Skills and Schools
Written by Iseldiera1. Introduction
2. Horizons as a Skill Based Game: Fact or Myth
3. Leveling, Skill Gaining and Importance of Prestige Classes
4. Multiclassing Explained
5. Conclusion
1. Introduction
Just like my review of Horizons Beta, again this guide was prepared according to my personal experience in Horizons Beta, and it should not be taken as a source of ultimate facts about the game that we will see at release. I have visited various message boards and I have seen some misconceptions and misunderstandings about Horizons advancement system.This article is going to consist of four sections, which i believe will pretty much summarize the whole concept of advancement.
2. Horizons as a Skill Based Game: Fact or Myth
First let us take a look at what Artifact Entertainment promised us on its official webpage:"Open-ended school-based skill system allowing you to choose a role for your character and to later switch to a different role if you desire."
This sentence has been misunderstood by many people that Horizons would actually bring a skill based advanced system. What the gamers actually mean by a "skill based system" is an advancement system which is not necessarily dependent on leveling by killing monsters, but rather by doing what you like or doing what your class is supposed to do, in order to gain levels. An example to what is skill based and what is not skill based can be the games Morrowind and Shadowbane. Let us look at the thief class in both of these games.
In Morrowind, a thief can gain levels by increasing his primary and secondary skills by USING them. This means, the thief goes into towns and tries to hide in taverns and shops or the thief attempts to steal things from people, which if successful, increase the skill of the thief.However in Shadowbane, a thief(or a healer or any other class) has to kill things(or join groups who kill things) in order to gain levels. A thief may very well never hide or never steal in their lives, but by killing things they may become the best in the game in terms of those skills.
Those who have been looking forward to Horizons as a skill based game can delay their hopes for other titles such as Dark and Light or Darkfall Online. In Horizons, all adventuring classes gain increases in their skills by leveling up, which is done through doing quests/tasks or by killing monsters. All crafting classes gain increases in their skills by leveling up, again by crafting items. There is a system of "current skill" and "base skill" which gave hope to everyone who just started playing in beta, but in time we realised that it is not the skill based system we envisioned it to be. Take a look at the Miner class for example. When you think of the description, these guys are supposed to be gaining more skill by continuously gathering ore. But no, they gain skill by the only given way - craft items.
It is even worse for adventuring schools. In order to further demonstrate my point, let me give you an example of a warrior who is fascinated with nothing but two handed swords in the game. When this person is at level one, lets say for the sake of this argument that his "base skill" for two handed slashing weapons is 10, and for a one handed crushing weapon is 10.We look at the character screen and see this:
| Base Skill | Current Skill | |
| Two handed slashing: | 10 | 10 |
| One handed crushing: | 10 | 10 |
At this point, one thinks that, if i use my two handed sword, even if the base skills are going to be the same, my current skill in two handed slashing will be higher, since that is the skill that I am ACTIVELY USING. Beep, wrong. Let us assume that this guy gained 10 skill points per level in both two handed slashing and one handed crushing for 15 levels. During these 15 levels, he used NOTHING BUT two handed swords. We go back to our character screen and see this:
| Base Skill | Current Skill | |
| Two handed slashing: | 150 | 161 |
| One handed crushing: | 150 | 161 |
What we originally expect is that this guy would have a very high current skill in two handed slashing, and not so different one hand crushing(i.e 179 two handed slashing, 150 one handed crush). We expect this because for 15 levels this guy used nothing but two handed swords and should have gained knowledge in that school.
Summary: those who pride themselves in the use of a certain skill over others will not actively be better at that skill than others. Everything is level based. Other than some quests which give you minor bonuses(i.e. +10 sword skill), every character is dependent on magical item bonuses and buffs to shape their skills in the ways they wish. Horizons does not have a skill based advancement system.
3. Leveling, Skill Gaining and Importance of Prestige Classes
So if its not a pure skill based system, how does character advancemenent work in Horizons?After each level, depending on your class choice or prestige class, you will gain a predetermined amount of increases in your attributes and in your skills. Each of these amounts will vary for each class, for example a Mage will get a lot more focus and power attribute increases compared to strength, and a warrior will gain more hitpoints and increase in strength compared to what a mage gets.
Let us take a look at the warrior class, and see what kind of increases they get when they level up.
Attributes
Health: +20
Strength: +9
Power: +5
Focus: +5
Dexterity: +7
Skill
Armor Use: +10
Evasion: +8
Magic Defense: +7
One Hand Crush: +10
One Hand Pierce: +10
One Hand Slash: +10
Shield: +10
Two Hand Crush: +10
Two Hand Slash: +10
Tools,armor, weapons, spells and various items all have some sort of minimum requirement on them before you can use them. The attributes and skills are going to affect your performance in two ways. First, they will actually augment what you do(Higher strength will allow the warrior to do more damage with an axe, higher jewelcrafting skill will reduce the amount of components required to make a certain jewel, etc), The second way these will affect your performance is they will determine the minimum requirements on the items(Bronze Battle Axe which does 10-13 damage requires two handed slash skill 1, while a Fine Bronze Battle Axe which does 26-30 damage will require two handed slash skill of 100).
Something that you might have heard from those who beta tested the game is that the classes do not have much difference among them. When you compare a lvl 20 conjurer to a lvl 20 mage, there does not seem to be any difference in the flame spells they can cast. Since the conjurer gains 8 points of fire while a mage gains 10, this will make a HUGE difference in late game. Understanding this factor will help you look at the idea of prestige classes and multiclassing in a completely different perspective.
To understand the skill gain concept further, and go into prestige classes, lets compare the skill and level gain of a conjurer and a pure mage.
You will come across many articles and guides in other webpages that show you pictures like these. Do not trust these statistics. They are both outdated and wrong. For example, even though it does not show on the mage tab, a mage gains 4 points of mind and 4 points of summoning every level, other than the standard ice and flame gains. The conjurer on the other hand,gains 9 points of flame instead of the 10 mage gets, but has a HUGE boost to the amount of summoning they get, gaining 12 points of summoning every level. Now let us first compare a lvl 30 mage to a lvl 30 conjurer, then compare lvl 90 versions.
Flame:
lvl 30 mage = 10skillperlvl*30levels = 300 flame base skill
lvl 30 conjurer = 9skillperlvl*20levels = 290 flame base skill
summoning:
lvl 30 mage = (4skillperlvl*30levels) = 120 summoning base skill
lvl 30 conjurer =(4skillperlvl*20levels)+(12skillperlvl*10levels) = 200 summoning base skill
Here we can clearly see the advantage of joining a conjurer school over staying as a pure mage, if we want to use the summoning spells. The conjurer is not lacking in the flame department compared to the base mage but having a significant advnatage over the mage in summoning. Now lvl 90.
Flame:
lvl 90 mage = 10skillperlvl*90levels = 900 flame base skill
lvl 90 conjurer = 9skillperlvl*90levels = 810 flame base skill
summoning:
lvl 90 mage = (4skillperlvl*90levels) = 360 summoning base skill
lvl 90 conjurer =(4skillperlvl*20levels)+(12skillperlvl*700levels) = 920 summoning base skill
Looking at our results, we can say that a person who loves using the flame spells will probably choose the pure mage, since the pure mage will have access to spells 8 levels higher than a conjurer(ignoring current skill system). But looking at the conjurer skills, they will have top notch summoning magic, and a flame skill a little behind pure mages. So, what is the benefit of staying as a mage over the conjurer(or what is the benefit of staying a pure class rather than a prestige)?
The answer is class specific abilities. Upon joining the conjurer school, the mage will lose very important abilities such as engulf, improved fire bolt, mage mastery and etc. and gain a few new abilities such as fireflies. It is up to the person to decide if they would like to keep their base class abilities, or go into the prestige class and start getting a new set of them. Other than the different skill/attribute gains per each class, another important decision a player has to make is if they want to sacrifice their base class abilities for the ones they gain by joining a prestige school.
Something that everyone should note is that, people with a lot of free time can level as a mage to lvl90, then level as a conjurer to lvl90, then switch back to the mage to enjoy the base mage spells, a 900 flame skill and now a 920! summoning skill. By using this freedom to level in any classes, you can see a mage who levels up in schools of sorcery, wizardry and summoning, ending up having higher ice,flame,mind,energy and summoning skills than any other person, having the "ultimate all powerful all knowing" character. This might be good news to the powerplayer, and bad news to the roleplayer.
Summary: In Horizons, each level gives you an increase in certain predetermined attributes and skills, which affect your performance in any given school. The only other ways to increase these are quests, tasks and magical equipment. Prestige classes offer the players specialization in one or two skill rather than havin an average knowledge in all skills in a given class. When players choose between staying as a pure class or going prestige, other than the attribute and skill gains, they have to look at which class specific abilities they are loosing, and which ones they are keeping.
4. Multiclassing Explained
This is where the most confusion is taking place in the community, because each of us have different understanding of the word multiclassing due to our past experience in other games such as AD&D. A player may "actively" belong to only one adventure school and one crafting school at any given time. This means you cannot run around as a cleric/mage, but you can as a cleric/spellcrafter. Multiclassing in Horizons refers to the ability to switch to another adventuring/crafting school and gain skills/abilities/attribites in that chosen school whenever you wish. This does not mean, however, that an "active" lvl 10 mage who has also 10 levels in cleric school will have access to everything an "active" lvl 10 cleric will have. This system is a perfect way to create unique characters and get away from one of the diseases in mmorpg's that we call "cookie cutter characters". Before I go on to explain the concept of level and rating, let me give you some examples to demonstrate what i mean.Let us compare the lives of a pure cleric and a mage, who also gained some levels in the cleric school.(For the sake of this argument we are assuming ratings donot exist.)
The cleric goes out and hunts around the newbie island, killing maggots grouks and skeletons till lvl 10. Right now as an active cleric, he goes to the consigner and buys some new spells. He has access to an instant heal which was given to him as a class ability, he has access to some passive bonus which increases his heals, and he has access to lets say four heals, one of them being the group heal. This person can resurrect a fallen friend.
The mage goes out and hunts around the newbie island, killing the same mobs and gets lvl 10. She has a lot of spell related abilities, such as burnout which increases her damage by %25, she has a high damage flame bolt and a damage over time engulf spells that are given to her as class abilities. She goes to the consigner and buys one more direct damage spell, and an ice spell which roots the target. This person goes back to the town and joins the cleric school. Upon joining the cleric school, she realises that she lost nearly all of her mage abilities, such as engulf, burnout and on top of that, she can no longer cast the ice spell. The only thing she is left with is her standard repeating flame bolt.
The mage gains 10 levels as a cleric, using a combination of her flame bolt and her newly acquired mace and gets lvl 10. As an active cleric, she goes to consigner and buys new heals and resurrection spells. If this person decides to stay as a cleric, she keeps all her cleric spells and can cast the continus flame bolt and perhaps a few other spells from mage class later on. But if this person decides to switch back to mage school, she gains all her engulf, burnout and mage bonuses again, but loses the ability to group heal, the ability to rez. Only thing she is left from cleric school are two minor and one major heals.
As you can see, multiclassing allows a character to have added flavor and utility by joining other schools. A monk prefers to level 10 levels as a warrior first then switches to a monk, because he will enjoy the extra hitpoints he got by lvl as a warrior first.
Now let me explain the you rating system to you. This is HIGHLY IMPORTANT in your decisions in character advancement in Horizons(Sigh, why do i feel that this is the only decision that you have to make? hehe). The rating system is kind of a precaution or a penalty against those who would like to gain levels in multiple schools. In Horizons, your rating system determines the amount of experience you will get from a given monster. Your rating is determined by your levels in the schools you have. Crafting has the same system, but to keep things short i will give examples from only adventuring as i always do.
(Please note that the numbers are chosen to give you an average idea, and might not be %100 correct for release version.)
Rating Calculation
If your active school is your highest school, then all the other schools you have joined add +1 to your rating for every 10 levels you gain in them. Examples, where mage is the active school:a lvl 28 mage with 3 levels into cleric school = 28+0 = 28.
a lvl 28 mage with 13 levels into cleric school = 28+1 =29.
a lvl 28 mage with 3 levels into cleric, 7 levels into warrior, 9 levels into druid = 28+0+0+0 = 28
a lvl 28 mage with 21 levels into cleric, 13 levels into warrior, 25 leves into druid = 28+2+1+2 =33
If your active school is less than your highest school, the formula gets a little confusing. The average between your highest school and your active school is taken, and one point is added for every 10 levels you get in another school. Examples, where the mage is active school:
a lvl 1 mage with 15 levels into cleric = (15+1)/2 = 8
a lvl 1 mage with 24 levels into cleric and 4 levels into warrior = (1+24)/2+0 = ~12
a lvl 1 mage with 24 levels into cleric and 15 levels into warrior = (1+24)/2+1 = ~13
a lvl 16 mage with 38 levels into warrior and 33 levels into druid = (16+38)/2+(30/3) = 30
Your adventure and crafting rating will ALWAYS be displayed for you on your screen, so you will never have to make these calculations while hunting. But it is a good idea to do all these calculations before you make your character, because once you gain levels in any school, there is no going back.
Let me give you some examples now for you to understand how experience is calculated on rating.I am making up these numbers on exp again to give you an idea.
If you are a lvl 15 warrior, and your rating is 15, you go and kill a lvl 15 zombie for 500 experience. If you go kill a lvl 14 zombie, you get 350 experience. If you kill a lvl 13 one, you get 280 experience.
If you are a lvl 15 warrior, but due to multiclassing your rating is 17, you go and kill a lvl 15 zombie for 280 experience, because your rating demands that to get that "full experience from same con monster" you go kill a lvl 17 mob. As you can see, those who are not careful with their ratings can gimp themselves pretty bad while multiclassing. It may come to a point that it will force you to join groups to advance, since the things you can kill at a certain level might not give you any exp at all! So plan ahead and dont gimp yourself by having a 70 rating as a lvl 58 adventurer with no ability to kill something above lvl 53.
Finally i would like to talk about some concerns that people have shown in beta, which have negatively affected many readers. It gave me BIG PAIN today to read some message boards to find out that three people are not going to buy the game because they have been misinformed in this multiclassing department. Here is the primary myth:
"Horizons multiclassing system allows players to have all powerful one man armies, who can do everything on their own."
This is absolutely wrong. While as i explained above you can become all knowing in ONE CLASS by joining all prestiges and maximum leveling in all of them(which will take a VERY long time because of rating system), you still will not be a master of other class abilities. Again let me give examples to elaborate.
A lvl 10 warrior who spent 7 points into mage and 7 points into cleric is a self sufficient killing machine. He can pull with a flamebolt, kill with a sword, and heal after fight. When this character becomes lvl 60, the lvl 7 bolt or the lvl 7 heal that he has is neither going to cause a scratch at the target, nor is going to heal a scratch on himself. That person will have to gain 60 levels in mage and 60 levels in healer only to get 1 powerful nuke, 1 powerful heal. Lets say the guy has all time in the world(we know people like this exist) and this guy got 60 levels in healer 60 in mage and 60 in warrior. As the warrior in group, this guy is not good as a lvl 40 pure mage, or a pure 4vl 10 cleric. Here is why:
The level 60/60/60 uber guy with his active warrior school will have access to 2-3 heals and 1 magebolt, and a couple of other spells. The lvl 40 cleric will have access to group heals, RESURRECTION, and many other useful abilities to keep his group alive, while the abilities of our uber guy will only be enough for himself. Same for the lvl 40 mage, who will have group magic protections, elemental resistance spells, roots mezes snares, that the uber guy will not have access to.
So as you can see, multiclassing is going to benefit a majority of the population ONLY IN THE FIRST 20 LEVELS OR SO, but after that you will have to play three times your normal playing to keep those "utility skill gains from other schools" up par with your level.
