Spiritual Guidance: A new look

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

4-12-2010 @ 1:30AM

Valithe said...

To me, the word priest poorly defines our class. I can't really see the cathedral in Stormwind to embrace the shadow side of our class. Instead the priest class is one that embraces contradictions. It has both holy and shadow or mind and body. The class is more ying and yang rather than just the narrow idea of the holy light which is what Paladins are all about.

If the Paladin embraces the holy light, then the Warlock class embraces demonic shadows. And Priests are caught in between. So no wonder we're ill defined. But instead of seeing this as a bad thing, why not embrace it? There are already abilities available that tries to combine both healing and dps. For example, we have vampiric embrace where as a shadow priest we can heal our raid group when we do dps. We also have holy nova where we do damage but also heal our group. Problem is these skills doesn't define us because it's not powerful enough and if it is we'll be accused of being OP. But if the spell is modified, couldn't it work?

Let's take Vampiric embrace, right now it heals everyone for very little and it's insignificant. What if we make it so that we can target one person, and when we do dps, that damage is funneled into that target? Would it be OP? Well it depends on the player. If the player isn't doing enough dps then he won't be healing enough, but wouldn't it be more useful than what we have now?

How about Holy Nova? The idea is there. A skill that do damage and heal as well, but how many of would use holy nova except to kill off small annoying swarms? It's not used because it's not strong enough to be used.

I think the idea of embracing contradictions would be an interesting direction for priests. Like if everytime our shield takes damage, we get sp buffs. Or maybe even like in Dragon Age there's the Spiritual Warrior class, where there's a spell that makes spirit equal strength. That could make us a bit similar to the new Monk class in Diablo 3. A fragile warrior. Isn't that another contradiction?

4-12-2010 @ 4:01AM

Twaxie said...

I so agree with the fragile warrior thing as well. Imagine a class that worked as a holy priest does, but he shifts stance to a warrior-type, using his discipline, and control over light and dark/life and death/etc to bolster his own physical body. It could use a lot of similar spellpower type abilities still, but translate it into a fist-fighting monk.

In FACT: in Final Fantasy, don't the monks/white monks get a move called Chakra?

It almost sounds like this is where they're going with it... Inner Fire, Pain Suppression, Discipline in general, sounds so much like a holy monk class. I would looove to see this kind of thing implemented here.

4-12-2010 @ 5:29AM

ZeroDesu said...

The FF "Chakra" move you're referring to is indeed a Monk ability in the Tactics series. It uses the Monk's inner spiritual strength to send out waves of healing energy to (all?) nearby allies, restoring a portion of their HP and MP. It's actually a very useful move, as it's a quick and minor heal for those life-or-death situations, but not very useful for a replacement for a White Mage...

And yes, it isn't priesty at all. Look up how Chakra is used in current media. Naruto, Avatar: The Last Airbender... It's not something a Priest would realistically have anything to do with...

4-16-2010 @ 7:11PM

Twaxie said...

Yep, it's all adjacent allies, and it also cures status ailments.

I mean, it can be said that it's a 'spiritual' thing, and therefore works with their 'spirituality'... though I think that there probably should be some flavor changes to the abilities since a lot of it doesn't seem to make sense anymore. Why would a human priest infect someone with devouring plague, for example? Why would an undead priest even have any chakra to use (considering the traditional version of the term).

I kinda like where they go with some of the moves, like "heal". You can do whatever you want with that, it just says "heal". There's no lore confusion... it heals, so it's called heal. Or the Power Words... that can make sense in a lot of contexts. Holy Fire, Smite, all of these are so generic that they can be attributed to any meaning you want...

But Chakra and Devouring Plague, specifically... Maybe instead of Chakra, you could use something more generic (as it is the priest style) like Life Force, or something to do with the soul. OR you could have each race's priest have their own flavor text, which would also be awesome. :p

I still like the idea of the holy monk class... though I think they feel they have that covered with a 'combat rogue with fist weapons'.

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