Most wanted Classes, Spells, and Skills?

Wicked General
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Hey all, saw that Mahler posted the above and wanted to share here in case anyone (like me) doesn’t have a twitter account.

For Classes:

  • Any class that gives me access to, or can transform my wand / staff into, a Scythe. :pinched_fingers:
  • Battlemage / Spellsword → Devs already look to be delivering on this perfectly. Brief glimpse from pre-early access streams show such a satisfying, weighty moveset with the Staff, and the mobility of Blinking is just so good. Overall, seems to hit the perfect blend of grounded weapon combat and weaving spells. Huge kudos to everyone involved in aesthetic & mechanical decisions here.

For Skills / Spells:

  • Skills / Spells that require precise timing and/or spacing to trigger a bonus.
    • Spacing → a long, horizontal Scythe attack that can trigger a follow-up for pulling the enemy in, but only if the 1st part of the attack is properly spaced so that it lands at tip-range).
    • Timing 1 → a sword skill where the player enters a stance with a unique parry window (e.g., Two Dragons Sword from Lies of P).
    • Timing 2 → A lightning spell that must be charged within a precise time-range: if you undercharge then the resulting bolt is weaker and shoots out erratically, but if you overcharge it then the bolt backfires and damages/stuns the player.
  • Skills / Spells that require some form of additional resource management → Blood magic, having an additional health cost for powerful spells, and then having spells / skills that can be used to steal back some HP if used properly.
  • For Spells specifically, I’m eager to see mechanical differences that can be felt & translated to playstyle differences. Instead of the typical pattern: Fire Spells deal Heat damage with potential burning, Lightning spells deal Electric damage with potential chaining, and Frost spells deal Cold damage with potential slowing/freezing; it would be more interesting to see Fire magic as leaning towards a fast/aggressive playstyle, whereas Lightning magic could have this more methodical feeling of charging spells with precise timings. Overall, it would be great to have spell groupings that are both aesthetically and mechanically distinct.
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Hey @PennyToast , thanks for copying this over.

Before I add my own input, you touch on a few things that I really like as well so I’ll just +1 those quickly.

Yes!

I really like this concept as well. I would love to see Lightning spells that ‘combo’ together with small timing windows that have the potential for massive spike damage. Or Earth-based playstyles that are slow, difficult to land, but hit like a truck.

For classes that I generally gravitate towards in ARPGs, it is usually physical ranged classes (archer types) or in-your-face berserker types.

For archer types, I would really enjoy a break from traditional ARPG models of PROJECTILE SPEW into something a lot more thoughtful. I would not mind at all having to be extra intentional with my positioning as a ranged character, having longer wind-ups for shots and needing to be precise with my spacing to allow for them.

I’ve always loved the idea of the “drain-tank” archtype, but it seems incredibly difficult to execute. It either heals faster than any incoming damage and is an unkillable machine, or doesn’t and just dies. XD HOWEVER! Within the context of NRFTW, certain skills/weapon combos that when timed correctly could give short bursts of either healing or damage reduction, that could be really satisfying to play around!

Another playstyle that can be enjoyable is the “debuffer” or “control” archtype. Skills or spells that debilitate enemies as your characters primary form of defense or safety can be satisfying to pull off, especially if your character would otherwise be squishy/vulnerable.

Overall though, more than stats and numbers, I would love to see you guys experiment and get super creative with the way spells and skills move your character. Rather than having strictly “mobility” skills, I wouldn’t be at all sad to see ALL skills move your character in some fashion, big or small, X Y or Z directions, because that is another deep layer of gameplay that is mostly untapped in other ARPGs, positioning! Skills that have multiple activations, each with its own differing movements.

Is there a way to add detection for when your skill movements effectively dodge attacks? If the game could tell “if he hadn’t done that, the enemy would have hit him” and grant skill-specific bonuses, like the next hit crits, or life steal is doubled, or damage reduction stack, etc etc. Would be a satisfying way to reward clean gameplay!

That’s all I got for now, thanks again for sharing this here. :slight_smile:

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Just wanted to add i always like to play paladin like characters.
Spell - Holy light as self healing but when you charge it creates aura we can aoe damage filthy plague enemies.

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I’m always drawn to magic users, but very often magic is just ranged damage with sparkles. Support and utility magic is a big draw.

That said, I always seem to end up with a classic sword-and-shield knight type. Maybe with a little holy magic thrown in later in the game.

As for Skills/Spells:

From what we’ve seen so far it doesn’t look like Shields have Rune slots, but it would be cool if there were still Rune skills that only work if you had a shield equipped in your off-hand:

  • A Shield Bash that could knock enemies down, or at least deal substantial Poise damage.
  • A Shield Charge
  • A spell that adds armor or elemental/status damage resistance to your shield.
  • A spell that retaliates (in the form of a magic missile) when blocking an attack.
  • Shield Ring: Your character hits your shield with their weapon, drawing nearby enemy attention and giving the character a defensive buff.

And, as @Profil said, some Paladin type spells:

  • A Holy Ground AoE that creates a stationary spot that does damage-over-time to enemies; perhaps it could double as a heal-over-time for allies.
  • Defensive aura(s): an area of effect centered on your character that moves with you, providing damage reduction; a single aura could have multiple effects, or there could be separate auras for Armor, Elemental/Status resistance, Poise, etc.
  • Support aura: an area of effect centered on your character that moves with you, providing healing over time; a single aura could have multiple effects, or there could be separate auras for healing, Elemental/Status build-up reduction or removal, Stamina regen, improved Focus generation, increased movement speed, etc.
  • Offensive aura: an area of effect centered on your character that moves with you; a single aura could have multiple effects, or there could be separate auras for increased attack speed, increased damage, Elemental/Status damage to weapons, Elemental/Status damage directly to enemies, etc.
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Priests, and I want to be able to build into the “I smite you and you die” priests and not healbot typical “priests”. I want to see more diverse magic schools outside the typical fire, ice, and lightning.

Since holy is my favorite school here are some I’d love to see…

Ray of Light - Fire a beam of light that consumes additional Focus the longer you hold it down

Radiant Bolt - Hurls a bolt of holy energy at enemies

Consecration - Creates a circle of divine energy on the ground that damages enemies that enters

Judgement - Hurls a hammer at enemies that jumps between targets

Holy Orb - Creates an orb of light that drags enemies around it and explodes, allies are also healed in the process

Divine Shield - Grants you a ward that absorbs a certain amount of damage taken

Holy Star - Toss a star at enemies that returns back to you

Rejuvenation - Places a sigil on the ground that heals you or your allies when you enter it

Regen - Cast a buff on yourself that restores your HP over time temporarily

Protect - A buff that reduces your damage taken for a certain duration

Reflection - Cast a buff that allows you to reflect 2 projectile thrown at you

Might brainstorm some more holy spells later and re-edit this, all I got atm.

I said it before but I also want to see staves that are designed for Faith builds.

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Hey all !

I apreciate skills that can be used in multiples ways. I think the most common example is fight and mobility skills, like a quick move and knife stab for a rogue, an aoe spell that stun ennemies nearby an teleport the character for a wizard or a long jump and hammer smash for a barbarian…

Also I do apreciate invocations spells or animal transformations spells.

As a class I like to play mages/wizards or rogue/rangers.

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I have a lot of fun with glass cannon characters when I’m solo. However, I am always wishing for more spellcasting utility gameplay, where I’m not just an aoe ice mage or something.

It’s super fun debuffing/applying statuses to enemies, and shielding/buffing my friends while they try their hardest to die.

I also appreciate the more classic priest archetypes and definitely enjoy them… but I’ve been wishing a game would let me play more of an enchanter style supportive role with my friends. It’s the one thing I miss from when I played Leage of Legends :sweat_smile:

I always wished that games would take some inspiration from the support characters in mobas, instead of WoW and the like.

Anyways, I know that what I like isn’t exactly the most exciting or in demand, but I’m hoping I’ll at least have more options than a holy mace and sanctified ground. We’ll see… If not, fuck it, I’m going to fireball things instead.

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There are some interesting suggestion in here. Thought I’d throw my two cents in.

Mechanics:
Maybe I’m a weirdo but I always enjoy a thorns build.

I haven’t seen anyone mention a spear weapon but I think that is a fun midrange playstyle. (I guess scythe has been mentioned which is in the spear family)

I always like the idea of applying DoT damage (or marking an enemy) and then having an ability that removes all DoT and it does a chunk of damage at once.

I think it’d be interesting to see a rope dart or chain sickle (Kusarigama). Basically a weapon that you could build up momentum and then do big damage or a ranged attack and also have the sickle for close combat.

Classes:
I’m a big fan of monk classes. Whatever your thoughts are on Diablo 3, the monk still had some fun looking abilities. Punching and kicking enemies with this gameplay (that is inspired by fighting games) feels like it’d be a good fit.

Lost Ark, while a very different game, had some neat classes/subclasses. Definitely some cool monk fighting styles but I also enjoyed their card based mage class, the Arcanist.

I think it’d also be interesting to have a pistol or rifle. I know the game takes place in 845 and guns wouldn’t be around for a while, it could still be a cool gameplay of doing damage and then having to reload. That could add to the tactic gameplay going on.

Another class (that might be filed under paladin) are the sword saints from Final Fantasy Tactics. I always thought their abilities looked really cool. Just the idea that a spell wielder can still have a sword seems different.

Can’t wait to dig into the game.

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If you want to undertake a skill-based combat with the game, no skill should be able to single-handedly accomplish a goal. I like to see skill designs to embody these 3 fundamentals: Positioning, Spacing, and Timing always be considered in tandem and various forms. Any skill with an intended design should consist of various ratios of the 3 above. E.g. 50% positioning, 25% spacing, and 25% timing. The goal shouldn’t be just picking some skills and going through the entire game with no changes; you have to swap out your skills periodically, to keep the gameplay fresh and roguelike.

I hope you won’t have to resort to cooldowns by and large; that would be a very shortsighted approach. Stamina is quite potentially the go-to albeit an overlooked mechanic; however, feature it to take on balancing factors on how skills should work interwovenly unisonally. Push the limits of skill-based combat; introduce and utilise stamina-based mechanics intermeshing with the combat mechanics to establish a tactical and well-thought-out perspective. You want to tie the reward mechanic to stem from hand dexterity and split-second decision-making.

I’d expect Magic to have steep accessibility but be powerful. I wouldn’t want to see magic as a replacement for the ranger to be a mere novelty factor. We should feel its unique provocative dynamics and incantation power of it.

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