Shattered Kingdoms

A passive skill that functions as a bonus when wearing all light armor/clothing would be great for swashies. Perhaps raising their dodge?
i still like the idea of buffing whips and making some reach weapons, and giving those to swashies so that they could work from the second row without the aid of a crossbow.



Don

Less passive and more super power combo moves for swashies. They are boring and they should be able to do really cool tricks. (Think Princess Bride sword fight comes to mind for me....)

Give swashies dance.

No.


Don

Here are some ideas:

Another dodge clone:

Evade - Works like dodge (work percentages as needed)

Give them either some Forms, they can switch back and forth in:

For example:

Heron form - Significantly increases chance to evade
Tiger in the Rushes - Riposte has a chance to add a stacking strength debuff to opponent (Damages Opponnents Arm)
Wolf at the Heel - Riposte has a chance to hamstring the opponent and significantly damage PE and PE regeneration (Damages Opponents Legs)
Raptor on the wind - Riposte has a chance to add a stacking slow debuff (Damages Opponnents Arm)
Bat in the Belfry - Riposte has a chance to gouge someone's eye. (1st strike - Partial Blindess just an accuracy debuff, 2nd strike - Blindess)
Mongoose on the prowl - Significantly increase chance to disarm
Bull on the charge - Significantly lowers all defenses but adds overwhelming chance to hit, and overpower an opponents defenses

etc.

Tweak the chances of occurrences for balance, and the maximum stacks. I would suggest that a swashy's debuffs have a long timer on them, as they are physical wounds, and that they require "Regeneration" to cure. I would also suggest that the debuffs themselves be small and stacking, as opposed to large and one time.

You could also add some funcitonality in conjunction to the already coded stances of aggresive defensive and normal or neutral or whatever. Increase the probability on Aggressive, but significantly lower the dodge capacity, and likewise you could decrease the probability on defensive and increase the dodge capacity

Swashies should be able to swap back and forth between forms fairly fluidly, to give them some things to think about and do in battle.

I've seen MUDs with similar stance schemes. it is definitely possible, but I don't know how easy it would be to code.


Don

I'm thinking more along the lines of active commands. Stuff that takes timing, luck, and knowledge of combinations to be the most successful. While stances and passive skills are cool, they aren't nearly as entertaining as what I'm imagining. I think swordplay should be the epitome of swashbuckler. Right now it would be more entertaining to play any other warrior class because of the options available to you. Circle stab, hamstring, rallying cry, berserk, fury, these are all active, unique combat skills that do stuff. I think that swashbucklers should have (not exactly the same) similar options. They should have more options than any other class when it comes to combat. The only thing they have unique is taunt. And the weakness of light armor. While a rogue has light armor, he can be devastating from second rank, where a swashie has taunt and... nothing.

If you're looking for more active classes (and I think this concept could be thought of on a larger scale)

I would suggest considering certain actions/spells that can be cast from a prone position.

Achernaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar.

Prone-valid tactics would absolutely be a step in the right direction for master swordsmen. We've had lots of talks over the years about swashies. I'm sure the forums are full of great ideas. I'm also a proponent of whips, but if we're going to stay pure to swords and daggers, there needs to be more to swashies.

I'd offer to run as many tests as you'd like with Ehlynn, but she's aged and not exactly a prime example of the class anymore.