I want to include Mesmerism, and base it loosely on this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_magnetism 

Mesmerism should be a skill, not a mystic power, I think. It has some unique properties... Here is a 2nd draft of the Skill.

1st Level
- Mystic Healing (+1 Mystic Point), once per encounter (can be used on self or others)
- Simple Suggestion ('so and so is not trustworthy'), once per day

2nd Level
- Mystic Healing (1d6 Mystic Points), once per encounter (can be used on self or others)
- Minor Hypnotic Augmentation (give a Skill a +1 Bonus), once per day.

3rd Level
- Sense Influence (detect others emotions, sense lying), once per character per day - requires touching the other person
- Complex Suggestion ('so and so is not trustworthy and you should do something about it'), once per day
- Minor Detect Presence (allows one to feel the animal magnetism of others nearby)
- Minor Mind Reading (catch glimpse of thoughts), once per day

4th Level
- Influence Emotions, once per day.
- Minor Illusion (brief and fleeting)
- Minor Mind Control (get a person to do something specific), once per day, requires touch
- Major Hypnotic Augmentation (give any Skill a +2 bonus), once per day.

5th Level
- Physical Healing (2d6 Life Points), once per encounter (can be used on self or others)
- Illusion (does not do damage, but can move)
- Major Mind Reading (can hear thoughts as if in conversation), once per day, within 10 feet * Character Level

6th Level
- Hypnotic Trance (Post-Hypnotic suggestions, Past Life Memory)
- Major Healing (4d6) either (Life Points or Mystic Points)
- Major Illusion (can do damage, lasts up to 1 hour)
- Mind Control Persons (get a crowd to obey one's will)
- Power Word Trance (instantly immobilize someone), once per day.

That's a rough draft there. The key, and it is very important, is to not overpower this skill. That will be difficult given that Mesmerism by definition is a rather complex thing. So while in concept I like where this is going, I'm afraid that it may be too powerful, and cause people to automatically take it because - well hell, why wouldn't you?! So... it has to have some pretty heavy restrictions to keep that from happening. One obvious way is to make it hecka expensive to learn in terms of SLP. Maybe it costs 5 SLP to learn. That however would work strangely in terms of leveling... as in if you need 5 you have to wait till after 2nd level to take it. Another is to assign it only to certain classes. Or make a special class just for Mesmerism (that would require some additional work, but it could be done). Or only allow Illusionists to take it (SpellChanter + Thief)...? Or perhaps the Mesmerist multi-class could require the following: SpellChanter, Cleric, Thief... If so the Experience Base would be 60. For Skill Learning Points (SLP) It would get

SLP = (NumberOfClasses + SLP_BonusPerLevel) + SLP_BonusAtFirstLevel = (3 + 2 + 3) = 8 SLP at 1st level, and then 5 SLP per level after that.

So at 1st Level the Mesmerist who would be a SpellChanter and Cleric and Thief could take Mesmerism (would kind of be expected, if not required), and have 3 SLP left over, and then a bunch of Mystic Learning Points for spells and miracles. That could work.

Thoughts?

Monica emailed me with the following comments:

I think that Mesmerist is special enough to deserve it's own class. But if you make it into it's own class, I think then simple suggestion, (or something else that is hypnotically inclined) needs to be bumped up to the first level so that first level character doesn't feel completely useless, because healing mystic points is kinda cool, it lacks that "hey I'm an Mesmerist" feel to it.

I'm not familiar with the Elkrons, other than Minvar, but does it fit with a specific Elkron. If it does it can be powers, or expensive skills that a Cleric of that Elkron can have.

Thanks Monica! Interesting thoughts! I tend to think that Mesmerist should indeed be it's own class... or perhaps the Illusionist Class should be renamed Mesmerist, and the additional features added to it. I'm not sure Illusionist and Mesmerist are really quite so different as to be different classes. Hmmm... thinking ...

Note: I made the change you suggested, and added two Hypnotic Augmentations. I'm thinking of things I've seen hypnotists do. Please add suggestions if you can think of any. Thanks!

I am at this point leaning heavily, if not overwhelmingly, toward making Mesmerism a Class with a set of Skills that are categorized under 'Mesmerist'. To do this I need to make a significant change to the web application. I worked on that last night on my development server and it seems to be working out. The Mesmerist Class will likely be SpellChanter + Cleric + Thief (60 Experience Base). It will likely have something along the lines of these Class Skills (making them Primary for Mesmerist Class):

Mesmerism - Basic Skill Set
I'm still noodling over how to work out the issues of Cross-Class Skills. For example, I can imagine that other Classes might be able to use Psychic Skills (Witch / Warlock, for example), or Illusions being also part and parcel of the Illusionist Class. That Illusionist Class however may be entirely replaced by the Mesmerist Class, or since it only requires SpellChanter + Thief, remain the same, but with fewer Primary Skills (and a lower Experience Base). Getting this to work may require a bit more tinkering with the web application but I think it can be done.

Update: Yes, the way I have it currently re-designed each Skill is assigned a Category, which can be anything like "Kung Fu", "Pyschic", etc. These Categories exist simply to allow for finer grained filtering on Skills while selecting the for Skill Books, and potentially allowing Players to filter by Category. The last remaining question I have on this is whether or not any Skills can or should be assigned to more than one category. Kung Fu skills clearly not. Medical? Don't think so. Etc. So far I have not run into any, which indicates that the current design is probably workable. I will try it out and see if it stands up over the next few weeks.

I'm sorry it took so long to respond!

At first glance, the Mesmerism skill didn't appeal to me. A lot of these skills that come with packages that improve with levels seems out of balance, but....

You've made Mesmerist a class, so according to rest of Elthos, that seems like the best fit. I haven't compared it to other classes because I am unable to due to my character maximum.

I haven't really studied the skills or the categories, but off the top of my head, I'm sure they could be put into multiple categories. I just don't know if it's worthwhile.

After glancing at the skills, I wonder how would you would categorize Animal Training, Horsemanship, Hunting and Falconry? Animal? Profession? Survival? Hunting relates to animals, sport and survival. It might be interesting to allow multiple keywords for each entry. It all depends on how hard that is to do, and if it's worth it, of course.

I'm sorry it took so long to respond!

At first glance, the Mesmerism skill didn't appeal to me. A lot of these skills that come with packages that improve with levels seems out of balance, but....

You've made Mesmerist a class, so according to rest of Elthos, that seems like the best fit. I haven't compared it to other classes because I am unable to due to my character maximum.

I haven't really studied the skills or the categories, but off the top of my head, I'm sure they could be put into multiple categories. I just don't know if it's worthwhile.

After glancing at the skills, I wonder how would you would categorize Animal Training, Horsemanship, Hunting and Falconry? Animal? Profession? Survival? Hunting relates to animals, sport and survival. It might be interesting to allow multiple keywords for each entry. It all depends on how hard that is to do, and if it's worth it, of course.

Thanks! I was thinking the same thing. It will take some finessing to get the categories to make sense, but at this point it is set up to allow one category for each skill, not two or more. The categories at present are:

Academic
Agrarian
Animal Magnetism
Artistic
Combat
Craft
Domestic
Feats
Hypnosis
Kung Fu
Medical
Psychic
Spirit
Thieving

There are undoubtedly more Skill Categories out there, and this list was focused on the creation of the Mesmerist Class and categorizing all of the existing Skills. I could fold some of them together, such as Hypnosis and Psychic under Mesmerist... but I was thinking that Witches and Warlocks would probably want some of the Psychic Skills under their book. Remember the Skill Categories are pretty much used as a convenience device to filter while creating new Skill Books. Books can be used to help create Generic Adventure Groups later, though I have not yet programmed that. However, I have created a Book for Thieves, and a Book for Fighters and there is also a Book for Scholars that covers both Clerics and SpellChanters.

Yes, it was a bit tricky to decide which way to go with Hunting, for example. It is an Athletic / Sporting activity, but also an Agrarian one some might argue, and possibly deals in some way with Animal Magnetism maybe, but if you ask your local Neanderthal Shaman type he may well tell you it is a Spirit thing. I want to keep the Categories list reasonable, though, and not have a million of them, and I want to keep the interface for selecting Skill Categories simple within reason. There are, as usual, trade offs either way. I think I'm currently pretty close to the higher end of the range in terms of numbers of Categories that I'd like to see in a list. So... I may consolidate. It's tricky. But once done it will serve well, I think. Adding Mesmerist Class convinced me to go ahead and create the Skill-Book system and add the Categories. So far so good.

:)