New Race proposal : Planeswalker

[Morrneyo]

http://i.imgur.com/RsI4yQG.jpg

  Code:

Planeswalkers are cloudy-shaped humanoids from other distant dimensions.
Those ancient mankind are use to travel through the number of dimensions,
and watched many things; Birth and death, creation and destruction, and other countless things.

They have close connections with other planes, so they are good at summonings and translocations.
They have learned the secrets of creation, so they are also good at creation and conjurations;
but they didn't understand of current dimension's elements yet, therefore they are not familiar with handle those.
Easily scattering because of their oddly gaseous body, they receive inferior protection from the armor they wear,
and have horrible aptitude for transmutations; and the other way, they are good at evading and hiding instead.

They have quite unstable form in this current dimensions, so they are usually bad warrior; but they can warp others by making contact with their opponents.


Starts with 5 STR/ 9 DEX/ 11 INT, +1 INT every 3 levels, +4 MR/level
30% less hit points than average, 10% more magic points than average

Deformed: Planeswalkers gain only half the base AC from body armor
Slow Metabolism 1: Planeswalkers require less food than usual.
Distorting touch : Planeswalkers' attack have innate 'Warp Weapon' effect. (preserves existing weapon brand)
Slow Healing 1: Planeswalkers heal more slowly than usual.
Damage Reduction : Thanks to their gaseous body, planeswalkers suffer less damage from every source.




Fighting -1
Short Blades -1
Long Blades -2
Axes -2
Maces & Flails -2
Polearms -3
Staves -3
Unarmed Combat 0

Throwing -2
Slings -3
Bows -3
Crossbows -3

Armour -2
Dodging +4
Stealth +4
Shields -1

Fire Magic -2
Ice Magic -2
Air Magic -1
Earth Magic -2
Poison Magic -3

Spellcasting +3
Conjurations +2
Hexes +2
Charms +1
Summoning +3
Necromancy -1
Translocations +4
Transmutations -5

Invocations +1
Evocations -1

Experience -1

Mod edit: removed ridiculously huge image

[chequers]

The non-flat weapon aptitudes is generally frowned upon and I don't see a no reason for it in the design. They could all be -2 except UC.

The aptitudes are somewhat extreme (there is a lot of ±4/5!) and the balance doesn't look too different from Felid. They also seem a little high overall to me.

Warp Weapon invocation is unique but steps a bit on Lugonu's turf, don't you think? Perhaps another brand would be more original, although I think the idea is not particularly interesting in general. It's just a spell you'd presumably cast before every (tough) melee fight, which would make melee-oriented characters more tedious than usual.

I think this species proposal has cool lore, but the implementation you have here wouldn't result in a very interesting or different play experience for players.

[lethediver]

Distorting touch : Planeswalkers' attack have innate 'Warp Weapon' effect. (preserves existing weapon brand)

hasted quick blade of speed + this

xD

[TeshiAlair]

Flat out, I'm not a fan, however I do wonder if a weaponless race with poor ranged apts and good warp-branded UC might be interesting?

[Lasty]

The distinguishing feature of this race, always-on distortion stacking with other brands, is incredibly strong. You'd have to make this species weak in pretty much every other way to balance it. "Reduced damage from every source" is basically just more HP on this monster, but you gave it an HP penalty. What's the goal there?

[WingedEspeon]

Distorting touch : Planeswalkers' attack have innate 'Warp Weapon' effect. (preserves existing weapon brand)

hasted quick blade of speed + this

xD

Quick blades don't have brands.

[Wahaha]

I think permanent distortion would make the game really easy. In the early game it would be hard to die because distortion does bonus damage, and because blink and teleport would probably increase survival. Later in the game distortion is super annoying and bad, but this drawback is "worth" the easier early game.

I would not have fun playing with distortion. I can't give any improvement ideas because distortion is the only notable thing about the race.

"Reduced damage from every source" is basically just more HP on this monster, but you gave it an HP penalty. What's the goal there?

Healing is more effective. But the goal is flavor I guess.

[infinitevox]

I can tell you from playing an Abyssal Knight into extended, the distortion brand is FAR more of a hassle and annoyance in the late game.

Donald showed up in Swamp with a SHIELD OF REFLECTION, 1 hit with my +9 eveningstar of distortion (Thanks Lugh -_-) and he and that wonderful shield disappeared into the abyss.
I entered the abyss on a whim to try and find him. I did, and 1 hit later and he was teleported

So while perma-distort would be really good early game, you really don't want it once you hit Lair.

[Sprucery]

Quick blades don't have brands.

I beg to disagree.

[Tiktacy]

Polarized stats, distortion branded attacks(a brand so powerful that their needs to be a penalty for unequipping it), and a boring mutation set made up of hybridizing other boring mutation sets from other races already in the game.

All I can say is that you should take a look at other race proposals that made it into the game, because this proposal has a lot of issues. Its kind of a mess to say the least, but I'm sure I probably made something like this too a long time ago.

[kuniqs]

What the HELL is with marysue races and horribly unbalanced aptitudes?!?

[Sar]

Quick blades can have brands, however speed is the one brand they can't get, as hasted mindelayed quickblade attack speed is already at maximum attack speed in the game (I guess that means Finesse is worse than Haste for quickblade users).

Donald showed up in Swamp with a SHIELD OF REFLECTION, 1 hit with my +9 eveningstar of distortion (Thanks Lugh -_-) and he and that wonderful shield disappeared into the abyss.

If you really wanted a mediocre shield brand, you could've just corrupted the place and collected your free shield later.

[dynast]

The good thing about lugonu is that you DONT have to use distortion, i really hope one day you guys catch up on that.

[Lacuenta]

Planeswalkers should be unique in the fact that you can port your character to other planes (roguelikes).

[Morrneyo]

What the HELL is with marysue races and horribly unbalanced aptitudes?!?

Seriously? You didn't get it or what?
There was no species with good aptitude with summoning (except deep elves with +1) so I just planned it.

It has quite straightforward concept. Summon some creatures, and Support with other magic.

[Shard1697]

What? If the point is summoning, why does it have features as strong as "distortion always" and "damage reduction"? Those definitely seem like the dominant characteristics of this species. Distortion on everything that doesn't override weapon brand is bonkers strong and a weird gimmick that doesn't exist anywhere else, so of course people are going to focus on that-it's the thing that stands out the most.

Also no one has really good summoning aptitude probably because summoning is really powerful so it's not really needed.

edit: I can tell you what I would actually do as this species if it were included: I would go monk, get a lot of dodging and decent unarmed from +4 and +0 apts respectively, and walk all over the dungeon with distortion branded unarmed attacks. Maybe grab translocations and summoning spells if I came across them, but wouldn't really build around it.

[dynast]

Distortion fisting sounds really awesome, flavorwise.

[RBrandon]

I don't think anyone would say it is a good idea to give a species electrocution unarmed, so I'm not sure why anyone thinks an even stronger brand would be appropriate.

[duvessa]

i mean, vs bite is an actual thing that is in the game

[WingedEspeon]

I don't think anyone would say it is a good idea to give a species electrocution unarmed, so I'm not sure why anyone thinks an even stronger brand would be appropriate.

Electric Fists, Fuck yes!

[Morrneyo]

What? If the point is summoning, why does it have features as strong as "distortion always" and "damage reduction"? Those definitely seem like the dominant characteristics of this species. Distortion on everything that doesn't override weapon brand is bonkers strong and a weird gimmick that doesn't exist anywhere else, so of course people are going to focus on that-it's the thing that stands out the most.

Also no one has really good summoning aptitude probably because summoning is really powerful so it's not really needed.

edit: I can tell you what I would actually do as this species if it were included: I would go monk, get a lot of dodging and decent unarmed from +4 and +0 apts respectively, and walk all over the dungeon with distortion branded unarmed attacks. Maybe grab translocations and summoning spells if I came across them, but wouldn't really build around it.

I thought other unique characteristics seems too powerful when it comes with summoning.
I planned like, 'add one more summon capacity', or 'anti-abjuration aura', but it looks too powerful.
And I was unsuspected that distortion attack was that much strong.
I should think other idea for it later. Maybe... disjunctive attack instead? (possibly blink other away when attack hits)

[Croases]

Maybe... disjunctive attack instead? (possibly blink other away when attack hits)

While it would have some strategic uses, I think that a "melee makes everything blink around like imps" species would probably discourage everyone from ever going into melee with this species (and possibly from playing this species to begin with).

In my experience, even the blinking/teleporting effect of distortion makes it annoying to the point that I'd choose a brandless weapon over distortion for personal convenience.

Seriously? You didn't get it or what?
There was no species with good aptitude with summoning (except deep elves with +1) so I just planned it.

It has quite straightforward concept. Summon some creatures, and Support with other magic.

My understanding of the Crawl design philosophy is that every species should be able to viably run a broad range of "builds", hence why flat aptitudes are appreciated. Even highly "melee-focused" species like minotaurs can pick up minor charms over (or in addition to) heavy armor, while "magic-focused" species like DE still have some fairly good melee aptitudes and can melee competently if you want them to.

If your species is geared towards the "summon things, then cast other things" playstyle to the exclusion of others, then that is a very good reason to shoot down that species. Also, tengu have +2 summoning for all your summoning needs.

[Morrneyo]

My understanding of the Crawl design philosophy is that every species should be able to viably run a broad range of "builds", hence why flat aptitudes are appreciated. Even highly "melee-focused" species like minotaurs can pick up minor charms over (or in addition to) heavy armor, while "magic-focused" species like DE still have some fairly good melee aptitudes and can melee competently if you want them to.

Of course I consider other builds. Planeswalkers could be nice enchanters or assassins thanks to the good aptitudes with stealth and hex, and average short blade skill. They can also be a good conjurers or an air elementalists. (The average aptitude of all species for air magic is -0.923 according to the wiki, so it's quite average)

In that point of view of your species builds, centaurs have the worst species-design of all. they have only good bow skill and fast movements. At least developers should give them a adequate polearm skill to maximize the advantage. Of course most of people think centaurs are quite good enough...

[crate]

The point of flat apts on new species is this: the design space for races that are basically "human with different aptitudes" is filled*. So any new race that gets added to crawl is getting added to crawl because it has some sort of gimmick that makes it very much not a human. If said gimmick is interesting enough to support adding a race, then it is a good idea to not further limit players who want to play that race: if you want to play a slow-but-strong race (naga, please don't argue over my use of "strong" here, it's not important) and use fire magic, you can do that. You could also use weapons, or necromancy, or whatever. This way, there only needs to be one slow race, instead of a slow icy race and a slow fiery race and a slow weapony race, etc.

Designing a race around aptitudes is pretty much definitely going to be a failure (especially since aptitudes really don't matter all that much).

Some of the older races don't fit this as well as they probably should, because Linley wasn't really thinking about aptitudes in this way when he created the races.

*there might be some room for a high-hp race that is aimed at casting spells instead of meleeing things, though probably less so now that gargoyles exist

---

In that point of view of your species builds, centaurs have the worst species-design of all. they have only good bow skill and fast movements.

Actually centaur should just lose its +3 bow apt, put it at +0 (or +1 if you insist, since xbows are already +1 so it doesn't matter if bows are also). Centaur would also be a good candidate for flat apts that are all bad (mostly -1 or -2 for everything) since fast movement and high HP is absurdly strong. But Linley didn't give them those apts and they have not been significantly changed.

---

Anyway this race seems to be mostly "deep elf with disto melee". Disto melee as a species gimmick is imo not very good since despite its strength most players prefer to play crawl without using distortion weapons anyway. It's also something that can be easily replicated by other races by either, you know, actually using a distortion weapon or by using the warp weapon spell.

[Morrneyo]

Anyway this race seems to be mostly "deep elf with disto melee". Disto melee as a species gimmick is imo not very good since despite its strength most players prefer to play crawl without using distortion weapons anyway. It's also something that can be easily replicated by other races by either, you know, actually using a distortion weapon or by using the warp weapon spell.

Yeah, distortion attack seems too irrational anyway... I should have think twice.
I just wanted to think about the nice gimmick of this race. Simple but powerful, like minotaurs. It's really hard.

[Rast]

i mean, vs bite is an actual thing that is in the game

It's because antimagic alone or vamp alone would have been too weak.