Witch Doctor is perhaps NOT the new Necromancer

Frostraven · 24-09-2008, 15:14

Someone said something about Witch doctors beeing similar to druids.

Or... perhaps they didn't.
I do not know.

What I do know is that the thought about the suggestion that might have been made made me think.

The witch doctor seems more like the druid and assassins' kid than a variant of the necromancer.

Summon mongrel?
Is that more akin to summon wolf or raise skeleton?

Zombie wall?
Fair enough.
Looking at african shamans (witch doctors are british folk who claimed to cure the diseases caused by the devil centuries ago, so I refuse to use that misleading name for shamans) zombies are not undead.
At best, they are closer to beeing possessed by spirits or beeing poisoned than undead.

No matter.
One zombie wall does not make a necromancer.

Looking at the rest of the skills...

Mass Confusion.
Mind Blast or the Confusion curse are spiritual (pun intended) ancestors of mass confusion.

Horrify.
Grim ward in a paladin aura.

Firebomb.
Well... No need to comment.

Soul Harvest.
Redemption aura meets nova.

The shaman is in touch with nature and it's resources, more than death and giving life to dead things or making things dead directly through death magic.

My word associations for the different names..:

Druid:
Animals
Forests
Potions/herbalism
Spiritual magic
Weather magic
Tribal
Uncivilized (but not uncivil)
Celtic style
Green and brown

Shaman (or "Witch Doctor" as they decided to call him)
Animals
Forests
Potions/herbalism
Spiritual magic
Vodoo
Weather magic
Tribal
Uncivilized
African style
Peacock

Necromancer
Death
Undead
Undead spirits
Death magic
Golems
Lone wolf
Decadent / civilized
Gothic style
Black and white

...

Perhaps necromancers simply are evil NPCs this time around?
Or even expansion pack material along with some random classes -- like some popular D&D character classes are expansion material for 4th ed D&D, because they were popular enough to use for milking?

Smash · 24-09-2008, 18:32

Good that someone notice it too. I hope it will end WD Necro comparison because there are not even close.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Smash

I wonder why people doesn't see that WD is like druid not like necro.
Massive damage in close range + summons for distracting and help not for main killing purpose (this part about summons Blizzard said himself) just look how long few mongrels took to kill one buffalo. Thinks about mongrels as wolves from d2x.

Karky · 24-09-2008, 19:55

Why do we have to try to tie it up to other characters at all? Why not just accept it as a new character? it's not the new necro, druid, assassin, or anyone else, it's a new character.

shizzz · 25-09-2008, 02:55

its going to be really interesting using this char.

Frostraven · 26-09-2008, 00:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by Karky

Why do we have to try to tie it up to other characters at all? Why not just accept it as a new character? it's not the new necro, druid, assassin, or anyone else, it's a new character.

Archetypes.

Let's mention some.

Mage.
Rogue.
Fighter.

Mage archetypes:
Druids
Wizards and sorcerers
Clerics
Necromancer

Where does witch doctor fit in?
In... the fighter archetypes? No.
In the rogue archetypes? No.
He DOES look the most like a druid.
Based the arcetypes and skills presented.

50% druid (Potions, nature, animals, spirits)
20% necromancer (Soul feast, wall of zombies)
20% assassin (Fire bomb)
10% arcane (That terror thing)

He fits in the druid archetype.

Why do I even mention archetypes?
Because there's only so many variations of skills possible that are easy to script:
-Limited range attack
-Line of sight attack
-Line attack
-Area of effect attack
-Area of effect centered on user attack
-Cone area of effect attack
-Fan attack
-Seeking attack
-Seeking chaining attack
-Wave attacks
-Aural attacks
-Turret
-Minion

Find one skill in any 2D game not following any of the attack archetypes.
Seeking, wave, cone area of effect and area of effect are "magic and chemical"-only attacks, and all other attacks archetypes feel bland when combined with magic.
All skills we will see will follow the limited selection of possible attack forms.
All were present in Diablo II.
All will be present in Diablo III.

The characters may be new, but the skills and their archetypes are old.
The skills will always be identical to skills in other games, the only difference beeing the damage type and graphical effect, and who gets the rights to specific styles and archetypes.
It is impossible to not see similarities to Diablo II skills as long as they keep using the skill archetypes.

I bet they will be using new combinations, like minion walls (zombie wall) and perhaps some clever ones as well.

nicro tower · 26-09-2008, 03:55

The witch doctor is more akin to the druid than the necromancer. Druid/shaman same thing. Definitions are confuzzling and tend to be very similar.

Kiley · 26-09-2008, 06:28

No one has really said the WD is the new Necro except the people who need something to be angry about because their necro class isn't in the game.

I'm sure this will be repeated for every class, as we find out about the new magic caster, the new bow using class, the new shield using guy.

I'm the oddball guy, I'm only angry that the barbarian is back. I think they could have made him an npc, and his lonely story told by Blizzards amazing cutscenes, better than making him a playable character.

I'd have rather had all new classes, even though I'll miss my Javazons greatly.

Valkenheim · 20-10-2008, 04:14

I remember somewhere they mentioned that they only wanted 6 classes at release, my only concern is that this may be the only summoner at the start, if so will sort of suck, although WD looks like an okay class I was hoping they would stick more with the necro pure summoner type of class, but I guess I can't really jump to conclusions.

From the video it does look sort of like a mad summoner, but mostly zerg type things which is not really bad thing just if they do end up being the only summoner I hope we eventually get a nice big boss tank summon.

knightmawko · 01-05-2009, 03:39

Ive been saying that the WD is a cross between a Necro and a Druid, after seeing some of its fire skills my mind changed a little, but then I thought, hey, maybe it's a whole new class.

Regardless right now its my favorite of the three anounced,

GoldenBird · 01-05-2009, 05:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by Frostraven

Archetypes.

Let's mention some.

Mage.
Rogue.
Fighter.

Mage archetypes:
Druids
Wizards and sorcerers
Clerics
Necromancer

Where does witch doctor fit in?
In... the fighter archetypes? No.
In the rogue archetypes? No.
He DOES look the most like a druid.
Based the arcetypes and skills presented.

50% druid (Potions, nature, animals, spirits)
20% necromancer (Soul feast, wall of zombies)
20% assassin (Fire bomb)
10% arcane (That terror thing)

He fits in the druid archetype.

Why do I even mention archetypes?
Because there's only so many variations of skills possible that are easy to script:
-Limited range attack
-Line of sight attack
-Line attack
-Area of effect attack
-Area of effect centered on user attack
-Cone area of effect attack
-Fan attack
-Seeking attack
-Seeking chaining attack
-Wave attacks
-Aural attacks
-Turret
-Minion

Find one skill in any 2D game not following any of the attack archetypes.
Seeking, wave, cone area of effect and area of effect are "magic and chemical"-only attacks, and all other attacks archetypes feel bland when combined with magic.
All skills we will see will follow the limited selection of possible attack forms.
All were present in Diablo II.
All will be present in Diablo III.

The characters may be new, but the skills and their archetypes are old.
The skills will always be identical to skills in other games, the only difference beeing the damage type and graphical effect, and who gets the rights to specific styles and archetypes.
It is impossible to not see similarities to Diablo II skills as long as they keep using the skill archetypes.

I bet they will be using new combinations, like minion walls (zombie wall) and perhaps some clever ones as well.

Thank you, someone who finally gets it.

Soooo many people are complaining about how WD is so unoriginal and everything, but really, EVERY single thing you can come up with, it's still going to be similar to something else and under one of the archetypes. No matter how hard you try, you can't escape!