Can you at least slow the phase cycle of shadows down in Vol w/ these changes????????

[Mhykke]

Nothing is more infuriating now than trying to hit these things with a spell, and just as they phase in and you have them, you start casting, and boom, half a second later, they phase out, wasting the spell and mana.


If you're going to make them fire immune, at least make them stay around for a few seconds at a time.

Jeez.

[Aspenor]

This was a really bad idea, they need to come up with something else.

[Mad_Bombardier]

Agreed. One of the reasons we use WoF is because it's persistent damage. That means we can deal damage whenever the mobs phase in. NO gameplay mechanic in the game is more frustrating then trying to target and cast at phase/incorporeal mobs before they blink out again. Add facing and/or "too close" misfires and it's time to rip your hair out.

[Cowdenicus]

what cleric spell allows you to make any weapon a disruptor?

[MysticTheurge]

Agreed. One of the reason we use WoF is because it's persistent damage. That means we can deal damage whenever the mobs phase in. NO gameplay mechanic in the game is more frustrating then trying to target and cast at phase/incorporeal mobs before they blink out again. Add facing and/or "too close" misfires and it's time to rip your hair out.

I hate to do this but...

QFT.

[Bradik_Losdar]

Agreed. One of the reason we use WoF is because it's persistent damage. That means we can deal damage whenever the mobs phase in. NO gameplay mechanic in the game is more frustrating then trying to target and cast at phase/incorporeal mobs before they blink out again. Add facing and/or "too close" misfires and it's time to rip your hair out.

Amen brother!!

[TEK]

Nothing is more infuriating now than trying to hit these things with a spell, and just as they phase in and you have them, you start casting, and boom, half a second later, they phase out, wasting the spell and mana.


If you're going to make them fire immune, at least make them stay around for a few seconds at a time.

Jeez.

i dont know. i personally think the knock down mechanic for the air elemental AT LEAST gives it a run for its money if not trumps it.

[Kadagan]

Agreed. One of the reason we use WoF is because it's persistent damage. That means we can deal damage whenever the mobs phase in. NO gameplay mechanic in the game is more frustrating then trying to target and cast at phase/incorporeal mobs before they blink out again. Add facing and/or "too close" misfires and it's time to rip your hair out.

QFT

[Big_Russ]

My name is Big Russ, and I approve of this thread.

[Cidolfas]

i dont know. i personally think the knock down mechanic for the air elemental AT LEAST gives it a run for its money if not trumps it.

"What do you mean I got knocked down? I'm a paladin and I rolled a natural 20 on the save anyways!"

[Vinos]

Agreed. One of the reason we use WoF is because it's persistent damage. That means we can deal damage whenever the mobs phase in. NO gameplay mechanic in the game is more frustrating then trying to target and cast at phase/incorporeal mobs before they blink out again. Add facing and/or "too close" misfires and it's time to rip your hair out.

Yep that about sums it up.

[Riggs]

Considering 'special attacks' like being able to phase out (or burrow underground like scorps - which they shouldnt have anyway), should only really be able to occur say - once a round....

Any incorporeal being that phsases in to attack should have to wait a mimimum of 3 seconds to be able to phase out again. Right now they flicker in and out so fast that the only possible way to kill them was for a melee to stand around and wildly swing while spinning in place (since every single monster in the game now, even mindless oozes always go for you back so fast that some can circle you faster than you can turn to face them) and hope that occasionally one of those swings will hit.

My wiz has almost never been able to target a shadow/ghost/wraith with anything because by the time you can target one, and hit a spell and wait for the spell timer to go off - its too late, they are long gone. Firewall was the one spell that could kill them because it would take damage as it appeared.

The issue here is one that really has existed since day 1, and frustrates many, many people on a pretty regular basis; There is a monster that has an overpowered ability that is really aggrivating for players to deal with - so they find an easier way. Instead of re-balancing a monster ability that is overpowered (like scorps bugging out about 30% of the time say - when scorps should never have the ability to burrow in the first place...), players abilities are nurfed, or new monster immunities are given.

This sounds a lot like the early days of Web. "Too powerful, so now suddenly half the monsters in the game are flat out immune". Web has since been balanced, but the first steps in that balancing involved a quick overcompensation where it became useless against many monsters it was still 'supposed' to work against.

Ghostly attackers are bad enough as it it - they rarely miss, hit hard, do stat damage - and I cant count the number of times I fail a 51-100 roll 6 times in a row to hit them, so spend a great deal of time 'whiffing' the air waiting for dice to finally stop rolling poorly.

Making an aggrivating and extremely annoying monster just flat out immune to the one spell that worked against it, without also dealing with the fact that due to internet lag, facing issues, and a near instant ability to phase out again make fighting these types of monsters really harder than it should be, seems to be going back to the days of "Nurf first ask questions later".

So maybe Vol was too easy as it was. It still doesnt address the problem of incorporeal monsters being overpowered due to the various above issues, so that firewall was the only thing that worked well against them.