Week 14: Design Discussion - Classes
Posted On: Apr 6, 2014 18:18:20 GMT
Ari, noobgod, and 8 more like this
Post by FrozenSoviet on Apr 6, 2014 18:18:20 GMT
This week I'm going to be giving everyone else a day off, and stealing the dev blog from Ari to talk character classes, giving a general overview of how they work, and answering questions you might have. Every now and then I'll come out and discuss a complex or important portion of the game design we are planning, similar to Llama's Tech Write-ups.
Design Discussion - Classes
The first thing you should know about classes, is that there are no classes. That's right, none. Instead, we have what I call the "skill slot system". Here's how it works: Your player character will have access to a number of skills. They can be either noncombat, such as Mining, or combat related such as Magic. These skills would be leveled by training the related activities, up to a maximum level of 100. These skills would fit in something called a skill slot, which, like its name implies, is a slot to fit skills in. However, here's the twist. Your character has only a limited number of skill slots. For the purposes of this example I will use the number 10, but that's just a number I pulled out of my head to give an example. This means out of all the available skills, you'd only be able to use 10 at a time. You can choose how the skills are distributed. If you want you can take 10 combat skills, 10 noncombat skills, or any sort of combination you want, like 7 combat, 3 noncombat. Your character will start out with a small amount of skill slots, and the number would gradually increase as you level up.
What this means is that you have to choose what you focus on as a player. Your "class" is not hard coded, but rather determined by what skills you choose to have in your skill slots. Let me give you a few examples:
This ensures that each character can be completely unique, and really fits what type of playstyle you want. It is even entirely possible to make a character with all noncombat skills, such as Smithing or Enchanting if you don't like combat.
If you want to replace any skill with another, you lose all progress in that skill that you got rid of, or "trashed". This does a couple of things. It makes sure that people don't just swap "classes" all the time to fit the situation, say to cheese past a specific boss fight or to fight a specific player in pvp. It's a lot healthier for the game that way. It also adds a bit of realism, in the real world you don't see people change professions in the blink of an eye. It's difficult to change character builds, but not impossible, you just have to work harder to train up a new skill. You can also do things like start a new character with a different skillset, to see if you like it before trashing one of your skills to replace it with another. However, you will have access to a temporary skill slot or two for temporary changes, such as testing out a new skill or swapping things around, but you can't keep skills in there forever.
A point I want to make is that skills have no effect on any stats directly. They will be used as parameters by the system for various things like quest requirements, determining if you can complete an action, or whether you can wield a weapon. This means if you have a level 100 Defense skill it won't gain you any extra stats directly over someone with 50 Defense. Now you may be thinking "What's the point of skills if they don't do anything directly?" That's where the second part of the class system comes in play: Abilities.
Each skill has within it an ability tree. As you gain levels in the skill, you can put points in the ability tree of that skill. Now I realize "Skills" and "Abilities" sound very similar, so I will try to explain the difference between the two. "Skills" are things that you train and fit in skill slots. They level up as you do. They have no effect on anything stat wise, but are system parameters.
"Abilities" are things that your character can do that affect the world around you directly, they can be passive or active. One example of a passive Defense ability could be Iron Skin, with the passive effect of +10% armor. The combat system is active time, so Abilities will be the things you use during combat, like Shattering Blow, Celestial Prayer, Group Heal, or Fireball. Basically, think along the lines of Lick your Wounds or Twilightning Bolt from FO, but with much greater varierty, and more complex effects (such as being AoE). Some examples of noncombat abilities could be Swift Feet(A passive 5% extra movespeed), Mining Expertise (10% faster mining speeds), etc.
Another thing that the ability tree system allows is for even more unique characters. You could take the same 10 skills as another player, but focus in completely different areas in the ability tree of each skill, which will make your character quite different.
There are some other small quirks in the class system I can't reveal yet as they tie into the storyline we have planned, but the interaction between skills and abilities make up the vast majority of it.
Please let me know what you all think of it. I know it can be a bit confusing at first so feel free to ask questions. I'm also going to say this every week, but please post suggestions. Hopefully now that you know how classes will work, you can offer some better critique ("Skills are a stupid idea, Frozen.") or better tailored improvements to the system. In any case I'll be watching the suggestions section!
Design Discussion - Classes
The first thing you should know about classes, is that there are no classes. That's right, none. Instead, we have what I call the "skill slot system". Here's how it works: Your player character will have access to a number of skills. They can be either noncombat, such as Mining, or combat related such as Magic. These skills would be leveled by training the related activities, up to a maximum level of 100. These skills would fit in something called a skill slot, which, like its name implies, is a slot to fit skills in. However, here's the twist. Your character has only a limited number of skill slots. For the purposes of this example I will use the number 10, but that's just a number I pulled out of my head to give an example. This means out of all the available skills, you'd only be able to use 10 at a time. You can choose how the skills are distributed. If you want you can take 10 combat skills, 10 noncombat skills, or any sort of combination you want, like 7 combat, 3 noncombat. Your character will start out with a small amount of skill slots, and the number would gradually increase as you level up.
What this means is that you have to choose what you focus on as a player. Your "class" is not hard coded, but rather determined by what skills you choose to have in your skill slots. Let me give you a few examples:
- If I wanted to be a general warrior type character, I might fill up my skill slots with defensive and physical combat skills, and perhaps a Smithing skill so I can make my own swords.
- If I wanted to be a fire mage, I would probably fill up my skill slots with skills that are magic and fire based.
- If I wanted to be a hybrid earth warrior/mage, I would pick half earth magic skills and half physical combat skills.
This ensures that each character can be completely unique, and really fits what type of playstyle you want. It is even entirely possible to make a character with all noncombat skills, such as Smithing or Enchanting if you don't like combat.
If you want to replace any skill with another, you lose all progress in that skill that you got rid of, or "trashed". This does a couple of things. It makes sure that people don't just swap "classes" all the time to fit the situation, say to cheese past a specific boss fight or to fight a specific player in pvp. It's a lot healthier for the game that way. It also adds a bit of realism, in the real world you don't see people change professions in the blink of an eye. It's difficult to change character builds, but not impossible, you just have to work harder to train up a new skill. You can also do things like start a new character with a different skillset, to see if you like it before trashing one of your skills to replace it with another. However, you will have access to a temporary skill slot or two for temporary changes, such as testing out a new skill or swapping things around, but you can't keep skills in there forever.
A point I want to make is that skills have no effect on any stats directly. They will be used as parameters by the system for various things like quest requirements, determining if you can complete an action, or whether you can wield a weapon. This means if you have a level 100 Defense skill it won't gain you any extra stats directly over someone with 50 Defense. Now you may be thinking "What's the point of skills if they don't do anything directly?" That's where the second part of the class system comes in play: Abilities.
Each skill has within it an ability tree. As you gain levels in the skill, you can put points in the ability tree of that skill. Now I realize "Skills" and "Abilities" sound very similar, so I will try to explain the difference between the two. "Skills" are things that you train and fit in skill slots. They level up as you do. They have no effect on anything stat wise, but are system parameters.
"Abilities" are things that your character can do that affect the world around you directly, they can be passive or active. One example of a passive Defense ability could be Iron Skin, with the passive effect of +10% armor. The combat system is active time, so Abilities will be the things you use during combat, like Shattering Blow, Celestial Prayer, Group Heal, or Fireball. Basically, think along the lines of Lick your Wounds or Twilightning Bolt from FO, but with much greater varierty, and more complex effects (such as being AoE). Some examples of noncombat abilities could be Swift Feet(A passive 5% extra movespeed), Mining Expertise (10% faster mining speeds), etc.
Another thing that the ability tree system allows is for even more unique characters. You could take the same 10 skills as another player, but focus in completely different areas in the ability tree of each skill, which will make your character quite different.
There are some other small quirks in the class system I can't reveal yet as they tie into the storyline we have planned, but the interaction between skills and abilities make up the vast majority of it.
Please let me know what you all think of it. I know it can be a bit confusing at first so feel free to ask questions. I'm also going to say this every week, but please post suggestions. Hopefully now that you know how classes will work, you can offer some better critique ("Skills are a stupid idea, Frozen.") or better tailored improvements to the system. In any case I'll be watching the suggestions section!