Aw man, I really want to use this class. It's got some great ideas and the flavor is really good. But.
As it is, most of my critique would be wording clarification/nitpicks (like: "expires" is not terminology used in Fabula; it should be "end/lose this effect"; or: Dedication and Knowledge should probably specify "your My Strength is Yours Skill" instead of just "the My Strength is Yours Skill" unless you want it to be technically possible to have a character being supported by one Squire give a benefit to a different Squire with one of these Heroic Skills) but I think there are some bigger issues as well.
I love the idea of being able to do more with Equipment actions, but Arming Maneuver needs some small but serious adjustments to not be absolutely bonkers broken (specify that you can only pick each option once, decide how it should interact with free Equipment actions, clarify "an ally" to "an ally you can see" if you want to avoid Navigator shenanigans, etc.) Twin Point Strike, meanwhile, is Entropist's Stolen Time plus Commander's Charging Cavalry with full damage on both attacks, whenever you perform the Equipment action -- even for a Heroic skill, that's going a bit far!
Which brings me to what I think is the biggest problem with this class: I think I can already do most of what it wants to do with some combination of Entropist, Commander, and Guardian, and I don't think rolling all of those things into one class is enough to justify adding it to my games, especially when those classes already harmonize so well. Combined with the Squire's extremely limited set of Heroics, I think this class commits the cardinal Fabula Ultima class-building sin of trying to be self-contained.
So what about Squire is mechanically unique? What about it adds something to other classes in the game rather than just combining things that already exist in order to streamline? For me, I think:
Get a benefit when you use the Equipment action. Again, I love the idea of centering the Equipment action for cool effects, but we gotta keep in mind firstly that a character's inventory space in Fabula Ultima is practically unlimited, so it's a very powerful action to take! and secondly that there are a number of things in the game that grant an Equipment action for free. (Dancer's Quick Change and Entropist's Stolen Time are obvious, but there's also the Make It or Break It Heroic Skill from Techno Fantasy and a sample rare weapon Quality from the GM Toolkit that allow the possibility of taking a free Equipment action whenever you attack. If you can potentially spend 5 MP to get an attack whenever you attack, that is... not ideal.)
Get a benefit when you cover an ally. I also really like this! Most of the enhancements you can get from Guarding only apply when you choose not to cover someone, so this, too, is an interesting niche to me!
I'm sure you understand a lot of the design intent better than I do, so I'm sure you can hit on more than those. I really recommend taking this class and considering how you could combine it with other classes in play to lean into particular archetypes.
I think there's some excellent ideas here, and I particularly like the work and polish you've put into it! I hope this feedback is useful and you'll continue to work on this class! :D
(Edit: what on Earth is happening to the word wrapping in this text box...?)
Hey, thanks for the detailed feedback! Squire is definitely still rough in places, and I'm considering fully replacing one or two of the Skills. I'm gonna be fairly hands-off with the Class until it goes through some playtesting, but all feedback is greatly appreciated and I'll take it all into consideration when I do a revisit. I'm pretty glad that my design goals for the Squire came through -- you spotlighted them exactly!
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Aw man, I really want to use this class. It's got some great ideas and the flavor is really good. But.
As it is, most of my critique would be wording clarification/nitpicks (like: "expires" is not terminology used in Fabula; it should be "end/lose this effect"; or: Dedication and Knowledge should probably specify "your My Strength is Yours Skill" instead of just "the My Strength is Yours Skill" unless you want it to be technically possible to have a character being supported by one Squire give a benefit to a different Squire with one of these Heroic Skills) but I think there are some bigger issues as well.
I love the idea of being able to do more with Equipment actions, but Arming Maneuver needs some small but serious adjustments to not be absolutely bonkers broken (specify that you can only pick each option once, decide how it should interact with free Equipment actions, clarify "an ally" to "an ally you can see" if you want to avoid Navigator shenanigans, etc.) Twin Point Strike, meanwhile, is Entropist's Stolen Time plus Commander's Charging Cavalry with full damage on both attacks, whenever you perform the Equipment action -- even for a Heroic skill, that's going a bit far!
Which brings me to what I think is the biggest problem with this class: I think I can already do most of what it wants to do with some combination of Entropist, Commander, and Guardian, and I don't think rolling all of those things into one class is enough to justify adding it to my games, especially when those classes already harmonize so well. Combined with the Squire's extremely limited set of Heroics, I think this class commits the cardinal Fabula Ultima class-building sin of trying to be self-contained.
So what about Squire is mechanically unique? What about it adds something to other classes in the game rather than just combining things that already exist in order to streamline? For me, I think:
I'm sure you understand a lot of the design intent better than I do, so I'm sure you can hit on more than those. I really recommend taking this class and considering how you could combine it with other classes in play to lean into particular archetypes.
I think there's some excellent ideas here, and I particularly like the work and polish you've put into it! I hope this feedback is useful and you'll continue to work on this class! :D
(Edit: what on Earth is happening to the word wrapping in this text box...?)
Hey, thanks for the detailed feedback! Squire is definitely still rough in places, and I'm considering fully replacing one or two of the Skills. I'm gonna be fairly hands-off with the Class until it goes through some playtesting, but all feedback is greatly appreciated and I'll take it all into consideration when I do a revisit. I'm pretty glad that my design goals for the Squire came through -- you spotlighted them exactly!