Weapons: The class would have two weapons, in the offhand/weapon slots. The primary would be extendable, razor sharp wires. The offhand would be for close range combat, and would resemble metallic claws.
Characteristics: This is NOT a thief class for one reason - speed is not what this class is built for. Rather, it's a physical counterpart to the mesmer class, focusing more on disabling physically oriented opponents. RE: Anti-Assassin class.
Attributes: (off the top of my head)
Dexterity (primary): Each point decreases the recharge time on all class related skills, and increases your wire count by one.(more to be explained) Each point increases the effectiveness of all class skills by a small amount.
Acrobatics: Each point increases the effects of "In Air" status, and related skills. Each point also decreases the negative effects slightly.
Wire Weilding: Each point increases the damage of wire-type weapons and related skills.
Claw Mastery: Each point increases the damage of claw-type weapons and related skills.
Armor Level: Probably something like 70 AL, with no extra bonuses save energy for some sets, or something like a built in rune for other sets, or one set that's made for characters that will spend a lot of time In Air.
Energy: 30 energy with 4 pips of regen or so.
Wire Count idea: The wire weapon looks similair to a whip in its passive state, coiled on the characters back. The wire is actually a seperate special, magical creature, whos skin easily serrates flesh and metal. The claws that your character wears special gloves, (claws), so they can handle the wire creature without hurting themselves. (yes, this is possible, more on this later)
The more skill the character has with the wire, the more pieces that they can split the wire up into, and manipulate at once. At least one wire is required for each skill, and many skills scale up in power with the more wires involved.
Okay, I mentioned earlier that the claws were required for wire manipulation. Some skills will be similair to say, Oath Shot, where they can cause self inflicted pain (Wiretap Scars), or in the worst case, fail with too low of Claw Mastery.
Wiretap Scars: A condition that is either self inflicted, or caused by a wire skill. The recipient of the condition loses 25 hp per second when this is active. (does not appear as degen, just a red number every second; in this way you can add degen to the mix)
In Air: This is like a condition, except that it can't be cured with a mend ailment. Several skills will put your character In Air, and there are positive and negative aspects to this. With more Acrobatics, the effects would change, obviously. You'd get more evade, and less damage from air attacks. It might appear something like this to start off with:
In Air Status: Your character has a 15% chance to evade all projectiles, and melee attacks miss. You lose 40 armor to air type attacks.
Anchored Wires: This class will be able to anchor parts of their wires to the ground, or cliff faces, mountain sides, etc. This does three things.
1. It decreases your wire count by one, (duh),
2. It causes an immovable, almost indispellable object to appear on the playing field. (maybe certain, high powered fire skills could burn the wires up) All characters will have to walk around the wire.
3. Anchored wires provide is a means of escape and movement, by providing the character with instant access to the end of the wire, and giving them the In Air status. Maybe you'd press a direction key to travel to the end of the wire.
Okay, all of this might be pretty confusing to a lot of people, so I figure I should just make up some skills to better illustrate the abilities of my proposed class.
Shard Blast (Wire Wielding):
Skill: Lose all wires in use. Your wire weapon detonates, throwing metallic shards into all nearby enemies. 45-100dmg, causes 3-8 seconds of bleeding.
Cost: 10e/0sec/15 sec recharge (well size)
Grapple (Dexterity):
Skill: Cast a wire in the direction your character moves next. Your character can then appear at the end of the wire at will, or anchor it to the ground, at the cost of 1 wire count.
Cost: 5-1 Adrenaline
Wire Seeker (Dexterity):
Skill: Using intuition, your character becomes connected with a targetted anchored wire. 50% chance of failure with less than 5 dex, causes Wiretap Scars with a Dexterity of less than 10.
Cost: 5e/0 cast/3 sec recharge
Unleashed Wire {E} (Wire Weilding):
Spell: For 5 seconds, you lose total control of your wire creature. Lose all wires in use, lose 10% current hp. All wires shoot out in all directions. This skill causes 3x(Wire Wielding) dmg, 10-20 seconds of bleeding, 90% reduction in movement speed on all affected targets.
Cost: 15 Adrenaline (ward size, affected targets depends on your wire count)
Face Swipe (Claw Mastery):
Melee Attack:Target suffers from blindness and bleeding for 4-11 seconds and takes an additional 10-20 damage.
Cost: 6 adrenaline
Unnatural Prediction (Acrobatics):
Skill: For 2-10 seconds, you anticipate the next offensive move against you. For melee attacks, the attack misses, and you gain In Air status. For magical attacks, you use 1 wire to shield you. Lose 1 wire count for (15/Dexterity Count) seconds.
Cost: 5 energy, 0 cast, 4 sec recharge.
Wire Mesh (Wire Wielding):
Skill: Send out 3-7 wires to entangle target foe. Foe suffers from 95% movement reduction, and cannot use physical attacks for 5-15 seconds. Wiretap scars with less than 8 Wire Wielding for 4 seconds.
Cost: 5 energy, 0 cast, 4 sec recharge.
Razor Fist (Claw Mastery):
Melee Attack: If target foe is entangled, you attempt an attack that deals +10-34 dmg. Target foe suffers from Razor Fist for 3hp degeneration.
Cost: 8 Adrenaline
Impaling Thrust (Wire Wielding):
Skill: Lose all wires in use. Target foe becomes impaled with (wire count) wires, taking 2-15 damage per wire, and suffers from a deep wound. Suffer from Wiretap Scars for 5-1 seconds.
Cost: 10e, 2 sec, 10 sec recharge.
Whipping Restraint (Dexterity):
Skill: Use one wire to slow an opponent's movement by 66%, attack by 33%. Target and you suffer from Wiretap Scars for 1-5, and 5-1 seconds.
Cost: 10e, 1 sec, 0 recharge
Backlash (Dexterity):
Skill: Use two wires to wrap around both of an opponent's arms. For each skill the foe uses, they recieve 5-10 damage and 1-2 seconds of Wiretap Scars.
Cost: 15e, 1 sec, 8 recharge
Lightning Thrust (Claw Mastery):
Melee Attack/Touch Spell: You strike for +5-10 damage, and +5-24 lightning damage.
Cost: 15e, 1 sec, 20 recharge
Bird's Eye (Acrobatics):
Skill: Use two wires to thrust yourself off the ground and gain In Air status. You may not use any skills for the duration of this skill. For 1-15 seconds, your party's radar range increases by 10-50 feet, and all party memebers recieve +3-8 to their attacks.
Lightning Blast (Wire Wielding):
Spell: All enemies being affected by wires recieve 25-60 lightning damage.
Cost: 25 e, 3 sec, 30 recharge
Swift Strike (Claw Mastery)
Stance: For 5-10 seconds, all your melee attacks deal +1-5 lightning damage. You recieve a 33% IAS.
Cost: 10 energy, 0 sec, 10 recharge
Lost Circuitry {E} (Wire Weilding):
Skill: Lose one wire count. This wire is embedded in target opponent for 5-10 seconds. For each second, the opponent takes 6-18 lightning damage.
Cost: 10 adrenaline, 10 energy
Metallic Earth (Wire Weilding):
Spell: Lose all wires in use. Sacrifice 5% hp. Each nearby opponent is snared with at least one wire, losing 66% movement speed and 33% attack speed for 6-12 seconds. All remaining wires are split up among the closest enemies. For each additional wire, opponents suffer -7% movement and -4% attack speed. You may use other wire skills, remember, you can't just grow extra wires. The effect of the spell will be lost on the enemies no longer affected by wires.
Cost: 20e, 2 sec, 20 recharge
Electric Soul {E} (Wire Weilding)
Spell: For each wire affecting an enemy, you steal 1-3 energy.
Cost: 5e, 1/4 sec, 20-30 recharge
Signet of Reversal {E} (Dexterity)
Signet Skill: For 10-30 seconds, your energy regeneration reverses. If you have negative energy, it becomes positive.
Cost: 5e, 1/4 sec, 40 recharge
Acid Charge (Dexterity)
Preparation: Your next skill used is charged with the lightning attribute.
Cost: 10e, 2 sec, 10 recharge
Winged Stance (Acrobatics)
Stance: For 8-18 seconds, you gain 33% movement speed while In Air, and 1-3 energy whenever you're hit by elemental damage.
Cost: 10e, 0 sec, 20 recharge
Cursed Stance (Acrobatics)
Stance: For 8-18 seconds, you reflect all status ailments back to the attacker, but suffer 1 second of wiretap scars per condition reflected.
Cost: 10e, 0 sec, 20 recharge
Metal Storm {E} (Acrobatics)
Spell: For 8-18 seconds, you lose all wires and suspend yourself In Air. All surrounding opponents suffer from Wiretap Scars and take 1-5 lightning damage per second (25% AP). This spell can be stopped with any non melee interrupt.
Cost: 25e, 1 sec, 40 recharge
Foresight (Acrobatics)
Stance: For 8-18 seconds, all skills recharge and cast 33% faster. When this stance ends, you lose 2hp for each point of energy have.
Mind Adaption (Dexterity)
Spell: For 8-18 seconds, you gain 12 of the primary attribute of target ally.
Cost: 10e, 1 sec, 20 recharge
Some side notes. If someone touches an anchored wire, they suffer from Wiretap Scars as long as the remain in contact with it, and 1-3 seconds afterward. "Entagle" cannot be dispelled without fire magic. If you are on a wire, and it becomes dispelled with fire magic, you suffer from burning for 4-2 seconds, depending on your Dexterity. I might have left some lose ends on this, but I tried my best. Please post comments/criticism/questions. And ArenaNet, read this and use it!
::EDIT:: Sketches posted. I'll draw an "in action" sketch later, as the wire weapon will look quite different when it's in use.
