Custom class : Arcanist

By rugal, in Descent: Journeys in the Dark

The second of my creations : Reworked totally :

So, basically, it could be called the "surge master".

Arcanist-full.png

Magical tome : Nothing impressive, but sometimes can deal real big attack and free a hand so can buy a shield.

Surge battery : each time you attack, you can charge this skill (as long as you do not performed a miss including lack of range) so you can reuse it latter.

Overmind : With surge battery, and/or mana weave, you are assured to have a maximum of surges, but you cannot recover surge from attack, so think wisely !

Overpower : The double surge spend is awesome and with Chain lightning, you can hear the Overlord chattering teeth

Swap : the good option to move over monster, puzzling the overlord's monster placement.

Call back : can save the day sometimes. It may look like strong, but 2xp, an action and a fatigue to this is clearly a situationnal skill

Magical bomb : Beware to not be back fired by this one ! But with some kobolds, it can be funny fireworks.

Pulsing magic : to be simple, if you attack deals damage to the monster, you can reduce them to move the target. A good option to free some blocked paths.

Chain lightening : This is the master skill of the Arcanist. It takes me absurd time to finally find that solution.

Omniscient : With this skill, you can keep a not so impressive weapon and do some neat impressive damages with it as long as your friends have greats surges on their weapons !

Edited by rugal

A very interesting class, however, I think that this class need a little bit more attention and balancing. Also, I'd like to make some suggestions regarding the wording of some skills. Since the tokens can be at 4 different locations (supply, hero sheet, monster and skill card), it is in my opinion sometimes a bit unclear from where I am supposed to discard a charge token.

1) Focus: maybe "Action: put two Charge Tokens on your hero sheet".
2) Focus: are you sure you want to give this hero the opportunity to get an additional red dice right from a starting skill? This seems to be extremely overpowered. I fear he would have Akt2 damage in Akt1 and Akt3 damage in Akt2.
Also: which attacks can be empowered with a red dice? Only standard attacks or also skill-attacks which say: perform an attack... I think it is the former, right?

3) Absorption: Typo: Recover 2 fatigue instead of 'recovers'. Also maybe 'Each time the Overlord draws the last card from his overlord deck, gain 1 Charge token' would suffice? Anyhow, you might want to drop the last half completely. If won't trigger very often. (I'm sure this is intended, but this may lead to situations where the mage player forgets about this skill, because it is used so rarely. Not optimal imo)

4) Empowering: I the hero gets 2 charge tokens at once, can he move 2 spaces?

5) Force Shield: Maybe like this: 'Exhaust this card when you are attacked, after rolling dice. Roll a brown defense die and add the results to your defense pool. If you discard a charge token, roll a gray defense die instead'. It is still quite a gamble to get a gray die for 1 fatigue + 1 charge token. Maybe too weak?

6) Halo: Am I supposed to take the charge token from the supply or from my hero sheet? If it is from the hero sheet, 2 fatigue + 1 charge token seems a bit expensive. But the skill is strong. I'm not sure

7) Wave Magic, 2nd part: 'When exhausting this card, you may discard 1 Charge token. If you do you may instead convert up to 3 hearts to 3 range or up to 3 range to 3 hearts.

8) Chain Magic: Pew, this is a bit messy. I get it, you basically want some sort of 'chain lightning/forked lightning' skill, similar to the skills in some computer games. But I think it must be more clear which of the figures are targeted and which are only affected by the attack. It is important for some items. I don't know of a better wording though. Maybe it would also be easier to go either for a forked (1 -> x) or a chain (1->1->1->...) style attack. Also: if you go for the the chain variant: can a monster be affected twice?

9) Full Charge: 'Gain 1 Charge token. Then, perform an attack with a magic weapon. While this card is exhausted, each of your attack gets +X hearts, where X is the number of charge tokens on your hero sheet.' Shouldn't the hero discard all Charge Tokens now? It this is not the case, Full Charge seems too strong in my opinion. Basically, you get a +4 damage attack for 1 fatigue each turn and you get to use 1 Charge token for other stuff. The Runemasters 'quick casting' gives him one additional attack but for 2 fatigue. And the attack is weapon depended, so it might be weak, or not strong enough to penetrate the targets armor.

So, in general, this class seems to be built around the idea: fewer attacks, but stronger ones. Cool Idea, but maybe too strong, especially against groups of large monsters and lieutenants. And since all campaigns end with a big, epic endfight against the main villain, the fight might be over in no time. I mean blue+red+red+Fully Charge + surge skills sounds like up to some 18 damage with a singe hit.

This Overlord complains. ;)

I've played it only once and it was not so strong. In my first idea, Focus should give only one Charge token, but it was a bit weak the way it was.

I need to try it out with 2, but it may be too much.

1) You're right, I will think of it so It would be clearer

2) In fact, your loosing an action to gain 1 red die. So, stronger on less attacks, but basically, your loosing the opportunity to make to attacks. In act 1, you can do 2 attack with blue + yellow, or only 1 with blue + yellow + red. Not so strong in my playtesting, but I may be wrong, since it needs way more

3) I've corrected. Basically, yes, could be forgotten, but basically, it spares you 1 action. Maybe he should gain 2 charge tokens ?

4) No, I may I worded it bad, but it should be "Whenever you gain any amount of charge tokens, you may move 1 space"

5) In my idea, you would gain 1 brown die for 1 fatigue or 1 brown die and 1 grey die for 1 fatigue and 1 charge token.

6) From you hero sheet. I need to correct that so it will be clearer.

7) Thanks, just made the changes

8) Nope, a same monster could not be affected twice. But you're right about wording, and i've still haven't find out. Let me try again ;)

9) needed to be tested again

Thank you so much for your answer ! I'm going to look back again.

I may change this class totally, since i'm wondering if I should not play it differently. My new idea was to spend an action and put the only 1 charge token on any of the class skill and this class skill would be more powerfull as long as the token is on it. If not, you use the "normal" part of the card

maybe better and simplier ?

what do you think ?

I really like the idea to spend an action to 'charge up' and have a singe strong attack instead of two weak attacks but the problem is that this affects the whole balance of some fights (I fear). One strong attack is simply much better than multiple weak attacks, since each attack is mitigated by a defense roll. Also, just imagine this very strong attack is combined with blast. The OL can adapt to this class by using groups with many, but weak monsters. However, whenever a lieutenant or agent is on the map, the OL will suffer and cry.

Maybe it is better to use the charge tokens for something different? Hitting multiple targets is imo absolutely no problem (avoid imba combos with blast?). But how about that: you get 1 or 2 charge token(s) every turn for free. (Using an action even more?) and get a magic shield as a starting skill. When the hero would get damage, the shield gets damaged first. This way, you get a quite though mage which becomes vulnerable if he uses his charge tokens for other skills (say special attacks, additional movement). The hero has to decide when to go in the offense, and when to play defensively while the OL must wait for his chance to knock out the mage. Let the mage wear only light armor and cloaks and you get a funny game of chicken.

Let me think of it :)

Will have to think a lot and test it out a bit

Interesting class idea. I like the charge idea but would need to play test a bit to see how I felt about it.

One mechanical issue I see is with absorption. As stated, you need to wait until the OL shuffles the last card. The issue is the heroes have no way of knowing that as the OL hand is secret. I would recommend you change it to when the overlord has to shuffle his deck due to being empty. That also punishes certain abusive behaviors of the OL.

In fact, as the rules as written, the OL must immediately shuffle back his discard pile into a new overlord deck immediately after he draws the last card of this deck.

See page 16, Overlord cards, last sentence.

I have some more, a Rogue and a Warrior, but they are not finished yet.

want to see ?

You are getting crazy man! :D Sure show them. Mabe in separate threads to avoid confusion. And once I figure out how to make these nice class cards, I show you a mage class I have in mind.

You recommended Photofiltre in another thread. I'll have to check that out.

In fact, as the rules as written, the OL must immediately shuffle back his discard pile into a new overlord deck immediately after he draws the last card of this deck.

See page 16, Overlord cards, last sentence.

I see you are looking at it differently that I. Its a problem with the English language. I just realized the "it" could refer to the deck or the last card draw. I took it as the last card being shuffled back but your way of see it is equally valid. Would be clearer to replace "it" with "deck" but maybe I am the only one to get confused.

ho, I see. Well, I will change that "it" by "deck" if it's clearer to you, then.

RBY with S: +1 Range and S: +1 Damage is too strong for act 1. I would recommend using 2 charges to perform that ability on your starting skill. It looks like a really interesting class. Good job!

RBY with S: +1 Range and S: +1 Damage is too strong for act 1. I would recommend using 2 charges to perform that ability on your starting skill. It looks like a really interesting class. Good job!

Though it may seem to be imbalanced reanimate has almost the same attck but a melee one. The only thing I hesitate about is the proccess of obtaining charge tokens. Getting two tokens (2 +red_die attacks) for a single action. It might be a bit fairer if base ability costed some stamina (1-2). But cannot say anything about thw whole class without testing.

PS I find this class really interesting and more or less balanced.

PS I find this class really interesting and more or less balanced.

I'm still working on it and testing it. The balance between the number of tokens gained when doing the action and the uses of thoses makes me the biggest problems.

If somebody could test and help, It would be really great

PS I find this class really interesting and more or less balanced.

I'm still working on it and testing it. The balance between the number of tokens gained when doing the action and the uses of thoses makes me the biggest problems.

If somebody could test and help, It would be really great

If you could change the starting ability to make it have a cost or something to tone it down, i'll give it a try.

Sure, I can !

What do you suggest ? fatigue cost ?

Sure, I can !

What do you suggest ? fatigue cost ?

Sorry, I'll playtest it first, and then make a recommendation.

Updated from returns. Big Thanks to infinity black 14

Updated from returns. Big Thanks to infinity black 14

Could I get some background on what inspired you to make this? How exactly do you want it to be played? I'll need to know this the next time I test it.

I was imaginating some sort of mage that would be able to "store" some energy and let it get out when the times comes.

I was Dr Strange later, so ... But I would see a wizard behind the front range, focusing his magic and storing it in his hands, waiting for the good moment to let it out and wiping out his ennemies, and going back again when discharged, leaving the capable hands of his friends to give him the time needed to be able to fight back again after.

In few words, a poor wizard that could be a really powerfull threatening caster if not broken from channeling his spells.

I was imaginating some sort of mage that would be able to "store" some energy and let it get out when the times comes.

I was Dr Strange later, so ... But I would see a wizard behind the front range, focusing his magic and storing it in his hands, waiting for the good moment to let it out and wiping out his ennemies, and going back again when discharged, leaving the capable hands of his friends to give him the time needed to be able to fight back again after.

In few words, a poor wizard that could be a really powerfull threatening caster if not broken from channeling his spells.

I'll compile what I understand from this:

- Store Charges in the body, not around or in the weapon

- Meant to stay behind the front line

- Meant to build up and release attacks

What I can recommend, maybe?:

- It could make sense that since the mage is meant to be behind, the charges could be thrown off a magic weapon.

---Translates to: "Ignore LOS with magic weapons when you discard a charge token." as a skill (1xp perhaps)

- Since the class is meant to be "charging up", interruption should be a factor, possibly removing charges when hit or when spending a surge to remove a charge.

---Translates to: 0 cost skill has "In addition, each figure attacking this hero gains Surge: remove a charge token from the target"

If you did the second, you may have to gain more charges to make it worthwhile. Further testing could remedy.

Edited by InfinityBlack14

edited topic