Mages.

[LindseyBalboa]

I was bouncing around an idea about mages and subguilds with someone and I wanted to share it. Feel free to dissect, hate, offer criticism, thoughts, etc.

The basic concept is that mages should be less skilled at things because they rely heavily on their magic. They would receive a general malus to stealth, combat skills, and weapon skills along the lines of a sorcerer. I want to note here that the combat skill malus is pretty huge - there's a world of difference between master, advanced, and jman parry, etc. Unmanifested gicks would either have the malus applied at manifestation or creation.

However, depending on the elementalist type, some skills would be boosted to account for synergies when appropriate elemental spells are cast. This wouldn't necessarily do much more than get rid of the malus in some situations, but it's pretty loosely-defined. I don't think they'd have to be tied to combat skills at all either: ex. a fire wizard with a visible fire spell might be better at jewelerymaking, cooking, etc. One of the best features imo of any magical subguilds are those of the touched - mundane skill bonuses tied to elements. Lean into that.

If tied to weapon skills I'd suggest the weapon type be the lower-tier weapon types if that mage class is able to create them magically, as those would be the ones that they'd have more experience and synergy with. If unable to do that, I can't think of a reason they'd get any weapon skill bonus.

Thanks for reading.

[Riev]

Kind of on board, at first viewing. The subguilds for magick was not something I ever agreed with, but since we have it... there needs to be something that makes them slightly less combat effective.

It used to be like
Class - You were born Mario the Plumber, excelling at all things plumbing.
Subclass - You decided to take a few classes as a plumber. You can do the work, and earn some money from it, but you'll never be Mario.

Now, you're still Mario but you can have a Tanuuki Suit or shoot fireballs. Why would you NOT choose that?

[Patuk]

Aren't we just reinventing full class mages here? We used to have a system where their mundane stuff was weaker, and it was a system that worked because mundane subclasses just weren't that good.

[najdorf]

I think Brokkr's new subclasses will solve the issue of mundane vs magicker balance. Rewarding > nerfing.

[dumbstruck]

I think Brokkr's new subclasses will solve the issue of mundane vs magicker balance. Rewarding > nerfing.

Disagree, I'm sort of with Patuk here on this.

Aren't we just reinventing full class mages here? We used to have a system where their mundane stuff was weaker, and it was a system that worked because mundane subclasses just weren't that good.

And? Doing it with the extended version literally is just making it the full class mages aren't always a dead easy give away just because this one maybe has apprentice weapon skills, or this one can make custom clothes (but not custom everything like a real heavy crafting class could). Like. Full guild mages with extended subguild style classes is the best synergy to give balance and not overpower mundanes or leave mages as nothing but mages with like 2 anemic skills aside it while never outshining a mundane at a mundane thing truly.