Developers Corner

Here are some of my own custom classes. 

***  Fire Dancer. 

She is a dancer and who also has pyrokinesis (fire magic).  She fights using a combination of moves from kung-fu, gymnastic, and ballet.  In the heat of battle, she may be completely engulfed in flames.  The fire is a manifestation of her psychic chi (mana). 

***  Silk Ice Princess. 

She knows Kung Fu and her weapon of choice is the Chinese sword (Jian).  Her fighting style is a graceful martial art dance.  Think Xianghua from Soul Calibur.  In addition, her chi comes out in the form of ice magic.  Some abilities includes ice projectile and frozen palm. 

***  Storm Archer.

She is an expert of range weapons, including pistols, machine guns, and the bow.  She can also harness the element of wind and lightning using her psychic chi. 

I do dance, meditation, kung fu, and ice skating.  And from these sports is where I draw my inspiration for my custom classes.  I just though you people might have some fun reading this. 
 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soul_Caliber

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jian

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xianghua

Originally posted by ironore
Wouldn't it just be great if a game had such a wide variety of skills that a player could work towards any combination of magic abilities, acrobatic and stylistic fighting moves, ect. to create totally unique classes right from the imagination just as you have described.  That would indeed be something.

This is really what we need to see in a game.    Awesome ideas.

Systems can be developed using equal and opposite techniques for good/evil charachter archetypes and a model where abilities fit into the equal and opposite model.

Abilities charachterised as:

All Charachters start or are created with a prefered ability area N/S/E or W

• good/evil --- alignment abilities
• compass of abilities which oppose North Mage/South Warrior
  • North abilities increas mana focus and reduce edged blunt weapon skill
  • and South would do the opposite
  • East abilities stealthed (Close)
  • West abilities ranged (Ranged)

consider the abilities to sit wityhin a compass a ability in the NW quadrant may be a fireball ...MAge Ranged or a Fire Arrow or WN Ranger type skill  arrow with magical fire. The combinations are endless

• faction abilities
• renown abilities --- God given

equal/opposite or compass abilities earnt solely through use some of these may be chained and level dependant so a thourough investigation of low level activities or lack of may me unobtained abilities --- Abilities earnt through Actions

faction/alignment/renown abilities earnt through quests type mechanism

Abilities increase through use and decrease through lack of use.decrease is capped based on the mastery level of the ability or via a mentor direct learning

• 0-50% ability - Tertiary acheived easily through use fast progress never degrades
• 51-75% ability - Secondary acheived easily through use if selected as a main ability dependent on level
• 75-100% ability - Primary acheived through use of items and regular use of skill

 When leveling all ability % knowledge scales to level / level is based on combinations of abilities and their baseline statistics.

Body is based on a set of base stats which effect the avatar as is seen on screen, Health Mana Endurance to give a feel

Levels are required to generate points used to modify baseline stats (Body) and points used to allow for the effect of equal and opposites to be negated.which make it easier to use combinations of opposed abilities for example fighter against Mage if you take traditional fantasy.

This type of system removes the need for class balancing as a charachter is what he is or in context made of his actions.

I have a design for equal and opposites which would eventually acheive what the OP posts.