[Job Concept] The Oracle

Hello all. I'm bored and was just fiddling around with an idea. This is, of course, only a basic skeletal outline of an idea. I have one for dancer too, but... we'll try this one first.

The Oracle (Yin Yang Priest-- onmyouji 陰陽師)

Weapon: Fuda (Paper Seals)
Gauge: Yin and Yang (陰陽道)
Role: Healer

Yin and Yang focuses on 2 primal forces: Yin the evil, cold, dark, shady, destructive and female force and Yang, the light, hot, protective, regenerative, and male force. According to Chinese philosophy, Yin and Yang are energies that transform into each other. This is the main driving force behind the Oracle and the Gauge mechanics.

Inspirations:
- Rune Keeper (LOTR:O)
- Chloromancer (RIFT)

Playstyle
Ideally a more active playstyle which starts off with quick casting, weak spells building up to longer casting more powerful spells as the gauge rises. Because this job mainly does DD healing, the idea as to not make it too powerful/overly desired is that the DPS is fast but weak, leading up to ~sch/whm levels of spells with special abilities to help them increase the heals on one person.

Utility in the form of its resurrection mechanic and shikigami. The Shikigami "buffs" are basically a "help yourself: system where the Oracle will sacrifice gauge to apply them to a member, but then in the form of a debuff on the target will manipulate the charges of these shikigami to allow the user's DPS to either store more charges or use them for added burst dps.

Main Mechanic Concepts:

Quite simply, the main idea behind the Yin-Yang force and the Oracle's ability is: When you heal, you do damage and when you do damage, you heal.

You, naturally, would start off at balanced Yin and Yang. Using your Yang abilities, you can heal allies while giving off a small amount of damage to nearby enemies. This will add points to your Yang side and give you access to more powerful abilities to heal, damage and buff. However, your access to all but the most basic Yin based abilities will be cutoff and each time you use these Yin abilities, you will lose your Yang points. This also works in reverse: using Yin abilities will boost your Yin giving you access to more damaging abilities and buffs, while cutting off access to all but the most basic of heals.

Abilities come in Tiers. Examples ( Warning: I suck at naming things >.>; )

Tier 0 (usable at any time)

- Forced Balance - Resets your Yin gauge to 0. This is not optimal, but if you really need to switch in a hurry, it's the best way to do so.

- Scorn - instant cast DD spell, Adds Yin, very weak (~ scathe on BLM) and not something you're going to want to spam.
- Mend - instant cast heal, Adds Yang, but its very weak (the scathe of heals). Not going to keep anyone alive for long.

Shikigami Protectorate- A paper doll which will accept the focus of the Yang created by your Yin spells, strengthening them slightly and directing them to the holder. Basically the same as the RIFT Chloromancer's Synthesis. This can only be given to one person (the tank) and does not work on the healer himself. Yin spells that do damage will heal this target for the damage delt + a bonus amount (I am not going to give numbers here just the basic idea of the effect). A person may only have one protectorate at a time, thus 2 Oracles cannot heal the same target with this ability.

Shikigami Aggressor- Same as above, but in reverse. Your Yang heal spells to your party will damage this target.

Tier I (requires a certain about of yin or yang)

- Longer casting and more potent heals / DDs. These will add more Yin/Yang respectively.This is also where the duality of healing for damage and damage for healing begins.

- Negative Shroud- Like the Radiant Spores ability for RIFT's chloromancer. You cast it on the target, group mates who hit said target will receive a small portion of their damage back as a heal. Sort of like a regen as long as you're hitting the target.

- Positive Shroud- any heals going to a target near this mob will damage it for a portion of the healing dealt (includes heals from healers other than the Oracle, but would not be triggered by abilities like Benediction.)

Tier II:

- Basic AoEs, DoTs and more potent abilities (longest cast times, best heal/damage)

- Pulse of Yin: Fires a bolt of Yin energy at the target which will then bounce to nearby targets (up to 4) healing all allies in the area for a portion of the damage dealt (Shikigami Protectorate bonuses apply should the target be affected)

- Pulse of Yang: Jumps between 4 party members (won't jump to non-damaged members) and does a portion of the damage healed to their target.

Tier III:

Tier III heavy hitting/healing abilities that are instant cast, but have cooldowns. stronger/upgraded abilities plus Shikigamis.

- Shikigamis are paper dolls that will cost an Oracle all his current gauge and half of the previous tier (so if you are at 1/2 the way in Tier 3 and use this, you will be brought to 1/2 between 2 and 3) but give a "buff" that will give an effect for a certain number of uses. Each Shikigami can only be one one party member at a time, and likewise each party member can only have one shikigami (if there are 2 oracles)
----- 3 Yang Shikigami and 3 Yin shikigami.
----- Yang Effects maybe... chance to evade attack/restores TP/Mp when using weapon skill or spell/Lowers TP/mp cost of weapon skill or spell / take reduced damage/ movement speed buff (help get out of mechanics) /etc.

----- Yin Effects perhaps adds DoT onto weaponskills / reduces damage of next attack / interrupts an attack / removes a buff from target / etc.

- Blessing of Yang- Like Gaze of Yang, but this time damage dealt has a chance to restore a charge to a Shikigami.
- Dirge of Yin- Similar to the above, but this one has a chance to consume a charge for an extra burst of damage to the target.
*the two above abilities will overwrite the shroud effects from Tier I and vice versa. They cannot be up at the same time from the same oracle. The effect is also more likely to be triggered on a critical hit.

Tier IV:

- offers the most powerful spells available to the oracle. These spells will completely flush the gauge and give the Oracle some of the opposite gauge so they don't start at 0.

- Reincarnation- Unlike other healers, the Oracle's res spell isn't always available. However, this means 2 things: 1 its a quicker cast. 2: It's different. Reincarnation sets the oracle back to a balanced state instead of giving them Tier I of Yin ot Yang. The resurrected target comes back as a beast with access to special abilities which they can use for 30 seconds (think manticore/succubus in Deep Dungeon). When the effect wears off, they will have no brink of death status, but instead they will have a damage & healing(received and casted) down debuff that will last for the remaining 30 seconds that Brink of Death would have been active for.