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Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Class System - Unnecessarily Rigid
ArchivedUser
Guest
From what we know, the "64 unique classes" aren't really unique classes in the sense that some people may be expecting (i.e. the secondary class does not add any new skills; but can profoundly change gameplay nonetheless). The secondary class is customization via augments and imo AoC's solution to allow for individualization of people playing the same class.
Before you read further: I think IS will do a great job with this system and make each class feel as unique and fun as possible. The reason for this post is to comment on the system (i.e. choose a primary class then a secondary class) that I feel will hinder developer flexibility for adjustment and growth of classes in the future.
The way I think about the secondary class system is like class talent trees of WoW back in vanilla/BC. They don't give us any new skills, they simply augment abilities to various extents. So to me, each class in AoC essentially just has 8 talent trees you could spec in, but of course speccing into one vs another may lead to very different playstyles and feels. The main difference between WoW's old system and AoC's however, is that in WoW each class had a niche and talent trees emphasized some unique aspect of that niche. In AoC however, your secondary class (your talent tree) sounds like it brings you closer to another class.
My main gripe with the primary-secondary class system is 2 things:
1. The asymmetry I feel between the martial and arcane classes [edit: resolved by a comment from atama below]
2. The rigidity of the system and its inertia towards more classes
I like the idea of having martial and arcane classes but magic just has more space to explore and opportunities for uniqueness. There are lots of posts about the missing druid/shaman nature magic class for example. By having the primary-secondary system IS is forcing themselves to make too many variants of each class, via secondary-class customization that I am worried about the uniqueness of each. An arcane secondary class to me allows for a much wider variety of possible augments than a martial one. I just don't see how much variety a ranger secondary could add to a class vs a mage secondary, or how different will the fighter & tank secondaries be?
Having a primary-secondary system also makes it sooo much harder and more work to add in a single new class as the multiplicative number of possibilities will be hard to keep up with and again harder to keep feeling unique.
The heart of the whole class system of AoC is augments. This does not necessitate primary-secondary class combinations. You could just have augment sets where a summoner could become a broodwarden, beastmaster, necromancer or conjurer. This reduction in possible "classes" should preserve the uniqueness of each more easily, allow for easier addition of more base classes and accomplish the exact same thing as the current system. Each class specialization doesn't need to only allow for 1 augmentation option either, like a conjurer could have the same augments that the current enchanter and conjurer were planning on having and you just get to choose for each spell/ability between whatever number of augments. Separating augments from a "secondary-class" also allows for more possibilities of acquisition. For example you could earn/unlock some augments through your progression with the thieve's guild or mage's academy etc. Not being pigeonholed into secondary-class themed augments also allows for more depth and specialization of each class emphasizing their uniqueness as opposed to making them more similar to other classes.
TLDR - the heart of AoC's class system is skill augments. The primary-secondary class combinations is just the wrapping it comes in. This wrapping can become extremely restrictive for future growth and risks the uniqueness of each "class" due to over-saturation. Keep the augments, get rid of the table and give me a forking flow chart of specializations for each class with less total number of classes but more uniqueness for each class with more specialized roles.
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Edits: adjusted the first bit of the post based on conversation below but left the essence of it the same.
Before you read further: I think IS will do a great job with this system and make each class feel as unique and fun as possible. The reason for this post is to comment on the system (i.e. choose a primary class then a secondary class) that I feel will hinder developer flexibility for adjustment and growth of classes in the future.
The way I think about the secondary class system is like class talent trees of WoW back in vanilla/BC. They don't give us any new skills, they simply augment abilities to various extents. So to me, each class in AoC essentially just has 8 talent trees you could spec in, but of course speccing into one vs another may lead to very different playstyles and feels. The main difference between WoW's old system and AoC's however, is that in WoW each class had a niche and talent trees emphasized some unique aspect of that niche. In AoC however, your secondary class (your talent tree) sounds like it brings you closer to another class.
My main gripe with the primary-secondary class system is 2 things:
1. The asymmetry I feel between the martial and arcane classes [edit: resolved by a comment from atama below]
2. The rigidity of the system and its inertia towards more classes
I like the idea of having martial and arcane classes but magic just has more space to explore and opportunities for uniqueness. There are lots of posts about the missing druid/shaman nature magic class for example. By having the primary-secondary system IS is forcing themselves to make too many variants of each class, via secondary-class customization that I am worried about the uniqueness of each. An arcane secondary class to me allows for a much wider variety of possible augments than a martial one. I just don't see how much variety a ranger secondary could add to a class vs a mage secondary, or how different will the fighter & tank secondaries be?
Having a primary-secondary system also makes it sooo much harder and more work to add in a single new class as the multiplicative number of possibilities will be hard to keep up with and again harder to keep feeling unique.
The heart of the whole class system of AoC is augments. This does not necessitate primary-secondary class combinations. You could just have augment sets where a summoner could become a broodwarden, beastmaster, necromancer or conjurer. This reduction in possible "classes" should preserve the uniqueness of each more easily, allow for easier addition of more base classes and accomplish the exact same thing as the current system. Each class specialization doesn't need to only allow for 1 augmentation option either, like a conjurer could have the same augments that the current enchanter and conjurer were planning on having and you just get to choose for each spell/ability between whatever number of augments. Separating augments from a "secondary-class" also allows for more possibilities of acquisition. For example you could earn/unlock some augments through your progression with the thieve's guild or mage's academy etc. Not being pigeonholed into secondary-class themed augments also allows for more depth and specialization of each class emphasizing their uniqueness as opposed to making them more similar to other classes.
TLDR - the heart of AoC's class system is skill augments. The primary-secondary class combinations is just the wrapping it comes in. This wrapping can become extremely restrictive for future growth and risks the uniqueness of each "class" due to over-saturation. Keep the augments, get rid of the table and give me a forking flow chart of specializations for each class with less total number of classes but more uniqueness for each class with more specialized roles.
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Edits: adjusted the first bit of the post based on conversation below but left the essence of it the same.
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Comments
I thought this was common knowledge. Your choice of your primary class (out of 8) decides what skills you have access to, and your choice of your secondary (which can be changed... like re-specing a talent tree) only gives you augments for these skills. Now, admittedly we don't have much info on how these augments will look like and how unique "feeling" each of the 64 primary-secondary class combos will be but their emphasis is indeed on making each combination feel unique.
Source: https://www.ashesofcreation.com/class-list/
If you keep reading, you'll see that I'm not really criticizing the augment system, I actually really like it. I am criticizing how rigid their way of delivering it is (i.e. secondary-class selection) for, imo, no benefit or specific reason.
I'm saying this because if you speculate too much and get your hopes too high, you will 100% be disappointed by the mid/end result.
So, as nagash said, we need to see how they implement the first version of the class/skill system into the whole MMORPG, and then come up with ways to improve those.
Don't get me wrong, I think it's a very good idea to say out loud what your expectations are about game mechanics, because this will help the devs decide how they're gonna implement those. You just have to wait for them to be available for testing first, since they will most likely be changed until Open beta or final release.
Take Summoner + Cleric for example. Most games your typical summoner is the pet driven class. Usually it's some sort of elemental they go with and have similar mage/wizard like skills to supplement their DPS. Well going Summoner + Cleric makes them a Necromancer. Those big burst spells now become dots, your pets are now undead based, your abilities gain lifesteals and heals. That is a completely different class than summoner by every since. The same is true for Summoner + Ranger that makes a beastlord. Making all abilities nature based and summoning beast from the wild. Plus with your race factored in maybe humans summon a bear, while orcs summon a warg and Tulnar summon some type of reptile. So if you go Summoner you can now be 8 different types of pet class users. That's extraordinarily flexible.
That's not just augmenting, that's changing the class. Sure they all work on the same principle of a pet style class but I've played many games that have separate classes the divided up summoner/necromancer etc. Each skill has a minimum of 4 augments and those can make a skill look completely different. You're thinking that if a Fighter has a sword swing attack and goes Mage as a secondary class that sword swing attack is only going to become magical based. That could be the case for 1 of the augments, one of the other 3 could turn it into a actual magical projectile or another could turn it into an AOE from afar. Your primary class will dictate your role more or less, but the augments will change the playstyle greatly where you will have different abilities. That's not just my thinking, that's Steven's words.
https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Skills
So I am not really trying to speculate on how things will be, but I'm trying to speculate on how readily things can grow/change from what we will be originally presented with. Let's take a super easy example: Instead of saying as a ranger, your choice of secondary class will determine if you are a strider, sentinel, scout, hawkeye, scion, falconer, soulbow, or bowsinger you could just say as a ranger you could specialize into the following 8 classes. This would require literally no change in what is currently proposed so what's the point?
Well one point is that augments will not be thematically constrained (I won't have expectations or rules about what augments I may find in the falconer class). The lack of restriction may allow for more unique augments and thus classes. One of my concerns was that magical augments could take on many shapes while a fighter augment less so.
So on the contrary, I am saying the exact opposite. I think a mage secondary for a fighter has so many ways it could turn out that it may be warranted to make two classes based on this combination, but by the way the class system is presented to us, they may have to be put into one.
On the flip side, if some combinations of the primary-secondary class combinations just don't feel quite unique enough, there will need to be a lot of work to give them a place and feel amongst the rest. Instead however, if we took those exact same 8 specializations for the ranger, and just paired them: new sentinel = all the augments of strider+sentinel, new scout = all the augments of scout+hawkeye ... you would get 4 specialization with more augment options for each spell/ability. This would not lose you anything other than cool names. It also admittedly shifts the balance problem from 64 classes to possible augment combinations. That example was arbitrary but the point is that if you avoid saying it's a secondary class choice that selects your class, you have more freedom on where to draw the lines and can dictate the numbers so that each feels appropriately unique.
The second reason to reword secondary class selection into specialization is that if they want to add another core class (I can't imagine what is left but let's just say they come up something) then now they are kind of obligated to increase from 64 to 81. Saturation thus quickly becomes an issue and making each class feel unique even harder than before. However... if for example people demand druids because there are none (let's just pretend) then they could just add a new specialization or two for the cleric and mage that gives players the feel they want. On that note, I am all about class asymmetry and would not be mad even a little bit if one class had more specializations than another if the augment possibilities were similar in number. If you slice the same sized pizza into 4 classes or 6, I'm cool with that.
So I hope this makes my points a bit more clear. I know they'll do a great job, I just think they will have more developmental freedom and easier growth if they packaged it a bit differently.
=( hmm, maybe ask a specific question? Or describe what you think I'm trying to say? Alternatively hop on discord and we can chat
Martial and arcane doesn't mean much besides where the power comes from and possibly the stats it uses to scales. You shouldn't look at arcane classes and assume they have all the goodies. Look at a class's role when trying to understand what it gives a class as a secondary. Tank secondary is going to make you tankier, fighter is going to give you mobility, ranger will possibly increase range, and rogue might give you stealth augments. Just be they aren't arcane, doesn't mean they wont be interesting or strong.
The current system gives a lot of freedom for players to create the character they want. Even though we don't have class combinations named the way some want, we already know there is more ways to build the class then what it's name implies. An easy example of this is the cleric class. We know there is both a life and death side to this class. A necromancer can build more traditional towards the death but there is also the option for them to focus on the life side. A high sword can be build like a holy warrior or a dark knight.
TLDR: stop freaking out about what they named the class combinations. Just because your preferred class isn't there doesn't mean you can't build it with the tools they give you.
I am not really freaking out, nor am I salty about the options or their names. Again, I like the system, I think it's great. I just worry about how it's presented and how much freedom the developers will have for further adjusting/adding to it.
I also don't think at all that arcane is stronger or better than martial. I'm just saying there is more variety with arcane. For example you could have augments for various elements or arcane magics, it's just more flexible since it's much more open to imagination.
I don't really think you follow my points. I am not worried about what they are trying to deliver, I just worry about how hard they will make it for themselves to adjust it or add to it in the future.
I don’t see how having an augment to, say, turn a fireball spell into an ice spell can’t turn a mundane sword swing into a freezing sword swing.
i think his example of "specializations" is very close to what it seems the devs are going for(won't lie, i just found this game yesterday). the main difference is that Neuro's system would allow for an easier implementation of new classes that have their own specializations to progress into rather than speccing into another class to gain/augment abilities.
edit: the base amount would still be 8 classes each with 8 specializations, and each new class would hopefully still have 8 specializations. it would also allow the addition of new specializations for a old class. this would also stop the issue of squaring classes.
"Not being pigeonholed into secondary-class themed augments also allows for more depth and specialization of each class emphasizing their uniqueness as opposed to making them more similar to other classes."
I'm a bit dubious about this...if you want to open up augment options, previously locked to a secondary class, then it's also possible that many base classes can choose the same augments from a larger pool and become even more generic rather than unique. Given how many min-maxers there are I'd say it's more likely you'll end up with a more generic than diverse player base.
Also, have the devs said they're adding more base classes? I kind of always assumed we'd just have the 8 forever, like Archeage.
An excellent point. If secondary martial classes do not indeed exclude magical augments then that eases my mind about uniqueness with arcane vs martial secondaries. Thanks for that point. I do admit I do not follow your second point about the ice sword though (but I think that's just a bit of us not being exactly on the same page).
@skullkid1105
Yes exactly. I'm a bit worried about the expectations it sets for future growth and how it is structured. I don't want the devs to shy away from giving us a new augmentation set because there are no more primary-secondary combos left or to feel that one primary-secondary combo is really being forced to feel unique without much effect or finally that the only way to add more to the class system is to make the huge huge jump from 64 to 81 classes (when adding only a few may be warranted).
@McStackerson
Yes absolutely. I would be super super happy if they did this. I like the idea of race augments and I really do hope there is more where that came from where through social organizations, as we both mentioned, you could get even more augments. This is exactly why I say the class system in AoC is about augments at heart, the primary-secondary class selection bit is just one way of delivering it.
@Ravudha
So given that the base classes will have different skills, I doubt they would have access to the exact same augments but yes they may be similar in theme. But that is also what may be the case with the current categories where a cleric secondary class will allow for similarly themed "self-heal" augments to some skills. I think that is fine and a bit unavoidable to a certain extent. In terms of do they plan to add more classes... well I don't know, I do recall reading somewhere that they had initially planned for more but I neither recall the source nor want to hunt it down. The main point I have is that I want the devs to have freedom regarding the possibility of adding (or removing) more classes. The wording of primary-secondary class combinations necessitates the existence and maintenance of a certain number of classes. But let's say only 62 of them really feel unique and 2 neither feel unique nor are they popular. I would like to devs to feel ok deciding that it's not worth the effort to marginally increase our variety in classes by having 64 instead of 62. Or similarly if people really feel like they are missing some class in game (despite the absurd number already) then the devs should feel ok adding 1 or 2 more classes without having to change any of the existing ones or without having to jump from 64 to 81. My whole point is that the system doesn't need to be changed to allow devs more flexibility in the future, it just needs a bit of rewording.
also if half of the shit that ive read from this thread is true(augments form race, religion, etc.), then im fucking excited about just making a character.
You are indeed correct sir. A rock paper scissor (x20 for the 64 classes :P) philosophy is what has been stated.
@skullkid1105
Somebody finally understands me! So like... want to grab lunch today or something? No yeah, that's cool I was uhm I was busy today anyways. No yeah I totally get it, you know what, I actually just even remembered I had this thing. With my friend. Yeah I kind of promised him.
Lol but yeah we do know there are racial augments. I just hope they take that a bit further and give us some sources of gated augments, like though social structures like thieve's guild and mage's academy etc (don't think this is confirmed).
im not only talking about 1v1 situations, what would the point be in picking a tank, if you just spec into a tankier build later on into the game. im not saying that i know what exactly they are going for, im just saying that im concerned that the combination of conventional classes, like a mage+tank could make running a full tank build obsolete. because going mage+tank would(and again, im not sure how they are doing this im just thinking of conventional mages and tanks, even if the second class just augments the first one) allow you to the possibility of good AOE dmg but without the worry of getting caught out because you have more survivability, however they decide to do that.
if you make a guild, i'd join it so i can understand the guild leaders thought process.
@skullkid1105
Haha I have no intention of starting my own guild but you'd be my right hand man if I did haha.
I'm not exactly advocating for fewer classes, but what I propose would make it easier to adjust the current system without crazy overhaul if your predictions come true and are largely echoed by the community.
I also want to say as explained by others here and in other posts, the word "balance" could mean different things and I'm not sure based on what IS has explained their balance philosophy is that it would be "impossible" but maybe not to everyone's liking?
The augments are enhancements that adjust the way your main class plays while altering some of the animated effects when using skills. A Tank+Mage is more likely a Tank, like all others, but with some elemental effects. A wall put down by a Tank+Tank will look different than one put down by a Tank+Mage and likely have different damage resistances (not better/bigger, different).
There were several post in other threads where a few peeps thought there would be no reason to do any Tank+Any over Tank+Tank because that would 'have' to be the tankiest. So they were for sure not worried about a Tank+Mage being greater or better than a Tank+Tank.
I don't want 100% balance, otherwise all the classes are the same so who cares about variety, I'm not playing 4ed D&D here. As for the uniqueness of 64 'classes,' you might be concerned IS can't do that, I will sit back and wait until everything has been tested and final before I judge.
...that doesn't mean not to give feedback. Starting with "'64 unique classes' aren't really unique..." this is how I would do it type statements indicates you have familiarity with all 64 classes and understand why each is not unique. If you have that understanding, and can state why, please do.
Otherwise as they are released during the alpha's and beta's those that play them will be most able to explain their 'uniqueness' and how similar they are. They will also be able to give value added feedback based on their experience with multiple classes.
Also, unique is a tricky word here, imo. We can be unique people, but even as unique as any two of us may be, someone can point out how 'similar' we are. For sure not all 64 'classes' will be 100% unique on their own islands with nothing comparable to them. That would lead to a less cohesive feel, imo, if if it somehow helped with balance.
If all 64 'classes' are done correctly, hopefully they won't ever need to add more