Ryzom

After playing with the post-patch magic system for a few days, I find that it works decently for small groups (2-3 players), is ok for soloing (or would be if my elemental and def afflliction would be near the same level), and is unworkable for large groups (7+ players) except for healing.

For small groups (assuming at least one melee type and one mage) you are able to fight 10-15 levels above your current skill, have a good chance of partially disrupting the creature with stun/blind/etc (meaning having it afflicted about half the time during the fight), can do decent damage with elemental, and can heal the fighter if the creature gets a few good hits in. Doing this you and the fighter can both get more xp will you will solo. Only problem here is you both have to be very similar in the level of the skills you are using - fighter has to be high enough to be able to taunt the creature, mage high enough to get the afflictions/elelmental blasts to not be resisted most of the time. I found effectively this means you're limited to grouping with people within 5-10 levels of yourself (can have a 3rd person be healer or melee damage of lower level), any more than that and your xp rate will greatly diminish. Groups of 2-4 mages also work, killing somewhat smaller things quickly before they can close to melee. In a good melee/mage partnership, I was able to get about 1200 xp per minute, limited mostly by the time it takes to pull the creatures (helps if the melee also have some healing to replenish your hp/sap). There is one problem with this - the melee is getting almost all of his xp in one skill branch, you'll be getting yours spread out over at least 2, so unless the melee type is leveling in two branches he'll eventually outlevel you, and you won't be able to partner anymore.

For soloing, you can either fight things with low hps and several levels below you which you simply blast down before it can do much damage to you, gettling less xp per mob but able to kill them as fast as your sap/hp regen will allow. If your def afflicton is the same level as your elemental, you can fight things closer to your own level relatively safely using fear kiting. Much less xp than partnering, I was probably getting 300 xp per minute (500 during the stretches where I didn't had to lose an add by running to a friendly tribe).

For big groups, however, to get a decent xp rate (equal to the partner rate above), you have to fight things 30-40 levels above you (assuming again everyone in the group is roughly the same level). At this point, the creatures are resisting you 80-90% of the time, making the afflictions worthless and giving you an elemental damage rate that's a small fraction of what the melee types are doing. I have seen several groups during this time who concluded that they only wanted fighters and healers to get a higher xp rate.

From my experiences, it's pretty clear that the magic resist rates need to be altered to allow non-healing mages to be worthwhile in large groups. We don't, however, want to return to the pre-patch state where a low level mage with level 1 blind/stun can lock down a level 250 boss, or to overpower the smaller groups. It would also be good if the affliction spells other than blind and stun actually had some use in groups. With that in mind, here are some suggestions which I have thought of for improving how magic works:

1) Remove the absolute pass/fail resist checks that are now made. Instead implement a resist system whereby the effects of the spell are diminished if the target resists. The level difference between mage and target will set a base resist rate to which a random amount is added, and at some defined level difference the base resist rate is some capped amount (like 95%, so that a mage always has some chance of affecting something, just like a fighter always has some chance to dodge/parry a blow coming in). Only stun should have absolute pass/fail on the resist checks, all the other spells can be scaled in their effects.

2) Each spell should be given a resist modifier based on the degree of impediment it places on the target. Stun should clearly be the hardest to stick on the target, as it's a complete immobilization, sleep should be relatively easy to stick on the target, as it is instantly broken if any damage is done (although I could see adding a modifier to the resist based on how damaged the target is, with more damaged targets harder to sleep).

3) All affliction spells should automatically link, with a check each tick to see if the affliction works - so even if you get unlucky and never get the affliction to take effect that combat you will still get xp for attempting to contribute to the group (unless the resist against you is maxed out, in which case you really shouldn't be part of that group anyway). Similarly unless the resist is maxed out, elemental spells which are resisted should still count as attempting to contribute to the group and you should get xp for them.

4) The above changes will likely make fear overpowered for soloing again, to counteract this I would allow the target a new chance to resist the fear every time it is damaged, and possibly give it a bonus to resist for every fear cast on it in the recent past.

5) Being an affliction mage is rather boring once you do get a lock (pre-patch, currently I haven't ever gotten a link to last for longer than 5-6 seconds). To somewhat alleviate this I would allow a mage to maintain a link and still be able to cast other spells or even melee, but with a significant malus on the actions (it's hard to concentrate on one action while performing another, but not impossible). This would also need a cancel-link button if you need to drop it in an emergency to quickly cast a different spell.

fiadd wrote:After playing with the post-patch magic system for a few days, I find that it works decently for small groups (2-3 players), is ok for soloing (or would be if my elemental and def afflliction would be near the same level), and is unworkable for large groups (7+ players) except for healing.

I completely concurr. I have been posting this for two days now. I hope you don't get flamed nearly as hard as I did.

1) Remove the absolute pass/fail resist checks that are now made. Instead implement a resist system whereby the effects of the spell are diminished if the target resists. The level difference between mage and target will set a base resist rate to which a random amount is added, and at some defined level difference the base resist rate is some capped amount (like 95%, so that a mage always has some chance of affecting something, just like a fighter always has some chance to dodge/parry a blow coming in). Only stun should have absolute pass/fail on the resist checks, all the other spells can be scaled in their effects.

This would probably work. Personally I would just like to see magic be equally as effective as melee is. Melee attacks have a much wider range that they can affect up to, and frankly they are not at all any weaker than most mage attacks. Most melee fighters lower level than me do more damage than my highest level elemental attack. They also hit better than I do >_< and have to spend less stamina than I do sap (or sap and hp with credits...)

2) Each spell should be given a resist modifier based on the degree of impediment it places on the target. Stun should clearly be the hardest to stick on the target, as it's a complete immobilization, sleep should be relatively easy to stick on the target, as it is instantly broken if any damage is done (although I could see adding a modifier to the resist based on how damaged the target is, with more damaged targets harder to sleep).

This is just gravy for the developers. If they want to rationalize making magic not completely broken for a team by adding situtational penalties... then so be it. Anything at this point is better than nothing.

3) All affliction spells should automatically link, with a check each tick to see if the affliction works - so even if you get unlucky and never get the affliction to take effect that combat you will still get xp for attempting to contribute to the group (unless the resist against you is maxed out, in which case you really shouldn't be part of that group anyway). Similarly unless the resist is maxed out, elemental spells which are resisted should still count as attempting to contribute to the group and you should get xp for them.

My #1 issue - I can't get XP in a team with people my own level because the enemies they fight for XP are far beyond my ability to affect regularly. It is not fun watching three mobs go down and not getting a single point of XP in any of my skills, yet being almost completely out of sap.

I Couldn't agree more that something needs to be done in this regard.

4) The above changes will likely make fear overpowered for soloing again, to counteract this I would allow the target a new chance to resist the fear every time it is damaged, and possibly give it a bonus to resist for every fear cast on it in the recent past.

Fear was never really that over powered for soloing to begin with in my opinion. One resist is all it takes in order for the mob to start hammering on you. Need to be quick with a good backup spell on that amp or have a fast switch to melee for the kill. Mage soloing actually was never really that good due to the high sap cost on abilities... A melee with blind 1 on his weapon and a create sap crystal spell was definately the best soloer in the game prior to patch 1. (And may still even be due to the fact that they can replace blind with stun for close to the same affect...)

5) Being an affliction mage is rather boring once you do get a lock (pre-patch, currently I haven't ever gotten a link to last for longer than 5-6 seconds). To somewhat alleviate this I would allow a mage to maintain a link and still be able to cast other spells or even melee, but with a significant malus on the actions (it's hard to concentrate on one action while performing another, but not impossible). This would also need a cancel-link button if you need to drop it in an emergency to quickly cast a different spell.

The manual quite clearly states that you can establish multiple locks. However in-game you cannot. This has bugged me ever since I realized this was the case. Most games have a concept of something called "Crowd Control". I think the EQ enchanter set the mold for this. Now that was a fun class, no direct damage abilities worth a sack of beans, but as part of a team you were the star player. Lots of action, lots of quick thinking and a ton of fun.

In Ryzom however we get... single mob control. And yeah I agree with you, it is boring as dirt. The devs can do a better job than this, and it even looks like they PLANNED to (the list of your active links display is still in game, supporting the idea they planned to have multiple links be established).

This is part of the reason why I think sleep is broken. I think sleep was supposed to be a "cheap" crowd control device. You stick it on adds while your team fights one at a time, the lower sap cost from sleep allows you to hold up more of them at a time than you could stun - which provides a tactical combat advantage.

I agree with alot of what you said. I suppose that is the death knell for your thread....

Enter... the fanbois.

jjm152 wrote:This would probably work. Personally I would just like to see magic be equally as effective as melee is. Melee attacks have a much wider range that they can affect up to, and frankly they are not at all any weaker than most mage attacks. Most melee fighters lower level than me do more damage than my highest level elemental attack. They also hit better than I do >_< and have to spend less stamina than I do sap (or sap and hp with credits...)

Yeah, forgot to add that the rate which the base resist should increase should be much slower than it is now - so that you still have a reasonable chance of success (maybe 50/50, 40/60, etc) against a mob that's of a level you would expect to fight in a 9 person team. With the variable resist it would mean you can still blind it, but the blind wouldn't be as effective on average as against a mob more your own level.

jjim152 wrote:Fear was never really that over powered for soloing to begin with in my opinion. One resist is all it takes in order for the mob to start hammering on you. Need to be quick with a good backup spell on that amp or have a fast switch to melee for the kill. Mage soloing actually was never really that good due to the high sap cost on abilities... A melee with blind 1 on his weapon and a create sap crystal spell was definately the best soloer in the game prior to patch 1. (And may still even be due to the fact that they can replace blind with stun for close to the same affect...)

Pre-patch 1, I was able to regularly fear kite creatures which gave me 3k xp solo (higher level herbivores with low hps generally as well as things like cutes), which I think is probably a bit excessive.

fiadd wrote: Pre-patch 1, I was able to regularly fear kite creatures which gave me 3k xp solo (higher level herbivores with low hps generally as well as things like cutes), which I think is probably a bit excessive.

Yeah, well pre-patch 1 I could melee 3k mobs to death back to back with my completely uber 71 close combat skills as well (two daggers mind you)

The risk/reward pre-patch 1 was just as screwed up as post-patch 1. What I'm looking for is some parity between fight and magic insofar as group contribution and solo/play as well as a re-balancing of risk/reward back towards something more sensible.

To me it looks like the game went from being able to get maximum reward for very little risk to getting minimal reward for a large degree of risk.

Mages right now have a lot of penalties fighting:

- Light armor is very needed to wear, but provides almost no protection.
- When casting you negate what little defenses you do have.
- You can be interrupted (quite frequently) when under melee attack.

The only way for a mage to effectively solo is either:

1) Nuke, then go for a swim and Nuke again.
2) Nuke and use some other ability to keep enemy at bay.

You can attempt to *concentrate* a spell through melee attacks with the new stanza, but even in that case you are still exposing yourself to a far greater degree of risk than a similar level melee character.

Personally if they want to have a 1k or 1.5k solo XP cap with something approaching the old combat system, I would be perfectly content. Atleast the game would be a little bit more fun...I don't find bombing ybers at max range a ton of fun, especially since my other magic abilities atrophy while I build elemental magic.

Btw, the way the game currently stands, picking on 600xp monsters I can basically sustain a 1800 to 2400 xp/minute intake with no down time. But like I said before... its not a lot of fun and the only abilities I get to use are my nukes.

However, it definately is the most effective way for me to solo my mage now...

The only things I can suggest are 2 things.

1) Leave a similar resist system to now, but let mage spells affect a much higher level mobs. For instance a level 50 mage affliction would land on mobs up to say 80-100, whatever the fair range is. (I haven't done research on the scalling of afflictions) This would be a smaller change and still allow mages to be in higher level groups.

2) Spells don't link very well after the patch, or perhaps my understanding of how the links work is less, but they should stay linked on mobs up to the level the spell states. Now they tend to break after only a few seconds no matter what level mob you use it on unless it is way below your level.