Suggestion Necromancers and mob summons.

[iAlchemist]

I know I know, "can't be done" they say. Well I'm about to say something amazing. It can be done!

With 1.8 scoreboards received quite the overhaul, enough that you could put mobs on your player's team and they'd be friendly to you. Granted they would not attack other mobs, it's possible for a summon command to functionally work through basic code and vanilla mechanics via scoreboards.

Example:
SummonSkeleton

have the skill perform a /summon command that summons a skeleton with a team of "Necromancer"
Basically, that would allow any necromancers in the area to have a friendly skeleton mob. Now mind you, this command wouldn't work in PvE. But it's very easily possible to remove the waste of mana famine and replace it with some sort of spell like this. It's slightly old and basic, but gets the job done. The skill also wouldn't work against other necromancers (because they're on the same team.) unless you wanted to do a really convoluted system where skeletons are summoned with player specific teams, which is also possible, albeit much more complicated. I'm sure you can figure it out.

Thanks for reading.

 

[LordZelkova]

Ah yes, remove Famine and replace it with a Skill that's easily countered.
The issue is, skeletons would either be worthless (Like Wolves were) or really really OP (Like wolves were at one point).

 

[iAlchemist]

Ah yes, remove Famine and replace it with a Skill that's easily countered.
The issue is, skeletons would either be worthless (Like Wolves were) or really really OP (Like wolves were at one point).

I suppose that's true. But it's worth a try, right?

 

[ncbugboy]

I always liked the idea of summons for necro, however getting the mob to do what you want is rather hard. It would be useless in group fights, for they would attack your team, and you cannot target a specific person. I love the idea, but summons are rather fragile.

 

[iAlchemist]

Another good point, is it possible to have mobs join your player party through some coding know-how?

I always liked the idea of summons for necro, however getting the mob to do what you want is rather hard. It would be useless in group fights, for they would attack your team, and you cannot target a specific person. I love the idea, but summons are rather fragile.

 

[_AlphaReaper_]

Currently, Necro is quite weak, it deals less damage than Druid and Decay can't stack on a single enemy so it has a 14s cooldown (instead of 10s). Plague isn't powerful enough, AOE skills are supposed to deal more damage.
Summons would balance it.
I've already seen summons on other servers, it's possible.

 

[LordZelkova]

Currently, Necro is quite weak, it deals less damage than Druid and Decay can't stack on a single enemy so it has a 14s cooldown (instead of 10s). Plague isn't powerful enough, AOE skills are supposed to deal more damage.
Summons would balance it.
I've already seen summons on other servers, it's possible.

Necro is actually quite good.
Drainsoul for sustain, Bonespear for a good Piercing Skill, DarkRitual allows for mana regen, HarmShield allows a bit of tanking.
Plague and Decay can be stacked on one person, and plague spreads.

Summons would make the current necro broken as hell if they worked.
And while yes, summons are possible, making sure they don't attack party members, they attack normal mobs, and that the summon themselves isn't op are all factors.

 

[ncbugboy]

Currently, Necro is quite weak, it deals less damage than Druid and Decay can't stack on a single enemy so it has a 14s cooldown (instead of 10s). Plague isn't powerful enough, AOE skills are supposed to deal more damage.
Summons would balance it.
I've already seen summons on other servers, it's possible.

Necro is a pretty strong class. It has great 1v1 potential and can even help in team fights thanks to an AOE or two. It is also quite tanky for a caster class, between drain soul and harm shield.

 

[LordZelkova]

Necro is a pretty strong class. It has great 1v1 potential and can even help in team fights thanks to the several AOEs. It is also quite tanky for a caster class, between drain soul and harm shield.

It has 1 actual AoE (Plague), 1 Line Aoe (Bone Spear), and Famine.
Wouldn't use the word Several.

 

[ncbugboy]

It has 1 actual AoE (Plague), 1 Line Aoe (Bone Spear), and Famine.
Wouldn't use the word Several.

True.

 

[iAlchemist]

It has 1 actual AoE (Plague), 1 Line Aoe (Bone Spear), and Famine.
Wouldn't use the word Several.

Despair, you forgot about Despair. Famine shouldn't be counted because it's borderline trash. You also have devouring darkness, which is another AoE. You have decay and drain soul as non-AoE attacks, which are both really great attacks.

@_AlphaReaper_

Necromancer is actually one of the strongest classes at the moment, with their unique DoT play style, it allows them to kite even more than any other caster because they don't have to look at a target to deal damage, and a lot of their attacks can't miss and waste mana. The ones that can miss have very wide hits (wide enough to hit around 1 block pillars) and Despair easily becomes an excellent AoE as it's also a silence attack due to its blind.

If you're trying to play necromancer as a burst attacker, you're not doing it right. Take your time, you'll have plenty of it. Just run away while your opponent tries to chase you down, and by the time they want to flee they'll most likely die from decay/plague quickly. If you're getting low on health, no problem, turn around and use that distance you've already put between the opponent and yourself and throw out a drain soul for that extra sustain. Enemy is getting too close now? Cast devouring darkness and flee, they'll get slowed down allowing you to easily escape again.

 

[_AlphaReaper_]

"plague spreads." It doesn't. The AOE effect isn't effective after using the skill.

"they don't have to look at a target to deal damage"
They have to look at a target to use a skill. And 120 instant dmg > 120 DoT dmg.

"Despair easily becomes an excellent AoE"
Despair only deals 65 dmg with 40 int -_- and it blind foes for 2 seconds (which isn't much useful against mobs).
Pulse is way better.

"Enemy is getting too close now? Cast devouring darkness and flee, they'll get slowed down"
Nope nope nope, it slows enemies for 3 seconds every 3 seconds but it isn't pulsing correctly (tested it).

DrainSoul only heals 100 hp with 40 int whereas you can die very quickly because you're not a tank, you're a DPS.

HarmShield is a joke, it grants 35% damage reduction for 5 seconds, with a 90s cooldown.

Necro DoTs are good, but they should deal more dmg because they don't allow to kill foes quickly so they can kill you first (especially in PvE).

 

[LordZelkova]

"plague spreads." It doesn't. The AOE effect isn't effective after using the skill.

"they don't have to look at a target to deal damage"
They have to look at a target to use a skill. And 120 instant dmg > 120 DoT dmg.

"Despair easily becomes an excellent AoE"
Despair only deals 65 dmg with 40 int -_- and it blind foes for 2 seconds (which isn't much useful against mobs).
Pulse is way better.

"Enemy is getting too close now? Cast devouring darkness and flee, they'll get slowed down"
Nope nope nope, it slows enemies for 3 seconds every 3 seconds but it isn't pulsing correctly (tested it).

DrainSoul only heals 100 hp with 40 int whereas you can die very quickly because you're not a tank, you're a DPS.

HarmShield is a joke, it grants 35% damage reduction for 5 seconds, with a 90s cooldown.

Necro DoTs are good, but they should deal more dmg because they don't allow to kill foes quickly so they can kill you first (especially in PvE).

Bone Spear is an Amazing Instant Magic Damage.
Decay and Plague stack, and Plague does spread after it ticks on the first enemy.
Despair is quite useful against classes that require targets, because blind makes it so you cannot target anyone.
Drainsoul is more than enough sustain for a class that can just kite.
35% less damage from all sources, how the fuck is that a joke?

The DoT's can pressure healers because the damage adds up, especially if plague keeps spreading around.
Decay had a low enough CD to be placed on multiple people.

Necro is fine.
If anything, use Summons for a new class, and don't make Necro broken as balls.

 

[Trazil]

This thread is really funny...

Bonespear is basically impossible to miss unless you are @Wild_Porygon
Drainsoul is actually amazing and I don't know how you could say otherwise because it basically gives you infinite mana
Plague and Decay give you kiting potential that you need to the lack of any movement skills
Then there is Harmshield... the skill is a joke and shouldn't be there. It is what in my opinion makes the class overpowered and I can definitely assure you @_AlphaReaper_ if you think that giving a class harmshield, bonespear, and drainsoul is not insane then you should probably look at another class.

The class is fine how it is. It is incredibly strong and there are other classes that could get the time put into them instead.

Btw friends, classes are balanced for PvP not PvE please don't forget that.

 

[Wild_Porygon]

This thread is really funny...

Bonespear is basically impossible to miss unless you are @Wild_Porygon
Drainsoul is actually amazing and I don't know how you could say otherwise because it basically gives you infinite mana
Plague and Decay give you kiting potential that you need to the lack of any movement skills
Then there is Harmshield... the skill is a joke and shouldn't be there. It is what in my opinion makes the class overpowered and I can definitely assure you @_AlphaReaper_ if you think that giving a class harmshield, bonespear, and drainsoul is not insane then you should probably look at another class.

The class is fine how it is. It is incredibly strong and there are other classes that could get the time put into them instead.

Btw friends, classes are balanced for PvP not PvE please don't forget that.

glad to see my moment in herocraft history will never be forgotten

 

[Irishman81]

glad to see my moment in herocraft history will never be forgotten

 

[_AlphaReaper_]

I'm not a PvP kiddy. I enjoy both parts of HC. Purely balancing sound PvE is a dumb idea. Balancing around both is the only logical one

Have you changed your mind ?
Currently, PvP is very, very rare on the server.

Harmshield would be a good skill on a real MMORPG with powerful bosses and burst skills, but actually Herocraft bosses are just kinda health pools. If bosses were less bulky and dealt more burst dmg, you could block their skills with Harmshield.

Bonespear is good, but it isn't 'incredibely strong'. It's a Line-AOE skill, but regular AOEs as Megabolt, Pulse and PlagueSheep deal much more damage.

Drainsoul is helpful as a damage skill, but it doesn't heal enough health because Necro isn't a tank and you need health to use your skills.

DoTs are useful against self-healing foes, but else they are less useful than pure damage skills as Bolt or ArcaneBlast, which can kill enemies faster.

@_AlphaReaper_
Take your time, you'll have plenty of it.

How ? Necro has the worst armor in the game, it has no mobility skills to escape and most players play as a DPS.

By the way, how is damage calculated on Herocraft ? It seems you can deal x4 damage on mobs but I don't understand why.

 

[iAlchemist]

Have you changed your mind ?
Currently, PvP is very, very rare on the server.

Harmshield would be a good skill on a real MMORPG with powerful bosses and burst skills, but actually Herocraft bosses are just kinda health pools. If bosses were less bulky and dealt more burst dmg, you could block their skills with Harmshield.

Bonespear is good, but it isn't 'incredibely strong'. It's a Line-AOE skill, but regular AOEs as Megabolt, Pulse and PlagueSheep deal much more damage.

Drainsoul is helpful as a damage skill, but it doesn't heal enough health because Necro isn't a tank and you need health to use your skills.

DoTs are useful against self-healing foes, but else they are less useful than pure damage skills as Bolt or ArcaneBlast, which can kill enemies faster.


How ? Necro has the worst armor in the game, it has no mobility skills to escape and most players play as a DPS.

By the way, how is damage calculated on Herocraft ? It seems you can deal x4 damage on mobs but I don't understand why.

Damage scales with levels, firstly. At least, it has this time, but leveling will be fixed during the reset.

If you had read my previous post and actually paid attention, you'd understand that necromancer doesn't need mobility or armor to be good. You have an AoE blind and a pulsing AoE slow, and all your damage is overtime, which allows you easily place a dot, and run away. Other casters can't do that, because their main damage is based on hitting the target for damage upfront. Decay also has amazing damage for its mana cost, and as a necromancer you also can almost never run out of mana with Darkritual and Drainsoul.

Your mind is too focused on PvE to really understand the concept of balance here. I suppose that's understandable because it seems you started this map, when PvE was given this major overhaul with dungeons and shit (which will be removed once again.) PvE is a temporary landscape, once you're max level PvE isn't really important anymore, and you really should be considering balancing from a PvP perspective.

You tried to compare megabolt and Bonespear, to which I respond that you know very little about balancing and classes. Bonespear has no warm up, and deals outright instant damage through all characters within 20 blocks of that line. Train mobs, Bonespear, deals damage to most of them, rinse and repeat. Megabolt has a second long or two second long warmup for more up front damage, yes, but megabolt also sticks you in place...not something you want to do in PvP without some preparation. Megabolt deals somewhere around 200 something damage right? On a significantly longer CD than Bonespear. So, you get 200 damage upfront, ok. But with Bonespear the CD is eight seconds, and by then you'll also have dealt 200+ damage to mobs or players. Now account for plague, which spreads each tick, and you can mow down hordes of mobs within a few seconds. It isn't as "fast" as other classes, sure, but necromancer is extremely mana efficient and can pretty much destroy hordes of mobs. It's also WAY tanker than other classes, having the most health, and two pretty strong sustain skills.

Before you make a rebuttal, get online and try these things: (try them on normal mobs not heavens gate mobs. Heaven's gate mobs are broken as fuck, confirmed my Kainzo.)

Try Bonespear/Drainsoul/Darkritual/Decay and stand back. The monster will be dead within a few seconds. That combo can also be applied to large groups by doing Bonespear/Plague/Drainsoul/Darkritual/Despair. Which will end hordes like crazy.

 

[_AlphaReaper_]

Maybe you're right about PvE, PvP and interesting skills combos. I've never fought players as a Necro. I hope there will be more players after the reset so I'll be able to test it again.
But I don't really understand why DoT's are better than instant-dmg skills.
And I don't understand how Plague currently works. I tested it on hordes of mobs (Chickens etc...) and it didn't seem to spread. Or maybe only the first target can infect other mobs ? I can't test it because actual hordes of mobs are rare, and players keep hiding :/
Summons could be added to a new caster class, I think...

 

[LordZelkova]

Have you changed your mind ?
Currently, PvP is very, very rare on the server.

I haven't change my mind, we need to balance for both. Just because PvP is rare, doesn't mean we should balance only for PvE now.
I have never had an issue with Necro for leveling.

Harmshield would be a good skill on a real MMORPG with powerful bosses and burst skills, but actually Herocraft bosses are just kinda health pools. If bosses were less bulky and dealt more burst dmg, you could block their skills with Harmshield.

35% less damage from all sources, including players.
Stack that with Drainsoul and you can tank quite well for a Caster.

Bonespear is good, but it isn't 'incredibely strong'. It's a Line-AOE skill, but regular AOEs as Megabolt, Pulse and PlagueSheep deal much more damage.

Bonespear: 116 Damage, 8s CD, 20 Block Line
Wizard Pulse: 122 Damage, 10s CD, 8 Radius, Max of 5 Enemies, 1.25s Warm Up
Beguiler Pulse: 118 Damage, 10s CD. 5 Radius, Max of 5 Enemies, 1.25s Warm Up
PlagueBomb: 217 Damage, 20s CD, 5 Radius, Has to die before it goes off, worst case has a 6s gap before sheep does damage.

Notice how both Pulse and PB have longer CD's, different ranges, and mechanics? It's almost as if they're different classes and skills!
Bonespear can hit hard, relatively fast, and is pretty damn hard to miss.

Drainsoul is helpful as a damage skill, but it doesn't heal enough health because Necro isn't a tank and you need health to use your skills.

Drainsoul heals ~84 hp, DarkRitual Takes 100, for 16 HP you can get 200 Mana back.
As Trazil said earlier, infinite mana.

DoTs are useful against self-healing foes, but else they are less useful than pure damage skills as Bolt or ArcaneBlast, which can kill enemies faster.

Again, different classes, different skills. We can't balance Necro around the fact that Wizard is a burst, so Decay should do 150 damage a tick.

How ? Necro has the worst armor in the game, it has no mobility skills to escape and most players play as a DPS.

Worst Armor tied with Wizard, Beguiler, and Shaman. Almost like Magic classes don't normally tank!!

For reference, all the numbers are based on the Wiki, and assume the target has 0% Magic Resistance, in game these will be off due to that stat.