Guild Wars 2

Me and guildies were thinking up possible future professions and came up with this wacky idea, which really isn’t wacky but pretty boss. The Monsterologist

Possible lore direction: Strange happenings have been going on, and a new science has been stirring in the darkest labs of Tyria. The strange mad science of monsterology is born, bringing with it a strange new profession—perhaps the strangest of all. Shapeshifting, a possibility only thought to exist to Norn has taken on new meanings. Unlike norn druid-like abilities to transform into our animal spirits, a darker science allowing heros to morph into monsters of all variety has become apparent in Tyria."

Profession Image: This class takes the trope of the well known Druid and “morphs” it into something a little darker, a little weirder and definately more fun. Unlike a nature loving druid, Monsterologist are a little twisted, morphing into monsters of a strange variety. They aren’t perhaps as dark and evil as necromancers, but their love of the strange and odd monsters of tyria has made them very distinct and very strange, studying all manner of monsters. There dress is somewhat mad scientist, or think wierd gypsy salesman traveling by wagon—it’s what happens when an Engi goes mad , although Monsterology is a theme all it’s own.

Profession Mechanics: This can go in two main directions, one more extreme than the other: 1.) Heroes can morph into a variety of existing Tyrian “monsters” (not “animals”) such as: wurms, minotaurs, harpy, griffons, karka, trolls. . .or anthing else created that makes the cut as a monster and fills a certain niche in battle.
b.) Heroes can morph into a selection of semi-classic monsters representing different classic horror tropes. Such as some sort of batlike vampiric creature, a swampy slimy scaley creature, a hairy wherewolfy type creature, a giant one eyed creature etc. . .The point is to create monsters original and distinct but allude back to classic horror monster tropes.

Whichever type direction this goes in (if not a little of both), our heroes main mechanic and distinction is to Morph. Morphing would be our F button mechanism, and once morphed our skills and utility bars change. The different monsters we can morph into have different niches and create much specialization within our hero. So someone might choose to trait more to be the minotaur and be more tanky build, or someone might choose to trait more for harpy and do more damage (or a little in both.) In any case, a selected advantage of which monster you choose to morph into can be built upon. The elites could be very fun, as you could pick a mega monster to morph into for a period of time—just think of morphing into a Giant Wurm, or Griffon! Boss.

Thoughts? Ideas?

ps. originally, the idea was to simply be a sort of Mimic, able to morph into a selection of lesser races such as quaggan, skritt, dredge, hylek, krait, kodan etc. . . . .

There is one thing I dislike about shapeshifting classes: lack of visual customization. You spend a lot of time unable to see the gear you’ve worked so hard on, your character’s race, anything that distinguishes you from that other guy next to you who’s also playing a shapeshifter. This could be remedied by giving the abilities long cooldowns and/or very short durations, I guess, but not being able to use your class’s unique abilities very often might get dull.

That said, for players who like the concept of elemental attunement switching but dislike other aspects of the class, this could be a neat alternative.

I really REALLY love the idea.

I was thinking we already have the engineer as a “scientist” class, but nothing is against having similar classes (for me, Warrior and Guardian are quite similar).

I think it should not revolve only on morphs, though. But what could this class have? And how would he morph? With potions?

Urthona: about the lack of visual customization, it gives me an idea. The morphs should give to the player only some monster’s attributes.

An exemple: Harpie morph. For the weapon skill 1, wings grows on the characters during the 3 attacks animations.

Or another exemple, the characters arms transforms briefly into minotaurs arms, and goes back to normal after the attack.

I think the monsterologist could be quite distinct apart from the engineer. Monsterologists would have to use something other than potions or elixers like engi’s but perhaps they use medicine’s of a sort—sort of like a witch doctor. Perhaps their science is more organic and natural than the engineer—maybe they even use cauldrons to create their morphing formulas, along with chanting. this makes them kind of dark engineers, using witchlike brews and concoctions instead of technology.

Sounds fun. I like the Island of Dr. Moreau theme.

This class has the potential for many possibilities:

Rare transformations to collect (maybe you have to defeat certain enemies before you can transform into them?).

Perhaps if the class was limited to humanoid monsters, its armor could adapt to the transformation for the sake of customization that Urthona mentioned.

Maybe the transformations could be randomized like the Engineer’s potions’ effects. Potion S transforms you into a random supportive form, Potion O transforms you into a random offensive form, Elite Potion ZOMG transforms you into a boss clone for 15 seconds.

good ideas! perhaps the monster are sooo cool in modality that players need not to show off their armor as much, some players like being creatures and care less about armor. Even so, the humanoid approach is a good idea, although I like the idea of becoming something very monsterish and devoid of any human shape!

Perhaps some monsters are humanoid in order to display armor and others aren’t—this way players choose which monster they enjoy the most. for instance, their could be a vampiric form where you turn into a hellish looking bat humanoid—still has on your armor. or you could turn into a big blob of slime

Perhaps mad scientist isn’t the right image as engi’s could also do that. What about a sort of vaudiville travelling circus character? There is always stuff about carnivals but no class really represents the carnivals. The Monsteroligist could be spotlighted as sort of the carnival freak show type collector. Give him some distinct medium armor and a whip as new weapon.

As long as this doesn’t turn into a WoW druid I’m on board. If it’s a jack of all trades it needs to remain a jack, not a king or god.

The circus theme seems to be a really great idea!

First thing that comes in my mind is this xD http://www.fightersgeneration.com/np6/char/scbd/dampierre-bd3.jpg

Also, the whip could be an awesome weapon for this class, as you said.

yeah the circus/carnival image is a good one—but slightly more ghoulish and more freakshow/mad salesperson. The top hat would be great with perhaps seringes filled with “medicines”. He should be able to call a sort of gypsy wagon to store his bestiary of oddities lol.

I think this could be a very viable mechanic. It doesn’t have to be all ranged or all melee but could have to choose before entering battle his smartest option. perhaps morphing has a longer cooldown or effect.

Vick.6805:

Maybe the transformations could be randomized like the Engineer’s potions’ effects. Potion S transforms you into a random supportive form, Potion O transforms you into a random offensive form, Elite Potion ZOMG transforms you into a boss clone for 15 seconds.

Oh god, please no. Random skills are terrible. They allow for no planning, no adapting to situations, nothing. Just roll the dice and hope you don’t get screwed. Engineer’s random effects are alright since they’re mostly “bonus effects” (in the case of something like the healing elixir) or still somewhat controllabe in the case of the Haste elixir. But the main class mechanic of a profession being random would just ruin any chance of the profession being anything more than a joke “fun” profession. Or at the very least make you ignore the profession mechanic most of the time due to unpredictability.

I really like the idea of a profession built around shapeshifting. I’ve always liked the general notion of morphing / shapeshifting and far too few games really utilize it to any major degree.

I personally wouldn’t really mind the lack of gear appearences, since you’d still see it plenty while out of combat (and really, in any group you’re not going to get a great view of gear anyway with all the effects flying around during a fight). But there are ways around that if it is deemed a problem. There could be a shifted form “editor” that would let you tweak the appearence of your forms, though that might be too much to add for one profession. Appearence could just change based on what armor / weapons you have equipped, like the texture and minor details of the form could be altered. Or they could just have the color of the form based on what color your armor is, that would be an “easy” way to differentiate, though it wouldn’t take into account actual gear.

Whatever forms were implemented they would have to be souped up versions of the in game forms. Like a player Kodan or Minotaur for example would be far more in debth than what they are now—whatever in debth means.

I really like the idea of a Monsterologist. Being able to shift into beastly horro forms perhaps somewhat vampiric, wherewolf like, creature of the swamp. .etc They wouldn’t be exactly so literal but could allude to those creatures—would give the class a very dark and odd feel to it. If not that than just creatures considered to be monsters, like drakes, wurms, harpys and perhaps new and more involved monsters—-one eyed tentacled things.

As far as the random mutations, i dissaprove as well—I think players should be able to actually trait into a monster some how, or lean one monster over others.

A cool ability would be also to call upon other monsters to help you in battle, or dig underground likd a dredge to excape/charge—maybe elites or something.

maybe character creation could be a specific type of mustache like this guy =)

I like the idea of Morphing into Monsters (or animals in general), something that doesnt really exist in Gw2 except as the Norn novelty forms.

Call me Druid from WoW or Adventurer from Anarchy Online, it was just plain fun to kick butt while in forms!

I’d rather we simplify it to being a partial Shapeshifter class.
My take on it is somewhat inspired by the manga series called “+Anima”. Humans who have the ability to shift parts of their body into a specific animal part. Example: Your back shoulder blades stretch out into wings

The important part of this concept would be to there being no “full-form” shifting. Only parts change at a time. That way, gear is still relevant in visually appeal.

Different utility skills could either only shift the body part for a moment and specified purpose
- Alligator head -> Gator Bite
- Dove wings -> Dove retreat -> Evade backward

Or a longer temporary shift for boosting your abilities
- Bear arm -> Grants bonus damage to melee attacks
- Elephant legs -> Grants stability

i dont like this idea. better alternatives are available like dervishes paragons and ritualists. and even if they were. this is just a bad idea imo. i dont think im alone when i say id probably stop playing guildwars shortly after this class was announced. were it to be announced.

DreamOfACure.4382:

I’d rather we simplify it to being a partial Shapeshifter class.
My take on it is somewhat inspired by the manga series called “+Anima”. Humans who have the ability to shift parts of their body into a specific animal part. Example: Your back shoulder blades stretch out into wings

The important part of this concept would be to there being no “full-form” shifting. Only parts change at a time. That way, gear is still relevant in visually appeal.

Different utility skills could either only shift the body part for a moment and specified purpose
- Alligator head -> Gator Bite
- Dove wings -> Dove retreat -> Evade backward

Or a longer temporary shift for boosting your abilities
- Bear arm -> Grants bonus damage to melee attacks
- Elephant legs -> Grants stability

I like this idea fo sho. Partial shape-shifting over full-forms any day

poe lyfe.5879:

i dont like this idea. better alternatives are available like dervishes paragons and ritualists. and even if they were. this is just a bad idea imo. i dont think im alone when i say id probably stop playing guildwars shortly after this class was announced. were it to be announced.

You would really stop playing the game over one class you could easily never play as?

The idea of the partial shifting is interesting and could be very neat. Wings would be cool as players could slightly hover above the ground such as a harpy—instead of “dove” they could be " wings of the harpy" giving you a temporary speed bonus. Perhaps they get krait legs underwater or something, or quagan fins? Perhaps elites could be whole form though, just for players who want to feel totally transformed?

Anyone who wouldn’t play a game they like because the community thought of a cool idea and it was actually implemented doesn’t really like that game. Look at engineer, all sorts of negative reactions when introduced, even i thought it was weird, now i like that profession. It’s all about working it into the game, and arena net could make it work easily—probably nothing like what you imagine. A shifter class wouldn’t be anything strange compared to an engineer. I just don’t understand how people could hate a shifter class that could change into monsters of tyria or animals.

How about making a dervish or ritualist sort of shifter? When you morph you get different curse abilities or bonuses for removing or applying curses.

Electro.4173:

poe lyfe.5879:

i dont like this idea. better alternatives are available like dervishes paragons and ritualists. and even if they were. this is just a bad idea imo. i dont think im alone when i say id probably stop playing guildwars shortly after this class was announced. were it to be announced.

You would really stop playing the game over one class you could easily never play as?

yes and you know why? same reason id quit if they created a nazi super soldier class or a tele tubbie class. i dont want it in the game im playing at all and find it offensive. not to the point of tears but its just such a lame idea it would make me feel bad for playing the game every time i even saw one. i chose to be a little nicer in my previous post but thats the reason.

I prefer sumon monsters :P dont like morph

but great idea

@poe, any link with or without having to do with being lame between a shifter that can transform into monsters and a nazi super soldier or tele tubie profession does not exist. therefore your argument isn’t largely shared and is seen as a dull and vicious defiance based on personal elitism against the community.

@ Alt, yeah but summoning is just another pet class—the transformation is what makes this more dynamique in theme and playstyle.

I like this idea! I think I would prefer the morphings were unique rather than existing animals or “monsters”. The look of the morphs could be created to reflect the primary play-style of that particular morph. And of course through traits and stats the play-style can be pushed one way or another.

The process of morphing could come through various means. Magic mutation? Spirit possession? Mad alchemy? Crystals with unique properties?

I kind of like the idea of the mad alchemy. I can picture your character gulping down different colored beakers and then shifting. Reminds me of the Alchemist from Asheron’s Call 2 a bit.

@Poe just out of curiosity how in the world would this type of character concept be anywhere near as offensive to a person as a Super Nazi soldier? I mean to each their own, but that just baffles me!

Kalizaar.4729:

I like this idea! I think I would prefer the morphings were unique rather than existing animals or “monsters”. The look of the morphs could be created to reflect the primary play-style of that particular morph. And of course through traits and stats the play-style can be pushed one way or another.

The process of morphing could come through various means. Magic mutation? Spirit possession? Mad alchemy? Crystals with unique properties?

I kind of like the idea of the mad alchemy. I can picture your character gulping down different colored beakers and then shifting. Reminds me of the Alchemist from Asheron’s Call 2 a bit.

@Poe just out of curiosity how in the world would this type of character concept be anywhere near as offensive to a person as a Super Nazi soldier? I mean to each their own, but that just baffles me!

Cool ideas Kalizaar, your spellblade is interesting but uses elemental shock so I think it is almost too close to an elementalist or even mesmer with title spellblade. Perhaps one of the “unique” monsters you speak of uses spellblade abilities lol. I like your in debth thought on the mechanics though—perhaps you can come up with some mechanics for the monsterologist too

The only thing I see with being a mad scientist or alchemist is that engi is already sort of an alchemist or scientist, although engi does come off a little more as an “engineer” than an alchemist, having a sort of technology/architect image. I think though, some sort of scientist that has a distinctly different feel to it might be viable. I was thinking of sort of a strange biologist field perhaps even belonging to a travelling carnival freak show or something—mustache, top hat, and monacle comes to mind even though i know engineer has a similar steam punk feel—although a distinctly victorian feel might belong to mesmers, that could also sort of work.

Remember a sort of guy that would travel by road wagon, where flashy clothes and maybe a straw hat? Selling “medicines” to people on the road such as tonics—sort of red stripes comes to mind. That is the kind of character perhaps this guy would be i was thinking—perhaps a little more ghoulish though. So they are lone travellers selling all sorts of mystical things, but have a secret society of shapeshifters—some working for travelling carnivals as freak shows lol. So it’s somewhere in there of a mad scientist, a gypsy, a travelling salesman, and a darker society of shifters—sort of like the masons, or those guys collecting money for the circus on the side of the road lol

gargoyle form would be cool. stone gargoyle form

A hodge podge concept I made with gw2 art and monster hunter art! I made the themed monsterologist color grey—sort of monsterish. Trying to also come up a good symbol for the monsterologist for fun.What do you think?

More on Mechanics:

so extrapolating, here are some new mechanics that I believe would be cool.

You are able to collect and use the heads of different monsters as you level/progress. These monsters will have different cooldown periods depending on how they are created and the fairness of balance.

Also monsters you start with you will have unlimited use without cooldown. But as you increase in powerful monsters their cooldowns will become longer. Some collected monsters will have faster or slower cooldowns in accordance to their abilities.

If you want to morph into more powerful monsters you must spawn your “traveling gypsy wagon” filled with all the heads of your powerful monsters. This wagon will spawn nearby your character and will also last for a limited ammount of time, then you will have to wait on a cooldown to spawn another one.

Your monsterologist can take with him from your wagon only three different forms of monsters unless he returns back and switches monsters from the wagon.

So a big part of this playstyle is picking good monsters so you don’t have to return to your wagon, but also using your wagon in battle means a plethora of variations on skill play in battle.

If all your cooldown are blown than you must fight as your natural self, something I haven’t decided on what armor you wear, but probably light or medium as some of your monster give you a lot of armor so would be op maybe to wear heavy armor. I was thinking in your natural state the monstorologist gets a new weapon—the whip, that applies single target damage at aoe range, so you get a little farther hit but are able to switch targets easier. Basically, if you are fighting different targets within aoe range your whip will hit each of them in turn—at the rate of perhaps close to theif attacks.

So basically, a fight might go like this:

You spawn a wagon as you see nearby enemies approaching then dodge roll some of their ranged attacks as you morph into A Two Headed Harpy spitting fire balls at them. You kite them until a warrior comes at you and you morph into a Cyclops Minotaur, taking more damage and ramming the warrior as much as you can. Your minotaur runs out and then you morph into a Bionic Wurm for a short period of time, burrowing underground to get back to your wagon to select from more monsters. You can either run and kite as long as you can in your natural form, waiting on your cooldowns, or you can take a chance and quickly switch monsters from wherever you wagon is spawned and switch to new monsters.

Sounds like a lot of fun. Would definitely be a very different play style and character type compared to what exists now.

The wagon is an interesting idea that would give you a lot of tools to work with unless it was destroyed in combat in which case you’d have to survive until the cooldown is over.

It could work. I see it as being more like an engineer. The 1-5 skills would be either weapon skills or monster skills depending on what monsters you have transformed into in the 7-0 slots. Additionally there could be several different ‘tech trees’ for the monsters

• Ferocity – Traits that increase damage output or radius
• Infusion – Skills that increase monster condition damages and offensive effects (like CC)
• Presence – Skills that increase the player or monster’s mobility, range or stealth
• Survival – Skills, passive abilities and active ability buffs that contribute to a monster’s survival or healing skills
• Transformation – Skills, triggered effects and cooldown reductions that trigger on or otherwise affect monster tranformations

Elite skills could be temporary transformations into powerful monsters, the summoning of minions, dimensional gates or effects caused by the player channeling his monster abilities.

Zero Angel.9715:

It could work. I see it as being more like an engineer. The 1-5 skills would be either weapon skills or monster skills depending on what monsters you have transformed into in the 7-0 slots. Additionally there could be several different ‘tech trees’ for the monsters

• Ferocity – Traits that increase damage output or radius
• Infusion – Skills that increase monster condition damages and offensive effects (like CC)
• Presence – Skills that increase the player or monster’s mobility, range or stealth
• Survival – Skills, passive abilities and active ability buffs that contribute to a monster’s survival or healing skills
• Transformation – Skills, triggered effects and cooldown reductions that trigger on or otherwise affect monster tranformations

Elite skills could be temporary transformations into powerful monsters, the summoning of minions, dimensional gates or effects caused by the player channeling his monster abilities.

I like those ideas, all of the traits sound good for a shifter. Also dimensional gates sound cool. What if the dimensional gates could summon small armies of monsters to aid you, would be awesome in wvw….maybe more than one player is required to open the gates/click on them. Might be too close to a necromancer though.

I think the elites are fun to think about. What about shifting into two or three monsters at the same time? When you move, your monsters are like a group, travelling alongside each other, so you are controlling all of them. Perhaps their is now the option to attack all at once, or you can make one of them attack and command two to defend you or stay where they are.

Kalizaar.4729:

Sounds like a lot of fun. Would definitely be a very different play style and character type compared to what exists now.

The wagon is an interesting idea that would give you a lot of tools to work with unless it was destroyed in combat in which case you’d have to survive until the cooldown is over.

Yeah, it’s a little complicated but could be cool. I imagine you could spawn it sort of like a banking gollum. It could contain all the heads of monsters you have collected, and would have to be a switched quickly if you were in combat. The only thing is, does arenanet devs really want to create beheadable new monsters, with different mechanics and put them all over tyria? Would be cool, then there could be exotic monsters or perhaps even legendary ones to find.

EroticAndHeretic.7398:

I really REALLY love the idea.

I was thinking we already have the engineer as a “scientist” class, but nothing is against having similar classes (for me, Warrior and Guardian are quite similar).

I think it should not revolve only on morphs, though. But what could this class have? And how would he morph? With potions?

The idea of a spawnable wagon with collected monsters inside of it I like. Then perhaps you are able to keep monsters in your utility and switch them out via the wagon, or perhaps even switch out f skills from your wagon. So maybe potions, but I like the theme of considering them medicines—sort of potions monsterologists consider medicines and keep with their shrunken monster heads lol so now he is more like a witch doctor than a scientist—using magic unlike a scientist.

It smells more like D&D than GW.

I didn’t play enough d&d to catch it. I didn’t base it off of d&d, although I know d&d is kind of monstercentric.

What if this class is simply a “shifter” with different transforming abilities in our trait lines that can specialize the type of shifter the player wants to be. The shifter could transform into other lesser races, monsters, ghosts/demons, or animals.

So perhaps the trait lines gear towards more or less of which type of transformations the shifter wants to specialize in.

Trait lines could be:
Monsterologist—increases power/condition duration and unlocks monster traits and monsters.
Druid—increases precision/critical damage and unlocks animal traits and animals.
Mimic—increases toughness/boon duration and unlocks special races.
Shaman—increases vitality/healing power and unlocks ghost forms/spirits.
Ritualist—increases condition damage/curse recharge and unlocks special “natural form” abilities.

so ritualist maybe not—but, something with similiar abilites where the player can stay in his natural form.

thoughts?