With the stated goal to improve Parry- to make Parry more desirable, i would like to request once again a clerical Parry boost. Eventually one will come in handy.

<<Benediction already increases your str/reflex/agility (up to a maximum 15pts each). How much more of a parry boost do you need?

and how much of a boost to parry does that give?

I am not a big fan of the parry thing either. Though that could change with the new combat changes. I can't say I am looking forward to it, but who knows.

On a wholistic perspective I really like how FoU fits in well with the bigger picture package of cleric skills and abilities.

In that vein I think we would be better off focusing on more effective curse/disablers on perhaps an area effect basis than boosting a particular skill. Like curse horde or something.

Making our curses more playable in syntax and application would be nice too. Such as defaulting mal, hulp and coz to what you are facing. That is an irriation that has grown considerably since the gen changes. I can only forsee that growing into more of a problem as I read where combat needs to focus more on actually killing a thing and possibly bonusing you for doing so.

I like how combat gen etc has changed because I don't have to dance now, I can kill and still learn cause there are creatures to show up and fight some more.

But, as stated above it is making casting our curses a more and more difficult thing to do, and really achieve the result and or target you wanted.

I suppose I can understand why mal doesn't default right now. But I quite simply don't understand why coz and hulp don't on a technical level.

The Bopper

Bopper- I would love area affect curses.

Oh, hey, on mal I almost exclusively use that as curse defense, there a way to get that to default right?

Thanks and stuff.

The Bopper

>>And I feel that a single target boost is much better than a multi-target debuff, given your aforementioned feeling that combat will soon focus a lot more on killing, not dancing.

I don't. If it is scalred and applied properly in say the same vein as how shadow web works, then I think an area effect curse can work.

The point being that we should focus on the aspect of the combat that we are the best prepared for. Most of us, granted not all, tend to train our mental and will stats to the detriment of our physical to a degree. In that we already get a great boost through bene to those physicals and thus should focus on doing something really useful with our trained up mentals in the form of an area effect curse.

It is focused in that it deals directly with the foes you are trying to handle at the moment. It would be something you could recast in a purposeful and targetted way to achieve a specific result in a specific situation.

Let's say I can area effect all targets defense or agility or reflex. Then I decide I don't like them on me and I invoke halo. They all go flying, now let's say that they also made me bleed, which ticks me off and I slam my heal into the ground and Ushnish eats them all up cause they suck at standing because they are cursed?

We could make up a scenario where their offense is impaired because of a dark pall before them etc etc. Though I think a mass agil/reflex blaster would probably hurt offense too....shrugs.
]

Follow where I am going with that?

I don't want to keep piling things on but adding things on that enhance other things that we already have so that we can do great things and enjoy our things because things are right and harmonious with the thing we do as clerics!

The Bopper

>>I'd like to see a spell for clerics similar to MM's moonblade. Having the ability to make our own "weapon of light" that would be permanently blessed would be nice for invasions, hunting undead, and just not having to carry x amount of extra weapons around (make it changeable into different weapon types).

Why? Bless is extremely simple to cast.

Now dancing, holy light, weapons of parriness surrounding a cleric would be Flavius' dream spell..... grins.

But on that vein an area type spell that focused on misdirection would be interesting.

And we could use something that has a backlash effect that causes a foe to think a little before they immediately lay into ya.

The Bopper

>>And we could use something that has a backlash effect that causes a foe to think a little before they immediately lay into ya.>>

Bopper, you mean like a clerical version of shear? It could be a self cast curse that affects anyone who attacks you. Would weaken with each use, but would be something I'd enjoy having as a 4th tier curse if it was effective.

I suppose a clerical version of sheer. But also different that plays off of our unique meta-magic capabilities as clerics. We are definitely weak against first strike magics as a magic prime guild.

Hmm, a dormant erupting curse is an interesting idea.

We could call it Release of the Hounds or something.

Hmm, or lets say we had something called Consumption that let you consume offensive magics cast at you and blast it back in one of your spells with added power. Ya know like how zombies grow bigger when they hit ya.

Since we are tert in shield and evasion we know we are gonna get hit so the immortals in their wisdom would have granted us this power out of pity... right?

The Bopper

<<Most of us, granted not all, tend to train our mental and will stats to the detriment of our physical to a degree. In that we already get a great boost through bene to those physicals and thus should focus on doing something really useful with our trained up mentals in the form of an area effect curse.

But I would argue that to get those great buffs from bene, you have to keep up those physical stats as well. Compared to say a moon mage, I think clerics on a whole would have less intelligence, wisdom, or discipline but more strength, agility, and reflex. (N.B. Stamina's currently the DR black sheep stat for the very reason for Dart's proposed combat changes). If anything I'd say clerics are wide and varied.

<<Let's say I can area effect all targets defense or agility or reflex. Then I decide I don't like them on me and I invoke halo. They all go flying, now let's say that they also made me bleed, which ticks me off and I slam my heal into the ground and Ushnish eats them all up cause they suck at standing because they are cursed?

And I would say that by it's very nature, an area effect spell is weaker than it's single shot counterpart. If your character's strong enough to take down 2-4 creatures (since that's the engagement limit) with an AOE debuff, the debuff's not going to be strong enough to make much of a difference. He'll be able to take them all down with the other TM spells just as fast.

Nikpack
player of more than I should list

Climbing List:http://www.elanthipedia.com/wiki/Climbing_skill
Swimming List:http://www.elanthipedia.com/wiki/Swimming_skill

And while I am evil, I try to avoid being just plain mean.
-Z

>>This is directly related to marking them as offensive spells, which will be done soon.

At least you can't mark vigil and bitter feast as offensive.

It sounds like you're trying to nerf ALL my safe room antagonistic pursuits. :(

First halo, now HULP, the rest of the curses follow suit...

You never loved me at all. </3

- Tyrun

>Well, yes.

Nerf safe rooms.

>>Shear should not interact when being cast upon in a safe room if halo won't activate either. >=[

Fair argument.

>>Or, make shear not interact with spells not flagged as offensive.

After we're done viciously nerfing your safe room antagonist pursuits, this is a viable option.

>>Nerf Armifer and his moon mage guild operating as his +1.

I like this sentence in contrast to the Lunar PP Model discussion.

-Armifer
<Kvlt> Step 1: Want stuff! Step 2: Be ambitious! Step 3: Believe in the ability of your fellow man to carry you to heights you are too incompetent to reach alone.

>>And I would say that by it's very nature, an area effect spell is weaker than it's single shot counterpart. If your character's strong enough to take down 2-4 creatures (since that's the engagement limit) with an AOE debuff, the debuff's not going to be strong enough to make much of a difference. He'll be able to take them all down with the other TM spells just as fast.

I disagree though. If the magic is scaled to my magical abilities then I should be able to magically dominate what I am trying to fight at melee. My shield skill, evasion, and parry are half of what my PM and harness skill are at this point. That gap is only going to grow wider and wider and wider. That's the nature of being prime, secondary and tert.

Granted, the TM aspect is somewhat accurate but not entirely. As stated in a different thread we do lack a little bit of upper end umph on our targetted spells. However, if I drop a Coz on something I guarantee it's going down next cast.

If we are going to be prime in magic then let's make it really happen. I see the point about a single skill buff... but what are global caps on something like that? 80 ranks? That's nice I will take it, but at the same time that isn't going to keep pace with the ever present tertness of my defense. Whereas if I can do multiple things to mess up multiple foes I have more of a shot at cascading them to their doom.

Further, I like the RP niche that Fires of Ushnish whee the holy wrath of a cleric in full fury see's it's expression. Something akin to that in a curse form seems to fit quite nicely into that idiom.

Honestly, FoU has very greatly increased my enjoyment of the game. It's not a dead out killer on it's own, but it so seamlessly weaves into what we have already that it's like someone finally came up with a chocolate beer recipe that is actually good and tasty.

Now as to the training. Don't take what I wrote to an extreme. Of course we still need stamina, strength agility reflex etc. But there is a tendency and rightfully so to put the mentals at a higher priority to take advantage of our magical skills to dominate in terms of curses and PS etc. I can cast a 20 mana PS in roughly 3 ticks max. That has value. I can cast a maxed hulped in maybe 4 ticks, that has value and that's why my mentals are always going to be higher. Not to an absurd extreme but to logical scale that makes my magic powerful.

The Bopper

Interesting. So basically a debuffing aura. What a fun idea =)

Fifth tier. Orb weavable with somewhere around a 300-500 MD cost maybe (that'd make it so enough skill would still allow you to put more spells in beside just it, make having 700 MD worth something other than a couple seconds)?

>Given the relative uselessness of MD, I'd rather have the solo weave have a lowish req of 100-150 ranks.

Per Elanthipedia, MD reqs:
3rd tier - Centering - 85
3rd tier - SOL - 100
4th tier - AO - 120
2nd tier - CoE- 125 (???)
4th tier - Halo- 165

Even accepting that some or all of those numbers are off, a 5th tier should be higher in cost than a 4th tier (so maybe 200ish). But only real reason I even was thinking 400ish was b/c of past GM posts regarding the difficulty of spells, I think I recall something about 5th tier spells starting at about 400 pm, so was thinking it'd be 400 MD to make it work happy with orb.

Not that this tangent really has any meaning, since whatever costs/balances would be decided on having nothing to do with what is in our heads, even if a spell like that were to come to life =)

>Isn't it like 365 to smush everything into the orb at once?

This is actually more what I was getting at. I'd rather some spells begin breaking the current archetype. Give me a huge effect, but make it take the whole orb, until I'm a hundred or 2 ranks above the normal 'break point'.