Possibilities and Variants

[ImagenAshyun]

I really. really personally favor no system at all, but the variant system seems to have a more structured means of allowing actual character development to take place while stepping up the social ladder, so for the sake of the server itself while perhaps providing me a chance to try a system, I'm voting for Variant. However, I fear the Variant system wouldn't allow social titles and only combat-centered ones, but I'm not worried about that. At least right now. We'll see what the staff will do in regards to that.

[Kaghuros]

Edit: I realize that we already have a system for approving variants: Special profiles. So all that might be needed for a variant in a free-form system is a supplemental sheet about what the class is, what their abilities and other stuff might be, and how your character is getting or has gotten to where they are.


I'm not sure what the "right kind" of restriction is, but there has to be a way for the GM team to figure out who is going after what title and who has one already. I quite like the way that application looks, and I think it could be integrated into the common profile system quite well with only a few changes on the wiki entry when a character is approved.

Then again, why does a character have to have extra weaknesses to take an alternate class? I mean, I like that it's listed there, but every other character should have their own strengths and weaknesses too.

Keep in mind, the system was designed as a way to help further character *development*, as opposed to rolling characters straight off the bat with whatever powers that you want. People have said that the main point of the prestige system was the development as opposed to the power, so the Variant System was intended to provide the benefits of the prestige system without any of the problems that plagued the prestige system.

Also, if a character is getting benefits in some way, then he needs accompanying weaknesses for the sake of balance. It's a means of ensuring that the problem of prestiges doesn't happen again, where a character becomes simply better than his peers because he went through a system.

Note: please do not take this as me championing the variant system. I am truly indifferent to the idea, as I am indifferent to the idea of having no system at all. I am simply clarifying the intent behind the decisions that were made with the concept.

Ah, I'm sorry I misunderstood you. I thought that the variant system would also be doing away with classes like the Demon Hunter and such, and so it would be focused on alternate classes with similar skill levels.

I actually like the idea of listing weaknesses and strengths, and I was really just wondering why it would be that way (due to my misunderstanding of the intent of the system). As for the special profile thing, I meant that maybe if you wanted to change classes you could post a little "variant sheet" with the details you needed in the special profiles forum, or even it's own subforum, and have that approved and tacked right on to your wiki entry. People who wanted to roll them starting off (if that's going to be possible) could just add those sections to a special profile and submit that all together.

[Brutalskars]

So wait grak... We are not allowed to play human archers because there are no human hunters in game? Even when in lore there have been how many hundreds of thousands of archers in human armies? Sometimes this, relation to the game logic baffles me and I will never, ever understand why I can't just roll a fair, variant/base class on almost every species. What honestly stops me in Wrath from playing gnomish riflemen, human/forsaken archers, orcish mages, twilight's hammer whatevers, dalaran battlemagi, silvermoon spellbreakers, if it is all stemmed off the fact, we do not have access to the class!

That logic is so very flawed in an RP community. Spell breakers for example, there are a massive amount of them in the blood elven military! In no means are they better or out of bounds of what a player should be able to access! Sure hunters are not aviable to all classes, but by the process of even human culture on earth. Everyone had archers at some point and still does on warcraft, because they are useful. I refuse to say that because elves joined the alliance, every last human forgot how to use a bow!

[Aphetoros]

...By that logic, Hunters should never have ever Dual Wielded melee weapons - or even used them effectively IC. Which... makes... a good number of Hunter characters completely obsolete.

Just because their abilities are taken away - from Dual Wield, to Mongoose Bite, to Raptor Strike - in Cataclysm, does not mean that Melee Hunters are suddenly not viable.

The skill it takes an individual to do a Wing Clip(In the case of avians) in combat, or to otherwise impair an enemy's movement by slashing through a tendon or part specifically needed for rapid movement, with a weapon, is considerably higher than that of hitting the person a little harder(Raptor Strike/Mongoose Bite), in addition to parrying every single melee attack that comes your way(Deterrence).

Just 'cause Hunters don't 'main' Melee weapons by Mechanics, doesn't mean they can't IC. Same way Rogues and Warriors can be archers or gun-men as their main form of offense, so should Magi and Warlocks be able to use swords.

I bring now the argument of Spellblades. Swords created with the purpose of being effective for caster-types. From the trusty old Azuresong Mageblade and the Blade of Wizardry to the well known Felo'melorn(Flamestrike, Wielded by Kael'thas Sunstrider), magi and fel-based casters alike have used swords for ages.

If you can do it in-game, you should be able to do it IC.

I will never, ever, understand why people roll hunters and then choose to neither focus on ranged combat, nor use a pet. It's utterly baffling to me. For the same reason, I am unable to fathom warriors being used as archers when hunter is right there...at least, in this case, there is an excuse that not all races can be hunters (until Cata, gnomes don't count), but it is still baffling.

Though this brings up the point that hunter is disallowed to certain races. Using warrior to get around this is rather cheap, and always has been. They were disallowed for a reason, and if you want to play a human archer so badly, can't you wait until Cataclysm?

That said, this is also a matter of balance, which is entirely why variations this far from the norm are a very, very bad thing. Mages being good in melee flies in the face of what defines the mage as a class. Hunters, at least, while not perfect melee combatants, have abilities that make them somewhat servicable, both in practice and in theme. Mages do not.

This ties in to trusting people to do the right thing in RPed out fights. If I'm playing a warrior, and I'm going into a straight-up duel with a hunter, pure melee...dang right I expect to win. Warriors are the peak of physical combat, they should thrash everyone else in it when it comes to a straight-up, non-magic fight (except possibly against the other non-magic physical melee class, rogues.) This is why I typically don't engage in things like fist-fight tournaments, because I find the idea of a mage character beating up a warrior in one to be ridiculous.

And yes, swords are made for mages...but what a mage does with a sword is very different from what a warrior does with a sword. Similarly, what makes a good spellblade isn't necessarily what makes a good physical slicer.

Kael'thas fought with Arthas with his sword.

I honestly think it's ridiculous to claim that everyone using the <Mage> tag is going to be a crappy fighter. I'm a fan of diversity and if I want to play a combat mage I will-- I like to imagine fun/creative ways to portray my character, and I find it baffling that you'd seem to want OOC class to dictate everything o.o

Like, I actually legit don't understand your thought process here o_0

There -are- different ways of playing your character, aren't there?

[Uguu]

If I may.

The issue, I take atleast, with mages engaging in Melee with -any- degree of success, is the slew of mages you get, running around tossing fireballs and tearing warriors and paladins down in hand-to-hand. Rather moots the point of rolling a warrior, when a mage can just kick the guy's rear in melee, just skipping by with emotes and a good roll.

[Rigley]

If I may.

The issue, I take atleast, with mages engaging in Melee with -any- degree of success, is the slew of mages you get, running around tossing fireballs and tearing warriors and paladins down in hand-to-hand. Rather moots the point of rolling a warrior, when a mage can just kick the guy's rear in melee, just skipping by with emotes and a good roll.

Aye, pretty much. Generally speaking mages don't have the raw power of a warrior, nor the ability; they might do something like fencing or some light swordfighting, but warriors are masters of the trade in this regard; their strength is melee, the mage's is magic. It just seems strange to think that the mage would prefer to pull out a sword and run at a guy with his robe and wizard hat.


As for the class restriction regarding archers/hunters... I'm honestly not getting this one. Especially when you regard Gnomes, a race which should be able to wield all of their technology but by WoW retail-standards is unable to properly fight with a gun.

Idunno. Ranger-esque characters have always made sense to me on humans and the like. I mean, it isn't like they don't hunt, or can't be wilderness oriented people. I think that's taking the restrictions imposed OOCly by blizz a bit too far to be honest.

[Ozewse]

EDIT: Drop the system. Freeform all the way. The last thing we need is -more- applications.

[Binkleheimer]

Eh. Same problems will still arise.
Might as well just do away with it now and forever.

[Grakor456]

Kael'thas fought with Arthas with his sword.

I honestly think it's ridiculous to claim that everyone using the <Mage> tag is going to be a crappy fighter. I'm a fan of diversity and if I want to play a combat mage I will-- I like to imagine fun/creative ways to portray my character, and I find it baffling that you'd seem to want OOC class to dictate everything o.o

Like, I actually legit don't understand your thought process here o_0

There -are- different ways of playing your character, aren't there?

Kael'thas is a lore figure, what he does is irrelevant.

It is a matter of balance, as I said. If everyone becomes as good at close combat as a warrior, why would anyone play a warrior? This is part of the problem of variants in general, and the problem that this inflicts the warrior class in general: Warriors are, by the game's description and the game's mechanics, the pinnacle of close combat ability. Yet, everyone and their mother challenges them in melee combat and wins through rolls, trivializing the abilities of the class.

Why am I playing a warrior when a paladin without magic can beat me? Why am I playing a warrior when a *mage* can out-fight me without magic?

Every class should have things that make them special. The RP on CotH has destroyed what made warriors special.

As far as what others are saying regarding humans and hunters...

Yes, in an ideal world humans would already have access to the hunter class. In an ideal world, we'd have all of the Cataclysm race/class combinations, but we don't. We have up to Wrath and that is what we have to work with.

Yes, humans had archers in the First War. They don't have hunters now. Do I believe that humans forgot how to do ranged combat since the First War? No, but them not having hunters in large numbers makes sense, as they allowed the elves and dwarves to handle their ranged combat needs for a pretty long time. Some archers exist, but they wouldn't be as numerous as in past years, and that is likely the logic as to why humans didn't get hunters in Classic. It is a decision that we have to live with now. However, if I say "you can play a human archer" I might as well say "you can play a night elven warlock" or "you can play a tauren rogue" or any other impossible race/class combination.

It isn't about the lore, at least not entirely. It's about consistency with the rules and playing in the world Blizz made for us. Also, a warrior specializing in bows isn't a minor change or personalization...I'm all for customization of a character's abilities, to a certain extent. However, not when it's completely opposite of everything that class is.

[Delta]

But since Blizzard gave warriors the ability to use bows, playing a human warrior who specialises in archery is a perfectly viable thing to do, even with that logic.

Isn't it?

[FlyingSquirrel]

Most Human Rangers I've met are just Warriors because there's no Hunter Class for Warriors yet.

[Grakor456]

But since Blizzard gave warriors the ability to use bows, playing a human warrior who specialises in archery is a perfectly viable thing to do, even with that logic.

Isn't it?

No, because by that logic, mages should be able to be sword specialists because Blizzard gave them the ability to wield a sword.

There is a massive difference between being able to pick a weapon up and knowing the basics of its use and self-defense with it, and being specialized in its use. A warrior may know how to use a bow, know how to string it and fire it, and heck, he may even be fairly accurate with it. However, warriors are not archers, and archery does not play into the warrior's strengths. A warrior would never be able to reach the level of ranged specialization that a hunter could reach, just a hunter could never reach the level of melee skill that a warrior could reach.

[Uthaniel]

I think it depends on how you portray it, to be honest. Uthaniel was a battlemage for most of his career, and I'd basically emote him like a glass cannon. He tried his best to avoid attacks by blinking and would fight by covering his weapon/body in different magicks to make up for his own lack of physical strenght.

And should he get hit, he'd fall back to a ranged role to try and maximize his chances of victory.


But that's just me.


EDIT: And, well, if we're going for realism, any mage that can hold a knife and go invisible can stab a seasoned warrior in the face and kill him with a single movement, weapon prowess or not.


EDIT2: to further elaborate on why I believe battlemagic makes sense:

High elves had nine thousand years to research the weaknesses of magic and try to overcome them. They didn't overcome all, of course, but given that they created the spellbreaker warrior unit, and they employ warmages that use ancient, sacred magics to improve their speed (but that's non-canon RPG), I don't see why my 100 year old blood elf or, heck, 10000 year old highborne, when cata comes, cannot have realized the glaring weakness of magic and trained to support it.

I don't think battlemages are as good in magic as a mage, or as good in melee as a warrior. They're in-between, capable of both but master of neither. In Uthaniel's case, again, he was only good with basic evocation (to cover his body parts with fire/ice/arcane) and illusion (for dodging), and conjuration, to create his weapons, where any other mage could just as easly outskill him in any of these schools.

The balance in multiclasses comes from the fact they're not as good as the other class in their field, but they can be a match by combining both fields they study in.

So a mage might not outbrawl a warrior, but he can confuse, cripple, and poison him,then move in for the kill when the opponent is weak.

[Grakor456]

I think it depends on how you portray it, to be honest. Uthaniel was a battlemage for most of his career, and I'd basically emote him like a glass cannon. He tried his best to avoid attacks by blinking and would fight by covering his weapon/body in different magicks to make up for his own lack of physical strenght.

And should he get hit, he'd fall back to a ranged role to try and maximize his chances of victory.

Perhaps I should have been more clear.

This, to me, is fine, because it's playing to the strengths of a mage...particularly, the use of magic, and the sword is simply a way to manifest that. This, to me, is "battle-mage" done correctly.

The problem comes when a non-warrior/rogue character claims to defeat a warrior/rogue in melee combat *without* the use of magic, which doesn't make sense to me.

[Uthaniel]

Oh, no, in that we agree. I don't think a mage should beat a warrior with raw skill.
They need magic to do it, otherwise being a mage altogether makes no sense.
EDIT: To elaborate, actually, given that arcane is an addiction, it's nigh impossible for a mage to go through a whole fight without using it once.