/2 time to meditate at level 2 (earth spells don't miss often), and only really get a good benefit starting at level 3. That means by level 3, the earth specialist effectively has roughly 2 - 2.5 features compared to the 8 features any other specialist has.

Continuing, an earth specialist would only really have one useful feature at 4th level (out of 3). 5th level is the only level where the earth specialist gains the same number of useful features as other specialists.

On the necromancy side, all of the banes and cloaks are a lot more useful, though the other features are difficult to use because necromancy is illegal. And, since converting necromantic carriers to normal basically gives away that you are a necromantic specialist, that would definitely result in some awkward questions if not outright being killed in some chapters. Basically, if you are a good guy who specialized in necromancy to get the banes / cloaks, you lose roughly half your features. If you are a bad guy, you have features that give away your specialization and make your bad-guy-ery hard to use (and you are likely to often not be able to take advantage of many features if you are trying to keep the character alive).

Basically, what I am saying is, the way the path is designed makes both earth and necromancy extremely sub-par choices. And when choices are truly that bad, it is better not to give those choices, because irreversible terrible choices make the game less fun for players.

-MS

 

[mikestrauss]

In addition to my above post, I am amused that the complaints on this thread are kind of opposite of the complaints on another thread. By not including Earth as an option for specialist, earth casters are receiving mild encouragement to explore non-healing paths (Cursing, Binding, Command, even possibly Enhancement**). Even assuming this path worked well for healing (it really doesn't), by not including healing as an option, this path helps further the narrative that non-healing earth casters are both possible and interesting. I'm surprised that the people who are complaining about earth casting aren't lining up behind this paragon path to support it.

-MS

**Edit: Just noticed this path is pretty awful for Enhancement specialist, for pretty much the same reasons (mentioned in above post) that it is bad for a theoretical Earth specialist.

 

[Draven]

In addition to my above post, I am amused that the complaints on this thread are kind of opposite of the complaints on another thread. By not including Earth as an option for specialist, earth casters are receiving mild encouragement to explore non-healing paths (Cursing, Binding, Command, even possibly Enhancement**). Even assuming this path worked well for healing (it really doesn't), by not including healing as an option, this path helps further the narrative that non-healing earth casters are both possible and interesting. I'm surprised that the people who are complaining about earth casting aren't lining up behind this paragon path to support it.

-MS

**Edit: Just noticed this path is pretty awful for Enhancement specialist, for pretty much the same reasons (mentioned in above post) that it is bad for a theoretical Earth specialist.

Mike, I gotta say, this is the first time I've ever seen you exude a bit of condescension on these forums. Maybe that's not your intention, but between the two threads, eh.

It's not that big a deal to me personally. It's just a different tone in your posts than I'm used to seeing.

I think the Paragon Paths, as a whole, are frankly terrible, and I don't think I've been holding that opinion particularly secret. I think it's better for the system as a whole if they either got straight-up deleted or changed to a series of abilities that people could prepare at Logistics based on requisites (I actually proposed such a system a long time ago, using Epic Points, that absorbed the Formal Magic system to keep it streamlined).

 

[mikestrauss]

Mike, I gotta say, this is the first time I've ever seen you exude a bit of condescension on these forums. Maybe that's not your intention, but between the two threads, eh.

It's not that big a deal to me personally. It's just a different tone in your posts than I'm used to seeing.

I've kinda had the same thoughts about your posts (and a few other posters as well).

I'll try to police my tone better. Condescension isn't my goal. And whether or not I think your opinions are right, I shouldn't let that affect the way I approach the topic at hand.

-MS

 

[Draven]

I've kinda had the same thoughts about your posts (and a few other posters as well).

I'll try to police my tone better. Condescension isn't my goal. And whether or not I think your opinions are right, I shouldn't let that affect the way I approach the topic at hand.

-MS

I'll make the same effort as well.