My idea would be to 'adapt' current mechanics to create the classes, since powers are level-coded, we can mix and match to create the style that we want. With some foresight, this shouldn't be too much of a problem. Thing is, the Class Features become quite interesting to adjudicate.
So I ask the boards if we can brainstorm together some good ideas for the Bending disciplnes! I've already got some preliminary ideas:
Fire is a Striker, quite obviously, though they do a few other things. This one should be quite easy to do, actually. Warlock and Ranger powers with possibly Wizard or Swordmage powers as needed. Class features to do more damage and enhance mobility/survivability.
Water is a Leader, with obvious healing powers and many ally-enhancing abilities. Trouble comes from the attacks, how to do some sort of 'water whip' style attack as an At Will? That, and the healing is touch-based, not at range.
Earth is a Defender, also quite easy to imagine. However, they have major terrain-altering abilities that would need to be taken into account. The combo of defending and altering terrain would need to be balanced. Class Features to Defend teammates are needed, Shielding Aegis being a perfect example to me.
Air is a Controller, lots of redirection and mass-minion effects. The debuffs are quite easy to explain, as Air is very good at messing with people's plans. Mostly Wizard stuff, but (so far) there's only 1 controller, so I want to avoid making it a clone. Needs LOTS of transportation abilities and extreme mobility as well....
As you can see, I simply want to appropriate current mechanics, using current Powers and Class Features, but re-arranging them to suite the setting's Elemental Theme, based on class. Balance is the 2nd concern, but it's still quite important. Earth in particular seems quite a powerful option, with Damage, Defense, and -major- Terrain alteration. Thoughts?
This could be awesome. :D!
Meanwhile, fire and air have an infinite supply of bending material and waterbenders don't have to look far for water in most environments, especially if they've mastered the act of bending water out of air or even plants.
... especially if they've mastered the act of bending water out of air or even plants.
And people.
Earth is a Defender, also quite easy to imagine. However, they have major terrain-altering abilities that would need to be taken into account. The combo of defending and altering terrain would need to be balanced. Class Features to Defend teammates are needed, Shielding Aegis being a perfect example to me.
If you have a DDI account, you owe to yourself to take a look at the Warden preview - http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/drfe/20090105 - for some inspiration. If not, well, go pick up the PHB2 when it comes out; the Warden looks like it's going to have a solid selection of Earth-y powers.
For right now though, I think we should start with some basic ideas for Race concepts. My idea was to allow all of the PHB races as simply different Tribes of humans, along with 'actual' Humans as a default. Each race would be tied to a different element, though it wouldn't be 'exclusive' to that element's Tribe, all races are all over the world.
Dragonborn and Tieflings are Fire.
Elves and Humans are Water.
Dwarves and Half-Elves are Earth.
Eladrin and Halflings are Air.
Genasi I'm not so sure about, they already are heavily elementally themed in the first place. Maybe have them be everywhere? Drow also I'm not too sure on, there didn't seem to be a whole lot of -darkness- style effects in AtLA.
Preliminary Thoughts?
Another thing (from a DM's perspective) have you given any thought to Creatures and the like? I haven't made monsters before but i'll give it a shot if you want.
Stone Pillar Earthbender Maneuver
You thrust your fists out and a pillar of earth shoots up towards your target.
At Will*Primal,Earth
Standard Action Range 8
Target: One Creature
Attack: Constitution vs. Ref
Hit:1d6+[Con] Damage and push the target squares equal to your Wisdom Modifier.
I was thinking Con, Wis Build?
Right now though, I'm trying to figure out how the Races with their huge amount of racial feats fit into the world...
You fire a block at your ally to block an incoming ranged attack just in time.
Encounter*Primal Earth.
Immediate Interrupt Range 10
Trigger: Your ally is hit by a ranged attack
Attack: Con vs. Allies AC
Hit: The Ranged attack is negated.
Some hints: all Defender classes currently use the Mark mechanic. The only class remotely close to a Ranged Defender is the Swordmage, so 'borrowing' some of that class's ideas would be a good place to start, IMO. Though I agree on the CON and WIS focus for Earthbenders.
Try starting with some basic design philosophies and working the powers around the theme and mechanical concept. I'm quite willing to straight-up steal the Swordmage's Aegis ability for the Earthbender, with an 'Assault Earthbender' flinging rocks at the enemy instead of teleporting around like some kind of sissy Airbender... :D
It'd take a little work looking through all the powers and saying to yourself "what elemental flavor does this have?" But it would definitely be worth it and I think it would be balanced! I wouldn't even change the powers, simply assign them to a respectful bender!
For example..
At-Will first level
Righteous Brand, Tide of Iron,: Earthbender
Preist's Shield, Sure Strike, : Airbender
Sacred Flame, Reaping Strike, : Firebender
Lance of Faith, Cleave, : Waterbender
Per-encounter first level
Cause Fear, Spinning Sweep : Earthbender
Divine Glow, Covering Attack : Firebender
Healing Strike, Steel Serpent Strike : Waterbender
Wrathful Thunder, Passing Attack: Airbender
And that's just using a few fighter/cleric powers! Each of the classes would be built relatively the same. Same HP, same healing surge amount, where'd they'd differ is their defense bonus, class granted powers, feats they can take, and powers they can learn later..
Earthbender=+2 defense to fortitude
Airbender=+2 defense to AC
Firebender=+2 defense to reflex
Waterbender=+2 defense to will
And they should gain more powers then your typical D&D game. That way you can explore different uses for powers and combonations.
I could see this working with Naruto too. Naruto is basically where they got the idea for Avatar. And there'd be even more diversity to character creation via powers! (possibly bloodline template..)
Also the three sets of levels make more sense. Hero=Genin, Paragon=Chuunin, Epic=Jounin.
That's a pretty good start Strange_Creatures, though I with 4ed's focus on damage for everyone, I'ld class that one as a Utility Power, personally. It seems you really like the Earth Bender, so feel free to work on it some more while I try to iron out some basic kinks like which stats to use for Fire, my favorite element!
My favorite Bending style is actually Water Bending but i'm a big fan of Earth Bending. Anywho Heres all my Earth bending Stuff
Stone Pillar:
You thrust your fists out a pillar of earth and rock shoots up towards your target.
At Will*Primal,Earth
Standard Action Range 8
Target: One Creature
Attack: Constitution vs. Ref
Hit:1d6+[Con] Damage and push the target squares equal to your Wisdom Modifier.
Earth Gauntlet
You draw stones to your hand to form a rock hard gauntlets and attack with crushing force
At Will*Primal,Earth
Standard Melee
Target: One Adjacent Creature
Attack: Strength vs. AC
Hit:1d8+Strength Damage
(This can be used as a basic Melee attack)
Rock Shield
With a gesture you pull earth from the ground to protect you.
At Will*Primal,Earth
Standard Utility
Target: One Adjacent Square
Effect: Pick a square adjacent to you. You draw a rock shield that provides you cover from attackers on the opposite side. The first attack that hits you with your cover bonus destroys the shield.
Quicksand
The ground you target softens and caves in
Encounter*Primal Earth
Standard Action Area Burst 1 in Ten squares
Target: One Enemy
Attack: Constitution vs. Reflex
Hit:1d6+Con to any enemies in the burst
Effect: Area becomes Difficult terrain and any creatures caught in the original blast become immobilized (Save ends)
Defending Block
You fire a block at your ally to block an incoming ranged attack just in time.
Encounter*Primal Earth.
Immediate Interrupt Range 10
Trigger: Your ally is hit by a ranged attack
Attack: Con vs. Allies AC
Hit: The Ranged attack is negated.
Another suggestion is to employ use of Genasi heavily due to their elemental nature. It's very easy to for example, to use Air Genasi due to their flight encounter ability, or have an Earth Genasi from the Earth Kingdom, due to his racial ability to create difficult terrain. Swordmage might work well, given the Aegis of Shielding along with a few burst attacks. The Warden was also mentioned as a strong Earth type of character, and I agree.
For air, you might consider something like a Wizard or Rouge. Rouges have a lot of push/pull (at least from what i've seen) as well as acrobat moves that could easily be seen as using their air abilities to twist and turn around quickly in battle to gain the upper hand. And Wizards have plenty of push/area effects that might work well. Also Fey Warlocks have a LOT of teleportation and trickery up their sleeve, and Star Pacts manipulate chance and so on.
Fire stands out as Infernal Warlocks, especially due to their high CON scores which should make them decently tough.
The biggest thing is I think Avatar is a very martial arts based show. In this game you hit back and forth a lot, whereas in the show they sort of repell each others attacks much more, and none of them really wear armor of any sort.
I think if you go down the list of classes like you did the races, and think about how their abilities could be applied and changed generally to elemental abilities, you will save yourself a lot of work. I think a lot can be done with what Wizards has given us with just a little stretch of the imagination and allowance of a few things to slide here and there.
Water Controller, minor leader
Air Leader, minor striker
Fire Striker, minor defender
Earth Defender, minor controller(Walls!!!)
All classes would have to get some AOE attacks but this could work nicely. i may work on the water stuff.
One question what stats to use for each i thought water=wis, air=dex fire=????con/str/cha???? at a loss here earth con/str
Water: Leader, sub striker or controller. From the Show, they're the most likely to deal with both keeping the forces going and the opposition busy.
Fire: Striker sub Controller. Fire always goes for the kill, but they aren't exactly subtle about it, and they can easily make a huge mess. From the giant waves of fire done in the last episode to the more general fireballs thrown about.
Air: Controller sub striker. Since we only see one airbender more or less ever in the show, and they're all pacifists; Controller would be the best bet, doing lots of minions, and enemy control. Though the speed and the capacity for striker really exists. Personally, I think they're Striker Sub Controller, a lot like fire.
Earth: Controller sub striker or defender. They're about all about walls and launching giant rocks, and controlling terrain. Full out controllers. Yet they're all about being rock steady...
None of the benders embody the particular sticky role of Defender particularly well, not even the earth benders, with the greatest earthbender; save for the avatar, being blind and extremely control heavy, or even bordering on striker (the iron man suit!).
The thing that would irk me is that quite a few utilities would be the same, while there would be definitive utilities competing with the more every day use.
The other issue is of implements or weapons, as many don't particularly use weapons, but every style presented has weapons training. Most of them tend to go the empty handed route it seems. How do you go about adding bonuses to that? Maybe totems would help.
Water - Cleric or Warlord (healing and aid powers), Wizard (slow, immobilise, hold, and cold powers)
Fire - Ranger (two weapon melee), Warlock (fire based ranged powers with a few control effects)
Earth - Fighter (battlerager perhaps, definitely a focus on being tough), Wizard (pushes, knockdowns, slides)
Air - Rogue (mobility and enemy positioning manipulation), Cleric or Wizard (protection or environmental manipulations)
Obviously tweaks to damage types, proficiencies, and skills would need to be made.