Armor system, Class system, building a character, Balance - do I get this right ?
Here is a copy-pasta of a post I made on the discord, but as I was told, discord isn't exactly friendly with long posts discussions, so here we are.
First, the armor system, somewhat similar to Archeage :
-Plate gives high physical defense, low magic defense,
-Leather gives medium defenses to both,
-Cloth gives low physical defense, high magic defense.
With that system, you would think :
Mage kill tank,
Tank kill rogue,
Rogue kill Mage.
Because you would traditionally think Tank wears Plate, Rogue wears Leather, and Mage wears Cloth.
But that is actually incorrect, because you can wear the armor type you want.
It may sound odd but there will be mages wearing plate.
And now, add the class fun.
You would expect a Mage to deal Magic Damage only, right ? Not so fast !
What if a Mage gets a subclass that allows to mod a spell to physical damage instead of fire damage... for example, summoner subclass can mod fireballs into hurling summoned blades instead !
The spell will deal physical damage instead of fire damage.
Yep.
A mage doing physical damage is possible.
Even a plate-wearing mage doing physical damage.
The same way, imagine a Ranger with a Mage subclass.
Ranger's skills deal Physical damage as a base (arrows are very much physical I presume).
The ranger can mod his skills to shoot flaming arrows instead of regular arrows, dealing a mix of physical and fire damage.
You get the idea : subclass will allow any class to gain a new type of damage, compensating for the mono-damage-type from their class.
In other words, players can select their subclass to gain in Versatility (aka ability to deal with more different situations with more ease) by increasing the diversity of damage type they can do (dealing physical damage in situations, dealing magic damage in other situations).
But with other examples, they will select their subclass to gain in Utility (most likely Bard subclass or Tank subclass).
Or, they can go for Pure Class and gain raw Power by increasing the potency of their abilities instead of modifying them.
Power, Versatility, and Utility were the 3 main factors took into account when the developpers of Everquest tried to balance their classes out.
Now, how do you balance all that ?
Well, actually, to an extend, you don't have to.
It is already balanced in its very core design : players are given the possibility to choose their defensive type through the armor system, and their offensive type(s) through the subclass mods system.
The balance will be made by the player's decision.
A quick example to illustrate this all.
I play a mage in MMOs, I'll play a mage in Ashes of Creation.
From my experience, Mages are usually wearing cloth, making them very frail in PvP situations, get killed very quickly by Stealth Assassins.
Knowing this, I DECIDE that I will wear Plate armor to increase my survivability against those PKs.
On the other hand, wearing Plate will make me vulnerable to Magic damage, which is usually dealt by casters, who usually wear cloth armor, which is strong against Magic Attacks.
Therefore, I DECIDE to pick a subclass that will allow me to mod one or two of my spells into Physical Damage instead of Fire/Lightning/Whatever Magic Damage.
By doing so, I will have both Magic damage spells and Physical Damage spells on my hotbar, allowing me to adapt to the foes I may encounter.
I will not be the best DPS, but I will not be instantly killed either. Because I DECIDED to build that way.
On the other hand, you may choose to build your character completely differently, as a Glass Cannon.
I can imagine Cloth Mage/Mage will dish out serious damage output, but in return, they will be easy to kill.
That is high risk = high reward, that is balance.
That will be their decision, their responsibility, they should not whine (or ask for nerfs of other classes) about getting killed too easily.
TLDR : the way you build your character defines your strengthes and weaknesses - it is your decisions that will make your character balanced or specialized.
Developpers give the options, Players build their characters. Balance happens naturally.
Did I get it right ?
