Should there be pet classes (poll)?

meddyck

How about something new to discuss? I've never seen Mark say anything about whether there will be classes that can summon or even charm pets. One of the easiest ways to make classes different in each realm is to have, say, a healer get a pet in TDD but not in the other 2 realms or have a Viking archer get a pet but not a TDD or Arthurian archer.

Classes that can have multiple pets (bonedancers) or spam pets (theurgists & animists) always seem to be overpowered, so I'd say don't have that kind of pet class. It's especially bad when only one realm has pet spam and the others don't.

Odaman

Avoid pet classes like the plague... most mmos can't get them right including daoc. There's always pathing issues, pet speed issues, and attack issues. If they do put them in, make them ranged.... I don't need flashbacks of white lions getting stuck on pebbles for 30s.

Arnfiarnunn

Pets use to bug, take server resources and are quite useless in pvp

 

I voted : No pets

KappenWiz

Last night (4/8) MJ did mention something in the KS comment section about pet classes being on the back burner for now, after speed, stealth, etc. So, right now, it seems they're not in the core plan, maybe for a stretch goal or expansion.

He said he liked them, but too many issues (pathing, etc) for a small team right now.

 

Yyrkoon_PoM

I think of pets can be implemented in a way to avoid the pathing issues, and make them more strategic in nature.  Make the pets more like a familiar spirits that cam pe placed at a location to provide a small to medium range aoe buff. Either make the different familiar spirits obtainable in some way (ex. kill x amount of class x or race x). this way you could have a  tower with archers and ballistae and a caster could place their ranged damage increasing familiar nearby to aid them. The pet should have no other purpose (ie. it cant attack or defend and it should have half the health that the user has). To avoid the pathing issue the pet can be summoned (say a 10 second cast time) as a focus by the mage to be placed when it is needed. The caster can only have one summoned focus at a time.  I know I am going to regret saying this but the mechanic can work much the same way the WoW warlock soulstone worked <protects self after mentioning WoW>.

Cypz

I vote no to pets, especially rangers/hunters/scouts.

Ice-Queen

I like pet classes like the theurgist, enchanter, mentalist, but for server performance I can do without them.

Wazluk

As a bard in DAoC, I always ran in groups with a few pets.  They were called "melee".  All you had do was play some Endo and they did all sorts of tricks for their master...

fanglo

Originally posted by Wazluk
As a bard in DAoC, I always ran in groups with a few pets.  They were called "melee".  All you had do was play some Endo and they did all sorts of tricks for their master...

lol.

I voted all pets and even pet spammers. By pets does that include stationary turrets like Mushrooms or gun turrets? I played an Animist in DaoC and an Engineer in War and the stationary pets were one of the main reason I chose those classes.

meddyck

Originally posted by KappenWiz

Last night (4/8) MJ did mention something in the KS comment section about pet classes being on the back burner for now, after speed, stealth, etc. So, right now, it seems they're not in the core plan, maybe for a stretch goal or expansion.

He said he liked them, but too many issues (pathing, etc) for a small team right now.

Ah. I guess I should start looking through those comments more often. I had assumed they were mostly people getting excited each time the Kickstarter reaches another $50K. Yeah I can easily see how pets could be resource intensive to get the pathing and other behavior working right (they never completely did that in DAOC for that matter as of the last time I played). I guess we can look forward to pet classes in the first expansion or something.

belatucadros

not worth all the issues that come with it

 

unless we're talking theurgist/animist style projectile "pets" which are really just a model attached to a bolt

Odaman

Theurgist and animist pets I can deal with, those worked fine for the most part. It was perma pet classes that had pet issues particularly on bridges. 

belatucadros

to clarify - no shrooms ;P

Jayaris

I don't mind cosmetic pets, but pet classes is something I'm against.

Sornin

I voted yes to pet classes, including the type that spam pets, but this is something for post-release. Mark has already stated that pet classes are likely out of scope for release, and server and client performance must come first. Each pet is another entity your client must display and the server must track, so if it impacts performance too much, I am fine with them never being added.

I am not a huge pet class player, personally, but I know there are fans and I hope one day they get their class.

meddyck

Originally posted by Sornin

I voted yes to pet classes, including the type that spam pets, but this is something for post-release. Mark has already stated that pet classes are likely out of scope for release, and server and client performance must come first. Each pet is another entity your client must display and the server must track, so if it impacts performance too much, I am fine with them never being added.

I am not a huge pet class player, personally, but I know there are fans and I hope one day they get their class.

The engine supports 10,000 models on the screen. It shouldn't be that hard to allow a few of them to be pets.

Stiler

Usually the way it works is the classic "ranger" style where your character is range and your pet is melee and they are the tank/dps while you are more utility.

Pet issues arise, from either pets being too slow (and lagging far behind the player) to other things.

I'd rather them take the time to do pets right, have some diffrerent styles of pet classes and treat them more logically.

 

What I REALlY would likle instead of just a pet class, would be a good SHAPESHIFTER class. Where you can shapeshift and it's treated better then what most games do.

 

Where your "shapeshift" form (which you can pick/become, IE wolf, Bears, etc) allows you to customize their look (just like your normal character) and as you build up your character you can build up your shapeshifted character the same, way as you would a normal character. Gaining new abilities/skills, etc.

 

One of the key things though for a shapeshifting class is animations, it can really take you out of the gameplay if the animations are quite poor, and animals move mor elike humans and what not.

 

Nanulak

No. No. No.  Maybe down the road well after release.  As everyone else already mentioned, this is just to much effort for so little gain at this point.

The only "pet" I should see in the game is a player who was transformed into a tree.

Deivos

If they brought back the functions of the Elementalist and Bonedancer (more the Bonedancer, I liked mah skeletal army and Midgard is superior >_>) That would probably be welcome for familiarity.

 

Not an immediate necessity though if they can spend more time making sure the game can get out the door with a stable and expandable base.

Troianman

Pet classes add so much to a game that I cannot help but want them, no pet spamming though. The pathing issues and speed issues can sometimes have hilarious consequences however I fully understand working out the more important mechanics before biting off something like that. My chanter in DAoC gave me a very large amount of fun, for many reasons and not all of them were necessarily good reasons but still sometimes brought a smile to my face. Groups with multiple pet classes with multiple types of pets sometimes made for a much more interesting battle than otherwise and of course other times it made you hate bonedancers and everyone who played them.

redcapp

I wouldn't mind some good pet classes (not spammer variety) but it is not exactly a priority, imo.