Casting Spells without Reagents = GOOD

Casting spells without reagents is the best news I've heard since they decided to bring back the 3d overworld map.

As suggested it has all the benefits of a reagent-required system, because every mage will try their hardest to obtain their reagents and keep them in stock, rather than be pathetic at casting spells, but when their back is against the wall or the dungeon has 2 more levels than they expected, they are not dead in the water.

It has the same impact on other parts of the game as reagents-required, because reagents are still so very important, but it removes the un-fun portion of "oops accidentally forgot to stock up on monkey glands guess I'll go all the way back out of the dungeon I spent the last 2 hours exploring to get more" issue.

I love it. Best. Idea. Ever.

 

There are multiple reasons that this is a horrible idea...but perhaps the most important one is the impact to game balance.

In a game where Min/Maxing will continue it's long tradition of being commonplace, the naked mage, naked exploiter, naked griefer, will greatly appreciate the fact that they can cast spells without reagents. It means they will never have to fear losing anything but the time it takes to respawn.

 

If taken at 1 elements value then yes all this nakedness would be a problem. They have answer for the naked mage.

Reagents have nothing to do with fear of loss, unless they have changed the loot system.

 

::sigh::

It's not even in question if we will see naked or near naked mages running around in this game if reagents are not required for casting. It's a forgone conclusion.

 

If naked mages die in a near instantaneous fashion, as they should, it is by no means a forgone conclusion.

 

You have a tendency to over-state your case or ignore part of the proposed idea. Magic is going to be much weaker without reagents. Assuming the devs know what they're doing (that's my first thought), it will be significantly weaker. Something that you would ONLY use as a fallback position, because casting without reagents is just that. A last ditch effort. It lets the pure mage stay in the fight, it doesn't allow them to remain competitive without them.

That's the whole point. You really NEED reagents to be effective, but if you run out, you're not standing around with your hands in your pockets, your contributing in a much weakened state.

And what do you mean they never have to fear losing anything but the time to respawn? Since this is not a full loot game, reagents doesn't change that one way or another since you cannot loot my reagents.

The point is that it doesn't really change much on a balance level, since the spells are so much weaker without reagents. What it does do, is allow a single player with limited time, to not waste their time completely when they run out of reagents in a dungeon.

 

Do a google search on "darkfall naked mages". Or really any PVP related MMO.

It's a forgone conclusion.

 

It's a forgone conclusion if done badly, I suppose.

Ya THINK???

 

Anecdotal evidence about MMOs does not make it a forgone conclusion. This is not a standard MMO. It is not Darkfall. Why don't we try it out and see what happens? Maybe you'll be pleasantly surprised. It's happened before.

 

Except the greatly reduced effectiveness of spells cast without reagents (2o-25% of full strength, for example) means that they will probably lose when facing a mage stocked with reagents and casting full strength spells. They stand a good chance of losing some of their loot and/or body parts. (You don't think mages will take advantage of that opportunity? ) Seems pretty fair to me

 

I'm sure we will try it out. I'm sure we'll see naked mages.

I don't know what you think I've been surprised about before.

 

It seems fair to all players that don't want to worry about reagents and will focus on the combat sigil as a primary form of attack.

 

Sounds like one of my suggestions actually got picked up
If they went with reagents empowering spells I am really glad to hear that, fighters get soft breakage for there swords and this is the only fair way to balance that

 

No.

When a fighter doesn't have a weapon, he can't fight. So how does it balance when a mage doesn't have reagents they CAN fight? It doesn't.

 

Even unarmed, a warrior can punch. I would expect that to be just about as effective as a mage casting without reagents.

 

Its been stated by deva hat 'broken' weapons are usable in their broken state. They aren't going to do much damage in that state, but the warrior isn't going to be unable to continue to at least due some damage. Casting without reagents seem to fall into the same camp. Since the deva haven't said anything about how non-reagent casting is going to work, a possible scenario is that reagents are always needed to cast a spell. If the mage runs out of reagents, similar to a broken weapon, certain spells could be cast at a reduced effectiveness. others may not be castable. I guess since durability is planned for R9, we'll be able to better compare mechanics. Unless of course the devs clarify things beforehand.

 

Personally I am hoping that broken weapons will not be useable. But if they are going to make broken weapons useable then I can see why they would see it as fair to allow mages to still cast without reagents.

 

If they implement soft breakage the way it was proposed the fighter ALWAYS has a weapon, It doesn't disappear or become unusable, it just becomes less effective to the point where you want to get it fixed. This was Chris's original idea because he said they didn't want your sword to suddenly break and leave you unarmed in combat or far from town, you should still be able to defend yourself just not very effectively.

That is why I proposed using reagents to empower spells at the same ratio as a completely broken sword to a newly repaired affinity sword (ratio, not direct damage)

 

Seems pretty fair to me - both the warrior wielding the broken weapon and the mage casting spells without reagents are both severely handicapped, but still more or less equally effective in combat At least that's the way it's supposed to be...

 

I'm hesitant to chime in on this since it seems to be such a hotly debated topic but I'd like to offer my opinion on the subject. My thoughts on character classes are rooted in the old days of text based MUDs. In those, particularly DIKI/Circle MUDS, balance came in the form of a mixed group and class trade-offs:

Trade-Offs:

• Cleric: Very very weak a low levels, can only fight the most basic of MOBs. Often taken under the wing of a fighter a few levels higher to help level up so the fighter would have a friendly healer to help him. High level clerics eventually get one or 2 very powerful offensive spells. Good defense at any level. Trade off - weak/slow leveling early, eventually powerful.
• Mage: Weak (but not as weak a cleric) at low levels. Becomes stronger at a faster rate than clerics. At high levels, more powerful than a fighter offensively but almost no defense against non-magic. Trade off - week/slow leveling early, no defense against weaponry, very powerful offensively at high levels.
• Thief: Weak in all areas except sneak attack a.k.a the infamous backstab. If you got a critical hit on a backstab a thief could take out a MOB well above his level in one blow, if he missed or didn't get good damage, he was toast. Trade off is pretty obvious .
• Fighter: Able to fight MOBs at low levels that none of the other classes can get near alone. Strong offense/defense at every level. Not as strong as mage (and possibly cleric) offensively at high levels but has much higher defense/hp. Tradeoff - strong at every level, not as strong offensively at high levels.

In general they had, for lack of a better term, boss mobs that could only be taken by much higher level players or a mixed group of appropriately leveled players. A typical battle went like this:

• Thief backstabs mob dealing heavy damage and backs away.
• Fighter steps in front of the other party members and attacks while taking all/most of the damage.
• Cleric watches fighters health carefully and either heals or casts offensive spells depending on fighter's health.
• Mage casts constant offensive spells.

In this scenario you could usually do without one of the 4 classes but more than that it would become very difficult if not impossible.

So the balance everyone is looking for came in a group. If you had a mixed group you were balanced. It seems to me that that because of PvP people are looking for a level X mage to be equal in battle to a level X fighter and that is just unrealistic. If I'm a bumbling novice mage I should expect a fighter at just about any level to be able to put a sword through my gut before I can manage to any real damage. If I'm a powerful master mage I should expect that no non-magic user should be able to defeat me without the element of surprise.

Now as far as how this relates to reagents, well reagents are a major PITA, and will actually throw everything out of balance. You're a fighter and you want a cleric to heal you in battle? You better be prepared to pay in reagents because if I have to spend 80% of my time gathering the materials used to play, then I will be using them only how it best suits me. Reagents will be so irritating to a magic user there will likely be far fewer of them in the game....balance gone, everyone is a fighter. Reagents to me say, magic user's have no magic, they are just chemists.

My favorite classes have always been Cleric/Thief, it seems that the classic Theif will not exist and if I have to go collect reagents to be a cleric, I know I'll wind up being a fighter.

Bash away