Howdy, Stranger!
Categories
- 6.2K All Categories
- 3.1K Everything Achaea
- 1.5K North of Thera
- 26 Archives of the Terraformer
- 257 The Matsuhama Arena
- 885 The Golden Dais of Creation
- 299 The Scarlattan Theatre
- 149 The Blank Canvas
- 2K Getting Help
- 412 General Questions
- 258 Quick Class Questions
- 1.3K Tech Support
- 313 Client Help
- 486 Curing Systems and Scripts
- 841 Off-Topic
- 255 The Wander Inn
- 586 The Universal Membrane
- 298 Class Discussions
- 298 Individual Class Sections
- 20 Alchemist
- 9 Apostate
- 30 Blademaster
- 9 Depthswalker
- 14 Druid
- 4 Infernal
- 20 Jester
- 19 Magi
- 34 Monk
- 11 Occultist
- 8 Paladin
- 7 Priest
- 29 Runewarden
- 18 Sentinel
- 26 Serpent
- 20 Shaman
- 9 Sylvan
Pacifist class
Hi there,
I think this will be a controversial proposal, without much likelihood of being implemented, but I was hoping to make the case: a pacifist class totally dependent on RP, no PK, and limited/no possibilities of hunting, with pacifism as an underlying philosophical impetus.
One approach is to have the class have as its underpinning ideology not to attack sentient beings that would be classified as living. It would have to level on things that are either not sentient, like gours and wolves, or sentient beings that are not alive, like undead, and the class could never engage in PK for any reason. There would be a vastly more preferable method of advancing quests that make sense for a pacifist, which would give this class XP in addition to giving normal benefits like gold.
The other approach is to make the class completely and totally non-violent, and it would have to advance in level in entirety by questing.
It would need a "weapon" whose function is not to attack but to have a utility or defensive function. Killing/killing inappropriately would cause the priest/paladin/occultist/Infernal/Apostate equivalent of excommunication, which could only be reversed by atoning and no longer going for violence. There would be a need to track two types of experience, so people don't advance to 99 by normal means and then switch to the class. People that are already leveled would have to renounce their previous life and start at lvl 1. Lvl 99 and lvl 100 would bring a type of Greater dragon that makes sense with this life and philosophy.
To make up for the inability to PK/fight denizens, the class would have enormous utility potential, being an all-RP class. But, they'd have to RP in such a way that doesn't assist violent acts with their skills. The class would be in its entirety RP and support. I can't see Mhaldor permitting it, but some of the other cities might.
If this was implemented, we'd probably need a god like Oneiros to control the heavy RP requirements.
I do not think this will be a popular idea, and I think it will be rejected. But I wanted to see what you guys think.
I think this will be a controversial proposal, without much likelihood of being implemented, but I was hoping to make the case: a pacifist class totally dependent on RP, no PK, and limited/no possibilities of hunting, with pacifism as an underlying philosophical impetus.
One approach is to have the class have as its underpinning ideology not to attack sentient beings that would be classified as living. It would have to level on things that are either not sentient, like gours and wolves, or sentient beings that are not alive, like undead, and the class could never engage in PK for any reason. There would be a vastly more preferable method of advancing quests that make sense for a pacifist, which would give this class XP in addition to giving normal benefits like gold.
The other approach is to make the class completely and totally non-violent, and it would have to advance in level in entirety by questing.
It would need a "weapon" whose function is not to attack but to have a utility or defensive function. Killing/killing inappropriately would cause the priest/paladin/occultist/Infernal/Apostate equivalent of excommunication, which could only be reversed by atoning and no longer going for violence. There would be a need to track two types of experience, so people don't advance to 99 by normal means and then switch to the class. People that are already leveled would have to renounce their previous life and start at lvl 1. Lvl 99 and lvl 100 would bring a type of Greater dragon that makes sense with this life and philosophy.
To make up for the inability to PK/fight denizens, the class would have enormous utility potential, being an all-RP class. But, they'd have to RP in such a way that doesn't assist violent acts with their skills. The class would be in its entirety RP and support. I can't see Mhaldor permitting it, but some of the other cities might.
If this was implemented, we'd probably need a god like Oneiros to control the heavy RP requirements.
I do not think this will be a popular idea, and I think it will be rejected. But I wanted to see what you guys think.
1
Comments
If there was some way to replace each class's combat skills with pacifistic skills, I think that would be better because then you really do have each class able to do this, in a way unique to that class.
I have no idea how classes like Apostate or Infernal would get into this. Some classes are not pacifistic by RP philosophy/
Or if it was mostly player-controlled (there would still need to be some admin oversight though), it would require players who are responsible enough to be trusted with the position, dedicated enough to devote a large chunk of their time to the task without getting burnt out, and have a lot of free time to spend on Achaea; and there would have to be a significant number of these players, not just now but for as long as the class exists, so if interest ever waned it would fall apart.
@Silvarien said:
"Some classes are not pacifistic by RP philosophy"
This is true, but its ultimately up to the player to RP their character and not let their personality be defined by their class. Certainly, playing a pacifist as a Mhaldorian class would be sort of weird, but you could play pretty much any other class and choose not to use any violent skills whatsoever.
Like @Karai said, Achaea could adopt the influence stuff from Lusternia, where you verbally battle denizens (taunt them, complement them, debate them, etc) until they give you experience points.
I do like this idea though, sounds neat.
Achaea could adopt the influence stuff from Lusternia, where you verbally battle denizens (taunt them, complement them, debate them, etc) until they give you experience points.
Oblivion flashbacks...
Maybe Thoth just gets tired of people wandering though his halls all of the time, and bestows the boon of protection on you, as long as you don't abuse it.
I could see it broken down into three different skills based off of tools every good pacifist would need.
1) Evasion. Potential abilities could include those that aid in dodging both physical and magical attacks (to take significantly less damage after active abilities), a stronger version of parry, and passive abilities to regain health, mana, sleepiness, and hunger at faster rates. The first ability in the skill could overwrite punch/kick/headbutt and attempting to do them would perform a feint which would momentarily increase evasiveness greatly at a reduced balance cost.
2) Glamours. There are certain animals that use visual cues to deter predators, this could draw from that and give the pacifist the abilities necessary to sneak past aggressive creatures, cast illusions, and alter their appearance. This would contain kind of a RP-kit, to solidify the pacifist class as the class for people who want to RP in the game without joining in combat, giving them an edge to what they could do. Maybe a passive skill to allow the pacifist to do custom emotes without an associated balance loss. Just like a blademaster can't wield shields, the pacifist would be unable to wield weapons. Instead, they would get lanterns, that they channel these glamours through.
3) Scouting. Instead of spending time training their body to channel complicated offensive magicks or wield weapons, they can train their eye and brain to allow them to notice that which even the most astute adventurer wouldn't otherwise recognize. This skill could contain an enhanced probe, auto-secrets, show exact number of plants, a trans ability that acts like fullsense based off of surveying the surroundings and multiple abilities that could aid in travel like dash, passive Mhun bonus, evade, and the ability to set a custom entrance/exit.
While I agree with many here that I do not ever see this being something that Achaea would do, it is quite fun to think about idly.
imagine a raid is about to happen, and city X sends in their pacifists. Depending on the outcome of that interaction, city X might gain some benefit or debuff that would either encourage the raid to occur or dissuade it.
For example, say you were playing a pacifist Priest, who had PK disabled for their character. They couldn't attack or be attacked by other players. But could you still heal, angel aura, deliver other players to safety? For fairness, you absolutely should not be able to, or else we'd have non-PK characters running around healing everyone in raids. And then, if you couldn't do that, it'd destroy the entire point of playing a pacifist Priest who only heals people.
I'm telling you guys, any sort of PK flag, or purely pacifist class, is not ideal for Achaea. The tools are there for you to convincingly roleplay a pacifist character without needing a hard-coded, non-violent class. As of right now, you could even theoretically quest your way to Dragon, if you had the patience.
Their goal seems to be for every class to be equally capable at the core activities of bashing and PVP - which I think is a good goal. It would be frustrating for a new player completely unfamiliar with the game's systems to roll a sentinel (for example) because they wanted to play a character based on Aragorn, only to discover dozens of hours later that this class was unsuitable for the way they wanted to play the game, and that it would be very costly for them to change class.
I won't say the idea of a 'white mage' or pure support class is bad or completely unviable in the context of a persistent-world, high-investment MUD like Achaea (compared to a shorter D&D campaign, or a game like TF2 where you can change class trivially), but, yeah, it doesn't fit in with their current sensibilities. Some classes do have quite strong support capabilities (eg. Tarot, Groves, Healing) but you don't often see that level of coordination being employed.
I would really like more activities in this game that support a pacifist playstyle. I don't think making it part of the class system is a good way to do it - it doesn't seem compatible with their design tenets. More quests and perhaps other activities that grant experience, like Lusternia's Influencing, would be great.
For a long time I played Blujixapug in a not exactly pacifist but conscientious way, gaining experience mostly from quests and only killing non-sentient animals (and a few who had it coming like the murdering Vertani (and that fool Agnes Mooch (and maybe some orphans))). But quest experience rewards are so minor that they stopped contributing noticeably towards levelling up around the level 78-80 point, compared to the much greater rewards from high-level bashing.
(edit ->) ^^ Sounds exactly like a priest, actually.
Quoted from their wiki: https://elanthipedia.play.net/mediawiki/index.php/Empath
"Empaths are highly attuned to other living creatures, allowing them to heal the wounds of others. Such powers have their drawbacks, however; since Empaths are so close to the pain of the living beings around them, if they so much as try to harm another living creature they will lose their ability to heal for a time. If they kill, such ability can be lost forever."
I can see your point with the way priest classes operate, and I suppose others that can render invaluable aid in combat situations, can still have a major impact on a raid. I am looking for a way to avoid any involvement with combat at all, and I suppose that would only work with some classes like alchemist or druid. On the other hand, simply not getting into combat or living in a city that doesn't get raided constantly would be the closest I could get.
I do admit, that I feel a little jealous, well a lot jealous, at how easy it is for combatants to get experience. Get a good group together, and massacre a couple villages or raid a city, and it's easy to get a couple levels in a single trip. I don't see what would be similar for quests.
Why go through all that development effort, when you could just play your character that way?
BTW: Ahtelas does not hunt sentient beings if they do not attack him or someone he cares for first. This has been part of my RP with him for over an RL decade.
Don't create game machanics to force RP. It just kills the reason for RP in the first place.
Maybe if your a top tier combatant or just very lucky. But generally I consider myself lucky if I come out of a raid having broken even. I've lost waaaay more xp than I've gained in pvp.
Your gain xp to pvp, not the other way around.
Honestly unless maybe you're in Targ/Mhaldor, its really easy to avoid pvp.
You're partially right, but what you're missing is the huge risk - reward ratio.
Theoretically, a level 50 character could go on a raid trip, get a couple lucky kills, and gain 2 levels. They've also now given whoever they killed the right to PK them later, and possibly a city bounty on their head. They will be killed later, and lose a chunk of that exp they gained.
I know you were just wishful thinking, but there's no reason to give an equal reward to something with zero risk.
But like Amranu said, you could gain massive amounts of experience and keep it, through PK, if you're good at surviving. You could make a Serpent, buy an artefact bow, and probably hit level 80 from PK alone, if you only take part in raids and spend the rest of your time phased or sitting in your city.
Its not all hopeless for non-PvPers though, trust me. There's someone who quested most of the way to Dragon, and only killed stuff that was required for quests (killing animals for the Dun Valley person, for example).
You're certainly right that people who want to roleplay pure 100% pacifism are at a disadvantage when it comes to earning experience. I'm not sure what could be done, because if you create more quests that give better exp, then people who aren't pacifists will be able to do those same quests, and still be at a higher advantage.
You could, and this is just a suggestion, stop caring about exp altogether, and focus on all the other fun things in Achaea. Get into sailing, join an Order, roleplay more with your House, try to get into the top 20 explorer rankings, get all the honors quests. There's so much more to Achaea than hunting and questing for experience.
Lets be realistic, the only reason to get to Dragon is to kill things better.
Every city has lists of places to hunt, or support arenas for fighters, but there is little support for exploration. I understand that no listing of quests hints outside of newbie areas is so new players are safe from spoilers, but it is still frustrating finding things.
I can make up a list of NPCs who buy carcasses, but I haven't found any NPCs who buy herbs or minerals. Considering the time some people put into scripting and tweaking attack/defense numbers, I'm going to see what else I can do to match that in terms of exploration and crafting research. Maybe someday, there will be a tome or two tucked away in a library with veiled hints. "Rick Steves Does Achae"?