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Shaman Class?

So, without having to comb through the 3,000+ (!!) responses to the main sticky, is there anything a blue-poster can reveal about the details of the Shaman class? I assume that it'll be rendered in the style of a Cleric kit, but I could be wrong; I know that AD&D 2e's Forgotten Realms Shaman (or at least the one that was all spirit-y) was its own class as opposed to a kit.

On the subject of classes/kits, are there any new kits that are in the works in general for the Infinity Engine games? And, related, can we assume that, at some point after SoD's release, IWD will also get access to the Shaman?
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  • GrammarsaladGrammarsalad Member Posts: 2,582
    It casts druid spells, so my guess is that it is implemented as a druid kit/class ala barbarian.

    The only thing I remember (other than did casting) is that it can 'summon am almost unlimited number of ghostly allies, but it's stuck in place when doing so'
  • EldrythEldryth Member Posts: 56
    It's an entirely new class, not a kit. It's main focus is summoning- they can summon a large number of spirit animals to fight for them, although iirc they can't move while using them. They also have access to druid spells. It'll be added to BG2 as well, but I haven't heard about it being confirmed for IWD. Seems a given when it gets patched next, though. And as far as I know, that's all we know.
    SixheadeddogSkie
  • GrammarsaladGrammarsalad Member Posts: 2,582
    shawne said:
    A divine sorcerer...cool
    Dexter
  • shawneshawne Member Posts: 3,239
    Chastising spirits would be a lot less useful in Baldur's Gate than it was in Mask of the Betrayer, so that makes sense. :)
    Sixheadeddog
  • SixheadeddogSixheadeddog Member Posts: 197
    You know, I did get a little excited when I saw this class (and the NPC who reps the class, being a female goblin) because it would very likely mean a class expansion for Half-Orcs (who desperately need it). However, I was a little disappointed to read the respondents here (and elsewhere on the boards) describe the Shaman as a druidic caster. What I was hoping for was *some* option for Half-Orcs and wizardly magic.

    You don't have the lore that would prevent Half-Orcs from getting a kind of token caster (as with, say, Dwarves, who are inherently non-magical); in fact, a lot of printed material supports it: from very early on, in 1st and 2nd ed AD&D, both orcs and half-orcs had "witch doctors" who could use wizardly magic. There were even several iterations of a Witch Doctor class/kit in every iteration of D&D, with orcs and half-orcs being among the races that followed such an occupation.

    In fact, I posted a suggestion for exactly this quite some time ago: [http://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/34512/witch-doctor-kit#latest]

    I believe that, with the advent of the Shaman class, the time for a Witch Doctor is ripe! Whaddaya say?
    RAM021JuliusBorisov
  • FardragonFardragon Member Posts: 4,511
    You can make half orc wizard in the editor easily enough.
  • shawneshawne Member Posts: 3,239
    Well, if the Shaman is a separate class, there's no reason it couldn't be made available to half-orcs - they can be Clerics, after all...
    GrammarsaladNonnahswriterJuliusBorisov
  • FardragonFardragon Member Posts: 4,511
    If a goblin can be a shaman, then anyone can. There isn't really any reason for Beamdog to stick any racial restrictions on the class.
    Grammarsalad
  • JarrakulJarrakul Member Posts: 2,029
    If anything, "shaman" implies an association with less traditionally civilized cultures. Humans and half-orcs are the races with the best prospects in that direction, with elves also being a decent contender. Hard to see any of the shorty races producing a shaman, although there are always exceptions.

    So basically, I'm always in favor of classes not being race-restricted, but if the shaman is, I'd still think half-orcs would be able to be shamans.
    Grammarsalad
  • JarrakulJarrakul Member Posts: 2,029
    Honestly, any player character in BG should be able to be a sorcerer, regardless of race, if only because "child of a god" is a pretty good explanation for innate magical powers. You know, as evidenced by the ones every charname gets.
    GrammarsaladEmpyrial
  • GallowglassGallowglass Member Posts: 3,356
    More or less as @Jarrakul says, a shaman is stereotypically associated with nomadic barbarians rather than with settled urban civilisations ... "primitive tribes", basically. In that sense, it's actually fairly appropriate that the class is introduced to us by a goblin, since they're portrayed as primitive tribespeople.

    Unlike @Jarrakul, I reckon racial restrictions on classes help to add in-game meaning and flavour to the existence of these various sentient species. The Shaman class certainly ought to be open to humans and half-orcs, who clearly produce numerous clans of barbarians or primitives, and maybe it's also an appropriate class for some of the more "maverick" half-elves, but I'm not so sure that it really fits the other races.
  • FardragonFardragon Member Posts: 4,511
    edited July 2015
    The 3.5 spirit shaman can be any race.

    And we are talking about CHARNAME here, you know, someone brought up in a library? They are hardly a member of a nomadic culture, whatever their race.
    Post edited by Fardragon on
  • GallowglassGallowglass Member Posts: 3,356
    Fardragon said:

    The 3.5 spirit shaman can be any race.

    And we are talking about CHARNAME here, you know, someone brought up in a library? They are hardly a member of a nomadic culture, whatever their race.

    Yes, but that's also a problem for some of the other classes too (e.g. Barbarian) - it requires some "hand waving" in the character biography to explain how CHARNAME chose to turn his back on his upbringing and adopt different customs. We just have to accept the unlikeliness of it and get on with playing.
  • FardragonFardragon Member Posts: 4,511
    I don't have a problem with the handwaving. I'm just saying that to say "you can't make a gnome Shaman because gnomes don't have a nomadic culture" is invalid in BG where your background is preset.
  • KamigoroshiKamigoroshi Member Posts: 5,870
    For what's worth, there are at least two different Shamans in AD&D.

    The Shaman "Class" is written within the Faiths and Avatars source book. This one is the closest to the Spirit Shaman and roughly fits the info we currently have on Siege of Dragonspear's Shaman. Reason is it has much to do with summoning various spirits. According to the book, this class is racial restricted to Humans only.

    Then there's the Shaman "Kit" of The Complete Book of Humanoids. In contrast to the aforementioned Shaman, this one doesn't have anything to do with spirits. At all. Rather, it's only benefits are healing, herbalism and the ability to cast the Reincarnation spell as a 5th level spell. Other than that it's a gimped cleric with limited magical abilities.
    However, the Shaman kit is only available to the following humanoid races: Aarakocras, Alaghi, Bugbears, Bullywugs, Centaurs, Firbolgs, Voadkyns, Gnolls, Flinds, Goblins, Hobgoblins, Kobolds, Lizardfolk, Mongrelfolk, Ogres, Half-Ogres, Ogre Mages, Orcs, Half-Orcs, and Wemics.

    Of course there's no guarantee that Beamdog follows the old AD&D rules. Or rather, the talk about the upcoming Shaman being a "divine sorcerer" makes it much more likely that it is based on newer editions where racial restrictions doesn't apply.

    Still, I thought it would be relevant to the thread to contribute sneakpeeks these old rules here. Especially considering that the Shaman NPC is a Goblin lass.
    SixheadeddogGrammarsaladRAM021JuliusBorisov
  • OurQuestIsVainOurQuestIsVain Member Posts: 201
    I've heard 'Divine Sorcerer' a lot and that makes me wonder. Will we have to choose a certain number of spells from the druid/cleric pool and be able to cast any of those that we've chosen a certain number of times per day as we do with the arcane Sorcerer class? That wouldn't be too bad as there are a lot of divine spells that are useless or close to useless.

    I'm curious as to what else they'll add on to make the class different from simply 'Divine Sorcerer'. I've heard a lot of people say 'spirit summoning'. Would this work like the Totemic Druid? Or is it possible that we can summon a greater amount of spirits that aren't as powerful. Either way, I'm excited to try it out.
  • GallowglassGallowglass Member Posts: 3,356

    Will we have to choose a certain number of spells from the druid/cleric pool and be able to cast any of those that we've chosen a certain number of times per day as we do with the arcane Sorcerer class?

    I guess so, yes. I can't see what else it could mean.
    Grammarsalad
  • FardragonFardragon Member Posts: 4,511
    Druid pool only I believe.
    GallowglassGrammarsaladJuliusBorisov
  • JarrakulJarrakul Member Posts: 2,029
    I agree with that interpretation.

    As for the summoning, it sounds like they'll be able to summon a lot more things than the totem druid, but they won't be able to move when they have minions out. I don't think we've heard anything about how powerful the summons are.
  • shawneshawne Member Posts: 3,239
    Presumably they're leaving room for high-level applications of that power in BG2...
  • GallowglassGallowglass Member Posts: 3,356
    gangler said:

    That being said, if it does learn spells in the same way that a Sorcerer does, I suspect this will be accompanied by a bunch of new druid spells.

    We saw the first few levels of the Druid spellbook in the announcement video, when they demonstrated the new UI, and I couldn't see any new spells in it at all.

    However, they haven't finished yet, so perhaps the promised new spells are one of the things not yet implemented.
    rorikon
  • SixheadeddogSixheadeddog Member Posts: 197

    For what's worth, there are at least two different Shamans in AD&D.

    The Shaman "Class" is written within the Faiths and Avatars source book. This one is the closest to the Spirit Shaman and roughly fits the info we currently have on Siege of Dragonspear's Shaman. Reason is it has much to do with summoning various spirits. According to the book, this class is racial restricted to Humans only.

    Then there's the Shaman "Kit" of The Complete Book of Humanoids. In contrast to the aforementioned Shaman, this one doesn't have anything to do with spirits. At all.

    There were actually at least three more Shamans in printed AD&D material, in addition to the Complete Book of Humanoids and Faiths and Avatars renditions. There was a book published for the Forgotten Realms line (I think? I could be mistaken here) titled simply "Shaman," which presented a class with spirit-calling magic very similar to what I've seen described both here and in the Faiths and Avatars book. Then there was the "Barbarian Shaman" class, one of two main classes of barbarians found in the Complete Barbarian's Handbook (part of the "brown book" complete handbook line).

    The last one predates the Book of Humanoids version and presents Shamans as simply lesser/less civilized priests of the various gods presented in Monster Mythology. Here, what you're generally talking about with a Shaman is a less-cool specialty priest of Gods A, B, C or D, and for the most part this applied only to NPC/Monstrous priests (except for the chapters devoted to the gods of the demihuman races, which of course could be rolled as player characters).
    Rather, it's only benefits are healing, herbalism and the ability to cast the Reincarnation spell as a 5th level spell. Other than that it's a gimped cleric with limited magical abilities.
    However, the Shaman kit is only available to the following humanoid races: Aarakocras, Alaghi, Bugbears, Bullywugs, Centaurs, Firbolgs, Voadkyns, Gnolls, Flinds, Goblins, Hobgoblins, Kobolds, Lizardfolk, Mongrelfolk, Ogres, Half-Ogres, Ogre Mages, Orcs, Half-Orcs, and Wemics.
    Actually, there are a few other pretty significant things that make up for the Shaman's limited selection of priest magic in AD&D 2e. The first, and most significant, being that they don't suffer the Cleric class' restriction on using edged or piercing weapons. IIRC, the book states that Shamans can use the weapons of their tribe. Well, suppose you're an Orc, and you're like: "My tribe, uh... uses swords. Yeah, that's it. We use swords, all swords. We're the Sword-User tribe." Well, there you go: Orc shaman with a two-hander. Or maybe you're a centaur, and you (somewhat more realistically) decide your tribe's main weapon is the longbow. Boom! Priest spells *and* long ranged attacks. Consider the further potential for a character who multiclasses (as the book does allow) a Fighter or a Ranger with the Shaman class.

    It's also worth noting that the Book of Humanoids shaman is only "gimped" because they can only choose three spheres of priest spells. This is almost no limitation at all: most people I've seen play Clerics really only cast from a few different spheres anyway. Healing, Combat and Protection would be a fairly safe, standard choice.
    Of course there's no guarantee that Beamdog follows the old AD&D rules. Or rather, the talk about the upcoming Shaman being a "divine sorcerer" makes it much more likely that it is based on newer editions where racial restrictions doesn't apply.
    Well, actually, since it grants access to Druidic magic, there's a chance Beamdog will preserve the race restrictions on Druids and give the Shaman class to only Humans or Half-Elves (this is my secret fear... Half-Orcs get shafted yet again!).
    Still, I thought it would be relevant to the thread to contribute sneakpeeks these old rules here. Especially considering that the Shaman NPC is a Goblin lass.
    Very much so!

    GrammarsaladKamigoroshi
  • SixheadeddogSixheadeddog Member Posts: 197
    gangler said:

    That being said, if it does learn spells in the same way that a Sorcerer does, I suspect this will be accompanied by a bunch of new druid spells. They've mentioned that there will be a lot of new spells with the expansion. In its current state I'm not sure that you could bring the number of spells you can learn low enough to form a meaningful limitation. Druid for example only has seven level 1 spells, and I'd say that most of them are stuff that you can afford to lose. Maybe some of these spells will be from Icewind Dale. I hear the druids have a much more robust and useful spell set there.

    If you've not picked up/played IWDEE yet, I highly recommend it. Even if you don't end up enjoying it as much as, say, I do, it's still a nice thing to have under your belt as an RPG gamer.
    It also should be worth noting that, between IWD, and the near *endless* pool of printed literature devoted to spells going back as far as 1st and 2nd edition AD&D, there should be absolutely NO problem giving Shaman casters a meaningful selection of low-level Druidic spells to choose from.
  • FardragonFardragon Member Posts: 4,511
    edited July 2015
    I recall Shamans and Witchdoctors in 1st edition material. I don't remember if it was Monster Manual or DMG, but it was basically similar to the kit from the humanoids book. It was a nerfed cleric for races too "primitive" to have proper clerics. Witchdoctors had both cleric and MU spells. Neither had special summoning or spontaneous casting, so I don't think the SoD class owes anything to them.
    Sixheadeddog
  • VarwulfVarwulf Member Posts: 564
    My body is ready...
    Vallmyr
  • IdahoIdaho Member Posts: 608
    So wait, if i undestand well (not so stronk in english) shaman should be just spamming spirits? I was hoping that he will have some sort of permanet companion, like spiritual bear in simmiliar way like wizards have
  • FardragonFardragon Member Posts: 4,511
    edited July 2015
    No version of shaman in 2nd or 3rd edition gets an animal companion or familiar.

    Some versions get a "spirit guide" but it's just that - a spirit, with no physical form. It may help the shaman to detect traps in SoD.

    They have druid spells of course, so they won't just be summoning.
  • IdahoIdaho Member Posts: 608
    Thanks, just lost interest about shaman = i dont need to wait for SoD and can create some new character right now :D
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