Forge Guard
I’ve played about 1100 hours of Last Epoch now, and Forge Guard is my favorite class, which I keep coming back to. I view it as the master of metal. This could be anything from an unstoppable tank, to someone who controls metal like Magneto. Below I wrote a list of ideas for Sentinel and Forge Guard skill additions, imagined specifically through the lens of the Forge Guard. Thank you a lot for making the game, and also if you make it through this whole thing.
Vengeance
- Could have a taunt effect, that also causes enemies to deal less damage to targets other than yourself. (Side note: really this tree is pretty good, you just need like 35 skill points to make it a really awesome skill (Volcanic Orb is similar in this regard))
- Alternatively, it could mark an enemy for your Forge Weapons to attack, and they’re debuffed to take more damage from Minions
Multistrike
- Could lend its Armament buff to your Forge Weapons and/or your Manifest Armor
Rive
- Could cause every third attack of your Forge Weapons to do a 360 spin attack
Lunge
- Could have a spec path where when you use Lunge, all your Ring of Shields and Forge Weapons form up as a wall in front of you, colliding/dealing damage as you move, just so you trample through things.
Javelin
- Could have a path where you throw in an upwards arc, but instead it comes down as 4 Forge Weapons with increased ferocity and damage, but they die after 4-5 seconds.
- It could have a Phalanx spec, where if you use it while Ring of Shields is active, it throws a spear from each Ring of Shields
Warpath
- While channeling warpath, it could cause all of your currently active Forge Weapons to do a 360 twirl attack once every x seconds
Hammer Throw
- Possibly have a path where you use Hammer Throw, and when they expire (either return to you or reach their end point), they instead turn into Forge Weapons – so you throw them initially to do damage but they then animate themselves
Rebuke
- Could cause all forge weapons and hammers to swirl around you then release with the explosion.
- It could have a path where after channeling, you (heal for x amount of damage you took * amount of seconds you spent channeling)
Smelters Wrath
- Covers all minions and hammers in fire for like 10 seconds after cast – they all become molten
- It could make all minions explode in mini Smelters Wraths
Ring of Shields
- It could have points to decide what shape/layout they summon in (like a wall in front of you, or spin around you, or a 180 crescent on front-side)
- Could spec to have it provide an aura of sorts. Maybe works like Holy Aura where it has a passive effect, but also an Activate effect – passively gives 15% DR for being on your bar, Activate to do what it does now (spawn the shields etc).
- could have a spec path where it reduces the duration to like 1 second, but for that duration you are invincible (maybe have further points where the duration is longer like 2-3 seconds, but the cooldown is longer, and your movement speed is cut in half)
- It could also be an Ammo system, where you stack Ring of Shields on your character and they get consumed by large enough blows, or damage dealt to your character is shared amongst the Ring of Shields
Shield Throw
- Could be a combo skill: if it were faster to spawn 8+ Forge Weapons (like with throw Javelin), then Shield Throw could be thrown - ricochet off of enemies/minions, and minions it collides with explode (like Lava burst but comboy with minions)
Manifest Armor
- Could be the leader of all your forge weapons, where they follow him and he provides a commanding aura. Maybe he summons the Forge Weapons as he hits things
- When you summon Manifest Armor, it pulls metal from all over the screen to one place where it comes to form, dealing damage in the process. Summoning one while one is already alive/active, causes it to explode
Potential future skill ideas:
Launch Shrapnel = (maybe channeled) spell where you launch shards of metal in target direction, fans out in a long range cone.
- If it hits your Manifest Armor, he gets covered in Shrapnel, which deals damage to enemies as they get near him and the shrapnel comes off.
- Shrapnel could also be specced to armor yourself in a Colossus (xmen) type of Iron Skin, where you move at like 80% speed but fully unhindered, take less damage, maybe ailments have reduced duration
- It could leave damage spikes all over the ground as it collides with enemies/terrain
- It could stick to enemies, coating them in shrapnel, slowing them, causing them to deal damage to other enemies in proximity
- Shrapnel comes down like a hailstorm in target area, leaves Shrapnel behind on the ground
- Shrapnel surrounds you like a storm of metal
- You hop on a disc made of Shrapnel and it transports you
Forge Weapons
- For being on your bar, it would have passive effects based on what you specced into on the tree
- could spec for different weapon types, configure what type of weapon it is, add ailments etc.
- It could change behaviors like it spins around your waist similar to Vergil’s gucci belt super (umvc3)
- It could have various “Activate” abilities which are incompatible with each other
- Activate to send all Forge Weapons to launch into target mouse area
- Activate to make all Forge Weapons explode
- Activate to make all Forge Weapons summon to you, and then rush forward in a wall formation
Forge Weapons themselves also don’t have to be strictly relegated to being minions. It could be converted into an animated but stacking buff on your character (similar to Armament stacks - something momentum based with some ramp-up to reach full stacks). It could be an Ammo system, where it is like a resource that generates over time and gets expended by large skills like Smelter’s Wrath or Forge Strike