Progress on Deciding Classes and How They Work

OK, so far I have come up with several ideas for classes. They are as follows...

Warrior (strong character with high strength and defence but slow)

Wizard (strong with magic and spells. Low defence)

Hunter (strong with long range. Low defence)

I'm sure if you have played RPGs before you will know what these are. I started with these as they are the basics that are needed in my opinion. But this isn't all. I am contemplating whether to combine these characters together to create more classes. I've not finalised the idea yet and I'm not quite sure how it would work or if it is worth doing. It might be better to stick to basics for now so this will be put aside for a while. However, I will list them here for your contemplation anyway.

Magical Warrior (less strength and defence than pure Warrior but able to use magic as well)

Magical Hunter (now able to put magic to your ranged weapons for more damage and elemental effects etc)

Hunting Warrior (your strength is focused on long range so you become the best long ranged battler there is)

The main problem with these is that they seem too good. They are likely to overpower the other classes. Maybe this could be an option after finishing the game at least once or something.

Now let's get into the details of the three original classes we have. I have contemplated quite a few different ideas for the details of these classes including, specific skills that will directly effect the crafting side and vice versa and elements that will help the classes to be fair and different from each other. So here are the bigger details of the classes according to crafting (see 'progress on crafting categories and other details' post for more on what these crafting options are of which are mentioned here.

Warrior (unable to use alchemy crafting and is only able to food crafting and items as a healing source. However, naturally good at blacksmithing and so starts with higher blacksmithing level)

Wizard (unable to use cooking craft but is allowed to use alchemy. Naturally good with harvesting plants and so starts with a higher farming or plant harvesting skill)

Hunter (can use alchemy or food crafting but not both. Naturally good at with wild animals and so has a higher monster taming skill)

There is a big question in my mind of whether classes should be specific to fighting elements only and purely only effect your style of taking down enemies and leave the crafting as a separate thing to do after the items are collected. Then have the crafting levels go up according to whatever you decide to craft and you can craft any kind of thing at any time. OR whether to make the classes directly affect and limit the crafting you can use for more replay ability. I would like to make the game more complex but I don't want to feel like I am not giving the player enough freedom to do what they want.

But it's not just this relationship of the classes and what skills should relate to them I need to think about. The classes need to feel different so I also thought about special abilities and advantages they could have for battling.

Warrior (all around tough. High strength and defence but only from short distance. Also lower defence than Wizard in the end. Overall balanced stats compared to the other classes. Average damage to almost anything but no critical damage against any particular enemy)

Wizard (high defence. Able to use powerful stat boosts but only temporary. High damage to magical beings)

Hunter (average defence and average attack but long range. High damage to non magical beings)

But then I started thinking about how certain skills can associate with certain classes in combination with other skills and special abilities.

Warrior (can use magic to enchant their weapons and armour for better fighting power)

Wizard (can use magic to tame beasts. Can use magic to create a large weapon to be more like warrior class)

Hunter (can use alchemy to create flash bombs and stunning effects to better hunt prey and tame enemies. Can use potions to add magic effects their long range weapons)

These are all great idea but this mixes the classes and skills again though but I like the idea of different combinations allowing different things so if no restrictions where on the abilities for each class then these fun idea would be able to appear. But then we are faced with another problem. Some of the crafting ideas are rather similar so I will have to be careful with how I balance the special abilities of them so that the skills don't become biased (see 'progress on crafting categories and other details' post for more on this exploration)

But now when I think about it, I think there may be a way to do this. Perhaps each class could have a certain way of doing the same thing. Like for taming enemies the Warrior could beat them and have a chance to tame them when they defeat them. Hunter could use traps, stunning potions etc to make them easier to tame. Wizard could use magic to make them easier to tame. They are doing the same thing but in different ways depending on the character. That sounds like a good idea. Doesn't help with all the confusing issues of how the crafting links with the characters though. I think it might be best to keep them separate after all but that means working hard on making the crafting not biased in any way and that is gonna be hard to do. Tell me what you think about my little excursion. What ideas do you like? What ideas don't you like? Any feedback would be very much appreciated.