Concept Profession: The Demonologist

THE DEMONOLOGIST.

This character is just a little work in progress I worked on a while ago. It came about from a new campaign idea I had whereby, rather than being the goody goody all the time, who tries to instill peace across a land scarred by war, or whatever. How about a campaign where you are the bastard who is aiding the forces of evil to take over the land. It is your job to instill fear and pain to all who cross you. And to fight the battle against forces of good, and insure that peace and harmony to not win the war. From this simple idea came the Demonologist.

An ancient profession, demonology is a talent passed down from generation to generation. Due to the high levels of concentration required to control the dark forces from the underworld and those that dwell there, Demonologists are naturally introverted and untalkative, prefering their own company. They are a conduit from this world to the demon world and must ensure that the demons they invoke remain under their control at all times, although they can control a demon, it doesn't mean a demon will cooperate willingly. Demonologists are also adept at utilising the power of runes, dropping them in the field of battle go gain advantages for themselves and their party.


SAMPLE SKILLS.
(Still very much a work in progress I have left most numbers blank, and can be subject to change.)

Runic Arcana: Runic Arcana spells pretain to altering and changing the surrounding landscape, aiding or hindering through the power of runic inscriptions.
(They are dropped on the ground behind you, leaving a glowing symbol of various colours depending on the type of rune you use.)

Ionic Disturbance: For XX seconds foes near this dropped rune's AoE move 50% slower.

Lucifer's Greed: Any foes near this dropped rune's AoE suffer -2 health degeneration.

Familier's Gluttony :All allies near this runes AoE are blessed with a +4 health regeneration.

Pandemonium: Foes near this dropped rune's AoE are interrupted everytime they try to cast a spell.

Runic Prison: A ring of runic symbols surround an enemy. They are paralysed for XX seconds and cannot inflict or recieve damage.

Reaper's Pardon: Any fallen allies near this dropped rune are ressurrected with 50% max health and energy

Razor Earth: Foes near this dropped rune's AoE are crippled for XX seconds.



Demonics: These incantations utilize the powers and abilities of invoked demons to aid, hinder, curse or damage those on the battlefield.


Asmodeus' Aura: For XX seconds for every action you take, Asmodeus will deal an additional XX damage.

Astaroth's Claw: Target foe is struck for XX damage.

Astaroth's Hammer : Target foe is struck for XX damage and for XX seconds moves 25% slower.

Baal's Revenge: For 20 seconds this spell does nothing. When it ends, Baal's Revenge strikes all foes that struck you during that time for XX damage.

Behemoth's Might: For XX seconds target ally is blessed with XX % increased physical attack power.

Cheitan's Burden: Target foe suffers from exhaustion for XX seconds and loses -5 energy every time they attack.

Gorgon's Gaze: Target foe move 50% slower and suffers -2 health degeneration.

Leviathan's Envy: If target foe has more enchantments than you, they take XX ammount of damage per extra enchantment.

Mammon's Avarice: Steal XX energy from target ally. When Avarice ends both you and ally recieve twice the energy stolen.

Phantom Hex: This hex does nothing but if its removed by the target's ally, the target and the ally both recieve XX damage.

Seraphim's Palm: For XX seconds target ally is shielded by Seraphim and has a 50% reduction in damaged and cannot be hexed.




Possession: Possession spells directly affect a target's weaknesses and abilities causing them to behave in ways beyond their control.



Bane of a Warrior : For XX seconds enemy Warriors take twice as long to build adreneline.

Bane of a Ranger: For XX seconds enemy Rangers have twice the chance of their attacks missing.

Bane of a Monk: For XX seconds enemy Monks spells take twice as long to recharge.

Bane of an Elementalist: For XX seconds enemy elementalist magic takes twice the energy to cast.

Bane of a Mesmer: For XX seconds enemy Mesmer spells take twice as long to cast.

Bane of a Necromancer: For XX seconds enemy Necros Curses and hexes last half as long as normal.

Bane of a Ritualist: For XX seconds enemy Ritualists spirits expire 50% quicker.

Bane of an Assassin: For XX seconds enemy Assassins attack 50% slower.

Bane of a Dervish: For XX seconds enemy Dervish enchantments end 50% sooner.

Bane of a Paragon: For XX seconds enemy Paragons shouts have a 50% smaller area of effect.

Succubus' Lust:. For XX seconds target foe is unable to attack allies of the opposite sex.

Clouded Vision: For XX seconds enemys health bar will not change while being attacked. When this hex ends the real health level is revealed.

Gift of Oblivion: For XX seconds target foe recieves +2 health regeneration, when this spell ends foe recieves +4 degeneration for every second spell was in effect.

Puppet Master. For XX seconds target foe loses complete control of their actions and turns their attacks on their allies. Spell fails if foe is a higher level than you.

Forgotton Task: For XX secs target foe is unable to attack anyone on the battlefield.

Respite: For XX seconds ally with less than 30% max health will not be attacked by any foe.

The Spy Amoungst You: For XX seconds target foe is attacked by their adjacent allies.

Constructive Criticisims as always are welcomed.

Bane of a Dervish isn't really a bane of Dervishes. At least the way I play, the Dervish enchantments usually don't last long before I shuck them off for the 'when this enchantment ends' effect most Dervish enchantments have.

If I were you, I wouldn't make the Bane spells quite so specific. You can still have each one aimed at a given profession, but they shouldn't be completely useless when used against the wrong target. While there are some specific counters out there, most affect at least two professions (eg Spiritual Pain against Rangers and Ritualists, Vocal Minority against Warriors and Paragons, and so on). I'm also not sure you have the right banes there - for instance, I'd probably say increased casting times is more the bane of the Elementalist than the Mesmer (they're long enough to start with...) while, to be frank, an Elementalist running attunements could probably better cope with increased energy costs than most - as dual attunements give most of the energy cost back, while the energy management of other classes is considerably more sensitive to increased energy costs.

Succubus' Lust is amusing, but in order to implement it, the designers would need to implement male, female and irrelevant tags on each and every creature in the game, including previous chapters - while some critters are definitely male or female, I highly doubt that the gender of anything apart from player characters is recorded.

Puppermaster looks like a nice skill, but when you get to the end of the game, most mobs are above lvl 20, making the spell fail 100% of the time.

still, it would be nice if you make it last 10 secs max and have a 50/50 change of failing when casting on mobs with a higher level then you.

otherwise, nice job on the whole.

Thanks all, comments duly noted.
Draxynic, I agree on what you said about the Banes, on reflection they are too profession specific and useless on the wrong professions. Bit of rethink needed there I think.

The possession spells are all way too overpowered.

honestly, I htink the bane spells are fine the way they are. but they should all be elites or something. Let's say you are about to go into UW, where you know the biggest threat will be aataxes, you might want to consider bringing bane of warrior or bane of ranger. The only thing is, that these skills are situational, which is nothing new, we have an entire class devoted to situational skills (mesmer). So it really isn't a bad thing.

Clouded Vision would be a must in every team spike build, might want to balance it out a bit, not sure how though.

the rune skills are awesome, I love them all, and very balanced.

I think some of the other possession skills, mainly those targeting the actions of other players, would have to be re-thought a bit. Puppet master should be something more like this : For (2...8) seconds target foe has a (5%...50%) chance for all skills used to fail.

Look good.. some skills could use a bit of tweak, but over all seem well put.

I like the Bane skills.

What is the range effect of the rune skills? Also what could be its counter? (can you target, attack, and destory them? Can they be strip? Can they be Pickup?)

Thanks for the comments.
With reference to the rune skills, I would imagine them to be targetable and can be destroyed, much like Rt's spirits. I suppose a long recharge time might even them out a bit too.

With puppet master, I imagine a long casting time, short duration or high failure rate, depending on the level of foe you cast it on. Possession skills, on reflection do seem too overpowered, something to work on me thinks.

I saw these as working against secondary professions as well though (see fingers of chaos. I guess if you balanced these by making them Elite it would require a little more teamwork from more than one Demonologist though.

Mo/De and Famine ranger anyone? ;P
Monk of Base.

so these runes are like wards that you drop around? cool... some stuff may be a little overpowered, as already said by someone else. (This is like some sort of cross between a mesmer and a ward ele, right?)

add a primary attribute effect

Godlike.
Overpowered.
Any other words anyone?


Btw, skills related to sexes arent going to be toooo welcome id imagine, sounds kinda stupid to me.