Dragonsworn Hero Class concept

[Jtree]

Updated:

This is a companion to my Emerald Legacy expansion concept thread. Travel and preparing to move saw me push a rough, disorganized version out. This is an attempt to make it much more orderly.


Also, forget anything about the class name that comes from non-WoW sources.

DRAGONSWORN

For centuries, the great dragonflights have noted the potential of younger races. In a few select cases, they choose a creature of another race to be one of a select few with the privilege of directly serving a dragon or an entire group of dragons. Such devotees dedicate their lives to the protection and service of their dragonflights, and reap the benefits of the great knowledge and power that their draconic masters share.

http://www.wowpedia.org/Dragonsworn

Dragonsworn are plate-wearing, mana using soldiers with specializations in melee DPS, caster DPS, and healing. They are available to the original World of Warcraft races: humans, dwarves, gnomes, night elves, orcs, trolls, tauren, and forsaken.

Dragonsworn, like Death Knights, begin at level 55. Their questing experience will be significantly longer, but they will finish at level 85. The DS's story will play out in chapters, and weave in parts of the regular questing experience in the zones he visits, supplemented with class specific quests and solo scenarios.


Specs and Base Abilities

Time Breaker: Melee dragonsworn empowered by the Bronze Dragonflgiht, Time Breakers are fast moving dual-wielders, who compliment swift weapon attacks with arcane and nature spells. With both disengage and charge type abilities, and several ranged spells, the TB can be a danger to any enemy, in any moment.


Dreamstate: Schooled in the power of the Green Dragonflight, these dragonsworn have a constant sense of the Emerald Dream. Wielding great power of nature, they use powerful debuffs to control their enemies, and synergistic procs to unleash devastating damage.


Life Binder: A healer following the Red Dragons, the Binder uses the powers of nature and cleansing flame to heal allies and consume enemies.



All Dragonsworn have a base compliment of melee attacks, offensive spells, and heals. Individual specs get expanded options to fulfill their role. DS do not have a direct secondary resource like soul shards or holy power, but build and consume buffs or debuffs unique to each spec.

Central to Dragonsworn combat is a set of short-term buffs called Charges. These spells improve the Dragonsworn for thirty seconds. An off-GCD spell called Discharge will consume the current charge to unleash it on the DS's target. (This concept is modeled on the vanilla/BC era paladin seal and judgment system.)


Charge of Time – Increases haste and movement speed.

Charge of the Dream – Increases crit chance and slightly reduces damage taken.

Charge of Life – Increases mastery, and damage and healing abilities heal the DS for a small amount.

Discharge (40 yard range, 8 second cooldown, off GCD) – Consume your current charge spell to damage an enemy or heal an ally, and cause an additional effect based on the current charge.

Time Discharge – Captures the target in a moment of time, slowing an enemy or increasing an ally's movement speed for three seconds.

Dream Discharge – Refreshes your damage- or heal-over-time effects on the target.

Life Discharge – Absorbs healing cast on an enemy target, or shields a friendly target.


Other baseline abilities:

Swift Strike (instant) – Basic melee attack.

Kill Strike (instant, 8 second cooldown) – An extremely heavy melee attack.

Flame Bolt (2.5 second cast, 40 yard range) – Launch a bolt of fire at your target.

Healing (2.5 second cast) – Heal your target for a modest amount.

Searing Wrath (40 yard range, 6 second cooldown) – Fire a bolt of flame at a target, dealing X damage and jumping to an additional nearby enemy. Hits up to five enemies, but damage is reduced on each jump.

Cleansing Fire (instant, 40 yard range, 8 second cooldown) – Purges poisons and diseases from a friendly target.

Blitz (.5 second cast, 35 yard range, 20 second cooldown) – Rush toward your enemy, knocking them to the ground.

Break (instant, 20 second cooldown) – Leap up and jump backwards off your enemy, traveling 15 yards back and knocking your enemy 15 yards into the opposite direction. Your travel distance is doubled if the enemy is immune to knock back effects.

Echoing Assault (instant, 20 second duration, 3 minute cooldown) – All damage and healing you do is duplicated .5 seconds later for 25% of initial effect.

Dreamshift (instant, 90 second cooldown) – You shift partially into the Emerald Dream, reducing damage taken by 30%.

Quantum Leap (instant, 5 minute cooldown) – Your party and raid members shift into a faster state of existence, increasing their melee, ranged, and spell haste by 30% for 40 seconds.

Allies receiving this effect will become unstuck in time, and be unable to benefit from Bloodlust, Heroism, Time Warp, or Quantum Leap again for 10 min.


Spec Details


Time Breaker

The Time Breaker is a unique combatant who mixes melee and ranged abilities to maximize his damage and keep his enemies off balance. As a baseline, Time Breaker spells are slower and weaker than the other specs, while melee abilities are much more powerful. He enhances his damage by building two stacking buffs:

Acceleration – Your melee critical strikes generate charges of acceleration, which reduce the cast time of your next magic spell by 1 second per stack. Spell damage is doubled if your target is more than 15 yards away. Each spell cast under Acceleration generates a stack of Mass.

Mass – Your blitz ability deals x damage per stack of Mass. Mass caps at 10 stacks.

The Time Breaker's mastery is Force – increases the damage of Accelerated spells and of blitzes made with the Mass effect.

In PVE a Time Breaker could build Acceleration stacks for specific phases of a fight, or use Break to get beyond 15 yards, unload his spells, and the use a Massed Blitz for another large burst of damage. In PVP he will be able to harry nearly any enemy, frequently keeping them at their least desired range.


Dreamstate

These Dragonsworn tap the fundamental power of the Dream to shape and bend the physical world to debuff and destroy their enemies. The Dreamstate's spells place a stack debuff on his enemy:

Warp – Your cast time nature and arcane spells stack the warp debuff on your target. Discharge detonates the debuff, dealing x damage per stack to the target, and 20% of that damage to all nearby targets, detonating their stacks of warp as well.

The Dreamstate's mastery is Destabilize – increases the damage of your nature spells and your warp detonation.

In PVE the Dreamstater will hold off on Discharges to stack up Warp, saving the detonations for procs or when there's a chance for damage to adds. In PVP they'll work hard to slow and control their opponents.


Lifebinder

This Dragonsworn uses the living flame of the red dragonflight to heal allies and burn enemies. The Lifebinder's heals leave behind a special buff on his allies:

Living Ember – A spark of living flame lingers on your friendly target, enabling you to consume them for additional healing effects. This ability is left by healing spells, and your offensive fire spells will add embers to nearby friendly targets. Embers stack up to five times.

The Lifebinder's mastery is Lifespark – your offensive and AoE healing fire spells have a chance to create additional Living Embers, and the healing of your Ember abilities is increased.

Embers essentially work like combo points on a friendly target. Ideally, a Lifebinder will bank embers on friendlies during low damage phases, to consume in high damage moments. The Binder will gain several additional heals, and can stack embers quickly using single target heals for strong tank healing.

[seventysix]

Creative ability names for the baselines.

[Jtree]

Leveling a Dragonsworn


(Cinematic intro – camera starts high over Silithus, tracking a bronze dragon, before diving down to the zone's entry.)

You are a proud young soldier, on your first expedition to raise your peoples' banner over a distant land. Glory and conquest fill your imagination, and thirst for battle flows through your veins.

But you will not have the victories you expect, for your fate is entwined with a far greater power.

CHAPTER I – Silithus

The player starts as a young Soldier in a scouting expedition to Kalimdor's remote southern desert. The force is immediately confronted by the Cenarion Circle, who are not happy to have combative armies in the region. After a warning to respect their neutrality, you are sent on your way.

The initial quests will have you fighting monsters and cultists to establish a small base. The player will quickly move through several training quests, as warrior, priest, and mage NPCs test the new recruit to discover his potential. The player's character shows promise in all three fields, and will come away with a couple of melee attacks, a heal, and an arcane nuke. This also unlocks the first talent row, of defensive cooldowns.

After establishing their outpost, the player will be sent to Cenarion Hold to offer aid. This will put the player into the regular quest line for the zone, with additional gather/kill quests. When the player returns to his outpost, he will be told of a lone gnome in the south, near a great ruined city. The soldier will be ordered to rescue or kill the gnome, depending on faction.

The gnome is very friendly, and not at all impressed the fearsome soldier's warnings/threats. She says she's investigating a serious threat to all of Azeroth, and quickly coerces the player into aiding her exploration of the ruins.

“By the way,” she says. “Have we met before? No? Call me Chromie.”

Completing her chain, Chromie sends the player back to the Cenarion Hold with a warning that the Silithid are rising. Several dragons have gathered there, and offer you a gift of power for your aid, opening your specs. Chromie also unlocks your second row of talents, three mobility spells, boons of the Bronze Dragonflight.

CHAPTER II – Blade's Edge Mountains

The Dark Portal has opened, and the armies of Azeroth have rushed through to stake their claims in Outland. You are now level 65, and have been sent to help establish outposts in Blade's Edge Mountains. Battle ogres, gron, and the other faction as you make your way across this harsh land.

The Cenarion Expedition is here as well, and in Evergrove you will find the next step in your destiny. There is a green dragon among the druids, disguised as a tauren, and he sets you to work helping him understand how Outland survives after the planet broke apart.

He will then unlock the third talent row, which will have magic DPS options.

CHAPTER III – Dragonblight

You are now level 75, and an elite soldier of your faction. War has been launched against the Lich King, and you have the honor of helping Bolvar Fordragon or Dranosh Saurfang establish forward bases at the Wrathgate.

Completing that, you escort an ambassador to Wyrmrest Temple. As the two faction ambassadors fall into an argument, Alexstraza summons you. She sees the touch of dragons on you, and from here you'll work through all the dragonshrine quests, then return to participate in the assault on the Wrathgate. When the forsaken turn their plague weapons against both armies, you have to try to escape the poison. As you are overwhelmed, the red dragons swoop in and burn everything.

Yet you survive, and are plucked out by the reds. They gift you with a new talent point, for a row of healing effects, to help you recover. However, your days as a front line soldier appear to be over.

CHAPTER IV – (not) Sitting out the Cataclysm

You are level 80, and a senior officer in the garrison in your capital city. Battles rage across a broken world, yet you are stuck training new recruits, and ferreting out cultists and spies. But when you expose (and ultimately kill) a traitor in the highest ranks, you are expelled from the service.

And then a familiar gnome appears, with a request for your help. The dragons have a plan to help restore balance between the flights after Deathwing is killed, but they need loyal fighters to see it through. Here, finally, you become an official Dragonsworn.

Your remaining quest experience will have you traveling across the Eastern Kingdoms, to deliver a single, uncorrupted black dragon egg to Ravenholdt Manor.

Upon completion, you receive your fifth talent point, a utility row, and are bumped to level 85. The dragons ask you to go out into the world, to be their eyes and ears, and to take their gifts and help your people rebuild.

You will, of course, promptly abuse your new power and and head off to wage war in Pandaria.



Leveling in the open world – griefing protection.

The DS will be placed into the larger world for parts of the leveling experience. To help protect them from harassment from higher level players, they will carry a buff called Uniformed Soldier. If attacked by an enemy who is beyond the zone's proper level, the player will take reduced damage, and deal significantly more damage.

It's not a license to grief high level players, though. If the DS attacks first, the effect will not kick in.


Gear

With the Dragonsworn jumping levels with each chapter, gear earned in one chapter will be obsolete in the next. The DS's gear will function just like heirlooms, updating itself with each new chapter. The player can equip heirlooms and quest reward items, if desired, but cannot sell or delete the initial gear. This equipment will be automatically reequipped when each new chapter starts.

[Deleted]

Skyrim is over there >>>>>

Thanks kid.

[Potassiumgluconate]

Pretty much sums up my feelings:

[Kaleredar]

Someone posted an idea like this a while back ago, with the same name.

I'll post the same thing I left in that thread:

"You should have acted.
They're already here.
Wrathion told of their return.
Their defeat... was merely delay;
Til the time after Pandaria opened,
When the sons of Azeroth would spill their own blood.
But no one wanted to believe.
Believe they would come back.
And when the truth finally dawns:
It dawns in fel fire!
But,
There are ones they fear.
In the nathrezim tongue, they are...

DRAGONSWORN!

FUS RO DAH!"


Anyway... I'd rather see true drakonids added as a race over a class form.

[justinmccray111]

This is so cool!!!!

[Sorrior]

Skyrim is over there >>>>>

Thanks kid.

Skyrim ruining the fun for Dragon Knight style classes just as Twilight did for fans of Werewolves/Vampires and the WORD Twilight itself...

[justinmccray111]

Skyrim is over there >>>>>

Thanks kid.

Obviously he's not making a suggestion about Skyrim, kid.

---------- Post added 2013-06-20 at 12:31 AM ----------

Pretty much sums up my feelings:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NpYEJx7PkWE

Pointless video made by a pointless forum troll.

Infracted

[Archangel Tyrael]

So.... Blitz is basically Charge with a different name..

[Jtree]

This is so cool!!!!

Thanks!

Skyrim ruining the fun for Dragon Knight style classes just as Twilight did for fans of Werewolves/Vampires and the WORD Twilight itself...

ROFL.

Obviously he's not making a suggestion about Skyrim, kid.

Never played Skyrim, but as I understand it WoW's dragonsworn are wildly different thematically.

So.... Blitz is basically Charge with a different name..

And Break is like disengage, or an inverse clash. But they will work with a synergy that other classes don't have.

[Tierbook]

Skyrim ruining the fun for Dragon Knight style classes just as Twilight did for fans of Werewolves/Vampires and the WORD Twilight itself...

the difference is that Skyrim wasn't crap

[Jtree]

the difference is that Skyrim wasn't crap

It was also a better love story than Twilight, right?

[Archangel Tyrael]

It was also a better love story than Twilight, right?

Yup, I married Lidya.

[Sorrior]

the difference is that Skyrim wasn't crap

Missing my point by lightyears.

Listen these days someone says Dragon????? And people start goibg "Fus do rah" to me that's just as bloody annoying as people saying that my having a guild named The Twilight Knights is all about the books.

Also that's like your opinion man.

I for one found unmodded skyrim nigh unplayable and even moddes i just did not overly enjoy it...I will admit i was hooked for a bit but Skyward Sword and Amalur yes Amalur the ONLY game ever made by 38 Studios i found to be better then Skyrim.

But then i haven't seemed to enjoy ANY elder scrolls games without massive amounts of modding...Which to me means the game itself isn't good but the mods are. Thus i won't give a company credit for an incomplete game.

[Syio]

I quite like the idea of leveling through different zones as they were set in the past to emulate the passage of time/ story development for your class or character. The old zones definitely still hold a lot of potential this way and I would personally play through such an experience!

[Deleted]

Sorry for necroing the thread, but I the one thing I see wrong with the idea is that you think it would be a plate wearer, if another class is introduced to the game it would be a mail wearer for the sake of balance as that would mean there was 3 classes that used each armor set rather than 3/3/2/4.

[Gelannerai]

Sounds awesome.

[Northem]

Thanks for revive this thread, now I can not read it with attention, but tomorrow I'll read it thoroughly and give my view, it looks great by the way ...

[Zalavaaris]

"Fus do rah"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8OVr3EfB_z8