Class Idea: Shadowdancer (Making It Viable.)

[Omegon]

Hello Folks!

On this post im looking to open the possibility of bringing in shadowdancer into the fold and making it not cheesey. So I propose this:

Old Shadowdancer Class Spread

1st +0 +0 +2 +0 hide in plain sight
2nd +1 +0 +3 +0 darkvision, evasion, uncanny dodge I
3rd +2 +1 +3 +1 shadow daze, summon shadow
4th +3 +1 +4 +1 shadow evade
5th +3 +1 +4 +1 defensive roll, uncanny dodge II
6th +4 +2 +5 +2
7th +5 +2 +5 +2 slippery mind
8th +6 +2 +6 +2
9th +6 +3 +6 +3
10th +7 +3 +7 +3 improved evasion, uncanny dodge III

Alangara Shadowdancer

1st +0 +0 +2 +0
2nd +1 +0 +3 +0 darkvision, evasion, uncanny dodge I
3rd +2 +1 +3 +1 shadow daze, summon shadow
4th +3 +1 +4 +1 shadow evade
5th +3 +1 +4 +1 defensive roll, uncanny dodge II
6th +4 +2 +5 +2 hide in plain sight
7th +5 +2 +5 +2 slippery mind
8th +6 +2 +6 +2
9th +6 +3 +6 +3 Shadowjump (Explained below)
10th +7 +3 +7 +3 improved evasion, uncanny dodge III


Additions and Revisions
Move Hide in plain sight to level 6, Providing investment and forfilling the 6 level rule.
Buff up the shadow summon (Give it higher AC, Haste and higher AB)
If we could create the feat shadowjump for level 9, It would encourage more people to play the class, The feat would be DM given and have to satisfy a roleplay request. Details are below!


At 4th level, a shadowdancer gains the ability to travel between shadows as if by means of a dimension door spell. The limitation is that the magical transport must begin and end in an area with at least some shadow.

A shadowdancer can jump up to a total of 20 feet each day in this way; this may be a single jump of 20 feet or two jumps of 10 feet each. Every two levels higher than 4th, the distance a shadowdancer can jump each day doubles (40 feet at 6th, 80 feet at 8th, and 160 feet at 10th). This amount can be split among many jumps, but each one, no matter how small, counts as a 10-foot increment.

For the servers idea of shadowjump, Keep it to 20 feet.

I hope this spurns some ideas to bring shadowdancer back into the fold, They are amazing classes and have a lot of lore about them too.

[tarashon]

Hmm...

In all honesty I believe our main reason for not allowing shadowdancers were the impact of HIPS. I cannot even remember the precise reason but if I recall it right HIPS is undetectable by truesight and it gave some weird balance isues with people going in and out of it. I really cannot remember. If someone can please explain its potential and limits to me again i would apreciate it. However if it IS "gamebreaking" then the level of it isnt really that interesting.


Shadowwalk i find rather interesting but I am truly not sure how to implement it. Perhaps Seeker can come up with some words here… I shall try to ask him…

As for the shadowsummon its a given it must be redesigned to "fit the standard of Alangara summons".

/tara

[Omegon]

Hi Tara,

Alright, I'll highlight the bits you mentioned and will provide some more feedback/ways that could be moved forward.

Hide in Plain Sight
"In all honesty I believe our main reason for not allowing shadowdancers were the impact of HIPS. I cannot even remember the precise reason but if I recall it right HIPS is undetectable by truesight and it gave some weird balance isues with people going in and out of it. I really cannot remember. If someone can please explain its potential and limits to me again i would apreciate it. However if it IS "gamebreaking" then the level of it isnt really that interesting."

So the description for Hide in Plain sight is as such:

Hide in plain sight
Type of feat: class
Prerequisite: shadowdancer 1

Specifics: The shadowdancer is able to use the hide skill even while being observed.
Note: This ability will not always be successful in the frenzy of combat, but disengaging from the enemy before attempting to hide in plain sight will succeed.

So essentially all hide in plain sight does is allow the player to hide without having to hide behind a corner and use hide to get away from enemies. Hide in plain sight is detectable by true seeing just like a hiding rogue without hide in plain sight.

Hide in plain sight has a cheese name to it due to it being used so frequently in PvP and spammed. Theres a very simple answer to this.

Place a cooldown on using Hide in plain sight to 6 seconds, I've seen it done on other servers before and I believe its scripted somehow. So for a TL;DR.

True seeing does see people in HipS, Just like classes that hide without it.
Bring in a 6 second cooldown on HipS if your worried about PvP spammers, Otherwise it wont make a different in player vs environment.

Shadowjump

Shadowwalk i find rather interesting but I am truly not sure how to implement it. Perhaps Seeker can come up with some words here… I shall try to ask him…

I believe the best way for shadowjump to be implemented is a teleport/Move character feature for 20 feet. Given via a widget and VFX using shadow shield to signify the shadow jump. Thats mechanically speaking.

In a lore fashion, Shadowjump should only be used when the shadowdancer can "jump" to a shadow that is at least half their height 20 feet away.

Summon!

As for the shadowsummon its a given it must be redesigned to "fit the standard of Alangara summons".

Luckily the shadowdancer summon does scale up with the shadowdancer as they level, It would be tweaking some variables to make it more Alangara friendly.

[tarashon]

Well i like the idea of making HIPs nonespamable then - that should work unless I am overseing something.

As for shadowjump it is precisely a question of mechanics. Basically i would find a need to not having too many jumps and secondly there need to be a good timer betwen them.
The reason for this is that we dont want people to be able to run/sneak through certain areas and this power could easely be a major spoiler there.
Another thing is that in PNP you would have to use these shadows. I find that hard to implement in NWN so basically it will become more of a local area teleport and for this to have any real use and "coolnessfactor" it must be an *instant*


These things being said I am still in favor of having it at it grants flavor and style to the class
( I'm just always vary of "exploits" and balance issues )

/tara