.hack//SIGN-Ups

[Lithp]

Preface: I couldn't decide between this & the historical RP. So I did both. Basically, .hack is a franchise that can be summed up as "a game within a game." It is a story that largely focuses on the mysteries of the strange happenings in the game. What direction will this RP, based off of it, take? Well, I guess you'll just have to find out.

Story: Some time before the beginning of this game, the computer virus "Pluto's Kiss" struck the Internet. In addition to basically destroying it, several people went into seizures from the flashing effect it used & died. This caused much greater penalties to be put on computer hacking. In fact, the individual who created it was sentenced to death--but it was never carried out.

Some time later, the world's first, and currently only major, operating system (OS) was created: Altimit. It was immune to the Pluto's Kiss virus. To complement the release of the operating system, the most advanced online game to date was released: An MMORPG called "The World."

Since its creation, there have been all kinds of rumors about bizarre AI characters, invincible monsters, and even players going into comas while playing. CC Corporation, the makers of both Altimit & "The World" have dismissed these rumors as being baseless every single time.

So, you decide, "What the Hell? I'm bored." And so you buy the software, turn on the computer, install it, & begin the registration process.

Joining Format:
Name: Your character's name...duh....
"Real" Life: Things on your life outside of the game. Won't come into play much. Be as creative as you'd like. Hell, Tsukasa was a girl in a coma.
Appearance: What the character looks like.
Class: See below.
Weapon: Take the basic concept of your class's weapons & make something. You can replace it with something else later, I suppose.
Inventory: Not sure how much this particular space is going to be used, because experience tells me that it's a pain in the ass, but this is edited if you get items.
Other: Fuck if I know, but this category is great for covering my ass when I forget things.

Classes: You're all familiar with what a class is. It determines the weapons, stats, & skill sets of a character. Those 2 sentences are redundant, but I digress. The point is that "weapon" denotes what types of weapons that the character can use, the elements determine the types of magic that can be cast--this will be covered later on--the strength, speed, & magic fields how effective the class is at that relative to the others, & notes are anything else that applies. Each character can only have 1 class & this can only be changed by having the character's "real" self delete it & start over. In that case, it's probably simpler to just make another character, especially since multiples are allowed, but I thought I'd note that the possibility is available, regardless.

Class: Twin Blade
Weapon: Daggers, bladed shields, katars, & claws
Elements: Fire, Wood, Thunder, & Darkness
Strength: **
Speed: ******
Magic: *****
Defense: ***
Notes: Twin Blades dual wield.

Class: Heavy Blade
Weapon: Two-handed sword, katana
Elements: Earth, Fire, Wood, & Thunder
Strength: *****
Speed: **
Magic: **
Defense: ****
Notes:

Class: Wavemaster
Weapon: Staff
Elements: All
Strength: *
Speed: ***
Magic: ******
Defense: *
Notes: All Wavemaster physical attacks do 1 damage. They have the lowest defenses, but the highest magical attacks.

Class: Blade Master
Weapon: Long sword, broad sword
Elements: Earth, Water, Fire, & Darkness
Strength: ***
Speed: ****
Magic: ***
Defense: ****
Notes:

Class: Long Arm
Weapon: Halberd
Elements: Water, Fire, Wood, & Thunder
Strength: ****
Speed: *****
Magic: ****
Defense: **
Notes: As spearmen, they have the largest reach of all classes.

Class: Heavy Axeman
Weapon: Large axes or maces
Elements: Earth, Water, Thunder, & Darkness
Strength: ******
Speed: *
Magic: *
Defense: ******
Notes:

[DanteFalcon]

I like the concept but it seems I maybe the only one. Dang. I love that series.

[Menarker]

Not thinking of joining atm, but I'd make a suggestion to put a catatgory rating for Defense. At the moment, some classes look totally weak and unbalanced. (Blade Master have 3 to all stats while Long Arm got 4 to all stats AND reach.) You mentioned that Wavemasters have the lowest defense, but we don't know who else is higher and how proportionally. (Although I assume the order would go Axeman, HeavyBlade, BladeMaster, Twin Blade, Long Arm, Wave Master. (Up to you though.)

EDIT: And maybe add cast time for the casters, unless you intend that casting power and speed go hand in hand and someone with 1 rank of magic is going to have crappy power AND cast time and should never bother.

[Lithp]

You should join, Dante. *Nod.* The more posts this get, especially sign-ups, the more chance I have to get this thing going.

Casting time was fairly negligible in the game, but that'll be something to think about when I get around to explaining how magic works. Since, y'know, I pretty much have to reinvent the system, or else it'll be too complicated. Joy.

The stats, as I mentioned, are relative. They come from what I observed in the game. * vs. *** doesn't mean that the character is 3 times faster, it's just that they're in "3rd place," if you will. I suppose I can add a defense stat, though.

Ideally, though, classes should also be balanced in terms of how the weapons can be used & the elements.

Edit: Heh, I only glanced at your list before I started editing. Are you psychic?

[Menarker]

Originally Posted by Lithp

The stats, as I mentioned, are relative. They come from what I observed in the game. * vs. *** doesn't mean that the character is 3 times faster, it's just that they're in "3rd place," if you will. I suppose I can add a defense stat, though.

Edit: Heh, I only glanced at your list before I started editing. Are you psychic?

I figured that you meant relatively as well, but best to err in giving out too much detail than not enough.

As for thinking I'm psychic... :3 That's quite a compliment, but I assure you there was some sort of logic to how I came across my list.

Wavemaster being caster specialist and cloth-like armor get the weakest defense naturally.
Axe Master having the highest strength and 1 in everything else should naturally get the highest defense to compensate. They are like the tank. Axes are heavy after all, and they are slow. So someone with such immense strength and no agility should naturally be inclined to the heaviest armor.
Blade Master is like the Jack of All Trade but still a swordsman at heart. That and their sword is lighter and easier to wield. Heavy Sword use two handed swords but focus on the sword-skill primarily more so than the blademaster. Thus those two should roughly even out defense wise. The Heavy Sword will only use swordskills but do so really well. Blade Master can do everything adaquetely but will falter when pitted against someone who is a specialist at a certain trait.
As for Long Arm, I reasoned that extra reach IS part of their defense, but because of their weapon's length, they can't defend as well when a foe gets in ultra-close range as opposed to the Twin Arms who specifically is built to fight scrappy style due to small weapon size, and thus can defend themselves better if someone gets in their space.

^.^

[Bard The 5th LW]

I may put a sign up in. I remember watching this show long ago, and I remember it fondly.

I'll think about it.

[Menarker]

Just out of curiousity, are there any magic types that are exclusive to the Wavemaster? It says "all magic" but I was wondering if there was anything like "Light" or "Holy" since a few classes have Darkness magic but I don't see any with the opposite.

Also, what sort of magic is present? Buffs? Heal? Direct Damage? Debuffs? AOE (Area of Effect)? Are they premade by you? Is there a inherent power circle over which one wins over the other like Pokemon's elements? (Fire beats Wood which beats Water which beats Fire for example?)

Do weapons come enhanced with special traits (such as built in element)? This might matter for a Blade Master if they choose a magic spell element type to cover a resistance that a monster might have against their weapon's particular element. (Trying to fight a fire monster with a fire weapon might be futile, so they might pack a water spell so they aren't useless)

[Lithp]

Edit: Holy shit, this post turned out longer than I expected.

Well, the way it worked in the games was that weapons & armor sometimes had spells. Through SP (skill points), you would cast those spells. The elements of the classes refer to what they can get through this method. You could switch out equipment to access other spells if your currently equipped piece didn't have them, so it was advisable to carry a few weapons & a few armors & such at one time.

All of these rules also applied to abilities that weren't magic in nature. IE, Long Arms had a lot of attacks that made them slash at the enemy's feet or spin their spear. These could be either non-elemental or one of the elements that the Long Arm could use.

In addition to that, there were scrolls. They were 1 time use, but they allowed anyone to cast any kind of spell. As long as there was a scroll for it, which there weren't for some summons.

So, to answer your question, a spell would be exclusive to a Wavemaster if it only came on a staff. In general, what that means is that they can cast all elements.

As I recall, there were some weapons that would sometimes hit with a certain element when used. The elements work like this:

Water<->Fire
Thunder<->Darkness
Earth<->Wood

There were also the Repth spells, which were used for healing, buff spells, & debuff spells. The attack spells were sorted into categories:

Rom spells whirled around & hit a few enemies (if they were clustered together) multiple times for small damage. Most of the hits would usually connect, too.

Zot spells would emerge below the enemy, typically doing a few hits to some enemies (if they were clustered together) for larger damage. Their accuracy was so-so.

Kruz spells involved things converging on the enemy. They were fairly dependable, but not as powerful.

Don spells involved dropping things on the enemy & were largely shit. They'd only hit one enemy & they weren't terribly accurate or powerful.

Summon spells summoned a monster that did a single blast with perfect accuracy & relatively large damage. Naturally, these cost the most SP.

What I'm thinking of doing is changing the categories to a more forum-friendly arrangement. So, you could decide the best spell type to use based on the situation. So, for instance, say you cast Gan (Earth) Zot. Maybe, in addition to being an attack, those rocks will stay as an obstacle. I think it's a fairly sound idea.

I really do not like the idea of having spells linked to weapons, because that feels overly complicated to me. I also don't like having them be scrolls, because that ruins the point of a scroll. In the game, books installed data onto a character, so I'll probably have spell learning work that way.

I'm not really sure about elemental equipment, attack abilities, or equipment abilities (shit like critical hit or half damage) yet.

Once I figure things out, I'll post them somewhere. Maybe in the OP of this thread.

[DanteFalcon]

I should ask where in the timeline this is taking place? Are you making an entirely new timeline? I'm more curious to see what you intend to do about things like "Bugged" monsters where the hp was infinite. And later on in the games (See Quarantine) they were freaking everywhere. But they were still existant back in the beginning of Sign.

[Lithp]

That's a secret.