Because I read the Ranger and Paladin theads and thought "why not?"

Then I had a really hard time picking 5 top spells. The WM spell suite is really good in a lot of ways and outside the basic TM spells, most spells have their niches.

So here's my list of Spells I Could Not Find Anything Good To Say About.

1) Air Bubble. This spell only exists to perpetuate jokes about how bad it is. Literally the only positive thing I can say about it is I don't have to learn it to get anything else. Should be a cantrip or a 0 slot Zephyr metaspell or something.

2) Paeldryth's Wrath - If I want to push something out of melee I can use Shockwave and also do damage / knock it down / stun it. If I want out of combat I can RETREAT or FLEE. If I want to get something to melee I can debilitate it while I'm advancing, or hit it with a TM spell while advancing, or generally do anything more productive than casting PW and having it arrive at melee whole and ready to fight while I need to spend another 8 seconds preparing a useful spell. The spell can throw naptha, which was ok before naptha got nerfed, but now I'm not sure why I would bother. Any time I hit something with PW I must be thinking to myself "That could have been a lightning bolt". What I really hate about this spell is that it costs 2 slots and I have to take it to get to things I actually want.

3) Y'ntrel Sechra - I would be less salty about YS if I hadn't trained so much plate. =( Right now, boosting armor ranks doesn't do very much and so this spell represents a slot I have occupied but not doing anything useful. I just consider Blumfor Garaen a 3 slot spell and that makes me feel a little better about the waste.

4) Grounding Field - This SEEMS like it should be a good spell. If hunting anything with an elemental damage component that is predictable, GF should be good. In practice between good gear, Ethereal Shield and Manifest Force, I don't feel like I need the additional barrier in PvE (also, often not hunting something that does elemental damage). And in PvP my oponent could easily choose different arrows/spells and turn my GF against me. I think the combination of too-niche and a very exploitable downside puts this in the bottom 5 for me. If a WM could take like 2 seconds RT to retune the shield to another element I might reconsider.

5) Ring of Spears - I know some WM players like this spell, and I respect that, but for me it has no niche. If I want an AOE cyclic that kills things at melee, Rimefang is both more damaging and less restrictive in use. And ROS is pure physical damage, so it doesn't leverage Mark of Arhat. I really cannot think of the circumstance in which I'd want to have this spell if I had Rimefang. And if I didn't have Rimefang I'd prefer Fire Rain since it can hit at all ranges and doesn't suppress itself if I advance or retreat. Bring back ROS's engagement protection and I would absolutely take the spell, though.



Mazrian

I really only use RoS because it's fully effective at lower mana than Rimefang. It could definitely use some love.

We keep hearing that air bubble needs to exist because of underwater content, but DR's underwater system is just a worse than terrible (and inconsistently applied) gimmick and nobody should be encouraged to interact with it. Actually, does anyone interact with it?

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Re: Life mana Spell preps

You raise your hands in the air. You wave them like you just don't care. Somebody says, "Hey!" Somebody says, "Ho!" Somebody screams.

I cast Air Bubble once to go underwater, it was totes awesome.

Honestly I don't really see why it's a problem to have "dead end" spells you can get on scrolls or devices easily. Tenebrous Sense was made to be like this once too. People had no idea why you would want to spend a spell slot on nightvision, and the answer was that you weren't really supposed to, you were just supposed to use the scroll to temporarily memorize it (or Unleash it, for Moon Mages) when you needed it.

I can understand why it existing would annoy people but as long as it never had to clutter up my spellbook I don't really see the issue.

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Thayet
@thayelf // http://thayette.tumblr.com

"But you must know that if corruption is powerful enough, it's not corruption at all — it's law. Unspoken, unwritten, but law." — Robert Jackson Bennett, City of Stairs

>I can understand why it existing would annoy people but as long as it never had to clutter up my spellbook I don't really see the issue.

I think the issue is guildleaders keep trying to teach it to us! Also I guess a smaller issue is the resulting absurdity that Air Bubble is the cheapest spammable utility spell that you can cast with free hands so people train with it.

Plus DR players hate consumables for some reason.

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Re: Life mana Spell preps

You raise your hands in the air. You wave them like you just don't care. Somebody says, "Hey!" Somebody says, "Ho!" Somebody screams.

>>
Alternately, maybe PW can be a leaf on the tree instead of a branch?

"I am a leaf on the wind; watch how I soar"

That being said, I like PW personally, but I do agree that fewer niche spells should be requirements for other spells that are not niche.

ROS is the best training cyclic TM to me. Rimefang takes too long to replace blades (what ranks are required for more than 2? At 975 PM and 625 TM I only get 2), fire rain kills nicely but not as good exp. If I want to lock up TM quickly (outside of FB) I can ROS and MAB in good spawn critters and it rocks. I use it on quest kill tasks. I use it when mining or lumberjacking. The spell is the most usable cyclic TM in my eyes.

Morp

Pretty sure it's just spell potency, yeah. Have you tried increasing the mana you use?

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Thayet
@thayelf // http://thayette.tumblr.com

"But you must know that if corruption is powerful enough, it's not corruption at all — it's law. Unspoken, unwritten, but law." — Robert Jackson Bennett, City of Stairs

second on ROS being great TM trainer and great for defensive purposes when training under-par weapons.

it would be cool if PW could be cast on yourself, and when you charge, it boosts your charge like a barrage would.

YS needs some love. a little MAF cushion or something would be nice.

hey whatever happened to the barrier spell review/rewrite/redux/reloaded?

-Munch-

>hey whatever happened to the barrier spell review/rewrite/redux/reloaded?

My availability tanked and no one else was in a position to take up the baton.

When my availability started to open up again I couldn't face diving right into writing that many new spells.

It's still in the wings.

-Raesh

"It was wise enough to know itself, and brave enough to BE itself, and wild enough to change itself while somehow staying altogether true." ― The Slow Regard of Silent Things

I wanted to give my full opinion here on my top 5 and bottom 5. Overall, I'm very positive about where WM magic stands right now, so I don't have too many terribly negative things to say - though I did have some points to make.

Top 5
SW/SUF - The Wonder Twins, the core of our buffing suite. Don't leave home without 'em.

AEG - The elemental transformation to beat. I love it so much that I don't think I can justify getting the planned barrier Aqueous Shroud because it's another elemental transformation - even though it comes with a much-needed Wisdom buff. I'll probably get my Wisdom buff from scrolls.

IP - Old reliable. THE single-target debilitator.

Fireball - As the main TM-focued guild, it's nice that we have the best TM trainer.

TM in General - I can't pick just one here, but I want to say that I really really like knowing that if there's a TM template or type of TM spell out there, we have an example of it. BG and DB are some favorites of mine.


Bottom 5
I started to write everything out here, but mostly I just agree with everything Mazrian said. A couple of other points, though.

Air Bubble - Nothing new to say here that hasn't already been said, but I do actually use this for Utility training, and if nothing else it's a great target for hanging a symbiosis on. It would be nice to see it go 0 slot, though.

Fire Rain - This spell is nice only because it's the only tool in the toolbox that fills its niche. Only one can be in a room, it doesn't move with you, and I SWEAR it seems like Pyre does more damage with less mana AND less skill. I spend a lot of time with a Bard, and it feels weird to have TM Spell Envy for another guild.

- Saragos

<<and I SWEAR it seems like Pyre does more damage with less mana AND less skill. I spend a lot of time with a Bard, and it feels weird to have TM Spell Envy for another guild.

Out of curiosity, are they using Will of Winter or Echoes of Aether to augment it? The former spell boosts both TM skill and discipline making Pyre noticeably more effective with it active. I think even the damage adjustment results in slightly more damage most of the time but it's hard to test that. The latter spell improves Intelligence making the damage output higher, although they don't get a TM buff if using it. Warrior Mages only have the TM buff and I don't think pathways function with non-targeted cyclic spells. Those differences may account for what you're seeing.

why does fire rain pale to universal solvent?

why as in why technically?

and why as in gauthos says fire rain is supposed to be the bombin ragetown of firestorm tm. fie!

I hope that blackfirestorm makes US pale in comparison.

are one of those transformations electric? I am ernest P whorl, electroman?

war mages can do cold damage with ele weapons, alot of it.

-Munch-

Because USOL pulses incredibly fast.

>also a suggestion, create a spell called firestorm, that shoots molten rocks, lightning bolts and freezings winds.

I'm not opposed to the idea, but why would you name that firestorm?

And what spellbook would you put it in?

-Raesh

"It was wise enough to know itself, and brave enough to BE itself, and wild enough to change itself while somehow staying altogether true." ― The Slow Regard of Silent Things

>>I'm not opposed to the idea, but why would you name that firestorm?


Sounds more like elemental cataclysm!

I'd put it in Hylomorphic Sorcery, call it Manastorm, and steal all the messaging and effects from the Lyras event.

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Re: Life mana Spell preps

You raise your hands in the air. You wave them like you just don't care. Somebody says, "Hey!" Somebody says, "Ho!" Somebody screams.

anabasis had the best reasoning.

I think a "storm" type spell would be super groovy, with different metas you can add to it for different effect/combos.

or call it <famous war mage's> maelstrom.

also on the notion of doing cold damage, is it possible to have a TM spell that works off the highest damage of your mainhand weapon? the thinking that you have a TM spell that will pierce or slice or blunt, and in case of summoned weapons it can earth electric ice or fire.

or turn a summoned weapon into a sort of golem or elemental that will do something to your enemies based on the propeties of said summoned weapon. cuz summoning. and all war mages can use elemental weapons.

basically anything that would terrify a novice is great in my book.

-Munch-

er...I suppose so.

I wouldn't mind a war magified version, though paladins might mind it.

I am really fond of the infusion spells, and how they work with aspects of summoning and manipulating the elemental weapons.

if perhaps a cyclic spell could be formed and shaped the way an elemental weapon could, that would be something, I think. To branch summoning into TM , and the infusions into TM.

Pathways are useful but I forget to use them most times when i spar. they seem to lack their namesake skill, a certain weight that I think summoning has come to imply with the addition of the weapons and their metas.

weaving the spell matrix to defend you with earth, or attack with fire, or do other stuff this way and that while the mage is standing there waggling his fingers and making stuff happen like tim the enchanter.

-Munch-

Would be amusing if WMs had a sorcery spell that was Alignment + Opposing Alignment

Aether = Puncture
Air = Slice
Earth = Impact

And the others being obvious.

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Uzmam! The Chairman will NOT be pleased to know you're trying to build outside of approved zones. I'd hate for you to be charged the taxes needed to have this place re-zoned. Head for the manor if you're feeling creative.