WARNING - This thread isn’t made for new players or those that seek guidance on how to use said class, please look for proper threads regarding it such as class overviews and build guides. Design Breakdown is a design discussion thread only and has no purpose to help players on practical aspects of the game.
Starting another Design Breakdown with one of the saddest classes that ever made into the game, one that had its power stripped right after the game release and even the improvements it received over time didn’t really fixed the problems, this is no other than Sadhu. In case this is your first time on a Design Breakdown topic go to this link for some basic information.
Sadhu - RANK 4 - ATTACK / SUPPORT
Today’s longer than usual introduction was done for a reason, Sadhu has no identity. The class doesn’t have enough skills to have a common thread to hold a goal nor takes the following skills to a common direction, there’s no way to explain what Sadhu does in the game nor why it is important. It’s a shame as the theme isn’t seen around it has potential for some unique fantasies.
Sadhus are hindu religious that renounce the material realm in order to transcend, escape the reincarnation circle or even become an avatar of a god, and by doing it they can receive divine powers. In order to do it they must detach from material possessions and family bounds, some may move to monasteries or turn into pilgrims yet it’s common for them to only keep clothes and religious artifacts. There are a couple Sadhus divisions that follow different practices, some may deprive pleasures while require them to abide the concept of good and evil by committing taboos. It’s common for yoga to be associated with Sadhus as it is a practice that seeks dominance over the self yet those two aren’t directly related, that link is formed due yoga being also a form of meditation in hinduism.
As the theme is more complex than a basic research can take it won’t be possible to identify which type of Sadhu was taken as the main source or even if they build it based on several types, as for it we’ll have to keep it as broad as possible.
Out of the Body (E)
It is unsure where the the concept of astral projection came from but it’s been reported around the globe without among different religions and groups. It’s believe this power can be achieved through yoga and training of mind, this feat is present in the indian ancient book Mahabharata, and is also acknowledge as Manojavah siddhi. This is a perfect fit for Sadhu theme as their goal is to detach from the material realm and develop their spiritual side, it’s an easy way to summarize this fantasy in a straightforward concept. One interesting details is that it references how some few scientists believed astral projection would behave, the spirit would keep the body shape and be tied by a string connecting the forehead with the back of the head.
Out of the Body has an unique mechanic that gives range by adding the risk of being killed as the spirit leaves the body unprotected or that’s how it was supposed to be, that balancing element isn’t present as any casted skill will use the body instead of spirit which allows clerics to protect themselves with little effort as early skills can take care of the job, and that said the only threat is control debuffs and disruptions. However even with that aspect ignored the skill itself is terrible as the spirit is generated by the skill and doesn’t carry attack lines nor is affected by attack speed and that doesn’t align with a skill that only allow Z attacks, even that out of the way the damage factor isn’t shown anywhere and is weaker than a regular attack. Range is a good improvement but it isn’t enough when the skill itself throw away all damage increments.
To get it back on rails this skill needs to take spirit attacks as a regular attack, it can also use SPR to boost the damage as it deals with a literal spirit attacking, and that can be enough to make it useable under the right conditions. As for the protection part it can bend the rules slightly and change the casting location to spirit instead of body, this would make Sadhu stronger offensive wise with the extended range and more vulnerable as it requires aim and positioning to protect the body. In this instance it may be better for self buffs, deployments and physical skills to be unusable with the spirit and give it an attribute for c2 or c3 to enable the last one, it can also convert it to magical damage based on MAtk and as such it won’t be able to deal critical damage. Of course if that presents too much power it can be compensated on shorter mobility range or by having more SP consumption, HP consumption, HP drain or even with heal prevention/reduction while out of body.
Prakriti (A)
Prakriti has many meanings that range from nature itself to matter and in this case it can be understood as the physical being, as the skill calls the body to the spirit it does kinda fit the term.
The only thing i have to mention on this skill is how it manages to be simple and fun, the whole purpose of it is to allow Sadhu to keep the spirit position by dragging the body and that just feels good, the whole usefulness of it is how creative the player can be with it.
Vashita Siddhi (F)
It could be possible that Vashita is a simplified (or mispelled) of Vasishtha that was a sage and important historical figure that helped to shape the morals of society and hinduism yet it feels more like a coincidence. Siddhis are supernatural powers that are believe to be achievable through training and meditation or by having a god blessing, for the followers of Vaishnavism it refers to specific group of abilities, that range from changing the self size and weight to godly powers, and in some sources it can be read as Ashta. There’s no siddhi that really connects to this skill mechanic, however as some siddhis have really broad concepts it may not but much of a stretch even tho the source material seems rich enough to provide more structure.
Channeling skills are troublesome to deal with as they need to provide a lot of power to compensate the waiting time, that doesn’t happen here as the effects aren’t attractive at all and their values are laughable.
A quick fix to it is to have it changed into a debuff aura effect for a short duration or a toggle with SP drain, that would make it at least useable but won’t change the fact that the skill itself isn’t interesting.
Astral Body Explosion (B)
It doesn’t seem like this skill has any reference aside the animation performed by the body that i’d assume is some movement related to hinduism rituals, yoga or indian dance, if you know it drop a comment so i can add it up here. There’s an issue with that approach as the spirit itself doesn’t change at all and explode all of sudden, the astral body is where the whole action is performed yet there’s not a single visual indicator on that side.
At the last Sadhu change they added a damage over time component to Astral Body Explosion and it did improved the skill however it doesn’t feel natural for the skill to have such element. It could be interesting to have a Prakriti attribute to perform the skill along the explosion, having it to increase the skill damage wouldn’t be a bad idea either.
There are too many wrong things going on here, not enough skill to pick, only one useable skill and the lack of identity and purpose are already visible at this point, not to mention that half of the skills go for indian language and the other two are in english. To not say the circle itself is horrible Astral Body Explosion can do the minimal for it but that can’t be support it alone, for the placement any rank 2 or above class can come close to it and won’t waste as many points in the process.
Possession (B)
Possession is defined to take something make it yours, in religion this is used to communicate when a higher entity is taking something as theirs usually for a brief time and that doesn’t happen here. The way the skill is executed it feels more like a type of exorcism than anything else, some could argue that having control over the enemy can fit the minimal requirement for a possession but that’s not reasonable in game bends the conventions. Unfortunately for it to be a true to its name it would clash with Druid’s Telepathy (and as extend Shape Shift and Transform) as it would take control of an enemy, yet that skill is also gimmicky and not as useful, and can be justified by the Parakãya Praveshanam siddhi that is a true possession. There’s also a non Sadhu exclusive issue as Possession uses the same visuals as Barrier as both are yellow circles of light, that’s something that should be addressed quickly.
On practical side Possession is a damage channeling and as an offensive one it can at least be engaging and having the bind component makes it quite effective, not only that but hitbox is good and really visible. Overall the skill is quite round and only disappoints as it can’t be used with Out of the Body as it was meant to be the main gameplay element.
With the current execution Possession kills the other Sadhu skills as it can deliver damage and be straight to the point, that isn’t the skill itself fault but rather the remaining skills to be ineffective, and as result it diminishes the whole proposed gameplay of Sadhu as it has no interaction with it.
Transmit Prana (D)
Another element from hinduism, Prana is a type of energy that flow through the body and can be taken as vital force/energy in its broadest sense, that isn’t exclusive to hinduism as this same idea can be seen on several cultures as Chi, Ki and Mana. There are practices in yoga that are said to control Prana by meditation and breathing and this with some artistic freedom made the basis for this skill, it’s weird to have it to share INT as SPR stands for Spirit but that is reasonable as it would be just another skill to increase SP and those never fill the additional portion.
The major issue with Transmit Prana is how annoying it is to apply to a target. It should be obvious that a skill with a tiny hitbox that only affects one ally wouldn’t succeed as a buff, the only instance it can work is by asking the person to stay still or to use it while it is under an imobile state and that can be troublesome during fights. Having the additional damage was a smart move for a skill that has no use without an ally, yet by making it stronger with Sadhu skills only increases the gap between circles.
It’s rare but this is a case of a skill is at a good state and improving it would only break its balance, even the targeting being annoying it can’t be changed and having it to apply to more allies would be gamebreaking. The only change that suits it is to either remove the stat scale and have it as flat 50% or add a floor to reduce overscale, at this point the stat increase is the secondary use for the skill. Even that said it may be better for this skill to be changed into something completely different to fit an identity and also empower Sadhu skills less.
As the last circle adds an empowering buff it doesn’t change how skills interact at all, it also doesn’t fix the issues it has nor lift its limitations. Transmit Prana seals the class as a c3 only as it can use all the points and ignore Vashita Siddhi completely as it is useless, this solidifies a single way to build the class as it lacks skills to distribute points.
Conclusion
At this point it should be obvious that Sadhu needs a rework to give it identity, the latest changes were a great patching but it didn’t changed the class design itself and that’s the problem. The ideal approach is to design a kit that uses Out of the Body as a the core and have a playstyle that makes use of it, it can have skills that won’t require the state but they should be useable in it as well.
One potential identity is to be a direct offensive SPR class as no other class does that. It isn’t that specific but as SPR is a support stat and the offensive approach is either for a single skill or to empower summons, that also opens up possibilities for other builds that make use of it and can also keep the supportive nature that the class was suppose to have by swifting stats.
Regarding skills Prakriti can be removed and applied as Astral Body Explosion component or attribute, Possession should be useable with Out of the Body and Transmit Prana could be changed into an SP recovery skill for party by draining the caster SP. Lastly just keep names consistent, if Sadhu is going for hindi names do it for all skills else get them to english, Transmit Prana is an exception as Prana itself is a concept and doesn’t sound off.
| C 1 | C 2 | C 3 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Identity | F | F | F |
| Theme | C | E | C |
| Gameplay | E | D | D |
| Cohesion | F | C | B |
| Point Distribution | F | E | E |
| Dropout | F | D | C |
On this breakdown behalf i’d like to apologize in case i’ve missed or misunderstood some linguistic, cultural and/or religious as i’m aware that there should be a decent amount of information available on the subject and my summarized points can diverge from the truth, but as i write those weekly i don’t have enough time to study it doing solo research. In case you do have more knowledge on these please share it on comments so i can correct properly and also give your thought on what thematic elements could be incorporated into Sadhu as it is the class with lowest skill point distribution in the game.
I think i listed it somewhere in my ramble but it just extremely powerful in endgame content for that very reason, on top of it scaling very nice with your MATK 
