Shapechange Vs. Polymorph

[Tarven]

The decision was made based upon the SRD rules for this spell (which indicate 1 minute per spell level). You could suggest a change for discussion in the "Game Suggestions" thread though.

Alright, the aforementioned was in regards to a different thread, but, here's the long and short of it. It appears that currently, the Shapechange ability for druids runs entirely off of the 'polymorph' spell code (I am assuming this because the duration of both are identical, and in fact when shapechanged the effect shows as 'Polymorphed' or some such). While I can see why, and how this would make things a tad easier in some ways, it's also quite unfair.

The spell duration for Polymorph is, indeed, 1 min/lvl according to SRD. It's my understanding that it used to be 1hr/lvl here on the MUD, which I can see as being entirely unbalanced for wizards.

However, also according to SRD, the duration of the Druid's Shapechange ability is 1 -hour- per level. As it was programmed before.

Wizards get disintegrate. Druids do not. Wizards get fireball. Druids do not. Wizards get phantasmal killer, and power word kill, and any other number of incredibly powerful spells.

I'm not saying druids don't get ANY good spells (as I haven't played one, I can't tell you) but I am saying that what they have probably doesn't stack up next to wizards.

In addition, clerics get domains. Druids do not.

Druids also do not get animal companions. They do not appear to get trackless step. Nor venom immunity. Nor Ageless face. The -only- signature ability they get on this MUD appears to be Shapechange. At 10 minutes per skill level, it's not only feeble at best for combat, but entirely useless for RP (At lower skill levels it lasts all of 5 minutes of OOC time. It takes some people that long just to type out a single response pose, sometimes).

If going by the SRD is the reason for the change to polymorph, then going by the SRD should be reason enough to give druids back their sole signature ability.

[Selveem]

I don't have a druid either, but I can say that being knowledgeable about the game's mechanics and seeing their spell lists is reason enough to dissuade me from entering into this class.

I love camping. I love forests and most wildlife. While I like quite a bit of Druid beliefs and even a few of the Gods, it annoys me to no end to play a really gimped class.

In D&D, Druids are arguably the strongest class. In FK, they're like.. second worst?

I don't see it as unbalancing to give Druids the proper class benefits that they deserve that can be easily converted from existing code of Polymorph to match proper duration and power (i.e. no spamming "shapechange fish" to get strong enough to shapechange into a large elemental when the Druid is already level 50).

In addition to shapechange, it would also be nice to get some of the Druid specialty feats to go along with it.

[Hrosskell]

I'll go ahead and throw my support behind this idea. Druids are woefully starved of their basic class features in FK. I think freeing shapechange from Polymorph's duration constraints and list of available creatures (elementals, magical beasts, etc. being available to druids) would be a wonderful enhancement and go a long way in providing druids with equality--and bringing the game as a whole closer to the standards we have applied just about everywhere else.

I understand there might be some issues with available races, and I'm not sure how the code works, but if this entailed adding specific elemental files that are toned down from the current ones, I think it'd be worth the effort.

[Althasizor]

Worth noting is that shapechange -does- last longer than polymorph currently(EDIT: It doesn't. My bad on this one, I set the wizard testing polymorph to the wrong skill level. D'oh!); Just not at the hour a level suggested here. It seems odd that wild shape is replaced by shapechange as a druid ability, when shapechange is a powered up version of polymorph for druids and wizards according to D20. But ignoring that, if this is being treated as a replacement for wild shape, it does seem a -tad- underpowered. To my understanding, this -is- the primary mode of combat, travel, etc. for druids in D&D. There's still the concern about making this too overpowered, though. The hour a level being suggested here seems extreme to me, for the FK environment. Skill levels go up to 25, after all. That's over a day of straight shapechange. You recover your uses in the span of an in-game day. And you are allowed more than one use of this per day. Essentially, a druid like this would be able to stay shapechanged -indefinitely-. Yeahhh..

Not to mention to my understanding, a lot of these races were locked because they were too imbalanced to begin with. It might be frustrating that druids seem weak because they aren't following how they are in SRD, but if they -did- follow SRD, they'd have a ridiculous advantage.

Selveem: Why wouldn't they have to? That's basic skilling up. In D&D, you also don't have to 'spam' polymorph to skill it up; Nor fireball, or magic missile. Why would that scale with player level, and none of the rest of the spell? That would be rather inconsistent, don't you think?

While druids do not get domains like clerics do, that doesn't automatically mean that they're weaker for it. Clerics do not get, for example, aura of vitality as a spell. They also don't get conjure elemental, and only get conjure greater elemental -as- a domain. Druids have their own advantages and disadvantages here, like all other classes.

There's a lot of discussion about polymorph and shapechange lately, With everyone coming around with a hundred different suggestions on how to tweak them. I think people need to put serious consideration into this, and actually decide what would be the best tweaks to suggest for the playerbase and MUD as a whole. As it is, I'm hesitant to throw my lot behind any of the suggested changes I've seen. No, I don't think shapechange should stay as it is currently, but no, I don't think it should follow SRD to a T.

[Enig]

Worth noting is that shapechange -does- last longer than polymorph currently; Just not at the hour a level suggested here.

A quick run on the test port shows this to not be the case:

A level 50 druid with 10 skill in shapechange obtains 2/3 of the duration as a level 50 wizard with 10 skill in polymorph. This is as a consequence of the wizard's spell level being augmented by their character level; a level 50 wizard with grandmastered polymorph and a druid with grandmastered shapechange have precisely the same duration.

Shapechange also randomly fails as a consequence purely of having low skill ("You failed"), doesn't benefit from metamagic feats like 'extend spell', and is only usable up to six times per day.

It should also be noted that the forms which can currently be polymorphed/shapechanged into are automatically restricted, ie. no races with a natural armour rating higher than X. Further restrictions can always be placed if any particular forms are deemed to be too powerful.

[Tarven]

Worth noting is that shapechange -does- last longer than polymorph currently; Just not at the hour a level suggested here.

A quick run on the test port shows this to not be the case:

A level 50 druid with 10 skill in shapechange obtains 2/3 of the duration as a level 50 wizard with 10 skill in polymorph. This is as a consequence of the wizard's spell level being augmented by their character level; a level 50 wizard with grandmastered polymorph and a druid with grandmastered shapechange have precisely the same duration.

Shapechange also randomly fails as a consequence purely of having low skill ("You failed"), doesn't benefit from metamagic feats like 'extend spell', and is only usable up to six times per day.

It should also be noted that the forms which can currently be polymorphed/shapechanged into are automatically restricted, ie. no races with a natural armour rating higher than X. Further restrictions can always be placed if any particular forms are deemed to be too powerful.

Well, couldn't it be set to follow the path of SRD? That is to say, perhaps up to a certain skill level, you can only change to small or medium size animals, at a higher skill level you gain large animals and humanoids (to reflect the disguise self ability, but still limit this to standard humanoids... no genasi, no avian elves, etc), at say expert you gain elementals and huge animals, (Not sure if plants are a viable option? Are there treants or shambling mounds in the game?) and at grand-master you gain huge elementals.

Keep the 6/day limit, as a balancing factor. But, in response to Alth's comment about druids being able to transform 24/7.. well.. YES. In SRD, they're able to do exactly that. At level 20, in fact, with 3/day uses, they could even maintain huge elemental shape 24/7.

Another 'balancing' factor, though this is just a guess, is that in SRD druids regain HPs as if having rested when they wild shape. I'd say leave that out.

Just wondering, Alth, how you'd feel if suddenly they decided that you being able to use maximize on disintegrate was just waaaay too overpowered, so they removed maximize spell from the game. I appreciate that you're agreeing that it should be upped to improve druids, but wild shape is as crucial to the play of druids as meta-magic feats are to the play of wizards.

[Gwain]

If we are going to follow SRD for almost everything as a standard, then we should adapt it for shape change. The only problem I see is that some people may make druids to abuse it, just like people that made centaurs or wemics to abuse the system by wearing armour or doing things neither of those races could do. It might just be easier to balance the skill levels between the two spells and make them identical, its not canon but we are not unknown for compromising in the name of balance. I don't mind piping in that tabletop and a mud are different in the respect that tabletop ends when the dm is no longer present but a mud runs with an automated design at all hours.

[Tarven]

If we are going to follow SRD for almost everything as a standard, then we should adapt it for shape change. The only problem I see is that some people may make druids to abuse it, just like people that made centaurs or wemics to abuse the system by wearing armour or doing things neither of those races could do. It might just be easier to balance the skill levels between the two spells and make them identical, its not canon but we are not unknown for compromising in the name of balance. I don't mind piping in that tabletop and a mud are different in the respect that tabletop ends when the dm is no longer present but a mud runs with an automated design at all hours.

I really think that having the skill level instead of character level be the determining factor is quite balancing. Reaching level 50 can be done with relative ease compared to getting a skill (that can only be used 6 times per day, at best, I might add) to grandmaster levels. Once that effort has been put forth, I think the rewards should be on par with the effort put forth.

And as stated before, this is really the -only- signature Druid thing that the class has going for it. Yes, they have a few spells, but nothing that isn't comparable to SRD, or wiz/cleric spells, really. Even Alth's example of elementals, wizards and clerics both get animate dead.

[Nearraba]

Giving this some more thought is certainly more I'd like to see, along with everyones
opinions. To me, this is a very important topic. Being able to shapechange is a big
part of druid's connection to nature. It is -their- ability. It is what makes them
unquie. I'd like to see more of our naturey characters giving their input! =)

The following are my opinions and aren't meant to be taken wrong, I'm just passionate
about this so I'll state strongly.

To address the abuse/overpowered possibilty, first- Anything can be abused, be it spell or skill.
As a roleplay enforced mud, however there are ways to do against this. I think we should
take Mele's guidelines from this post - viewtopic.php?f=77&t=15408 and make them hard rules. She explained it plain and simple how it should in fact be done.
Not everyone is out to cheat the system or be over powered.

• We can put them in a helpfile and also keep them available on the
  forums so they are easily accessed and the "I didn't know" excuse can't be pulled.
  If we worry so much about what COULD happen we're never going to get anywhere, with
  anything. It's good to consider, but in the end it will only hold us back.

As for the "skill up" it isn't as easy as it is made out to be. As Zorinar hence stated
in a similar forum,

The third problem is skill ups. The ability is usable a few times per day, but it is based
on a skill, just like turn undead. How is a druid supposed to get better at this skill if
they need to grind it in the conventionally manner like every other skill/spell in the game
but can only use it 3-6 times a day. With quick and dirty Math, I can estimate that it would
take over 6 real life years (not missing any days) to get the skill to GM if it raises like
most other skills or spells.

I've already had Nearraba for a few good years. I don't plan on her living for six more.

I enjoy roleplaying. That's what draws my attention and keeps me interested in the game.
To sit around and "spam" a skill isn't fun to me. I'd rather be in a group talking or
doing a quest. It get's boring quick and people give up and they move on to something else.
Which is why I am guessing we have a slim to none amount of druids. I know for arguments
sake that it isn't suppose to be easy, it's not asking to be handed to us, but it /should/
be less difficult than it is now.

Nearraba is at skill level Apprentice and I've been shapechanging ALOT recently. Still, I
have not recieved a skill up. The OOC time she stays shapechanged is a grand total of 5
minutes. In my opinion, that makes the ability pretty much pointless. I might be an oddball, but
she use(d) it in her roleplay rather than fighting. So, if she shapechanges into (animal)
and goes into Ardeep with a small gathering there, it could as stated before take
five minutes just for a reply smote. So the time is a huge issue in my eyes. We do not
have any feats to boost the time or any extra skill perks to train to be able to boost it.

If there is again that -possible- worry about a druid staying shapechanged forever, limit
the amounts that can be used. But the TIME should be INCREASED. Alot of roleplay goes into
a "nature" character. (And that is not to say other classes don't it's only to ephasize.)
It CAN be enforced in a good way to work for the MUD and not against it. Even when it was
at one hour per level, we saw limited misuse. And when it was misused, it was addressed and
the problem was solved.

The types of creatures able to change into, really isn't bad. I enjoy the varity. The only
thing that draws my attention here is the akwardness of what you can be at what character
level. (I'm trying to figure out how to word this without too much IC.)
Nearraba was able to change into a type of cat before hitting level 43. Once she hit 43
she was no longer able to change into that cat. BUT she can change into a far less powerful
bird. To me, that's backwards. It's something I'm willing to deal with, though.



So, in short -

• Time for the ability/skill should be increased. If it is misused, it should be addressed
  and if it continues to be abused, the PC can lose that privledge.
  (Edit: For something like this I'd even offer to write/code a quest to be able to train higher than
  skill level apprentice (not too high maybe journeyman.) As it is now via quest, that's as high
  as you can train the skill.)
  
  The types of shapechanging (to me) is fine. They have a wide range, its just a matter of
  figuring out what they are. (I see no problems there.)

So, that's my novel of thoughts. Hope they all make sense and thank you for bringing this up and
listening. =)

[Nylo]

I support this - I'd like to see duration and possible forms changed to SRD. And that particular cat form, if it's the one I'm thinking - it stops working at level 43 because, according to the race file, it recieves massive stat boosts at that level, becoming essentially a dire form. Thus, overpowered.

[Raona]

Nothing will happen on this front until the basic polymorph code is fixed to address some of the mechanisms by which it is unbalancing and/or subject to abuse. We'll look into beefing up shapechange vs. polymorph at that time. Right now I believe it is correct to say they are identical save with respect to what races are allowed as targets.