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Comments
lol never played or really saw any gameplay of that but ill take your word for it.
A lot of it's general theorycraft for now, my speculation is whatever an archetype excels in is what kind of flavor is brings as a secondary archetype, Tank is tank and Mage is AoE (maybe) so Tank+Mage might be a good AoE tank
now let's say the tank has a utility like shield wall a mage+tank might be able to make an AoE ice wall or something.
What you expect a shaman class to provide?
Helas? some dmg? totems (wow variation)? If so the cleric+summoner may be something similar
I also like Bards conceptually, like Thom from Wheel of Time, Taliesin from The Pendragon Cycle, or Cuoth/Coat from Name of the Wind. I like the idea of a storyteller, lorekeeper, musician, and not all of them have to be boundless extroverts. Hidden pockets, daggers, and random brick-a-brack to help save the day, uplifting and encouraging allies.
I feel like Bard would also be neat because the other thing I like are support roles, which are SO FREAKIN' RARE (as an actual role, I mean, not just calling "tanks and healers" "supports"). So Bard could potentially scratch both itches of aesthetics and roles.
...but, if it CAN'T be an effective healer, then I dunno. Summoner if it CAN be (jack of all trades could be useful...), and if neither of those can be, I'd kind of grudgingly take Cleric, lol
Edit:
We'll have to wait until we see what Summoner actually looks like, but something like Ranger/Cleric or Ranger/Summoner might be what you're looking for (not sure which order). I could see a Ranger/Summoner doing something like WoW's Shaman with nature themed Elemental summons and some healing, and Ranger + Cleric in D&D is often something vaguely resembling what a Druid would be.
I do agree a number of these combinations give me "I have no idea what this will be like" vibes, lol
Might be cool to make one here as well (and link it there), but I don't know if one can make 8 option polls here or not (apparently Reddit caps at 6 options).
I feel like they could be strong dps classes
Okay. First of all a Cleric and a Shaman are in no way similar. Shaman is a Tri-bred 1 part Fighter, 1 part Druid, 1 part Bard. You should be sub-standard in melee but when you buff yourself you can become very good at beating people in Melee, if you focus on that. If you focus on offensive spells you should have enough damage to deal with most encounters, some encounters will be difficult due to the narrowness of your spells.
The main problem is some of the names of these classes don't match their actual role. The Cleric is not a Cleric it is a Priest, all ranged spells lots of healing that is a Priest, Sorry. The Ranger isn't a Ranger it is a Hunter or an Archer. I have never seen a class called a Ranger without the ability to heal or melee capabilities. EVER. No spells at all in 20 abilities except 1 you could kind of consider a spell.
Lastly I will repeat myself I don't want to level a Cleric. I don't want to level any of these classes except maybe the Archer.
I'm willing to bet money it is some Nature based class since that is the only slot left to fill. Problem is I can't stand pet classes. They are so very boring.
Feels like you are too based for classes from some particular other game. Just coz the heal there was called "priest", doesnt mean "cleric" is not suitable name for a healer, Or that AOC should copy their version of the healer.. Same for ranger. And while Archer implies that the class specializes in shooting arrows, Ranger implies that the class is more than this. And the Hunter class in WOW didnt have heal at earlier expansions. Tho lately Wow makes every class have exactly the same kit, and making the game so boring and bad
Scout - this will be my primary character for exploration
Shaman - mostly because I am curious as to how it will play compared to a Restoration Shaman in WoW, but also because that'll give pretty good access to group gameplay.
#1 High-stuff, Fighter/Cleric: Direct, good, hybrid damage, high defense, and healing
#2 Keeper, Tank/Summoner: High potential health points, high control, high defense, and higher damage or utility than most tanks (multiple character threat management could add some interesting skill ceiling
#3 Spell-shield, Tank/Mage: Significant aoe damage, possibly the best control build with frost augments, elemental defense(?), and potentially good damage
#4 Oracle, Cleric/Mage: Healing, some defense, bursts of magic abilities (healing, control, or damage), more versatile
#5 Spell-stuff, Fighter/Mage: High hybrid damage, some defense, some control
I will use heavy armor on all these characters
As always it will really depend on what is implemented around secondary class and augments. In the case of Hunter I would hope my Fighter gets some increased utility with using a bow, plus some of the camouflage perk. Being a strong DPS, ability to kind of obscure my location, and ambush sometimes from range and then leaping in with my dual swords a whirly winding
Not necessarily. There are a lot of Healer players around, like myself, who just don't necessarily post in these threads (we've had a lot of them, and just giving the simple answer every time is kind of meh, but the complex ones are long and therefore effort to 'repeat').
But for what it's worth:
"Shadow Disciple".
Ya my guild class roster had way more Bards and Clerics then the forum represents.
During Alpha 2 makes sense to try each.
If I would start today, I would choose mage.
But if healers would be in shortage, I would switch to a healer fast enough.
Hard to say which one will win.
You sound like you have played 1 mmo in your life, and we all know its wow. It is literally a cleric. It can hold a mace, wear a shield, and be equipped with plate. Your argument is utter nonsense.
There will be plenty of clerics in alpha. According to the roadmap the first archetype that will get class augments for play testing will be Cleric. So I imagine that in that phase that many will select Cleric as their secondary.
Also, I have a few archetypes that I would like to take out for a spin. Number one for me will be Cleric. But I have seen a lot of these posts where there are a lot of Cleric responses. So I decided to mix it up this time and reply with my plan for a fighter 😀
I get what you mean, but I think I know where he/she's coming from. What's the difference between a Cleric and a Priest in general? Like if a game had both, what makes one one and the other the other?
I'd contend that Priests are typically "clothies" that are going to be ranged magic/caster in terms of damage dealing and have an abundance of heals, probably the majority of their abilities being heals. Cleric, on the other hand, is typically going to fall closer to the D&D Cleric, which means wearing heavy armor, having a wide slate of heals, but also focusing on things like turning undead (and sometimes demonics), wearing scale mail or chain mail armor (second to plate), and generally being a bit more tanky and melee-capable.
Now, some of this is down to the builds of which games have which, but I'd say, for instance, that a Holy Paladin in WoW is closer to a Cleric than a Holy or Discipline Priest in WoW is. So if viewed this way, the other poster is probably looking at how Cleric here is a lot more on the side of flinging magic and a lot less on the more gritty heavy armor wearing, mace swinging Cleric.
And likewise the Ranger. Rangers are generally derived in fantasy from the Dunedain of Lord of the Rings, with Aragorn being quite possibly the most prevalent example in all of fantasy for what a Ranger is supposed to be, though few fantasy settings actually really nail it. MOSTLY a physical class with mastery of forests and wild spaces, melee AND ranged combat, stealth, often (though not always) traps, and herblore/limited nature magic (in games with Druids, often coming from the same set of magic abilities Druids have - D&D and Everquest both did this, I believe; Paladins in EQ pulled from the Cleric spell list while Rangers pulled from the Druid one in Baldurs Gate/D&D, and I think in Everquest as well, where there were differences).
So I can see someone thinking of a class that is just focused on bows/ranged attacks feeling more like a Hunter (generally though not always involving pets) or Archer (if not involving pets) rather than a Ranger if it lacks that melee/ranged with a pinch of nature magic feel to it.
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Don't mistake me - I'm not saying AoC needs to bow to those existing archetypes. In in the case of Cleric, it sounds like players will have wide ranging choices of gear, so one could wear cloth and use a wand if they want more of a Priest or wear mail and wield a mace and shield if they want more of a Cleric (and stuff like Castigate seems more like a Cleric ability than a Priest one), I'm more just saying I an understand where the other person is coming from.
I think it will depend on a lot of things. I know Pantheon did a poll a while back and about 15% said the wanted to play tanks, 18% healers, and the other 67% (2/3rds) was roughly evenly split between people wanting to play support and people wanting to play pure DPS. There's a real hunger for a Support role that seems not to be an itch most MMOs scratch. It's probably because it's hard to balance and they'd rather just sprinkle support abilities across other classes, but it is what it is.
Regardless, healers and tanks are always in short supply, no matter the game, especially if they're very class limited because you run into people that don't like the spells/lore/aesthetics and suddenly limit their options so they play something else. For example, in WoW, if you don't like holy magic or nature magic, you basically couldn't play a healer until Mists of Pandaria added Monk since Holy Paladin, Holy Priest, and Discipline Priest all used holy magic and Restoration Druid and ARGUABLY Restoration Shaman (was a bit more spirit/elemental magic, but there's a lot of overlap) used nature magics.
It's the one downside of saying ONLY Clerics can be main healers, that you might have people (like me) that don't really want to play Cleric being locked out of the role entirely. I feel like Summoner and Bard might be a way around that, but it remains to be seen.
However, we also only have 8 classes/archetypes here, so there'll probably be a decently even distribution across them. Though I do suspect Tank and Cleric will be in the 15-20% range of played. The linked Reddit poll (unscientific, I know) has Tank and Cleric as the least picked choices. Granted, Fighter/Rogue and Ranger/Mage had to be combined since the Reddit poll only allowed 6 options, but in terms of representation, it is on the lower end.
Part of that may be recency bias due to the recent Bard showcase, though. And I have a feeling if Summoner IS versatile, a lot of people will pick it. Hybrids almost always have more players in games because a lot of players like being able to slot into different roles. That's probably part of the Bard surge as well, since people see this neat party synergy class that looks like it could MAYBE heal for small parties/offheal in larger parties OR be a full time support for larger parties, and people like that versatility.
It's possible if we see Cleric fleshed out to have builds for healing or support or damage dealing, people will get more into it, especially if there's different VFX aesthetics for the different specs. Because it'd be kinda weird if a High Priest and a Shaman had the same spells, visually and aesthetically.
God, I cringe every time i see that. Just wizard would be fine as a name of the class.
Since both of you nimrods decided type something without reading the thread I'll repeat myself again.
When I started playing MMORPGs back in 1999 when EQ came out I played a Shaman. In fact I was Playing 2nd edition DnD before I ever played EQ (Which BTW I Still fucking play). So I don't care what either of you think you know about me. But maybe read the thread before you type something that makes you look like clinical morons.
By the way I don't care how they design the Classes I care that the class names match the tropes in a game genre over 50 years old in it's most recent iteration. Yes a Priest and a Cleric are both fine healer names, but a Priest stands in the back wearing Cloth and casting spells from afar, and a Cleric stands in the middle of the action healing people and getting up close and personal swinging his Mace/Club/Morning Star around.
Same goes for Archer and Ranger. They are similar but not the same. There are some notable differences between the two which transfers into gameplay differences. Same as Priest and Cleric. Now personally I don't care how they name the classes. That is their prerogative, but when you lead with misnomers which will cause people to think they are getting something they are not making them quit your game (Yes this will happen), because some certain sub sect of your fan base might think you're copying a game which was a copy of a copy of a copy.
The Fighter is supposed to be a get up in your face kind of class, which is fine, so I want the subclass of Hunter to be that all up in your face, single target dmg, but if you step away from me I've got a ranged Execute type ability.
That may end up being a fighter/summoner also. The combos are going to be interesting to see. A fighter may possibly get a pet with the summoner class that may help you achieve what you want better. Seeing how these combos will play out interests me the most. I know in Warhammer online they have a fighter class(2h melee dps only) that has a pet lion that will throw a distant enemy back to you along with other cc.