T2 class idea: Golemcrafter

[Therem Harth]

Golemcrafters build golems (duh). I figure they fit best as a Loremaster subclass, though a Mage subclass makes more thematic sense.

Skill tree:

Combat (+0.0, +0.5)
- Weaponmastery (+0.0, +0.5)
Sneakiness (+0.0, +0.9)
- Stealth (+0.0, +0.4)
- Disarming (+0.0, +0.9)
Magic (+1.0, +0.9)
- Magic-device (+1.0, +1.0)
- Golemcraft (+1.0, +0.8)
Spirituality (+0.0, +0.5)
- Prayer (+0.0, +0.5)
Monster-lore (+1.0, +1.0)

Golemcraft includes the following spells. Spells require gold as well as SP, more gold for more powerful golems. Golem levels are boosted by half of total Golemcraft skill level. Spells cannot be cast at all with insufficient gold or SP.

Stone Golem (level 1, 10 SP, 1000 gold)
Raises a stone golem from the ground you're standing on.

Iron Golem (level 10, 20 SP, 5000 gold)
Raises an iron golem, using the rock of the dungeon and lots of coinage. Assume the golem doesn't actually have much iron in it.

Mithril Golem (level 20, 30 SP, 25000 gold)
Creates an expensive mithril golem.

Eog Golem (level 30, 40 SP, 125000 gold)
Creates a mighty eog golem.

Bronze Golem (level 40, 50 SP, 625000 gold)
Creates a demonic, spellcasting bronze golem. (The price tag is worth it.)

...

I'm working on an implementation of this, but I have to ask: does this sound anywhere near balanced? In particular, I wonder if stone golems near the beginning of the game are too powerful, price tag or no.

(Summoning bronze golems sounds horrible too, but Demonologists can already summon leveled greater demons, Symbiants with greater Qs can summon endless platoons of Wyrms, etc. Player mass summoning is kind of a fact of life in T2.)

[buzzkill]

I'm working on an implementation of this, but I have to ask: does this sound anywhere near balanced? In particular, I wonder if stone golems near the beginning of the game are too powerful, price tag or no.

1000 GP for an early melee powerhouse does sound cheap, but if it moved slowly or slightly slowly.

[Therem Harth]

Currently testing. Stone golems do seem to move slowly, the low level ones get worn down pretty fast. The main problems are at high levels - because I tried to make the leveling simpler, and wound up with "less powerful" golems getting leveled insanely high. Leveled monsters gain speed as well as HP, and so a level 50-something Iron Golem can dance all over the screen killing everything nearby with impunity.

Edit: in retrospect, I'm thinking of cutting the golem costs by a factor of 10, so that golems can be employed early on. The sluggishness of stone unleveled golems makes them not very powerful at low levels. To compensate I'll make the leveling much less steep.

[Derakon]

Instead of making the stone golem cheaper, why not use a clay or flesh golem as the lowest tier?

[Therem Harth]

Flavor, I guess; flesh golems seem more like necromantic stuff. Clay golems would make sense though (insofar as any of this makes sense).

Having done some testing though, I think I can safely say that low levels are not overpowered - unleveled stone golems are slow and don't hit very hard. And I've nerfed the leveling enough to make things reasonable at mid levels, I think. Bronze golem summonfests at high levels are decidedly unbalanced against single monsters, OTOH huge sweeping battles against summoners can be kind of fun (e.g. your army vs. Glaurung's).

[Therem Harth]

BTW, I'm not entirely sure I like the gold requirement. It's slightly sensible (golems require metal, tougher ones require more, and more expensive) but it seems a little silly seeing as you can carry millions of gold points, whatever those are.

OTOH, I feel that summoning should require some kind of resource limitation, or other limitation on the character. For Demonologists it's limitation of equipment, for Summoners it's reliance on fragile totems, for Possessors it's inability to use any other magic, etc.

Maybe it would be better to use items, such as suits of armor?

[AnonymousHero]

Requiring normal/ego/artifact (depending on type of golem) armor/weapons (depending on type of golem) in different combinations might be an interesting mechanic.

It's not as if randarts are extremely rare, but you'd be a bit more limited since you'd have to use inventory space to keep "junk" to make golems from in case your current one(s) die. (Whereas gold doesn't have any inventory limitation.)

[Therem Harth]

Now testing with the gold requirement removed, and so far so good; the class's summoning capabilities are balanced off by poor learning rates for prayer and weaponmastery, and total lack of utility spells. However, I haven't gotten to bronze golem level yet.

If Bronze Golem proves to be way overpowered, I may replace it with a Drolem spell...

[Therem Harth]

Oh wow. There is one thing that really has to be mentioned about this class, and any other class that can summon: monsters that shriek (mushroom patches, Crebains, etc.) have a 50% chance of turning your summons against you, regardless of monster level, and apparently regardless of friend/companion/coaligned status.

In a way this is cool, because it means that a single Crebain or shrieker mushroom patch could make gameplay very interesting. OTOH, a flock of Crebains in the deep dungeon could probably get your character killed very fast.

Still, I think I'll keep this class and other summoning classes. Consider the danger of pets going bonkers to be one of the occupational hazards of not doing things yourself.

[Therem Harth]

Okay, golem leveling had to be nerfed a bit, but I think this class is now ready for the master branch.