Changing Jester from Prep to Momentum

Jester has long been disliked for its style of combat.  It's a prep class, but it's also the best hindering and best escaping class.  People often say that it's no fun to fight a jester because of either hangedman/fashion or run/fashion tactics.  I have often heard people try to suggest fixes to the class by recommending the removal of some of their ability to hinder (hangedman) or run (somersault).  But I think the spirit of what a jester is should have both elements of hinder and escape.  Therefore, what should change is actually that they are a prep class.  I believe jester should be a momentum class, and I have come up with an idea to combine Puppetry with Tarot to do just that.

Puppetry will lose all its current abilities.  It's abilities will now depend on tarot cards that are attached to the puppet. There are 6 tiers.  At each tier, the jester reads the fortune of his target. This is accomplished by holding a tarot deck in front of his target and telling them to choose a card.  The card is then revealed and attached to the puppet, instilling it with new powers. Only one card from each tier can be attached to a puppet at a time. The only way to remove a card is to let the fashions fade so that the tier requirement is no longer met and then refashioning to try for a new card. I would also like to emphasize that fashions decay on a 1 to 1 basis for every second that the jester is not actively fashioning.  This means that a jester should only run when necessary, and will not be able to do so without losing progress made on his puppet.

The timing to move from zero to tier 6 I will leave up to the experts, but for now I suggest each fashion always act as a truefashion and provide 2 fashions, and each second spent not fashioning decay 1 fashion. I tentatively recommend that it take 4 fashions to move from zero to tier 1 and 4 more for each tier beyond that. At current fashion speed of 1.6-1.7 with nimble it would take about 3.3 seconds to move from tier to tier and about 20 seconds to get to tier 6 unhindered.

Tier 1 Fool, Priestess, Magician, Emperor
Tier 2 Lovers, Empress, Hermit
Tier 3 Tower, Hangedman, Hierophant
Tier 4 Justice, Creator, Wheel
Tier 5 Lust, Aeon, Star
Tier 6 Death, Moon, Devil

The idea behind this theme is to create the effect that somehow the draw of the cards is unraveling the target's fate. To reinforce this, 2 cards provide a benefit to the jester's opponent, 1 punishes the jester for running, 1 takes fashions from the puppet, and 1 has a chance to either give or take fashions from the puppet.


Tier 1 (4 fashions) 2 balances
Fool - Creates a passive single affliction transfer from the jester to the puppet's target. Approximately once every ten seconds or so.
Priestess - Provides the puppet's target with health regen. (Yes, this is intended)
Magician - Provides the puppet's target with mana regen. (Yes)
Emperor - Gives functionality identical to puppet command.

Tier 2 (8 fashions) 4 balances
Lovers - Damage dealt to jester by target is reduced from all sources. (No more than algiz would provide).
Empress - Can travel to puppet's target within local area.
Hermit - Jester takes damage if he uses hermit or universe to escape in the presence of the puppet's target. (Fate is cruel)

Tier 3 (12 fashions) 6 balances
Tower - Rubble automatically generates in any room where the puppet is in the same room as its target. (Not when they are apart)
Hangedman - Flinging hangedman now becomes a noose, dealing asphyxiation damage over time until target writhes free.
Hierophant - Puppet loses some fashions.

Tier 4 (16 fashions) 8 balances
Justice - Reflects some damage done to jester by puppet's target.
Creator - Bomb's can be attached to puppet. (Effectively removing the ability for the target to avoid them)
Wheel - 50/50 chance to lose fashions or to gain fashions.

Tier 5 (20 fashions) 10 balances
Lust - Can empress target within local area.
Aeon - Flinging aeon will hit twice.
Star - Flinging star will cause 3 meteors to come down on the target in a row. (As if three stars were flung)

Tier 6 (24 fashions) 12 balances
Death - Flinging death will cause puppet's target to lose 10% of max health every second until they leave the room. (Jester is free to attack after flinging death)
Moon - Flinging moon gives all 6 moon afflictions at once for ten seconds. (stupidity, masochism, hallucinations, hypersomnia, confusion, epilepsy)
Devil - Flinging devil causes a devil to hand one of a concussion, web, or dust bomb to your puppet's target every time you do for ten seconds.

Buffer (30 fashions) 15 balances

I'd like to mention that none of the original functionality of tarot cards is intended to be changed by any of this.  For instance, death tarot can still be rubbed on a person to go for an instant kill, it only changes when it has been attached to a puppet.

Unless otherwise stated, all abilities are lost when the fashions on the puppet fall below the minimum tier level. So for instance, one might say its not fair to have incurable justice.  However, jester is not a damage heavy class as it is. The addition of more effective justice, hangedman that turns into noose, triple star flings, and death draining health, are meant to give jester a damage option.  Also, if you hinder him, run, make him run, or otherwise remove his ability to fashion consecutively, he will lose the justice on his puppet and will have to refashion, with only 1/3 chance of getting it again. 

The 3 tier 6 options are meant to be strong, but not enough to win a fight on their own.  They provide a jester a huge advantage while they have it, but if they don't capitalize on it, they can lose their fashions and have to start over. Death is a damage option. Moon can help stick impatience for a lock or to add hinderance for an instant kill. Devil obviously provides fast hinderance.  

So it is possible for a jester to fashion and get a less than ideal set up. But that's what makes it interesting I think.  That you have some idea which cards you will get because of the tiers, yet there is still some chance left to it. I really hope, even if I'm sure there are many adjustments that would have to be made, that this can be a starting point for a better direction for jester to go in.

Comments

  • That looks really interesting! I'm leery of some RNG but I think it would work. I like it! Would there be a way for a jester to spend fashions with this? Like if you know you got a bad tier one, could you spend a few fashions to crush a limb or something and try again?
  • Drot said:
    That looks really interesting! I'm leery of some RNG but I think it would work. I like it! Would there be a way for a jester to spend fashions with this? Like if you know you got a bad tier one, could you spend a few fashions to crush a limb or something and try again?
    It's possible.  My idea is far from perfect but I think it's a start.  I think it's something that can be built off of.
  • This reminds me of work when I tell my staff it's easy to point out problems..it's harder to find solutions.

    Nice well thought out solution... Albeit a huge change



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