Paladin alternative

[Evil Storm]

Paladin alternative

I've heard about a class described as a "dark paladin" (warlock or something like that)... This should be great... But it's all speculation...

this is what was written in another topic by mordred. If Blizzard does not want to add Paladin class in D3, then it might be we will see a Dark Knight or a Death Knight, I am a big fan of Warcraft and WoW, so I was thinking adding this class in D3 as a Dark Knight, for example, will be a great idea. What are the benefits of it?

1. A character that will remind us of a good old D2 Paladin
2. It will not be the same Paladin and it will have a different class name, probably adding to it a few Paladin's abilities like 1-2 auras
3. Paladin fans will not be dissapointed
4. And what is very important, for example, for me. ->> It is good to be bad +) Or at least pretend that u are bad.


What do u think about this idea guys ??

 

[Sepharia]

Re: Paladin alternative

It's been suggested several times before, and I'm certainly not against it. At the same time though, part of me would like to see them come up with something completely different rather than trying too hard to adhere to the Diablo II class molds.

Edit: Not that I think they have so far. Despite some differences, the three classes so far feel very new (to me anyway). They could pull it off I'm sure, but they'd need some good new mechanics to make it not just feel like a paladin with new graphics.

 

[tomhyde]

Re: Paladin alternative

While I too am hoping the D3 has at least 1 more melee based class (and a hybrid melee/caster class to make up the 5) I don't think adding something like a dark paladin or "death knight" is exactly the right way forward.

No offence and don't get me wrong I too love WoW and all blizzard games in fact but the Death Knight is a WoW thing. Its a fair certainty a fair few people who play WoW will move to D3 even if they never played D2. After all they want to sell lots of copies and make lots of money. What would bother me is people might not like the death knight in D3 because it isn't like the one in WoW. No gargoyles or death and decay or anything like that.

By putting in an old class architype into D3 is taking quite a risk. It could be argued that people who played paladins in D2 might not like the new paladin unless he was exactly the same as the D2 version. If he wasnt as powerful or as cool or whatever people might just dismiss him out of hand simply because hes not how he used to be. Its a limited argument i concede but a likely concern or at least a consideration on Blizzards behalf.

They face the issue with the barbarian. Its well known the barbarian wasn't originally ment to be in D3. As the melee fighter went through development he became closer and closer to the barbarian. In the end they threw caution to the wind and put him in D3. They had to add all his classic moves like whirlwind and leap to keep everyone happy. Could you imagine the uproar in D3 if the barbarian didn't have whirl wind?

One other point. In D2 all the heroes are essentially good. Diablo and Diablo 2 at their cores are the stories of 1-8 of mankinds greatest heroes against the forces of evil. A deathknight doesn't really fit into that picture very well. It does in WoW as the backstory explains but frankly I still find even that to be very weak. Even the necromancer isn't described as evil. People just aren't paticularly comfortable with his methods. He isn't out right evil.


What I'm trying to get at is they need to move D3 away from D2 or at least try and reduce the amount D3 is compared to D2. Afterall its very hard following up one of the most successful games of all time with a sequal 8 years later. Its time for a complete change of scenery. A new art style, a new story and new characters.

 

[5zigen]

Re: Paladin alternative

I'm with Tom.

I'm all for playing whatever, but when the goal of the game is to work with angels and defeat demons it's questionable to have "dark" characters, and personally I thought that the necromancer lore in D2 was a bit of a stretch to make him fit into the game as a good character. I can just imagine the lore of a "death knight" or something similar...

A replacement to the paladin is somewhat obvious as a holy based archetype there are many options, Priest, Bishop, Monk... Any kind of holy smiter would seem to work.

 

[Kiroptus]

Re: Paladin alternative

I think D3 is leading to a more "neutral" direction. The classes are neight fully in darkness or in light so far, sometimes its a mix of both.

The WD does look a bit evil but he controls more of the power of the spirits and animals of the jungle, plus people who played the demo said that he has a "heroic" dialogue when speaking to the guard near tristam. So he isnt evil as he looks.

The Wizard is also quite neutral, she may be arrogant and all but she is doing her part, slaying monsters and demons.

The Barbarian is the brute, war-scarred hero we all know.

And the ranger could very well be the desert raider we saw in a Blizz con panel, which is again, if our speculations about him are correct, he is quite a neutral character.

Maybe its also the thematic chosen for D3, the light is heaven, dark is hell and in the middle there is the mix of good and evil with mankind, so a death knight or a proposerly "dark" paladin would feel a bit out of place now but I may be wrong, its just what I see so far looks to be heading into that direction.

 

[stillman]

Re: Paladin alternative

I found the twisting of a necromancer into a good guy 'fighting for the forces of light' in d2 sounded very forced and akward. I don't want to run into that same problem in d3.

Actually, I think the barb is 'fighter' enough to take the place of both fighter and paladin roles. I'm hoping the archer class will have some potential as a melee fighter much like the zon, so if we have a paladin-type of class, that would be 3 'fighters' when the barb seems to be good enough. Plus Blizzard declares the WD is fierce in melee too, so that would be 4.

 

[Bad Ash]

Re: Paladin alternative

you all realize that the D3 team makes the lore to go with the chars right?

If it is an "evil" character, they will make damn sure you know why he is also a hero. they wont just say "ohz, here is an evilz char, good lucks lolz"

 

[5zigen]

Re: Paladin alternative

you all realize that the D3 team makes the lore to go with the chars right?

If it is an "evil" character, they will make damn sure you know why he is also a hero. they wont just say "ohz, here is an evilz char, good lucks lolz"

Right. But there is a limit to suspension of disbelief, and if you can tell they're making up the lore to fit the character I would say they are doing something wrong. Lore should seem like the source of the character, not the other way around.

In D2 you could really tell they went out of their way to make some necromancer lore so players could play with dead things and not be "evil." while some people were really into the necro lore, to a lot of people it felt really forced and disjunct from the general storyline.

The WD feels much less evil than even the necro did, despite the tons of lore about how necros aren't evil, which makes it more immersive because it's easier to believe that the WD is a good guy, despite his playing with dead things, because he doesn't FEEL evil.

 

[GuardianHadriel]

Re: Paladin alternative

By putting in an old class architype into D3 is taking quite a risk. It could be argued that people who played paladins in D2 might not like the new paladin unless he was exactly the same as the D2 version. If he wasnt as powerful or as cool or whatever people might just dismiss him out of hand simply because hes not how he used to be. Its a limited argument i concede but a likely concern or at least a consideration on Blizzards behalf.

They face the issue with the barbarian. Its well known the barbarian wasn't originally ment to be in D3. As the melee fighter went through development he became closer and closer to the barbarian. In the end they threw caution to the wind and put him in D3. They had to add all his classic moves like whirlwind and leap to keep everyone happy. Could you imagine the uproar in D3 if the barbarian didn't have whirl wind?

One other point. In D2 all the heroes are essentially good. Diablo and Diablo 2 at their cores are the stories of 1-8 of mankinds greatest heroes against the forces of evil. A deathknight doesn't really fit into that picture very well. It does in WoW as the backstory explains but frankly I still find even that to be very weak. Even the necromancer isn't described as evil. People just aren't paticularly comfortable with his methods. He isn't out right evil.

Well, you´vve got quite a few points there, well done!

 

[peasant]

Re: Paladin alternative

Well, introducing an 'evil' character isn't nearly as difficult as you all are making it out to be. I mean, it's presumable that whatever Diablo has planned probably doesn't bode well for the mortals. And just because a character is evil doesn't mean s/he wants the world to burn in Hell for all eternity with a Devil himself lording over all humanity. The 'evil' character's motivations can be entirely self serving (i.e. he wants to ensure Diablo doesn't succeed so he can live and continue his reign of terror) where as the 'good' heroes keep him around so that he's accounted for and because he's simply that powerful (and therefore, necessary) lore-wise.

 

[sinned]

Re: Paladin alternative

I found the twisting of a necromancer into a good guy 'fighting for the forces of light' in d2 sounded very forced and akward. I don't want to run into that same problem in d3.

The lore presents the necromancers as the guardians of balance, not fighters for the forces of light. Actually, the lore in Sin War makes the D2's paladin look stupid since the High Heavens aren't all that pro-human .

If we are to venture into Heavens and fight angels as some predict then a holy/light-based char will make as much sense as a dark/evil-based one.

 

[Bad Ash]

Re: Paladin alternative

Right. But there is a limit to suspension of disbelief, and if you can tell they're making up the lore to fit the character I would say they are doing something wrong. Lore should seem like the source of the character, not the other way around.

In D2 you could really tell they went out of their way to make some necromancer lore so players could play with dead things and not be "evil." while some people were really into the necro lore, to a lot of people it felt really forced and disjunct from the general storyline.

The WD feels much less evil than even the necro did, despite the tons of lore about how necros aren't evil, which makes it more immersive because it's easier to believe that the WD is a good guy, despite his playing with dead things, because he doesn't FEEL evil.

It doesnt matter though. You know what does matter? Is the char fun to play. with the necro being left out of D3, the community is up in arms and the necro was obviously one of if not the fav. character across the board (not mine personally...), and you didnt hear one person complaining about how the lore felt forced. If the char is fun to play the background info does not matter.

bashiok said it best. ALL the lore is just people sitting around thinking it up.

 

[5zigen]

Re: Paladin alternative

It doesnt matter though. You know what does matter? Is the char fun to play. with the necro being left out of D3, the community is up in arms and the necro was obviously one of if not the fav. character across the board (not mine personally...), and you didnt hear one person complaining about how the lore felt forced. If the char is fun to play the background info does not matter.

bashiok said it best. ALL the lore is just people sitting around thinking it up.

You obviously weren't around when D2 was in beta. Lots of people thought the lore felt forced, and while it is all people making stuff up, there is good lore and bad lore.

Blizzard doesn't need another Space Goat Demon Paladins (Draenei from WoW). It "works" but it detracts from how immersive the game is because it seems like it was made up on the spot, not like they just have some story.

The problem isn't just with the lore of the character, it's with doing quests and helping people in the course of the game, along with NPC's helping you. If you're playing a actual evil character, it wouldn't make sense to have the general people help you the same way they would be helping the other warriors of "light" it just detracts from the believability of the game.

And a game based on evil characters, where you have to kill people and eventually make your way to the heavens to fight angels would be insanely creative imo, (but would probably draw much scorn). The problem arises when you are trying to fit patently good characters with patently evil characters into the same storyline doing the same quests. At that point doing quests and helping NPCs all the sudden becomes about getting loot and experience, not about making sense with the lore.

And just to talk about the most obvious argument, that the "evil" character helps other people so he can become rich or more powerful, but if they were truly evil they would just lie or kill the npc, take their money or loots, and save themselves the work. It just doesn't make sense to have an evil character shoehorned into the same storyline and questlines as a good character...

 

[peasant]

Re: Paladin alternative

You act as if this has never happened before when in fact, literature (not to mention real life) is filled with examples. Not only that, Blizzard themselves have employed it before in Starcraft. A list of examples can be found here.

Regarding motivation, it's pretty obvious; there's a greater evil approaching. There's a proverb that says 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend'. This would explain why the 'evil' character would help NPCs (it furthers his own goal/self preservation) and likewise help him in return for the same reason, if somewhat reluctantly. This can be displayed through dialogs and NPC responses (which are already different depending on which character you play).

 

[konfeta]

Re: Paladin alternative

The whole "forced" issue with Necromancer lore seems to be rooted in "making undead = bad guy" archetype in general fantasy rather than the Necromancer lore itself.

I never felt it was forced. From the beginning it struck me as a great way to make a dark character that completely bypassed the whole issue of converting bad guys into good guys. Nobody shoehorned a bad guy into a good guy. They reimagined the Necromancer as a whole, then used him. Vastly different things.

That said, no to Dark Paladins and whatnot. We already have plenty of grey in character choices. Creating bad guys and then making them arbitrarily good to assuage the "I wanna play the super cool bad guy" crowd is entirely unnecessarily. Now, on the other hand, actually create an interesting backstory for such a class archetype and we are in business. Necromancer, Witch Doctor, Vizjerai Mage, Wizard, Assassin - all of these guys have sufficiently interesting and believable backstories without the whole "being bad but turning good" crap.

 

[webbt01]

Re: Paladin alternative

I am a strong believer that the new paladin class is going to be a cleric, "The cleric is one of the standard playable character class in the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game.[1] Clerics are versatile figures, both capable in combat and skilled in the use of divine magic. Clerics are powerful healers due to the large number of healing and curative magics available to them. With divinely-granted abilities over life or death, they are also able to repel or control undead creatures. Whether the cleric repels or controls undead is dependent on its alignment. It is the only class to be in every version of Dungeons & Dragons without a name change." Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleric_(Dungeons_%26_Dragons)

However, I do remember there was a blue post stating that Diablo fans are going to hate the next class announcement and 2 things spring to mind.
The first been the Ranger class which will be very similar to the WoW hunter causing fans to whinge and moan about WoW ripping bla bla rant rant. Now please take this with a grain of salt people, the second could be the introduction of the HEALER class type, causing even more upset and rage! We all know Blizzard love their "holy trinity" tank, healer & dps system and I wouldnt be surprised if we see a priest introduced in some different form. Not exactly sure how this will effect the globe system but I am sure they could work in conjunction with each other.

Keen to hear your thoughts...

 

[Telzen]

Re: Paladin alternative

The hating thing was talking about the wizard. We are supposed to love the next one. And now that I think of it I said in another thread somewhere that the love comment was about the wizard, everyone keeps bringing them up to much and its confusing me.

Also they said every class was going to be dps.

 

[webbt01]

Re: Paladin alternative

The hating thing was talking about the wizard. We are supposed to love the next one. And now that I think of it I said in another thread somewhere that the love comment was about the wizard, everyone keeps bringing them up to much and its confusing me.

Also they said every class was going to be dps.

So is everyone meant to hate or love the next class, I am now also confused :crazyeyes:

Now that I think about it they couldn't bring a pure healer into Diablo, it just wouldn't work. So I will have stick with the Cleric then.

 

[Telzen]

Re: Paladin alternative

He joked about us hating it when talking about the wizard. I think since all the Necro fans were pissed about the WD, he thought maybe the same would happen with the wizard replacing the sorc. Then after the wizard was revealed and everyone loved it I think he was asked how we'd feel about the next and he said we'd love it. So the 4th is the one we are supposed to love.

 

[mordred]

Re: Paladin alternative

The next will be the Archivist...