Caster Problems : Ancient Spells?

[Stanos]

I was talking with a few casters on IRC, and the problems I keep on hearing are:

1) Itemization sucks
2) Spells don't stack up to weapons

I'm not sure about #1, but I was thinking, why not just put Ancient-type spells in the game?

Just throw a rune or two on MC bosses for Ragnaros's Assfire or whatver you want to call it, a healing spell, whatever you want.

For PvP, do the same thing, except make it for ranks for whatever.

Any thoughts?

[Tuco]

You'd may have to come out with new spells every time you upgraded weapons significantly.

Generally speaking, having new spells every time this happens(assuming the current rate of weapon progression, where we can assume UBRS level weapons = level 60 trained spells) may put a lot of spells in the system, but would be better than the current situation.

You could put fewer spells in. (Eg: For a mage you could find the next fireball and arcane missile in MC, and the next fireblast/frostbolt in BWL, rather than upgrades to all numerical spells in each dungeon).

I'd prefer tying numerical(healing, damage based, PW:Shield etc) based spells to a caster's weapon(Kruegen, 2004), or INT/SPI. This would be a bit of a balancing issue, but that's their job.

But yeah, spell upgrades are the only thing they can put in at this point, and I fully expect them in the future.(You'd then have the problem where HP, avoidance and mitigation isn't properly scaling with DPS)

[Laek]

I just don't see why they didn't copy the DAOC system of having a stat increase spell dmg. Its simple, effective, and helps balance mudflation issues of melee out stripping casters.

[Wodin]

Originally Posted by Laek

I just don't see why they didn't copy the DAOC system of having a stat increase spell dmg. Its simple, effective, and helps balance mudflation issues of melee out stripping casters.

They did and they do. +DMG is exactly what you're looking for there. The problem lies in the fact that the initial implementation was buggy(resisted or partially resisted spells completely ignored all the +dmg). Then we have the fact that there's no visible feedback in the user interface, so casters can never have tangible gains to look at, completely at odds with the nice clear feedback a better weapon or melee armor gives you. There's also the fact that +dmg itemization was godawful(and still is in many respects), and the fact that there wasn't even a clear explanation of how the mechanic worked until two months into retail. 0-60 itemization has barely any +dmg gear, with most of it focusing on pure +stats. The few pieces that do have both stats and damage are world drop and epic or rare, which means it's random luck or cash that acquires them. They also forgot to put in weapons with stats and a decent hunk of +dmg to give casters the "woo I just got a new weapon, I do a lot more damage" feeling. Most of the problems are based on perception, misunderstanding of the mechanics, and poor itemization. Had they corrected the perception or given useful feedback, people might have been willing to wait for the itemization to catch up, but the community is pretty much poisoned against +dmg as a means of caster scaling now.

[Samus Aran]

This is an awsome idea, im a mage(60) early in the game the spells matched up with end game weapons pretty well, but lately with Lava dredger, Obsidian etc... alot of really High DPS weapons have come out and is making us look like fools.

The idea of getting scrolls off of bosses is an awsome idea, awsome, makes the game more appealing I think.

[RunningDog]

I guess +healing can be thought of in the same way. It would be nice to get +PW:Shield , or +ticks to Renew, or -time on Heal line, or -resist, or a dozen other things other than +heal and +regen.

[Zarcath]

Then you'd have some pro-PvP person demanding Ancient spells from Battlefields, and then people that do MC/BWL for a month to get them will complain that it only takes a PvPer a week to get it.

[Dyscord]

+ ticks on renew or any HoT would blow. In MC a front line healer is expect to pump out large heals on demand. When Rag turns on a rogue all the extra time on a HoT in the world isn't going to help that rogue. He needs health, right now, not in 12 ticks. I've tried using HoT's in MC. All that ends up happening is people complain I'm not healing them. People are rarely slightly hurt to warrent a HoT. Most of the time they're perfectly okay, or getting a world class beat down.

Major helps to any healer class would be a form of priest bubble. Its the best 'oh shit' spell to give someone time to pull your ass out of the fire. But then again priest bubble is one of the defining skills of a priest, and contributes strongly to its claim as the best healer.

I speak from experience though when I say, as a druid, I'd LOVE a real flash heal spell. Our current fast cast heal is massively mana inefficent if you take into account the majority of its heal comes from a HoT, and as stated before, HoT's aren't cutting it in MC. If I could get a real, fast cast, mana efficent heal, that'd be just spiffy.

[Asmadai]

Originally Posted by Zarcath

Then you'd have some pro-PvP person demanding Ancient spells from Battlefields, and then people that do MC/BWL for a month to get them will complain that it only takes a PvPer a week to get it.

As sad as it is, this is probably the best reason as to why you will never see said changes. People will always find something to complain about.

[leane]

Just refit the magic system to use the DPS value on weapons and bring caster weapons up on par with Melee. Higher DPS staff=Higher damage nukes (cap it off at 50% DPS if they actually try and use it in melee of course) Casters get the same benefit from equipment upgrades as melee, no more gimpy itemization if they both get the same benefit offa stuff.

A Mage with a 70DPS staff would do a LOT more damage than one with a 49DPS staff.

[Fammaden]

Originally Posted by leane

Just refit the magic system to use the DPS value on weapons and bring caster weapons up on par with Melee. Higher DPS staff=Higher damage nukes (cap it off at 50% DPS if they actually try and use it in melee of course) Casters get the same benefit from equipment upgrades as melee, no more gimpy itemization if they both get the same benefit offa stuff.

A Mage with a 70DPS staff would do a LOT more damage than one with a 49DPS staff.

And then I could equip my lava dredger and one shot priests with earth shock! I like this idea!

[leane]

Originally Posted by Fammaden

And then I could equip my lava dredger and one shot priests with earth shock! I like this idea!

You would have it scale a bit for balance of course, wouldn't want casters to be way outta line with melees since the damage tends to be front loaded rather than over time. Might have to rework a few spells to fit them in better or the weapons...

I tend to favour the idea of making it so no spell or attack can do more than 50% of the targets max health in any one shot. I always hate one-shot kills, even when I do them.

[Kasonic]

While the weapon-DPS-effecting-spells is an interesting and different idea, it's not needed. Right now itemization is going fine with the new caster MC gear, at least for warlocks/mages; +dmg should be the primary statistic for mages, not Int. Anyone who's run MC in a full XXX Wrath suit or close knows five thousand Intellect isn't all it's cracked up to be. Between Gems, Potions, and Evocation, I wouldn't care if I had 4k mana buffed as long as I'm tossing 800 damage frostbolts.

[Kildace]

The caster problem was mostly fixed with the 1.6 patch, rogues and mages now come very close to the other dps classes over a long enough timespan, and iirc a mage was our best damage dealer against onyxia last night.

I'm expecting a bunch of other improvements and a resulting imbalancing of mage dps in comparison to rogues and hunters, that will be fixed in about 6 months.

[Nerionx]

Seems the simplest solution is to add next rank spells in dungeons and such. Adding dmg based on staff dps seems too complicated to set up and balance. I dont see any reason why you can't simply let these raid bosses drop the next lvl of spells. If pvpers complain just add some of those spells that are on par with the gear in pvp put in the pvp system.