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Very nice! Considering monsters are central to the experience, the more you can easily add that can lead to more and more interesting scenarios the better.

Hmmm, more monsters also has other ramifications. Maybe a class like Druid becomes doable then?

That's something to be considered. What makes the druid fun for you? is it the summoning or the shape changing?

BlueSalamander wrote:That's something to be considered. What makes the druid fun for you? is it the summoning or the shape changing?

Both of course. Druids are very versatile. They have better offensive spells than clerics, are a good source of natural AC (there are no natural AC enhancing items/spells in KotC , that's a good time to include spiderskin ), have access to a set of nice Mage spells, have access to a set of nice cleric spells, are the best summoners and Shapeshifting on top. They're awesome. Sadly in games like NWN2 shapeshifting is nigh useless, what's the purpose of Shapeshifting if you're way weaker than unshifted and can't even fly?

ps: their druid-only spells are cool too

I liked the Druids of the old AD&D ruleset, when they were bizarre, pure-Neutral hippies with mostly their own spells. Like everything else D&D, they just got more vanilla and boring over the years. The main reason I'd like to have them is that I hate Clerics and it's basically impossible to build a party without one.

Just think about the reincarnate spell, your dead party member returns but in a different body, a different race. Later you could use Miracle/Wish to restore the original form if you so choose.

Both of course. Druids are very versatile.

Personally I like the animal companion and spell/summoning ability, but I don't think the shapeshifting is very useful in a video game. The way I see it, in pen and paper it can help in a few situations:
a) when you want to hide or spy: turn into something small
b) when you want to scout an area: turn into a bird
c) when you've got to explore underwater: turn into a fish
Now a) and b) are out of question in a video game, and c) may be giving too great an advantage to the druid compared to everyone else in underwater areas. After that there's shapeshifting for combat purposes, but since you retain your base attack bonus, Hit Points and your only armor class bonus is the natural armor bonus, you'll be less effective than a fighter, and you'll be taking more risks.

BlueSalamander wrote:

Both of course. Druids are very versatile.

Personally I like the animal companion and spell/summoning ability, but I don't think the shapeshifting is very useful in a video game. The way I see it, in pen and paper it can help in a few situations:
a) when you want to hide or spy: turn into something small
b) when you want to scout an area: turn into a bird
c) when you've got to explore underwater: turn into a fish
Now a) and b) are out of question in a video game, and c) may be giving too great an advantage to the druid compared to everyone else in underwater areas. After that there's shapeshifting for combat purposes, but since you retain your base attack bonus, Hit Points and your only armor class bonus is the natural armor bonus, you'll be less effective than a fighter, and you'll be taking more risks.

Hmm...but in this case, there's always taking a more "what distinguishes more" slant! For instance, my notions for the Monk class being quite distinguished in terms of what it can do/affect period versus the usual Spell effects and a Fighter with a weapon---so too could shapeshifting or perhaps Fusion with a chosen animal companion lend itself to this thinking. IE: What combat relevant actions could a Were-Bear of sorts bring to the table with their physical constitution that a trained Monk, for instance and in the context of the Monk class notions I suggested, simply couldn't do because it just wouldn't make any sense thematically or otherwise? I'm sure much can be arrived upon in cases like these....just a matter of seeing where the bestiary and natural world go this time around.

With this class like others, once it gets closer to the time, I say we need to have a grand old pancake jamboree, metaphorically with this being a message board, on laying out the entire lot of them(In conjunction with Racial factors) then revising to remove boring/all too familiar and unsatisfying overlap aspects so that each class is as unique and not needlessly constrained as feasible. Considering the module based nature, we'd want the "base resources" to be as rich a set of building blocks as the lot of us can think up.

BlueSalamander wrote:

Both of course. Druids are very versatile.

Personally I like the animal companion and spell/summoning ability, but I don't think the shapeshifting is very useful in a video game. The way I see it, in pen and paper it can help in a few situations:
a) when you want to hide or spy: turn into something small
b) when you want to scout an area: turn into a bird
c) when you've got to explore underwater: turn into a fish
Now a) and b) are out of question in a video game, and c) may be giving too great an advantage to the druid compared to everyone else in underwater areas. After that there's shapeshifting for combat purposes, but since you retain your base attack bonus, Hit Points and your only armor class bonus is the natural armor bonus, you'll be less effective than a fighter, and you'll be taking more risks.

Wild shapes can be useful in a variety of ways in combat, like flying so the enemy can't reach you & casting (natural spell feat) in wild shape form. However you're right with saying that's pretty difficult to realize in a CRPG. Maybe it's the best for CRPG purposes to give the Druid Wild Shapes that are useful in specific circumstances as an additional tactical detail, like Troll (heal up through regen) or ooze to become magic resistant etc.

screeg wrote:Did you work with Antonin(sp?) Kuukka?! Helherron is one of my favourite TB strategy games of all time. I have long dreamed of creating an isometric TB pirate RPG based on the game mechanics of Helherron and Pirates of the Western Sea. I'm forever talking up Helherron and trying to get TB fans to play it. Kuukka really created something special with that game and frankly the bugs are few and far between considering the scores of hours of gameplay. It's a great example of AAA gameplay.

I love Helherron too!!! I played it 3 times to the end, once with 1 character. It's a masterpiece.
Many RPGs fail, because they are either not so good in terms of gameplay, like not much tactics, no turn-based combat or much less variety.
OR
they are clunky, extremely ugly and very user-unfriendly. (this is characteristic for ASCII-like roguelikes and specially no-saving games, like ADOM)
Helherron is genial, because it got everything right enough - the graphics and sounds are acceptable, the controls are survivable, and the gameplay and combat is simply perfect. I know, AI isn't perfect, but it isn't supposed to be. In Helherron, enemies make up to that by their great variety, abilities and...numbers. Fighting them is sometimes more like fighting natural catastrophes, simple, mindless but treacherous in countless ways. And the thudding sounds, throwing back and blood fountain effects are soooooo satisfying I couldn't emphasize that more, if I do something to enemy, I want to see it and hear it, regardless if the combat is tactical.

I regret that Antti Kuuka became buddhistic monk. (before I got to contact him) There is no single enlightenment, only perpetual, gradual enlightening. It was not necessary for him to leave the samsarous world. Quite oppositely, putting a meditated-up wisdom into practice in daily life and work is much faster way of self-enlightening, than being separated. But it's also true he probably couldn't make such a violent games anymore