Knight Development Thread

[Blizz_Work]

I'm actually really liking the every class gets a free action ability thing - equip change for squire, defend for knight, etc.

[Schwerpunkt]

Zone of Control works best with hexes. I'm not entirely sure how we'd implement it with squares.

And I don't think we'd be giving it to everyone, no. I'd like to see it tied specifically to whether or not you carry a shield.

[Mordred]

It might make a good class feature for the Knight. It's a little more limited with squares than with hexes, which makes it perfect as a free ability.

[kablizzy]

Actually, that's a good point - Since the maps would be relatively the same size, it'd be harder to span the entire map with your ZoC under a square system (Which I think we'd all prefer, assuming we can get a decent map editor), so perhaps that's the way to go.

[kablizzy]

Made all of the changes you suggested here, standardized some stuff, and shuffled a couple things around. I really like Challenge over Provoke, by the way. That was an awesome call.

[Schwerpunkt]

Disarm's text contradicts itself. It says 40% at one point and 50% at another.

Honor Strike's requirement to face an opponent's front is counter-productive. In addition to being a hassle to check, it's an unnecessary impediment to the Knight's ability to engage high P-Ev targets.

Shield Bash's primary utility came from the (extremely unreliable chance to) Interrupt. If it can't Interrupt, it's barely worth using. There are so many classes that get vastly superior knockback abilities. If that's where we're going with this, the knockback rate needs to be much higher.

Is Reckless Strike really reducing the target's chance to evade? Because that seems kind of silly.

Cleave not being a cleave is just silly. It really is. If it doesn't hit more than one person, it's not cleave. Solution: it hits the target and the people to his sides for 65% damage each, with a 20% chance of applying a Hemorrhage for 20% damage over two turns. The maximum possible damage here would be 235%, but that's extremely unlikely.

Debilitating Slash I hate on principle, but apparently I'm not winning that war.

Braver doesn't really have a downside. Once you pass 50 Brave (which is extremely easy; 75 isn't that hard to get), it basically renders most attacks in this tree irrelevant. There needs to be something preventing it from being spammed. An MP cost would be useful here. And so would turning down the damage coefficient to something like Brave*1.25.



Iron Bravery is extremely bleh. It seems like a reaction skill for the sake of having another reaction skill. Braveheart is so much better (unless you're losing, on average, more than 1 ally per 5 turns, in which case the extra brave probably won't save your sorry ass).

Steel Resolve's description is still misleading.

Slow March may need to be reviewed after we finish the discussion about evade and such, but otherwise I like it.



On the whole, though, I do like the theme of Brave playing a role here. That's kind of ideal for a tanky type.

[Mordred]

Debilitating Slash should probably be -1 PA, since -2 could fuck a guy up in a very short period of time.

[kablizzy]

May 12, 2013 3:25:58 GMT -6 Schwerpunkt said:

Disarm's text contradicts itself. It says 40% at one point and 50% at another.

Honor Strike's requirement to face an opponent's front is counter-productive. In addition to being a hassle to check, it's an unnecessary impediment to the Knight's ability to engage high P-Ev targets.

Shield Bash's primary utility came from the (extremely unreliable chance to) Interrupt. If it can't Interrupt, it's barely worth using. There are so many classes that get vastly superior knockback abilities. If that's where we're going with this, the knockback rate needs to be much higher.

Is Reckless Strike really reducing the target's chance to evade? Because that seems kind of silly.

Cleave not being a cleave is just silly. It really is. If it doesn't hit more than one person, it's not cleave. Solution: it hits the target and the people to his sides for 65% damage each, with a 20% chance of applying a Hemorrhage for 20% damage over two turns. The maximum possible damage here would be 235%, but that's extremely unlikely.

Debilitating Slash I hate on principle, but apparently I'm not winning that war.

Braver doesn't really have a downside. Once you pass 50 Brave (which is extremely easy; 75 isn't that hard to get), it basically renders most attacks in this tree irrelevant. There needs to be something preventing it from being spammed. An MP cost would be useful here. And so would turning down the damage coefficient to something like Brave*1.25.



Iron Bravery is extremely bleh. It seems like a reaction skill for the sake of having another reaction skill. Braveheart is so much better (unless you're losing, on average, more than 1 ally per 5 turns, in which case the extra brave probably won't save your sorry ass).

Steel Resolve's description is still misleading.

Slow March may need to be reviewed after we finish the discussion about evade and such, but otherwise I like it.



On the whole, though, I do like the theme of Brave playing a role here. That's kind of ideal for a tanky type.

Honor strike is no more cumbersome to check than any regular attack - Since facing is a thing, and since Ninja has a couple "From Behind" abilities. But beyond that, I think you're right - Honor Strike should have a benefit for attacking from the front.

You're right on Shield Bash, I'll give that a tweak as well.

I think the concept on Reckless Strike was reducing the Knight's chance to evade until the next turn. Just kind of a haymaker in exchange for the extra damage.

Actually, something we haven't done with *Any* of these classes is include MP costs. That's totally a discussion that we need to get into, but you're right, the damage coefficient on Braver is high.

Iron Bravery was one of those skills I shuffled off of Squire, but I wanted one more reaction ability to fill out that area (Since Parry is weird). We can totally come up with something else here.

Steel Resolve's description was leftover from... Something. I'll change that up.

And yeah, Slow March might need to get changed.

Edit: Cleave as it is does hit the person in front and those to the side. I made it Range: 1, Effect: 2, and we can specify that it doesn't hit the dude behind that space.

[Ilium]

Yes, some of these abilities definitely need MP costs.

[kablizzy]

Also, Debilitating Slash was your idea specifically, Schwer. You called it 'Rending Strike' or something.

[Schwerpunkt]

Yeah, well, I pulled an Obama and had my position "evolve."

I agree with Mord that -2 PA is really high. -1 PA (in return for, say, 65% success rate) seems fair.

I really don't like the notion that Honor Strike requires your opponent face you. It's actually kind of difficult to make that happen, especially if it's something like a Ninja trying to rip your Priest's face off. The Knight will have enough trouble merely keeping up, much less getting between the Ninja and his target. Honor Strike, which is specifically intended to allow the Knight to hit high-evasion targets, isn't very useful if it's very easy to simply not face the Knight.

Reckless Strike adding an evasion penalty to the Knight is kind of clunky from a mechanical position. I'd rather add a new status effect ('Unbalanced'), which we can go over in the status effect thread. But I like the clarified use: you hit harder, but you become unbalanced for it. It's reasonable.

I think Equip Shield should become 'Sword-and-Board' or something, basically allowing you to slap on a sword too.

I'd like to cut Iron Bravery since the Knight has 3 R's with it.

And Cleave still needs to be redesigned.




I'd rather not delve into adding MP costs to everything these POJs do. It's not an FF convention and it requires a dramatic redesign. It's much easier, I think, to simply add MP costs to the magicky abilities the Knight has, which are the two limit breaks. It shouldn't cost MP to swing your sword.

[Ilium]

May 12, 2013 15:24:56 GMT -6 Schwerpunkt said:

I'd rather not delve into adding MP costs to everything these POJs do. It's not an FF convention and it requires a dramatic redesign. It's much easier, I think, to simply add MP costs to the magicky abilities the Knight has, which are the two limit breaks. It shouldn't cost MP to swing your sword.

May 12, 2013 11:58:23 GMT -6 Ilium said:

Yes, some of these abilities definitely need MP costs.

Keyword some. Adding MP costs to a few of the abilities in these POJ classes will allow us to present these skills in interesting and usable functions, without necessarily having to nerf damage, accuracy or evade each and every time.

[kablizzy]

-1 PA is good, yeah. I'll make that change now.

In an open field, it's easy to just walk around to the other side of someone, but you're right, once you're in the thick of things, it's hard to do. I'll ponder something for this.

I'm very okay with Unbalanced, I'll add that in.

I'm okay with cutting Iron Bravery, it's kind of weird and counter-intuitive. If your allies are dropping, you're not doing your job as a Knight.

[Mordred]

Perhaps Honorable Strike *forces* the opponent to face you, then you make the attack. It also has the added advantage of you then being able to direct the opponent's vulnerable backside in the direction of your choosing.

[Schwerpunkt]

May 13, 2013 16:32:26 GMT -6 Mordred said:

Perhaps Honorable Strike *forces* the opponent to face you, then you make the attack. It also has the added advantage of you then being able to direct the opponent's vulnerable backside in the direction of your choosing.

I like this a lot more.