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Healer Specific Changes

19 minutes ago, Fool_Hardy said:

I may be wrong on this one.

I believe that all healers can stand their ground, but not chase without fear of divine punishment.

I believe you ARE allowed to defend yourself, and even others.

I believe you ARE NOT allowed to end another characters life.

Unliving unprotected.

That's what I believe to be true, here is my personal opinion.

Tranquility states "you have never raised your hands to anyone".

Tranquility healers should avoid ENGAGING a living enemy when ever possible.

Compassion healers should avoid Engaging enemies when they (the healer) are the only persons in danger.

Again, these are just my opinions.

You can chase as a healer, just not an extended one (multiple areas).  Undead excepted.

Defend yourself, absolutely.  Others ... well, few are the healers that have willfully jumped in the middle of a battle/chase to save someone.  Likely in fear of the ganging "rule".  I think it should be done more often, personally.

I was never punished for killing non-undead as a healer.  In those situations, I was never the aggressor either, but that's a different can of worms.

Tranquility I see as pacifists, though in reality it can be interpreted in a number of ways.  As pacifists, they can fight, they just chose not to and can go to lengths to avoid it.  This is obviously a religion thing, though, and as such dictates play style rather than setting predefined rules.

Compassion can take multiple forms.  Is it not compassionate to pull the plug instead of letting someone remain in agony?  Again, this is a religion, not a rule.

@Tantangel As I reread your post, I noted you dropped Divine Intervention.

Not sure that is the right move. The strongest skill nixed, and nothing offered as a replacement.

Just a suggestion, what if we created a "sacrifice" like spell that instead of shoving the target out of danger, the healer recalls the target losing mental strength instead of health. The "target" ends up at their recall fully healed, and the sacrificial lamb is left to deal with the "targets" enemy. The mental strength lost would be substantial, and just to make it interesting give the spell a cool down that prevents the healer from gating. A cool down that stacks. Sacrifice could then be used over and over, to protect a large group, though the Healer becomes stranded. Truly sacrificing themselves for the good of others.

Edit: If you are sacrificed by an evil healer, you return to your pit with 1 hp. The evil healer would get some sort of buff from sacrificing you for his cause.

Perhaps title the good and evil versions of this spell differently, and force a neutral healer to select one or the other.

Edited

Yea that was my thoughts on healers as well, they SHOULD be jumping defensively, so assisting in the chasm if you're a knight for example to defend your brothers in arms, even if its just by healing/buffing the cabal mate. I dunno I remember it being really strict and several times I played a healer specifically in Knight, I never felt I was allowed to do anything as far as assisting via my spell kit. Maybe I just over thought it/took things too literaly.

Well, Knight is tricky like that.  Most times, there shouldn't be 2v1 due to "honor" or the like, but everyone and every character is different.

As a healer in Knight, I'd often heal companions between battles.  Not all the time or not always to 100%, but often enough.  Additionally, when cabalmates were retrieving/stealing standards, I'd gate ahead and refresh them enroute.  Not easy to get some runners, might I add outside of triggers.

So I'd wager it is all in how you assist.  Physically jumping into a battle or chase might seem to be considerably more aggressive in how Imms see healers currently, but I'm not them and haven't asked.  Another reason people might be hesitant in doing such, currently.  Though a compassion healer might slide more if it's a stalling tactic than a tranquil one would.  As I see it, of course.

Still, the non-aggressive healer mandate says that they're reactive, not proactive.  You can kill, but only if you're not the instigator.  You can retrieve standards, but not take them.  And that gives people more wiggle room in what they can do and when.  It's a bit blurry in some cases though.

http://theforsakenlands.com/community/index.php?/topic/2749-cabaled-healers-and-standards/

22 hours ago, Fool_Hardy said:

@Tantangel As I reread your post, I noted you dropped Divine Intervention.

Not sure that is the right move. The strongest skill nixed, and nothing offered as a replacement.

Just a suggestion, what if we created a "sacrifice" like spell that instead of shoving the target out of danger, the healer recalls the target losing mental strength instead of health. The "target" ends up at their recall fully healed, and the sacrificial lamb is left to deal with the "targets" enemy. The mental strength lost would be substantial, and just to make it interesting give the spell a cool down that prevents the healer from gating. A cool down that stacks. Sacrifice could then be used over and over, to protect a large group, though the Healer becomes stranded. Truly sacrificing themselves for the good of others.

Edit: If you are sacrificed by an evil healer, you return to your pit with 1 hp. The evil healer would get some sort of buff from sacrificing you for his cause.

Perhaps title the good and evil versions of this spell differently, and force a neutral healer to select one or the other.

I dropped it purposely in favor of giving resurrection more of a new look based partially on Religion and possibly other things as well. Such as if you're the path of Greed, rather than being a set +10 to healing hp/mana/moves for every successful one, it could be more based off of the Religion itself. For example, granting cut purse to the Healer as a skill at 100%, addict perk randomly and possibly a level 5 only resurrection, steal skill at 100%, etc. Although DI is powerful, the ones that were useful as far as damage output were mostly Purity and it really affected Undeads most. The others really didn't benefit them too much, and I didn't see it particularly worthwhile to keep given the added benefits of Resurrection if it were fleshed out more and added in. This could make a Healer extremely mysterious when being approached to kill as no one would truly know what to expect from it. I wouldn't say give them blackjack as a potential bonus, just simply some of the lesser Thief skills if Greed was something they followed.

@Celerity I was thinking as far as damage output to balance out the lower damage making them more viable is to allow them to be granted Path of Deceit as Evil, Ray of Truth for Goods, and Blistering Entropy for Neutral paths. This would do one of a few things once added such as blindness similar to flame strike and firestorm but with a higher chance to land based off of protections of armor. Not necessarily saves, but perhaps the lower the armor class, the easier it is to land, and once they hit the -500ac mark it is less than a 5% chance of landing successfully, with the exception of fighting a Feral as they'd already be prone to having it land much easier due to the fire like properties of it and would naturally mean a lot less damage against Fire Giants. If it's used as an opener spell, there's a 2% chance it'll cause an 'aging' like affect causing the person to forget something that's actually useful to them in combat such as a weapon they may be wielding or a spell they'll rely upon heavily in combat. A caltraps like affect that causes movement speeds to be affected possibly causing them to hit less often.

I'm still okay with adding in third attack since they'd still rely more heavily upon spells rather than weapons themselves. It all can be fleshed out more as time goes on so that it's more balanced if implemented. I'm going to assume that I'll be asked how saves will affect the new spell, to which I'll say that it depends on which affect comes into play. Although the damage from the spell itself could easily be targeted as an affliction type, any side affects can be saved against based off of other saves entirely.

I have always loved the differences in a healer created by their divine interventions.

I think we have a lot of areas where we could allow the healers religion to alter spell affects.

Beyond bless and DI, think about the things we do to add religion specific flavor to spells such as curse, dispel, and even calm.

The problem with DI is that it's the exact same DI as a Cleric can have except the Healer is a lot more restricted currently. A few of them to me are mundane and honestly don't fit in as far as their restrictions go, hence the removal altogether and benefiting of Resurrection changing slightly. It gives them a different kind of edge since the benefits can be small, but greatly change the way they can fight. One Healer will be drastically different from another assuming different religions are chosen, and an added damage spell to help make them more viable. I'm not saying that DI is useless by any means, but I feel that a Healer should be different and stand out more and anyone who has played multiple religions or has the old code would know what each religion benefits for them. I'd be more inclined to separate them further from Clerics though and rather than any 'Divine' power stepping in (outside of Retribution at least), they should be slightly more grounded in terms of Divine help. They're Healers, so it would make sense to have them pray so to speak that their medicines work on others, but not so much to the point that they're more of a fanatic like a Cleric could/should be.

Honestly though, I used to love the aspect of Divine Intervention and all the nifty things it could do to benefit a Cleric or a Healer. The two things that has changed with them though since I last played one for an extended period was they got a nerf and I think it was along the lines of Barrier not being able to be up with something else a decade ago I believe and resurrection stopped giving people lives upon success. I remember when Virigoth said they should be a walking fortress with all of their spells/skills available to them, and I pulled that off I think rather well with mine. Even so though, the only real time DI was useful had been when I was fighting Undead creatures and took out Xanthak over the course of a few IG days. Sure the others would've given me various benefits, but when it comes to Healers now, Purity and Compassion are really the only two that suit a Healers RP. The rest have a tendency to overstep their guidelines quite a bit in terms of RP, so I don't find it a fitting spell to continue allowing them to have. With the perks shifted to Resurrection though, you gain a new way to add life to a class that very few seem to touch since just the resurrection change alone. If that idea is fleshed out more, DI would honestly seem rather boring to most people as I could see a Healer being far more viable, but still not quite the steam roll of a class that many seem to overlook.

Random unfleshed idea.

Let healers join the guild from either Cleric, Paladin, or Ranger.

From Cleric is the current healer +

Cure Undead-- A spell that can turn an undead back to human for 50 hours. Cuts them off from all undead skills/spells. 

Exorcise Demon- when used, the player is suddenly cast out of their body. They become a noattack ghostly being, and their char becomes their pet, following them around, taking limited orders. They have no skills/spells and are in pure survival mode for something like 10 hours.

 

From Paladin is current healer +

Wrath- Same as for Paladins

Compass- a skill that points them to the closest demon/undead at any given time, just tells them n,s,e,w

 

From Ranger is current healer +

Tincture-- they can make a potion of esuna, restore faith or heal, which is a potion they quaff later.

Faith's Eyes-- They can see hidden undead/demon, as well as vamps in bat form.

Faith's Arrows-- Arrows that hit vulns for each undead, demon, vamp.

What is dead may never die.