Armageddon General Discussion Board

I'm seeking feedback from players on what existing regular subguild they would never choose for their characters.

I want to know which of the subguilds listed above is least used/liked. We are looking to do some renovating of subguilds and guilds, which may include additions. Before making any additions or alterations I want to streamline our offerings, so information on what isn't used would be most helpful.

This will be a systematic process. Subguilds are first on the agenda so keeping any comments focused on this area would be helpful.  As I move to other parts of the project I will post additional polls/feedback threads so commentary on those other areas would be best saved till then so that it doesn't get lost in the shuffle.

I never pick archer for some odd reason because the classes I run usually get their abilities anyway so who cares.
Also caravan guide never gets picked.
No real reason.

I'm kinda curious here, can't staff just conjure up a list of characters created the past year or two and watch manually? I kinda wonder if that's not a better metric.

Chose three, but linguist would be the single one I'd never take.  Languages can be picked up during play.  Other skills not so much.  If Linguist allowed someone to choose one or two uncommon languages known (bendune, cavilish, tatlum, literacy, or even heshrak) it would be more useful.  Elf and Dwarf Linguists gain even less.

I also chose clay worker because it's a brutal greb for what amounts to a hobby at sub-guild levels and physician because the level of bandaging and bandage-making skills is pretty insufficient to act as a true medic IMO.

Suck it, Tinkerer.


Seeker

Quote from: Patuk on November 14, 2015, 03:27:41 PM
I'm kinda curious here, can't staff just conjure up a list of characters created the past year or two and watch manually? I kinda wonder if that's not a better metric.

No.  At least, I could go through accounts one at a time and see what people chose. But that's not really a great method, there is no way to cull all this information into a nice spreadsheet. Plus I was hoping for player input here.

It's optional input though, so if you love all the subguilds, having nothing to say about any of the existing ones, or just don't want to comment, that works too.

Oh. Unfortunate.

Quote from: Patuk on November 14, 2015, 03:27:41 PM
I'm kinda curious here, can't staff just conjure up a list of characters created the past year or two and watch manually? I kinda wonder if that's not a better metric.

This poll will allow people to explain their answers.

A lot of guilds are probably never chosen less because they have balance issues, and more because they don't suit most people's playstyles. If you're looking for ways to tweak the subguilds you want to hear about subguilds people would want to play, but don't because of their skill list.

For me, I'm not a fan of any of the crafter subguilds that lack haggle.

Quote from: Patuk on November 14, 2015, 03:27:41 PM
I'm kinda curious here, can't staff just conjure up a list of characters created the past year or two and watch manually? I kinda wonder if that's not a better metric.

That only tells the staff which subguilds haven't been picked yet by various players. Players who only have 3 or 4 characters in the past couple of years, only have had a chance to pick 3 or 4 options so obviously all the other options would've been "not chosen."

It doesn't tell anyone which ones they would intentionally cast aside, it only would indicate which ones they've favored.

There's a few I haven't tried yet simply because I haven't played a character who'd have use for them yet. But I haven't intentionally chosen against them for any reason. Clayworker, rebel, and I can't remember which else were the three I picked.

I was just curious, sheesh. It's not worth having a gdb debate or whatever over.

Quote from: Jihelu on November 14, 2015, 03:09:02 PM
I never pick archer for some odd reason because the classes I run usually get their abilities anyway so who cares.
Also caravan guide never gets picked.
No real reason.

Caravan Guide is useful for warriors, as it gives ride, direction sense and value (for that weight min/maxing). It also gives Bendune for fun.

But I suppose it is kind of weak compared to Nomad, which gives ride, direction sense, haggle, bendune+tribal accent and spear-making.





I would probably never ever take Tinker.

I picked tinker, acrobat, and con artist (I prefer thief)

Probably Tinker. I like linguist though, even if it's currently the least useful one on its own, and wish only it and maybe bard could pick up languages through listening

Make Bard/merchant/linguist the only ones who can pick up languages through words and make it so you have to be taught everything else and they become gucci I guess?

You can't codedly teach languages. They can only be learned through listneing to others speak it. So that won't work, Jihelu.

Quote from: BadSkeelz on November 14, 2015, 04:02:00 PM
You can't codedly teach languages. They can only be learned through listneing to others speak it. So that won't work, Jihelu.

Well with the whole "make' thing I assumed we would add that good jesus code and make that a thing.

Quote from: Beethoven on November 14, 2015, 03:48:52 PM
I picked tinker, acrobat, and con artist (I prefer thief)

we picked the exact sames ones  :o

Acrobat, con artist and general crafter. 

General crafter gives you basket weaving and stone working, not sure why those choices. If You put woodworking and tool making in there, and made all to masters (with no branching) then it would be worth it. I would play that for sure.

Tinker gives tool making, and I think that skill is fun. I wish it came in some other ext-subguild packages.

Cheers

I had more than three choices. Its not a simple question, because different characters lifestyles have different needs, but despite that there are still sub-guilds I would almost never choose, because there are better options out there.

I feel like this question can be better answered if we split it into sub-guild that offer similar sets of skills.

Riding:
Nomad (being regarded the top sub-guild. Due to the fact it offers a mix of utility(riding, direction sense), crafting (haggle, spear-making) and as icing in the cake, language skills.

Caravan Guide- Caravan guide doesn't offer as robust language skills or crafting skills. It lacks a lot compared to nomad, in exchange though it gets value and pilot. Value was okay but the sub-guild can't haggle, and you don't need value skill to get a general weight of things. The problem here is pilot though. Pilot is a skill which should really be something hidden anyone can learn. I mean, how many people have access and trust to use a wagon? How many people routinely risk their life on silt skimmers? If you are willing to risk or take the time to earn the right to do these activity you should learn the skill automatically, instead of having to pick a sub-guild on the off chance you'll someday get to do these things.

Mercenary: This is great. Knife making is better than spear making since poles are hard to get. Still, never felt as great as Nomad. I would trade the repair skill for just about anything else, sure it fits, but it isn't as cool as language skills or any other skill I would much rather be using. Wish they had shield_use so that my rogues had a bit more could live a bit longer on a mount.

Wilderness:
Hunter- Amazing. Skin to make money with, ability to find and then sneak to catch your prey, archery, and arrow making and direction sense. To balance it off though, no riding...ouch

Scavenger- Not bad. You don't get sneak but you do get climb, better forage and the ability to find food, and search for other stuff. Being able to find food and water is sometimes tempting enough to go without ride and more important direction sense, which you should probably have if you are venturing outside. Still I've only taken this once before, and after I found out it had no direction sense, I never took it again. Hunter can skin animals for food, and with direction sense get to places where they might find water after all. Climb skill is better now with rooftops I suppose.

Forester- Kinda neat in the north, makes stuff that spear-makers should be able to do as well. Even in the north though I wouldn't take this over hunter but that is mostly due to preference.  

Rebel- An terrible sub-guild with an outdated name. It has sneak and direction sense but so does hunter. Despite having some crafting skills and armor repair, I would never pick this it.  The crafting skills are okay but other sub-guilds get one or the other with better utility skills like Ride. As mentioned before despite the changes to repair, there is an NPC that can do this with less hassle on my part, so its nice to have but not overly necessary. It really needs another skill like ride, or heck even hide, or maybe just allow it to get advanced sneak in the city and wilderness. Its really lacking in comparison to hunter.

Crafting sub-guilds:

   Armormaker
   Clayworker
   General Crafter
   Jeweler
   Stonecrafter
   Subguild Tailor
   Weaponscrafter
   tinker


All crafting guilds are amazing...with ranger. For classes who aren't ranger like any of the three rogue classes we have in the game, it becomes more of a question of how easily they can get items to use in their craft. Or how much money the items they make cost vs the cost of getting it themselves or buying things themselves. There is also the question that some things sell better and in more places then others.  Not to mention there are other sub-guilds that give a bit more utility along with a crafter skill to make a bit of coins. Crafter guides need to be looked at individually but I feel some could benefit for a tiny bit more utility. Either direction sense to allow them to go and forage the items themselves, and/or haggle, so that they can buy and sell items for a little more coin. Then again haggle doesn't seem to be helping tinker out in the popularity department.  

Linguist and Bard: My only problem with Linguist is that I rather take bard and get a better chance of learning those languages instead. I can't help but feel these two decent sub-guilds should be combined to make one awesome sub-guild.

Thug and thief: Both these sub-guilds are great. Though I'd love to see another roguish sub-guild with city sneak. Always wish thug had sneak, but might be a little insane then.  

Con artist: I wouldn't pick this over thief.

Acrobat: I wouldn't pick this over scavenger.

House servant-  I already said my peace on pilot skill. Listen is alright but its lacking.

Physician- Utility and crafting skills, nice.

Archer- A mix of utility and crafting, but in this case I wish it would pick one or the other in this particular case. Archery is more useful for hunter who has the other skills needed to find, and bring down prey. Bow making is a neat crafting skill I suppose.

Guard- My top pick for most useless sub-guild. Shield_use would be excellent, combined with utility skills that allowed you to actually use it. Most people have NPC guards in the city. Guard is great in the wilderness but so is fast reflexes and rescue (which rangers get). On top of that by picking this sub-guild, you miss out on other utility skills like ride or direction sense skill which you need in the wilderness where your shield and guard skills are most useful. Subdue used to be powerful and deadly but now its really niche too, as in nice to have but not really necessary for any real job function  (in my opinion). Even as a soldier, its usually better to fail subdue and let the NPC's handle it, or just have the person not resist.  Shield_use/Guard with Mercenary would make a legendary sub-guild to rival that of even nomad.

tl;dr

1. Guard.
2. Rebel.
3.Con artist
4. House servant
5. Caravan Guide

Quote from: Dresan on November 14, 2015, 05:58:04 PMThe problem here is pilot though. Pilot is a skill which should really be something hidden anyone can learn. I mean, how many people have access and trust to use a wagon? How many people routinely risk their life on silt skimmers? If you are willing to risk or take the time to earn the right to do these activity you should learn the skill automatically, instead of having to pick a sub-guild on the off chance you'll someday get to do these things.

You can already learn pilot, it's one of those hidden skills anyone can learn just by typing "pilot w" a bunch of times.  And you can raise it high enough to be competent at it, even if you don't have a guild or a subguild that includes it in their list of skills.

So its inclusion in subguilds has always puzzled me a bit.  I assumed there was some hidden reason, or maybe piloting in the desert or on the sea needs a higher skill level than piloting a wagon around Allanak.  That would make sense.

Wow. If that is the case, I might need to bump up caravan guide up to four or three on my list of worse sub-guilds, instead of five. Since it would almost make it completely useless in comparison to taking nomad or mercenary with their much more useful set of skills, on top of ride and direction sense.

Tinker, there's nothing they can offer that a tool-selling npc can't.
I can think of a single non-tool related craft that requires something made by a tinker.

General crafter, crafts generally worthless shit.

Bard, I've played bards. I've never played a bard that needed anything off the bard subguild.

Rebel - Useless with Nomad and Hunter, or Mercenary, for that matter.

Archer - Useless with Hunter around, all the same stuff but less. Non Journeyman+ archery in general is pretty useless, and I doubt Archer goes to advanced. Who knows, never used it.

Con Artist - Useless, doesn't really have enough, and what it has can be found in better subs, much like Rebel and Archer.

Of course this is all biased by my general choice of characters.

This is a little bit of a derail:

However, I really think direction sense should be a hidden skill too. This is mostly because with Redstorm, luirs and morins are now the alternatives to Allanak, and I don't think people should get forced into a select few guilds/subguilds to be able to play effectively in these places.  If people find themselves in the right situations they should eventually learn the skill but in exchange it should be capped right at journeyman. This is not to say sub-guilds like nomad shouldn't still get it, at the much higher level that they do, it is just that once upon a time these sub-guild didn't even get direction sense to begin with.  


Anyways sorry for the derail.

Con artist (no interest in the skills) forester (rarely ever play close enough to the trees) and physician (no interest in making medicine.)

I've tried almost every non-extended subguild if not all of them, and honestly I just pick scavenger now, screw everything else.

I like tinker (I like any crafting subguild) but I understand why its losing. Tools don't make much money, and they're only codedly useful right now for crafters--- most of whom are combat guilds with a crafting subguild. Shovels exist and everything, but they don't appear to be tools, and the only grebbing tool I've ever seen is a limited number object that is occasionally made by Kadius for its own employees.

I've always like the feel of acrobat, as a "you can't catch me even if I'm weak" skillset, ethough I don't know how stats stack up. Though, really, I put it on a ranger and a burglar, which is a bit dumb. The ranger could climb up anything without blinking, fully armed and shielded when he got "led " up cliffs without me having time to react.

I feel like bard don't seem to have much use other than listen and the ability to play instruments. Maybe if it's tweaked some, it'll be good. I remember it used to have instrument making and then it got removed for some reason.

Last I checked you don't actually play instruments or am I crazy?

Tinker + General Crafter.

Quote from: Rhyden on November 15, 2015, 01:02:43 AM
Tinker + General Crafter.

I like that there are crafting subguilds for the less valuable crafts, but I think they should probably have more skills than the higher tier crafting subguilds to make up for it. Tinkers in particular only appear to have three skills, which is tied for the least of any subguild.

Quote from: Jihelu on November 15, 2015, 12:44:41 AM
Last I checked you don't actually play instruments or am I crazy?

If I remember right, you can 'play <instrument>'.

But it's been a while, so I might be wrong.

Anyone can >play <instrument>

Bards can -craft- instruments.

If you were to mix bard, linguist, and house servant into a single subguild, that'd probably garner a lot of interest for players who want to get deep into the socialization aspect of arm.

Quote from: Lizzie on November 15, 2015, 06:31:00 AM
Bards can -craft- instruments.

If you were to mix bard, linguist, and house servant into a single subguild, that'd probably garner a lot of interest for players who want to get deep into the socialization aspect of arm.

I could seriously get behind this.

My three lowest: tinker, con artist, and general crafter.

tinker has nothing really to offer but making tools, which is pointless because tools are primarily useful for crafters - other crafters, and taking it with merchant to have those other crafting talents, is redundant af.

con artist - this one ties with bard, honestly, but since I do less stealth than socializing I just picked it over bard, they're equally as pointless with equally as little to offer.

general crafter - generally useless. other crafting subs at least sort of have the pretense of 'well, this is my profession but I'm no prodigy (no mastercrafting)', but what is the focus of this even? it feels like a patchwork to throw random crafting skills together that you couldn't find another reason to give to a subguild.

Quote from: Lizzie on November 15, 2015, 06:31:00 AM
Bards can -craft- instruments.

This hasn't been the case since at least 2007.

I'd like to see an 'artist' subguild that lets you mastercraft a painting every couple of months or so.

Quote from: RogueGunslinger on November 14, 2015, 07:22:33 PM

Archer - Useless with Hunter around, all the same stuff but less. Non Journeyman+ archery in general is pretty useless, and I doubt Archer goes to advanced. Who knows, never used it.

It goes to advanced.

My least favorite general crafter, acrobat, and linguist I guess.

So kicking, climbing and fleeing, not to mention some awesome RP chances for Acrobat. Despite this, it seems like it could be improved somehow.

Bards, to my understanding, GET NO crafting abilities.
Instrument crafting branches from [figure it out nerds] and you can probably guess what guild gets it.
Hint.
It isn't warrior.

I picked Acrobat, Caravan Guide, and apparently Guard though I meant to do General crafter. Was doing a lot of alt-tabbing.

Regardless, I've PICKED acrobat before because I felt it fit the background of my character at the time, and I don't see how the skills it provided really assisted the gameplay, I could have just kept the background without being an acrobat. Granted, the main guild was warrior, so WORST. PICK. EVER. Most guilds that would need flee, have it. Kick is one of the most underutilized skills (I had a warrior at 50d played and couldn't get past advanced, kicks still got absorbed), and other better subguilds have climb.

Caravan Guide I chose because while it DOES have direction sense, Pilot is almost never used except by a rare few (and in those cases, people don't pilot, the NPC is told where to go), and having a decent assess skill is also useless if you don't have barter. What good is knowing that item's worth is 200 coins if the NPC won't barter you past 30?

General Crafter just... wugh. Dyeing isn't exactly sought after and is applicable only in a few instances, vines and such aren't exactly readily available in 'Nak, and again... blind assess with no haggle. Frankly, other than knowing the 'weight' of something (I have a suspicion that high assess means 'truer' weight of items), I don't even see where the skill is useful.

my reasons are gona be a bit weird sincei havent played every subguild out there.

thief: I see this as a balance issue. Why does the thief subguild start with sleight of hand but pickpocket does not?
Scavenger: I personally think the ability to forage for food should be a bit more broadned out, a few more subguilds or something. I also think scavenger should have Dir sense.
I voted tinker but i was sleepy as heck at the time, i'd actually change my last vote to acrobat.

Mostly for the exact same reasons as riev has said, I'm not sure what to suggest for it, but it definetly needs some overhauling.

Linguist is a good pick for merchants, because if you're a merchant, most other subguilds are pretty irrelevant. The only ones that are of real use would be linguist, physician for brew, or nomad if you're hoping to play a traveling merchant.

I dont particularly like tinkerer because it doesnt tend to make a character well rounded. I can see a ranger having weapons making, because he tends to have a lot of bones and stones that weapons are made out of. I can see 'any guild' jeweler, because it's a cool hobby and it's something someone would apprentice for, but stop due to life happening.

Why would someone learn how to make tools specifically and not go further in this?
I find con artist to be useless. The skills con artists offers are absolutely awesome. But not awesome enough to warrant losing instead of some others. I've played a lot of con artists. I can still be truthful when I say that every single of my elf PCs swindled someone within the first 24 hours played. But none of them were subguilded con artist.

I dont like acrobat, but I dont like kick skill in general. I find it to be absolutely jarring.

I like acrobat better now after picking a class I thought would have flee!

I picked tinker, general crafter, and con artist.

So this is what it looks like to me.

Great subguilds (<1%):
Armormaker
Hunter
Jeweler
Mercenary
Nomad
Scavenger
Tailor
Thug

Good subguilds(<5%):
Archer
Clay Worker
Forester
Guard
Linguist
Physician
Rebel
Thief

Mediocre subguilds that might need some tweaking: (< 10%):
Bard
Caravan Guide
Con Artist

Bad subguilds that should have something done about them (> 10%):
Acrobat
General Crafter
Tinker
   

So I think someone would need to think what makes Thug and Hunter so good but General Crafter, Acrobat, and Tinker so hated.

General crafter and Tinker are so bad they should be considered outliers.

I'm not sure why people like hunter so much. It's good, but has tons of overlap with other subs. Also not sure why people seem to dislike acrobat, probably becuase it has only 3 skills. Maybe it needs something like + to agility. But that's a whole can of worms that likely doesn't need opening.

Jeweler, Tailor and Armorcrafter are obvious. Armorcrafting takes forever to branch on merchants and is amazing on a ranger. The other 2 are the big money-makers as far as crafting goes.

I think hunter is popular not only for the wilderness abilities but also because it offers a decent amount of skinning and direction sense. Also, it offers like 5 skills that might have SOME overlap but not for all characters. I'd imagine its a decent sub for a magicker that wants to be self-sufficient and not a scavenger.

Caravan Guide is that high up there?  Really?  It's got 3 solid skills and a language.

Quote from: Marauder Moe on November 15, 2015, 07:02:14 PM
Caravan Guide is that high up there?  Really?  It's got 3 solid skills and a language.

Borderline, it was like 5.5% when I sorted them out.

Quote from: Riev on November 15, 2015, 11:11:23 AM
I picked Acrobat, Caravan Guide, and apparently Guard though I meant to do General crafter. Was doing a lot of alt-tabbing.

Regardless, I've PICKED acrobat before because I felt it fit the background of my character at the time, and I don't see how the skills it provided really assisted the gameplay, I could have just kept the background without being an acrobat. Granted, the main guild was warrior, so WORST. PICK. EVER. Most guilds that would need flee, have it. Kick is one of the most underutilized skills (I had a warrior at 50d played and couldn't get past advanced, kicks still got absorbed), and other better subguilds have climb.

Better sub guilds? Does any other sub guild apart from scavenger have climb?

Quote from: solera on November 16, 2015, 01:56:37 AM
Better sub guilds? Does any other sub guild apart from scavenger have climb?

Acrobat.

Edit: Which technically answers solera's question. Far as I know, Acrobat and Scavenger are the only two with climb.

What I'm hearing so far is that certain subguilds are limited in their application but they contain a couple of key skills that aren't found elsewhere like climb and toolmaking.  Seems like adding these skills to different subguilds might help here.  Are there any other skills which are limited in availability that people strongly feel should be included in one (or more) subguilds?

Mostly climb, for me. I'd go so far as to say climb should be like cooking. Everyone should get it with a low cap that can be raised by guild or subguild choice.

More access to the search skill would be cool, though it seems to be a very underutilized skill. I think only one guild even has access to it.

I feel that all subguilds should have at least one crafting skill, capped low (as in - novice or apprentice) if it's not an actual crafting subguild. This, in addition to cooking. In this way, no matter which main guild you play, you will have something to "do" during downtime or when you're just flat-out in the mood to spam-craft something (admit it - everyone enjoys mindless spam-crafting at least once every so often). Toolmaking, featherworking, dyeing, claywork, anything that gives everyone a shot at making any of half a dozen things of little "NPC merchant" value but that PCs might occasionally have use for.

Quote from: Adhira on November 16, 2015, 11:49:46 AM
What I'm hearing so far is that certain subguilds are limited in their application but they contain a couple of key skills that aren't found elsewhere like climb and toolmaking.  Seems like adding these skills to different subguilds might help here.  Are there any other skills which are limited in availability that people strongly feel should be included in one (or more) subguilds?

Listen, Search, and Pilot, maybe.

Tool Making being thrown under General Crafter and doing away with Tinker all together would probably make sense.

Do away with Archer and give Bow Making to the Hunter Subguild as something they branch eventually. (Let rangers branch it eventually too for that matter. Archers can't master Archery yet Rangers can but Archers can make bows and rangers can't? Wut?)

Combine Acrobat and Bard into "Entertainer Subguild", or something similar.

Take Knife Making away from the Mercenary Subguild. Replace it with Guard and Rescue. Because in reality...that's what Mercenaries in game use....not Knife Making.

Combine Thief and Con Artist into their own Subguild. (Rogue might cover this already. But make this a less talented version of Rogue. The sub-guild version instead of the extended version, so to speak.)

Take Kick away from Thug and replace it with Bash. Bash seems a lot more "Thugy" than "Kick". When you think Kick do you think Jayne Cobb or Jackie Chan? When you think Bash do you think Jackie Chan or Jayne Cobb? Just makes more sense to me.

Give Hunter and Outdoorsman (or maybe just Outdoorsman) Wilderness Quit.

We might as well just get rid of subguilds altogether and automate it.

Give everyone a certain amount of CGP.
Say 10 + your 3 you built up + your karma. If you take karma class then it's not available for the subguild of course.

Be able to add skills/abilities for certain costs.

Mercenary: Direction sense 3, enhanced ride 2, knifemaking 4, alcohol resist 1 or however the prices are set.

Prices for indoor/outdoor hide sneak etc would have to be set reasonably.

Also automate skill bumps so people can start playing what they want sooner.

Alot of the flavor subguilds are acceptable because they have skills that don't really harm you if they fail.

However, there are many subguilds where a skill failure equals failure of objective and draws immediate consequence.  Sneak, climb, and all stealth skills in general immediately end play on skill failure.  Some skills are only useful if they function flawlessly, so sneak, steal, palm, slip, peer and climb all have this core dysfunction and shouldn't be considered useful when capped at low levels, only flavorful.  Some other subguilds, such as Thug, are still useful because their skills make them simply better at what players generally do, so they are strictly bonuses.  Direction sense, forage, and pilot are also skills that can soak up extended fails during play so long as the player has some caution.

Hide is one example of a stealth skill that could be useful at low levels, but is strangely absent.

Some other subguilds have skills that simply don't mesh well and cause more work for the player.  Rebel is a good example, as it has spearmaking, but no ability to make the poles it needs for its craft, and I can't even remember if General Crafter has dyemaking.  However, General Crafter's main flaw is that its main skills do not make much money, and are superseded by other objects in the game that are lighter (making them easier to carry) and much cheaper.

Tinker is absolutely abysmal because almost all of its skills require some other skill to make its components.

Archer gets a pass because people can generally forage for branches.

I personally think that some of the more obscure crafting subguilds should get a smattering of crafting skills capped at low levels, just enough to do materials processing. Three or four skills per subguild just doesn't work in some cases.

I think maybe five subguilds could be collapsed into two or three just based on crafting skills alone.  Forester and Stonecrafter could soak up the Tinker skills, and then you could split up basketweaving and dyemaking between them.  The primary caveat here is you would need to break up the standard of three to four skills per subguild just a little.  Many of these skills are just not that useful on their own.

I would like to see skills that simply don't exist anywhere else, such as axemaking or clubmaking, thrown into some subguilds. Axemaking in woodcutter and clubmaking in...scavenger?

Acrobat should take reduced fall damage. Those guys have learned how to fall.

Quote from: AdamBlue on November 16, 2015, 07:15:32 PM
Acrobat should take reduced fall damage. Those guys have learned how to fall.

I would like acrobat to have advanced climb and j/m throw. A basic subguild with throw would be boss.

Quote from: Inks on November 16, 2015, 07:26:10 PM

Quote from: AdamBlue on November 16, 2015, 07:15:32 PM
Acrobat should take reduced fall damage. Those guys have learned how to fall.

I would like acrobat to have advanced climb and j/m throw. A basic subguild with throw would be boss.

This would def be cool.

One last thing and then I will stop spamming this thread. Please give any guild with spearmaking the ability to make poles. I mean it.

I agree with almost every point in here except that I find caravan guide to be indispensable for concepts of dune traders born in a city. I loved that PC, and yes, even if it lacks a skill or two that nomads get, it was a really versatile concept for roleplay, whereas being tribal and having tribal-accented sirihish is socially limiting. It gets value as well, for that travelled, city-knowledge RP.

Con artist is crap, and I voted for it; many other main guilds have one skill that overlap with it anyway.

I voted for physician because I feel it exists mainly for bandage and brew, since bandagemaking is only really good for extra coin and handouts. It frustrates me that physicians can't forage for food, which are very useful medicinally... [ic info] Foraging food without any boost to the forage skill itself would feel fair and appropriate.

Rebel < Hunter as caravan guide < Nomad. Give rebel 'throw' at a low skill cap, I say,  since they can make spears and knives, and enjoy "guerilla" combat... it only makes sense. Then again, if you roll up an assassin rebel or warrior rebel you'll be able to throw anyway (so it's not game-breaking), but having it pre-branched as a warrior isn't too shabby and it'd go well with a pickpocket.

Here are what I think are the important categories:

1. Does it give direction sense?
(hunter, rebel, forester, nomad, mercenary, caravan guide)

2. Does it give you ride?
(nomad, mercenary, caravan guide)

3. Does it give you dual city/wilderness sneak/hide?
(hunter, rebel, thief)

4. Does it give some new combat abilities?
(hunter, archer, thug, acrobat, guard)

5. Does it give you some new manipulation abilities?
(hunter, con artist, bard, thief, physician, guard[I'm counting subdue], forester)

6. Does it give you listen?
(bard, servant)

7. Does it give you a character quirk?
(linguist, nomad, caravan guide)

8. Can you make mad cash with it?
(anything that gets good haggle or that can craft... but at the end of the day everyone at least gets forage and cooking).

9. Does it give you climb?
(acrobat, scavenger...?)

The subguilds that appear multiple times above (especially at higher skill levels) are the good ones.

I play mostly outdoorsey characters.

I choose tinker
Guard
and Con-artist.



I would state that you'd see a more variety of sub-guilds chosen if climb wasn't such a factor.  I feel everyone should have climb, if even capped low, so you have some ability to get out of the silly hole you found yourself in.
As well make more incline to play other classes.

As well, If stealth wasn't so environment base you wouldn't see so many assassin/hunter ranger/thief combo's.  I'd love too take more crafting sub-guilds. Ranger/rebel was a blast when I played one, but I always feel ham-strung by the fact that stealth works in only one environment. 

I know there serious balance issues to consider with stealth indoor/outdoor, but gosh I'd love not having the dilemma every time I roll up a ranger or city stealth character.

Ideally, I feel it be nice to pick and choose sub-guild skills at a whim, for more variety.
I'd drop steal/sleight of hand for city stealth and a craft skill for a ranger. Or get Sub-due.

Again balance issues, ranger/thief is a pretty dangerous combo as well as assassin/hunter.  I'd hate to see these sub-guilds go but as well I wouldn't mind feeling obligated to choose them and would be more inclined to the variety of the other offerings.

Give acrobat 'ride', because they're very good at keeping their balance.

Quote from: Marauder Moe on November 15, 2015, 07:02:14 PM
Caravan Guide is that high up there?  Really?  It's got 3 solid skills and a language.

Every time I've taken Caravan guide in hopes of piloting a skimmer, because merchants don't have storm navigation or the ability to fend off the nasties that lurk in the sea.

I dunno, Adhira.  What do you think?

I would be very happy if thief and rogue got climb to make them perfect 'rinth dwellers.

Like Dalmeth said, low-capped hide would be useful while at the same time making scan actually matter for something other than rat-hunting.

Quote from: FantasyWriter on November 17, 2015, 06:28:56 AM

Quote from: Marauder Moe on November 15, 2015, 07:02:14 PM
Caravan Guide is that high up there?  Really?  It's got 3 solid skills and a language.

Every time I've taken Caravan guide in hopes of piloting a skimmer, because merchants don't have storm navigation or the ability to fend off the nasties that lurk in the sea.

Thats why you hire those ten krathis to fight them off.

Quote from: Dalmeth on November 17, 2015, 12:31:57 PM
I dunno, Adhira.  What do you think?

Lots of things!!

More seriously there's some good information here, and it's definitely being considered. Right now I'm up to about 5 pages of various notes and re-orgs with the subguilds.

Nothing is decided but I'm thinking that Tinker is definitely going to go the way of the dodo.  The comment on hide being absent is a good one and we should definitely be looking at where that will be most appropriate.

Guard subguild would be better with low-capped parry, so you didn't need three karma or a special application to unlock parry for the classes that eventually branch it. Linguist should get cavilish and bendune, maybe even heshrak (bards too, for that matter). It would be nice if a subguild got city track. I'd say it'd be nice if thug got hide, but that might be going too far. If cutpurse doesn't get it, though, that I think would be acceptable. Maybe a subguild could get pick-making, like tinker.

If tinker got journeyman pick-making that would make them useful  and wanted.

I approve.

I think most of the subguilds should be scrapped or totally revamped.

A lot of the subguild skills are useless because of their low cap levels.  Skills like hide, sneak, steal, scan, climb, sap, bandage, skinning, and tanning are all too costly and too dangerous to rely on at low levels.  So, they're fine to add a little bit of color to your character, but you pick them at the cost of not picking another subguild.

Some subguild skills are fun, but so completely situational as to be nearly useless.  I'm looking at you, linguist and bard.  Language is a fun element of this game, but it's very, very underused.

Combat skills like kick, sap, and shield use (and the combat ESGs) are also pretty bad because unless your character has other combat skills, then those things are just going to get your character hurt.  That's not TOO bad, but most of the subguilds with combat skills offer redundant choices for combat characters.  A warrior takes thug for sap, but the subdue, kick and flee are wasted.  A ranger could gain three skills by picking thug, but a ranger/assassin/burglar/pickpocket has no reason EVER to pick acrobat... they should always pick thug.

The only really useful subguild skills are: direction sense, forage food, and crafting skills.  The first two are pretty universal.  Crafting skills... let's just say that some let you churn obsidian from thin air, while others require a lot of effort to be useful.  The gap is so wide that it's absurd.

I've suggested it before, but I really wish we could just go to a deeper class system, and ditch all of the subguild/ESG nonsense.

Languages would be worth more if they couldn't be learned at random

I'm always in the mood for additional subguilds. Like four new commoner subguilds for in-city survival, and four more for half-crafting, half-hunting/grebbing people. A new subguild of some sort with forage food in it would be wonderful, especially if it had knifemaking or some such. Forage food is so limited. I don't think it should be common, but your options for getting it are narrow.

What I want to see is the guy who buys a bone, makes a sword out of it, tracks a chalton in the morning through a blustering sandstorm, kills it and ends up being a magicker three days later.

Stuff like that.

Quote from: Old Kank on November 19, 2015, 04:55:57 PM
I think most of the subguilds should be scrapped or totally revamped.

A lot of the subguild skills are useless because of their low cap levels.  Skills like hide, sneak, steal, scan, climb, sap, bandage, skinning, and tanning are all too costly and too dangerous to rely on at low levels.  So, they're fine to add a little bit of color to your character, but you pick them at the cost of not picking another subguild.

Some subguild skills are fun, but so completely situational as to be nearly useless.  I'm looking at you, linguist and bard.  Language is a fun element of this game, but it's very, very underused.

Combat skills like kick, sap, and shield use (and the combat ESGs) are also pretty bad because unless your character has other combat skills, then those things are just going to get your character hurt.  That's not TOO bad, but most of the subguilds with combat skills offer redundant choices for combat characters.  A warrior takes thug for sap, but the subdue, kick and flee are wasted.  A ranger could gain three skills by picking thug, but a ranger/assassin/burglar/pickpocket has no reason EVER to pick acrobat... they should always pick thug.

The only really useful subguild skills are: direction sense, forage food, and crafting skills.  The first two are pretty universal.  Crafting skills... let's just say that some let you churn obsidian from thin air, while others require a lot of effort to be useful.  The gap is so wide that it's absurd.

I've suggested it before, but I really wish we could just go to a deeper class system, and ditch all of the subguild/ESG nonsense.

I have to disagree slightly with this on one point.  I don't see any priority in placing useful skills in subguilds, I just want to see skills that work.  There are a lot of subguilds that either need additional skills to be useful, or the skills are capped too low to ever be reliable.

I have no problems with the flavor subguilds, those can stay.

General crafter and tinker seemed kind of pointless to me, and honestly, I've met like one PC ever who could reliably bandage without potentially murdering their target.

I'm sorry, but bandaging something is just not that hard or dangerous. You shouldn't hurt someone so much or so often on failures.

So, based on that, physician. I would never, ever pick physician, and if one was near me with a bandage at hand I'd immediately flee the vicinity before they could attempt to strangle me to death by failing their attempt and somehow wrapping it too tight around my neck and EEEEEEEEEAAARGNOOOOO... gack...

The body of In Dreams lies here, because bandage failed again.

Also, languages. Languages would be a much bigger deal if every PC didn't have the Way anyway.

Was that PC a ranger? Were they in the byn at any point?

Access to sparring + cloth = capped bandaging reasonably quickly.

I hate all the crafting subguilds, because mastercrafting stuff is so much more interesting. The large piles of coin a couple of these can give you are great, but there are other ways to making money. The actual crafts just aren't good enough compared to NPC store bought stuff to pick crafting subguilds. The new mastercrafting subguilds are another story.

A lot of skills just don't have much "screen time". They're usefulness is very limited, and I would only ever pick them if nothing gave me an alternative. Climb is one of those skills.
A handful of skills will be seeing use nearly every time you log in. Direction sense is a key one, with the types I'm playing.

So I never pick most subguilds. The skills most give you have alternatives, or I just don't use the skills enough.
I play a ton of warriors, and I pick the same subguilds everytime. Grebber is the number one top slot. Nomad/Guide are about the same to me, just depends on concept. For Celves scavenger is my go to. Hunter for half-elves.

Thanks for the feedback so far. Rathustra and I are going to be spending some time this weekend working on subguilds and the commentary here has been of great help.  If you have any other thoughts please add them!

Once we get subguilds knocked out I'll be coming back to you with some thoughts on guilds, which I think is going to require a lot more work/discussion and input.

I do want to mention that this isn't a singular process. There may be changes implemented, then we'll seek more feedback and review, and look to see what else needs adjusting.

Hi,

First, I really like how this thread is going, both player-side and staff-side.  The whole 'balance' thing is a tough issue, and it's good to chew on it a bit together.

I voted for linguist, and here's some reasoning:

I love the idea, but I found it was a bit limiting -- you only get a few very common languages.  Granted how the language acquisition code works in Arm, we can all just acquire those languages through time (unlike coded skills).  Moreover, as someone else suggested above, granted that we can just use the Way to overcome language barriers, there's not much room for playing a 'translator' PC.

Suggestions:

o Perhaps toss on a few more languages, e.g., bendune, cavillish, and of course kentu :D.[1]

o Speaking out of ignorance of the code (i.e., maybe this is the case already), but perhaps make it easier for linguists to pick up new languages / accents.

o Give linguists the 'listen' skill!

Only barely related:

As someone that loves the lore and history of Armageddon, what if there were a subguild associated with that?  I'm not sure how this would be implemented, but here's a sketch of the idea.  You wouldn't have very many hard skills, but you'd be able to tap into some of the lore or history, I guess by asking staff, or perhaps you'd get access to a few of the books that have been written (random, say up to three a RL month or something).  (Of course, you wouldn't have the capacity to read those books, but you'd have acquired the knowledge that is contained in them via scholarship, whatever that means in Zalanthas, or via folk tales.   Oooo, you could also 'mastercraft' a book to be added to the 'lore' catalogue.  That'd be neat.  Moar Loar.)  My favourite times in Arm have really been when other PCs have explained the history and lore of an object or area, and I'd love to see more of that.  


[1] I'm only half joking on kentu.  Set aside that I've had a PC try to learn it IG, it'd be kind of cool to have a 'new' (or 'old') language floating around that linguists spread.  For instance, a linguist could start with the gamut of regular languages and one 'weird' language, e.g., kentu.  They could then teach it to PCs, and other PCs would pick it up, and suddenly we'd have, through time, a few PCs out there speaking this really strange new language.  It doesn't have to be kentu, it could just be some obscure desert language.  I'd be curious how long the language survives inside the game.

An extended subguild with master kentu and a little bit of elvish would be pretty neat. Also add a regular subguild with journeyman kentu. I think it would be realistic of there were more subguilds with varying levels of fluency in sirihish, elvish and dwarvish.

Do the extended subguilds count?

Because from reading through the descriptions on the website, and having played an actual sorcerer, the sorcerer subguilds seem really, really, really.... lacking.

Like really. They sorta went from one extreme to the bottom of the other.

But, I think I saw somewhere that it is being worked on already - if so, great! I think they need it.

One of the absolute best things about playing a sorcerer, that I really enjoyed, was the creative approach you could take to problem-solving. The way you could combine various skills and magical abilities together to create a variety of scenarios and solutions to whatever challenge came up was attractive to me. The subguilds do not seem to offer remotely that level of flexibility. Note that flexibility doesn't mean power - there's still a lot of steps you'd need to take, and some clever creativity you'd need to be capable of.

While I agree that it would be nice if linguists got more than two languages...why kentu? Why not give them the language of a race that's actually in the game as npcs and can be spoken to during many violent physical encounters?

MY VOTE IS HERSHRAK (http://armageddon.org/help/view/Heshrak)

Another merc subguild with apprentice heshrak, guard, ride, and direction sense?

Quote from: LauraMars on November 20, 2015, 01:19:14 PM
While I agree that it would be nice if linguists got more than two languages...why kentu? Why not give them the language of a race that's actually in the game as npcs and can be spoken to during many violent physical encounters?

MY VOTE IS HERSHRAK (http://armageddon.org/help/view/Heshrak)

Seconded. Why would anyone outside of Sath scribes know kentu?

Give me literacy and starting Tatlum so I can be a library raider fam.


Nah jk give northern linguists Anyar and southern ones Heshrak or Bendune.

Quote from: Adhira on November 20, 2015, 11:25:58 AM
Thanks for the feedback so far. Rathustra and I are going to be spending some time this weekend working on subguilds and the commentary here has been of great help.  If you have any other thoughts please add them!

Once we get subguilds knocked out I'll be coming back to you with some thoughts on guilds, which I think is going to require a lot more work/discussion and input.

I do want to mention that this isn't a singular process. There may be changes implemented, then we'll seek more feedback and review, and look to see what else needs adjusting.

Yessssssssss, I can't wait for main-guild discussions. Coming to a consensus on the stealth classes is going to be a tough one. We're probably just talking re-arrangement though, and I think some guilds could use entirely new skills.

Ohh! I really look forward to this, especially if it means getting sub-guild access to some skills we've never seen before, like hide and maybe lower level parry.

I would personally would love to see sub-guilds be made more useful no matter who you take them with, for example:

Rebel:
Not comforming to rules of society, rebels are skilled at avoiding detection and moving both in city and out. Whether they have a cause is of no importance to the populace, thus they often find themselves at odds with people or groups, because of this they are good at defending themselves with a shield.

(advanced) Shield use, both city and wilderness sneak/hide (mid-journeyman) and direction sense(journeyman).

Yeah I know it might be a little strong (okay pretty damn strong), but its only because it would be useful to almost any class that takes it. From warriors to rogues to mages would benefit from it, even rangers would get something out of it.  Especially if they ever make sneak/hide fail less and require scan to actually see even at low levels.

Reading this now, I tend to think it might be a better system to have people choose multiple, overlapping subguilds rather than  just one, specific subguild.  Think of a subguild tree system where selecting armor mender branches into armorcrafter, but one can still select spearman to get a bonus to piercing and the spearmaking skill.

Also, might I suggest that players be allowed to spend 1 cgp two months after a character's creation to bump skills below advanced?  Seems fair enough to me.

Not to get too far off topic, but I liked nauta's idea about a lore subguild.

Quote from: nauta on November 20, 2015, 12:08:15 PM
As someone that loves the lore and history of Armageddon, what if there were a subguild associated with that?  I'm not sure how this would be implemented, but here's a sketch of the idea.  You wouldn't have very many hard skills, but you'd be able to tap into some of the lore or history, I guess by asking staff, or perhaps you'd get access to a few of the books that have been written (random, say up to three a RL month or something).

What about if every IG game year a new piece of lore was added to your bios?


> bio
1. 2015/09/01 Initial background
2. 2015/10/01 Overheard at a Storytellers' Circle: the Dragon's Library


It would require some code to check what lore (and what variations of it) were in your bio already.  But I think some of our game's creative writers (including players) could be asked to write in some very cool, open-ended bits of lore.

The best lore is going to be the stuff that hints at something in-game, albeit in vague terms.

Rath and I are picturing a House Servant that is pretty good and staying unnoticed... they manage to hide and listen in to all kinds of conversations about the Estate...

Quote from: Adhira on November 21, 2015, 05:53:22 PM
Rath and I are picturing a House Servant that is pretty good and staying unnoticed... they manage to hide and listen in to all kinds of conversations about the Estate...

Sounds more like a Snoop, because I could see this being applied all over the place, also being a de facto pick for every single cElf that doesn't pick up these skills in their primary guild.

Is this a good thing, or a bad thing?

Quote from: whitt on November 21, 2015, 06:31:52 PM

Quote from: Adhira on November 21, 2015, 05:53:22 PM
Rath and I are picturing a House Servant that is pretty good and staying unnoticed... they manage to hide and listen in to all kinds of conversations about the Estate...

Sounds more like a Snoop, because I could see this being applied all over the place, also being a de facto pick for every single cElf that doesn't pick up these skills in their primary guild.

(http://i.imgur.com/ny5IYST.gif)

I kinda like the house servant idea. Since cooking and making flower memento crafting seemed kinda weak, though to be honest I've never tried it or...seen it at all in all the years I've played so I don't even know if there a market for that. I think pilot should just remain a hidden skill for anyone who has access to wagons to learn. Listen, sneak, hide are great skills...and it would be awesome if cooking started journeyman already and went into mid advanced.

Just trying to think of the guilds who would most benefit from this:

Rangers: This would be a solid sub-guild choice, but what isn't a great choice on rangers
Warriors: it would be great on them, particularly on elven and rinthi warrior but no direction sense and ride is pretty brutal other on most warriors, in my opinion at least especially with the current events of the game(though I have a little gut feeling might be addressed at some point).  
Merchants: Wouldn't be a bad choice either.
Mages: Good choice for one that never want to leave the city, otherwise a tough choice.
Sneak classes: Would benefit less though there is one exception

I guess how good it is comes down to the level of sneak and hide. I feel that currently sneak and hide are not really worth relying on unless you have it at advanced or mastered, and not because of scan or listen either, but because it still fails quite a bit. This is going a bit beyond this thread if sneak and hide didn't fail at all at low levels, and even apprentice level sneak/hide was good enough to sneak around people without scan/listen (or perhaps really high wisdom) then it would be an awesome sub-guild. Not to mention add to the feeling that characters can be useful from the start.

Overall though, it would be a solid sub-guild without it actually being overpowered. It might benefit from a slightly more interesting crafting skill added to it but otherwise it looks pretty solid.  

Quote from: Rathustra on November 21, 2015, 06:47:29 PM
(http://i.imgur.com/ny5IYST.gif)

Touche' sir.  Touche'.

Quote from: Adhira on November 21, 2015, 06:40:02 PM
Is this a good thing, or a bad thing?

I love the idea.  Should have been more clear that a general name like "Snoop" (sans the Dog) makes it have a broader application than just being a servant of a Merchant/Noble House.  Kind of like the predecessor to Spy.

The idea is sound, but the names just aren't quite there. Like a c-elf would be a "House Servant" in the first place.

Though having hide/sneak in a subguild would not be a terrible idea. And it would give the non-Ranger scan classes in the game a fighting chance.

I wish it could just be like "Subguild Shadow: sneak, hide, listen, climb" and the idea is more of "being someone's shadow or being a shadow on the wall, this person is at home being unnoticed" etc etc