Paladin and Trinity Designs | Patreon Weekly #293

Hey Patrons, in this weekly I’m going to go over my current close-to-final plans for Trinity and the Paladin, which I’m starting implementation on today! Also, if you missed it, there’s a new blog post on ShatteredPixel.com that shared all the things I currently have planned for Shattered, including the things mentioned last weekly. I also overhauled the website’s main page to have more than just a big logo:

There’s also a new Patreon Poll this week! In that poll I’m asking for your feedback on the things I talked about in that recent blog post. I’m interested in seeing what things you guys are most excited about.

Trinity

Trinity will be the second Cleric armor ability, with the unique trait of effectively being three abilities in one! Rather than using the armor itself, the Cleric will get access to three new talent spells that each use both tome and armor charge. My plan is for these spells to each focus on two types of equipment.

I’ve got solidifying ideas here, but am currently figuring out two details:

• Not having a direct armor ability is a neat distinction, but it does seem like a waste. I’m debating over whether I want the armor itself to not be in the picture, or do something like have the spells change the ‘mode’ of the armor ability, which then performs the direct effect.

• The spells will focus on ‘body’, ‘mind’, and ‘spirit’. The body spell will work with weapons and armor, and I’m currently mulling over ideas there. Most of my ideas currently boil down to giving the weapon and armor bonus stats, which can work of course but seems a bit boring.

The other two elements, the ‘mind’ and ‘spirit’ spells, are getting pretty solid. The mind spell is going to let you repeat the effect of a recently used thrown weapon or wand, and the spirit spell will grant you a temporary ‘spirit copy’ of any ring or artifact you’ve identified that run.

The Paladin

The Paladin’s basic ability set is also becoming pretty solid design-wise. Here’s what we’ve got on that. Firstly, two innate abilities:

• Holy Weapon and Ward become more powerful for the Paladin and no longer overriding existing enchantments. While holy weapon or ward is active, casting other spells will extend their duration based on the number of charges used.

• Smite is the Paladin’s innate spell, costing 2 charges. It’s a bit like a weapon ability, giving a guaranteed hit and some cocktail of bonus magic damage and bonus enchant power.

Then three talent spells:

• Lay on Hands costs 1 charge and is a simple and direct healing option. Just like other Cleric spells, it can also be self-cast for shielding, and can overheal allies. Lay on Hands is instantaneous, but only works on adjacent targets and has a cap to how much shielding it can give at once.

• Aura of Protection costs 2 charges and grants direct defensive power to the Paladin and allies within 2 tiles of the Paladin for a duration. I’m currently considering having this just give a % damage reduction and some shielding on-cast, but might change that a little to be more interesting.

• Wall of Light costs 3 charges, and is another terrain manipulation spell, this time with more of an anti-ranged focus. The Paladin creates a straight 3/5/7 tile-wide temporary wall in front of themselves. This wall does not block vision, but is solid, preventing enemy movement and ranged attacks. Enemies caught in the initial cast are pushed backward if possible.