Archetype: The Warden (Melee/Support)

[Bluhman]

Hi I'm a longtime player that's returning from like Issue 7 era obviously interspersed with a bunch of other games played like Champions, Pathfinder, Overwatch, Lancer, etc, other things you could fit in 1.5 decades.

One thing I've noted is that there's a specific niche I believe CoH doesn't really address, and that's the Melee Support role - all support roles currently, with Defender, Controller, Corruptor, and Mastermind, are chiefly made to operate with ranged powersets for their attacks. Here's something that aims to try and get this role satisfied by an Archetype that fills that niche:

The Warden

Primary: Warding

Secondary: Melee

Inherent: Vindication

 

The Warden is a versatile close-quarters combatant that leads the fight, capable of bolstering its allies while simultaneously dishing it out. While particularly competent both on their own and in groups, owing to their Warding powers providing buffs for both themselves and nearby allies, they are limited necessarily by distance - for their allies to get benefits, it needs to place itself centrally, and with that deal with all the dangers that poses!

 

Stat Abstract:

Survivability	7
Melee Damage	7
Ranged Damage	2
Crowd Control	4
Support	7
Pets	2

 

About Vindication:

Wardens' capabilities are kept in check by their natural recognition of battle-wide morale and opportunity. When pushed to their limits, on the brink of destruction, their Vindication drive drops, improving their defensive and supportive potential - once aid is rendered, openings are created, and spirits are high, Vindication surges, and the strength and accuracy of a warden's attacks sharply rises, ready to deliver the decisive counterattack!

 

Vindication works with an extra status bar, similar to Brute Fury - when outside of battle, this bar will stabilize around 50%, and the current level of Vindication can alter how certain abilities operate, signaled by the color it adapts:

0-33%: Merciful - Warding abilities offer defensive and restorative benefits, and the Warden's Mez resistance improves.

33-66%: Balanced - Ready for combat: the Warden and their nearby allies gain slight passive boosts to their damage output, defenses, accuracy, and movement speed.

66-100%: Vindictive - The opening is shown, as opponents lose their energy, fall victim to control statuses, or lose health - seize the opportunity! Sharp boosts are given to the Warden's damage output and accuracy, and Warding abilities now emphasize boosting offensive capabilities via recovery, accuracy, damage, etc. 

 

 

About Warding Powersets:

The specialized Warding powerset choices offer a combined suite of personal defenses and specialized PBAoE support options - with powersets like a Force Field/Energy Aura combination, or an Empathy/Regeneration combo probably offering the most natural conversions. In general, they follow a framework that would look like this for each power granted per level:

1. PBAoE burst (healing aura, tweaked repulsion field with some Vindication mechanics, etc)
2. PBAoE aura toggle (Dispersion Bubble, Regeneration Aura) - a core defensive and support mechanic.
3. etc - Personal defense toggle i.e. defensive sets
4. etc
5. Flexible PBAoE Support Burst - temporary buff
6. PBAoE Panic Button option - Decrease Vindication on command.
7. etc
8. Targeted entry AoE - get to the center of combat as fast as possible (i.e. leap attack)
9. Personal Defense Panic Button option (elude, moment of glory, etc.)

As can be seen the Warding Powerset designation's necessary since it's really quite its own beast - a combined Support/Defense powerset. The core things to keep in mind on its design is that they're

A - not designed with targeting allies in mind. You're going to see lots of that PBAoE delimiter tossed around in implementation of these sets - the core conceit is for the Warden to be able to provide this defense/support to things nearby itself, rather than having to target specific things. For reference think of the playstyle of a character such as Lucio (Overwatch) or Gunner (Deep Rock Galactic) - the class doesn't need time to choose what target to help, just that they're there, passively helping, and are an active combatant at the same time.

B - context sensitive. Because it's very much its own beast (i.e. yes something that hasn't been done before ever in CoH) this gives it some opportunity to tie more closely into how the archetype's core mechanics operate. This is perhaps the main thing that might save the implementation of the powerset - most implementations will probably be stretched really thin because they're trying to shove two powersets into one, so then by necessity, the effects of some of the powers will be highly dependent on what level of Vindication is being used.

 

Example Warding Powerset Drafts:

Powerset/Abstract	Regrowth - Emphasis on regeneration, recovery, healing, etc.	Barriers - High defense, deflection, knockback of opponents	Flame - it's element. That's kinda hot.	Sensory - "Super Reflexes" as support, combined with lots of sight, accuracy, etc.	Fervor - The "Warlord" angle; directly bolstering morale, leading the charge, etc.	Faith - The "Paladin" angle; versatile "Willpower" support.	Music - The "Bard" angle.
Tier 1 (burst)	Regenerative Burst (click heal/energy)	Forcefield Burst (click knockdown/defense burst)	Flame Wave (click damage/backdraft)	Acuity (click stealth removal/defense debuff)	Command (click fear/damage boost)	Rally (click heal/resistance)	Chorus (click regenerate/speed)
Tier 2 (toggle aura)	Regrowth Aura	Area Forcefield	Warmth Aura	Spotter	Leadership Stance	Congregation	Backing Tune
Tier 3 (personal defense)	Improved Regeneration	Personal Forcefield	Fiery Skin	Heightened Senses	Bolstered Armoring	Shield of Faith	Fancy Footwork
Tier 4	Absorb Pain (wide area heavy heal, deal self damage)	Hardened Energy (toggle self-slow for added resistance?)	Blazing Aura	Panopticon (area toggle that grants mez resist/stealth sight)	Reprovision (Boosted damage output, redistribution of energy/health of teammates?)	Blessing (pre-fight general buff, pbaoe)	Encore (revive?)
Tier 5 (temp context sensitive  buff, reduce Vindication)	Adaptive Health (several ticks of healing or energy, improved resistance)	Power Drain (drain enemy power, grant allies either the energy, or improved attacks.)	Consume (applied to multiple allies)	Callout (targeted debuff that severely weakens the target's damage or defense - pointing out incoming attack or weakness)	Bolster (restore own energy with nearby allies, or offer accuracy)	Miracle (restore health, or reduce enemy resistances)	Bridge (boost movement speed or regeneration)
Tier 6	Undying (aoe revival)	Enclave (self-immobilizing massive resistance boost)	Smokeout (Creates massive cloud of smoke, blinding/choking enemies, reduce accuracy)	Halflight (Massive defense boost for self and nearby allies.)	Recoup (radiate an area of protection, mez resistance.)	Untarnished (burst heal and mez removal)	Crescendo (mez area)
Tier 7	Speedy Recovery Aura	Passive Bulwark	Heat Aura	Lucky Aura	Inspiring Aura	Sanctuary Aura	Groovy Aura
Tier 8 (targeted entry AoE)	Vitality Rush	Barrier Roll	Firewalker	Adrenaline Rush	Lead the Charge	Godspeed	Power Slide (if the powerset actually uses a guitar, this'd be fun.)
Tier 9 (personal panic button)	Moment of Glory	Overload	Phoenix Rising	Elude	Battle Cry	Strength of Will	Finale

 

About Melee Damage Powerset tweaks:

Wardens, like Brutes and Tankers, get Taunt.

Any abilities similar to Build Up will also be integrated into Vindication mechanics, manually Increasing Vindication for the Warden when activated.

Edited January 22 by Bluhman
oops forgor to fill in a cell

[BazookaTwo]

I honestly really like this. I always wanted a hybrid of scrapper powers and defender powers in an AT. 

[SupaFreak]

I, too, could go for something in the vein of this.

[Techhead]

Yo this is a really cool AT concept. My main thought is that tanker/brute-style taunt is probably gonna be real rough on an AT with one 1 defensive ability. Maybe something like a PBAOE placate to buy a few seconds for the team, and possibly that's also where the reduce vindication goes instead of warding's T5.

 

I also get a good vibe of vindication's effects but not so much how you increase/decrease it besides the dedicated buttons.

[Turric]

Dark Age of Camelot had a Warden class (for Hibernians) that was nearly exactly this. Melee / support. Depending on how you specialized, it tipped the scale one way or another from melee heavy to support heavy. It was a great class, lots of functionality. I almost feel like some of the ideas for this came from there.

 

In any case, I think it would be alright also.

[Turric]

As an aside, I would make the Taunt power the lesser version like scrappers have.

[Bluhman]

On 1/24/2024 at 12:45 AM, Techhead said:

Yo this is a really cool AT concept. My main thought is that tanker/brute-style taunt is probably gonna be real rough on an AT with one 1 defensive ability. Maybe something like a PBAOE placate to buy a few seconds for the team, and possibly that's also where the reduce vindication goes instead of warding's T5.

 

I also get a good vibe of vindication's effects but not so much how you increase/decrease it besides the dedicated buttons.

I absolutely get that, that's the part I'm most leery about as well. The idea is that it would likely measure lots of elements, such as team HP levels, enemy statuses, attacks done - but given how the bar's been explicitly written to phase between low/med/high stages it might be a bit too strident when reacting to things happening and just get forced into the mid-stage too often.

Granted the description's a bit vague here by design since I want to leave it up to experts in implementation to balance that out so eh.

16 hours ago, Turric said:

Dark Age of Camelot had a Warden class (for Hibernians) that was nearly exactly this. Melee / support. Depending on how you specialized, it tipped the scale one way or another from melee heavy to support heavy. It was a great class, lots of functionality. I almost feel like some of the ideas for this came from there.

 

In any case, I think it would be alright also.

That doesn't surprise me - I tried that one out a little as Albion (MaA) but it generally did seem that each of the factions had a pretty wide gamut of melee/support styled class paths. The name's candidly a coincidence (actually from Champions Online's "class perk" trees, which have a great set of Superhero Class synonyms tbh: Avenger, Sentinel, Sentry, Vindicator, Warden, Guardian, etc...)

16 hours ago, Turric said:

As an aside, I would make the Taunt power the lesser version like scrappers have.

I forget if Brute/Tanker Taunt limits mob range like Scrapper appears to in the detailed power window - if it doesn't, then yes I absolutely recommend making it Challenge instead since the chief use here would be to try and condense mobs into tighter areas.

[Rudra]

9 minutes ago, Bluhman said:

I forget if Brute/Tanker Taunt limits mob range like Scrapper appears to in the detailed power window - if it doesn't, then yes I absolutely recommend making it Challenge instead since the chief use here would be to try and condense mobs into tighter areas.

Tanker Taunt has an AoE effect with a -100% range component to draw mobs to you. Brute Taunt has an AoE effect with a -75% range component to draw mobs to you. Scrapper Confront has a ST effect with a -75% range component to draw mobs to you.

[Crossie]

Couldn't you just make a defender and get brawl and punch or whatever it's called?  Same thing