Trying to think up something I have not seen before...
Eagle Eye
As there will be no map this buff could be used to make the camera pull back and away from your character, high into the sky and show almost a map view of the area around you. But a full 3d top down view of a wide-ish area.
Something like this, but perhaps a little higher
~~~ <()> ~~~
Valor and virtue ride with me, my blade defends the helpless,
my might upholds the weak, my words speak only truth,
my wrath undoes the wicked!
<~ Vaultarn Stormborn ~>
First, if i think about my warrior's feet in EQ1 i will say a buff like spirit of wolf. Simple but convenient, and very usefull in an exploration game.
Lyrina is true, breeze, clarity were classics too, but when i think pleasure to buff someone i will remind always the troubador in EQ2 and the feeling it was in a raid our even a group with casters.
Temporary buffs like "Precision of the maestro" or "jester's cap" were very impressive because you had the feeling you were a true maestro in a concerto and you could change the rythme of a fight.
I know the bard isn't on the way actually but casting or cooldown acceleration is the true drug for casters. The GOAT for me was "upbeat tempo" (AA in high lvl), all casters wanted it cause it was a only one character speed casting buff. You were so fast that it changed all your ways to cast, a totally fresh cycle. I loved to buff my friends with it.
About pleasure of buffing someone remind something else. The possibility to do so even if if you're not in a group with someone. In eq1 i saw many power leveling with that but it may scale to your lvl.
As healer i was always happy to help someone with a little heal or just a little boost of AC or life point to someone during my travel on a road. It's part of social life in a game and you feel free when you do, because you have the choice to do so or not. In response the player in front of you was thankfull and could engage a discuss.
We rarely see this possibility in MMO today (maybe because of pvp i don't know). Less interactions less exchange...
Vaultarn said:Trying to think up something I have not seen before...
Eagle Eye
As there will be no map this buff could be used to make the camera pull back and away from your character, high into the sky and show almost a map view of the area around you. But a full 3d top down view of a wide-ish area.Something like this, but perhaps a little higher
~~~ <()> ~~~
Valor and virtue ride with me, my blade defends the helpless,
my might upholds the weak, my words speak only truth,
my wrath undoes the wicked!
<~ Vaultarn Stormborn ~>
I'll call it "Windwalker" and it would be a combination of a movement speed buff and levitation. If I had to pick just one, that would probably be the most useful in a game with lots of water and exploration on foot.
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Other ideas:
Class/Role specific buffs should be permanent auras that enable when you're grouped, and you don't have to re-cast, but you can toggle. These would be things like STR/STA/CON aura from a warrior, agi/dex/str buff from melee/ranged dps, and wis/int/cha buff from casters. Or something like extra custom skills & abilities you gain on your 'special' hotbar from having each class in a group.
and/or
group special attacks, combo's, or group effects from each role participating in combat in a very short period of time. That is, if the warrior kicks, bashes or taunts, the rogue slices, backstabs, or poisons, the shaman slows an enemy, hastes a group member, or makes their pet attack, all within a few seconds? Then there's a group effect that maybe does somehting like summons ethereal animals to attack all the the curren unmez'd enemies. The effect could either be set by the group leader, or determined by the order & class makeup.
and/or
the relative power of a buff would be indicated by it's duration, and those with a very short duration would be extremely powerful. I'm not really a fan of punitive recast timers, but if those are going to be used, then at least make the spells noteworthy and impressive.
and/or
of course, customizable spells, including buffs, with all that entails, including every aspect of a spell being temporarily or permantly customizable, perhaps based on what Environment you're in. Things like cast time, recast time, range, targets, the actual effect or damage magnitude, consumables, damage type, particle effect type/color, dot ticks or pulses, total duration, all that. With sanity caps to keep things reasonable.
and/or
Similar to the first one above; For rogues (because there's a chance they won't suck horribly, one last time) group poison proc buffs, for warriors group defensive buffs like granting parry, riposte, disarm, dodge as temporary skills to casters who wouldn't normally have them, or to A single party member that wouldn't normally have them. Add melee fire/ice dd or DoT procs from wizards, and interrupt procs from summoners, personal haste procs from crits from enchanters, short duration slow procs from crits from shamans, that type of thing.
That's probably enough for now. :)
A buff which infuses weapons with colored mana where melee attacks gain bonus damage and adds a proc?
I'm thinking along the lines of Ice Fang: + 20 magic damage per hit (bonus vs. fire based enemies) add proc Iceblast.
Or Heightened Awareness: Increase probability of encountering a perception event.
Something with the new mechanics! :D
I'm of a different opinion than many. In the end most standard buffs (health/runspeed/mana regen/whatever) are just going to be factored in as a given for the more challenging content. You don't test raids unbuffed and not expect a buffed team to trounce them.
So I'm not so caught up with those, we'll get what we get.
What I want is a buff for powerleveling. I'm not sure how XP will be given but back in EQ you could load up on damage shields that you could either buff the person you're trying to help get caught up with and let them do their thing. Or you pull a giant pile of low level creatures to beat on yourself then stack your damage shield and let the powerlevelee hit them to gain the experience.
I liked this. Many people have had problems with power leveling and I can agree to a point, but getting a late coming friend caught up is something very valuable to me. So that's something I'd like to see in the game, a way high level characters can really help lower level ones.
I love the ideas posted above. Mana regen is always a favourite of mine being in enchanter, Love my cleric symbols and my shaman buffs.
But what I would really like to see is some sort of charisma boosting or faction raising buff. Does not have to be in the form of an illusion but I know in EverQuest I was able to buff my charisma to make me more charismatic. So I think it would be a neat buff in this game to be able to buff yourself and group to give more charisma or faction. This skill could be really beneficial when travelling to the different communities of Pantheon, could be useful when hunting when needing to speak with an NPC or proceed to the next step of a quest. This could also be a factor when an enchanter is trying to mezz a mob. Maybe they'll find me more alluring if I'm more charismatic :)
