[crossfire] Classes

[Mark Wedel]

On 05/28/10 05:48 PM, Brendan Lally wrote:
> On Thu, 27 May 2010 22:03:50 -0700
> Mark Wedel<mwedel at sonic.net>  wrote:
>
>>    For starting skills, should skill tools be done away with (eg,
>> talismans, holy symbols?)  My take, which may be wrong, is more often
>> than not they are annoying/disliked, and I'm not sure what is really
>> gained by having them vs giving the characters the native skills.
>> Thoughts?
>
> I'd agree with the skill tools bit, mostly they are just clutter in my
> character's inventory until I find a 'proper' skill scroll (which I
> would typically buy anyway because they are cheap enough).
>
> Maybe talismans could remain as a form of amulet that gives a skill
> boost to the spell schools in question? If they were made rare enough*,
> then this would be a way to make it much easier to 'start' a
> wizard-style character.
> Give a talisman as starting equipment to each mage that increases the
> effective level of their skill by 3 levels (probably capped at level
> 15 or so). They would then immediately be able to cast 4th level
> spells whereas non-specialists are forced to start with first level
> spells.
> If the first area of effect spells are made available at levels 3
> or 4 then it will be very slow going for anyone who isn't a wizard by
> trade.

  That could be done.  One thought is to have the talismans/holy symbols be 
attuned as now, but add something more to attunement.

  While attunement is certainly useful right now, I don't think it is especially 
so.  It means that the effective casting level is slightly higher, and sp cost 
slightly lower.  But casting level typically doesn't have a huge impact on spell 
ability - it may mean an extra point or two of damage.  What is really useful is 
making real level of the skill effectively higher, so you have access to more 
powerful spells.


>>    Related to the skills discussion, maybe sense magic&  sense curse
>> skills go away, and instead become special bonuses of praying and
>> wizardry skills?
>
> Or maybe they should just become an extension of the identification
> skills? So if I have an enchanted sword and use my smithery skill on
> it, there are three possible outcomes:
> 1) I fail completely and think it is a mundane sword.
> 2) I know there is something magical about it but don't know what.
> 3) I find out everything there is to know about it.
>
> If the skill is lacking, then you could still have an unmodified roll
> against INT and WIS to try and determine 2.

  Having it tied to to the skill for the item is a good idea.

  It does make sense that depending on your skill, you would learn different 
things out, or perhaps nothing at all for powerful items.

  The one issue here, relative to curse, is that it is often handy to be able to 
detect curse on item because you can still sell it for money.  I say this in the 
sense that the player doesn't have any control of it being identified as cursed.

  But a reasonable change may just be that cursed items, whether known cursed or 
not, are considered worth 0 value in shops - shopkeeper should at least know 
what it is.  Otherwise, one could argue that a player should be able to erase 
any signs of its true nature (how does the shopkeeper know what it is if I 
identify it away from him?)

  But cursed items could perhaps still be decomposed into raw materials, so you 
could use a cursed sword to make a normal sword (just as melting down a +1 sword 
results in a pile of ordinary steel, same would be true for a -1 sword).