Nice ideas. Especially about using the WSE to balance better, like lighter shields. They could make the 1-2 skill shields lighter but less appealing to true sword & boarders (reduce speed?..kinda unintuitive but the idea is to allow 2 handers to be protected and not be overly weighed down, while not making them OP for 1 handers)
Another thing is to me if you apply all your damage from range you should get some kind of balancing to reflect that safety, like being a glass cannon. Even archers/crossbowmen can be quite heavily armoured and have the same HP as everyone else.
I was also thinking that it would be more "PVP" to encourage archers to priorities other archers / horses rather than melee fighters, by making their damage type unique for low armoured characters and making sure all range guys have low armour. Maybe chain or higher will do significantly less damage than leather/cloth and ensure range character will use that armour type. Also make the stagger or interrupt they do when they do damage based on the amount of damage they deal. ATM it seems as long as you hit someone they get the interrupt for the same length no matter the damage.
I'm also not sure about ladders. Where you place ladders can have a nice impact on a map and make people play it a bit differently. But they do make it so much easier for people to play safely like they're sniping in some FPS game. Maybe make it so you can't damage them? But then you will get griefing. I have a feeling just removing them is the easiest option but then the maps may be played the same way each time. They are very 1 dimensional atm and only used for archers to get into safe areas.
Personally I don't want a game without all the character types, ranged adds to the depth a bit imo and makes you approach situations differently to how you would if it was pure melee. But it feels a bit too "snipey" without the archers having to sacrifice much for their damage, either by putting themselves at risk or being encouraged to play strategically
Thanks, finally someone answered.
I don't know how much the following idea would go against the principle of cRPG for free character development, but how about changing the character skill system in the following way:
Next to strength and agility you get three more attributes, I will just call them Blue Blood (BB), Hawk Eye (HE) and Heavy Grunt (HG).
Now let's watch the skills (the numbers in the brackets show the relation between the skills and the corresponding attribute)
Agility skills are:
- athletics (1/4)
- riding (1/4)
- shield (1/4)
- horse archery (1/4)
- weapon master (1/4)
Strength skills are:
- Iron Flesh (1/4)
- Power Strike (1/4)
- Power Draw (1/4)
- Power Throw (1/4)
As you see, except of the relation of the needed skills nothing changes here.
Next to this you have the choice of unlocking ONE of the following skill trees:
Blue Blood
- Dressage Riding (1/3) [Riding Skill]
- Jousting (1/3) [Weapon Master]
- Melee training (1/3) [Power Strike]
- Defense (1/3) [Shield Skill]
Hawk Eye
- Strong Back (1/3) [Power Draw]
- Strong Shoulders (1/3) [Power Throw]
- Marksman (1/3)[Weapon Master]
Heavy Grunt
- Strong Right Arm (1/2) [Power Strike]
- Strong Feet (1/3) [Athletics]
- Strong Body (1/2) [Ironflesh]
- Strong Left Arm (1/2) [Shield Skill]
- Experienced Warrior (1/3) [Weapon Master]
As you can see some skills have received different names, but remain actually the same. Concerning the attributes all new attributes count as "Strength".
Technically it's easy:
The skills ingame remain the same. Only the skill screen on your character page gets some kind of "mask", and you can only change your skills via this mask.
Same skills and attributes get added. This means someone with Strength 6, Heavy Grunt 9, Iron Flesh 2 and Strong Body 4 has 15 stregth ingame (important for weapon difficulties) and Iron Flesh 6.
The Idea behind this is to limit the access to skills you class doesn't need really, and also balancing the different amounts of skills some classes need to work properly.
This is an example, of course, and please don't hang yourself up on some values, it's just an example to show how it could be made with making the skill system more complicated.
The only thing I think that could be more complicated is making the difficulty values for different weapons. E.g. a Flameberge could have difficulty 18 concerning "Heavy Grunt" points or difficulty 9 concerning "Strength" points. Or, for example, 1 Strength and 15 HG, 2 strength and 12 HG and so on. You get it? You have to waste your valuable class attribute points for strength to use weapons your class is not meant to have.
For example an axe could have Heavy Grunt difficulty 12, Hawk Eye difficulty 15 and strength difficulty 9.
Something like that. I already discovered a few flaws, but it's just a suggestion for thinking into a direction.
Poll