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lani

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Yet Another New Profession Idea

Hi all.
In another topic What Kind of Skills would you like to see?, I briefly mentioned the idea of a Bardic Profession. Someone else later requested not to include new professions in that particular thread, so here it is, as a new topic.

And this time I spent time working out my idea before unleashing it on you all, should be better nuanced than my last one :-)

The Bard profession would be mainly into buffing his fellows and demoralizing the enemy. A lot of his skills would affect all creatures within range, kinda like a moving SPirit.

Enthralling voice*:
This attribute provides a bonus to all songs that target creatures within range, and increases the duration of the effects thereof
Morale songs:
Points allocated to Morale songs increase the duration and effectiveness of skills that target friendly units within range.
Taunting/demoralizing songs:
Points allocated to Taunting songs increase the duration and effectiveness of skills that target enemy units within range.
Performing:
Points allocated to Performing increase the duration and effectiveness of skills in this category.

*: Primary Attribute, available only to primary Bards

Songs are a mix between a spell or an enchantment. They can be disrupted at any time by disruption skills. even after activation.
For purposes of removing an enchantments, the Song counts as an enchantment for all listeners who benefit from it. The same goes for remove Hex.

Songs:

Rousing song: Attribute: Morale Song Cost: 10
For the duration of this song (5-15 seconds) all Friendly Warriors within range recieve one extra adrenaline point per succesful hit.
Activate: 2 Recharge: 30

Energizing Song: Attribute: Morale Song: Cost: 15
For the duration of this song (3-12 seconds) all party members within range recieve (1-5) Energy Regeneration.
Activate: 2 Recharge: 30

Blissful Song: Attribute: Morale Song: Cost: 20
For the duration of this song (5-15 seconds) all party members within range recieve (1-5) Health Regeneration.
Activate: 2 Recharge: 30

Taunting Song: Attribute: Demoralizing Song: Cost 10
For the duration of this song (5-15 seconds) all enemies within range have a 10% chance of missing their attacks due to the distracting nature of the taunting.
Activate: 2 Recharge: 30

Screeching howl: Attribute: Demoralizing Song: Cost 15
For the duration of this song (3-12 seconds) all enemies within range are slowed in their attacks by 25% due to flinching away from that horrible sound.
Activate: 2 Recharge: 30

Howl of the Ban sidhe: Attribute: Demoralizing Song: Cost 20
For the duration of this song (5-15 seconds) all enemies within range have their maximum health reduced by 15% as if suffering from a deep wound.
Activate: 2 Recharge: 30

Shouts:
Once more into the breach my friends: Attribute: Morale Song Cost: Cost: 5
Party members within range gain +15 armor against elemental powers for 5-10 seconds. Activate: 0 Recharge: 15

Suck it up Trooper!: Attribute: Morale Song Cost: Cost: 5
Party members within range lose one negative effect. For every effect removed the Bard loses (5-3) Health.
Activate 0: Recharge: 30

Dodge This!: Attribute: Demoralizing Song: Cost 5
The Bard's next attack/skill/spell can not be dodged, blocked or otherwise averted. Activate: 0 Recharge: 45

Stances:
Flamboyant pose: Attribute: Performance: Cost 5
For 5-15 seconds, you have 75% chance to block attacks, when an attack comes through, the stance ends.
Activate: 0 Recharge: 12

Striking pose: Attribute: Performance: Cost 10
For 30 seconds your Bardic skills cannot be interrupted. This stance ends if you use a non-bardic skill.
Activate: 0 Recharge: 45

Taking your bows: Attribute: Performance Cost: 10
For 15 seconds you take in the favor of your audience, gaining (2-9) Health & Energy regeneration.
Activate: 0 Recharge: 45

Flashy fencing: Attribute: Performance Cost: 5
For 10 seconds, while using a sword, your attack rate is doubled, but you suffer a 25% armor rating loss.
Activation: 0 Recharge: 15

There's more I could come up with, but this is enough to set the general theme I think. I've yet to come up with some direct attack skills for this profession.
Also I'm not sure whether or not I want this profession to carry an instrument and if so, what it would do. Probably an energy boost or some such.

Let me know if you like this idea and if you have recommendations for it, and how well it would work in combination with existing professions :-)

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10/03/05 16:10

trax_stormrage

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Re: Yet Another New Profession Idea

I'd like an assassin or ninja type profession to be on there, i'm not going to give skills like you just did but assassins wouldb e awesome :)

10/03/05 16:56

DexAholic

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Re: Yet Another New Profession Idea

QUOTE

I'd like an assassin or ninja type profession to be on there, i'm not going to give skills like you just did but assassins wouldb e awesome :)

Assassins aren't really combatants, though. A ninja could sneak into your castle and kill you in your sleep, but could not for one second stand up to a skilled combatant like a samurai in an actual battle. I'm not sure that Guild Wars is the right type of game for a class like that.

A bard is a pretty cool idea, though. They tried to make bards useful in the 3rd edition AD&D rules. They're pretty neat, but at the end of the day they're a little underpowered. Done well, a Guild Wars bard could be a lot of fun to play without unbalancing the game. That type of skillset would adapt well to the game.

***THIS POST HAS BEEN EDITED***

10/03/05 17:17

lani

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Re: Yet Another New Profession Idea

Well, when people say Ninja, they think more along the lines of those horrible "American Ninja" movies, than of the somewhat more histroically acceptable Shogun or Mushashi (hope I spelled that right).

An assassin would be really unsuited in this game. Just imagine having to wear drab clothes, talk to a plant, walk into Mursaat strongholds and take down Willa in an elevator...
I mean, you'd end up taking in Gwen as a roommate for crying out loud. ;-)

Back to Bardic now. I especially like the idea of a Bard because of it's potential in regards to music. I always think it a great improvement if the music in a game is good. That's why I got the extended soundtrack and the Minipack from DirectSong. I'm curious as to the Battle Pack 1 which just came out. But anyway, a Bard would give them a chance to really let lose with musical effects, not just visual mumbo-jumbo.

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10/03/05 18:10

DexAholic

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Re: Yet Another New Profession Idea

There could be some cool specialization posibilities too. Not to get too artsy about it, but you could have a music skill and another that is like a dance-fighting skill (Capoeira anyone?). The dance-fighting specialist could have skills that play off of a music-bard's songs. The music bard could also have some instrument-based attacks like the musician fighters in Kung-Fu Hustle.

10/03/05 18:20

neoelasticman

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Re: Yet Another New Profession Idea

QUOTE

I'd like an assassin or ninja type profession to be on there, i'm not going to give skills like you just did but assassins wouldb e awesome :)

If you wanna talk about rogues, ninjas, assassins, etc then the place to be is my rogue thread, not here. It has made it up to 3 pages now and I am proud; it is my most replied-to thread and well worth putting your thoughts into, since I put a link to it in Guru so that A-Net can see it.

This thread follows suit, starting on a new profession by going vastly into detail on what exactly Lani means, so I hope, Lani, that your thread becomes as long and insightful as my own, if not more so. So I'll start the trend by getting back onto the topic of bards.

I don't think your big ol' comprehensive list of attributes and skills said much about weapons or armor, so I'll put my two cents into that. One of your stances hinted at fencing, so I'll continue by saying that the weapon of choice of a bard will be a rapier, epee, or foil (these are all real fencing weapons). It would be different than a warrior's sword, because fencing swords are built to be quick, not strong. Also, you don't hack at the enemy, but rather you try to hit with the tip of the sword. Here are some skills for you fencing weapon, which I think should have a performing attribute requirement (fencing is more a form of art than warfare). Obviously going full offensive against a warrior is a bad idea, so instead most of the fencing skills will focus on defending yourself and counter-attacking, just like in real fencing (I wish I did fencing!):

Riposte
Performing
fencing defense
energy cost: ?
casting time: 0
recharge time: ?
For 5 seconds, the next time you are hit by a melee weapon, damage is reduced by n% and your attacker takes the damage that was reduced in this way.

Feint
Performing
fencing defense
energy cost: ?
casting time: 0
recharge time: ?
This attack has n% armor penetration, and the target loses balance and is knocked down.

As for the bard's armor, I think it should be fitting to the bard, but not to the point of ridiculousness. Hence, the jester's outfit is not a jingle-belled hat and clown colors, but a more serious take on the common outfit. Here are my ideas for armor sets:

Jester's ...
Performer's ...
Musician's ...
Singer's ...
Romantic's ...

I think their armor would be third best, just under ranger's armor, because they will be using melee weapons, but mostly songs I would think. Which would mean that their HP would be about equal to a ranger's, and their EP would be around the same as, say, an elementalist's base EP? (I'm thinking that since their songs are all AoE, they should have slightly higher costs, so they need the EP to balance it)

I hope this post is helpful enough to get a train of others started, I would look forward to this class as well.

Garrett Gervasius R/Me20, Zaya Gervasius A/R20, Artemis Gervasius Me/N, Electric Gervasius E/Mo

Use the Build Maker to make easy, linked skillbars for your unique build, without uploading a single picture! Just copy and paste code for each skill!

10/03/05 18:32

lani

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Re: Yet Another New Profession Idea

I kinda like the idea of making the Bard a swashbuckling "Ha! I fart in your general direction!" fencer :-) Fighting style should be flamboyant and more focussed on making a bumbling idiot of the enmey than to actually kill it.
"Trip opponent" for example might be fun.
It neatly gives me the direct-offensive set I was looking for. Thanks Neo :-)

It might even be a way to squeeze dual-wielding in there for those who think any Fantasy game is incomplete without it. As poniards, daggers or even cat's claws are acceptable side weapons for a fencing weapon.
Actually this is just about the only historical use of dual-wielding. Nobody ever lugged around two multiheaded flails for example. Well, maybe someone did, once, not for long though.

As to armor and energy level, I'm thinking that the same AL as Ranger and Energy as for Monk/Mesmer ought to be good. Giving the bard a bonus like Ele's might be going to far. Sure some of the Songs ar expensive, but keep in mind he can only maintain one of them at a given time, so there's enough time to regen I think.

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10/03/05 18:48

lani

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Re: Yet Another New Profession Idea

Aargh, double post due to PM pop-up :-(

***THIS POST HAS BEEN EDITED***

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10/03/05 18:48

DexAholic

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Re: Yet Another New Profession Idea

What would the primary attribute be? Something that would relate to all of their abilities...Presence or Charisma maybe?

10/03/05 19:03

lani

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Re: Yet Another New Profession Idea

I had "Enthralling voice" for that, more or less similar to Divine Favor for Monks. But Presence might be a better name for it as the Bard's not purely about voice :-)

QUOTE

Jester's ...
Performer's ...
Musician's ...
Singer's ...
Romantic's ...

Maybe Mountebank's ... instead of Jester then?
The travelling mountebanks wore a cheerful panoply, but atleast it didn't have bells on. And I think there's a Performer's ... allready in the Mesmer wardrobe somewhere. So maybe replace that one with Troubadour's...
The more I think of it, thiss profession would be closely related to the Mesmer's in some ways. At first glance of them I thought they were Bard(ish), definately inspired by the Shakespearean era anyway.

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10/03/05 19:29

neoelasticman

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Re: Yet Another New Profession Idea

I'm thinkin' that a bard would be to a mesmer what a warrior is to an elementalist. Where the elementalist is the powerhouse magic-user, the warrior is the powerhouse brawn-user. The same would apply to a bard: where the mesmer is the anti-magic, the bard is the anti-physical.

Now, a mesmer has his domination for magic and his illusion for physical, but illusion is severely lacking in what i know it could potentially have. Its potential could be realized in the bard, who's songs will affect mostly physical things, and barely any magical things. Plus, the mesmer only deals in hexes and spells, no enchantments. The bard, on the other hand, has "enchantments" galore, as well as a few "hexes," in the form of his songs. And, I would LOVE to have somebody wielding a rapier.

Garrett Gervasius R/Me20, Zaya Gervasius A/R20, Artemis Gervasius Me/N, Electric Gervasius E/Mo

Use the Build Maker to make easy, linked skillbars for your unique build, without uploading a single picture! Just copy and paste code for each skill!

10/04/05 15:22

DexAholic

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Re: Yet Another New Profession Idea

Yeah, I was thinking of something along the lines of a mixture of illusion and inspiration...

10/04/05 15:30

Sainty

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Re: Yet Another New Profession Idea

Although this topic is probably out of my league I would like to reply :)

It would be nice to have bard, but I have a small question.. about the spells cast..

1: If the spells are cast on your own team, will they be enchantments or shouts?

2: If the songs are cast on other players, will they direct themselfs at 1 or more players, and will they be hexes/enchantments or will there be a new spell type called songs?

3: If they are a new sort called songs, would they be interruptable?

4: The skills say "while the songs lasts", does it mean the bard has to keep on using this skill, and will he be able to use other skills, or are they just like the -1 energy regen skills?

5: What would be the counter skills to this profession?

would be nice if you could fill this in for me lani :) I like the idea :D

Sainty Salvation || Sainty Battle || Sainty Nature || Naughty Sainty

10/04/05 17:11

lani

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Credibility: 28 pts

Re: Yet Another New Profession Idea

QUOTE

1: If the spells are cast on your own team, will they be enchantments or shouts?

Well, to qoute myself:

QUOTE (Lani)

Songs are a mix between a spell or an enchantment. They can be disrupted at any time by disruption skills. even after activation.
For purposes of removing an enchantments, the Song counts as an enchantment for all listeners who benefit from it. The same goes for remove Hex.

So they are not shouts as they have a casting time, getting into the song so to speak. The effects can be stripped from individuals as if they are Enchantments or Hexes and a Song may be interrupted at any time, even after 'casting'

QUOTE

2: If the songs are cast on other players, will they direct themselfs at 1 or more players, and will they be hexes/enchantments or will there be a new spell type called songs?

Area of effect. Not gonna quote myself twice, but it's in there :-)

QUOTE

3: If they are a new sort called songs, would they be interruptable?

Yes they would.

QUOTE

4: The skills say "while the songs lasts", does it mean the bard has to keep on using this skill, and will he be able to use other skills, or are they just like the -1 energy regen skills?

Like any other skill that doesn't require an energy upkeep, you can only have one of them active at any given time. A Bard can't sing a shanty and an opera at the same time either ;-)

QUOTE

5: What would be the counter skills to this profession?

Well, obviously disrupting, or Hex/Enchantment removals.

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10/05/05 14:12

LT_Little

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Re: Yet Another New Profession Idea

I agree, all very good ideas but so obviously taken from a game like Everquest.

LT Little- lvl 20 R/N
LT Liam- lvl 19 E/Mo
Mighty Mighty Liam- lvl 18 W/Mo
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10/05/05 14:39

DexAholic

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Re: Yet Another New Profession Idea

QUOTE

I agree, all very good ideas but so obviously taken from a game like Everquest.

Hehe. Not so much, my friend. Many games have used bardic musical spell effects, and Everquest was nowhere near being among the first. The concept has existed in literature and the pen-and-paper D&D games for a loooong time. The first computer RPG I remember that used bardic musical spell effects was a game I played as a wee lad called The Bard's Tale. I used the play those Bard's Tale games on my Commodore 64 on the order of 19 or 20 years ago. The original Bard's Tale games pioneered CRPG concepts that are still being used today.

This is NOT a new concept, but it would be a cool adaptation for Guild Wars.

10/05/05 14:50

DexAholic

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Re: Yet Another New Profession Idea

On a side note; here's a little CRPG history for ya: the game engine created for The Bard's Tale was updated to create The Bard's Tale II, III, and IV, and were groundbreaking not only in that they were the first truly pen-and-paper-like computer RPGs, but also some of the first games ever to attempt a 1st-person, modular viewscape. This user interface became the standard for CRPGs for many years. Some of the same people who were involved with The Bard's Tale used a modified version of the engine to create a game called Wasteland, which is one of the best CRPGs ever made to date (IMHO). Wasteland was the basis for the more modern Fallout and Fallout 2, which were spiritual 'sequals' made many years later. Anybody else remember those?

Sorry for the thread hijack/tangent, lani. I'll be good now.

***THIS POST HAS BEEN EDITED***

10/05/05 14:59

lani

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Re: Yet Another New Profession Idea

Hey, no problem. I'm a Bard's Tale veteran myself :-)
But I played it on an Amiga 500, along with Dungeon Master and the old Dragonlance games.
I'm not sure if Bard's Tale was the actual mother of CRPG. I seem to recall Ultima III having something similar. Not sure which was first though.

And I freely admit that the Bard profession isn't new or original. I do deny any influence whatsoever of Everquest as I have never played that game.

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10/05/05 15:31

DexAholic

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Re: Yet Another New Profession Idea

QUOTE

It wasn't the mother of CRPGs, but it was the first to provide the 'total package' for players. Sure, the Ultima and Wizardry series had one or two titles in first, but The Bard's Tale was the first to really integrate all aspects of party-based role playing into a neat package under a good user interface and game system.

Ah, how I long for the days of shopping in Garth's shop...getting recharged by Roscoe...barging into random houses in the city and being attacked by werewolves...

The song I sing
Will tell the tale
Of a cold and wintery day;

Of castle walls
and torchlit halls
And a price men had to pay.

When evil fled
and brave men bled
The Dark one came to stay,

Till men of old
For blood and gold
Had rescued Skara Brae.

If you're interested in a bit of nostalgia:
http://www.geocities.com/thebardstale/

***THIS POST HAS BEEN EDITED***

10/05/05 15:50

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