I do like playing my shifter, but I just think I should do alot more while in form as an animal than I am. All I can do is bite, or forage, or bite, or rake, and in some forms you can't do anything except sit there. I just think that these forms need a little changing up. I think each form should have it's own skills that it can use during a fight. I mean after all we are the humans that change into the animal that we know. We should have alot more skills than just bite, or something of that nature. We still have our original minds, i think we just need more skills while in form. See what I'm saying? We still are the human, or felar, or half-drow, we are changing into a form of animal to help us out because that's all we know. Dont animals Lions do alot more then just sit on the same level as their opponent and bite?

I know this may sound stupid but you see the Lions on Discovery channel always jumping on the back of the prey, and biting them from the back, or always going for the throat for a kill. This could be an example of something a lion could do if you change into one. Something like that. Where the jumping on the back, and biting them, or clawing them can cause extreme bleeding. Or going for a throat bite which all Lions do which would maybe hinder a mage from casting or a bard from singing because they have a damaged throat.

With tigers that could be the same way, but a little different. Tigers I believe are the largest Cat, somewhere around 800+ pounds? I know they have the pounce skill, but that pounce skill should work the majority of the time, and when a Lion, or Tiger would pounce on you, you are seriously screwed. A 800 pound Tiger on top of a 180 pound human would be very bad for the human, and you could have those skills that the lion would have too with the throat bite, ect..

I just think changes like this would make the shapeshifter class more fun, and also give us skills while in form. More animal like skills then just bite, or claw. Every top form if it's a cat like creature should make the opponent bleed very badly, and weaken them alot.

You might also be able to bite a particular area of the body if you are in form. Whether that is as a rattlesnake, cobra, lion, tiger, ect... The different areas you bite they different effects that would have on the opponent. The quicker animals like Lions, Cobra's, ect.. would be a little easier to bite a certain area, then let's say an anaconda which is much bigger, but slower and alot stronger.

All of these forms should have different skills. I dont mean changing all the lower tier forms, like Bear, or rhino, ect.. Just the third and 4th forms you get. I think that would make it so that the animals we change into are alot more deadly then just a bite. Give them more animal skills that they use to kill prey.

Just my thought.

While I don't necessarily disagree with the idea that shifters would be more fun if they had more things they could do in form, this is a pretty daunting task. Right now, I think we have around 95 forms plus quest forms. So if we were to add in two new skills for each one, that would be a lot of work considering we like to make each one as unique as possible. There could be some overlap obviously, but even if we decided to just do one new skill for each of the major forms, that is about 30 new skills and coming up with the basic ideas, the assorted echos and getting them all coded and balanced is a huge amount of work. I think I added about 30 new fighting skills when we first split the class off from transmuters and the whole split took several months of it being my main priority on the mud. So overall, while I don't mind the idea in spirit, actually going out and doing all of this gives me a headache.

I agree that's too much work, and a single new skill per form wouldn't do much to alleviate the tedium anyway. How about a little spellcasting ability instead? Shifters are mages, and losing that aspect entirely in animal form is disappointing.

Say shapeshifters could take a charge from a wand/staff/scroll, and capture the energy in a tattoo. This energy could then be released in animal form.

The number of simultaneous tattoos would be limited of course. Perhaps a shifter could have just one, although being able to choose between two or three would be more fun.

As a stronger limit, top-tier forms could be prevented from activating tattoos, on the argument powerful forms take too much of a shifter's attention. Add in some mana/time costs, and I think this can be made to balance out.

I wouldn't want to see mage form become useless to a shifter in combat. But as is, animal forms are too boring for me to put up with the class, even if the concept is appealing. YMMV.

Pachyderms are low end forms, so are rhino's. Let's think about that for a time.

And a Big horned sheep is just UBER hard hitting multiple times.

The forms are silly and I had seeing one on "where".

>We still have our original minds,

Not exactly. Check your stats.


>
>think we just need more skills while in form. See what I'm
>saying? We still are the human, or felar, or half-drow, we
>are changing into a form of animal to help us out because
>that's all we know. Dont animals Lions do alot more then just
>sit on the same level as their opponent and bite?

They also have rake. :)

Skipping the rest of this... basically, what I read here is that you're playing a shifter and would like them to be tougher without regard to game balance.

I'll ignore his comment about its victim being screwed if a tiger pounced on him (more power is not needed) to suggest it would be quite interesting if every form had, several (5+) improvable skills associated with it, skills accessible only in form. At present, most forms have a comparable number of abilities, but being able to enter commands and seeing skills improve over time can be rewarding. Depending on the forms and the skills, shifters would have more tactical options, too.

To help (a little I know) for game balance, these skills could come through use of the form (becomming confident, etc). Perhaps slow down a little the time it take to improve in the forms but give more skills ?

I know when I had my shifter, the last forms were VERY quick to become confident.. I had the mongoose (last form I got), and became confident within One Level (max two) .. Which is, I think too quick...

So, making them "upgrade" a little slower but giving more options might be interesting.

Ultimately, you are going to become confident in the form, no matter how much it's slowed down and the skills being mentioned are a what I see as a significant strength boost. So in order to grant these without taking something away, we are talking about giving hero shifters a healthy tick up on the power scale (bleeding, -str, -dex maledictions, improved pounce/chase, hell why not give them disembowel?).

If you suggested minor flash skillsy to each form more in the neighborhood of knee, or elbow, perhaps than it's simply an arguement of the forms need something to do besides bite.

With the whole biting of an area, either leg, waist, arm, ect... That would make the opponent thing a little about what armor to wear on those areas of his body. If he's wearing nothing but a cloth, or leather on his legs, and I as a tiger try and bite the leg, i'm going to bite through that cloth, or leather, and maybe take down his dex because I bit his leg, and caused bleeding.

I think all the cat like forms should cause bleeding, not just the jaguar. The Jaguar is nothing compared to a Lion and Tiger, but the Jaguar is the one known for bleeding.

It's just my idea, and I think it would make these forms alot more fun. Just a couple of skills we can do in form is all i'm asking, something to where we can blind them, or weaken them, or make them lose a weapon by biting a limb. Because we can't do that right now. When I say blind them I mean biting them right in the face. Something to the effect on that. I dont believe it would unbalance anything. I think shifters need a little more, that's all.

Everybody complains about the one offensive form that can do that.

nt