Hexblade Class?

[DrakeD77a]

Here is a idea for a update. Bring in the Hexblade from D&D 3.5 in. The Hexblade is a close combat fighter with limited spellcasting ability, mostly using it to debuff or lower stats of his enemies. This ability is through "curses" or "hexes" and at higher levels gets a aura of unluck which gives enemies miss chances against him because they caught bad luck. Luck is a central theme in their backgroud. Supposely they are such unlucky people they had t learn how to make that bad luck affect their enemies instead of them. They lose the fighter feats for this limited ability but i think its a cool idea.


I would think this would wed nicely into current ddo animation abilities since it is not asking for much more in the way of animation besides normal casting rites or something, because most of the affects are invisable just affecting the luck of the enemy. balancing those hard fights.

[licho]

Here is a idea for a update. Bring in the Hexblade from D&D 3.5 in. The Hexblade is a close combat fighter with limited spellcasting ability, mostly using it to debuff or lower stats of his enemies. This ability is through "curses" or "hexes" and at higher levels gets a aura of unluck which gives enemies miss chances against him because they caught bad luck. Luck is a central theme in their backgroud. Supposely they are such unlucky people they had t learn how to make that bad luck affect their enemies instead of them. They lose the fighter feats for this limited ability but i think its a cool idea.

/Signed

Even more than druid* i would like to see some gish class, combining limited casting with melee.
Bards are cool, but i wish something more selfinsh than buff all around.
Artificers are cool but they are rather ranged by default.

Im seeing place for either Hexblade or Duskblade or Warblade (seeing ToB stances would be cool) or Psionics.

* The reason why i prefer another melee than Duid is since D is another caster with single class feature more powerful than whole other class, and i suppose Turbine will make any new class pay for, so to sell it they need to balance casting and nocasters.

[Talias006]

I like this idea, but will only /sign to it if they come after or alongside Druids.

I would also like to see Psionics, both the system and Psionicist/Psychic Warrior.

(I loved Dark Sun because of the Psionics found there.)

[DrakeD77a]

Also another balanced idea for a melee specialty is the Marshal. The marshal is a military commander whose abilities are focused on leading others into battle and inspiring them to victory. They project auras that grant a variety of bonuses to nearby allies based on the marshal's Charisma. A Charisma based fighter that is more of a support fighter than the hard charger.

[Phidius]

Let's wait and see what they do to Tenser's first - if fixing a single spell to make it attractive to melee casters is this hard, though, I seriously doubt they'd devote an entire class to it.

Your best bet is to use the existing classes/races to try to reproduce the flavor of a Hexblade, and just ignore the min/maxers who label you "Gimp".

[DrakeD77a]

I can understand that for tensers but Hexblade is a completely different flavor than a caster who can melee, its a Melee who has a couple of aces and doesnt play fair. a Hexblade is closer to a rogue than it is to any true caster.

[Seager52]

I want Warmage, so I can have all good damaging spells (Firewall, Blade Barrier, Comet Fall, Fireball, Implosion, etc) basically all evocation spells. And on top of that you get some weapon profincies and spell points like a sorc and you would end up with i think about 6 spells per spell lvl, if i remember the list correctly. And include the thing were you can pick one spell every two lvls.....so reconstruct? WF?

That wont be overpowered right?.....guys?.....come on.....it will be fine........trust me....

/end sarcasm

[DrakeD77a]

How would Hexblade be over powered? Hexblades have a few drawbacks like that they are secondary string fighters who have limited improvement of fighter skills and they definitely cant cast all that much. The balancing point is the enemy gets in bad shape when cursed. I believe its on par with what we have now anyways. Any other ideas about it?

[Jay203]

sorry, i'd rather they finish up all the PrEs first

[RenigadeWolf]

Personally, I enjoy the idea of a Hexblade, BUT, make it a specific debuffing class. most MMOs have one (normally the 'Rogue' type) but in DDO we do not. imagine with a Hexblade -1 to all saves on a crit, or Shatter-mantle on any weapon, perhaps even Fort lowering abilities (or make the 3 PrEs Melee-focused debuffs (fort ect) Caster-focused debuffs (saves, SR, ect) and Healing-focused debuffs (miss chance, less damage done by target, ect)) and give them that role. I feel it would fit well. (make their abilities useful enough that they are worth giving up a DPS slot many times.)
but yes, current workings are certainly more of a concern.

[Angelus_dead]

I would think this would wed nicely into current ddo animation abilities since it is not asking for much more in the way of animation besides normal casting rites or something

Hexblade would be a technically simple thing to add, but by the same token it would hardly improve the game to have it there.

They'd have to do a lot of work on extras to bring Hexblade up to par, and that would take time away from important projects like Warchanter, Spellsinger, Virtuoso, Radiant Servant, Warpriest, Exorcist, Divine Avenger, Angel of Vengeance, Purple Dragon Knight, Ravager, Slayer, Knight of the Chalice, Hunter of the Dead, Battle Engineer, TBD ARTI SPEC2, TBD ARTI SPEC3, Acolyte of the Skin, Mechanic, Acrobat, Deedwood Sniper, and Henshin Mystic.

Did I miss any? Yes I absolutely did, but you get the point: the devs have no time to mess around with new classes when the existing ones aren't done yet.

[DrakeD77a]

I can get that they need to work on what they have, and doing this would take time any which fashion just to arrange enhancements and prestiges. But i dont accept that all those other class prestiges needing means that they cant have new ideas for classes brought up, cause isnt Artificer a new class itself.

[BlackSteel]

Did I miss any? Yes I absolutely did, but you get the point: the devs have no time to mess around with new classes when the existing ones aren't done yet.

+1

I'm irritated that we got another new class with yet another unfinished PrE. Having a blast so far with the arti, but it really does drive me nuts that we only got battle engineer 1

[Symar-FangofLloth]

Personally, I enjoy the idea of a Hexblade, BUT, make it a specific debuffing class. most MMOs have one (normally the 'Rogue' type) but in DDO we do not. imagine with a Hexblade -1 to all saves on a crit, or Shatter-mantle on any weapon, perhaps even Fort lowering abilities (or make the 3 PrEs Melee-focused debuffs (fort ect) Caster-focused debuffs (saves, SR, ect) and Healing-focused debuffs (miss chance, less damage done by target, ect)) and give them that role. I feel it would fit well. (make their abilities useful enough that they are worth giving up a DPS slot many times.)
but yes, current workings are certainly more of a concern.

Debuffs exist, but are rarely used because:
Trash dies so fast its almost not worth it
Bosses tend to be immune to nearly everything other than raw damage.

So making a class, or PrE, based on debuffs would require them to work on bosses for anyone to bother.

[DrakeD77a]

True, i was thinking on that and it could still work since very few things in paper pen version is immune to luck stuff, though some can get saves on some of its stuff. And it would give the class a firm place in any raid party or party just to be able to debuff a boss.

[Angelus_dead]

So making a class, or PrE, based on debuffs would require them to work on bosses for anyone to bother.

The developers could certainly figure out a way for the class to apply the debuffs super-fast, such as an automatic aura around you, or from every melee attack you make.

But then they'd reach another problem: Debuffs which are applied very easily have about the same result as if you had simply buffed the party members for the same amount. So that would mean having a Hexblade with you is sort of like having a Bard: it makes everyone else seem stronger than normal. And that's trouble. Adding another class with another category of stacking buffs means that the combined buffs are so strong that they push monster interactions completely off the die.

Either the monsters are too strong for groups with no buff-class members, or they're too weak for groups with 2-3 characters from different buff classes.

[DrakeD77a]

Thats sounds like a cope out, that problem has always been about when you dont balance your party. My wiz and pally two man party make it. It just adds another dimension to me.

[Grenada]

More classes is always better. (as long as they come loaded with lots of finished PrEs for the other classes too in the same update)

[Aashrym]

More classes is always better.

Tell that to anyone who want to have the completionist feat when at some point there is no additional functionality in adding another class beyond flavor. At some point we need to ask ourselves how many classes we really need to have.

[Deanarth]

Im seeing place for either Hexblade or Duskblade or Warblade (seeing ToB stances would be cool) or Psionics.

No Warblades. Ever.