One way to intertwine narrative and mechanics in a game is to do so through character classes. In order to have unique feeling classes, the class style needs to match the narrative of what they are. For example, a warrior needs to feel like a physical powerhouse, and a mage needs to feel like a squishy, but powerful spellcaster.
DRACONIC KNIGHT:
In Draconic Echoes: The Ardent War, the physically focused warrior and magic hybrid class is Vendra’s “Draconic Knight” option. The in-game description of the Draconic Knight is as follows:
Selecting this option will change Vendra to the “Draconic Knight” class. Aureus’ (a golden dragon) blood will unleash her latent mana, giving her a substantial boost to her magic potential and magic power. She will learn fire magic, wind magic, and spells typical of dragons. All of the spells she learns through the Draconic Knight class have a small chance to apply the “dragon fear” effect to their targets. She will also passively reduce any fire damage that she takes. The Draconic Knight is an aggressive mixed physical and magical damage dealer, but she also gains a unique set of defensive spells to support herself, which become very effective if she successfully anticipates her enemies. Although it may take some adjustments, the Draconic Knight is a terrifying force with the proper training and gear.
Draconic Echoes: The Ardent War
The Draconic Knight is a class style that resembles paladin tanks and damage dealers, as it is a warrior and spellcasting hybrid, but it is also based on using spells themed around dragons. As the Draconic Knight casts spells, it is beneficial for it to allocate some resources to increasing its Magic Power stat. This, in turn, lowers the available stat resources for other important warrior stats such as physical defense, HP, and strength. As the player must make sacrifices in terms of stats, the class needs to make up for that minor deficiency in its abilities to stay competitive with the standard warrior class, “Warlord.” To elaborate on how the “Draconic Knight” effectively makes the player that the character is an effective tank and a spellcaster at the same time, I would like to explain a few of the class’ skills in more detail.
Blazing Breath– Breathe the vicious flames of a golden dragon on your enemies, hitting them all twice. This spell has a small chance to apply the “dragon fear” effect. Generates 4 TP per hit.
If the point of the class is to feel like a dragon, then there has to be a fire breath. This spell has a high mana cost, but also an abnormally high TP generation, so it rewards players for breathing fire on groups of enemies, which then gives the caster a chance to attack with hard-hitting TP spells. The flow is meant to emulate that of a dragon. The caster swoops in to weaken the enemies with a flood of fire breath, then finish them off with a massive physical attack.
Flaming Talon– Envelop your weapon in golden fire and strike the target for massive fire damage with a chance to apply the “burning” and “dragon fear” effects.
This skill is one of the large physical damage skills that uses TP mentioned just above. It has a high base power, and it also deals fire damage which can be even more devastating if the player is following the primer and detonator mechanics described in earlier posts. Basically, if players are using wind spells first, fire damage has the potential to deal double damage. Draconic Knights have access to a couple of wind spells to support this combo potential.
Golden Scion– Magically fortify to gain wind resistance and fire absorption. This spell also increases the caster’s M-POW for a short time and grants immunity to the “dragon fear” effect.
In this game, dragons absorb fire damage, halve wind damage, and are immune to “dragon fear.” Therefore, it is a must to give the dragon-resembling class access to the same bonuses. How could one not feel like a dragon without bathing themselves in fire to heal? How could one feel like a dragon if they themselves fear dragons? Therefore, this spell provides these unique defensive benefits.
Now, “dragon fear” has been thrown around a lot in this discussion of the Draconic Knight, so it would be prudent to define it here and describe the thought behind its function in the game.
Dragon Fear– reduces strength, magic power, speed, and luck by 34%.
As the name suggests, this is an effect used by dragons. For the most part, only dragons can apply this effect to the player, but the player can have access to this effect through the Draconic Knight class. It is applied through most skills in this class’ spellbook, and it is the Draconic Knight’s answer to having its stats spread more thinly than the Warlord. The effect is applied actively through fighting normally, and it mitigates damage for the player. The idea for the player to use “dragon fear” in this way was inspired by World of Warcraft’s introduction of “active mitigation” tanking in the early to mid 2010s.
Overall, the goal of the Draconic Knight class is to make the player feel like they are fighting like a dragon. Although some lower numbers may appear on the stat page compared to the Warlord, the Draconic Knight becomes an overwhelming force through its aggressive offensive skills, and its ability to mitigate damage both actively and passively through skills.
Ultimately, the goal of most classes are the same: attack to get the enemies’ HP down to zero. Therefore, it is up to the blending of mechanics and narrative to make each class feel unique. Theming a class around a certain archetype or narrative will help to define each class mechanically as well.
If you’re curious about how all my nonsense actually plays out in a game, check out Draconic Echoes: The Ardent War on Steam!