"passive" skills

[Char]

for the skillsystem, i have to decide which skills are counted as "passive" and which are not.
a word to why i use this differenciation: i thought it was a bit dumb if just ANY barbarian would use battle orders and shout at at least level 10 because it does effectively not cost anything (about 2.66% of the skillpoints you receive until getting level 90). passive skills are more expensive at low levels, but turn out to be cheaper for very high levels (25 and higher).
some skills do NOT count as passive skills, although one might think they should, for example the barbarian weapon masteries. noone will invest in more than one (or maybe 2) masteries anyways, so theres not the risk of the "abuse" because of low cost for low levels. auras dont count as passive either. on the other hand, skills like manashield and thunderstorm count as passives because they are effectively passive (once cast, they last for LONG.

here is a list of the skills considered passive. additions? comments?

Amazon
Critical Strike
Dodge
Avoid
Penetrate
Evade
Pierce

Sorceress
Warmth
Thunder Storm
Energy Shield
Fire Mastery
Lightning Mastery
Cold Mastery

Necromancer
Skeleton Mastery
Golem Mastery
Summon Resist

Paladin
Prayer (modified, passive now)
Cleansing (modified, passive now)
Meditation (modified, passive, will be changed to sth i dont know yet)
Holy Shield

Barbarian
Shout
Iron Skin
Increased Speed
Battle Orders
Natural Resistance
(Increased Stamina doesnt exist any longer)

Druid
Wearwolf
Shape Shifting
Wearbear

Asassin
Claw Mastery
Weapon Block
Blade Shield

[VonHundengebissen]

Looks good...very good... (comment )

(addition )

what do you mean with passiv now by the paladinskills? Pasiv in the Diablo vanilla style ?(you don't need to choose ?)
You have said that the masteries (Barb) are not pasiv, but is' n it a good idea to make it passiv? If the Barb want really be a master of one weapon he can skill it very high(30+), or he save the points for activ skills. (hope you understand)
Why Holy Shield ?
The Druids looks very good.

PS: I have forgotten to tell that i although love th weardruid
(->betatest)

[deathfiend]

Y only some cries are passive, they all (except for the "find" ones and grim totem) have the same process. Prayer is passive? Does that mean its always on healing you? Does it still take mana? And if meditation is the same, isn't it just a better form of warmth now? And cleansing a worse form of natural resist?

[Char]

some cries are passive cause you use them once and you have the effect for a long time (other than war cry, taunt, ....).
yes, prayer lets you regenerate some life all the time. i have not decided if it will cost mana yet though. maybe, but only a small amount, while it will heal you quite fast (considering that it is passive).
cleansing is not a bad version of natural resist. it reduces curse durations and such stuff.

EDIT: forgotten ... like i said i still have to work out what meditation will do. it will quite for sure not make you regenerate mana points, unless i un-passive it again. not sure what it will do. ideas?

[deathfiend]

I dont like meditation as a passive, unless you change it some how. Prayer costing mana would suck, since you can't turn it off. EX: You need just a little more mana to kill meph with fist of the heavens when BAM your prayer kicks in, draining some of your mana, and delaying the fist of the heavens. If prayer is free though, then you get free life regen, which i actually like, some racial identity. Are the assasin bos/fade/venom gonna be considered passive? And your right, cleansing wont be a bad version of natural resist, it will be a bad version of fade.

[Char]

And your right, cleansing wont be a bad version of natural resist, it will be a bad version of fade.

no it still wont, it will be unique. no other skill is capable of decreasing curse length.

your point about manacost for prayer is good. probably it wont cost any mana. but if it will, it will only reduce your mana regeneration a little bit, you wont be able to see that.

the asassin BOS / fade / venom wont be passive. you can only use one of them at a time anyways.

[deathfiend]

your point about manacost for prayer is good. probably it wont cost any mana. but if it will, it will only reduce your mana regeneration a little bit, you wont be able to see that.

Then whats the point of any mana cost at all?

And your right about only using one assasin modifier (bos,fade etc.) making it passive wouldn't make sense.

[Char]

hmm. yes fade does also reduce curse length, just seen. but its not passive, so theres the difference. cleansing also reduces poison length. whatever, i didnt like the undertone of your statement.

its still a difference if the healing costs mana or not. normally, for a prayer you'd have to concentrate, and the only thing that would represent the need for concentration at least a bit is mana. your mana wouldnt recover slower if you were at full health though.

[deathfiend]

Having were forms count as passive sounds kinda harsh... when i looked at your site it looked like it was hard to get passive skills to high levels, and werewolf and werebear are essential to druid builds.

[Rattlecage]

What about Werewolf? If it's passive, does that mean that my druid will always be a wolf? If that's true, what if I put points into Werewolf and Werebear? Will I get a druid that lifts its leg to pee and steals pick-a-nick baskets?

[Char]

no, of course they arent actually passive. they just COUNT as passive for the skillsystem skill cost calculations.

[VonHundengebissen]

can you use elemental skills in wearform ?

[Ssergit]

Good call on the Bos, Fade, Venom skills. Since you are restricted to using only one of them at a time, that's a big enough 'penalty' for lack of a better word.

I think it's a shame that the Paladin has so many nice passive skill potential--it would be so tempting, for example, to turn Salvation and Vigor into passives as well... Just a thought for the day Your mod is quite inspiring!

[Char]

vigor passive == increased speed
salvation passive == natural resist

i dont really want to get a barbarian clone.

you wont be able to use elemental skills in wereform, or is there a good reason why you should be?

[deathfiend]

I think there should be one form for casting and one for fighting. For the sake of argument, lets say the werewolf is casting, werebear fighting. The werewolf would get faster cast rate, and a boost to spellpower. The werebear would do mostly what it does now, only it could use some of the werewolf only spells now that it doesn't need them.

[Rattlecage]

I'm not sure if I like that idea exactly the way it is now. I liked how werewolf dealt less damage and was faster whereas werebear dealt more damage and was slower. Neway, you could have werewolf able to use the druid's fireskills, and the werebear able to use cold skills or something along those lines.

[Char]

deathfiend: i dont need a werewolf for casting, the non-shapeshifted druid can do that, and i want to keep the three builds caster / wolf / bear.

the question also is what the different builds will do against physical immunes. i mean, main weapon = physical. physical damage. second weapon slot: ideally a multielemental damage weapon, but those are extremely rare, so one element here. makes two. wolves / grizzly: physical damage. . rabies / fists of fire: third elemental. then you need a rouge or iron wolf to get a fourth elemental. possible, but hard. solution: undo shapeshift and use arctic blast. other possibility would be to allow some casts to be done while shapeshifted, but i dont really want to do that.

druid has a hard time with immunes, more than other characters... perhaps i should make one of the summons deal elemental damage? negative side effect: heart of wolverine doesnt work on that... better ideas?

[deathfiend]

Perhaps make Spirit of Barbs (No one uses it ) add elemental damage to attacks?

[Rattlecage]

That sounds like a good idea. For party play you could have 3 druids, one with Oak Sage, one with Heart of Wolverine, and one with the new spriit. You could make it rainbow colored.

[noir]

the asassin BOS / fade / venom wont be passive. you can only use one of them at a time anyways.

That's one of the things I never liked. Venom is only useful to very specialized chars (ranger sassy), fade is mostly used by trapsins (who don't need bos). I'd really like to see those skills reworked, but we were going to discuss asn skills anyway IMO sassy and pally are the only classes w/o good passives.

[deathfiend]

WBlock and CM are both good passives. And remember... passives are harder to get to high levels, so be glad that there aren't too many of the for sin.

[Char]

hmm actually passives are harder to get to low levels.... in high levels, they are cheaper. you can get one single active skill to lvl 46... or one single passive skill to lvl 51 (both idiotic of course).
passive skills are more expensive for levels 2-17 and less expensive for levels 19+.... that is, if i dont rework that AGAIN.
i am thinking about making passive skills take no bonus at all from +allskills and maybe +skilltab items. not sure yet though, and i am not sure if that is possible. its not possible in the beta for sure.

[deathfiend]

But because of diminsing returns it is pointles to get them to too high of a level. Might I suggest switching the passive and active skill systems, meaning active are hard at begining and easy at end. That way, passives start getting hard when you don't need to put points into them anymore, and active benefit from getting them to high levels anyway, so theres a double benefit. Of course, I'm sure you have a reason for the current system... just trying to put my thought out there

[Char]

no, you may not.
well, yes, you may, but i wont. you told the points why i wont yourself. double benefit for active skills. BAD. if they benefit a lot, it has to be expensive. and passive skills less effective at high levels -> they need to be less expensive. besides, your idea "passive skills are less useful at high levels" is just wrong. the diminishing returns formulas can be changed, too, and things like sword mastery dont have diminishing returns.

[deathfiend]

When you put it that way, your system seams even better. Can't wait for the mod , Oh, and I didn't know you could edit diminishing returns formulae, although its obvious to me now...