13/28. The cyclic song spells are the essential "Bard Thing" as far as their magic goes.

Moon Mages for comparison have three entire signature spellbooks (except for PD), and a bunch of spells that aren't currently flagged signature but require moonbeams or something so might as well be, and end up at 23/45 by a quick count.

Paladins are really brutal with their soul requirements (Something I should really looking into easing back on... but that's just a passing thought, not a promise or an approved proposal or something). Along those same lines really every guild needs another pass for what is and is not signature.

It's a change we felt was needed for thematic reasons as we push the Bard cyclics closer and closer to the old enchante system in appearance (While still running under the nice happy Magic 3.0 core). Even if this hadn't happened there are almost certainly nerfs coming to cyclic learning (And possibly buffs to non cyclic learning) and cyclic interactions with sorcery.

-Raesh

"Ever notice that B.A.'s flavor text swells in direct proportion to how much one of our characters is getting screwed?" - Brian Van Hoose

Not thrilled about the prep time returning, but bravo on the solution for the messaging.

>>13/28. The cyclic song spells are the essential "Bard Thing" as far as their magic goes.

Well, yeah, almost half :P

>>Moon Mages for comparison have three entire signature spellbooks (except for PD)

It might be a personal bias showing, but I kinda understand the logic behind "well, moon mages have teleporting and using moonbeams this way as their signature thing" better than Bards and cyclics, just because it's not like cyclics are a Bard-unique thing. As for Teleological being MM only, I consider the magic primary sorceries different, too (hell, I want all guilds to have guild-only sorceries, really...).

>>Even if this hadn't happened there are almost certainly nerfs coming to cyclic learning (And possibly buffs to non cyclic learning) and cyclic interactions with sorcery.

My issue is less the "cyclics rule the world when it comes to exp/sorcery" thing and more "I legitimately liked having access to some of those spells and I didn't think that access was at the diminishment of the Bard's guild."

It's just disappointing that the spirit of the scroll system in 3.0 is now being limited. I really like the scroll system in 3.0 and having almost half of a guild's spells now locked out because they're cyclic hurts that.

Then again, the "well, this stinks" feeling might shift once some general non-guild sorcery stuff is released.

---

The teeth lands a solid (5/23) hit that pokes the teeth into Turul's rear end (more embarrassing than painful!).

Crap.

These cyclics are now totally eating mana again, like hardcore. I can't even maintain a 30 mana Abandoned heart or Desert's Maelstom anymore, and that's not even the cap.

I think the previous 'cyclic' spell setting flagged the mana usage of these cyclic spells as different than regular mana spells, by nature of the fact that they continually pulse.

Anyway the mana drain for these cyclic spells can be looked at and toned down a bit, now that that setting no longer is in play, please?

~ Leilond
http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h307/ss1shadow/Leilond_Progression.jpg

>>These cyclics are now totally eating mana again, like hardcore. I can't even maintain a 30 mana Abandoned heart or Desert's Maelstom anymore, and that's not even the cap.

Nothing I did should have changed this (aside from the few spells that weren't doing their first pulse when they should have, I believe Abandoned Heart was one of those). It looks like they're draining mana at the proper amount per pulse.

Keep in mind 30 mana is a lot to be pumping into a cyclic (that's a lot closer to cap than not), it's going to be taxing.

I think there's an expectation to be able to run cyclic spells forever - that's not really the case.

>>Raesh, could your changes have introduced a bug into Abandoned Heart? It seems to only be targeting the first critter in the room.

Could I have? Uh, sure, I suppose so - but I can't reproduce it.

You deftly contribute enough of your harnessed streams to maintain your cyclic spell.
You sing, purposely warbling some of the held notes for effect:

"Home beckons me back, like a dream,
For my love sleeps with the end of days."

A goblin grows deathly pale!
A goblin collapses to the ground, shuddering and moaning until it ceases all movement.
A goblin grows deathly pale!
A goblin collapses to the ground, shuddering and moaning until it ceases all movement.
A goblin grows deathly pale!
A goblin collapses to the ground, shuddering and moaning until it ceases all movement.
A goblin is weakened by the power of your enchante.

Keep in mind that Abandon Heart only messages a "hit" if it actually hits (That's the spirit damage part).

-Raesh

"Ever notice that B.A.'s flavor text swells in direct proportion to how much one of our characters is getting screwed?" - Brian Van Hoose

> Keep in mind that Abandon Heart only messages a "hit" if it actually hits (That's the spirit damage part).

Before your change, I was hitting every super-celp on every pulse. Now I'm only ever hitting one celp, and it's always the first one in the room. I dropped down to baby celps, and it's the same thing.


You sing, purposely warbling some of the held notes for effect:

"Home beckons me back, like a dream,
For my love sleeps with the end of days."

An asaren celpeze is weakened by the power of your enchante.

>l
[Mer'Kresh, Gull Circle]
You also see an asaren celpeze that appears stunned, an asaren celpeze and an asaren celpeze.

I really don't understand this. I had thought with 3.0, all guilds would more or less have to contribute equally to the pie except for things that were truely signature.


example : moonmages: moongate
example : clerics ressurection
example : WM: chain lightning
example: Necromancer: call from beyond


It just strikes me that, although bards do have more cyclic than most, these type of spells are not exclusive to the bard guild. It seems more like, to quote a certain high-level MM in plat "Bards don't want to share".


<<The real thing DR needs is to get out there to the kids who actually read books.>>

>>I think there's an expectation to be able to run cyclic spells forever - that's not really the case.

Yeah, I guess I'm just still used to the old system where I could pump 60+ mana into stuff like Abandoned Heart and Desert's Maelstrom and have them last forever.

But just fyi...

When you had flagged these spells as cyclic, the mana drain per pulse significantly dropped.

When you reverted the change, the mana drain per pulse significantly raised back.

~ Leilond
http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h307/ss1shadow/Leilond_Progression.jpg

>>I think the fact that pulse rate increased for the spells is the main reason that mana is getting used so quickly.

Aside from the first pulse of a few spells (Abandon Heart, Pyre and I think one other), the pulse rates should be exactly the same. In many cases I didn't even touch that code at all.

>>Before your change, I was hitting every super-celp on every pulse. Now I'm only ever hitting one celp, and it's always the first one in the room. I dropped down to baby celps, and it's the same thing.

Try something other than celps? Celps are weird with TM.

>>Super cool. Now if it just started training performance (hey, we're singing, right?!) we'd be back where we were.

Not going to happen.

>>I had thought with 3.0, all guilds would more or less have to contribute equally to the pie except for things that were truely signature.

This is why we need to do a pass of what is and is not signature for a guild. Keep in mind previously the number of Bard spells a non Bard could cast was... 0. So we're still talking a vast improvement.

>>As it seems like more spells are signature than not, can we get a list somewhere of which spells can be learned by other guilds?

It's kind of a mess right now, so this is something that wouldn't happen until we can do some overviews. There's spells that should be flagged signature that aren't spells that likely don't need to be, spells that are functionally signature but not flagged so (Spells that interact with Moonbeams, spells that fail if you don't have soul state and so forth).

>>When you had flagged these spells as cyclic, the mana drain per pulse significantly dropped. When you reverted the change, the mana drain per pulse significantly raised back.

I'm really not sure why that would be the case. A number of the spells had bad castmods which were corrected at the same time as the cyclic changes. When they were reverted we kept the fixed castmods (And I just double checked abandon heart to be sure). Are you certain you're keeping your other factors constant?

-Raesh

"Ever notice that B.A.'s flavor text swells in direct proportion to how much one of our characters is getting screwed?" - Brian Van Hoose

Is pyre fixed so that it no longer hits people in your group or people who pass by? It was unusable in a group as of about 2AM this morning.

cast or Cast creature didn't change the situation either.

---

<<"earning too little skinning experience for a day or so isn't nearly as bad as having a spell that breaks your wings."

> Try something other than celps? Celps are weird with TM.

Same behavior in Lun'Shele. I've got Will up, if it matters.


You rock back and forth, humming a long string of sad notes and occasionally punctuating the melody with vocal tones.
A Lun'Shele trekhalo is weakened by the power of your enchante.

>l
[Fala Inisharon, Lower Slopes]
You also see a Lun'Shele trekhalo that appears stunned, a Lun'Shele hunter, a Lun'Shele hunter and some junk.

<<This is why we need to do a pass of what is and is not signature for a guild. Keep in mind previously the number of Bard spells a non Bard could cast was... 0.>>

I just wonder what would happen if we applied this same logic to other skills/systems that other guilds are being forced to share in 3.0.... say...

"Keep in mind previously the number of lockpicks a non-thief could carve was ....0."



<<The real thing DR needs is to get out there to the kids who actually read books.>>

I'll test the mana thing a bit later and record results.

I appreciate the changes Raesh :)

~ Leilond
http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h307/ss1shadow/Leilond_Progression.jpg

> Guild vs Guild arguments are a very good way to increase your free time. Consider yourself warned.

Seriously what now? Is this really a thing?

- Useff

>I think they should just be taken out of the scroll system entirely when they are flagged as signature.

I would agree with this.

>>For what it's worth, conceptually not all Bard cyclics need be signature, but the current decision is that enchantes do.

Bleh. I get it, under the viewpoint that "well singing magic is kinda a Bard signature thing," but at the same time I can't say I'm a fan of the methodology of how a spell is prepped/cast as another thing that can count as signature.

Mind you, once again my own bias may be showing here, because I see nothing wrong with signature-logic like "well, you can't access the Plane of Probability/use Thanatological Rituals/integrate the devotional component that fuels this spell" but "well, you don't know how to sing spells, silly!" seems like a really weird reason to me.

But, once again, I think part of my issue/bias is that I personally have little interest in TM spells from other guilds (because while our own guilds don't have TM overlap a lot, I don't feel other guilds have TM spells that are THAT alluring...) and the augmentation/utility/debilitation ones are the most attractive to me. So now that I've lost the possibility of accessing those Bard spells that I feel would be legitimately interesting for me to use.

Just as a guidepoint, I've used/loved old-3.0 Compost (the utility/TM hybrid), Piercing Gaze, Tenebrous Sense, and Hodernia's Lilt. Around ~85% of my sorcery ranks so far (almost at 300) come from non-cyclics. I point this out just to try to address the [reasonable] assumption that I'm taking this stance against all current Bard cyclics turning signature because it's the only way I've been training sorcery so far due to general cyclic exp advantages and/or the reduction of backlash.

---

The teeth lands a solid (5/23) hit that pokes the teeth into Turul's rear end (more embarrassing than painful!).

>>Drums, rage, harmony, pride, the elemental rituals -- those are all still on the table.

Honestly, I don't have a solid grasp of what spells are on the table. For whatever reason I assumed guilded rituals were automatically signature for all guilds. That could be totally wrong though.

---

The teeth lands a solid (5/23) hit that pokes the teeth into Turul's rear end (more embarrassing than painful!).

>>Raesh said the bard rituals aren't.

There's that, then! Thanks for clarifying. I still dislike a guild having over half their spells as signature (but, once again, I'm assuming there are at least some non-cyclic-song Bard signatures), but it's good to know that it might not be as heavily restricted of a spellbook.

---

The teeth lands a solid (5/23) hit that pokes the teeth into Turul's rear end (more embarrassing than painful!).

On the downside with a few exceptions most of the noncyclics are advanced or esoteric.

> Is this right? If something feels bardic, it's something like word or soul rather than Aether Wolves or Glythtide's Joy.

Here's Raesh saying that Echo isn't signature. I thought he had commented on the other rituals, but looks like not.

http://forums.play.net/forums/DragonRealms/The%20Bards/General%20Discussions%20-%20Bards/view/1813