Shadowbane had an interesting character building system. Check these (the first two are my design, one is my adaptation on a rarely seen spec, and the last one was as "cookie cutter" as far this game was concerned):
Smarty Barbarian: Max INT for sky high 2h Ax skill, take Gladiator rune for the +Accuracy buff, drop in to Precise Stance, drop high avoidance fools with a "low accruacy class" Single handedly made half-giant barbs viable again.
C-Class PvP Human Druid: Some good heals, but could also CC like a mother and hit like a freight train dual-wielding mack trucks. Insane synergy with melee, Furies, and Lightning Channellers. Could single-handedly outpace a siege-specced healing priest's healing if geared out enough. Frightening.
Dual Dorf Sader: Dual wielding 1h maces (unheard of in a paladin-type class) twisting chants. Lay on Hands. Snares. Every melee debuff known to man. Procs procs, PROCS! If you ain't got wings/plate/lots of healing/a druid really damn good at kiting, your ass was jackhammered dead.
Half-Elf-Knight-Dark Knight-Werewolf wielding a crossbow. Nuff said.
Watching MMO after MMO deem fit to tangle with simpler loadout-based mmmmmmmmmmmmmobas' character building systems instead of more in-depth long-running systems like this is perplexing to me.
SMT: Nocturne.
The Demifiend starts off basically weak to everything but by the end of the game with the right stat management and careful acquisition of different Magatama you become a nigh-invincible god.
That game's melding of the narrative of the Demifiend doing such things and him in-battle becoming a force of nature was very, very well done. Dont' forget the demons too!
The Etrian Oddyssy games immedietly spring to mind for how much they make every single level and point matter.
This is one of the reasons I'm glad the subclassing is gone with EO4, it shat all over the delicate balance the 5-man system worked with in this series. 4 was too few people to do anything with and made a death a critical emergency by default, 6 covered all the bases.
djtiesto said:
I liked trying to counterfeit money and failing and then having bounced checks suck my money away. But yeah, SO2 has the absolute best skill/item creation system I've ever seen in a game (it also happens to be my #2 favorite RPG of all time). The amount of shit you can do in it is legendary. Pickpocket from your party members? Mix herbs together RE style? Send a pigeon out from a dungeon to pick up items for you? Cook food and enter into an Iron Chef style tournament? Write a symphony and then play it back to stimulate your characters to invent better shit? Go for it!
There are (many) reasons I hold SO3 in contempt, and this is one of those reasons why.
