Mage Wand/Offhand feedback.

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Shehriazad

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I'd really love going full wander....but mage as it is makes it hard.

You cannot raise crit chance as wands are excluded from the current advanced skills and offhands seem to be mostly utility and defense.


It would be really nice to have this option as staves already get really insanely good scaling and base damage (1 int = 2 damage + 1 Agi = 1 damage) equaling insane burst.

So some offensive offhand would be nice in addition to making going crit wander a thing. Offensive offhands could be balanced by having an ADDITIVE Arcane modifier (Arcane 2 wand turning to arcane 4 with a+ 2 offhand)

Just my 2 cents as wander seems to lack a bit more power than it should
 

DavidBVal

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I also have a feeling that wands need some adjustment, but it's too late to add it for this week's update. I'll give it some thought to try to balance it better before the 1.1 development phase is done.
 

Shehriazad

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DavidBVal":2kbh5yhh said:
I also have a feeling that wands need some adjustment, but it's too late to add it for this week's update. I'll give it some thought to try to balance it better before the 1.1 development phase is done.

I mean the boring way would probably be to give the wand mastery +1 damage every three levels at Max rank(don't want to make it op).

Or give it like I said a way to scale one of the other stats....scaling the speed is too dangerous as it would make the knockback too op.

That leaves us either with a crit boost passive or even timed buff and/or giving certain off-stat boosts to orbs( I think they can mostly be disregarded right now.

Orbs require an interesting solution as you could mix and match damage types or give them a + to base crit.

While the last one would be cool...it would require the most effort of you...but at least in my eyes it currently almost does not seem worth it to take an orb over one of the shields available to all classes as they have stronger defense with actually having HP and armour+ elemental Res...while mana is already so plentiful on every other piece of gear.

Lastly dual wanding at lowered damage on each wand couuuld be done... but I'm not sure if its feasible or necessary.


I hope I didn't annoy you with overanalyzing wands, I just get carried away at times.
 

VDX_360

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I really want to like wands, but wands suffer compared to 2-H staves. Tricky to balance so I'm not sure how to adjust them?
 

Shehriazad

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VDX_360":14u8s112 said:
I really want to like wands, but wands suffer compared to 2-H staves. Tricky to balance so I'm not sure how to adjust them?
EDIT: Just ONE of the 3 adjustments!

In my eyes it's easy...but a bit of work for the Dev. Rework orbs to include more offensive bonuses. This means we could run double elemental damage setups or gain extra critical strike chance from them.

Another option: Making them viable crit weapons would be a good option too. This would require him to add base crit to wand mastery and enable the advanced crit skills for us.

The easiest way would be to add +1 damage every 3 levels via wand mastery...any more than that and they'd start to outshine staves in lategame... It's okay that they got a bit less DPS than full invested staves like this as they have more utility and defensive options.

Maybe Dev even gets another idea...but those 3 options make the most sense to me without making them stronger than staves
 

VOSTOK

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As I think wands can not have high damage or criticals. All about pure damage is staff. You know - it is bigger, lager cristal used to create want and more offensive magic to charm it. As I see wands - is speed and nasty non dmg effects. For example - wand has knocking back effect but it doesn't bring enough productivity. With distances everything balanced perfect. But what is missing in knocking back is stun for zero point something of a second, for some really tiny ammount of time. I explain why on example of my companion. I knocking back enemy, companion reaches it and attacks and gets straight way hit from that enemy. When enemy gets knock back and straight way hits first. Like he was not knocked back but teleported back. So this knocking back just helps to keep enemies away from me.
So I thing have to add some zero point something of a second stun time just enough for companion to hit first.
So If see mage with a wand - I expect really annoying enemies tricks from him.
Mage with a staff is about heavy damage slowing movement from burning, lightning and any other type of offensive magic.
 

DavidBVal

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Extra damage for wand (other than maybe slight adjustment) is out of the question since it's supposed to be the "less DPS but..." option. But it needs better/more varied offhand items to make a good tradeoff for the DPS. Still, I completed the Sewer with a wand mage and damage was good enough.

The problem with any changes done to pushback is it's already on the edge of being exploitable and get zero damage from enemies, so it needs to be changed very carefully.
 

DavidBVal

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Since I was reuploading 1061 due to other issues, I did a few numbers to slightly improve the wand mastery skill.

I found it was bugged, for starters. It was supposed to give +1/+2/+3/+5 according to description, but was giving +2/+2/+3/+4.

I changed it to +1/+2/+4/+6. (It has been also changed in translated descriptions)

In future updates I'll add more offhand items.
 

Shehriazad

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DavidBVal":1xn33aye said:
Since I was reuploading 1061 due to other issues, I did a few numbers to slightly improve the wand mastery skill.

I found it was bugged, for starters. It was supposed to give +1/+2/+3/+5 according to description, but was giving +2/+2/+3/+4.

I changed it to +1/+2/+4/+6. (It has been also changed in translated descriptions)

In future updates I'll add more offhand items.


Well a total of +2 extra damage might help a bit I guess....my personal issue is just that Staves seem to be able to get up to 100% higher dps than Wands while Shortsword vs Twohand Sword will be about a 50% damage difference and somewhat stay like that...with melees also having the option for offensive off-hands to make up for this and get even closer to Twohanders.

But I'll see how it plays out as soon as I can get my hands on that small Wand fix... Since it is an all around 2.2 base dps increase at max rank, I guess that'll at least bring them somewhat closer.

Maybe asking for Wand buffs might be too much? Is it Staves that are actually too strong then? I mean I've reskilled my Mage and tried Staff...and sitting at like +20 damage boost if you invest into int...and certain accessories and armour pieces also boosting your Int...It does seem terribly strong for the fact that you mostly only give up miniscule defensive bonuses...

Jester Skull felt like the first Off-hand that seemed worth considering. I had been using older offhands that were labeled "all" until then as their stats just gave me more tankiness.

P.s. Maybe Nerf knockback a bit to not have it be such an issue?
 

toopa

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My problem with orbs is that they are kinda useless stats-wise. Unfortunately I can't remember all the stats but the common orbs only add 5 Mana and 18 resistance to a specific element. 5 mana is close to nothing for a mage and 18 resistance against a single element can be useful but is pretty mediocre at best. Even the best orb (that I know) doesn't have too useful stats (I can't remember the exact stats though).

You say that you don't want orbs to increase DPS, what about making them special then? You would either need to buff the stats, or make them interesting in a special way (requires more work though). Example:

- Orb A adds 5 Mana, + 18 XYZ resistance and has a special ability. The abilities could be (some are a bit offensive):

- "Mage Armor takes +X hit(s)"
- "Ice Storm lasts + X sec(s)"
- "Lightning Bolt + X% stun chance"
- "Your summoned creatures have +X level(s)"
- "Your summoned creatures have +X HP (or X% HP)"
- "Reduce cooldown of summoning skills by X seconds"
- "Reduce mana cost when using skill X by Y (or Y%)"

Note: I don't mean that you have to make a new ability for every orb but alter the item description. "This orb increases X by Y" instead of making 100 new abilities just for orbs.


I think it would be fun to spend time as the player to find out the best buff for them. "Should I use buff X or buff Y?... hmmmm". Some examples:

Lesser White Orb [Old]: +5 Mana, +18 cold resistance
Lesser White Orb [New]: +5 Mana, +18 cold resistance. "Ice storm lasts +1 second".

Lesser Green Orb [Old]: +5 Mana, +18 poison resistance
Lesser Green Orb [New]: +5 Mana, +18 poison resistance. "Your summoned creatures have +15 HP".

Lesser Blue Orb [Old]: +5 Mana, +18 shock resistance
Lesser Blue Orb [New]: +5 Mana, +18 shock resistance. "Mage Armor takes +1 hits".

Lesser Black Orb [Old]: +5 Mana, +18 death resistance
Lesser Black Orb [New]: +5 Mana, +18 death resistance. "Reduce cooldown of summoning skills by 5 seconds".

Lesser Red Orb [Old]: +5 Mana, +18 fire resistance
Lesser Red Orb [New]: +5 Mana, +18 fire resistance. "Fireball Skill costs -25% mana".

Pouch of Reagents [Old]: +20 Mana, +15 holy resistance.
Pouch of Reagents [New]: +20 Mana, +15 holy resistance. "Your summoned creatures have +1 LVL".

Orb of the High Clouds [Old]: +1 Armor, + 10 Mana, +25 fire resistance, +35 shock resistance.
Orb of the High Clouds [New]: +1 Armor, + 10 Mana, +25 fire resistance, +35 shock resistance. "Reduce mana cost when using any skill by 15%"
So, the better/rarer an orb (or other mage offhand) is, the better is its special ability. You could also make orbs that don't have these abilities but better stats in general. Example:
Lesser White Orb [Old]: +5 Mana, +18 cold resistance
Lesser White Orb [New]: +10 Mana, +18 cold resistance

Orb of the High Clouds [Old]: +1 Armor, + 10 Mana, +25 fire resistance, +35 shock resistance.
Orb of the High Clouds [New]: +2 Armor, + 30 Mana, +25 fire resistance, +35 shock resistance.
I think that way orbs would actually be strong and interesting, maybe it's tricky to balance though.
 
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