Tested new Icestorm and Critical Mod

[Legendary_Agent]

In the current version 9 out of 10 of your casts do ZERO crits... Are those wasted? Are those worthless? Can you survive an encounter without casting a crit spell?

Sure it's nice when you get a crit spell and everything dies... But you certainly don't depend on that, do you? You do just fine with 90% of your casts being normal damage, right?

Now, instead of 90% being normal damage, and 10% being awesome damage, you get 100% being a little better than normal damage and zero being awesome damage.

Is that better for us? Probably not.... But is that terribly worse? Nope... I never counted on that 10% awesome damage anyway... And now all my 90% spells will actually do more damage than before...

On average, we'll do the exact same damage as before...

Cool story man, as far as i know 11 is not equal to 15, so on AVERAGE we will do crappier damage than before 27% less damage than before, wasting 27% more time than before and 27% more mana than before, i find it a big deal.

[Thrudh]

Wow! This is a HUGE nerf to casters:

NERF #1
Before if you got a crit AoE you cleaned up all the mobs in one cast. Now you can only get 1-2 crits in a group of 10 mobs, so you will ALWAYS have to cast multiple times to finish them which makes us use a lot more mana.

NERF #2
Can no longer crit fish in epic content. Without crit fishing content is going to take a lot longer to complete, and wizards contribution to the group just went way down.

NERF #3 (Unconfirmed...can someone please confirm this?)
This is perhaps the biggest potential nerf and I'd appreciate it if someone could confirm it. I use major lore items to boost my spell damage output. Usually I'll cast an AOE spell like firewall, with my major fire lore item equipped, then swap to my major ice lore or major acid lore item so I can cast a polar ray or acid fog while my firewall is going. Under the old system my firewall crit chance was set when I cast it, so if I unequipped the major fire lore item to cast other ice and acid spells, it didn't impact the crit on the firewall. Under the new system the crit chance is determined throughout the spell. So either I have to sit there and just stare at my firewall for 2 mins (with my major lore item in hand), or I have to foregoe all major lore crit bonuses if I chose to switch lore items to cast other spells.

NERF #1 + NERF #2 just made wizards very undersirable in high end content. NERF #3 would completely destroy my build since I have carefully taken time to collect major lore items for each spell type. If I can't cast one, and fix the lore chance, then move on to the next, my entire build / gear selection is shot. And I have spent countless hours collecting this stupid **** that gives you high lore chance to a specific element. Now I would just have to sit there and watch while my AOE spell finishes. Someone please confirm?!?

Nerf #3 is not true...

Nerf #1 isn't that terrible... You're saying it's the end of the world if a caster ALWAYS has to cast multiple times, when before he had to cast multiple times 80% of the time anyway (and the OP had to cast multiple times 91% of the time before)

Nerf #2 is true... crit-fishing is no longer possible... But I never used that method anyway. Others will be more affected...

[kernal42]

Cool story man, as far as i know 11 is not equal to 15, so on AVERAGE we will do crappier damage than before 27% less damage than before, wasting 27% more time than before and 27% more mana than before, i find it a big deal.

Using real numbers is a little less than 20% more sp spent.

Using real strategies (like, casting a single ice storm) means spending 75% less sp than before.

Sounds like a win!

-Kernal

[Legendary_Agent]

Using real numbers is a little less than 20% more sp spent.

Using real strategies (like, casting a single ice storm) means spending 75% less sp than before.

Sounds like a win!

-Kernal

amazing! care to show me how ull almost reach double damage with the new casting system on a 2d6+3d8 spell? :O

also my calculations are average so yes its 27% not less than 20%

On top of that ur critical chances are now useless as i demonstrated before, unless u hit each enemy once then the next one is not a repeat of the ones uve already hit which is a very low chance for such thing to happen your spells critical are useless as u wont kill the whole group untill u drained them all with normal damage.

[Thrudh]

Cool story man, as far as i know 11 is not equal to 15, so on AVERAGE we will do crappier damage than before 27% less damage than before, wasting 27% more time than before and 27% more mana than before, i find it a big deal.

Who the hell casts 11 times or 15 times at the same group of mobs?

Your example makes no sense, because no one who is any good at this game wastes SP like that...

My game-play won't change at all... Damage will be exactly the same on average.... The speed at killing mobs MAY go down a little... I doubt I'll notice it.

But I don't nerd-rage much... None of the ten thousand changes made to this game over the years have slowed me down much.

[Legendary_Agent]

Nerf #3 is not true...

Nerf #1 isn't that terrible... You're saying it's the end of the world if a caster ALWAYS has to cast multiple times, when before he had to cast multiple times 80% of the time anyway (and the OP had to cast multiple times 91% of the time before)

Nerf #2 is true... crit-fishing is no longer possible... But I never used that method anyway. Others will be more affected...

11*100/15=73% 100-73=27%
27%>11%

Youre disapointing me mate.

[Calebro]

nm, I don't wanna get into a math debate

[Calebro]

Yes, your damage wont change at all itll be the same on average, i understand how hard you want to believe it and how much pro u are that no nerf ingame will make u less efficient cause ure da man! but there are some players who dont want to be total **** u know?
But im sorry to tell you this, itll be a nerf and real players will be affected, with real damage spells with real builds.

Yes, we're aware.

[Legendary_Agent]

Yes, we're aware.

lol

[kernal42]

amazing! care to show me how ull almost reach double damage with the new casting system on a 2d6+3d8 spell? :O

also my calculations are average so yes its 27% not less than 20%

On top of that ur critical chances are now useless as i demonstrated before, unless u hit each enemy once then the next one is not a repeat of the ones uve already hit which is a very low chance for such thing to happen your spells critical are useless as u wont kill the whole group untill u drained them all with normal damage.

Assuming they drop the damage of the current version down to the description and don't include extend to the metamagic that affect ice storm:

10 cold + 14.5 blud
*2.5 (empower + maximize)
*1.75 (Sup Glac clicky)
*(1+ .18*1.5) (average crit increase; each mob should be crit ~3x)
*15 ticks
825 cold + 1215 blud (total damage)

That's 2k damage from one ice storm, which is more damage and less sp than any crit would do (though does take longer). I don't know how much cold resist elite amrath mobs have, but even with cold immunity, the bludgeoning damage from two ice storms totals 2400 damage, which is enough to kill (or very nearly kill) any trash in question. Even supposing two casts are necessary, that's less than half the sp you'd be spending on chain lightnings given the current system.

Cheers,
Kernal

Edit: Can't believe I forgot damage enhancements: Increase all numbers by 40%, 60% for capstone'd sorcs.

[Thorzian]

With the Current System:
10 enemies, cast number 1:

....

____________
10 enemies, cast number 12:
Spared

10 enemies, cast number 13:
spared

10 enemies cast number 14:
spared

10 enemies cast number 15:
spared
.

you're saying that you find it acceptable to blow 11 spells to kill a group of mobs but not 15? hmm.. personally, i find anything more then 3 or 4 a total waste of spellpoints.

to put it simply, casters are about AOE DOT spells when mana preservation is the focus, which it should be. if you're running around chain lightninging or fireballing everything then youre an idiot. firewall.. period. the new system helps firewallers more then it hinders them. immune to firewall? cloudkill.. 1 cast! extended ck drops everything. kite it for a while. the only thing left is golems and none of the other instant aoe's work any better on them anyway.

for single mobs instead of a group you should be enerydrain/fingering them. 2 spells. i would laugh endlessly at anybody who used more then 4 spells to take out a group of mobs.

[Legendary_Agent]

you're saying that you find it acceptable to blow 11 spells to kill a group of mobs but not 15? hmm.. personally, i find anything more then 3 or 4 a total waste of spellpoints.

to put it simply, casters are about AOE DOT spells when mana preservation is the focus, which it should be. if you're running around chain lightninging or fireballing everything then youre an idiot. firewall.. period. the new system helps firewallers more then it hinders them. immune to firewall? cloudkill.. 1 cast! extended ck drops everything. kite it for a while. the only thing left is golems and none of the other instant aoe's work any better on them anyway.

for single mobs instead of a group you should be enerydrain/fingering them. 2 spells. i would laugh endlessly at anybody who used more then 4 spells to take out a group of mobs.

i kill any number of orthons and devils in 2 casts wasting 110mana in total per group, thx but firewall is useless at some high level content.

[Thorzian]

Assuming they drop the damage of the current version down to the description and don't include extend to the metamagic that affect ice storm:

10 cold + 14.5 blud
*2.5 (empower + maximize)
*1.75 (Sup Glac clicky)
*(1+ .18*1.5) (average crit increase; each mob should be crit ~3x)
*15 ticks
825 cold + 1215 blud (total damage)

That's 2k damage from one ice storm, which is more damage and less sp than any crit would do (though does take longer). I don't know how much cold resist elite amrath mobs have, but even with cold immunity, the bludgeoning damage from two ice storms totals 2400 damage, which is enough to kill (or very nearly kill) any trash in question. Even supposing two casts are necessary, that's less than half the sp you'd be spending on chain lightnings given the current system.

Cheers,
Kernal

wait a minute kernal, you cant just go around making sense like that in this thread. dont you know that every spell does only 1 tik of damage.. just read L_A's posts and you'll learn.. 1+1 you know..

[hityawithastick]

If you cast a spell and don't kill the mob, then just ask your tank to kill it for you. ^^

[Thorzian]

i kill any number of orthons and devils in 2 casts wasting 110mana in total per group, thx but firewall is useless at some high level content.

then why the stupid talk about 11 shots vs 15? and you forgot the cloudkill. you're a fisherman with a pout on. you have at least 4 other people on this thread with years of ddo experience telling you you're wrong but wont just take off the blinders. devils, orthons are not the extent of high level content.

[Legendary_Agent]

wait a minute kernal, you cant just go around making sense like that in this thread. dont you know that every spell does only 1 tik of damage.. just read L_A's posts and you'll learn.. 1+1 you know..

Oh you mean like when i kill in 3 seconds with single aoe spells and waste 110mana and with icestorm i waste around 50mana and 14 seconds to achieve the same result? Yeah man that makes so much more sense :O

[Cartheron]

With an 18% crit chance, you have a 36% chance of getting a crit within the first three shots, and a 10% chance of getting a crit on the fourth, which gives you an average of 4.2 casts to kill the group, compared with an average of (read: exactly) 5 casts to kill the group under the crit-per-mob scenario. Basically you're losing the "hey awesome, they're dead already!" situation. Certainly a weakening of this tactic, but the loss is less than one cast on average.

Presumably this is mitigated by the ability to kill them all with a single cast of Ice Storm now.

Cheers,
Kernal

Killing group in on average 4,2 cast is 16% improvement above 5 casts. If I invest alot of AP in crit enchanting lines and use major lore item I except it will make a difference, 16% difference is fine for me. Getting zero difference is not something I would expect from pretty big investment.

Regarding Ice storm - sure thing, it will make my life easier. 1 ice storm and 2, max 3 chain lighting should kill mobs with 2500hp. Using 2 ice storm is quite a long time, Im not sure if keeping myself alive while being beaten by 20+ mobs will be cheaper than blasting them with nukes. I will test that when changes will go live (my lamannia caster is unable to do anything above normal Amrath ), but this doesnt change fact that this change is 16% nerf to nuking spells (using your own math ). Its ok, I could not fit crit lines for acid/light anyway, so for me almost nothing changes (I dont even have to swap major light lore item anymore ), but if someone would like to be acid/light specced (I dont know why, but Im not telling others how to play) it is pretty big hit for them.

... devils, orthons are not the extent of high level content.

True, but everything else will die in wall of fire, so why bother speaking about them I dont agree with most argumentation of OP, but he has right in 1 thing - this change makes AOE direct damage spells weaker than they were before.

[Legendary_Agent]

then why the stupid talk about 11 shots vs 15? and you forgot the cloudkill. you're a fisherman with a pout on. you have at least 4 other people on this thread with years of ddo experience telling you you're wrong but wont just take off the blinders. devils, orthons are not the extent of high level content.

Because i need to go all the way down to your level to properly explain how this is making critical damage a useless option as itlltake the same ammount of time to kill the whole group as if u didnt have critical chance at all.

Or when i try to explain how critical chance actually used to matter before update 8 as it actually did something of value.

Ill just put my caster on pause and when the new sorc prestige comes up and if they are any good ill drop all crit and focus on that instead, no way im gonna waste so much ap for an enhacement line which achieves nothing on the long run.

[Lifespawn]

That doesn't make much sense as written...

Say you had a 20% crit chance... Crit fishing meant you cast on average 5 firewalls until you got a crit one.... which did, what? 2.5 damage?

It's more SP efficient to run them through 3 normal firewalls, than to cast 5 looking for a crit one... Now the crit method is FASTER.... but you if were running out of SP, then crit-fishing was the wrong way to go...

I'll do some math for you with specific numbers as a place holder not actual game numbers since i can't know how much hp each mob gets back when they regen or spam heals on themselves.

I like to solo epics when ever i can for the challenge and no i'm not talking about perching.

Say your fighting a cleric type with 20000 hp


regular fw will do 180-250 a tick over 1 minute so we'll say 200 average x30=6000 hp of damage.

the cleric type spams heal on itself every 6 seconds for 400 a shot=2400 damage healed of the 6000 done bringing the total damage per regular average fw to 3600


20000/3600 = 5.56 firewalls with constant walls down

maximize 20% crit chance 2.5x multi over the same amount of time is roughly 15000 damage- the 2400 they heal or regen is 12600 meaning i only need 2 crit firewalls to beat the regen

say i have the abbot necklace thats 5x a day to make maximize cost nothing for a short period of time by the time i cast that 6th normal firewall i'm out of clickies and it costs me full sp from then on until i shrine.

With crit fishing and my 20% crit chance i can throw all 5 in that time frame costing me no maximize let that wall run out and cast another one with the next clicky to get a crit end up with more sp and have 3 clickies left for the next mob because with the crits not only do i do more damage per hit but i severely lower the amount of healing or regen they can get in in less time.

[Lifespawn]

then why the stupid talk about 11 shots vs 15? and you forgot the cloudkill. you're a fisherman with a pout on. you have at least 4 other people on this thread with years of ddo experience telling you you're wrong but wont just take off the blinders. devils, orthons are not the extent of high level content.

i would love to use cloud kill if it scaled to level and hit things not immune to acid damage.

The rule of them being immune to poison makes them immune to the acid damage is just stupid we need more competitive spells so that everything isn't firewall, a spell pass needs to be done on dot and instant spells to make more of them worth using and make them much less sp inefficient