Best Of

@Iaxus nobody thinks anyone is owed any RP in the interaction, but the "OooOoo this will make for some amazing RP!!!" crowd came in pretty hot and heavy in the first few pages of this thread.

2021/8/06/19:02 You have successfully nullified a Champion contract that had been taken out on you

by Adrynkeep! The reason given was: Lord Adryn demands satisfaction from this murdering SWINE..

10/10 hiring reasons. Love it.

I'm just speculating because I don't know any better, but people have been complaining in this very thread about finding quest givers dead because over-zealous bashers have cleared them out before being able to turn in a quest.

A soft disincentive that leaves certain mobs alive is wildly easier to justify for me than the blanket immunity to damage that I've encountered a few times. If their answer to both is to discourage rampant quest giver killing with the threat of bounties, I find that solution fairly clever and inventive.

Just waiting on the quote button to come back so I can repost what I said a couple pages back.

If the NPCs really want to rise up they ought to merk whoever keeps announcing those Great Hunts.

I genuinely do think the spirit of this idea can work though, with some tweaks made. I'd like to see it tied to either the Mark system (unaligned) OR city bounties (allied villages), OR some kind of cosmic avenger NPC (Tree) OR whatever it is Meropis does (drop a boat on them? Idk). Add a few more (sizable) beast-only areas for xp gain, and use that tower thing for Great Hunts going forward.

Area suggestions definitely not inspired by video games I've been playing while dying of the plague:

- Spiders have infested a mild-mannered village and you have to kill them (preferably with fire). Lower level area.

- Someone has been collecting the husks of all the adventurers who die for money, putting them on spikes and turning them into zombies. Go cull the herd, attacks inspired by serpent and forestal skills for no particular reason. (midbies)

- The werewolves of the LHG have formed a group somewhere and welcome all challengers, though weakened a little without Lupus. (higher levels)

The GH point is especially important because, if you want to encourage seeing NPCs as more than points, you need to stop treating them like points for events (especially with a credit prize).

You didn’t include a category for commodity arbitrage, which I am the best at… so I take offense. :P

Most PvPers probably play more hours in the day and are likely much better at scripting… I don’t know why you feel the need to disparage over half the player base because they don’t like the same things you do. That’s just rude.

WoR/Lyre is whatever in groups.

In 1v1 they're fucking stupid though, anyone who WoR's 1v1 should be stabbed in the neck.

Also nerf forestal classes

Charnel & Crypts

Charnel provides a bunch of bonuses for Pariahs that are by no means necessary for basic combat. Crypts provide a house for Pariahs to hide out in, a place to store tablets that are used in rituals that vary from covering an area in sand to providing additional passive heals and afflictions for the Pariah. It also provides many of its defensive abilities, some of which I have mentioned previously. Largely though, you get a nice house you can chill in. Other Pariahs may attempt to plunder your crypt in search of tablets, though.

Pariah Artefacts and Optimal Races

Generally, none of the Pariah specific artefacts are needed for anything. They are just convenience. However, Pariah has a lack of defensive options available, thus sip bonuses, health increases and stat increases (especially Intelligence and Constitution) are very useful for it. In group combat, one might wish to have a lyre as well.

In terms of race, Pariah utilizes Intelligence defensively for blunt/cutting resist since it does not have armour. Thus Grook and Tsol'aa are useful races. Horkval can also be chosen as an alternative due to its racial bonus.

Final Comments

I hope this overview has been relatively useful. I know that I didn't really touch on for instance coding burden. Personally I have a relatively complex setup for my Pariah, but there are tools available to make Pariah viable to play without much coding knowledge. Specifically, when you are attacking you can setup an epitaph and not have to worry about choosing individual logographs through the epitaph ability. Thus you need only choose the higher sorceries and plagues that you are going to afflict any given balance. The class is fun and the theme is really cool. Pariah has been a really fun class to play personally, and I'd be happy to see more taking it up.

Pariah Overview

Pariah is the newest class introduced in Achaea. They are a new affliction class that is themed around the use of blood magic, swarms of insects, plagues, and desert magic.

Afflictions & Abilities

Pariah has two main sources of afflictions

Logographs: Found in memorium, these are used via the TRACE ability to afflict someone with one of several afflictions. These afflictions are among the more common afflictions used by other classes. Unlike other classes, a Pariah is restricted in what they can afflict at any given time by the need to maintain an epitaph,which I will talk about shortly.

Plagues: Found in Pestilence, these are delivered by stinging or infesting using swarms that you build. There are 5 plagues, each of them have different effects but the effects are relatively minor, but are the more important afflictions in the kit by far. The more plagues someone has, the closer the Pariah is to killing them, in general.

Logographs & Tracing

Pariah's offense centers around the idea of tracing logographs. In general when using the TRACE ability, one considers two things:

Epitaphs

Central to how a Pariah attacks in combat is the concept of an epitaph mentioned previously. Epitaphs are built by chaining together logograph traces. such that the logographs "flow together". For instance, a simple logograph chain that continues an epitaph is tracing serpent (paralysis), then next balance tracing skein (impatience), then sun (epilepsy) and finally serpent (paralysis) again. However, one cannot afflict paralysis and then haemophilia without breaking an epitaph chain, since the serpent (paralysis) logograph only flows into the skein (impatience) or nest (weariness) logographs.

Epitaphs do several things:

1. The balance time for traces that maintains an epitaph decreases. You traces start at 2 seconds balance, and have gradually lower balance times until you are down to 1.5 seconds on the 4th trace.
2. For all traces including and after your second that maintains an epitaph, your opponent becomes exposed. This allows you a single use of certain abilities known as "Higher Sorcery" against them without using any balance or equilibrium. You use this to begin, among other things, afflicting plagues.

Because of both of these points, in general a Pariah will want to be maintaining an epitaph for as long as possible, both to keep the decreased balance times and also because exposing your opponent and using higher magics on them is generally how you make progress towards a kill. Below is a picture that provides information on the available logographs and which logographs they flow into, courtesy @Shecks. (Relapsing means Scytherus for Scorpion here)

Heartbeats

Whenever a Pariah traces a logograph, they can choose to delay the delivery of that logograph by 1-5 seconds through the use of the heartbeat ability in Memorium. This is almost always used in the opening of an epitaph when you don't have reduced balance times and your opponent is not yet exposed to push the initial logograph afflictions forward and not lose momentum that would otherwise be completely wasted. It can also, of course, be used for tricks.

Swarms & Plagues

Pariah utilizing swarms of insects which carry plagues they use to afflict their opponent. Swarms are built by enthralling various insects which can sting, burrow, and fly (though not necessarily all three), which they can find in the various areas of Sapience. A Pariah can have many swarms and can afflict each individual swarm with a plague. A Pariah currently may have up to 10 swarms, and each swarm can carry 1 plague. Generally, a Pariah will have 5 swarms which can sting, and 5 swarms which can burrow. Thus for every plague, they will generally have two swarms afflicted with that plague.

Swarms are used in some higher sorcery which are paired with traces after a certain point, and allow afflicting with the following plagues:

• Pyramides: Increases bleeding by 10%, cured by bloodroot/magnesium so long as the opponent isn't paralysed.
• Mycalium: Can extend an opponent's balance time by a few seconds. Cured by goldenseal/plumbum.
• Sandfever: Acts like Impatience and also lowers the opponent's celerity by 1. Cured by goldenseal/plumbum.
• Rebbies: Afflicts with sensitivity whenever an opponent applies a salve. Cured by kelp/aurum.
• Flushings: Makes the opponent bleed when they cure a ginseng affliction that isn't Flushings. Cured by ginseng/ferrum.

Swarms are used by the sting, burrow, infest, latency, and scourge higher sorceries.

Plagues affect the latency, virulence, and scourge higher sorceries.

Higher Sorceries

Pariah utilizes tracing epitaphs to allow them a single use of a higher sorcery balanceless per trace, starting from their second trace.

Basic Higher Sorceries

Pariah makes use of four higher sorceries initially to build plagues on their opponent. Once the opponent is sufficiently debilitated with plagues, the use of other higher sorceries can be used to lead into a kill. The following higher sorceries are initially used to build plagues or otherwise meet conditions for kills:

1. Sting: The chosen swarm afflicts the opponent immediate with the plague it is infected by.
2. Burrow: The chosen swarm burrows into the opponent.
3. Infest: If a swarm is burrowed in an opponent, the swarm becomes unburrowed and the opponent is infested with the plague that swarm was infected by. This infestation manifests in the opponent being afflicted with the plague twice, the first time 6 seconds after infest is used, the second 12 seconds after.
4. Extract: If a swarm is burrowed in an opponent, the swarm becomes unburrowed and the opponent is immediately afflicted with the plague the swarm was infected by, and also given 100 bleed. Can be used to accelerate a Scourge kill, but in general infest is the better option to utilize burrow.

Notably, all of these abilities can be used while prone.

Advanced Higher Sorceries

Once an opponent is sufficiently plague ridden, these higher sorceries can be used, generally though not in all cases to attempt to secure a kill:

1. Virulence: Afflicts with many different afflictions which vary based on which plagues the opponent has. Most often used to secure a lock by afflicting with anorexia/and or slickness as necessary. Can afflict with more than one thing if the proper plagues are available. Can also be used defensively to afflict with the peace affliction provided the proper plagues are afflicted.
2. Scourge: Instantly kills an opponent that has Pyramides, Scytherus, Haemophilia and is bleeding for 200. Generally is used in combination with the scorpion logograph to afflict with scytherus and secure the kill.
3. Latency: Prevents the opponent from curing voyria for 13 seconds. Voyria is generally afflicted with a serpent logograph after a scorpion logograph has been traced, and latency is used either with the scorpion logograph or the serpent logograph.
4. Accelerate: Speeds up the voyria countdown. Used twice after latency and voyria have been afflicted to secure a kill, by ensuring that voyria completes before Latency wears off.

Virulence is complicated, the image below provides information on what it can afflict with provided the corresponding plagues are present, again courtesy @Shecks.

Note that the Sandfever/Mycalium combination smart afflicts dizziness first, then stupidity if dizziness is there, then blackout if they both are. It does not do all three at once.

General Combat Theory

Basic Attack Pattern

A Pariah will generally open a fight through the use of the ability Ensorcell in Memorium. This ability afflicts the opponent with a room hinder that lasts 20 seconds and stays with them regardless of how many rooms they move, and more importantly gives the Pariah their blood which allows them to begin tracing logographs and eventually exposing them.

After grabbing their blood, they will do a single trace of a logograph that is heartbeated, generally followed by a second heartbeated trace the next balance that maintains an epitaph. The opponent will then be exposed, so on their third balance they will generally do either burrow/trace or sting/trace. Afterwards, they may choose to use infest if they burrowed, which will act essentially like heartbeat for a certain plague, or continue stinging plagues with their traces. Note that the Pariah could make use of the opponent being exposed immediately on the second balance to do trace/sting or trace/burrow, but generally a Pariah wants to preserve expose due to it being useful for certain kill paths.

Generally, a Pariah either chooses to rush for a kill by stinging as much as they can on the third trace following and hoping they build enough plagues to use one of advanced higher sorceries.

Kill Paths

Lock

By conserving expose, a pariah can afflict with two higher sorceries on the same balance. This is most often used for virulence, by afflicting a plague with sting, then tracing a logograph, and finally using the newly gained expose to use virulence immediately. In this way an opponent can be quite easily locked. For instance, if the opponent has Pyramides, Flushings, and Rebbies, then the Pariah can sting Sandfever/trace jackal (asthma)/virulence for anorexia and slickness to complete a basic lock on the same balance.

Alternatively, a Pariah can lock through the use of transpose which applies a single venom to the target, while using virulence via expose to give anorexia/slickness on the same balance (i.e. transpose gecko/virulence for anorexia). This particular form of completing lock only requires two plagues and to have the remaining lock afflictions stuck (asthma and impatience/sandfever, weariness if necessary). They can also sting for a plague and virulence without a trace to complete a lock under certain conditions. These latter two methods completely bypass shield, since both sting and virulence do not respect shield, but of course require that you have already stuck asthma, and impatience if you are not using the sting for sandfever.

Scourge

Scourge is an instantkill that can generally be performed once the opponent has Haemophilia, 200 bleeding, and Pyramides. If one has an epitaph 4 or more traces long then the Pariah can conserve expose from the last trace and do trace scorpion/swarm scourge to complete the kill. The bleeding can come from two sources: either the bear logograph, which gives haemophilia and 50 bleeding if the opponent doesn't have haemophilia, or 150 bleeding if they do have haemophilia, or by using two extracts after sticking haemophilia. A trick that Pariahs often make use of is to heartbeat the bear logograph so as to be able to trace bear very quickly once the initial haemophilia and bleed is given, thereby very quickly pressuring scourge. Extract can also be used to pressure scourge, however this reduces their affliction output since they need two extracts to be able to scourge after sticking haemophilia.

Latency & Voyria

Once the opponent has three plagues, latency can be used to prevent voyria from being cured. Again this is generally seen by using expose with latency along with a scorpion trace, followed by a serpent trace to afflict voyria and using the expose from that trace to accelerate the voyria, which then must be followed up by accelerate quickly to secure the kill.

There are several alternatives to this, such as using latency with the serpent logograph after scorpion instead of using it with scorpion, and using latency with transpose to afflict with voyria on the same balance. Note that these are in general weaker than using latency with scorpion since they provide larger windows for defensive measures.

Wrack

The wrack ability in Memorium deals increasing damage based on the number of plagues. One can for instance combo an exposed sting + wrack for considerable damage. However, doing more than one wrack in a row stops your epitaph. In general, damage kills are viable against people with lower level arties considering your Basic Higher Sorceries to deal some damage, enough to outpace lesser artied opponents. The damage is not increased by Intelligence.

Combat in Practice

Pariahs generally burst afflictions using heartbeat and possibly infest, this can lull a naive opponent into a false sense of security, as they initially have very few afflictions but become overloaded as the heartbeats/infests land. Generally a good Pariah will switch up when they use infest or sting to play mind games with their opponent. Choosing if and when to use ensorcell is also important, since the ability resets any epitaph.

Pariah's main advantage in combat is it's overwhelming offense. While Pariah has some defensive options, notably a passive affliction cure in the leech logograph and an entangle cancel in Reconstitute, it has very little ability to defend itself once it is on the back foot. This becomes especially problematic if the Pariah becomes hindered long enough to stop an epitaph, as they lose the benefits that have accrued and must start from the beginning. Pariah thus is very scary to face, given that an opponent needs to react quickly to a large burst of afflictions and go on the defensive, or have a very strong hinder as part of their offense.

In general, Pariah's offense has two main weaknesses that an opponent can exploit defensively:

• Since Ensorcell only lasts 20 seconds and ends an epitaph, the opponent can run away once ensorcell fades. Pariahs can choose to forego Ensorcell to maintain affliction pressure, but again the opponent is otherwise free to walk away. Sandfever, which reduces an opponent's celerity by 1, rarely is effective due to it being top priority for opponents to cure.
• Pariah's shield break is relatively weak. This means that if an opponent shield spams (and one cannot complete the lock on the first shield), that opponent is effectively unkillable for the Pariah. Of course, they also aren't putting any pressure on the Pariah, so that's nice.

Generally, good opponents will start shielding after the Pariah attacks several times if ensorcell is up, until ensorcell fades. At that point, the Pariah can choose to Ensorcell, which will give the opponent time to begin pressuring the Pariah, or forego ensorcell, at which point the opponent may leave to reset the fight. Pariah has little choice during shield spam but to continue afflicting. Infest and heartbeat can be used to attempt to burst pass the shield, but these are generally not effective. In order to kill an opponent, they generally have to be fighting back. Still, because of Pariah's burst offense, kills can be secured very quickly and with little warning.

@Elyon You missed the point so entirely I'm not even sure where to start...