This ... Is ... Sparta!

[Dr.Disaster]

After watching the movie 300 once again i thought about a melee team variant based upon it, battling monster hordes with might and tactics not magic. For those who don't know the movie: it's based on the true event of spartan king Leonidas fighting the persians at the battle of Thermopylae in ancient greek 480 BC.

Several limits with some being really rough have to be set with the Spartan theme for style, abilities and behavior.


1) Equipment

Weapons:
primary: one-handed spears (all kinds of javelins)
secondary: short sword or war sword
Shield: large shield type only, must be used at all times

Head gear: full helm type only
Body armor: hard leather, studded leather, breast plate, light plate and any other armor without sleeves. Shoulder pads are allowed.

Gloves: none
Boots: light plated boots or greaves
Belts: sash or light belt

Amulet: any
Rings: none

As long as the base requirements are met anything goes; runewords included.
Of course exceptional and elite item versions are allowed too.

Note: body armor restrictions were taken from historic Spartan warriors. Going with the movie it would be no body armor and no boots at all!

All Spartans start with the so-called agoge, an initial solo training in the wilderness. The agoge's purpose is to prepare a Spartan to his life as a soldier. It's done in the early areas of Act 1. Usage of any found gear is allowed also completing the Den of Evil quest.

Important: Returning to town is NOT allowed before the training is finished! All level up stat points must be assigned to strength! The agoge is finished once a Spartan reaches 50 strength.

After the initial training is complete the Spartan receives this basic set of gear:
javelins, short sword, large shield
full helm, hard leather armor, light plated boots, sash

This gear can be shopped from any vendor in the game as long as it's white (normal non-magical). Now if your Spartan is able to find(!) superior or none-white parts of the basic gear set during his agoge he can - of course - keep them!


2) Character Class

To become a Spartan a character class must have at least one weapon specific combat skill, be it spear, sword or shield-related. This limits the choice to the Amazon, the Barbarian and the Paladin.

Note: by this class limit the team can play in both Classic and LoD mode.

Nit: I'm aware of the fact that back in ancient Sparta women could not join the army.Yet the D2 game designers build the Amazon class with greek mythology in mind so it would be most unfair to exclude her.

With minimum strength 50 required to equip the Spartan basic gear no character will start at level 1. Amazons have to be at least lvl 7, Barbarians at least lvl 5 and Paladins at least lvl 6 to meet the strength requirement.

Along with the class limit go three required roles that must be set:

King Leonidas (Barbarian)
- is the only one allowed to use Battle Cry
- leads the party
- can assign the command to his captian
- can send out his captain with a sub-party to do specific tasks

Captain Artemis (Barbarian)
- is the only one allowed to use Battle Orders
- leads the party by king's command or if the king gets MIA/KIA
- makes Berserk his primary combat skill if his son Astinos gets KIA

Both king and captain are the only ones allowed to use Battle Command

Dilios the bard (Barbarian)
- is the only one allowed to use Taunt and Shout
- returns home if the king gets KIA (due to king's order)


Here a number of optional roles which can be choosen:

Astinos and Stelios (both Barbarians)
- love to show off as a Dance of Death Tag team
- always belong to Artemis sub-party

Arkadian leader Daxos (Paladin)
- is the only one allowed to use Concentration
- can give orders to other Paladins, but not override the kings orders
- returns home if the king gets KIA (due to loosing his faith)

Queen Gorgo (Amazon)
- is the only one allowed to use Charged Strike
- returns home if the king gets KIA (to bring her husband's body home)

The Oracle (Amazon)
- is the only one allowed to use Slow Missiles (like predicting the future)
- is not allowed to wear or use items with "Half Freeze Length", "Cannot be Frozen", "Poison Length Reduce" or IAS

Of course more roles can be designed, having both Pro and Con.

Given the listed roles are choosen the worst case would be the king dying with Dilios, Daxos and Gorgo leaving which cuts the team down to half it's size. Debatable.


3) Skills

Barbarian:
Leap, Leap Attack, Whirlwind
Bash, Stun, Concentrate, Berserk
Sword Mastery, Increased Stamina, Increased Speed
Throwing Mastery
Spear mastery, Iron Skin, Natural Resistance
Howl
Find Potion, Find Item, Grim Ward

All Barbarians must learn either sword or spear mastery.
Warcries beside Howl, Find Potion, Find Item and Grim Ward are restricted to roles defined above.


Paladin:
Sacrifice, Zeal, Vengeance
Smite, Charge, Holy Shield
Might (see below), Blessed Aim, Concentration (see below), Fanatism
Cleansing
Defiance, Redemption

All Paladins must learn Holy Shield.
Might and Concentration (special, see Daxos above) are valid by Highest Aura First rule only:
- to keep Concentration active Fanatism has to be in use by another Paladin.
- to keep Might active Concentration has to be in use by Daxos.

Holy Fire, Holy Freeze, Holy Shock, Sanctuary and Conviction are never allowed, not even within a specific role design.


Amazon:
Jab, Impale, Fend
Powerstrike
Dodge, Avoid, Evade
Critical Strike, Penetrate, Pierce

All Amazons must learn Jab.
All Amazon magic skills are restricted to roles defined above.

All classes can place points into any synergy and passive skill effects but using them is verboten.


4) Battle tactics and dealing damage

The Spartans primary battle technic used was the Phalanx formation. Simply said it's several stacked rows of man forming a wall with their shields and attacking from behind their shield with spears.

Transfered to the game this could be 3+ chars fighting alongside with Bash, Jab and even Charge or Whirlwind! Feel free to experiment and develop more.

The teams main attacks deal physical damage. Now D2/LoD also has physical immunes and there will be no Necromancer around with Amplify Damage or Decrepify curse to break this immunity. So Amazons should have Powerstrike, Barbarians should have Berserk and Paladins should have Vengeance ready for these encounters.


5) Minions and Mercenaries

None at all. They don't meet the melee spear/shield or melee sword/shield requirement.


6) Softcore vs. Hardcore

Goal of the game is of course to defeat Xerxes who is represented by hell Diablo in Classic D2 and hell Baal in LoD.

Softcore team:
Killed charakters wait in town until the remaining party has finished adventuring in the current game area and is ready to enter the next one.
Now if the king died this has to be tougher .. any suggestions?

Hardcore team:
This team is under strict Last Man Standing rule. No rebuilds at all!
Now if the king died and at least Dilios survived all charakters who had to return home are allowed to join(!) a new follow-up team which will be lead by Dilios.


Input welcome

Dr. Disaster

[Occhidiangela]

After viewing 300 once again i thought to myself how about a melee team variant based upon it, battling monster hordes with might not magic?

Several limits are set with the Spartan idea.

1) Equipment

Weapons:
primary: 1-handed spears
secondary: short sword, falchion or war sword
Shield: great shield type only, must be used at all times

Head gear: full helm type only
Body armor: hard leather, studded leather, breast plate or light plate
Gloves: none
Boots: light plated boots or greaves
Belts: sash or light belt

Amulet: any
Rings: none

Each and every Spartan gets a full set of normal white gear at startup. He/she needs to raise his str/dex stats to gear required minimum and fully equip him/herself first before anything else.

Of course the exceptional and elite versions are allowed too.


2) Character Class

To become a Spartan a charactera class must have at least one weapon specific combat skill, be it spear, sword or shield-related. This limits the choice to the Barbarian, the Amazon and the Paladin.

Along with the classes come some role requirements that must be met:
King Leonidas (Barbarian) is the only one allowed to use Battle Cry
The King's Captain (Barbarian) is the only one allowed to use Battle Orders
Both King and Captain are the only ones allowed to use Battle Command
Dilios the bard (Barbarian) is the only one allowed to use Taunt and Shout


3) Skills

Barbarian:
All combat skills beside those requiring 2 weapons
All combat masteries beside axe, maxe and polearm mastery. Sword or Spear mastery must be learned.
Warcries beside Find Potion, Find Item, Grim Ward are restricted to certain roles listed above. Howl and Warcry are not allowed.

Paladin
Sacrifice, Zeal, Vengeance, Smite, Charge, Holy Shield (must be learned)
Blessed Aim, Fanatism
Cleansing, Defiance, Redemption

Amazon
Jab (must be learned), Impale, Fend, Powerstrike
Dodge, Avoid, Evade, Critical Strike, Penetrate, Pierce


4) Minions and Mercenaries

None at all, since none of them meet the melee spear/shield or sword/shield requirement.

Opinion. Must add might and concentration to the options, if fanat is to be allowed.

No mercs, got it.

Agree on class restrictions.

My PC is dead, will be a week or so before I have D Ii up again.

Occhi

[KingOfPain]

In the movie:
They used Round Shields
Everyone helped built the wall with stone and enemy corpse - Grim Ward (about 39 mins into the movie)
Totally irrelevant if we are not making a block buster


Yep, take Double Throw out of the equation
Got to have a Zon with Slow Missile for slow-mo fx
Holy Freeze for slow-mo?

[Sullla]

I'm sure that this thread isn't inspired in any way by the activity over in the RBCiv forum...

[Dr.Disaster]

Opinion. Must add might and concentration to the options, if fanat is to be allowed.

True in prinziple. Hmm ..
Since the Spartans have been a kind of fanatics i'd say they must have Fanatism first on the field (if available), before they can add Concentrate next and Might last. Highest Aura First rule.
To have all 3 active it would of course takes 3 paladins .

They used Round Shields

Aye! The D2 Large (round) shield is the closest resemblance. I also corrected my mistake in the start post.
The D2 Round Shield is simply too small in size.

Everyone helped built the wall with stone and enemy corpse - Grim Ward (about 39 mins into the movie)
Totally irrelevant if we are not making a block buster :neenernee

Aye Grim Ward is definatly allowed for all Spartans. This includes charges.

Yep, take Double Throw out of the equation

and Double Swing and Frenzy too.

Got to have a Zon with Slow Missile for slow-mo fx
Holy Freeze for slow-mo?

Hehe cool thought ..
Slow Missile seems perfect. Holy Freeze would be nice too but it has that nasty blue cast which ruins all scenes

I'm sure that this thread isn't inspired in any way by the activity over in the RBCiv forum...

Just "borrowed" the title


Edit:
A lot of changes happend to the team concept, also due to this post. Please re-read the thread starter post!

[Occhidiangela]

I have a machine back, but it's an old one, D II capable but no, for example, GUild Wars capable.

New account: Occhilaconic
Chars burned in so far:
Thermal_Polly is an Amazon
No_BeXerxes is a Barbarian
Hop_LiteBeer is a Paladin

Oh, and I am messing about with Osaykan_uThebe

So, when do we start?

[Dr.Disaster]

So, when do we start?

With 1.13 nowhere in sight why wait any longer!
Get your shields up, spears ready and enlist!
:duel:

[Dr.Disaster]

Revised Skill balance for Player Character classes
Barbarian
-Whirlwind - Reduced initial mana cost by 50%.
-Masteries - Changed critical strike chance from 0-25 to 0-35.

Any Barbarian Spartan seems to benefit, especially the Dance of Death Tag team

[Occhidiangela]

Any Barbarian Spartan seems to benefit, especially the Dance of Death Tag team

Occhilaconica has eight persons in varying states of advancement, HC, from level 7 to 22.

In anybody wants to mess around, the password is the usual for RB accounts.

I also have a bunch of random stuff ... or we can wait and do a team event and all start from zero.

Occhi

[Dr.Disaster]

I've started preparing some chars yet but won't drive them past the needed minimum lvl to get strength req 50 met. I added a bit about that and the initial training in the starter post.

I also think that granting all Spartans the use of Howl is ok because they tend to utter a collective AH-UH!

EDIT:
After the initial training it's very likely that your Spartan came up with superior, socketable, magical or even rare versions of Javelin, Short Sword and / or Sash. Keep and repair them if you like.

White Hard Leather can be bought from Charsi or Gheed. White Full Helm, Large Shield and Light Plated Boots to complete the basic gear set can be bought from Fara in normal act 2.