Attributes, charms and class relationships

[Fenrir]

A Deathknight focuses in Dex with the lesser part of their two stats towards power, the Inquisitor class is the other way around.

[Jamstalldhet]

if i want to be mercenary->dk, does this mean i'm focusing on power as priority and dex as second?

Hi Darthblood,

First of all, if you plan to become a DeathKnight, I humbly think it's a bad idea. Because if you take a look at the class requirements, you'll find "remorseless" which means you can harm or rob someone and feel nothing about it, or worse feel good because you think your the smarter one. Moreover, feeling remorsless is not enough, you must prove you are, by effectively doing these things to the people of Estiah. But think about this : hurting someone is much more easier than effectively protecting him or her from harm, because all living things are fragile, including us the humans. Therefore, the smarter ones are those using their skills to build their community.

Just for the sake of understanding the system, we can try to answer your question anyway.

• At lvl 20, one can become a fighter with pow=100 and dex=80. Shadow and sword are the favourite charms.
• At lvl 30, one can become a mercenary with pow=200 and dex=160, and rank3 with sword. By then, the melee charms should get more important.
• At lvl 40, one can put aside his humanity and become a remorseless deathknight with pow=300 and dex=350, sword rank4 and shadow rank2.

As you can see, following this particular path, one starts with more power, and end up with more dex, but both stats are important all the way through. These stats are minimum : if one wants to always use the finest swords available, one keeps its dex high all the way.

[Gothmogged]

if i want to be mercenary->dk, does this mean i'm focusing on power as priority and dex as second?

Hi Darthblood,

First of all, if you plan to become a DeathKnight, I humbly think it's a bad idea. Because if you take a look at the class requirements, you'll find "remorseless" which means you can harm or rob someone and feel nothing about it, or worse feel good because you think your the smarter one. Moreover, feeling remorsless is not enough, you must prove you are by effectively doing these things to the people of Estiah. But think about this : hurting someone is much more easier than effectively protecting him or her from harm, because all living things are fragile, including us the humans. Therefore, the smarters ones are those using their skills to build their community.

Kudos on your ability to empathize from within the gestalt of the Estiah universe.

That said, in game mechanical terms the "remorseless" requirement is meaningless.  Its just a different path through the job skills.  You could actually choose total pacifism by never attacking any player (the only action you can really take which affects others) and still become a Deathknight.  The only conduct which is actually enforced in the rules is that in order to become an Assassin, you must master Cruelty by defeating much lower level players.   There is no mechanic stopping Paladins, or any other ostensible defenders of the downtrodden, from mastering Cruelty or Remorseless.

Estiah classes are really determined by combat style.  If you want to use draining attacks, debuffs, and spirit attacks, play a Deathknight.    If you want to blast thing with big fire damage, be a Pyromaniac.   The flavor text around each class adds to the fun, but does not restrict you in any way.  How you choose to play is up to you.  I play a Deathknight, but I regard myself as a nice guy who can generally be relied upon to help people.

[Earendil]

I play a Deathknight, but I regard myself as a nice guy who can generally be relied upon to help people.

To help them... INTO THEIR GRAVES!

[Gothmogged]

I play a Deathknight, but I regard myself as a nice guy who can generally be relied upon to help people.

To help them... INTO THEIR GRAVES!

Well, only after I've extracted their souls to power my greater glory!  Generally, I leave the graves to other people, I prefer to leave a path of the dead and dying so my next victims know how to find me.

[Jamstalldhet]

Interesting point of view Gothmogged. Let me develop a little bit here. And thanks for the opportunity.

I'll start with the agreements  . I agree with your description of the game mechanicals. You can effectively become a Paladin, crush the younglings for fun and be a master of evil  . Acting righteous is not a requirement for the title. In this case, « l'habit fait le moine » (sorry, I don't know how english speakers say it  ).

I also agree combat style is closely correlated to classes, although I doubt one determine the other. 

That said, in game mechanical terms the "remorseless" requirement is meaningless.

Ouch, now to answer this one, we venture deep into the meaning of meaning !  What does it mean that a requirement is meaningless ?

In mechanical terms, all of this is just a bunch of numbers flipping in a database in a box somewhere. And I really don't care for the futur of that box. From a certain point of view, this is totally meaningless, the whole thing. What am I doing here anyway ? 

But, this is a role playing game, isn't it ? We are the ones who put the meaning in it, not some mechanics, don't we ? We play games because it makes us feel something, good feelings, sometime bad feelings  . You press some buttons on your computer, you read you defended your guild from the invaders and saved tons of efforts to build some new guild improvement, you feel good. You go to the forum and answer some newbie questions, you feel good, your a nice guy  . You feel it for real. You can still feel it when the computer is turned off.

I agree there is a difference between remorseless and cruelty in the game mechanics. One the one hand, you develop the "skill" through jobs (can remorseless be called a skill  it sounds like an emotional disorder...) On the other hand, you have to interact with other players in pvp. One could argue that pvp is meaningfull because it involves human interactions  , and that jobs are meaningless because they don't  . Robbing people as a job is meaningless because there is no interaction with humans.

But I disagree with that line of thoughts  . When one is infront of his computer, and is role-playing, and is into the game, he might think « hey, I'm a deathknight, I rule, I'm so cool, I will beat the crap out of some people today in the arena, I will go downtown and rob some defenseless markets, I've got a big sword and I'm a remorseless deathknight, which is so cool   ». And then one wants to change his avatar : « I want something that looks very bad, very evil, cause I'm a deathknight you know, I'm evil, I want my avatar to represent it  ». You can go to your friends and talk about it : « You know this cool game, Estiah, I was a nice guy because I helped others in the guild and the forum, and I robbed some traders you know, had to do it, I'm a deathknight  ». When role-playing, one is at least interacting with his own imagination. One knows its only happening in the computer but the thoughts and the feelings remain. I don't think it is meaningless. I would tend to argue that there are consequences for real, outside of the box.

I would conclude with the same phrase as you, but from an existentialist perspective : the team of Estiah bring you the game, but you work your imagination, with the consequences ; how you choose to play is up to you. 

[Darthblood]

ah ok i get it...a few general questions though

once i master rank 1 in a skill, which i have done in sword and frost, how do i advance to rank 2?

what are the trials (domination, salvation, etc)?

things like bloodsucking fleas, rat skin, and other stuff you find in sewers...what do i do with it? just sell it?

and how do i sell charms i dont want/need? or is that not allowed?

[Srdja]

You can gain points in rank 2 the same way you've gained points in rank 1 if you unlocked the next rank. They are unlocked based on level. Basic weapon skills (ie. sword and frost) unlock a new rank every 10 levels.

Trials are dungeons that drop special Marks that you need to advance to a T3 class (http://www.estiah.com/class/tree - the classes on the right are T3) You can see what marks each class needs on their respective class page.

[Darthblood]

whoops i edited it around the same time you posted, so here's some more i have...

things like bloodsucking fleas, rat skin, and other stuff you find in sewers...what do i do with it? just sell it?

and how do i sell charms i dont want/need? or is that not allowed?

[Popeye]

Since the flea is an animal, you can adopt it as a pet. You can then feed it a (wide) variety of things to watch it grow, and race it or have it fight against others' pets.

Rat Skin can be used to craft a Rat Cloak, which is a decent armor for very low level players.

Most items have some kind of usefulness, part of the fun is finding these out. You can also check the wiki for information.

Charms cannot be sold, but once you outgrow some of your crappier ones, you can go to "View your Charms" (http://www.estiah.com/character/card) and archive the old ones so they won't appear on the "build your gear" page. This isn't really necessary below level 10 or so, but when you accumulate dozens and dozens of different charms it's a great help to hide the wooden sword, etc.

[Darthblood]

woo i adopted a hamster XD

how do you create things like the rat cloak?

[Srdja]

Go to Inachis Market. There's a shop called "Fight with Art". Rat cloak should be the first item on the list there. You need 2 Rat Skin, 1 Rat Hair and 15 gold to make it.

[Darthblood]

i understand that to level up, you need to raise your fundamental attributes, but how do you do that, besides doing jobs?

[Srdja]

Mastering skills gives you attribute points. There are some consumable foods that can also raise them later in the game.

[Gothmogged]

I agree there is a difference between remorseless and cruelty in the game mechanics. One the one hand, you develop the "skill" through jobs (can remorseless be called a skill  it sounds like an emotional disorder...) On the other hand, you have to interact with other players in pvp. One could argue that pvp is meaningfull because it involves human interactions  , and that jobs are meaningless because they don't  . Robbing people as a job is meaningless because there is no interaction with humans.

{elided}

I would conclude with the same phrase as you, but from an existentialist perspective : the team of Estiah bring you the game, but you work your imagination, with the consequences ; how you choose to play is up to you. 

That is the key difference.  I just don't feel any roleplaying mojo from clicking a job button.  If were RPing some actual banditry in some more interactive way, then I'd be with you.  With PvP there is not only interaction with another person, but actual planning of gears which affect the outcome of the action, like PvE, but richer due to the unpredictability of the opponent and the potential for them to interact via the forum or messages.  I get a real sense of accomplishment from that, so I get a higher level of engagement. 

The job button is just a single choice of  a job from a list with guaranteed success.  The choice easily becomes driven entirely by mechanical considerations and the attached text becomes increasingly irrelevant.  So, to me the job labels just don't really matter.  If working as a Bandit, Hijacker, or Hitman could get you put on the outlaw list, then we'd be at least looking at some interesting ramifications.  As it is, jobs exist in their own ontology with no real overlap on the rest of your Estiah life.