Jace

If you're going to survive in this world, you better choose to either learn how to defend yourself, or find a safe town and stay there for the rest of your life. Your choice.

These are the titles of common classes we refer to people by. It's easier than saying, "The guy with the weapons that do that thing..." There are going to be exceptions to every rule, but these are the basic sorts we encounter and a few extras. And if you're going around with us, it's probably all you'll need to know. We'll fill you in on the others as they come up.

Classifying Adventurers-For-Hire

swords icon Class: Swordsmen


There are probably more swords in the world than people can count. All of them fall into this catagory, and all of their forms as well. Even those nut-cases like Crim who insist on periodically using more than one sword still fall into this catagory. Some of the more basic ones you might recognize are:

  • short sword
  • broad sword
  • daggers (non-throwing)
  • various piercing style swords



heavy icon Class: Heavy


Anything that requires quite a good deal of muscle to swing around falls into this catagory, and sometimes big swords walk the line. Other weapons carried by people like Gia and myself are:
  • maces
  • axes
  • clubs
  • morning stars



range icon Class: Range


Those whose weapons focus on attacking a more distant target fall into this catagory. They tend to fight from the back lines.
  • bows
  • pistols
  • throwing knives
  • darts
  • cross bows
  • sling shots
  • boomerangs



lance icon Class: Lance


This one falls somewhere between the standard range of a close-weapon user and a ranged weapon user. Lancers use weapons that generally are long poles or are on long poles, so sometimes they're called Pole Arms users.
  • staffs
  • scythes
  • halberds
  • glaives
  • various poleaxes



melee icon Class: Melee


For the most part, these fighters use their fists, feet, and bodies as their weapons. They specialize in styles of fighting that don't require weapons, although sometimes they upgrade with minor weapons to cause more damage.
  • various martial arts
  • grapplers
  • wrestlers
  • street fighting



alchemy icon Class: Alchemy


Alchemists focus almost solely on what they can mix using various natural ingredients.
  • natural healers
  • potion makers (who work in healing as well as status brews)
  • bombers



dancer icon Class: Dancer


Dancers are a rare class, but we've run across a few. They turn their love of a more leisurely art into something a bit more dangerous.
  • ribbon dancers
  • fan dancers
  • blade dancers
  • fire dancers



magic icon Class: Magic


Mage is a wide class, but it encompasses anyone who fights using magic as their weapon.
  • healers
  • All of their magic focuses on healing or curing.
  • illusionists
  • Their magic focuses on tricking the senses - the more intricate the illusion, and the more senses it tricks, the more difficult.
  • summoners
  • They summon real or imagined creatures from some other place and (to a degree) controll them.
  • elementalists
  • They work magic in the form of some raw element or another (fire, electricity, rocks, vegetation, ice, water, et al).
  • controllers
  • They work magic that controls other things - necromancers, shadowmancers, and golem creation spells all fall under this catagory, as well as a few others.
  • ritualists
  • Through intricate ceremonies and sacrifices to "dieties" some mages can call upon powers of other worldly beings to do their *ahem* dirty work.
  • mixed magics
  • Some mages dabble in various forms and never specialize.
  • enhancing magics
  • Some of these are called "buffs" in common slang, and focus on increasing or decreasing effects, or affecting a health status with something like sleep or temporary paralysis.
  • arcane magics
  • More intricate castings can create more intricate spells - anything not easily learned or easily catagorized probably falls under arcane magics.
  • bards
  • Bards use music and song as their casting medium as opposed to raw magic or "word" magic (as most other mages uses one of the two).
  • telekenetics
  • Mages who seem to have an invisible extra set of hands, which can be used at a greater distance thereby granting them a slightly better defense