As many of you may know Shdaow Knights (SKs) comprise only around 2% of the total gaming population in Everquest. There are thus, the archtypal "minority", and show all the signs of typical "underdogs" whining and bemoaning their fate in the worlds. Most, if not all, of the popular message boards sees not only the "bewailing SK" but the much more annoying Paladin v SK comparisons... all of which is somewhat irritating to those who have never either played an SK and the multitude who have probably never even seen one outside of a newbie zone.

I would like to make a few comments on the lives of Shadow Knights, and in the process a possible "critique" of the Everquest developemnt team... perhaps surprisingly I do not limit this to Shadow Knights, but i will use them as the springboard for the critique. I hope that those who read this will be able to see beyond the usage of Shadow Knights and see how some of the points do and will apply to other classes and races.

To start off let me explain to the uninitiated what the common woes are:

Shadow Knights feel hard done by for a multitude of reasons, not least of these is their inability to level easily due to both the nature of their class i.e. repeteated deaths to NPCs, a complete inability to heal and thus downtime on a par with warriors, an apparent "weakness" to the class per-se and more importanlty; a PERCIEVED weakness of the class by the other gamers on the servers. This later one is the real hidden danger especially at higher levels, when given the choice to a group of completing their six with a SK or a warrior..the warrior will always win out, likewise a paladin or a ranger or even a rogue. This in itself makes the game infinitely harder for the shadow knight, often resulting in him(her) not being able to group with his immediate peers due to this percieved weakness to the class.

WHY?

Well, it is almost entirely down to perceptions, there are very few SKs and of those that there are, the majority are below mid to upper levels. As a naturally late-peaking class this means the "average" gamer will only have experienced SKs at lower levels (after which many give up) and the impression gained is not always admirable..and in comparison to others, certainly not favourable.

As far as the class itself is concerned the "weakness" is felt by the actual SK, they consider themselves weaker than all the other hybrid classes. Thier alter-ego, the paladin, meanwhile is percieved as the BEST of the hybrids and certainly so by those forming groups. I'm not going to dwell on these issues, I simply want you to be aware of them.

Class-specific disgruntle-ment is the overiding curse of the shadow knight. Any SK site or message board is full of lamenting gamers over spells (in particular) and the unique ability: Harm Touch (HT). HT is a direct damage "pseudo-spell" that costs no-mana and can be cast once per EQ day. The damage it CAN do is 10 x the players level + 1 , thus a level 20 SK can deal 201 damage and a level 50; 501 damage. The problem is that whereas the paladins "equivalent" ability (Lay on Hands [LoH]) not only never fails but is always 100% effective, HT can and regularly is, resisted either partially or entirely. This, somewhat unsurprinsingly causes a certain level of annoyance.

Additionally, SKs feel that they have a raw deal with their spells.

The SK Class is "supposedly" three quarters warrior and one quarter necromancer. SKs will commonly tell you that the quarter necromancer is the quarter that a necromancer would never use! The Sks spell list is entirely derived from necromancers spells and gained at much later levels than necromancers... the reasons for this should not need to be explained in depth, simply accept that SKs are primarily tanks with some necromantic abilities.

BUT, (there's always a but...)

My contention with this scenario (and please relate this to other classes in similar situations) is WHY!? do SKs draw their spells from the Necromantic spellbook?

Necromancers are dark/evil magic user who utilise an undead soul for doing the dirty work (an on-character-level-par skeleton), whilst they cast from a distance, thus they are NOT a mellee class. SKs per-se ARE a mellee class, though also dark/evil. Yet, the spells are shared between the classes, SOME necromantic spells can be used by SKs, though by the level they do, the necromancers would never consider using them, deeming them too weak...

Now I fell that this is both right and just... SKs should not be either all powerful mellee types with life draning abilities at their whim. Yet I also find myself curious about the SK position in all this... and my curiosity led me to some serious questions for the developers.

Scenario: A patch is completed: This patch updates a number of Necromantic spells to help "balance" the necromantic class, some spells were added, some changed and others removed... unfortunately this also impacted on the SKs who used a few of these spells, and the impact was far more dramatic. Why? Well simply because a) they have fewer to choose in the first place and b) because they get them at much alter levels they "rely" on them more when fighting "harder" higher level monsters.

( IF a level 4 necro spell changes from 30 damage to 20 damage.. the necromancer doesnt worry to much..the creatures he is fighting with this spell may only have 100hps... the SK however wont get this spell untill the monsters he is fighting have around 250 hit points... with far less mana at his disposal the RELATIVE impact is far greater on the SK)

Now here is my point: Why should changing necromantic spells impact on Shadow Knights? err what? i hear you say? speak sense i hear you say?

Well WHY do SKs use necromancers spells? WHy dont they use Shadow Knight spells? I know this is a tad radical, as you are, no doubt, used to the cross fertilisation of spells inherent in this game..but WHY did they do it like this? The most obvious answer, and most believable is that in the "rush" to release the game it was simply easier to create a smaller list of spells which were shared between classes, than a list of spells for each class.

Now think a while on this (and similarly think of shamans , druids, clerics paladins and every other class with spells), IF (big if) each class had their own spell list, surely blanacing would be far easier? changing necromantic spells would ONLY impact on necromancers.... definately easier.

Now go a bit lateral on the subject:

It makes "sense" (EQ world wise) for differnet classes to have different spell list, OK sure, some will be the same or at least very similar..but then think about races.

Why (big why) do shamans from the barbarian villages share the same spells with ogres and troll shamans? Do they share the same gods? Live in the same environments? Have the same histories? have the same teachers? Have the same outlook on life? The answers are invarialy no, no, no, no and no.

I accept that the workload to achieve this "perfection" would have delayed the game, so is it pointless to pursue this idea? I do not think so and the dev-teams avowed intention to continuosly update the game and their current work on new races and zones, suggests that they are both willing and capable of making changes. Could they completely overhaul the race/class spell lists? NO, realistically i dont think so, we are stuck with what they have done... but are we?

My solution to the SK problem is one that can be fitted to a number of situations: Introduce a small number of class or class/race SPECIFIC spells.

For those who do not know the intimate details of SK life the following may seem a tad bizarre or confusing but bear with me:

REMOVE the ability for shadow knights to heal their pets. SK pets are always much lower levels than their masters, so much so that many do not use them, advanced guides even promote the death of the pet in any fight, their purpose being to gain casting time only..so why heal them...

ADD the ability for SKs to DRAIN life from their PETS... why? Well SKs have no way at all to heal themselves, and this is one of the top three issues to all SKs. Downtime is almost as large as with warriors and in the hybrid group it puts them at the bottom of the pile.

MAKE this ability/spell SK specific.. we dont want to cause any balance issues with anyone else do we? :-)

This one single change will not only make 90% of the small SK community happy, it should not make any of the other classes unhappy..why not?

Well heres a scenario:

An SK comes out of a solo fight with 10HPs left, he is level 35 and has a max of 900 HPs. He cannot heal himself, but say he can bandage to 50%, or 450 HPs. The remaining HPs he can simply sit down and wait for. With the above however, we allow him access to his pets (level 16) approximate 360-400 HPs.. this however comes at a cost: Not only does he need to meditate for the mana to summon the pet, he must also have the spell components, having done this (btw this normally uses around 40-50% of the SKs mana to summon) he can then use his Drain-pet spell to help heal HIMSELF as his mana allows. Balancing would suggest a medium mana-cost spell, requiring perhaps 2 session of meditation to fully drain a pet. Downtime to the SK is reduced by perhaps 50% (max) and you have a far happier AND more playable class. Furthermore it makes sense in a RP / AD&D sense and it is very hard to abuse this ability. Don't forget we are REMOVING the SKs ability to heal his pet so after draining,the pet is either dead or must regenrate at normal speed.

In a simple and small manner we have increased the prospects of the SK class, not affected the other classes AND made the class more interesting and "intriniscally" bound to the Everquest world... this sort of ability defines the classes in my opinion.

How can we add to this or pursue it?

Well, lets twink/adapt the spell for different races, make mana costs, or points gained or *something* different for each race... this holds more possibilities for the other classes and races also, an infinite range infact, and ALL of them will help EQ to stay clear of the TANK_MAGE scenario prolific in other MMGs. We WANT differences between our characters, My HUMAN paladin, should surely have something different to a HIGH ELF Paladin in abilities.... OR do we really want our race to have no affect other than a slightly different look and a different starting faction? Lets face it, above level 35 nearly every race/class combo is hunting for the same equipment and has the same spells and abilities..surely that is far far too mundane for us to accept?

The mundane nature of highlevel characters (in that they are all too alike) may, perhaps, also suggest the need for something a little different in how they obtain there spells, why not remove some of those unhappy-campers to alternate locations for while. Another SK woe is the almost complete absence of class quests..well lets combine the two shall we?

Our class/race specific spell for that level can be made a questable item. This makes it not only something that only that race/class can even obtain , let a lone use, but further defines our characters place in the Everquest World. Not only does it reduce the "boredom" factor in the class but it relieves the sheer monotiny of returning to the guild to purchase EVERY spell at each level...having even one spell per level ONLY attainable via a class-race specific quest would not only add much needed spice, but increase the rich tapestry of Roleplaying that is the foundation for this game. Lets avoid the ability for others to even get their hands on this spell, lore, no drop and better still, it vanishes if anybody other than that race-class touches it. It might even reduce some of the camping for specific items, not permanently but a tleast relocate them to other localities, defineable by the Dev team.

Thus, in one move we have added to the life of a SK in many ways, more quests, more uniqueness, ease of tweaking by the dev team via unique spells or abilities without cross-class impactation. We have similarly reduced the ability of people to use "The grass is greener" to justify (or attempt to) the differences or weaknesses between classes, as now that simply isn't enough..you now have to take into account race... the unique spell or ability for that class/race combo MAY be the very thing that your group also needs to help get through a dungeon and may make that race/class combo paladin, think twice about fighting you in the Arena... though he'd happily take on a DE SK he doesnt want to take on a Troll SK because he's a Dwarf paladin....

Summary:

Every class has it woes and needs, Sks are the most pitiful in that they have the fewest supporters, as they have the fewest gamers. The current usage of shared spell lists only makes balancing harder as it will always impact across classes. Furthermore the race of class-characters seems to dissapear once faction is overlooked and many of our higher level gamers are so similar nobody, other than roleplayers, even CARE what race somebody is.

A little bit of lateral thinking, some added quest spice, a touch of uniqueness to each race or class or race/class combo cannot hurt the game? We know that VERANT have the capability and work on the "next generation" that is ongoing suggests they have the time... so why not let us see some of the original flair and ability that was so much in evidence during beta... but now with months of hard earned expertise to add a few spells or abilites into the game that CANT upset cross-class blancing, and even if they did, can be uniquely tweaked or changed with "oh so little" issues to anyone else in the game?

Some might suggest that this increases the level of complexity of the game, and would impact too heavily on newbies, understanding everquest as it is now can be enough trouble? Well, again, lets simply look at how and when we give these speecial abilities or spells, Using (again) the SK, we dont add then at 9 or 15 where the gamers is learning the game still, but at 22, 30 and 39 where he is both proficient in the game and has started exploring the world. I found with UO that all too often the dv-team and GMs were disinclined to listen to the gamers, suggestions were always seen as something to be defended against,a s though they were always a criticism. Certainly in Everquest the GMs are from a different world, and thier PR department would have us believe the Dev team are also from "out there"..:-)

MMGs (Massivley Multiplayer Games) are no longer fledgling environments populated by geeks and a few that stuble over them, they are populated by thousands of discerning customers, many of whom lie within income levels with high disposable incomes, with high standards and who have alternatives to go to. The success of a given game depends on its longevity; and this is ultimately dependent on its ability to keep as many of its paying gamers as happy and continuously interested as possible. Adding to a game simply through add-on products is not an entirely acceptable solution to many gamers. Ultima Onlines' T2A proved this extremely well. Neither does bug-fixing really constitute an "improvement" in a game, this is simply a "fix for something that should't have been broken in the first place".. improvements in any MMG should be something that ADDs to the game in both its overall enjoyment and in a DIFFERENT manner to what currently exists. An additional quest does not add to the "quality"of the game but simply the "quantity" and this will not keep the discerning cutomer happy for long.

I know its hard being a designer and Im sure it would be easier without us gamers and the websites that report on YOUR game :-). I know the accountants really control what transpires in development and not the "true thinkers"; but simply send the accountants to me and I'll sort them out for you :-)

Somewhere there is a person who "designed" the SK class, how disheartened must he/she be too see so few playing his/her class? And if there are those who would have done had it received attention, is that not a case for the accountants to invest some time and money?

A personal addition:

I was the founder of the Ultima Online petitions for European servers, in that case the games company had believed only 200-300 europeans played UO, 6500 names later they changed their minds...but too late to make much difference to many people who either never bought the game or gave up on it. This started from the "tiny minority" who could be bothered to push for changes. I see now that petitions have started for changes to the SK class, official and unnoficial message boards are full of complants and suggestions... from experience this suggest that there are many more in the silent majority who have concerns over this class, or other classes. Lets not allow things to become bad, before they get better...that typified UO in my experience and was why I came to Norath. Experience so far has suggested I made the right move.

I have a level 35 SK on Bristlebane server, I do not find it underpowered to the extremes that others do, I do however find the spell list very peculiar in its choices of necromantic spells and can clearly see WHY Verant have chosen a lot of these spells. All the time it comes down to their failure to utilise class-specific spells. I do NOT subscribe to the shouts and whines from gamers who continually spam message boards with "Paladin v SK" messages, I have NO interest in whether a paladin is more "powerful" in a one on one against myself or any other SK, even attempting to comapre them is a bad move in my opinion. However, the ability to compare them or any other set of classes is more due to their "similarities" than differences. How would the arguements be so much more fun if they went:

Human SK v High Elf Paladin and that that discussion was much more different to Troll Sk v Dwarven Paladin!

The very fact that you dont see this happen, would seem to validate my point on races meaning so little and the need for some "uniqueness" to them.

I hope that this treastise has not appeared a "rant" for SK rights but has simply opened your eyes to some potential for classes and races... I simply use my in-depth knowledge of Shadow Knights to promote something, which I feel, every gamer would have a long and interesting wish-list for and some lengthy experience with UO to have an idea where a LOT went wrong when games-companies "ignore" their customers.

Jerrod Jer'Odus
BloodSabre
Future Witch King of Erudin.