Spec Casters....

[Aetosion]

The point of a caster is to do the greatest deal of damage, whilst having the least protection.

@ Whoever mentioned the heals warmup, fireball is not a heal. Fireball is the staple damage output of the caster path. For another class, this would be like putting a warmup on melee strikes. Now, fireball has been tweaked recently. I think the tweak made it more powerful, personally, but that was the choice made by the devs. I do like the idea of the hoe modifier.

Perhaps something like:
No Hoe: 12 base
Wood Hoe: 14 base
Stone Hoe: 16 base
Iron Hoe: 18 Base
Diamond Hoe: 20 Base
Gold Hoe: 22 Base

Although I don't understand from a Lore point of view, why a caster would need a tool to cast the magic, but the modifier would make the spell more balanced. This should apply to healers and their heals/smite as well to make it fair, if the basis for magic is now revolving around staffs/hoes.

As a Wizard, I acknowledge that my class has the rare ability to walk out of a graveyard at full strength. This was one of the primary reasons I chose this class, its adaptability and mobility. I do understand the issue however, and I think adding a hoe modifier would make sense. It would anchor the strength of the combatant to the inventory, like with most other classes, and ensure some sort of drop from a ready opponent. It would also do a huge nerf to caster strength, while giving it a kind-of buff. The point should be made that not many casters would use a gold hoe, just like it's rare to see a thief with a golden sword.

@millejinta87 Unless you gave casters chainmail armour like Rangers (and increased hoe melee), warmups would not be practical. Rangers are a hybrid class, having the ability to wreak havoc close range with an axe, and picking enemies off from the distance with arrows. Rangers can survive the 3-tick aim and charge of a bow, they have chainmail armour and prowess close range. Casters have leather armour and at best, 4 dmg melee attacks.

Casters are not a hybrid, they are pure long-range damage, and removing that ability would severely handicap the class.

There's also a 2ish second cooldown between fireballs, whereas a melee attack can be immediate, one after another. If you want the caster to have the same attack quality of another class, their fireball cooldown should be changed to .5 seconds or so. The fireball damage should be lowered about 5 - 10 points, and the mana cost should be halved. Or more.

In conclusion to my last contention, casters are made to not be conventional combatants. They should not be treated as such when balancing. However, a damage modifier like the hoes could be effective.

 

[Aetosion]

Speaking of which, me and my Ranger buddy were fighting pig zombies. Rangers have higher damage per second than Wizards, it took me far longer to dispatch my foe than he his.

 

[HollowSith]

As a Wizard/ Geo maxed spec, my opinion is that fireball be dropped to 15 damage, 19-20 with fire tick, no lower. In no way can it have a warm up. It's the only skill as a Wizard that they can use to steadily deal damage without losing incredible amounts of Mana.

Fireball does a great deal of damage, but at a price of mana. Initially the mana cost looks nil but in reality, it is quite significant. For example, lets use Samurai.

The samurai can use his diamond sword (base attack) for let's say 100 times before it breaks, again, as an example. Dealing 10 damage. This player can use and in-fact spam this, up close, 100 times while hitting someone. 100x10 is 1000 damage and because he is up close he can hit 8/10 shots while strafing (again, only using his sword (no skills)). He can click at a rate of 5 per second. 800/5 is 160. So in 160 seconds, a samurai can roughly do 800 damage. A little over 2 minutes. The problem with samurai's is that something (whether it be lag or the game mechanics, I don't know) prevents from you dropping like a fly. Those 5 hits per second don't hit. After testing it's close to exactly 1 second before each attack gives actual damage to the enemy. So simply it becomes 10 seconds, 100 damage. With the average miss, 80 damage per 10 seconds.

A Wizard at present time does 18 damage every 3 seconds. At 11 MANA per shot, along with regen. It's 10 shots per full bar of mana. 10x3 is 30, and 10x18 is 180. So in 30 seconds, a total of 180 damage can be dealt. I hit about 6 of 10 shots while fighting. So 10x3 is 30 and 6x18 is 108. In 30 seconds, I will get roughly around 108 damage on you.

This is all by my own tests, experiences and findings. Wizard, 108 damage over 30 seconds, 216 of 60, if you wanna use replenish. Samurai, 80 every 10. The trade is that Fireball goes through armour and has longer distance but also has a cool down + requires mana that you can not use sparingly; while the sword will not break easily in a fight, can be spammed with no consequence and can deal steady accurate medium damage, up close. The draw back to the sword is the minerals needed to create it and the lack of armour penetration. I see two up sides and two down sides to both offensive parties. Both of which cater to the players personal play style.

Maybe I messed the Math up or you yourself have your own findings, but I have personally tested this with friends. In my opinion this is a fair trade off. Fireball, in this example, compared to a common samurai's sword is completely acceptable. There is no need for a nerf, but if it must, my opinion is 15, no lower.

 

[Aetosion]

Even 15 is a serious cut. By your math, every 30 seconds a Samurai can do about 300 damage (with armour on himself). A wizard could do somewhere around 100, maybe less.

Someone tells me the fireball for Geomancer has different mechanics. According to @atvrider312 who just said so on TS, Geomancers have a third of the cooldown for fireball. That could be an issue.

 

[Ling_Ling_]

Yes no doubt caster is overpowered, but fire ball can be hard to hit sometimes, and it only takes like 2-3 hits from a sword to kill a caster. Maybe a slight increase in cooldown?

 

[lax12]

all i have to to say is that yes warrior class of any kind can just spam the crap outta a caster with their sword with no consequences, while lag considering and mana like hollow said I would be more than happy with those odds, plus me being a beguiler fireball is my really only attacking skill at lower lvls, but can't complain im gonna unlock an exploding sheep haha.

 

[BulkPhase]

Sure you could 4 shot someone, if they don't move.

Root, Web, DeepFreeze and Piggify solves that.

 

[Aetosion]

@Ling_Ling_ Again, fireball is the staple skill of every class in the caster path. Casters have little to no melee, and little to no armour.

Okay, according to the wiki, Beguilers have 1 second fireball cooldown and all other casters have 2 seconds.

Lowering damage on fireball in some way could be a viable alternative, provided it doesn't render the class unplayable, but increasing a cooldown would not be. Just as giving fireball a warmup would not be. Once more, I will compare it to giving (regular) melee attacks warmups and cooldowns. The current damage output of a Caster spec with just fireball, compared to a Rogue/Warrior spec with just Bow/Diamond Melee Weapon, is weaker than their melee based counterparts.

 

[BulkPhase]

@Ling_Ling_ Again, fireball is the staple skill of every class in the caster path. Casters have little to no melee, and little to no armour.

Okay, according to the wiki, Beguilers have 1 second fireball cooldown and all other casters have 2 seconds.

Lowering damage on fireball in some way could be a viable alternative, provided it doesn't render the class unplayable, but increasing a cooldown would not be. Just as giving fireball a warmup would not be. Once more, I will compare it to giving (regular) melee attacks warmups and cooldowns. The current damage output of a Caster spec with just fireball, compared to a Rogue/Warrior spec with just Bow/Diamond Melee Weapon, is weaker than their melee based counterparts.

But when a melee class can just get froze or some other way of root they are completely rendered useless. Normally when the Caster outputs a root skill and a fireball they run off and the melee chases after only to be kited by fireballs dealing a forth of their health every hit. I'm done with this thread, but just putting my input out there, Fireball needs a nerf. Not sure how, but they need to work a nerf in there.

 

[Aetosion]

@Kazho I believe the immobilization spells break before you can get a second fireball in. Getting a lock on with root is just about the same as managing to hit with fireball. Root/Freeze/Etc. just gives the caster time to get a little further out of the way. I'm not speaking for Geomancers with their epic slowing skills, but other caster classes are not given much of an advantage with Root/Pig/etc. It's harder to cast root on someone than it is fireball, you need to be close range for root.

The spells discussed don't give serious offensive advantages, instead they give a ranged class room to try and stay ranged. Just as Dragoon's jump gives a close-range class the ability to stay close-ranged.

Root causing the person it is cast upon to get hit with 4 fireballs is their fault. I've gotten frozen/root'd by plenty of other casters in combat. It sucks, especially if it's a geomancer and I can't get out of the way afterwards, but if it's not- I can avoid the next few fireballs with relative ease. You've got to understand that all casters have got to fight other casters as well. It's not like we're a giant arcane army focused on destroying all melee classes. Root is like a caster's armour. It shields him or her from some possible damage, and gives the chance to get an extra hit in there,

Strafe my boy! Strafe!

 

[Aetosion]

On that note, I think the speed upgrade fireball got makes it a little too hard to dodge. The old fireball with +4 damage -50% speed was more balanced than the near auto-hit version (within 20ish blocks) that we have now.

 

[HollowSith]

Root breaks on damage. Root also has a short range for use. This means, either the caster can risk letting the enemy get close and use a fireball or other like skills, or run for his/her life. Either way, it isn't a long enough duration or post any severe advantage for it to be called OP or have any impact on this discussion.

The fireball isn't auto hit, it just uses a different form of estimation. Which many players seem to be taking a liking to.

 

[lhatchy1]

In my opinion the recent nerfing of fireballs makes the caster an equal class to all other classes. All classes are matched equally by obvious things like armour restriction etc. So I have no real complaint

 

[itzmak]

In my opinion the recent nerfing of fireballs makes the caster an equal class to all other classes. All classes are matched equally by obvious things like armour restriction etc. So I have no real complaint

No, not when fireball goes right through armor.

 

[lax12]

piggify actually makes it a lot harder to hit a target because the freakin pig moves all over the place XD

 

[itzmak]

Bingy just killed me in literally 2 seconds. Root -> Bolt -> Fireball and maybe another fireball then I am dead. Do something about this shit. It's making this server not fun for non caster specs (even though 75% of the server are casters)

 

[Kainzo]

It just means that Fireball should have a higher cooldown if anything. A warmup on fireball may have too large negatives...

 

[BlackOhso]

Fireball on anyone will just stun them, not litterally but the damage dealt will just make you think wtf just happened. Even on a pally they get wrecked and they're supposed to be able to take hits. It makes armor virtually useless while fighting a caster. Me being a healer, I can't out heal a party member or myself while going against a caster as that now they shoot even faster along with their damage. So I agree that maybe just a nerf on damage would help things out rather than warmups.

 

[arcanegrove]

My option, give fireball a 0.75 second warmup. Even if Dmg Dmg was reduced, casters could still kite. If fireball had a warmup, kiting would be much harder to kite, not impossible, just harder. A geomancer could easily take this nerf, and wizards have blink. It wouldn't even make caster specs close to usless, just harder to play. If warmup was present, I think this would be a wizards Rot, root, bold, fireball, blink, fireball, and repeat. Adding a warmup would requir caster specs to use all their skill for a few different circumstances. Geomancers have their slows, wizards have blink, necros have web, and reduce casting time for beguiliars to 0.5.

My 2 cents.

 

[Aetosion]

It just means that Fireball should have a higher cooldown if anything. A warmup on fireball may have too large negatives...

Again I'd mention that all those cooldowns would stack up, and a caster would be defenceless for a few seconds, those few are enough to die without armour. I'd propose lowering damage of fireball, and reducing cooldown / mana costs. That way there's a greater ability for the enemy to escape, but there's still steady attack like all other classes.​

About:​

1-1.5 second cooldown​

12-15 damage base​

Approximately 8% mana cost​

That would leave caster damage output relatively the same, but it would take more mana / fireballs to output the same level of damage. It would take an extra fireball or two to take out the enemy, meaning a dodge or two can leave the enemy in much better shape.​

My option, give fireball a 0.75 second warmup. Even if Dmg Dmg was reduced, casters could still kite. If fireball had a warmup, kiting would be much harder to kite, not impossible, just harder. A geomancer could easily take this nerf, and wizards have blink. It wouldn't even make caster specs close to usless, just harder to play. If warmup was present, I think this would be a wizards Rot, root, bold, fireball, blink, fireball, and repeat. Adding a warmup would requir caster specs to use all their skill for a few different circumstances. Geomancers have their slows, wizards have blink, necros have web, and reduce casting time for beguiliars to 0.5.

​

My 2 cents.​

Adding a warmup is like getting the caster super drunk. When they need to attack, they need to wait to do it, and since it's a projectile attack, that'd be near impossible to hit with. Instead of targetting and throwing the fireball, you'd need to track the enemy as the move after trying to throw, making it near impossible to hit them. You'd no longer be able to hit them strategically when they're on bad ground. You'd be randomly throwing fireballs missing most of the time. Warmups also stop if another spell is used, making your proposition about Web/Root/Pig/Freeze entirely pointless.​

​

Once more I'll relate it to adding a warmup for conventional melee strikes. Imagine someone getting close to you, and you trying to slash at them. OH , WAIT, suddenly you need to chill while you're being destroyed, then you slash. You're either lucky, dead, or you missed and you're about to die.​