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Shapeshifting
Ap0ph1s
Member
i think i have already made a discussion about this before but i just wanted to talk about the idea again since i would absolutly love if there was a augment on the summoner class that makes it so you no longer summon allies to fight for you but instead summon aspects of creatures to enhance how you fight yourself and honestly i would love if i could rp a druid that can transform into a wolf to have better mobility at the cost of power in a fight or maybe transform into a deer or elk or something for more speed at the cost of actual manueverability and also a rather deadly if hard to aim attack and it would also be fun if this could almost serve as a alternate mode of general transit or maybe take on the form of a mighty large bear to give up any hope of speed in any fashion for the benefit of some big boi health and armor bars and some really meaty if slow damage that could let you burst someone down possibly.
i think this would be fun as a choice ONLY for someone who specs double summoner with maybe summoner getting a second alterante augment that allows for shapeshifting which for other classes like say for example rouge would only let you morph parts of your body temorarily into say maybe that of a shadow demon or something. i really just love the idea of being a more classic dnd style druid and even if it doesnt end up getting added i will still have hope that one day we could maybe see it
i think this would be fun as a choice ONLY for someone who specs double summoner with maybe summoner getting a second alterante augment that allows for shapeshifting which for other classes like say for example rouge would only let you morph parts of your body temorarily into say maybe that of a shadow demon or something. i really just love the idea of being a more classic dnd style druid and even if it doesnt end up getting added i will still have hope that one day we could maybe see it
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Edit: * Source:
https://youtube.com/watch?v=Yhr9WpjaDzw
hmm well i kinda figured cause even just like elden ring draon magic type shapeshifting would likely be hard to code right but hey, who knows what may come after full launch?
It's one of the things I think would make logical sense to add as a new class in an expansion given how limited they seem to be treating certain aspects of their core design. A key expansion could always use a new class to attract excitement and feel like it's adding something more to the game.
(In the spoilers are my thoughts on Eidolon as a core game concept, which are related to my opinion of why they fit as expansion content better, but not directly, so feel free to skip this part of my post for those of you who are not interested in a long rambly analysis.)
You could also probably add something similar to dragon magic style animations without too much trouble. It would be a little janky though without polishing to the level where I'd expect such animations to be used on other archetypes to justify adding that much work load. But I have a feeling they will be added to things like fighter/bard/ranger. After all archtypes have access to 'magic'. So making animations similar to dragon magic could be an easy way to emphasize that while looking flashy and cool. I'm sure there are certain augment combinations where this will feel very natural without necessarily needing the design changes required to add full on shapeshifting.
In fact that is partially why I think mechanically speaking I expect smn/ftr, smn/rng and smn/brd to have something around these lines in terms of outright mechanical function even if they are not shapeshifting animation wise. They all focus on a certain aspect of flow control in combat, will almost certainly have cc, and almost certainly have augments that empower themselves in a similar way to an eidolon without 'relying on the summon itself being around as a separate entity'.
I therefore also don't think smn/smn is actually the best candidate to look at from a mechanics point of view because the ultimate strength of a summoner is having multiple bodies and when you double down on this, 'multisummoning' or the ease of switching which summons are out is the logical conclusion to reach, in my opinion.
Over all though I think that what the 'eidolon' full shapeshift concept offers is very little in one sense mechanically. The core concept of an Eidolon in my mind, is that it's creating a very specific style of summoner that has neither the weaknesses OR strengths of a summoner, while still filling a similar role of 'being the parties damage and defense optimizer throughout multiple phases of a fight'. This definitely adds gameplay. But not a lot from a core party composition level, which is what the main archetypes are here to add. I think that fighting style is therefore addable to the current possibilities of Summoner playstyle, but it'd require very intentional design space, that is already easier to jump off from via what smn/ brd, ftr, rng will need to offer already (based on both current IS design notes and player requests for the smn archetype.)
If you made it a separate archetype on the other hand it can offer a class of augments that summoner isn't going to have 'room' for and I think those classes of augments could be a very interesting addition to the game. Morphing body parts, gaining special abilities normally only accessible on mobs, specialized shapeshift forms not present at release, stat redistribution abilities, defense redistribution abilities, quite a few different possibility spaces.
It's a bit gimmicky, but also has a ton of flavor and would open up a slightly new play style for ALL archetypes. And because of these types of abilities an Eidolon offers mechanically, it makes a good SECONDARY archetype, even if it's not a very 'good'(mechanically unique) PRIMARY archetype. But in a game like Ashes, that makes it a very GOOD post release class to add as everyone gets a chance to dabble in something new without having to make a new account and therefore be behind everyone else, while the few devotees to the summonless summoner style get their classes true form finally unlocked while still having already had something close enough on Summoner and therefore have an account that can still participate in end game content while they level the new class.
It also is a 'new class' that makes sense with Verra's lore. You can write a whole story event around 'the colonists getting used to magic and it effecting their bodies in unexpected ways' causing a whole minicrisis. But in essence the reason why it wouldn't be 'immediately available' is because the colonists haven't been exposed to magic for long enough. So it even feels like a natural progression rather than a mindless insert.
Over all I'm kind of glad they aren't adding shapeshifting to the game initially since it feels almost perfect as a mechanic and design space for a post release archetype. I would expect given how good they did at picking initial archetypes that it would be very hard to find additional design concepts otherwise without them feeling convoluted, unnatural, or just down right gimmicky (and shapeshifting is itself pretty gimmicky.)
https://youtube.com/watch?v=Yhr9WpjaDzw