Who's There?

The skill "hunt" and its progeny recently gained a great deal of accuracy by allowing a second keyword.  This change brought much needed accuracy to single-target searching, and it's really a fantastic upgrade.

I think it's time for many of the area-wide scouting abilities to also include one or two keywords.  Currently, the majority of area-wide scouting abilities are subclass abilities, subclasses which are never chosen for a main character, because of their highly situational utility.  The problem is that these scouting abilities are limited to player characters.

Why would a warlock give up the strong defense of battle learning or the all-around utility and power of reduced lag/prevention times for only the ability to sense the players in an area?  Especially given that warlocks already have a silent, instant spy and sixth sense, there's a very narrow margin of usefulness for a scouting subclass spell, especially one with a significant prevention time.

What if NPC's were searchable with scouting abilities?  The use of a scouting ability with no modifier would return players as it does now, but adding a modifier should return any NPC matches with a short description of the rooms:

a tangle tree -- In the Mudhole
a tangle tree -- In the Mudhole
a tangle tree -- The Wetlands

This additional functionality would greatly increase the utility of scouting abilities.  For example, a hunter of the right subclass could much more easily find a lost pet or a single NPC within an area.  She could enter an area, scout for its room name, and turn on hunt when she arrived in the general location.

My understanding is that the following classes have scouting abilities in one or more subclasses:  hunter, warlock, druid.  Obviously, the strength of each ability could be adjusted according to the class.  The casters might have room exits returned next to the room titles because they are actually "seeing" their targets, whereas a hunter's ability might only return the room titles.  Perhaps druids would only have the strength to scout for NPC's from their havens, with remote owls retaining the current limitation.

If an NPC ability would be too cumbersome from a design perspective to tack onto the current abilities, perhaps these could be new skills; they could be used for expansion upon current classes/subclasses.

Oh Master, My Master

The majority of master class mobs should not be master class.

There are many master class mobs throughout Nodeka which serve as traps for the unwary newbie. Merchants in Lycaeum, the questgivers in newbie zones such as Kobolds, Orc Town, G'kir, and the general in Ruushi are all flagged as master class NPC's. My guess is that master class mobs were originally introduced (Raash and various Guildmasters) as a deterrent. At that time, there was no mechanism to prevent NPC's from being attacked, even in safe rooms, and thus it was necessary to prevent key NPCs and trainers from being attacked.

However, Nodeka now has !attack mechanisms available. San'vestra is not attackable, even though she is master class, which means her status as a master is flavor rather than protection. This is how all quest mobs should be. Why is Sajha attackable, but San'vestra not? Why are the quest npcs in kobolds attackable? Various key merchants? If these NPC's aren't meant to be attacked, they should be unattackable, not simply master class. If the game has a more precise tool, why isn't the more precise tool being used?

This is not to suggest that master class should be removed from the game. Kiskr in the citadel and the Tabernacle Curators are examples of NPC's that have good reason to be master class. (I might suggest that the volume of damage is excessive, but that's likely to be a matter of so much contention and debate that it distracts from my main point.) But quest NPC's? In memory of my many rdeaths, please just make them unattackable.

Ninja Races Breakdown

The most popular races are presented here. I'll write-up any race requested in the comments.

Veldruk: Racial !spy is more valuable on a ninja than any other class, because antei of the clouded mind will be a total mindfuck to the caster. High agi/dex/nr/quick/hit/dam (counting the str/dex) and very highly powered racials make veldruk a top choice, even without physical resistance. The enhanced physical recuperation is also a strong selling point to all ninjas except the author (rank affect cheez), and the highest racial lateral deterrence are just bonuses.

Daimonikos: 57% physical resistance and flight are great starting points for a race with high speed, dam/hit, all around attributes, and small bonuses to NR/quick (on top of that provided by wil/agi). Blackened strengthens the stealthiness of ninjas. Throw in sustain and !spy, and the only weakness to this race is the holy/spirit vulnerability.

Weretiger Khan: Again, high hit/dam/nr/quick make weretiger an immediate top choice. Unlike veldruk, weretiger khan has speed in addition to its racial attacks for a strong boost to "white damage". Difficult to hit is great on any class with high quickness, and since ninjas are especially vulnerable to impairment, the 10% impairment invulnerability is helpful. Even the improved hunting speed (which works with shi-ku) and see undetectable movement (better on a sneaky class than on non-sneaky classes) are useful for ninjas. Another top choice, comparable to veldruk, although with mental vulnerability instead of mental resistance.

Sprite: Improved dodge and high agility/quick lean towards a ninja's avoidance strengths, but a complete lack of auxiliary defenses makes sprite one of the easiest to kill ninja races. Invisibility is a fun addition, as is having flight, but the lack of +damage and the weakness of hasted assaults causes the relatively low amount of combined dex/speed/willpower to be fatal to this race as a selection.