A little update on the project I said I'd start some time ago.

I've been playing with two monk characters Wong Fei-Hong and Master So recently, and reached the conclusion that drinking lots of alcohol (even without fatigue) does NOT give you god-like powers and actually makes for a rather boring game where the low-level monsters can't hit you on anything but a 19 or 20, and you need a critical hit to hurt anything as well.
THAC0 penalties of up to -10 do not make for short encounters, and even having the characters walk in a drunken zig-zag pattern did nothing to activate the exotic fighting style referred to in the topic and names of the characters (no really? [img]tongue.gif[/img] ).

Naturally, this calls for a new kit, and as luck would have it, there is a 2nd edition Drunken Master kit around which might be usable for BG2 with a bit of adaptation. I'm working on that now, although the kit has some abilities I do not think I can fit into BG2 without some serious scripting, and that calls for alternatives.
Suggestions on kit abilities, as well as large quantities of alcohol, are welcome ;)

Make it a monk kit. We need monk, barbarian and sorcerer kits.

Here is my suggestions (only abstract ideas right now):

Barbarian: There should be three kits each focusing on one of the barbarian's three strenghts. One focused on speed, one focused on durability and one focused on barbarian rage.

Besides the Drunken master the ninja should also be a monk kit. After all the historical ninjas were groups of renegade monks who worked as mercenaries due to their lack of affiliations. Perhaps losing out on bare-handed attacks, but having stalker-type backstabs instead.

I don't have any ideas for sorcerers yet. Some suggested the psionicists, but the psionicists of AD&D are so different from anything else that they are hard to implement.

Actually, most Ninjas were rogue assassins and thieves, occasionally fallen Ronin, but were seldom ever Monks. Ninjas were nobodies, people who had lost their land, their titles, all of their holding and had nothing to lose. Highly romantic notions of the Ninja are false, they were little more then highly skilled sell swords who fought dirty. They had little in the way of honour and were generally dispised and hated by all sides in a conflict, seldom trusted, and usually exterminated in large numbers.

Well, I thought that they were renegade Buddhist monks who were outlawed because they didn't follow the approved (Rinzai) school of buddhism.

And BTW the original assassins were also a religious sect (in this case an islamic one).

The term "assassin" actually comes from the Hashish trade. They were highly trained killers used to remove compitition.

Ninjas were trained Assasains. :D

Contrary to popular belief, Ninja were more commonly used as spies and secret agents than assassins, and a good many of them were women. Also, they almost NEVER put on the black leotards that all the Hollywood Ninja today wear. Sure, in wartime a few Ninja might scale the walls of an enemy castle under cover of darkness, fire a few well-aimed arrows, perhaps start a fire or two, and depart, but most of the time they were people like your mistress or your trusted court aide (with you being completely unaware of this duplicity, of course.) Keep in mind that many Samurai families taught their daughters, as well as their sons, how to fight.

The "Ninja kit" idea is so common that just about everybody's designed one. TDD has one, and so do I--I believe both of them are variants on the Thief. My Ninja has an increased Backstab and low Thieving Points per level like the Assassin, but also increased Stealth skills, Critical Strike and Poison (the spell) abilities, but severe armor and weapon restrictions.

For Monks, I've got a Staff Monk, a Thief Monk, a Priest Monk, and a Bard Monk, while for Sorcerers, I've got a Thief Sorcerer and a Priest Sorcerer. My ideas for the Warriors are basically to allow each class of Warrior to take certain kits from the other classes (such as a Fighter Undead Hunter, Barbarian Beast Master, and Paladin Archer. Heck, we've already got a Ranger Berserker and a Ranger Wizard Slayer).

To try and give some assistance to Legolas (*nudge* *poke* *nudge* *clears throat*)

Is there any way to script potions into the game as usable items? You could make a potion that provides the same morale bonuses and AC/luck penalties that a usual night on the town would bring, yet combat bonuses that would last as long as the intoxication. Like combining the de'Traanion Baalor Ale with a potion of Heroism and make it last 8 hours.

And maybe some Drinking Gear to go along with it, like Jan's Adventure Wear. Only usable when the monk is drunk as a skunk. :D Boots that vary between haste and slow speed, so it looks like the user is hastened, then slowed, hastened, then slowed. Clothes that give off fumes (stinking cloud, anyone?) or really easy to move in (robe of the drunken archmagi: same as the other archmagi robes, but randomly casts 1-4 Nahal's reckless dweomers a day.) A ring that cures poison (for when you don't know what you're imbibing) and has a chance to cause feeblemind when curing the poison (to account for that dazed feeling you get when you drink something a bit disagreeable).

Are you basing this off Legend of Drunken Master by any chance? ;)

That's correct. IIRC, the killers in this trade were called "Hashishim"...say it out loud and you'll see where "assassin" comes from".

Actually... and this is according to 2nd edition D&D rules, it may have changed in 3rd...

Ninjas were never their own class, nor were they really a thief class. Part of being an effective ninja was never having anyone know that you were one. Ninjas actually were required to multi-class with another oriental class character (wu-jen, kensai, etc) to help conceal their identity. Ninjas had some nice bonuses granted to them, like immunity to poison after a certain level, the ability to run across water for x amount of feet per lvl, the ability to fall x amount of feet per lvl without sustaining damage, pole vault x feet/lvl, and various other bonuses I can't remember. They only got 1-2 HP per lvl which blows but... hey, they're stealth, not rugged. They had a lot of ninja-only items that helped them do stuff easier, quicker, and quieter (sp?) than a thief. Smoke bombs, climbing tools, lotsa other stuff that escapes me right now... Tho I think they used the thief THACO and XP charts, they're really a seperate class. Oddly, the benefits aren't THAT great, but they're really fun to play when you have to constantly pretend that you're something else... tho people eventually get suspicious when the mage of the party is jumping in and out of trees and off walls like a chimp on crack.

Oh, and I think they had to be human. Yeah, I know, a multi classed human? Yes, a multi classed human alright... just so long as no one else finds out. ;) n-n-n-ninja!