Casting in MA

[tengheau]

I have a question for you folks, whose contribution I greatly appreciate from the depth of my inability, who really sweat the details of game mechanics.

In situations where a caster is more likely to get hit, is the protection given by MA over LA worth it compared to the cost in malus? Is there some combination of LA/MA which optimizes the equation? (Assume that there is no healer for the duration of the time the caster is getting hit.)

Even though my motivations here are qualitative and my question does contain the qualitative word "worth", I am actually trying to get to a generally quantitative answer.

Now, I am not talking about:

• situations where a caster is *not* likely to get hit, such as nuking behind a tank.
• situations where the caster is getting hit because the tank just died and the caster didn't expect it, better armor won't help sloppy casting.
• situations where the caster expects to repeatedly sacrifice themselves such as when being a dedicated healer on a trek. It is just going to happen that those being trekked pick up aggro by taking a straight line from their current location to the leader instead of the exact path the leader took (and of course, when the hole the leader took closed after him/her).

I would pick LA in these three cases.

Situations I am thinking of include

• leading a trek as a nuker, or trekking solo
• soloing nuking, where you expect to get chewed on before the last cast lands

Okay so what are my qualitative motives? I am having a fashion crisis. I would generally prefer not to wear a prom dress and most of the male LA pants are ugly with a capitol "ug". I have no desire to wear "Biker-Boi" Fyros, "Peter Pan" Zorai or "Pumpkin Pants" Matis and the "Rat Patrol" Tryker doesn't look very good with much else. Incidentally, as a Tryker with a conservative haircut I am a dead ringer for Peter Pan when wearing my red zorai LA with pants. This is great for yuks but I don't find very inspiring. Maybe if you all clap your hands it would help, I dunno.

There are a lot of cool looking MA combinations that I would love to make and wear as long as they make even a lick of sense or if there is a particular combination that makes any sense.

Lastly, why don't I just experiment with it for a while? Because I am clawing my way towards AoD in casting and my MA crafting is only at 110. As I don't know any high level MA crafters, I am hoping to get the theory ironed out before I spend a long time trying the practical experiment. Besides everyone I asked didn't know, and I figured somebody had worked it out.

Anyway, thanks in advance,

Calevin

[japamala]

I don't know about casting, because I don't do a lot of magery, but I can say that medium armor with ranged works perfectly fine, and I have gone with it quite often.

[ghyselsj]

Get a set of +1 dodge, with sap bonus. You have same HP as in LA, more protection, and the sap bonus makes up for most of your MA penalty.

Realistically though, for trekking solo, wear HA and keep running. For leading a trek, wear LA if you insist on casting, and have a healer standing by. For solo ele grind... don't solo ele

MA is good stuff. The only things it should absolutely not be used for is crafting (yes harvesting in MA is sometimes a good idea... hard to dig spots become a lot easier with a set of focus MA and a healer... they'll pull it off you, but at least you wont die and lose all your focus in one or two hits.). It's acceptable for casting since the malus is bearable. It's acceptable for melee cause the protection is decent (provided you have a good set, and +1 or even +2 parry). It's wonderful for ranged since ranged drains stam like daggers do (meaning heavy would be really painful).

From a fashion PoV, if you feel more comfortable casting in MA, by all means, go for it. As long as you don't use HA, it's all good.

[d29565]

I have a all LA set except for the vest with is MA. (no particular reason other than fashion for using vest as the MA). I decided to use one piece of MA because it doesn't really interfer with my casting (if I have decent amps), it gives me extra protection (because it is always a supreme vest), and I make sure it is plus 1 dodge so that at the very least my dodge is only brought down 1 point from 260 (with a geneal +2 dodge set).

I cannot offer you actual fashion idea though, as you are a male avi, and tryker...not quite what I work with.

Hope what I said was a little useful.

[dcrispo]

Some others have suggested to me to try wearing MA for general purpose hunts and treks plus the odd OP battle. Just started doing so and so far it seems to be alot more protection then I'm used to wearing LA. Like two great players mentioned get a set with either +2 dodge or parry. I like the idea of having some sap bonus added to the MA, my set (while Supreme) is all HP bonuses, a decent mix of bonuses might be the perfect fit for me at least.
Like everything else here ingame, try it and see! What doesn't work for one, works for someone else just great. And your right not a whole lotta MA crafters out there and I seriously think its going to be a much sought after skill in the very near future.

[0balgus0]

Some good discussion on MA usage Here. Some points will be redundant, but still good to know.

[sidusar]

I'd say the extra protection of MA is definitely worth the extra malus in those situations where a caster is likely to get hit. I wouldn't worry too much about optimizing the equation though. You could calculate an optimal efficiency, I'm sure, but you'd have to calculate it for every seperate situation.

As some general numbers:
The malus on MA means you'll burn 24% more health and mana on spells.
The health bonus and increased protection on MA mean you'll be able to take about 40% more (physical) damage.

But that second number changes depending on how much health you have, how much damage is being done to you, whether you factor in dodge, how much health you regenerate during the fight, etc etc.

For leading a trek as a nuker, MA could be a good choice if you want to give the healers some more time to react. For trekking solo though, you generally don't want to be casting at all. For soloing nuking I'd go with LA, as you shouldn't get chewed on regularly. If you can't kill the mob before it reaches you, you need a different strategy or a different mob.

I'd think MA would also be the better choice if you plan to repeatedly sacrifice yourself. The longer you stay alive, the more good you can do.

And if your motives are mostly fashion-based, there's even less reason to worry about optimal efficiency. Even in those situations where you don't expect to get hit, wearing one or two pieces of MA only gives a small penalty compared to a full LA set. Spending 5% less sap on your spells is hardly worth having a fashion crisis, in my opinion

[raven41]

I don't usually mage in MA... Even back when I soloed ele from 235-245 (wow that was a rough ride too , Before cats ever existed) Id never recomend solo'ing ele at higher levels unless you have alot of patience

But with Sap boost, And good +dodge on it, It works pretty well with the right spell setups... Tho, I still have never been able to dodge mid cast... Iv been told you can, But every test Iv done shows otherwise, When you do escape being hit its because the mob simply missed

Mages shouldn't tank

[sehracii]

Right, you always have a 0% chance to dodge or parry while cast6ing. Getting special +2 dodge LA or +1 dodge MA will only help if you plan to stand and stare at your attacker doing nothing or run away. (And still then +5 dodge only changes your chance of getting hit 3% at best)


One piece of MA is pretty much inconsequential. Go for the pants! All the time, it won't matter.

More is, of course, siutuational. I cast in 4 pieces of MA pretty much always, but as a mainly afflictionist, I don't use many expenive double spells.

The biggest complaint I have about it is the reduction in range of my cast.
I can see this causing a big problem while soloing elemental (more thna one piece anyway) - as ideally you attack something 50m away and have it killed before it gets to you. Reducing your range with multiple pieces of MA will cause it to get to you much sooner.

[raven41]

Right, you always have a 0% chance to dodge or parry while cast6ing. Getting special +2 dodge LA or +1 dodge MA will only help if you plan to stand and stare at your attacker doing othing or run away. (And still then +5 dodge only changes your chance of getting hit 3% at best

HA! I knew I was right... I just gave up arguing lol...