So, healers got new communes in revamp. Good work with the revamp, Imms. Some healer thoughts here.

Firstly, the odd syntax of Aegis. I think syntax "commune aegis <type> <target>" would be better than the old "commune aegis <target> <type>". This would make aegis easier to use, since there would be no compelling need to provide a target when the supplication is communed on self.

Second is the new communes: "Purity of Flesh, Purity of Mind and Purity of Blood". I remember someone saying healer class used to have resistances as separate communes, which were combined to aegis. In same fashion, these three communes could be combined as a commune simply called purity. The new syntax could be "commune purity <type> <target>", providing new targets as higher level (Blood at 34, flesh at 36 and mind at 38.) in similar fashion to how aegis works.

Some questions:

Guiding hand and stalwart arm use the trust system. Do they have some drawbacks that cause a need for such trust to arise?

Is vitality just +con or does it have additional benefits?

Part of the philosophy behind the thread is that we made some mistakes previously which led the game in general to skew somewhat evil. Our class distribution skews evil, with three evil-only options (necromancer, AP, berserker) that don't require empowerment and one good-only option that does. Conjurers used to serve as a de facto good-skewed class, but in light of various improvements to demons and devils, that isn't true any more.

Way back when, this skew was countered by the fact that evil healers and bards didn't exist. (Or were restricted by race. I don't go back that far, and corrections are appreciated.) We eventually opened up those classes to all alignments, but never did anything to counteract the impact of that decision.

This matters in practice-- Thera tends to run about 40% evil, 33% neutral, and 27% good, fluctuating by at most 2%. That's nearly a 3:2 ratio of evil:good, and the breakdowns suggest that if the classes were evened up, that imbalance would largely go away. We're taking a baby step here-- giving one empowered class a skew towards good to try to lure over another percent or so (*).

On top of that, as Nepenthe originally outlined, even at equal numbers, an evil human healer ended up much more useful than a good human healer. This had nothing to do with the healer class, but rather the general offensive-over-defense skew of the evil-only options.

Let's say you're a hero healer grouped with a conjurer and a paladin. Think about how many of your abilities are redundant here-- both of them can obtain Sanctuary, heal themselves rapidly, and cure basic maledictions. If that group can't take down some super-tough PC, it isn't because they don't have enough defense and recuperative ability.

Contrast that with an evil human healer. Now you can provide the damage reduction, curing, and healing resources that your orc/necro/AP groupmate either can't do, or has to rely on rare devices for. All you have to do is keep them alive while they dish out huge damage, reliable command denial, or powerful maledictions.

Those cases don't matter for solo healer, but then again evil solo healer is just about as powerful as good solo healer the way we did things.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

(*): In theory I'm fine with some level of evil-skew, since evil characters are theoretically more prone to infighting and factions, whereas good characters can often form a united front or at least avoid killing one another. However, in practice, the Team Evil mentality kicks in and partially neuters this factor.

Percept numbers don't show the whole picture, goodies tend to bunch together while evils fight each other.
If we are going to have 1/3 goodies, 1/3 neutrals and 1/3 evils I'm afraid we will end up with Light domination.
Fortress already dominates hero range very often while Empire and Scion often are almost non-existant for months.

I disagree with evil healers being more helpful.
They are most useful for fighters and fighters can have both alignments. The only exception is orcs but you wouldn't see many evil healers attached to orcs due to RP reasons.
Healers are also good friends of invokers, but they also play both sides.
Necro/AP work fine without healers, they don't really need them.
Necros because they don't fight but spam sleep :) and aps replace healers with a barrier wand. ( At least I did ).
They are perhaps are as useful for a barriered AP as a good healer is useful for an angel-based conjurer.

Almost every goodie joins the Fortress or tags along with them. Evils are divided between Empire, Scion, Tribunal and every so often Outlander/Rager. Arvam questioned a while back why a mere arcane and invoker citizens had so much power in Empire. The answer to that is simple, a lone invoker or arcane makes a huge diffence. I'm all for getting rid of Scion or making it a religion ala Scarab and bringing mages back into the Empire.

I don't think that'd balance anymore unless you simultaneously took out the Sect Leader / Emperor powers.

And evoke wouldn't come back, but, you know.

Agreed. Sect/Emperor powers would definately have to be adjusted or removed. I'd lean towards adjusting. Evoke was just all around badass, but I'd even give that up. Perhaps replace it with magical control?

>I disagree with evil healers being more helpful.

As someone who has played both good and evil characters, I'm just going to cut straight to telling you that you're wrong. I accept your expertise in certain areas; good vs. evil balance isn't one of them.

Heavy offense / low defense characters skew way, way evil. Some of that's class design, and some of that's just player choice of things that could go either way.

Healers have the same restriction they always have, only human or d-elves able to be evil. Before that it was clerics who could be anything.

Bards use to have to be good or neutral, then I don't have any idea how long ago they were allowed to be evil as long as it was a race that could already be a bard. No duergar or d-elf bards =(

Evil bards came in circa 1998.

First evil bard was Amberlea wasn't it? She started nuetral then Scar turned her?

We know that pc healers are affected by align in how well they heal others. Are NPC healers affected in the same way?

to balance out races that are weak but smart, with strong but dumb, and strong but average...

Is to re-do the mana/hp gain tables.

For instance, a dwarf paladin, is going to get an assload more hp than an elf, but an elf will not get nearly as much more mana than the dwarf.

so, dwarves are stronger.

same can be said of shamans. etc.

just an idea.

..Than the dwarf gets hp, you meant to say?

Elf mage has over 1000 mana at hero. Felar mage has over 700 mana at hero. That's about difference of 200-300 mana points. So, are you saying that the difference between elf pally and dwarf pally is more than 300 hp?

Let's say (an example, pulling numbers out my rear, mostly)

a fire shaman averages 16 hp a rank. and 13mana a rank. let's call that a total score of averaging 28 a rank.

an elf shaman might average 9 hp a rank, and only 16mana a rank.
for a total score of averaging 25 a rank.

thus, all other things being equal, just in numbers, the fire shaman will always be more powerful.

Add in the inate damage resist of giants, the fact that giants have coverable vuln and elves can never cover theirs...and the inbalance goes even furthor.

My idea, was maybe bring up the elf's mana gains, to make the total average score closer to even.

just an idea. I might even be totally off. just the impression I got from my experiences.

>an elf shaman might average 9 hp a rank, and only 16mana a rank.
>for a total score of averaging 25 a rank.

My guess for elf shaman mana gains would be around 20 or so, maybe 18.

I sent you PM to notify you on another issue. Please read it.

Maybe the rng just hates me.

I've played more than one elf shaman, although never heroed any.

Sure, there have been 20 point mana gains. but I just re-ran the numbers on the logs of ranking, and even with the 20 point mana gains, I average 16.69 mana a rank with full int/full wis elf shamans. those 13/14/15 mana gain ranks really bring the average down.

Also, those elves averaged 9.2 hp a rank.

So using my score method, they average 25.89

pulling up my log of all of Odrirg's ranks...I get....

an ave 17.08 hp gain per rank. and an ave 13.367 mana gain per rank.

so using my score method, dwarf shamans get a score of 30.477 per rank on average

That's almost a 5th better. Add in poison and magic resist and a coverable vuln to dwarves....add in mental resist and a non-coverable vuln to the elves. And I just don't see them as balancing out.

that's just my own opinion though.

On a side note evil healers communes got toned down for most others where they are more selfish could we see maybe an evil only offensive commune(not saying something crazy) Unholy Fire or something or maybe a Channel commune that while you are darkpacted to someone you can use there energies to blast peoples or something I don't know LOVE LOVE LOVE the concept but i was just a little depressed at no offensive commune for the evils

Great Job guys truely got me excited like I used to be going to the library to mud

Giving the healer an advantage in the expence of the healee sounds pretty cool.

But it is nice if you're stuck trying to keep one guy alive. You get something for your mana. The tradeoff isn't "fair", though-- the victim suffers more than you gain. Pay the piper, yo.

Hopefully, it'll help spur evil healer roleplay in a more promising direction. For every well-played one we've seen, there has been at least one Acolyte in a (Red Aura) suit, merrily assuming a support role to any yahoo lucky enough to group with them. A purely selfish healer profits nicely from this revamp-- several new supplications including a few with a lot of punch. But the proverbial Team Evil 'bitch' healer will be less effective.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

"On a side note evil healers communes got toned down for most others where they are more selfish could we see maybe an evil only offensive commune(not saying something crazy) Unholy Fire or something or maybe a Channel commune that while you are darkpacted to someone you can use there energies to blast peoples or something I don't know LOVE LOVE LOVE the concept but i was just a little depressed at no offensive commune for the evils."

While they are evil, they remain healers. Their abilities are excellent for protecting themselves, and this revamp makes them better at that-- all of the downgrades impact how they heal or cure others.

Something like Unholy Fire would blur the line between an evil healer and an evil shaman. While I'm not opposed to offensive abilities in general, they'll probably be more like Curse or Antipathy, designed to deprive others of the divine forces like those the healer channels.
valguarnera@carrionfields.com

My idea i would like to clarify i would call it Unholy Channel name doesn't really matter though you have to have a Dark Pact with someone to use it and they have to be in the room it drains there mp
instead of yours to use it but could maybe hit for a mangle/*** i don't know i just think it would be cool i don't honestly think it would be a huge boon to healers as healers normally need to focus on the healing exspecially if your heals are going to be doing less then normal but would be fun to have options or maybe

through various items and kick coupled with a certain item.

In retrospect, I'm not sure combining all of those supplications into Aegis was a great idea. I think the healer class leans towards human/storm a bit, and having more incentives to play the smarter/leaner options is desirable.

(In general, and this is a far-off plan, I'd like to see classes eventually hit a point where it isn't practical for the dumber races to practice all skills. I think the mental stats take a back seat to the physical ones, and I also like the idea of not knowing exactly what your opponent can bring to the table. Having an excess of skills can create a form of subclassing.)

Guiding Hand and Stalwart Arm use the trust system. Do they have some drawbacks that cause a need for such trust to arise?

At first glance this looks like an error. I'll review my notes when I get back home. I don't think there's any reason to cast this on anyone but an ally.

Is Vitality just +con or does it have additional benefits?

Not just +con. As the helpfile implies, it helps recovery from wounds as well, to varying degrees. Very healthy targets won't see a huge improvement, but your more frail types will.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

"(In general, and this is a far-off plan, I'd like to see classes eventually hit a point where it isn't practical for the dumber races to practice all skills. I think the mental stats take a back seat to the physical ones, and I also like the idea of not knowing exactly what your opponent can bring to the table. Having an excess of skills can create a form of subclassing.)"

Oh, man I hope you're serious. It's this kind of thought by you guys that makes CF truly awesome...

Though it might just finally kill the more compulsive skill/spell practicers like myself ;-).

"Tommy likey, Tommy want Wingy!."

>> "(In general, and this is a far-off plan, I'd like to see classes
>> eventually hit a point where it isn't practical for the dumber
>> races to practice all skills. I think the mental stats take a
>> back seat to the physical ones, and I also like the idea of not
>> knowing exactly what your opponent can bring to the table. Having
>> an excess of skills can create a form of subclassing.)"
>>
>> Oh, man I hope you're serious. It's this kind of thought by you
>> guys that makes CF truly awesome...

Actually, it would be the dumbest idea, ever.
The world is suffering enough from affinity invokers already.
And I still hope, despite of the healer revamp, it would be still possible to gather an evil hell group and new healers will be still useful there. We haven't seen a capable exploring group for years and I doubt the revamp will make the situation better, not worse.

I would love a change like this, it seems silly that at hero having high intelligence makes little difference other then having more practices to convert.

Most races with at least 17 int and 18 wis are able to learn all of their skills and have the most useful ones practiced to perfection by hero rendering the extra high int practically useless. Other stats such as con, dex, and str remains useful for the entire life of a character thus discounting the value of elves and dark-elves at hero in particular.

But I agree that once you've been around a while, STR/CON (and DEX for fighting classes) do a lot more for you.

INT impacts how much mana you have, how well you defend against mental stuff, and a host of other things, but it's very specialized compared to the attributes mentioned above. Running out of mana due to low INT is bad, but not nearly as bad as running out of HP due to low CON.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

Tuning up int/wis usefulness is promising.
Throw in additinal spell duration and resistance ( above what is now ), make more skills int/wis dependant, whatever ( just don't go crazy that way )
And... nerf giant's bash. If low str races would bash a bit better than currently and high str/size races would bash a bit worse, then you would see more drow aps and less fire aps :)