Help Saixy Help You

[Saix 0]

Hey there Forum, your friendly neighborhood GM Saixy here, and I want to talk to you guys about Unique Skills.

So, as it was discovered today, Unique Skills are a thing. I'd like to clear up some info about them here, and get a little feedback from the Community on these skills.

First off, What is a Unique Skill? Well, without wanting to give away too much of whats going on, Unique Skills are special Skills that have 5 Sword Skill only available to the holder of that skill. Now, we set these skills up based on a variety of things; like advanced skills for the weapons we already have, fitting a specific theme or role, or even emulating something from pop-culture.

Now, technically the Unique Skills were created by Zero, but since I was the GM put in charge of modulating the Skills in the game, they sort of fall under the Umbrella of what I do. Yep, that's me, the Equipment and Skill dude. Anyway, I have a few things I want to lay down as far as how the Unique Skills work.

First off, lets look at some numbers. FOUR SEVEN A'HUNDRED NINETEEN!

Now that we have that out of the way, let's look at how the Unique Skills work.

After being earned, the 5 Sword Skills are Pm'd to the current Skill Holder. Whether or not that player decides to go public with those skills, or try to keep it a secret, is up to them. However, all skills work in a similar fashion, with a few important notes.

1. Cooldowns. Each Unique Skill Sword Skill has a specific cool down. These skills have 5 attacks that can be used. To determine the Cooldown, take the number of the attack and multiply times 2. So the first, 1, attack would have a two post cool down. The 3rd, 3, attack would have a six post cool down. And the final, 5th, attack would have a 10 post cooldown. It's pretty simple.

2. Unique Skills, why? When Zero decided to start working on the Unique Skills, and sat down and decided what he wanted them to function like, I pushed to have them serve as a special means of accomplishing something in the Rp. Some of the Unique Skills are specially suited for DPS, others Control, and even Tanking. I have always pushed for maximum customization for the players, and I felt that the Unique Skills should be no exception. In short, they are meant to provide advanced options and be the evolution of the basic Sword Skills we see now.

3. How do I find one? Thus far we have seen one Unique Skill earned by a player, it was actually much faster than I had anticipated. However, as this case has shown us, a player has the chance of obtaining such a skill by satisfying the request of an NPC with the skill. But Saixy, how do you encounter the NPC? See, I can hear you thinking. I check topics daily to see if I can find one that satisfies the basic requirements for such an encounter. When I do see one, I roll a D10. If the roll is a six or higher, in pops the NPC. It's that easy.

4. What if the skill I want has been found already? If the skill you wanted has already been obtained, then there are a few things that can happen. 1, you can challenge the player to a duel for the skill. Obviously, the player with the skill must accept the terms, simply attacking and defeating them will not get you anything. 2, if that player dies either at the hands of a monster, boss, or even another player(s), then that Unique Skill goes back into the queue, and the Skill NPC will begin appearing again.

Now that we have some basic questions out of the way, we get to the meat of this post. SAO canon had 10 Unique Skills, only 10. Now, while we do try to adhere to canon, we don't want to potentially alienate players. So while we do currently have 10 Unique Skills written and planned out, that does not necessarily mean that they will be the only Unique Skills released. So, I ask you, The Forum, to leave a few suggestions here as to what kinds of Unique Skills you might be interested in seeing. Don't just throw names at me, give me some details, how would they work? What function would they serve? What kind of weapon would they use? Etc.

I'm not making any sort of guarantee that any of it would be used to implemented, but I would be very interested in what you guys have to say on the matter.

Peace,

Saixykins

[Nikki Styx 0]

Mist Evasion

This skill is designed for Evasive players. When activated a player will disappear in a cloud of black mist. For 2 turns a player will be immune to all attacks against them, However attacking from within the cloud will ruin the illusion, and render them able to be hit again. This ability can be activated once every 5 turns.

[Zerva 0]

If you will forgive the newbie butting his head in, I think an interesting unique skill would be something inline with the control aspect. A cryomancy of sorts, like for example your weapon becomes chilled (ice optional) and if you hit someone it numbs them, making them slow down or with the unique sword arts maybe partially freezing them temporarily? Like their hands to make it hard to swing or their legs to prevent running or such.

I don't think the skills necessarily have obvious visual ques to their owners, but I could imagine a player with the skill maybe breathing out frosty mist and feeling cold to the touch if they are readying the skill or just for flavor to make themselves seem cooler. Heck, the frosty mist could also just be applied as it's own effect like howl, going back to the freezing and numbing part.

Insert pun about brain-freezing as a skill here.

Edit: Optionally I could see someone covering themselves with ice as a psuedo armor or something as another unique skill, maybe soaking in some damage before shattering.

[Ethereal 0]

You're missing raw DPS. It seems to be all stealth but no power.

Afflictive Warhammer

A two-handed skill that is designed to cause status effects such as bleeding, paralysis, knockback, poison, etc.

Blazing Strike: High chance of burn, medium damage.

Spiked Blade: High chance of bleeding, medium damage.

Lightning Thrust: High chance of paralysis, medium damage.

Spartan Kick: Medium knockback, low damage.

Etc.

[Saix 0]

Not bad suggestions, though do remember that SAO was supposed to be a world that did not have Magic, it was almost completely 'martial might' focused. However that is not to say that we can't find some common ground. With that said, I'd like you guys to focus on things a little differently. Instead of just giving me individual techniques and how they might function, also give me some ideas on the whole package. Give me an idea and how you think it should work, what kind of skills it should have, etc.

Example:

Hoplite Style: Spear and shield style that is defensive focused but uses both shield and weapon to switch between offense and defense on the fly. (Greek Hoplites are badass)

Spear attacks - It would have some spear attacks, that would probably cause some bleeding damage

Shield attacks - It would have some shield bash moves, that would probably cause knockdown/back

[Zerva 0]

Ooh! You are right, sorry. I guess I let my love of ice magic override my higher thought processes. I considered it more like a weapon buff in a way, really. Well, for my own character the sole unique skill kinda covers stealth and effects, so I can't say much more on that one, or anything that would apply to my character as he is...

Secondary suggestion: Berserker

Requirement: Two handed weapons required

Skill examples:

Enrage - Grants the user a damage boost relative to their hitpoints for x turns(skill rank?). The lower their health, the stronger the attack.

Second Wind - The Berserker regenerates a quarter of their total health once a day, allowing them to keep fighting while on the edge. Can only be used at or under 25% health.

Thaaaaaat's all I got. I saw a thing saying that throwing weapons are a nope, and the difference between ninja and assassin are slight.... soooo I am out of ideas for the moment for my own self-improvement!