Tracking is never going to get any significant trap-related upgrades so long as pit remains as it is, which is both a good and bad thing.

I... what? You mean that submitting a new druidry idea without a corresponding report from BT has the same chance of going through as a unique skillset (that is shared among guilds, but dosn't have different skills for different guilds, as druidry does now)?

I'm saying that if you carbon cloned druidry into two separate skillsets (which can't involve all THAT much coding, both skills would be exactly the same except where they already differ) which means that reports like 563 (treefrogs) that may have been denied because it would leave us with more afflicting from the exact same skillset as BT, would now be in different skills thaat could compensate on their own time and go their own direction over time.

Which part of that is not correct? I can see how it would be some work to split it like that but it's not coding anything new from scratch (two 'new' skillsets. four if you count the 'new' wiccan skills that are split). It also seems like having actually different skillsets, instead of sharing absolutly all of our skills, would provide both a morale/ego/rp-capability(can you say different cudgels?) boost and more freedom to envoy.

No, I'm saying that a new druidry idea for Hartstone without one for BT has a MUCH higher chance of going through than having two different druidry skillsets.

(If for no reason other than because I'm pretty sure the latter will never happen!)

We could certainly split them into two identical skillsets, and the reality is that if they feel a change isn't necessary, /it is still not going to be necessary/.

Everything you want can be done without two skillsets - and it's been said in the past we would consider it. What /isn't/ said is that they'll rubber stamp anything/everything that goes before them simply because of that. And no one has ever said Blacktalon Druidry needs a new skill every time a Hartstone Druidry skill is added.

Okay, that makes more sense. Though it's still impossible to tell why exactly things aren't wanted and it's not always possible to get a clear answer (and I've gotten a definate vibe in the past that things weren't done because they would make the skillset lopsided), if something isn't feasible, isn't wanted, or is a wanted thing but too powerful as suggested.

We're still yet to see anything that backs this up though. Even changes like giving the fae new summon messages to refresh wiccans and bring the old fae in line with the new fae haven't been seen. At the end of the day until the players see some proof that your belief that you can make the meaningful changes that these threads are hoping for without separating the skills (like every other guild in the game, except warriors) is valid, why should we stop pushing for these changes?

And, at what point do guild specific abilities in a skill stop being slight modifications? Specifically, think about where this is employed elsewhere and to what extent.

From the perspective of an rp'er/influencer: I love being a druid. But there is little in Druidry itself to attract me. I learnt cudgel because, well it's cudgel. But the only other skills in there I make use of are meld (for the influence boost) and totemcarve (because its is expected of me, and I'm actually starting to enjoy sweeping the forest for elders). Druidry is just boring for the non-combatant/influencer/basher. There's nothing above cudgel I even want. Stag and Ecology are far more attractive, because they have a number of cool things, like facepaints, bonded totems, familiars, damage protectors and so on. I stay druid because of those - and it's probably silly because bards also get ecology, and their other skills are better for influencing than stag is. But I don't want to be a bard.

On the other hand, I do like the fact that the druid guilds all share druidry, and that nature and totems is shared with the wiccans. It give the communes a different feel to the cities - a communal feel if you wish.

I just wish Druidry had a few more 'bells and whistles'.

I am still new to this envoy thing, but why not do special reports that would allow for a more comprehensive development of differences between HS and BT.

Usually, special reports need to be asked for admin side. We can write up special reports all day (and some do), but the vast majority of them aren't looked at fully, usually for good reason.

A point which I still wish to clarify is the fact that Wiccan and Druids share the same basic skills (Nature and Totems). I am rather not sure why Druids and Wiccans are two different archetypes, if anything Wiccans seem more of Druids that choose a more spiritual master specialization. The Wiccan skill also only gives the ability to summon entities that follow you around for passive abilities, and only a few of them being offensive, if anything wiccans seem to be rather lacking in the "spiritual powers" department.

So summarize, Nature and Totems is the same skills Druids have. Their tertiary skills seem more just handed down from/shared with the cities (never understood astrology for wiccans). Lastly, Wiccan is the same skill shared with SD and their Moon/Night skill is shared with warriors. I think at the least Nature should be replaced for Wiccans with a basic skill more suited to them that could perhaps allow them to utilize more abilities that could work alongside getting their kills in a solo fight, not to mention reflecting their more spiritual side.

In the long run, Wiccans need more uniqueness and differentiation.

Warning: Longwindedness ahead. If you are easily bored, or dislike discussions of IG history, turn back now. You've been warned.

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To understand why Wicca and Druidry are shared between the different communes despite their modern differences, you have to look at the histories. Wicca and Druidry are the result of an ancient agreement between the communes and the Maeve, a magical construct created by the Elder Gods during the Elder Wars to marshall the numerous spirits awaked in the forests of Lusternia against the Soulless Gods. Its sole task was to protect the forests by any means necessary using the resources allocated to it. Those resources include:

-The contents of the four forests the Maeve was created to protect, including the animals, trees and other natural features of the geography.
-The ethereal reflections of those four forests.
-The eight Great Spirits given over to protecting the suriviving forests, Crow, Night, Moon, Stag, Bear, Lake, Sun and Lion.
-The fae and animals spirits controlled by said Great Spirits.
-All of the other forest spirits which, while not directly under the control of those eight Great Spirits, were still present in Faethorn to be bound to the Maeve's will.
-Various divine artifacts, constructs and creations left in Faethorn or on the ethereal reflections.

During the Divine Wars, the Maeve used Faethorn as a reserve force to reinforce any forest that was begining to fail under Soulless attacks, as a sort of "Allied Command" for all forest defense opperations and as a storehouse for various strategic resources which could be used from the safety of the reletively unattackable Faethorn realm.

The ethereal reflections, meanwhile, were a combination opperational theatre command post and fallback position against the Soulless who, for whatever reason, found themselves unwilling or unable to attempt to breach into the Ethereal Plane. Each ethereal reflection contained two of the commanders of the various theatres of the war, Stag and Moon in Serenwilde, Sun and Lion for Jojobo and so forth. Each would deploy their own specialized fae and animal spirits to their own forests where they could directly oversee them and have the ability to rapidly deploy them to hold off initial Soulless advances while the cavalry from Faethorn arrived.

During the Vernal Wars, Kiakodia made a mutally beneficial alliance with the Maeve to use her own powers to assisst and bolster the various nature spirits that the Maeve commanded in exchange for the Maeve's agreement to defend the mortal races that Kiakodia sheltered within the forest. This agreement, after Kiakodia's death during the Great Sacrifice to defeat Kethuru, formed the basis for Ellindel Treeheart's (and, presumably, her Jojobo counterpart's) pact(s) with Faethorn wherein Ellindel and her Wiccan followers would heal and defend the forests in exchange for the backing of the forest, protection against harm, bountiful harvests and incredible supernatural powers granted by the fae and other Elder leftovers. The Druids are an extension of this agreement, wherein Ellindel's husband, Glinshari, and his followers, were given direct physical command over the forests by the fae in exchange for their assistance in constructing the completeing the physical halves of the Ethereal Moorings the Elders built to protect the forests and for expanding the forests themselves using the aforementioned incredible supernatural powers.

The basic point of all of this is that, up until very recently, the differences between Ackleberry, Glomdoring and Serenwilde were about as different as Post-WWII Germany and Post-WWII Japan. They all had similiar problems, similar leaders in charge of resolving those problems with similiar goals for the various regions and only differed fundementally in the resources and individual characters of the regions in question. As you can imagine, the groups in charge of the two regions have very similiar methods, equipment and skillsets, only differing in the unique local varients that could only be found local to the regions in question. Like the the Emperor of Japan. Or, in this case, the King of the Redcaps.

The bolded is the most important part though, the Hartstone call on the power of the forest, the Blacktalon call on the power of the woods, jojobo druids call on the power of the jungle and acklberry druids call on, rainforest perhaps?.

Faethorn is different to all four, yes it is most likely a mechanical thing to stop Serenwilde from holding Glomdoring corrupting Faethorn over their heads, but further in the mechanical Ackleberry and Jojobo are probably going to have their own forest types too, otherwise you'd have two enemies using the same terrain type and that would be bad.

The question that is coming to mind now is, How would the (forest) kill you?

I don't mean in general or the commune, I mean the forest itself. Each forest is a living entity, yes, through the spirits they are connected back to the Maeve and faethorn which reinforces them when they are in need but they are still separate. How many millennia have passed since what you have talked about occured, Gloriana was tainted and corrupted into Glomdoring (pre-wyrd event) and yet, how much of a difference has the impact of that on the forest been reflected in their druidic abilities.

Ackleberry thematically could be very cutesy with its effects, giving the feeling that it is open and inviting, flowers and happiness everywhere and then "OMG, WHY DO THE BEARS HAVE CHAINSAWS!!!"
Serenwilde seems cyclic, ancient forces protect the forest and those who harm it could find themselves trapped in the unending circles of life.
Glomdorings perhaps mists and mystery, the forest has evolved and strange beasts that perform unspeakable acts on your body will come to its defence. (could clash further with serenwilde if glomdoring is seen to be all about pushing evolution and the future while Serenwilde is "stuck in the past")
Someone else can to jojobo.

But the aim overall is to show that even if they all started off in the same place, they are all different. They might have all had the same druidic powers when the fae first taught them, but over time they learned to call on their own forests more and more as opposed to the perhaps... sylvan centric skills shared through the connection to faethorn. The way that this would be shown in the requested revision is like all archetypes, they share their base primary skill but then they branch off in their own direction.

With fae, we've learned about other fae that exist, perhaps these can be/are tied to the Maeve as well, willing to serve Glomdoring and allowing the balance between the forests to be maintained?

You won't find sunshine and happiness in a rainforest. The trees are really tall and their canopy tend to prevent sunlight from ever reaching the ground. One would only find shade-loving plants growing underneath these great trees. Also Rainforests and jungles tend to go hand-in-hand. "In contrast, a jungle allows some light in, and jungles are often located surrounding rainforests, near water sources like rivers. Parts of the Amazon rainforest are really jungles, because the tree canopy doesn’t fully block the light. "

Rainforests/Jungles also have the largest biodiversity, which is also supported by Lusty's lore within the book of Aslarn:
"Oh, within the jungles there were many fine creations, some of the most artistic and creative works of the Seventh Circle could be seen in the many kinds of monkeys and florid birds, the long necked giraffes and graceful gazelles, the colourful boa constrictors and enormous elephants, but it was Lorella's great lovely cats that were my secret favorites."

It wasn't really a suggestion, it was just thrown in there because the other three have their own types. Though with the description of the jungle it seems likely, if given their own spec, that the Jojobo druids could be all about animals with a few exotic plants.

Agreed. People constantly want more toys, it seems. Guildhop more!

Aye... New cities still need their unreleased bardic/monkish guilds and certain Warrior specs, such as bonecrusher, still require a rework. The day we can spare the time and resource to 'diversify' commune skills is when the all the kinks and quirks in the current combat system is smoothed out. We'll have to live with Greleag's explanation of why certain commune abilities are similar to one another for the time being. Just be glad that you guys have unique totem specializations (Hart/Crow/Night/Moon) to differentiate from one another. Think of what it'd be like if it followed Achaea's class system with each org (ex: Sentaari Monk=Ebonfist Monk w/ tekura+kaido+telepathy) sharing the same class skillsets with every other city. Pretty much one of the reasons why I stopped playing there after 2-3 years...

To be honest, from a lore-perspective, I do not understand any of your arguments, except for perhaps Greleag's, and perhaps I am just misunderstanding it all (if so, forgive me!). If we are aiming to show "that even if they all started off in the same place, they are all different," then this is already understood and seen, perhaps better with druids than from wiccans, however. All druids have the same "druidic powers when the fae first taught them" (Nature), "but over time they learned to call on their own forests more and more" (their respective Druidry skills). The practice of Druidry is fundamentally the same; the only difference between them is the effects that are produced - as evidenced through squirrels instead of a crow murder or spiders instead of a swarm of bees. I am not entirely sure what you are arguing about, Saran, except for Blacktalon and Hartstone druids should have separate master-level main skillsets (which would be a.) a pain b.) not happening and c.) just weird from the perspective of if they don't have druidry, what makes them druids?).

The idea is essentially the same for wiccans, except the only difference being the effects of their respective wicca skillsets is their own variant fae; otherwise the practice of Wicca is the same across the board (except for maybe Jojobo, seeing as we have sun druids?).

Now, this isn't to say I do or do not agree with the addition of new skills to help make MD/SD Wicca and BT/HS Druidry different, but I think we are beating this horse to death!



Alas, Serenwilde is confined in the geography of a cycle. People need to think outside the box.

If Pyromancers don't have Aquamancy, what makes them Mages?

EDIT: wow, iPhone fail.

If you want to claim that the nature skill is the original druidic power then you ignore that wiccans have it as well.

If we consider that druidry is the fae teaching mortals how to call on the "defensive systems" of the forests that they live in then the most rational explanation is that the druids are calling on faethorn more than their own forests, they've learned a few personal tricks in the millennia since druidry was first uncovered.

All forests have briars, roots, spores, pollen, treelife, treebane, thorns, swarms, sap, storms, thorn lashes and fury. In say... two miilennia the druids of Serenwilde has uncovered three secrets unique to that forest

As to c... no offence but this is rather face-palm worthy. With the exclusion of Wiccans and Druids, not one archetype in the game is defined as a new archetype by its spec choice. The primary base skill is what defines each archetype and then their spec separates the guilds from each other.

The OP is asking that druids and wiccans be like all other archetypes in the game, defined by the base primary skill. What would make a druid a druid? Let me ask you...

What makes a Mage a Mage? What makes a Nihilist a Nihilist? A Harbinger? A Shofangi?
You can answer all of these questions with one word.

You are a Warrior if you have Knighthood, you are a Mage if you have Elementalism, you are a Guardian if you have Cosmic, you are a Bard if you have Music and you are a Monk if you have Kata. Take away Warriors, Druids and Wiccans and you can define any player by their primary skill spec. Even if it is their only skill you can link them directly to their guild. Secondaries are non-optional and Tertiaries add a bit of flavour.



Wiccans all calling on the same fae except x, y and z comes back to them calling on Faethorn not their own forest. It would all fine if that was in the base skill, like Aeromancer being able to call on a few very basic fire abilities. But, given that the fae go to Serenwilde and then go back to Faethorn. Wouldn't this mean that the Pooka that is helping you today could have helped kill you yesterday?

Also, the mention of Sun druids is rather suspect because if there is only Sun and Lion bound to Maeve then Lion would need to serve as the Wiccan spirit, even though we already know there are sun fae, and would need to have avatars rather than aspects so sun would need to have aspects rather than avatars. Of course the other possibility is that sun leads both the druids and the wiccan but that has a whole other set of issues.



Then add some? I will be quite happy to be proven wrong if the admin added unique skills that differentiated them enough, but in the four or five months it has been since this last came up druidry and wicca remain the same. And I still ask the question, how far would you divide up the skill to make them meaningfully different and how far do you divide up a skill like this before it is effectively just two separate skills smashed together.


With Etherwilde, Stag and Moon. Yeah cycles, path twist arguably points to the concept of being trapped in the forest, going in a straight line yet running around in circles. If you wanted something seasonal and timeless, they could call upon the seasons, stepping through them with each tick to different ends, which moves the defenses of Serenwilde a tad away from the physical forest and towards mysterious forces within the forest manipulating the weather and so on.

Yeah, Faethorn was originally forest, it was changed to sylvan after Glom's release so that we didn't have an advantage over them.

I still don't see why people think the sharing of Nature between Wiccans and Druids is a problem. The skills in nature are a very small percentage of the abilities available to the two classes, and a lot of them are very utilitarian - Flow, Torc, Barkskin, Rooting, Gate. They are, after all, low level skills. The important skills are in the specialisations.

The fae don't serve the Shadowdancers because they want to. That's the reason for the whole...tav'rai is it called? I can't remember. So I see no problem with a pooka switching sides. It's not like they have a choice in the matter.

Oh, but I never said this, you are putting words in my mouth! I very well know that wiccans have it as well. Wiccans and druids draw from the same source!



Yes, the fae taught mortals druidry. However, I am not certain why you are making a "rational" leap to druids calling on Faethorn "more than their own forests." I assume because you mentioned all those shared Druidry abilities; however, those abilities deal with the actual body of a forest - trees, briars, roots, thorns, etc. I do not see anything wrong with that seeing as that both Glomdoring and Serenwilde are forests. Their few personal tricks are those that are adapted uniquely to their variation of Druidry. Sure, more can be added, but let us not forget that those distinctions that already exist are a comment that druidry is subtly different because of the environment/totemic following of a singular druid. Apologies for confusing Pathtwist with Swarm, however!



Perhaps not the best, yeah, but it is still something to be said. What makes a druid a druid in the mechanical sense is that they have Druidry, precisely because wiccans and druids share Nature. A character with Nature can EITHER be a wiccan OR a druid in terms of archetype; their archetype is more dependent on the specialisation. I was of the thought that you meant to change the specialisations to be distinct things (because all guardians share Cosmic, their differences lie in whether they have Nihilism/Celestialism/Transmology/Harmonics). I am happy to admit that I didn't understand what you are talking about.



Why would wiccans call on their own forest? The focus of wiccans has always been based on the fae and Faethorn, not on the actual, physical forest. You are also assuming here that the fae you summon are meant to be the fae that you gather for Moon/Night. From a roleplay perspective, there are probably more than the 30+ fae that are in Faethorn and it is makes sense to assume that you are summoning many of them.



On this last point, I was commenting more on the general theme and thought process of Serenwilde here!