Soul Tap - alternative thought

I wanted to make a comment about Soul Tap, but before I did, I searched the forum to see if someone else had already posted about it. I did find one other post, here, but it did not address my thought/question about the skill/spell.

Why does Soul Tap take *my* health and convert it to focus?

I expected the skill to take some small about of health from my *opponent* and give me that amount of focus. I was quite surprised when I heard that it does not work this way. Indeed, when I first heard about the spell I thought, 'Ah - that would be good - so for low level characters who haven't been able to build up their focus skill yet, this would allow them to keep going a bit longer.'

But not only does it not do this, it penalizes a new character who desperately needs his/her health by taking away some of their health. Because of this, I am now completely taking it out of my own combat deck, and I am going to warn my grown kids (who just started playing SotA) to be wary of this spell/skill, even though it is supposedly a low level spell. I could just see them "committing suicide" by casting it when their health was near the bottom.

So my alternative thought/question is this: Wouldn't this spell make more sense if it took a small amount of health from one's opponent and gave you that amount of focus?

 

This version of Soul Tap would be ever so much nicer. Can I like it twice?

 

Further, if they did it this way, I would think that it would need to have diminishing returns and a cap so that it would not become overpowered for higher level characters.

 

Wouldn't that mean you could just keep using this single spell forever? The whole point of using abilities is they cost focus.

If this one steals their health AND gives you focus, why use anything else?

 

I recommend warning your kids before using any skills in the chaos tree. They are all quite dangerous/unpredictable. ;-) Enjoy SotA!

 

I think the key would be to make it take only a small amount of life and give only a small amount of focus. In that regard, I think it could be balanced. But I'm no dev, so you might be correct.

@ Miracle Dragon - lol!

 

I have to say that Soul Tap isn't a spell I would ever choose to have in my deck. Over time and with the spells Soul Tap can be useful as you can replenish your health quickly for less focus than you leached from your health. In saying that in a 'snapshot', health is king and I wouldn't cast any spells that reduced what I had.

I do like the idea of leeching focus from another player, whether its focus directly (a bit like the old mana leech in UO) or their health to turn into your focus..............this spell would be far too powerful for low level and would have to appear higher up in the tree.

 

They need only to tweek it a little bit.
Its a cool mechanic to pay hp for focus. this skill is more like an emergency skill.

 

I'm not sure if I like drawing other people's health for focus as a low tier spell. This would make a better combo, say Death Touch + Tap Soul.

 

I will agree at lower levels it's not useful, especially if your ability to heal is poor. But once heals are stronger, this is a handy way to replenish focus during an extended encounter.

I think the mechanic of the spell is fine, I think that it needs to be tweaked so it doesn't draw so much or it shouldn't be a first tier spell. Having to buy 3 of them just to get to other death magic is kind of lame early on.

If it were changed to a "take health from something else to gain focus", there would be little need for other spells. I would stack my deck with as many of these as possible, for non stop spamming of abilities. Every spell should have a price that comes with the gain. Most spells is Damage dealt for Focus lost, others is health gained for focus lost. Since in this case focus is gained, the only thing to lose is health.

It's death magic, essentially a blood sacrifice of your own for more power.

Final note, pretty sure that offensive abilities have a red border, anything else is either friendly/passive/self targeted. I could be wrong here.

 

I've played in a game with a somewhat similar skill where a mage would use the skill (tap his life and get more mana) with a cleric in tow where it was a good combination for the mage/cleric. Infinite magic for the mage because it actually cost less focus for the cleric to recover the health of the mage and the mage could keep on using his/her magic to do more damage. Too much work for the poor cleric though, trying to keep the squishy mage alive.

 

I like Soul Tap. Because I'm level 40+. I didn't use it prior though because the health take away was just too much then. I don't like spamming heals and the balance of HP outgoing from Soul Tap to HP incoming from Death Touch/Ray doesn't seem balanced. Like OP said, I just left it out of my deck. But...when you get higher level and you are able to take on 4+ enemies at a time without much concern for health drop, having that focus is a crucial aspect. I think it's a useful situational utility, however, given that fact..it may not belong in the first tier.