Magi Classleads/Skillset

Saeva

lol is Kaden a non-com now?

Cooper

These are the type of things likely to be looked at for implementation, not the 'let's make Magi be able to 1v4229890 easily' things.

Xith

Xith said:

Anyway, moving on to the mysterious 3rd skillset.

Had some ideas for abilities to add. These are designed to aid Magi's attacks outside retardation while providing limited benefit in Retardation due to timing factors.

Infuse <element>: Saturates the [battle]staff with the element, which is then transferred to the target on-hit. Could also be infused directly into the target but I think the two-step process balances better for retardation. Infusing adds a level of the element's influence into the target. Each level will fade after 18 seconds of contact (max 6 levels), and while above 3 levels, a particular effect is granted (similar to tempered humours). (3s BAL on the ability) Effects as follows:

Earth: Limbs too heavy to parry. Also cancels (not strips) levitation's effect

+ - staffstrike, geyser/gravity/tremors

Water: Icy skin causes double salve balance (except restoration)

+ - deepfreeze, efreeti/staffstrikefire, freeze

Fire: Causes bayberry/hawthorn/moss to disintegrate in target's mouth.

+ - transfix, stridulation, general damage

Air: Cancels (not strips) mass's effect.

+ - adduction, [Cyclone - see below]

Couple other ideas for Elementalism or whatever:

Cyclone - lifts unmassed enemies into the sky.

Thunderbolt - Moderate damage to enemies on the ground, greatly increased damage to flying enemies

Quoting to bring to Page 6. :P

So basically, Earth aids with prep, fittingly. Water aids with afflictions that help damage/hinder. Fire aids in hindering and slowing healing. Air -- as usual -- helps bypass defenses and escapes.

We've also got Erode, Lightning, and Dissonance that strip defenses. We're better strippers (lol) than almost any other class. Adding more ways to capitalize on missing defenses would be cool. So instead of chasing herbs/salves for purposes of afflicting, it's just to keep defenses down to make bigger damage and things. 

So if you Infuse Water in someone, deepfreeze (~3.0 with Aldar) will consume 4s of target's salve balance instead of 2s. And since infuse only affects one target it doesn't make the freeze any more useful against multiple opponents. Normal freeze is about 2.3 with Aldar, so it'd actually be slower than the salve balance. Staffstrike is 3.0 balance.

The only tricky thing is ablaze, the ablaze affliction is so easy to cure that it has no particular use outside retardation. Magi have two ways to give the aff but no way to capitalize on it. Maybe keeping a target ablaze could negate their frost defense?

Kaden

Saeva said:

lol is Kaden a non-com now?

Who me? Just another face in the crowd. Quiet, unassuming magi right here, yep. >.>

Xith

Digging up old sticky notes with ideas.

Heat vibe could prevent 'sip frost', not strip it, but prevent it so that if it's eroded by erode/zap/dissonance, Magi can capitalize with fire damage.

Also 1st person message for dissonance stripping a defense so the Magi can see which one was stripped?

Shecks

Cool, can I have a "prevent sip immunity" vibe, while we're at it?

Or how about a "prevent necklace of impurity from making locks impossible" vibe.

Jovolo

Man you must have it tough being a t fang serpent. I guess you and no one else ever managed to lock a: Apostate, Bard, Druid, Magi, Paladin, Priest, Runewarden, Shaman or Sylvan?

Shecks

I was referring to the Healing skillset, when I said "Healing".  Not Rite of Healing.  And a lock implies not being able to get "unlocked", which doesn't apply to Sylvan, Apostate, Druid, Paladin, Shaman, or Sylvan.  Only Priest and Magi have passive healing that doesn't wear off.

Jarrod

If you genuinely lock someone and apply voyria, it's basically impossible (I think both of those things are 15 second ticks, if this is the case then it is impossible) for passive regen to cure both voyria and a lock affliction before you get balance and use an instakill, or relapse them out.

Passive healing is fine since the changes.

Shecks

You can lock long enough for a kill, that's a fact.   And yeah, I agree with you that passive curing is fine, aside from the lack of 3rd person message on most of them.

edit:  Angel care is like 10-30 second random, RoH is like 7-20 second random, and necklace of purity is a fixed 10 second, but only cures venom afflictions (which actually makes it better even better, vs serpents).

Mithridates

Magi has necklace because most other classes have some kind of active curing (alleviate, fitness, SHRUGGING). Stop whining. 

Jovolo

Magi have one of the best active curing abilities in the game?

Mithridates

Meh, debatable. Yes, bloodboil is very useful but at the same time, there's quite a few situations where it cannot be used. 

Jovolo

The same situations where other active curing can't be used i.e. crippled/broken arms, paralysed and prone? The only difference is that you need simultaneity up to use it, which is not all that much of a prerequisite. It's definitely one of the better active curing abilities. Not that I think this is a reason for Magi to not have necklace, it makes sense given retardation, but Magi's are pretty decent vs afflictions really.

Mithridates

Yeah it's good, but still lockable. I like where magi curing is at right now. 

Shecks

Magi is harder to lock than most, but it's far from impossible.  Personally however, I find the concept of hidden passive curing to be a little OP.  Serpent combat (like any other affliction class) relies on momentum, and having something like rite of healing, panacea, necklace, etc. eat up something key like asthma or impatience can destroy massive setups, without even showing that something was cured.  If a message was shown, at least I'd know that -something- went away, or in most cases, how many things went away, during a setup.

I don't think magi would be losing anything by having necklace/bloodboil have a 3rd party message, and same goes for all other passives.  I doubt them being invisible was ever intentionally even part of their design, and I'm in favor of fixing it if so.

Nemutaur

Well at most you'd see something like 'A necklace of purity, work by Mithridates, glows briefly.' or something. I doubt they'd ever tell you what affliction it managed to cure.

Also didn't this get class leaded and rejected a while back? Yeah found it, 165 got rejected which is this. You got 156 instead which is the voyria first cured passive.

Shecks

Obviously it would only show activation, like all of the passives that -do- show when they activate.  (all the newer ones)

Mithridates

Pretty sure it's fine. Magi doesn't need any nerfs, that's for sure. 

Kafziel

Shecks said:

Obviously it would only show activation, like all of the passives that -do- show when they activate.  (all the newer ones)

Which are these?

Shecks

Dagaz is the only one that comes to mind, actually.  I wasn't focusing on the plurality of it, but I guess it really doesn't matter to the argument of whether or not they should be visible.

Xith

Daeir said:

Xith said:

Anyway, moving on to the mysterious 3rd skillset.

I'd almost like to see staff fighting, to give a physical element. Staffstrike feels like a move in that direction, especially considering that it's balance based rather than eq.

Had some ideas for abilities to add. These are designed to aid Magi's attacks outside retardation while providing limited benefit in Retardation due to timing factors.

Infuse <element>: Saturates the [battle]staff with the element, which is then transferred to the target on-hit. Could also be infused directly into the target but I think the two-step process balances better for retardation. Infusing adds a level of the element's influence into the target. Each level will fade after 18 seconds of contact (max 6 levels), and while above 3 levels, a particular effect is granted (similar to tempered humours). (3s BAL on the ability) Effects as follows:

Earth: Limbs too heavy to parry. Also cancels (not strips) levitation's effect

+ - staffstrike, geyser/gravity/tremors

Water: Icy skin causes double salve balance (except restoration)

+ - deepfreeze, efreeti/staffstrikefire, freeze

Fire: Causes bayberry/hawthorn/moss to disintegrate in target's mouth.

+ - transfix, stridulation, general damage

Air: Cancels (not strips) mass's effect.

+ - adduction, [Cyclone - see below]

Couple other ideas for Elementalism or whatever:

Cyclone - lifts unmassed enemies into the sky.

Thunderbolt - Moderate damage to enemies on the ground, greatly increased damage to flying enemies

Magi have a few elevation-based techniques that could be made part of additional kill strategies, so that's the basis for those.

To give you some fair feedback:

Earth: Okay, I guess.
Water: Nah, too much of an effect. Caloric + mending break is a 4s salve application with this and you can do that freely on one temper thing. Too strong.
Fire: Nope, free transfix (see old epidermal illusion) was retarded.
Air: This one is not a terrible idea, but at the same time, it sort of is, since it transforms adduction into an unavoidable beckon tick on an unmassed person, which is pretty horseshit.

Cyclone & Thunderbolt: Forced synergy between two skills is so pointless. May as well just make the same ability do both things.

Appreciate the feedback, but each of these requires 3 infusions of the element and maintaining above that level for the effect to work. Fire's intended to give a free transfix because it's currently impossible outside of retardation. Water also requires those levels, which again fade after 18 seconds total (or 9s after your 3rd balance recovery from infusing). And yeah, the air version is to negate mass (not remove) so that adduction is not a pointless vibe and to be able to use the proposed Cyclone on people who are infused or unmassed.

You also can't do a caloric and mending break at the same time. I noted that restoration shouldn't be affected, so the best you could do is the standard staffstrike water to get your lvl2 break. It would slow down other mending cures slightly but only while the infusion remains above 3 levels. Their resto apply consumes about 4s of salve balance (3 of which you're offbal from staffstrike) so in your remaining 5 seconds of their double salve effect you could probably deepfreeze (3.65 diadem) and get a disrupt before the infusion wears off completely, but again, it's only hindering.

It's also double the prep time on your end and probably doesn't have any more effect than if you'd prepped 2 limbs instead.

If you try to make use of it in retardation...

Infuse earth, maybe still valid if your vibes' proning didn't already prevent the use of parry.

Infuse water, deepfreeze and the magi's other attacks should already outpace salve curing if he's smart

Infuse fire, 3 seconds versus transifx (2.2 diadem)

Infuse air, again, just gives adduction validity, this one might be smart in retardation since they'll want to tumble at some point

But in general, the 3 seconds of adding an infuse while in retardation is probably better served by just transfix/deepfreeze/damage or brazier. If you PREP with infusions, it's the same balance as 3 staffstrikes which are the current prep for retardation. The difference being that infusions would wear off.

These ideas were designed to benefit non-retardation damage in the way of hindering that could slow limb curing or counter tumbling so that holocausts and such can be used strategically rather than spamming them and hoping they enter your fogged room at the right time. Everything a Magi does revolves around staying in the same room, but top tiers tend to fight with a monolith in every adjacent room so they can always tumble out safely. That's the 1v1 reason that adduction needs power.

Mithridates

Right. Why is staffstrike balanced base while all other elementalism/crystalism skills eq based?

Anedhel

Cuz diadems are utter crap and you need to suffer a little like the rest of us. Builds character

Mithridates

I will not be grouped in with you proletarians. 

Trey

Xith said:

Cooper said:

Why do you think that losing elementalism makes Magi deserves absolutely enormous, unheard of buffs?

Go read the rules, Cooper. Point out what's so "enormous".

The alternative is to suggest what combat skill is going to replace Enchantment in a balanced way. But I'm primarily addressing multi-enemy things (again, first post) right now.

I'll follow up with 3rd skill ideas later but I figured I'd get this stuff out of the way to see where people feel Magi is at.

@Xith, if you can't look at your ideas and have some notion of what's 'enormous', or rather what should be considered unreasonably powerful, I don't think @Cooper is going to be able to explain it to you.

Xith

See but that's a cop-out response. If someone asks "explain why I'm wrong", you can either explain it or say "I'm not tellin" and they have to assume you're the one spewing bull.

Some skills were explained why they would be overpowered, I acknowledged those and moved on to refining ideas and coming up with new ones.

You'll notice that in movie reviews, for example, critics don't just say "That film was so bad why are you even making films?" They dissect it and give paragraphs of basis for their opinions.

I don't need a novel, but a post that says "I'm not even gunna explain why this so bad" does nothing for me, the thread, the game, and not really anything for you except to look self-assured, no matter how many members of your boy band Like or Agree the post.

Cooper

Cooper said:

@Xith - I'm not going to go through all your suggestions and point out why they are overpowered and not balanced in the slightest, necessary, or why the entire premise of your suggestions is wrong (hint: Magi are already the strongest in the game at fighting/damaging/hindering multiple people by a long shot and are already amazing at this). You should have a better understanding of the strengths of your class and combat in general before suggesting massive, sweeping changes to a class.

Mithridates

Damaging, yes. Hindering, no. 

Kafziel

Xith said:

You'll notice that in movie reviews, for example, critics don't just say "That film was so bad why are you even making films?" They dissect it and give paragraphs of basis for their opinions.

1) Movies that are critically reviewed are generally made by people qualified and experienced with the art of making movies. Some dude with a camcorder and no professional knowledge isn't gonna get a write up in any paper, he's going to be dismissed out of hand if he hasn't put in the effort to know what he's doing before he does it.

2) Myself (and others) have tried going through your points one by one and you categorically refuse to accept even when told by multiple people that an idea is bad or overpowered.