EVOKE is the new alternate way to cast certain spells, which is similar to CHANNEL, except it doesn't cause roundtime.

To clarify you are saying it doesn't cause HARD rt...it would still have casting RT, correct?

LOL you got a point, but its now 9:50 Eastern...

Just an elf about town...

>> Rapid Fire (515): we're mostly happy with the new proposal, but as I suggested earlier, if wizards are interested, we could look at putting the spell in the 540 slot with a 30 second duration, reducing castRT to 1 second, but it would not have a cooldown. If we did this, Temporal Reversion would move to 520 slot (with a small adjustment), and Stone Skin would move to 515 slot.

I don't hunt with Rapid Fire (mostly because I'm not at the level where it's essential yet, from my understanding). However, I don't see myself using it after these changes (which means that going 519/ward spam is my only option for the future).

Out of curiousity, is there any way we can just wait to adjust rapid fire until after the mentioned fixes to bolting in general are in? Overall, my biggest complaint with the RF change isn't even specifically the changes being proposed, it's that there's an outright admission that current RF is just a band-aid for deeper problems (which I'll gladly agree to) but it still feels like the band-aid is coming off before the underlying problem is addressed, which has always been my issue. With those adjustments, the rapid fire effect itself might even be needed, or could be overhauled completely into something cooler (in the 520 or 540 slot).

LADYFLEUR:

So basically you've continued to pay no attention to how 515 is in no way comparable to the power of 240 and is not a 40th level spell, still requiring mana per cast and with no AS/CS boost. A 20th level spot being self-cast and non-stackable would be appropriate but not anything more unless its power is boosted significantly in comparison to 240.

515: GUARANTEED 3 casts in 3 seconds, with a decent chance for more (27% chance of 1 or more 0 RT cast in three casts with a modest 55 ranks of air lore).
240: CHANCE of 2 casts in 3 seconds, with a weak chance for more (better chance if you cast a low-level spell)

It's not clear that the latter is better than the former, even taking into account that the latter has a CS/AS boost and no mana cost on the successful second chance.

That said, I'm baffled by the people who favor moving 515 into 540. The only wizards for whom this would be an advantage are the ones who have huge mana pools... I think it would kill the spell for lower level casters who use the spell situationally rather than as a continuous power-up. I remember having fun with this spell occasionally back in the day, and my wizard never even got to level 50, let alone 100. I'd hate to see this fun spell lost for lower level players just to keep capped power-gamers happy.

But I would suggest a compromise: keep the proposed spell at 515 with cooldowns, but if cast again during the cooldown, make it cost 40 mana for a new 30 seconds. I imagine this would also be easier to implement than the +5 mana per rapid cast. Pretty much the same deal as (or really, better than) putting it in 540 for those so inclined, with no need to shuffle spells.

And again you've continued to pay no attention to how 519 costs more mana than 1115 or 317 and is in no way comparable to the effect of either without a 240-style booster.

519 is better than 1115 because you only need to train 1 lore to boost 519, whereas you need 2 lores equally trained to boost 1115 the same way. Several critters are also completely immune to 1115. 317 has ZERO chance for instant-kill; it just has criticals akin to what 519 also has independent of instant-kill.

Bringing in the 240 booster is kind of a non-sequitur for comparing these spells. That's like arguing that 519 is itself better because you can cast it 3 times in 3 seconds with 515. If 317 and 1115 always had a guaranteed +30ish endroll with no mana cost complaining about the difference between the spells might make sense. But 240 is a different spell that costs 40 mana for a CHANCE at a second (better) endroll, and it's not at all clear that it's better than using 515+extra mana to get those GUARANTEED extra casts. See above.

>"<HCW handaxe while hasted>" -- Throgg, and probably other warmages

>Okay, well, that explains it.

>You were doing it wrong. (Probably, ALL of you have been doing it wrong.)

>Crit weighting, for warmages who are bitching about how badly their weapon AS sucks, IS FRICKING STUPID, PEOPLE! Fighters, at least, have the cleverness to know that if they can barely scratch the beasts, they use a non-crit-weighted weapon.

>.

>If You Are Hasted, You Use Flares. Or DAMAGE Weighting.

>.

>.

>Now. Can we hear the results of some competent warmages, and their feelings about Haste possibly leaving them at only 1s, and not being run all the time, and suchlike. -Krakii

I picked up THW/CM post cap, but all I've hunted with is a claidh and a bunch of enhancives, and I do fine against most things, even against Scatter vvrael and their stupid plate.

If you need enhancives just to hit reliably in offensive, swinging from stance advance is going to miss most of the time.

Please exit 1995 before you start insulting everybody and offering bad advice.

~ Methais

Sort of echoing Tav, but I'm seeing a lot of spells being compared to each other as if everybody had access to every spell. While I guess eventually this could happen (with knowledge enhancives) it's a bit off. For most of us, the power of one spell on it's own can only be considered based on what it allows us to do. Even a spell in the first circle that's AMAZING isn't overpowered if the 19 spells above it provide nothing (although obviously that circle should be internally redesigned, it's just an example).

Overall, please stop comparing one spell to another when they aren't both available to any normal player, and look instead at the overall power/utility within the class itself. You can compare classes, but don't cherry pick two abilities between the classes and compare them. This doesn't work in ANY game. Classes have to be considered as a whole.

To illustrate the point, let me describe how I hunt currently and take a guess as to how I will hunt post-rapid fire:

Lich in the room with or without anything else? Call wind. Follow with cone if multiple enemies present, major shock if not.
Siphon in the room? Rapid shock. With a fetish master? Ewave. With a lich? Call wind. Cone if multiple enemies.
Cerebralite? Rapid shock. Unless lich/fetish master present, then call wind. Cone if lich. Rapid shock if master.
Fetish master? Call wind or Tonis bolt (if single target). Rapid shock. If a lich is present, cone.

So I use a lot of call wind, a lot of cone of lightning and major shock, a lot of rapid shock, and a little bit of Tonis bolt and E-wave.

With the new changes?

Lich. Call wind. Major shock. No change there.
Siphon? Major shock. With masters? Ewave, cone. With a lich? Call wind, cone.
Cerebralite? Major shock. Lich/master? Call wind, then cone.
Fetish master? Call wind or Tonis bolt (single-target). Major shock. If multiple enemies, cone.

So the only thing that changes with the removal of rapid fire is rapid shock is replaced with major shock.

Now I will admit that on plane 4 I use rapid shock and nothing else, mostly because it works and nothing else does. Take away rapid fire and the only thing that changes is I now cast major shock instead, I have to wait for crawlers to attack me before I can hit them or I waste vasts amount of mana plinking them for minor stuns, and I need to use ewave to keep crusaders from regenerating. I'm going to be spamming major shock for all of the damage just as I used 901 for all of the damage previously.

When Wyrom came here and mentioned that the point of changing the "big 3" was to encourage us to use other spells, he seemed to be under the impression that we were receiving a class review or that something in the ELR would fundamentally change the way we hunt. I know the ELR isn't complete, but is this actually going to be part of it? As of right now I'm just not seeing it. Where I hunt, in every instance where I formerly utilized 901 I am now using 910 instead. 901 is no longer on the list, but nothing new has been added. Was this the intent?

~Taverkin

And its not just a made up example either. I use rapidfire (Scrolls, saved from gs3) in invasions, on demons/high end stuff I can't hit at all, or barely, if I need to roll a 90, or I hope a flare fires pushing my over the edge. If I can combine an acuity, ensorcell, and benediction flare at the same time I can get a solid hit in. So I'll rapidfire hoping to brute force it, miss miss miss miss miss miss miss, etc. It is all I can do. Sometimes, even with 117 and mad..er something secret, hitting is still difficult. Of course while I'm doing this some bard or ranger or paladin comes in and kills the thing.

In contrast, if I were an empath or cleric, I'd simply 240 and wham bam thank you ma'am.

240 and 515 are probably about equal when hunting like level or underhunting, where the AS/CS bonus is moot, but for overhunting 240 is easily the better spell.

>Rapid Fire (515): we're mostly happy with the new proposal, but as I suggested earlier, if wizards are interested, we could look at putting the spell in the 540 slot with a 30 second duration, reducing castRT to 1 second, but it would not have a cooldown. If we did this, Temporal Reversion would move to 520 slot (with a small adjustment), and Stone Skin would move to 515 slot.

Also, why is 540 the only available spot? Why not 530, moving 530 to 535? It's already being nerfed, we're paying double the initial mana cost, so why can't we have the same duration?

240's power comes from the extra free mana spirit slayer casts, which flare often, and the fact that said free casts come with massive CS boosts. The proposal to move Rapid Fire to 540 at the proposed costs is also untenable.

If Rapid Fire stays at 515, is it possible to do a reverse seed summation so that it takes more skill to reduce the cooldown but by 2x EMC you could get down to no cooldown? There has to be some incentive to continue to train post-cap. Otherwise, why would people have continued to play wizards instead of just being used for pocket enchanters or buffs and then moving on? That is WHY there are so many wizards running around now.

>> The final overarching point is I still don't understand why you can't just make 515 and 506 self-cast before worrying about having to nerf further within the wizard class. It's almost as if you are protecting everyone else's ability to access these spells and forcing wizards to pay a higher than necessary price in downgrade to keep this option open. This is completely unfair and contrary to how you've treated outside access to 319, 215, 307, 303, 1601, etc. etc.

Agreed.

<If bolting is really that much weaker at causing critical kills than CS attacks and physical attacks, that's something that should be fixed, keeping in mind the moving pieces there, too. <Whirlin had the numbers for comparing bolts versus physical attacks, at least. But a 20% crit-kill rate in 3 seconds is a 36% crit-kill rate in 6 seconds. A 20% crit-kill rate in 1 second is <49% in 3 seconds or 74% in 6 seconds. The real cost is mana. I think it's probably fair that wizards should be able to crit kill as quickly/frequently as anyone else without having to burn <ridiculous sums of mana compared to other casters, I'm just not sure (from what I've read) exactly how much bolts need to be changed to get there.

If rapid fire demonstrated anything it's that you don't necessarily need to hit harder or crit more often to be effective. We could make bolts crit more easily. We could allow them to be aimed. Or we could stick with the primarily attrition-based model and address the reasons why using the same bolt over and over occurs. If rapid fire was making it so that I only used 1 spell, why am I still using only 1 spell without it? Let's answer that question and think about how rapid fire could be used as a solution to that problem. That was the thought process behind my suggestion for a revised rapid fire. How do we get wizards to use bolts of various power and elemental types when they are all basically the same spell? Obviously, we need to change that.

~Taverkin

>I'm incredibly concerned with the direction wizards are heading. We are not the super powered class we've been made out to be, and anything that was seemingly powerful seems to be getting reduced with absolutely nothing to make the class more dynamic, fun, or interesting to play. Everything enjoyable and unique about the class is being removed or nerfed to hell, and we're left as jack-of-all trades class that has 0 niche, except for our buffs... So, no reason to level a wizard past 14.

>At the end of this review, if Wizards would given the ability to change classes, that Sorcerers would instantly be the most popular class by a wide margin.

+1. There haven't been such broad, profession-wrecking changes since Growing Pains in GS3. At that point, most professions suffered through it. This second major downgrade in wizard power is disheartening.

The mana spellup updates and increased durations are all nice and welcome boosts for those at lower levels, but it's a double-edged sword as it also further incentives people to have pocket buff characters. That is why there are so many pocket wizards.

You should be protecting wizard mains by keeping core spells self-cast before nerfing further instead of protecting pocket wizards first and then leaving the wizard mains to pick up the leftover pieces.

For 515, what would the lore tie in turn into if it switched spell slots? There was no mention of that.

For Cone/Immolate/Evoke goodness, they look great, not much else I can say about it.

Tal.

Really, its not clear?

Okay, how much damage do you do on 3 casts in three seconds when you can't ward your target? How much damage do you do when the second or third casts (a third cast is very attainable with lore) has boosted attack strength allowing you to hit the target.

Hint, 0*3 is still 0.

One spell is clearly better.

"can't ward" is an extreme situation. My comparison (as far as it goes) was everyday use. And even if you can't ward your target, the extra strike gets you what, 30, 40% chance of warding, tops, assuming the critter is just barely out of reach? If you're looking for a warding power up, there are better ways to go; this is just one of a few. Meanwhile, for wizards, where we're generally talking about bolts, which resolve under completely different systems and have even more options for increasing their endrolls (or hit percentage, in the extreme case). Again, these comparisons have to take in the big picture -- it's just too easy to distort relative power of abilities by looking at one effect in one situation.

And again you've continued to pay no attention to how 519 costs more mana than 1115 or 317 and is in no way comparable to the effect of either without a 240-style booster.

---

Actually we have. I've two sets spreadsheets with damage/crit that insure the new 519 will be on par with 317. One for old 519, one for new. They include comparisons of results at a creature specific level and damage/crit progression charts. To put it into perspective, roughly 3500 calculations. The new spell won't be as flashy as the current 519 with it's 5 flares, and that makes me a sad panda, but it will be a solid attack spell with appropriate lethality.

It'll now also include the original disabling utility for those that used in that manner.

As to the extra 2 mana it'll cost. As people are so apt to point out when a class primary spell is weaker than a major/minor spell in the same slot - it should cost more! You're comparing a major circle spell to two class circle spells - 2 mana is a small price to pay for equal footing.

...

So, that's my stance on where 519 is heading, and the level of effort and thought we've put into getting it right. You've made a pretty hefty assertion in that it needs increased CS as well as 2-3 hits to be as effective as 1115/317.

I'm listening, what makes you believe that assertion?

Viduus

>So, that's my stance on where 519 is heading, and the level of effort and thought we've put into getting it right. You've made a pretty hefty assertion in that it needs increased CS as well as 2-3 hits to be as effective as 1115/317.

Thank you for explaining your stance. 519 is already much more costly to make viable as a hunting option (in terms of extra spell ranks almost solely for CS, extra harness power training, and lores, even if thresholds are reduced) vs. 1115 or 317. For wizards, it's generally a post-cap option that is more often used situationally depending on the creature hunted than not. Generally, it was only used on those creatures that were bolt resistant to begin with, but of course some creatures are fire immune.

Along with rapid fire bolting, it was one of 2 spells that could get the job done, but it was already a gamble as even the previous instant kill rate was lower than needed vs. just throwing more bolts. Often it was used when spirit was an issue and one needed a lethal CS-based spell to get the job done. Whether it's major or profession circle, it's still the only viable and effective CS-based spells wizards had. And it was mostly usable as the panic button BECAUSE of the chance of instant kill at all.

1115 and 317 are powerful on their own, but the true power comes when you combine them with 240. That massive CS boost and free mana casts make it a "power-up on top of a power-up" panic button for when things need to be mowed down in a hurry. With the severe nerfs of 515 AND 519, you've removed both wizard panic buttons. We no longer have a panic button to use when our core bolts have failed and we're stuck and low on mana and can't cough cough to get more because we need spirit to bolt.

>A wizard is not designed to be a combat intensive class.

And I couldn't disagree with you more. Wizards in any fantasy RPG are meant to be powerful, combat characters. When I think wizard, I think Gandalf, coming in to mow down the hordes and save the realm, not the ancient mage sitting in a corner waiting to buff up whoever else is running in to save the day. Same for sorcerers.

Clerics and empaths, there are your utility and support characters. Regardless, every pure is meant to be able to be powerful in combat these day, and by the currently proposed standards, wizards will fall far below the bottom of the heap.

<And I can't disagree with you more. A wizard is not designed to be a combat intensive class. It is a casting class. Support and casting are it's strengths and how it was designed to be. The <fact that wizard spells are sold off the shelf means nothing. If you like to solo, good for you. But this game was meant to be a group setting.

You're both right. I don't want to see haste made self-cast. Nor do I want to see wizards given a heavily watered-down version of haste that is inadequate to their needs specifically because it is not self-cast. What to do?

~Taverkin

>As people are so apt to point out when a class primary spell is weaker than a major/minor spell in the same slot - it should cost more! You're comparing a major circle spell to two class circle spells - 2 mana is a small price to pay for equal footing.

I'm also pretty sure the rationale behind putting Immolation in 519 was to encourage people to train in the Major Elemental spell circle at all. It doesn't matter that it's a Major circle when only one profession can access it. So don't try to compare that to Major Spirit.

I'd be perfectly happy for you to move 519 to 917, except I'm pretty sure that would be turned down because then there would be zero reason to train in the 500's.

Since Charge Item is only used situationally, with the downgrade in power, I would also be fine for you to move Immolation to 517 and Charge Item to 519.

BLACKKOBOLD

Any thoughts on the versions I've proposed which apply the reduced RT to bolts -2s for 901 and -1s for 906 with a multi-cast effect?

There are no plans to give wizards an always active ability to cast Minor Shock (901) in 1 second of castRT with the ability to also multicast.

GameMaster Estild