So my suggestion is to put an area of effect jamming Anti Magic aura into the fight skill tree, which fighters can use to defend themselves against hostile mages - and creature specials - and offensively by preventing enemies from healing targets within the zone. By standing over a downed opponent, they can prevent it being rezzed, or by closing with the 'mage line' they can lock them down -forcing them to do something besides stand in place and spam nuke spells.
Melee fighters would be needed to counter enemy melees, getting back to the traditional system of defensive infantry/fighters, and offensive artillery/bombers
It would even revitalize ranged combat, if nuking was not 100% reliable anymore.
the auras would need to be level based, so a level 50 fighter couldnt wipe out a level 200 mage - and possibly even branch-based, so your aura against healing is not as effective against nukes or afflictions...
-maybe have bricks vs magic branches.. so you can choose not to defend against defensive afflictions in the hope no-one uses them against you
The timed aura system currrently in play wouldnt work very well with this, you would want some kind of hp/stam -maybe even sap- cost per tick.
One other point. Im envisaging this as a total lockdown effect.. your own team cant heal you either.
Im making this up as I go
, just thought of having it ~percentage reduction effect, so spells in the zone still work, but effectiveness is reduced by ratio of fighters level vs spelll level ??Anyway, thats my offering.. say anything nasty about it and I may never heal you again
