Dragons: What are they?

[Jinx]

This post is going to be rather long, as a warning.

First, my perspective: I started playing this game quite a while ago. The oldest character on my account was created over 600 days ago. Shortly after that, I quit the game. I quit because the game was bug ridden and incomplete, and it basically sucked. When I quit, I told myself, "Self, you should come back in a year or two and see if it's better." So here it is, a year or two later, and I'm back seeing what it is like.

What I'm seeing: There is some good and some bad. The game still seems largely incomplete, bug ridden and laggy though. For nearly two years to change the game, it is pretty disappointing. When I go exploring, I can still walk for an hour and not see anything besides trees and grass, or volcanes and rocks, or ice and mountians. When I try to do quests, I still encounter bugs I'd expect to see in a beta test, not in a completed game. When I approach a town, I still lag despite it being completely empty, and despite having a superior computer than I did two years ago.

But my biggest dissappointment, I have to say, is dragons. This is the area I knew Tulga had been working on. This is the area I expected to be impressed with. Perhaps that is why I was so disappointed. I had heard they finally 'completed' dragons.

So, what are dragons?

Well, apparently they are a biped that can't multiclass, with far more quest content for that class than any other individual class. And they get bigger and fly. Whoopty F*in doo. Don't get me wrong, quest content is good, getting bigger and flying is good. But it hardly make them special. Take all the quests that bipeds can do and a dragon can't, from various classes and crafts, and I doubt the quests will even be even, bipeds still have more quest content. Get bigger? Yay, I get a new graphic for my character, if I were a biped, I could change my character graphics by buying a new set of clothes, and skip the whole quest line. Flying? Well, this is something unique to dragons in this game, but it being so doesn't really make sense. You have a class that "Only touches the ground at birth and death" (dryads) but can't fly. This makes no sense what so ever. It is still cool that dragons fly, but it isn't worth giving up everything that dragons give up, all the content for multiclassing, all the power lost from not being able to multiclass, just to fly.

So far, this has been more of a rant than a suggestion. I did put it in the suggestion forums for a reason, however.

So, what do I actually think dragons should be?

First:

As originally stated by the game makers way back when, dragons should be the long, hard route to the most powerful class in the game. So, to that end, I present the following idea. (Also, I feel that dragons should offer something unique and different from biped play. I believe they were complete seperated from biped advancement for this reason, but failed to meet that goal.)


Hatchlings:
Dragon Hatchlingsare the weakest class in the game. They gain the following per level:

5 in all stats
5 points in all skills
6 Training Points
Current gain in abilities/spells/quests
Will not gain the following: Tooth and Claw training or master, Primal trianing or mastery, Healing mastery quests.

Remove Gold Rage.
Change Galewind to be a duplicate power of Silver Strike, however, Silver Strike will gain it's power from T&C and Stength, and be melee, and Galewind will gain it's power from Primal and Power, and be ranged.

Remove 2 of the 'breeze' spells. Replace it with Breeze and Improved Breeze.

Remove 3 of the AoEs. Leave the low damage fast cast fast timer one in. Make a 'Improved' version. Make it a 'Repeater'.

Hatchlings are slow and hard simply because they lack the skill gain of anormal character, they are vastly underpowered for there level.

At level 50, a hatchling will have reached the point they can complete the Adult RoP. Level 50 will be the requirement for becoming an adult. They may continue to level as a hatchling, however it will be at double the experience cost. When a hatchling becomes an adult, it will gain all previous benifits it would have gained from achieving adulthood at 50.

So, on to adults:

If the Lunus RoP is done, the Hatchling will lose all levels of Hatchling and gain an equal number of levels in the Thrasher class. Thrashers gain levels at double the experience cost of normal biped classes. All Training Points spent are removed and Thrashers and given unspent Training Points at Thrasher gain rate for current level.

Thrasher gains per levels:

11 Strength
10 Dexterity
11 Tooth and Claw
10 Dragons Breath
10Evasion
Equal to Warrior in Health and Armor
5 Primal
5 Power
5 Focus
5 Magic Evasion
12 Training points

Thrashers gain access to Gold Rage quests.
Thrashers gain access to Tooth and Claw quests.
Thrashers lose Galewind.

Thrashers gain Ability: Fearful Presence- PBAoE debuff, all creatures in melee range lose XX Armor and XX Evasion

Alternately, if a Hatchling does the Helian RoP, the Hatchling loses all levels of Hatchling and becomes a equal level Primalist. This is the same as Thrasher except gain per level changed to:

11 Power
10 Focus
11 Primal
10 Dragons Breath
10 Magic Evasion
Equal to Warrior in Health and Armor
5 Strength
5 Dexterity
5 Tooth and Claw
5 Evasion
12 Training Points

Gain Access to Primal/Power based ranged duplicate of Gold Rage.
Gain access to Primal quests.
Primalists lose ability Silver Strike.

Primalists gain Ability: Primalist- Targeted AoE debuff which lowers Magic Evasion and resistance to primal damage.

Anyway, I have more, dealing with Ancients, but I have to go. Essentially, Thrashers could Multiclass to Ancient Thrasher with Level 100 as a requirement. Ancient Thrashers would have Primalist gains in Power, Primal, etc, and gain 20 and 21 for the Thrasher skills and attributes. Would also gain 16 training points per level. Would have 8 times the experience cost of a normal biped class. Ok, gotta go.

[Jinx]

Err, before I go, also, would add a bunch of spells only open to Primalists and Ancient Primalists.

[Guaran]

I like the general ideas. However the spell suggestions show a lack of familiarity with the class. Dragnos need more damaging spells, not less.

Thrasher and Primalist should be seperate adventure classes, NOT tied to Lunus/Helian which are merely POLITICAL FACTIONS. Plenty of Lunus cast spells, Helians can be among the best melee fighters.

I agree the stat, skill, and healthpoint gains per level are just copies of abiped character, and do not make much sense. In fact a Fitter level 100 will have more strength than a Dragon of 100 levels. Different races should get different stats per class per level. A Warrior gnome might get 6 strength/level, but a warrior half giant might get 12. This would make sense.

I doubt they can fix all that at this point in the game, however the caster/melee schools would have been nice for dragons, even that it's probably too late to change. Now we have been told that Ancient dragons will get to multiclass. So far only new annouced class is Lairshaping, a crafting school. If some specialized schools for adventuring were added that would be most welcomed.

[Jaraiden]

Some nice game mechanic ideas, but without lore-based game mechanics it means little. Hatchlings should have a difficult time, but if able to group with bipeds, especialy those leaning toward the Lunus path . . . .

I'd suggest supplementing your suggestion with some lore-based game mechanics also.

And yes, per lore dragons should be the strongest. Significantly more so. An Ancient dragon should be able to do more strength based damage than a half-giant warrior-type. The muscular power behind a claw should be a lot more than behind a two handed sword or hammer.

[Goriax]

I think it's a bit late to be redesigning the most popular race in the game. Heh, we'll be lucky to see just the new ancient schools within a year and you're proposing far more extensive changes. Oh and what Guaran said.

Lunus and Helian are just factions. They never had much difference and with the ancient schools it'll probably blur a lot more, which is good since that decision is one of the few decisions a player can make in this game which they can't change their mind on later.

I was long a proponant for dragons harder at lower level but more powerful later but they made the very deliberate design decision to not make them particularly difficult -- just different. In fact that's been their approach ever since they emerged from blackout which was LONG before it even entered beta. If you don't find them particularly difficult it wasn't an accident.

I've never seen the official reason behind that decision, although I'd guess a major one would be the following: If you're going to make a character hard to play at low levels, you BETTER reward it a lot at higher levels and you BETTER make sure it can't be powerleveled in any way shape or form. They MUST earn it. No other way. I suspect they weren't confident they'd be able to remove every possible way of powereleveling a dragon and of course powereleveling is easy -- even without access to gold rage and with double experience cost it would be easy.

The original reason people proposed real world time limits was to make sure there would be at least one brake on the powerlevelers. One they couldn't get around.

So instead dragons have different lore, different abilities, the whole need for hoard, different advancement but they're neversuper powerful. Maybe that's not enough difference for some people. Such is life.

Heh, I don't even use gold rage in most of my fights. Too freakin much hoard when I have to gather my own hoard and it isn't needed anyway for run of the mill mobs my own level including mobs on the Satyr islands.

Since dragons are purely mythical, every work of fantasy has it's own idea of dragons. They often share some chracteristics, but those characteristics are subject to change at the whim of the person designing the fantasy.The HZdragon is vastly different from the EQ dragon; mainly because theHZ dragon must be balanced as a playable race and the EQ dragon is not playable so doesn't need to be balanced. Some people think that makes HZ dragons uninteresting. So be it. There's lots of people playing this game who think otherwise. Dragons aren't for everyone.

[Kothar@Chaos]

I really can't see the benefit of making dragons tedious and boring from lvl 1-50. Not many games have a playable dragon race. I want to enjoy playing one, which would not be possible if you can't reach adult until 50 and the first 50 levels are difficult. That's a long time. Ideally, Adult dragons should start somewhere around 20-30 similar to when other races can specialize. Ancients should start around 60-70 so that there's time to enjoy them. Why would lvl100 be a good requirement?

[evilkarl]

Well I agree with some of your ideas mostly the L50 req for rop, double xp cost for adults, different stats for adults to hatchlings..although not in the same manner as you have laid out.

Tulga found out a long time ago that the players HATED abilities/etc being dolled out on a per faction basis deciding classes on that would be met with the same amount of anger. How ever the option to pick a class upon reaching adult would be nice but its too late to do now.

BTW as a single class dragon is by far the most powerful single class.

[Pharcellus]

BTW, Dragons aren't really single classes, as hoard is akin to another class.

A single-class Dragon with 0 hoard is quite the wimp.

I really wish people would stop spreading disinformation and lies. Thanks!

[Tribunal]

BTW, Dragons aren't really single classes, as hoard is akin to another class.

A single-class Dragon with 0 hoard is quite the wimp.

I really wish people would stop spreading disinformation and lies. Thanks!

You show me a dragon with 0 hoard, I'll show you a dragon that doesn't have a clue whats it going on in game.

The only two reasons dragons as a whole are not powerful is #1. they can't mass kill, #2. I've meet maybe... two? dragons that know and have proven how powerful the class is.

I don't know how many times I've heard "A dragon can't stand a chance against a heavily multi-classes bi-ped." When that truely is not the case. A dragon who knows what they need to do, who isn't just playing a dragon for the sake of being a dragon (which most of you are) and wants to excel in the class can rock the socks off of many bi-peds. It's a simple case of "Lets actually try and figure out how to run my dragon." But that only implies to adults and ancients.

The main reason that many posts come up about how underpowered dragons are,is do to the fact that they don't have the slightest idea of how to use one. I'm sorry the truth hurts so much.

[evilkarl]

Filling your hoard is part of adventuring these days.. Any dragon not hoarding is a fool and really is not playing its character correctly.

While it may be your opinion that hoard is a seperate class I disagree I think it is you who is spreading lies and disinformation.

[Pharcellus]

You show me a dragon with 0 hoard, I'll show you a dragon that doesn't have a clue whats it going on in game.

The POINT, which you so obviously MISS, is that the EFFORT is not of ONE SINGLE CLASS. People who keep echoing that "Dragon is best single class in game" also tend to say "hoard is like a second class". WHY is that, you think? Umm, maybe because it IS? Durrrrrr.

I don't know how many times I've heard "A dragon can't stand a chance against a heavily multi-classes bi-ped." When that truely is not the case. A dragon who knows what they need to do, who isn't just playing a dragon for the sake of being a dragon (which most of you are) and wants to excel in the class can rock the socks off of many bi-peds. It's a simple case of "Lets actually try and figure out how to run my dragon." But that only implies to adults and ancients.

I've been to the arena. I've witnessed and lived what a heavily multiclassed biped can do when they are played right, too. The door swings both ways there, pal.

I've played mine for two years. I know how to play him to his fullest just fine, thankyouverymuch.

The main reason that many posts come up about how underpowered dragons are,is do to the fact that they don't have the slightest idea of how to use one. I'm sorry the truth hurts so much.

It doesn't bother me, because I KNOW it is bullshit. But, please, feel free to keep shoveling.
[:)]

[Pharcellus]

Filling your hoard is part of adventuring these days.. Any dragon not hoarding is a fool and really is not playing its character correctly.

While it may be your opinion that hoard is a seperate class I disagree I think it is you who is spreading lies and disinformation.

You've said on several occasions in the past that hoard can be considered a second class. Just using your own words against you, Zodias. [:)]

Like Tribunal, you miss the point as well. It is AS MUCH EFFORT AS a second class to raise hoard to where it has a significant benefit.

[evilkarl]

I've said in the past the effort required was similar to that of a second class or more but I have always maintained that it is part of the drag adv school design not a seperate class unto itself.

Now that hoardables are so redily available it is a hell of a lot less of a chore than it once was.

[Pharcellus]

How long would you think it takes a Dragon to get to 25 million hoard now?

How long does it take to a biped to get a second Level 100 adv class?

More or less effort?

[Tribunal]

How long would you think it takes a Dragon to get to 25 million hoard now?

I'd give it out free because of how frequently it drops. and I just solo, I'd hand out 100k+ almost every day, sometimes multiple times.

How long does it take to a biped to get a second Level 100 adv class?

More or less effort?

that depends on how you want to discribe it, you could easily be grouped to you're next 100, and a dragoncould easily get hunters to get it 25mil,but if you're like me, I perfer to do things myself.

Now lets say since you speak in terms of dragons getting the hoard for themselves is hard, that me getting my second 100 is pretty f*n difficult. I was a Berserker, I had an insane amount of 2hs, I am doing warrior for the other weapon skills and am using my 2hs, I was working on it for over a month, I am currently lvl 83 at it. Over that time I have given out weeeeeelll over 6mil in hoard, maybe more. (example, once I had 8 priceless mirrors from a days work, and those are 64k)

It is hard for both, no doubt. I can understand how you think it is another school, I have gotten that arguement. The difference is that you lvl that school with your current 100 adv, were I had to start all over with bronze armor at 1.

This is not anything to argue about, there are pros and cons for both.

[Pharcellus]

I'd give it out free because of how frequently it drops. and I just solo, I'd hand out 100k+ almost every day, sometimes multiple times.

Note everyone is as generous as you. In fact, I'd say you are the rare exception. Still, there's lots of Dragons out there, and 100k+ a day split 100 ways ain't much.

that depends on how you want to discribe it, you could easily be grouped to you're next 100, and a dragoncould easily get hunters to get it 25mil,but if you're like me, I perfer to do things myself.

Dragons grouped together split hoard, thus dividing it, making it take that much longer. A single Dragon grouped with bipeds will do better, just as a biped raising his second class in a group of bipeds will do better.

Let's do the math. Using your first set of numbers above, to get to L100 hoard, a Dragon will take 250 days to achieve it. That's assuming they don't use any hoard to get there.

Using your second set of numbers (which radically conflict with your first set), 6 million in a month means 4 months to get to L100 hoard, assuming again that none is used in the acquisition. You've said you've soloed your second class to 83 in the same time. Level 83 is more than half of the XP required to get to 100. So, it looks like you will be L100 before a Dragon would have half its hoard.

..and we STILL are assuming that the Dragon uses ZERO hoard to acquire it. A pretty monumental feat, to be sure!

Thus, with your own numbers, it appears that it is actually MORE difficult than a second class to raise hoard to L100.

That said, I return to my previous point:

Saying that Dragons are the "most powerful single class in the game" is misinformation and belies the fact that to get to their max power in their "single class", they have to expend AT LEAST as much effort as a dual-classed biped, if not a triple-classed biped. As such, I call that misinformation for what it is, and will continue to do so every time it appears.

It is hard for both, no doubt. I can understand how you think it is another school, I have gotten that arguement. The difference is that you lvl that school with your current 100 adv, were I had to start all over with bronze armor at 1.

When hoard is lower, it takes longer. Further, bipeds can use all of their masterable abilities from their first class up to half their level in it. Most Dragons who level their adv to 100 rarely have more than 1/4 of their hoard by that time. Many have less than 2 million. Thus, they spend the majority of their time after L100 adv farming for hoardables. It is not simply a matter of adding hoard, as a significant portion of hoard is spent to acquire more hoard.

By the way, you can easily wear padded ironsilk armor until you can get to a level where you can wear metal armor that is equivalent or exceeds the padded ironsilk (Steel platemail is equivalent, cobalt exceeds).

This is not anything to argue about, there are pros and cons for both.

I'm not arguing the pros and cons, I am just dispelling the continuing myth, hoping that someday people will STOP spreading it. As long as people persist, so will I.

[Goriax]

I'd give it out free because of how frequently it drops. and I just solo, I'd hand out 100k+ almost every day, sometimes multiple times.

100K is a drop in the bucket. You'd have to do that 250 times to geta single dragon to level 100 hoard. So sure, suppose that each and every day you give your 100K hoard to the SAME dragon.In effect you're powerleveling that dragon.After 250 days he'sgot hishoard maxxed as long ashe never uses it, or finds any additional hoard for his use himself. Even if you AVERAGE twice a day that's still 125 days. Ithink you'd have no trouble getting your biped to level 100 in a second class a lot quicker then that, especiallyif someone was powereleveling you.

Sure, dragon IS the most powerful class in the game if you define power as one on one melee damage with no regard for hoard.Not so good if you look at AoE, healing, debuffs, etc. Or what hoard really means for a non-powerleveled player..

Dragons can do one thing well. One thing. Seems like a lot of jealous bipeds really resent that.

If after all that, you still think dragons got the better deal then I have a solution for you. Play one.

Dragons are different. They were always intended to be different. That's it.

[Tribunal]

A drop in the bucket yes, but how many of me are there? plenty

there are hoardables that are worth almost 100k by themselves, the 8 pricelss mirrors if I had gotten two more that day I would have gotten about 600K, thats only the priceless mirrors and I only used that example because of all the T6 hoard I get... thats the only one I can remember what it's called/spell.

now change your math to accomidate around 500k a day. not just the 100.

There are nice people in istaria, more than willing to just throw hoard around, I know it's not an easy thing to do, it's like a bi-ped asking to be power-leved, you just have to know the right people, and I know that they are out there.

Hoard drops plenty, far and wide, 13g for a dragon (of lvl 100 craft) is not an impossible feat by any stretch of the imagination, if you only find the assholes of Istaria and the bi-peds that want money for it, that would just about cover most of your hoard.

Jealous of dragons I am not, you have one class that is fine by me it should be as good as a multi-classed bi-ped and it is when you pit the two together, and I mentioned earlier that 1 reason that dragons are not the best in game is because you can't mass kill, dragons and me are in the same boat (aside from hoard) we are both built for solo fighting, and we do it well, but we are built that way in a world drivin by mass-killing.

[evilkarl]

Blah blah blah

Dragons are meant to be more difficult, unfortunately in this game more difficult usually translates into more tedious. Hoard is part of making a dragon's development more difficult it is part of the dragon race. It is not a seperate school.

However if you want me to be more specific Dragons are the strongest single class melee adv in the game.

[Narkano]

Some of the ideas of the initial suggestion are quite interesting even if I think that it's too late to introducemost of them at this stage of the game.

On the other hand I absolutely cannot agree to the statements about dragons beinga classthat is not yet completed. Neither can I agree tothe points that dragons had to trade their ability to fly for not being able to multiclass or had to give anything up for it.

Ialso cannot bear all the talk about dragons being weak, having difficulties of getting hoard, are more difficult to play and so on and so on ...

Do we really speak about the same game and the same dragons???

Matter of factly dragons are no doubt among the most powerful characters on Istaria if notbeing the most powerful of them all. And they cannot be considered single class characters since they combine the best aspects of many classes.

After all those changes and adjustments being made it is also wrong that dragons cannot mass-kill groups of mobs. They can!

And all the talk of needing hoard for some of the more powerful dragon abilities ... if you're out hunting mobs that drop hoard items you get more than enough hoard! I use all my abilities to their fullest whenever they become available again and my hoard at least keeps its current level. On the long runit even keeps climbing!

To describe dragons (adult dragons since most dragonsgrab foradulthood as soon as possible)

Currently ...

- Dragons can fly and therefore move about freelyto anywhere on Istaria

- Dragon Scales now are among the best armor available

- Dragons deal out more melee damage than every other class with Gold Rage having it recycled and ready againwithin 15 secs

- Dragons have their Silver Strike and Ravage abilities for further devastating melee damage

- Dragons have Galewind ability for moderate damage and Dragon's Reach for pulling foes from afar

- Dragons have a tail attack stunning their foes long enough to get in 2-3 of their other devastatingmelee attacks

- Dragons have a bite attack causingDoT to their foes

- Dragons have a breath weapon with a 33% chance of causing DoT to their foes once completing their 50th level augmentation quest

- Dragons have their fast recycling Spiked Scales ability similar to CoT

- Dragons have their Refreshing Breeze ability to heal damage faster than most mobs or groups of mobs can inflict it

- Dragons have their Gold Shield ability to trade damage for hoard and halving all damage inflicted to them

- Dragons have an Instant Heal ability based on primal skill

- Dragons have abilities and spells to enhance health, armor, strength, dexterity, evasion, magic evasion, primal and tooth & claw all at the same time

- Dragons have abilities and spells to weaken their foes and make them more vulnerable to their attacks and spells whichcan be used for apull

- Dragons have more AoE spells that even a mage

- Dragons have spells to enhance their ward against fire/ice/energy or nature/spirit/blight

- Most Dragon Spells can now be teched with Cleansing Technique

- Ancient Dragons have even better armor

- Ancient Dragons have even better Spiked Scales

- Ancient Dragons can resurrect once per hour with their Primal Rebirth ability

- Ancient Dragons have a Drain Strike ability with a 200% damage adjustment

- Ancient Dragons have an AoEbreath weapon for 700-1000 damage being even better than DC

- Ancient Dragons have Dragon Fear to mezz their foes for 45 secs

- Ancient Dragons now move about at 109 flight speed using wing scales with velocity and 159 with Drulkar's Wings ability

- Ancient Dragons now have up to 5.000 capacity that no biped can everreach

...

Really someone out there calling dragons weak? Considering them broken or not yet completed? Being single class characters that traded flight for power?

I am "only" a Helian dragon with maximum training points in Primal skill as well as having all my scales techedfor Primal skill. No extra strength or Vengence scales.Nonetheless I have about 2.350 armor and I am well able to take down any named mob with only my own buffs most of them having not even the slightest chance.(Of course not taking SoG or Impaler into account). I killed Mouf yesterday withoutany damage to myselfat all since it took me only the time that my Gold Shield, Refreshing Breeze and Spiked Scales were up. I am also well able to take on 6indestructable fyakkis as well as groups of 12 purple spiderswith 8 bloodsnout gruoks ...

... even for rating 160+ multiclassed bipeds those battleswould takelonger and would bemore difficultto fight. Only the strongest bipeds able to use all healing and draining spells and abilities might take on groups of mobs too large for a dragon to fight and even those cannot beat a dragon on 1:1 battles.

... an 80th level dragon with teched tier V scales easily takes out 2-3 120th level fyakkis in no time. Show me any 80th level single classed biped able to accomplish this.

Stop calling dragons weak ... those times are gone ... if you're a dragon andconsider yourselfweak at this stage of the game, you probablyhave missed something or don't know how to play your character.

- Narkano