Diplomat

A social and support base class that is registered with its own guild and ranks but has no abilities built yet.

The Diplomat is the game's intended answer to the question of what a character does if it wants to win through talking. The design is a social class built on persuasion, court intrigue, leadership and insight: someone who resolves a confrontation before it becomes a fight, who reads a room and a person, and who leads a group by standing rather than by damage. It is registered as one of the eight base classes, so it needs no prior class behind it, and it has a full guild identity with a channel, a colour scheme, its own entry on who and a rank ladder running Envoy, Emissary, Negotiator, Ambassador and Guildmaster.

None of that is a class you can play yet. The Diplomat has no skill daemon, no command directory, and not one implemented ability anywhere in the game. Its four talent trees exist as names in the skill catalogue and nothing has been assigned to any of them. There is no diplomat guild entrance in the world either, which means join diplomat has nowhere to succeed: the command checks the room you are standing in against a guild entrance list the Diplomat is not on, and refuses. Even setting that aside, the guild takes no walk-ins, so a guildmaster would have to admit or induct you first. Treat this page as a record of what is registered rather than as a guide, and pick something else for now.

Resources#

No primary resource is defined for the class, because nothing exists to spend one on. A Diplomat character would have the same HP, SP and EP bars every character has, shown on score, and would spend nothing at all.

The class configuration does carry a set of base combat proficiency ratings, which become the character's own skills, read at runtime like any other skill, and which also feed the skill averaging that sets a character's level. They read the other way round: the third figure on each line is the starting level for that skill, so a higher number is a better one, and all sixteen are granted as primary skills. The best figures, four apiece, are melee attack, melee defence, blunt defence and stealth, while the worst, one apiece, are magic attack, conjuring, bargaining, fishing, faith and healing. That is a fighter's spread rather than the support profile the class name suggests, and the list is identical line for line to the Merchant's and the Paladin's, so none of it was chosen for the Diplomat in particular.

Diplomats have no armour category access. Plate, mail, leather and cloth are all closed, leaving only gear with no category set on it, which is the ordinary unrestricted kit anyone can wear.

Talent Trees#

Four trees are declared in the skill catalogue. All four are bare labels with no abilities implemented behind them, so what follows is what each is named for rather than what it does.

Persuasion#

The intended branch for talking a situation down: convincing, negotiating and changing minds. Nothing implemented.

Intrigue#

The intended branch for court politics and information: secrets, leverage and manoeuvre. Nothing implemented.

Leadership#

The intended branch for commanding and supporting a group through standing rather than through combat. Nothing implemented.

Insight#

The intended branch for reading people and situations, and understanding what is really going on. Nothing implemented.

Skills#

There are no Diplomat skills. The class has no skill daemon and no command directory, so there is nothing to list, no levels to plan for and no rotation to learn. Joining the class, were it reachable, would grant a character no abilities whatsoever.

Playing a Diplomat#

You cannot, and the honest advice is not to try. join diplomat will refuse wherever you stand, because no room in the world is registered as the Diplomat guild entrance, and a character who did somehow end up in the class would have no skills, no armour access worth the name and no combat ability, which is the same position an Explorer is already in. The Explorer has no skill daemon and no command directory either, so neither class has anything a player would call an ability list, though the Explorer, unlike the Diplomat, can at least wear leather. Where the code does separate them is in the vitals, where a Diplomat carries a larger spell point and stamina pool than an Explorer and a little less health, and in guild entry, where a guildmaster can only induct an Explorer into a base guild.

If what draws you to the class is the social side of the game, the closest things currently built are the Merchant and the Rogue. Merchant is the other non-combat base class and it is fully implemented, with seventy-eight abilities covering appraisal, contracts, auctions, shops, property and hiring, all of which involve dealing with other players rather than killing things. Rogue carries a surprisingly deep social branch in its Trickery tree, including Bribe, Swindle, Threaten, Disguise, Counterfeit and Eavesdrop, and it can fight as well.

If you want the roleplay of a diplomat specifically rather than the mechanics, nothing stops you playing one. Clan membership, the titles you earn and how you conduct yourself are separate from your class, although guild membership is not, because the game sets your guild from your class and keeps the two in step, and plenty of the game's social systems are open to any character. Just build that character on a class that has abilities behind it.