A favor request to Steelstar

[Abilbo]

It is my understanding that Steelstar is one of the driving forces that made the Artificer (my favorite class) as good as it is today. So I am asking that he take a look at the rune-arms that are in game, and change the way that they fire.

All of the electric bolt and Light spiral rune-arms have mechanics to them, that make firing them very ineffective.

My capped character is currently using the Legendary Toven's Hammer. Over half the time when I fire it, the bolts just fizzle away and don't do anything. To me, and my simple way of viewing the issue, it appears as if how my camera angle is set, depends on if the rune-arm fires correctly. I am not sure how to describe it correctly, but I know its an issue only with the Electric bol and Light Spiral rune-arms.

Use an exploding rune arm such as the Hand of the tombs, and when you fire, it the globe of fire heads straight out, (will track mobs slightly) and then explodes on impact.
Use a bolt tracking rune arm like the Whirling Words, and when you fire it, 5 books are shot out, that do a decent job of tracking mobs if they move.

Neither of these two style of rune arms have any issues, that I can remember. It doesn't matter what type of tracking bolt, be it Whirling Words, Corruption of nature, Driftwood, Toven's Prototype, or quarantine, these are all what I call tracking rune-arms and they all fire very well. Regardless of how close to you the target is, they just work. Some of them have a wider arc when they fire, which can be problematic in narrow hallways, but you learn to adjust for that.

However all of the Electric bolt, and Light spiral rune-arms don't fire properly. If the target is on top of you, the bolts just disappear. If your camera is turned at a weird angle, because you are trying to see better, then the shots don't work well either.

Is it possible to change the electric bolt and light spiral runes arms so that they fire more like the Driftwood or Whirling Words?

The artificer is my favorite class. I have two characters, that are full triple completionists, that both did 90% of their past lives as Artificers, or multiclassed with artificer splashed in. Yet neither of them uses lightning bolt or light spiral rune arms while leveling because they don't work properly, and at end game I try to avoid them for the same reason. My friends and I were running reaper last night, and I was trying to use my Toven's hammer, which does decent damage, when it fires properly, but having it do so is a hit or miss scenario at the moment.

I know there are a few classes that need work, and that the rune-arm issue is probably pretty low on the list of things, I was just hoping that in the future, (maybe in the near future and not 5 years down the road) we would get to see a change to rune-arms and how they fire.

[droid327]

Rune arm targeting has been a pernicious issue for years. There were a few runearms that would never hit anything while you were moving, or couldn't hit things if they were too close to you, or just wouldnt ever hit anything at all :)

I dont think its necessarily something that'd be an easy "to-do list" kinda fix, unfortunately. Up there with Pet & Hireling AI fixes, which Artis would also greatly benefit from.

Things I'd like to see for Arti that are probably easier:

- An option for a minimalist GUI element for runearm charging. Just some small, inobtrusive pips under the character, where they're visible but not blocking your actual view of the action

- Bring back Craftable on runearms and add it to some (most?) of the current Epic ones

- Remove the Doubleshot penalty on RXBs. No reason to have it now that Doubleshots dont actually roll extra procs, and it unfairly penalizes RXB scaling. Or just make it like a flat -20, so at least it scales your DPS at the same rate as Bows and Throwers.

- AT capstone adds Thunderstroke to your spellbook at L6, so pure caster Artis have an actual Epic-tier spell for Epics. Tac Det is basically just Horn of Thunder, but Spellsingers get Wail in their capstone


Things I'd like that probably arent as easy:

- A BE tree pass. Its woefully dated, and largely obsolete with Inquisitive.

- A Runearm DPS pass....Tier 5 scaling is 1d10 per Arti level, which is the same as 1d6+2, and that's low Heroic tier damage. Should really be 1d6+(0/2/4/6/8) per Arti level. Yes I know its "free damage", but its also a core class feature, so its gotta have viable damage scaling through L30.

- Redoing RXB animations so that they can benefit properly from Attack Speed. Right now only like 10% of the animation is "eligible" for Attack Speed bonuses.

[SlowDM]

Give paid for classes and races what they deserve a massive boost. Make them pay for it same as other games. Sorcerer is free and the best for free players. Please explain why, "

[Kalapurka]

I know i gonna rustle someone's jimmies, but try to give this feedback on the DDO Discord Steel And Lynn are really active there.

[AlcoArgo]

Do you know what my favorite thing about rune arms is? This:

1) There are several rune arms with ML 1.
2) The only class that can use rune arms is artificer.
3) Artificers get the feat Rune Arm Use at level 2.

[acemonkey]

Been 2-3 years since I did an arti caster life but the electrical storm shot was a heavy hitter, iirc it was a quad line aoe but required point blank or a jump shot to be effective, and controlling camera angle and getting close was worth it when a full charge shot hit.