Spell penetration - another stupid implementation

[Sanader]

Hello. A bit rant time, but I stand behind every word I say.

So........let me get this straight. A pure wizard, with 3 wizard past live feats, 3 FvS past life feats, taking +3 sp in enchantments, taking both sp feats,having heighest possible sp item and +3sp from ED would have excatly 50% chance at landing a spell at the lowest level drow there is (and im talking about drow warriors and archers, not drow pristesses). Breakdown:

20lvl
+4 both feats
+3 AM sp
+3 ED
+6pl wiz
+3pl FvS
+3sp item
=42sp max at lvl 20?
So a fully maxed sp wizard needs to roll a 10 to pass drow SR in first EE encounters (ES 1 chain). Im talking about drow warriors and drow archers btw, not the priest.

Some people might say: well that's what you get for going in lvl 21 EE quests with a lvl 20 wizard. I say to them: How to hell to reach lvl 25, and how come all other classes dont have any problems in EE's as lvl 20 (did 15 or so EE lives, most of them solo)? Even at lvl 25, I would have 75% chance to land a spell as a totally maxed out SP wizard (good luck everyone that doesnt have 3 FvS and 3 wiz past lives. Or gods forbid that you aren't pure wizard).

Im curious, what's the SR of enemies in tempest spine? I couldn't find any info. I went to check youtube and search for a LE runs that has a wizard in it. I found non. No wizards at all in LE tempest spine or LE HoX. Full raids.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Brat7JR5BU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Kr5HzRtZ9E
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXOyfx-NkC4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-aVuHESwUIw

To conclude, good job turbine for making wizard a worst CC class (and I challenge anyone to try a class that has worse CC capabilites then a wizard in EE). Now let's see some solutions:

Stunning blow breakdown at lvl 30:
10 (base)
+12 (boots of the innocent)
+2capstone
+3fig pl
+6 insigniful combat mastery
+6 LD
+3 race
+4 legendary feat
+2tactican
+20 feat
+15know the angles - I took 40 int which is easly reachable (15item+7tome+2ship+11starting+7insig is 40. with 11 starting only).
+35 str - I took only 80 str at lvl 30 which is a joke
=118 DC of stunning blow and I only took 80 str (probably all str builds have 80 str at lvl 30)
I left tons of things here, like psionic str, madstone, ofcourse didnt add cookies, pots, bard songs etc. I didn't even add the epic destiny str or str on level ups. This number can go up easly, I'm really far from max achivable stunning blow DC. Not to mention some tactical feats have higher base or they add character level to.

So here is my suggestion to make wizards a CC class. Give end game mobs 118 tactical feat saves (to casters and archers, melee mobs should have 130), and remove no save tactical feats. Let's see how would those nerve venom spammers, 1st life tacticians with lvl 11 gear and no save CCers feel then.

Or you could finally fix dispel and fix/remove spell resistance.

P.S. I'm quite sure you forgot that all DnD games that were ever made had a spell that lowers spell resistance. Where is it?
Oh and, does anyone in DDO actually bother to go over 120 tactical DC? I still find it funny how wizards are trying to increase their DC's and spell penetraitons like there is no tomorrow and melees barely get half of max possible tactical feat DC and they are good to go. Great balanced stuff right here.

[Faltout]

20lvl
+4 both feats
+3 AM sp
+3 ED
+6pl wiz
+3pl FvS
+3sp item
=42sp max at lvl 20?
So a fully maxed sp wizard needs to roll a 10 to pass drow SR in first EE encounters (ES 1 chain). Im talking about drow warriors and drow archers btw, not the priest.

I see you take into account +3 spell pen from ED. So, I should assume a maxed out caster ED. Every arcane ED provides 5 extra caster levels (with each ED core) which is +5 spell pen. Also, there are various destinies with spell pen and you can twist more spell pen from those abilities for an extra +6 spell pen. That raises your spell pen to 53 at level 20 (assuming max EDs).

You also forgot 2 spell pen from ship buffs (+1 from cargo hold and +1 from arcane sanctum).

Stunning blow breakdown at lvl 30:
...
+6 insigniful combat mastery

Just wanted to comment that instead of taking an item with insightful or exceptional or whatever combat mastery, you should just get an item with simple combat mastery from random loot up to... +11 insightful bonus?

[blerkington]

Hi,

There's a lot of content at and around level 20 you can run on your wizard where less or no spell pen is required even on EE. SR makes some of the content harder for a few spells, but then of course there are all those quests where wizards can CC or kill pretty much everything in levelling content with a couple of presses of the button.

Your calculation for spell pen at level 20 is missing things and some of those values (such as gear) can be higher. So you are overestimating how bad this 'problem' is for a maxed out wizard. Even if you aren't a pure build and don't all of these bonuses, it's possible to get 42 or above. On top of that, claiming that wizards are terrible at CC in general because one particular approach does not work at full effectiveness in a handful of quests is just nonsense.

One very good CC option for high SR enemies is web. Talking about how bad wizards are at CC when you don't use all of their CC options doesn't make much sense to me. I had very little trouble in those quests on my 18 wizard/2 rogue because I knew what I was going to be up against and chose spells and ED abilities which worked well against those enemies. One of the strengths of your wizard is versatility, and changing your approach can make hard quests easy. If you are inflexible and expect hold monster or finger of death to work on everything, then you will get frustrated, but that is not the fault of the game.

If you research the forums or run LE content more often, you will see that wizards can provide effective CC in LE raids.

Thanks.

[Sanader]

I see you take into account +3 spell pen from ED. So, I should assume a maxed out caster ED. Every arcane ED provides 5 extra caster levels (with each ED core) which is +5 spell pen. Also, there are various destinies with spell pen and you can twist more spell pen from those abilities for an extra +6 spell pen. That raises your spell pen to 53 at level 20 (assuming max EDs).
You also forgot 2 spell pen from ship buffs (+1 from cargo hold and +1 from arcane sanctum).
Just wanted to comment that instead of taking an item with insightful or exceptional or whatever combat mastery, you should just get an item with simple combat mastery from random loot up to... +11 insightful bonus?

For combat bonus, I took the boots of innocence stunning blow bonus which don't stack with normal combat mastery, right?

And yeah, I forgot +5 levels, +2 ship +6 from 2 t3 twists. Sorry
The spell penetration problem at early epic levels isn't only drows, I have hard time beating SR in tide turns chain and carnival chain thieflings.

About versatility, let,s see what we have against spell resistance that I can think off:
Electic loop - evocation, breaks on damage
Sonic blast - evocation, breaks on damage
Web - conjuration, actually really nice one. Not to sure how do all the str check things work to be honest.
Greater shout - evocation, breaks on damage (daze)
Sunburst - conjuration, actually pretty nice I use it often.
That's 5 spells in wizard spell list that can crowd control enemies. Non of them is in same school as necromancy of enchantment. Did I forget some? For the slowing effects like ice storm you might as well be in shiradi ED and spam MM. Actually I did that on shiradi. 5 times better CC on undead and SR mobs then DC wizard. With no DC and SP and stat focusing gear at all *cough balanced*

And actually my biggest concern, howcome Turbine doesnt force tactiful feat users to grind 6 PL's, completionist, have the best gear available, spend feats and epic feats, force them in matrial destiny, force them to have 2 t3 twists, force them to spend AP and force them to go pure to have a reliable tactical DC?
Not to mention that those tactiful feats work on alot more things then wizard spells do. (I could probably count to fingers enemies immune to trip. Oozes, mempthis.....air and fire elementals....erm....). Nor do champs get special immunities against trips nor do enemies use some special spells that gives them immunity to a form of tactical feat. That can't be dispeled because dispel is broken.

Still wasn't able to find a wizard doing LE on forum (in a raid, not solo ofcourse. They are not warlocks of rogues pfff). There are some theory crafting that it is possible.

[cru121]

Greater shout - evocation, breaks on damage (daze)

greater shout is a daze but does not break on damage

[Faltout]

For combat bonus, I took the boots of innocence stunning blow bonus which don't stack with normal combat mastery, right?

Wrong, they stack. Boots with the stunning bonus are enhancement bonus type. normal combat mastery (and ALL types of combat mastery) are insight type bonus.

Of course it's a bug, but I don't see it fixed any way soon.