Wands are Dumb

[psuedoenviro]

I want to be a WD not an orchestra conductor.

I want a shriveled monkey paw. I want a chicken I hold by the feet with blood dripping from its throat while its nearly severed head swings. I want an elephant tusk that enhances my magic but can also be used to impale monsters with. I want a human spine with a enough connective tissue that I can use as a whip.

Sorry but a twig just is not going to cut it for this character.

[Rumford]

Yeah, a bloody chicken on the back of the WD would be awesome. :evil:

[DemolitionSquid]

Agreed on all counts. Wands are for Wizards.

[pcguy]

How about a doll?

[Sass]

Rubber Chicken with a Pulley in the middle?


Seriously, the monkey paw or something sounds nice ;)

[Naja]

Rubber Chicken with a Pulley in the middle?

Dude, I was waiting for a Monkey Island reference somewhere!

[Mad Mantis]

Not too many gamers these days have played Monkey Island.

[Guercio]

The Butcher: "Aaah, fresh meat!"
WD: "I'm selling these fine leather jackets..."

I love it.

[teh_Thrasher]

yeah wands were dumb in d2. i liked the wands in Guild Wars though. they had some use albeit smaller than other more physically damaging classes

[psuedoenviro]

I can't see a guy in leaves using huge metal swords. A WD should be using more organic weapons. So here are more random ideas:

Gharbad's horn - magical and stabby
Fangskin's tail - whip with a sharp point at the end
Stormtree's thorned mace - woody and spikey

[Athanasios]

Agreed. This guy looks down and dirty, a polished wand doesn't do him justice

[konfeta]

Some mummified demonic wang, perhaps?

I am trying to figure out whenever that would attract or scare away the stereotypical 12 year old children to/from playing the WD.

[Athanasios]

Some mummified demonic wang, perhaps?

I am trying to figure out whenever that would attract or scare away the stereotypical 12 year old children to/from playing the WD.

You have a point...aw nutts

[Wierdoom]

The human spine whip would be awesome. And maybe a voodoo doll in the other hand...

[ThomasJ]

I'd like to see the Witch Docotors use magical gloves and gauntlets instead of wands.

[emceha]

Like Sass said, monkey/cat/demon paw is intresting and funny idea.
other stuff:
doll, bird head, puma/lion/monkey jaw, horns, tongue ;)

[raveharu]

I want to be a WD not an orchestra conductor.

I want a shriveled monkey paw. I want a chicken I hold by the feet with blood dripping from its throat while its nearly severed head swings. I want an elephant tusk that enhances my magic but can also be used to impale monsters with. I want a human spine with a enough connective tissue that I can use as a whip.

Sorry but a twig just is not going to cut it for this character.

Your tone is annoying, you're like one of those "I-want-yada-yada-I-think-yada-yada" idiots.

Anyway I guess they can approach the wand approach but not a piece of wooden stick but rather with a shrunken head attached , or feathers and otherwhat-have-you voodoo thingy.

[Naja]

What about a rubber chicken with a pulley in the middle? He could wear some fine leather jackets for the extra defense rating.

[Grug]

When is the WD seen using a Wand? The gameplay vid on the site shows him with a Dagger.

[Elmacro]

Well i think the mace made of skulls which leaves magical powders behind is real cool, its in the diablo 3 official site on the wd page.

[Nightswipe]

Graveyard dirt and a rusty nail
chicken feet and virgin blood
take the grease from a snail mix with Transylvanian mud
now spice it up with Spanish flies
to make sure he suffers
before he dies
add cursed water by druids at Stonehenge
and I guarantee u sweet revenge

[Jambe]

I would like the ability to craft caster weapons from corpse bits. The WD could have a couple skills like the D2 Barb's Find Item/Potion, something like "Eviscerate" for organs and "Harvest" for bones, where he pulls out a blade and cuts up the corpse for x_chance to find certain body parts (maybe the parts can only be found via those WD skills, too). Perhaps there's varying quality like bruised vs pristine spleen or cracked vs intact jawbone, etc.

Then you lump your assorted bits of flesh and bone together with other items and transmute (hehe) or wave your monkey paw over it and x_item is created. They might have some preset mods, random mods; you know, some unique combinations that make the process worth the time and skill points. Or hell, the Eviscerate and Harvest abilities could be innate to the WD, without any skill investment necessary, and items could boost his WD's chance to find useful corpse bits.

I brought it up elsewhere and ThomasJ hit on this point a bit here, but I also think it'd be cool to have caster-specific gloves. Perhaps you could find or craft some sort of concoction to dip your hands into which'd then give you an enhanced casting ability (and the caster-specific gloves would be required to use them).

There's really loads of possibilities for customization. The more routes I could use to get to the same end, the better. Say you want a really defensive build who zombie-walls a lot and then pounds things with critters or hard-hitting spells. Perhaps there are two or three specific uniques that could make you really good at this, and two or three great Witch-Crafts (lol), and a couple glove/concoction routes as well...

*shrug*

[Grug]

Hehe. Witch-crafts. very clever.

Well, there's already Soul Harvest. I say often that crafting in D3 won't work unless it's really streamlined. IE, gathering simple reagents, like Green Moss or Iron Ore or Dark Leather, would be boring and take up inventory spaces.

I had an idea for Scroll crafting. Monsters would drop scrolls, each with an item and requirements on it, and you could put 2 into scroll slots. While the scroll in in your slot, it starts adding up your monster kills. When it's conditions are complete, like kill 200 zombies or a unique Dark Vessel or have a magic Axe in your inventory, it can be consumed to produce an item.

[royalstyle]

"Billy Witchdoctor dot com, more comfortable with chicken"

[Jambe]

@Extracrispy: right, right, you don't want it to be overly complicated or time-consuming. I do think, however, that you want the process to be involved enough to warrant the power/utility of the presets.

I don't think the item collecting itself would be an problem; the game is about finding and collecting stuff, after all. What you really mean is you don't want the process to be streamlined (read: straightforward).

A variation of your idea mixed with mine: the WD's Soul Harvest skill (or just any WD skill, or a select tree/branch of skills, etc) has a chance to cause monsters to drop organs or bones or both. The organs and bones stack in a specially designated container as you said (maybe there's even a visual indicator of this on the WD!). If you have the required amount of reagent onboard you can right-click the container which changes the cursor to an Enchant/Craft graphic. Then you could left-click a craftable item (wand-like items such as paws/tails, shrunken heads on sticks, rubber chickens et al) and produce a craft.

That'd be very simple, and if you picked up the reagent simply by walking over it, it'd reduce the amount of clicks necessary to craft an item from D2's nine to three. Or, if you could craft items on the ground and assign "craft" to a specific button, then you could reduce it to a key press and a click (two steps).

I'm not sure if that's simplifying it too much. Maybe you could have a variety of craft possibilities. Say you keep the aforementioned organ/bone setup and you need some variety of gem to craft, too. Then you could make it so each variety of gem has its own craft presets — that'd sure be interesting, and it could really allow you to tailor your WD to a specific play style.

[Psyco]

Voodoo doll PEOPLE VOODOO DOLL!!!

[tetracycloide]

yeah wands were dumb in d2. i liked the wands in Guild Wars though. they had some use albeit smaller than other more physically damaging classes

If wands are included in diablo III cues should be taken from Guild Wars and WoW to adjust the attack animation. Make wands ranged weapons that fire magic projectiles instead of melee weapons that look absolutly rediculous when swung.

That said, here's hoping the witch doctor weapons are more akin to the necromancer trophies from diablo II than they are the necro wands from diablo II.

[Sass]

What about a rubber chicken with a pulley in the middle? He could wear some fine leather jackets for the extra defense rating.
lemon head mask IMO.

[Grug]

If wands are included in diablo III cues should be taken from Guild Wars and WoW to adjust the attack animation. Make wands ranged weapons that fire magic projectiles instead of melee weapons that look absolutly rediculous when swung.

That said, here's hoping the witch doctor weapons are more akin to the necromancer trophies from diablo II than they are the necro wands from diablo II.

You may get your wish, but not in the way you'd think. If you've seen the Blizzcon B-Roll (and if you haven't, go to GameVideos.com right now), it can be seen that the Wizard has a staff in some scenes, and when she casts magic missile, she swings her staff to fire. Could be something similar. I'm against wands themselves producing magic, though.

[Srikandi]

Sacred 2 gives its voodoo caster class shrunken heads. They drop from mobs, and they're different types according to the mob you got em from. They have random defense related stats and function as gear, but you can also use em to summon pets of the same type as the head.

It's pretty fun :)

[Psyco]

Sacred 2 is horrible...i miss the first Sacred...anyway wand have always been there to "channel" caster magical power...in some game they cast on their own and other dont and other do both like D&D wand have charge in them other help you channel spell...i never really had problem with wand in D2...im a caster and as long as i can cast my stuff wand are just there to help me strengthen my spell...they are "FOCUS" item if you like just like in EQ

[AtomicJ]

I haven't even read the thread, but I'll agree with you that wands were my least favorite weapon in D2.:thumbsdown: For magic users, I much prefer staves and the new crystal orbs that the Wiz has (I'm assuming the Doc can't use those), though I hope Blizz beefs up the damage that staves can inflict this time around. They look cool, but they were too weak against enemies.

But yeah, down with wands IMO.

[AnimeCraze]

Yes, down with the wands. A witch doctor is not a Harry Potter type wizard.

[Nighthavk]

The Butcher: "Aaah, fresh meat!"
WD: "I'm selling these fine leather jackets..."

I love it.Oh god. xD

[peasant]

Agree, no wands. Maybe they could get the Necromancer's Shrunken Heads instead? Except this time, they're an offensive weapon. What could possibly be scarier than a half-naked man dressed in leaves beating demons to death with their own skulls?

[knightmawko]

Maybe as a WD I wouldnt see wands, but I liked wands in D2, I mean necro was, is, and probably always will be (unless they add a necromantic knight class, heck, I only want 4 skills back, bone spear and fire golem + summon resist and golem mastery)

But seriously, the best weapon I have on my necro right now is a bone wand, and Im at Baal so its not because Im a noob, its just got sweet buffs. I just like the idea of casting my bonespear out of a wand, instead of my hands.

[GoldenBird]

Heh, you know, after reading this thread, I was inspired and drew a picture of a WD-type holding a decapitated chicken... maybe I'll upload it one day :P

[langevi]

Organic weapons. Poison darts. Maybe dolls.

[Ishtor]

what are you all saying wand are the coolest thing in the game, my barb duel wiled wands because they were so freakin amazing. I mean i walked in the throne room and ball could touch.... he was to busy laughing and rolling one the floor :whistling:

no but wands willl return and i bet WD will be the class that will wield them. to me it does not matter, i would wield a Dildo, as long as it gave me the stats i needed.

[Sepharia]

I want a Voodoo Doll, that every time I open my inventory and right click it, Cain feels like something is stabbing him in the ***. That'll teach him to stand too close to my stash.

[FreshMeat]

I think the wd should be able to wear skin suits like those worn by Buffalo Bill.

[trollslayer]

Well, this thread got a little off topic, but no, this is what I'm thinking Blizzard will do to satisfy a wide range of people.

A: You could equip voodoo stuff (bloody skulls and pin dolls)

B: You could equip a conventional weapon (mace, sword, probably not 2h)

C: You could equip a wand, staff, w/ever.

The only challenge this creates is easy to see; balancing them all. If I want to use a sword, they had better damn well be the same stat bonus as a dried skull, or a wand. I think they (Blizzard) said something about class specific weapon and armor sets, so we shall see what they offer us... Or not, I mean it will obviously "ship when it's ready"

[Sass]

Why would a sword have the same stats as a wand?