Flaming Arrow spell and blades of the dark six billion....pretty useless

[PestWulf]

Hey,

I don't know how this spell missed the spell pass, but 20sp for 50 flaming bolts/arrows that must be summoned inside the dungeon you want to use them in, is a bit on the useless side is it not?

On a lvl 8 bow character using silver longbow and rapid fire I can go through 500 arrows in a medium length adventure easy. AT 50 per 20sp you are looking at 200sp.

This needs to be changed to act like the summon bolts spell if you want anyone to really be able to use this spell. Summon 100 at a time and let it survive until you log out.

Otherwise the spell is just fluff so folks can say look at all the spells we have, and not really practical to use. Even if you use the wands of flame arrow, summoning 50 at a time is wasting time when you can't carry them outside a dungeon.

I would also like to add that you give up on blades of the dark six collectible turn ins. You have them drop as collectibles all over the game. I'm guessing because you turn in for 20 random ammunition at a time and you think folks will need to be able to turn in a lot of these to get some cool ammo to play with. Well, it's not working. I just capped 1k blades again and went to turn in 100 just so I could put the leftover in my bag and deal with them later. Turning in 100 of those things filled up 2 and a half backpacks with various bolts and arrows, the highest stack of which I had was 120 +1 arrows.

Why don't you scale down the chance for these to drop from the something like 75% chance that they currently are, down to something more normal and then change the ammo from being random between 50 odd choices down to be random between like 10 choices...and then make the choices count. How about letting us choose what type of random ammo we get first of all, and then make the random ammo be things that count, like +1 Metaline ammo or Bane or Slayer of the common types. "Plant bane", while fun to say, has nothing to do with this game except to say that you have banes for every possible type of critter. How about instead, making up some kind of new "omni" banes or slayers that you can only get from the turn ins...something to make turning these things in be worth the time, inventory and hassle.

Did you know it's even a hassle to just destroy them? being that they only stack to 99 when you pull them out of the bag? The only reason I pick them up is because I've gotten a medium eberron shard out of one of the random bag drops before so my greed is causing me issues. Still, you now you've done something seriously wrong when collecting them and then destroying them when they reach 1,000 is better than turning them in for a "reward".

Sorry for the tone, didn't plan for this to be a gripe as much as I wanted to just raise your awareness again about some silly things..but it appears collectibles **** me off.

[Heronous]

If you want to use the fire arrow spell


Buy a wand! = 50x for 0 sp = WIN

[PestWulf]

If you want to use the fire arrow spell


Buy a wand! = 50x for 0 sp = WIN

Nope. Still doesn't address the underlying issue of evaporation on exit. Plus, with repeaters actually fixed...bolt consumption is through the roof.

I have been using a wand of flame arrow, when I got disconnected from lag and game back in to find all my bolts had turned into vapor. Strangely, they don't seem to be as effective that way.

Even without all my bolts *poofing* it is still a very bad implementation. I think the original intention was that you would only use flame arrows for special situations. However, Bolt/Arrow management with no help from the interface is far to much of an issue to deal with. Inventory management shouldn't be a game all on its own.

But the fact that the wand is the only semi-useful way to use the spell...is a pretty good indicator that it needs some adjustment.

[cforce]

Gotta side with Heronus on this one, PW. Even if Flame Arrow cost 5 SP, I'd still be using wands exclusively. The wands are cheap enough that burning through a bunch of charges every quest for disappearing ammo feels practically free, and I'd still be doing this even at 5 SP. The spell just isn't designed to be cast from your SP bar. Maybe it was in Pen and Paper, but the wand availability makes the whole discussion moot.

[PestWulf]

Well, unfortunately I also agree that the wand is the way to go even though I don't like the ammo's poof-i-ness


That's kind of why I brought it up though. I'm hoping when the ranged pass makes it in a couple of updates things like ammunition and spells that "modify" ammunition like this one are put on the table as well.

It just seems like such a waste that the spell is the way it is. If for instance the flame arrow wands were removed from the game...would anyone really try and use the spell? It's a lot of mana to dole out at the beginning of a dungeon when folks usually are going through their buff cycles to make it to that first shrine. Not to mention taking up a valuable spell slot :/

[Talon_Moonshadow]

Once wands became available, I have never memorised this spell since.

Disappearing when you leave te dungeon is not a problem IMO.

Only currrent complaint I have is that the wands are min lvl 5.
(I suppose it would be nice if it gave a stack of 100 instead of only 50)

[Glenalth]

One of the things suggested in another thread to make this useful to someone that actually takes it as a spell is to grant the ammunition a returning % based on caster level.

[Ithaquah]

Give me a Cleric with Divine Vitality, and I'll show you and endless supply of ammunition for the whole party.


My Sorcerer regularly makes 600+ arrows/bolts for every dungeon my party runs. It takes a few DV's from the cleric to offset the Spell Point cost. (and with the Cleric's PRE, their turns regen over time, so there's no real cost.)

My friend's Artificer had no issues with cranking out ammo throughout quests. Between a cleric's divine vitality uses and using shrines we had plenty of ammo.