This suggestion is sort of a response to A Possible Second Awakening for Paladin: Massively Buffing Auras.
This is basically a better second awakening than the 10% damage reduction listed on the Trello. I know second awakening is pretty far away, but I already typed the main idea of this out as a response to someone else, and I decided that I might as well finish it. This suggestion contains three ideas for Paladin awakenings (mainly for second awakening but it could also apply to first).
First idea: Putting the 'spirit' of Spirit Weapons into spells
This idea for a Paladin awakening lets you maybe any spell consume health instead of energy. This basically turns it into a drawback attack/something similar to using spirit weapons. This gives it an all stats up at the cost of taking health on use instead of energy.
Magic circles also won’t appear when casting the spell, since magic used to be casted with the soul in the lore (and it hurt the user when they did it, until magic circles were created). Only problem with this is that it heavily favors magic-oriented paladins, but I think this would be cool as an addition to the first awakening effect.
Second idea: Spirit Weapons are easier to cast
You can use energy for spirit weapons. The player would have the ability to customize spirit weapons (maybe with a new UI), and maybe make a chosen spirit weapon use energy instead of health. You would have the choice to substitute half of the health cost for energy, or all of it for energy.
This ability is pretty simple. There could be additional effects, like stat changes or additional effects.
Third idea: The harmony of health and energy
This is inspired by an idea to repurpose the energy bar for Warden (I saw this idea in a thread about vitality I think). This awakening buff basically helps a Paladin balance their health and energy. This awakening buff has two effects.
- Gain damage resistance based on how full your energy bar is (maybe up to 20%). However, half of the resisted damage is done to the energy bar (lose energy when taking damage). If your energy goes below x% (maybe 10% or 20%), then this ability is disabled until your energy reaches the 50% threshold.
- Gain energy regen based on missing hp, up to 2x energy regen at 100% missing hp (this would never happen but it would lineraly approach that).
I think this would create a fun flow between using magic abilities and using spirit weapons. Probably my favorite, though I also like the first idea.
Summary
- First idea is to let the player turn any magic spell into a drawback attack that gives all stats up
- Second idea is to let the player substitute the health cost of spirit weapons for energy, maybe with more effects
- Third idea is to gain damage resistance based on the energy bar, and regen energy faster based on missing health
These ideas are mainly for the second awakening, but they could be added to either of the awakenings.
Also, thanks to @iforgotmeword for proofreading this suggestion!