I like the idea of having topical areas (always a strong proponent) on threads. Recognizing that there may still be tagential or even irrelevant posts / points, it is always a good idea to consolidate thoughts.

With that, something that I'm (still!!) working on is a summary of the State of Wizardry. It's not always a welcome endeavor, since the State of Wizardry is a full spectrum discussion and not one narrowly focused on achieving goals within a certain level range (post cap, for example) or segment (war mage, for example) of the population. I have had a couple of conversations with other wizards that suggest a scorecard summary is an important facet of the State of Wizardry, and now CURTIS has been kind enough to rough in an initial cut.

So - with that background, I'm simply reposting CURTIS' information in table format so that we can discuss it - with the intent and goal of this being an important part of the summary for the State of Wizardry. Scores are 0 to 7 scale (to limit 'middle path' results) and are my attempt to summarize what I feel I am seeing as the current mindset of wizards posting opinions. Feel free to modify with your own evaluation!

Buffs	Rating (subjective)
*Baseline somewhat crit padding, trainable to heavy around cap (520)	6
*"Always-on" defensive haste (535)	4
*Better bolts for war mages (513)	4
*A very powerful maneuver attack spell (917)	5
*A new, powerful "panic button" (550)	4
*A devestating room-clearer (950)	5
*Better e-wave via water and/or air lore (410 / 435)	4
*Accelerated enchanting via water lore (925)	3
*Removal of catastrophic enchant failure (925)	6
*Possbility to enchant elemental flaring items (925)	2
*A low-level warding attack option (502)	4
*Another mass disabling option (512)	3
*Can now easily eblade 1x weapons and higher with dedication (411)	3
*Minor Elemental Edge better for your war mages (902)	4
*Increased physical AS for war-mages (509)	?
*Free action knock-down (909)	4
*Improved box popping via water lore (407 / 408)	3
*Cone of Lightning now element-selectable (518)	5
*Increased temporary mana recovery via water lore (418)	4
Nerfs
*Rapid Fire 1-second RT (515)	1
*Rapid Fire cooldown, but can be trained away post-cap (or at-cap with sacrifices, if it's important to you.) (515)	0
*Slower enchanting due to increased popularity, if you opt out of water lore (925)	0
*Previous full offensive benefits of 506 now require air lore (506)	1
*Immolation now less lethal- more of a "disabling" spell (519)	0

Opinions / observations

Unless I'm missing something here, there has been no "Great Wizard Nerfing of 2016." Stuff changed. Many new strategies, tactics, and choices have been opened. And some pre-existing strategies aren't as good now. If you gave me a choice between 2015-wizards and today-wizards, I'd take today-wizards easily. [CURTIS]

I'm legitimately excited about the new options available. Can we explore and discuss that? I bet there's some really powerful hunting options buried in all that new stuff! But we seem to get stuck only on what we lost. (Or really what got down-tweaked- nothing that people cared about was completely taken away.) [CURTIS]

With my thanks to CURTIS for the initial legwork, my thanks to ARCHSENEX for the reminder to strive for discrete threads, and my thanks and admiration for the entire wizard population of Elanthia for their contributions past / present / future.

Doug

I would describe the Always on Haste 535 as a lateral shift, a way to preserve the defensive nature of old Haste while retooling it. yY main assertion is that I consider it neither buff nor nerf, but just a retooling to make space for other things.

The 410 Buffs aren't Wizard specific, so I would remove from the discussion. Same with other 400 level changes. I actually like all the 400 buffs, but so do other classes, so they're less specific to the wizard discussion.

Completely separate, I have some requests around 418's lore benefit, but that's in the back of my head and I'd bring it up in the thread for that circle if I ever feel it merits discussion

>>I would describe the Always on Haste 535 as a lateral shift, a way to preserve the defensive nature of old Haste while retooling it. yY main assertion is that I consider it neither buff nor nerf, but just a retooling to make space for other things.

Agreed in general principle. There is, however, significant value (I feel) in it being (much!) longer duration and stackable. Still defensive only, but for the non-weapon swinging side of the world still a very tangible benefit.

>>The 410 Buffs aren't Wizard specific, so I would remove from the discussion. Same with other 400 level changes. I actually like all the 400 buffs, but so do other classes, so they're less specific to the wizard discussion.

Not opposed. Since this is tied to ELR, and ELR needs to somehow be summarized, I'd likely de-emphasize as opposed to remove. Still, while recognizing it benefits / harms all - we can't very well scorecard wizard development without at least a nod in the direction that it benefited / hampered wizards. Perhaps the answer is to do a subsection on ELR specific to wizard profession, and put it there?

Doug

>>It is a benefit if you are at least level 35. Otherwise its a nerf.

Yes, I see and agree. So nerf near 20% and bennie near 80%. Good clarification, though - and important to retain as part of the 'notes' in the summary. Thanks!

Doug

Personally I like the Rapid Fire that replaced the OP rapid fire more. It allowed for more combinations and flexibility in casting for multiple situations that the pre-prep interfered with. Now The rapid fire without downtime at 200 EMC ranks is awesome for me since I moved from x1 to x2 EMC ranks gradually from level 70-level 100 even before all the changes.

I use 515 constantly in the confluence or solo hunting in the sanctum of scales. When the downtime was in effect I would just wait in the room or choose my targets carefully before moving recasting it.

I use 950 for my single target kill spell on bosses and my swarm clearer. I have to say it works very well for me at both things. Currently I have 60 ranks in Earth which allows me two casts a minute but I am strongly considering lowering that to base.

I use 917 on TD/bolt high creatures but it really works best for me only on scaled shapers and bandits. As a Halfling wizard I am already CS limited so a non CS attack spell was a godsend for me.

My hope is that whenever I max CS I will be able to 504/912/410/909 a room and bolt things to death before they can move. I think it will work very well as it works amazingly well in the sanctum and the confluence.

Right now I feel no growing pains as a wizard, but remember I come from a gs3 bards perspective.

There are things I wish would have been done differently. 519 should be a bit better/do more damage. Enchant 925 10k mana pools a week for wizards shouldn't be so hard to get to. I will continue to push for those things I think should be better (ie 950 use being limited by earth lore instead of EMC, lore split does not seem equitable amongst the pures) but I still think wizards are doing great as a hunting class.

The overall scorecard for me on the changes would be a 7 out of 10.

GBB

>> Currently I have 60 ranks in Earth which allows me two casts a minute but I am strongly considering lowering that to base.

I chose to purchase incredibly cheap EL:E enhancives to get +10 for wizards that I'm portraying where this is important to me. So I keep the base training at 50, and supplement to get the benefit of the other 10 ranks.

>>The overall scorecard for me on the changes would be a 7 out of 10.

Thanks! I'll likely summarize this as 5 out of 7. Technically 4.9, but rounding shouldn't harm the general discussion.

In general, I'm also curious if we should include a category of something like 'wishes and desires' that are a summation of things we said we'd like to see that are not yet implemented. I'll give an extreme example - I think the game would benefit if all pures could train in the Arcane list, perhaps up to 25 or so. There's a lot that goes with that but that's why if I were to suggest it be included it would be in the 'wish' category.

There are a great many others through out my time here that others have suggested. Might not be a good fit for the State of Wizards, though - might deserve its own heading and handling!

Doug

Me personally, I would be in favor of EVERYONE being able to either natively cast (pures) or learn through Spell Research (everyone else) Arcane Blast/1700.
(But then again, I'm looking for a mana-less way to reap Sonic Weapon flares out of a runestaff, so that's entirely self-serving.)

Fixed: You'd really put up with a 5 second hard RT just for a chance at a weapon flare though?

-- Robert

>I'm already waiting through 3s of castRT in Guarded with Disruption costing me 10 mana, being able to wait in Guarded a little bit longer to save 100% of that mana cost is trivial.
>And if more walk in to threaten me, I get to uncork open-Disruption, which isn't eligible for flares anyhow. It's like free experience on the hoof.

I'm not sure if you're trolling, but if not then I'm confused...why would you even care about sonic flares in the first place when 1030 annihilates everything, usually in one shot anyway? 10 mana for a single target isn't expensive, and 30-60 to wipe out a room certainly isn't.


~ Methais

"The 410 Buffs aren't Wizard specific, so I would remove from the discussion. Same with other 400 level changes. I actually like all the 400 buffs, but so do other classes, so they're less specific to the wizard discussion."

Wizards already gain additional benefits from elemental lore training, so the effective cost of training up 410 with water lore is less.* Also, I reject the general idea that unless something's (completely) exclusive to wizards it doesn't "count" for wizard power levels. I've heard this argument taken to extremes- that the 415 double cast (was that something I missed in my initial run?) doesn't mean as much since warriors can get it to. (In reality, they can't, for any reasonable definition.) Another example was someone complaining that we were being sold out since people could access a much weaker non-native version of 520 via a Duskruin item. I understand power level is somewhat relative, but it's not a 0-sum game.


*I'm slightly sidestepping the issue that sorcs or bards could fully train all their lores far post-cap, because that's only 1 portion of the player base and the discussion should not be confined to them. For the vast majority of players, where TP limits are a very real thing, getting 410 benefits along with your buffs to 512, 925, etc. really does matter in overall value calculation.

For me, it implies not having to spend mana in the field on it and not having to either worry about it constantly falling off or an auto-refresh script randomly putting me in cast RT. That seems like a positive.

>>How is it a nerf?

Used to be able to cast it at 6th level, now you have to wait until at least 35th level. So for 29 levels, that protection isn't there where it used to be.

In truth, it's not quite that dramatic since there's little that causes that type of round time except herb eating until around 20 trains. But the observation is accurate.

Doug

I reject the notion that the Minor Elemental updates have relevance to any state of wizards discussion because these were "benefits" received by every profession with access to the Minor Elemental Circle. They are most certainly not what I include in my list of accepted benefits for the sacrifices that post-cap pure wizards made in offensive power after the nerfs, which is why they are largely net zero changes for me.

Most pure wizards don't e-blade, use weapons, or care about physical AS. Mana isn't a consideration for any post-cap pure, and the 407/408 benefit is better utilized with no sacrifice by those who don't have a strong need to train in a particular type of elemental lore. As it requires water lore, it's pretty much a non-starter. 410/435 are not reliable disablers in post-cap hunting, and the lore benefits associated with them don't result in improved levels of reliability or damage sufficient to warrant the sacrifice in my view.

Nope, not trolling. But I routinely find myself low on mana, and having no choice but to spend 10 mana every cast means I would love some Arcane Blast. (I do not consider saving 2 mana but getting the lower punch of Banshee's Wail/1008 to be worthwhile. That spell is too high in level, OR Disruption is too good. Since I've been saying for years that Disruption is too good, I'm sticking with that viewpoint.)
Worse yet, the krag yeti & dwellers don't even have weapons, so VibChant currently does me no good unless I get a flare.

Yes, I have been saying for years about how great VibChant is... when it happens. No weapon, no shield, no effect. I would love it if I could use it on every creature for every cast (and save 8 mana), but normally there's not more than two opportunities (and 2 crit locations--the "other hand" and "other arm"--have the possibility of removing the second possible).

.

Apparently I'm doing my Disruption wrong, then, because I'm at 1.25 in Spell Research and fully singled in both Lores, and I keep having to attrit creatures.
(Now, it doesn't help that I've gone through about 30 levels of giant-sized [so, 400+ hps per beastie, even if they don't regenerate] creatures, since 30th up to 68th, with the only break being an excursion to the Sheruvian Monastery. Man-sized HP levels and mana for the harvesting, it was great.)

Yes, Disruption is great. It's even greater in a swarm, and I was loving things in the Stronghold when there'd be like 5 or 6 mastiffs, and up in the Krag Slopes now when there's three each of the yetis & dwellers. 20 mana twice in one room without moving is both cheaper and faster than 10 mana 'lebenty squillion times having to track them down. But that doesn't happen often enough, so I'm back to 10 mana at a time, and some times it's only 40hp and a 35hp crit. <shrug> Nothing I can do about that, d100 didn't like me. Random location with random severity is, well, random.

>> This still feels like a net benefit to me, but that's a reasonable argument.

Hence my initial stance, I think it's ok calling it a lateral shift because of the splitting etc. It lost some availability, but not when it was super necessary, and it gained some convenience, but not enough that a wizard with mana problems suddenly wouldn't have them.

I replied in relevance to people being able to train in the Arcane list, and provided feedback about the suggestion that had been put forward.
Since then, yes, we've digressed to specifics. :)

"As Methais pointed out, one is level 30-40 for maybe a couple months. One is capped forever."

That is only true if you're hard-core levelling, which I strongly suspect is a small minority of players. (Although GMs with data can certainly correct me.) In my case, it took nearly *30 years* on-and-off to get to 40.

"But Curtis, you weren't playing for much of that time, so it doesn't count."

Partially true, but making sure the pre-cap experience was good means I have a desire to come back.

No one is denying it's important that the pre-cap experience is good. Where we'll disagree is that the pre-cap experience was already significantly better for wizards than for spiritual pures before the changes. Now pre-cap wizards get to have more of their cake earlier, but there is less cake overall when they get to the post-cap levels. I continue to believe it's important to ensure that post-cap characters of all professions have goals to strive towards.

A couple months may have been hyperbole depending on one's personal experience and time, obviously, but in general, it holds true that being pre-cap or within a specific level range is a temporary status condition, while being capped is the end game.

>How is it a nerf? Even if constantly re-casting the defensive half of 506 didn't bother you, how it not having to do that a nerf?

The duration was the only buff. Everything else was a nerf.

>"Once again, we've getting sold out and our skills getting devalued! Why don't you just remove orb gems entirely or give us a useful spell for 1004 if you're going to make it worthless. Why do wizards get all the love?"

You might have a point if bards weren't making millions of silvers purifying their gems. There's little to nothing in it for the bard when it comes to orbing gems for other people. A tip at best.

>Apparently I'm doing my Disruption wrong, then, because I'm at 1.25 in Spell Research and fully singled in both Lores, and I keep having to attrit creatures.

I thought you were capped. For some reason. I have no idea what level 50 life or whatever is like for a pure bard. It's pretty incredible at cap though. And no it doesn't need to be nerfed.

>LadyFleurs- We should stop framing this as only post-cap matters. That's a small fraction of the player base. I understand it's important to you. But saying that something that many others find useful doesn't count because it's not useful to you at your level is just wrong. Post-cap stuff isn't irrelevant, but neither is pre-cap.

Nobody is saying that pre-cap issues are irrelevant. Post cap wizards were the ones hit hardest by the nerfs and took a significant power loss though, while level 37 wizards are still pretty much the same as they were before, other than having to now spend 35 mana to cast Haste, which they probably don't have yet. The post-ELR discussion has almost exclusively focused on the post cap game for that reason. Not saying that pre-cap issues shouldn't be brought up or addressed, just that post-cap issues are where we've been hit the hardest.

And there are plenty of capped players, with that number steadily increasing. Meanwhile, the number of level 37 wizards tends to stay roughly the same. There are probably more level 100 active players of any profession than there are of any specific pre-cap level of the same profession.

If pre-cap wizards have problems, bring it up. It should still be addressed separately from post cap issues, because different problems arise post-cap that don't exist pre-cap.

>That is only true if you're hard-core levelling, which I strongly suspect is a small minority of players. (Although GMs with data can certainly correct me.) In my case, it took nearly *30 years* on-and-off to get to 40.

Is this what you feel the game should be balanced around?

~ Methais

An issue for quite nearly every level of wizard: Bolts.

We have a pretty good handle on the causal reasons, I think. We've had a few suggestions. Let's walk through this and see if we can summarize some thoughts that we can agree to for the State of Wizards as an open issue.

Doug