I don't think they cut for time issues as much as game play issues. I'm not saying everything is peachy and they aren't pressed for time.. just that on this decision; some of the classes had redundancy imo.

Originally posted by FireHead

I don't think they cut for time issues as much as game play issues. I'm not saying everything is peachy and they aren't pressed for time.. just that on this decision; some of the classes had redundancy imo.

Then why did the remove the one that the official forum polls show to be more popular, and keep the less popular Herald? If they are almost the same style, you get rid of the less popular one and merge some of its skills and abilities with the more popular one. That would have been the more intelligent move at least.

Originally posted by Paragus1

 

 

That's exactly what I was thinking.  I was surprised to see the Lich go and the Herald stay, but we don;t know too much about the Herald yet I guess.

They combined the two classes since they are so similar.  So one could guess that you could specialize down the lich or demon side of things or combo.   As for the scion of set, don't know why they cut that one. I would love to see the assassin pick up more of the healing from the scion side of things.  I like playing the rogue/healer class myself.

A rogue with healing abilities . *shiver* 

Let's hope the devs give the SoS' poison abilities to the rogue and leave the healing to the priests. In fact it was my interpretation that the SoS and the Priest of Mitra where suppose to be the “main healers” with the Druid and Shamie being secondary healers. Hopefully everyone’s heals will be bumped up so that the entire AoC population isn’t spamming /LF PoM ONLY

Originally posted by Baikal

 

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Originally posted by TedDanson
GG Funcom for actually having detailed class overviews for these two just a few months ago...

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A few months ago?

You mean 1 year for Scion of Set and 11 months for Lich? I guess if that's how you define a few...

/shrug

I think the bottom line for it meant that Funcom deduced that they were not fun to play, and merging some of those skills with other classes made them worthwile and enjoyable. In the end that's a good thing, but when you remember they originally had 26 classes, you realize how ambitious that really was...and how impossible it would be!

Cutting content is never a good sign....I'm still going to give the game a shot though because I think it deserves it.

Am i being a tard cus i don't see this as a bad thing? (it's rhetorical don't bother answering).

I frankly think it’s good that they made the tough decision to do this. It means they’re willing to make the tough calls to make sure the game plays well. Now we have 3 specialties per archetype each with a unique set of powers. Of course the timing could have been a little better I’ll grant everyone that – I’m kinda surprised that they didn’t come to this conclusion earlier. But none the less, by stripping these two classes out they even up all the archetypes and set themselves up for a future release with ‘new’ classes.

Hell, everything they do before release is OK by me as long as it improves the game. Let the speculation on why and how and when and whatever run rampant but the bottom line is Funcom did what they thought was in the best interest of their customers.

Originally posted by iflost

A rogue with healing abilities . *shiver* 

 

From PnP DnD to many online MMO's ... minstrel, bard etc. 

This announcement is not a bad thing.  Both of the classes are redundant and would be difficult to make very different from other announced classes.  I'd have had a hard time to chose between a Herald of Xotli and a Lich because they are so similar.

Originally posted by TedDanson

GG Funcom

Excuse my lack of internat savy, but what does 'GG' stand for?

Originally posted by Terminus-Est

 

Originally posted by TedDanson

GG Funcom

 

Excuse my lack of internat savy, but what does 'GG' stand for?

"Good game", typically uttered after a map of a FPS has ended, people say "GG" to each other if the map was fun (or even if it was a lopsided slaughter...).

"Good going", typically used sarcastically, as a way of saying "Gee, thanks for smacking in the face and telling me to like it."

In this instance, I believe "GG Funcom" is a sarcastic response to the issue of the two classes being removed, kinda like an internet "golfclap".

Yup. This was bound to happen.

Next thing to get scrapped -> Spellweaving

Originally posted by Lobotomist

Yup. This was bound to happen.

Next thing to get scrapped -> Spellweaving

Loosing those two classes I can live with. Loosing spellweaving on the other hand would be very bad. That's one of the major features of the game. Let's hope it's in.

im terribly sorry for these two classes getting thrown away like a worn out cape, i think they both had some good points in these 2 classes..

ah well, we still have shape-shifting menace, herald of xotli which seems really interesting char and im most likely one of those persons that will definetely try that class.. i wasnt that keen on lich but im sure there still was persons looking for exactly THIS class, i feel sorry for the really

and for the priets, we will still have them but not the scion of set.. that char sounded important class for this game too

maybe lich and scion of set will get in the game later on.. like in some kind of patch or something... who knows...

Only delusional fans can attempt to justify feature removal as only a positive matter, a prime example of which is displayed by some here.

I wonder if there will be more announcements or tacit acknowledgements of things that will not make release, of course with the usual promises of there implementation after release.

Ho hum.. I kind of fancied being a lich - it was a wonderfully gruesome kind of class, that to me set AoC apart from other MMOs more than other classes. But there you go... tis the nature of things

By the same token Polarization, there's no need to be snarky about it, and call people delusional. We all know it's the nature of the industry - features are cut, nothing is set in stone, and some features will make it in after launch, and some will never make it in. This happens with all MMO's, admittedly some more than others. FC's marketing guys probably could've handled it better but I don't find cuts, even at this time all that surprising. And I suspect that the cuts were made a long time ago since there's never been any detailed description of these classes and no videos.

They were probably only ever fleshed out in designs, and were possibly considered stretch goals - ie, ''if we have the time we'll implement them''. Therefore, they'd probably put them on hold a while ago (and it would be unwise to give a detailed acccount of these classes, or categorically stage that they were in or not'' until theydecided to definitely cut them.). It's how it goes.

More important is whether the combat is fun, mounted combat works, the quests are in the main enjoyable and meaningful, crafting is also meaningful, and the end game gives it longevity.

I am of course hoping spell-weaving makes it into the game - even if it didn't I couldn't see them not implementing it in a critical patch.

So? 

More classes is not better.  I would rather have six amazingly well developed classes with multiple options for each class to explore and many, many abilities for each class to use, than 12 classes with half the abilities.  Or 20 with a third. 

After taking a deeper look to classes I think this is a good think. Why? cause before almost all casters were "melee focused" with transformations, disciple and lich were almost the same but one in demonic form, and the other, undead form.

If you take a look now this will give classes more variety and deeper skills, so if you choose the necromancer you will get this one and the lich skills, more fun in this class, the same as storm of set (whatever its called).

So dont think the problem is they need to cut down classes to finish the game; seriously, sometimes I think some people is a bit "paranoic" and think that they doing nothing when, before the delay to change combat system, the game got already some info, do you think they did nothing in all this time..? there is lot of money on it and Im pretty sure that they are working hard, the problem is, perhaps, that the NDA dont permits to see how much work they already done.

The whole idea that these two classes were cut due to TIME and MONEY doesn't make sense.   Why would they be talking about cutting them for 9months-1 year?  That seems like they knew a while ago they had problems with those classes.   Most likely making them fun to play or possibly making their play style mechanicly work within the parameters of the game.  Maybe its easier to cut two classes then  to rework the game play??  I think that makes a lot more sense.   I certainly can see how those who don't wish to think logicaly about the WHOLE of the situation could come to a totaly baseless theory like this, but none the less it's absolutely nothing but speculation.

It looks like many people didn' t actually read the articles...

Most of the features from the Lich were merged into the Necromancer, and the features from the Scion of Set and Stormcaller merged into the Tempest of Set.

If you wanted to play a Lich before, just play a Necromancer now. It always seemed a bit silly to have both in the game anyway. Also the Lich looked kind of like a pig-man so I didn't really see the appeal there at all. Kinda glad that class is gone.

I don't think this is cutting features due to money/time I think this is acknowledging that an implemented feature was poorly planned, which I think is good when companies realize this.