2019 ED Pass: Arcane Sphere

[Charltonsexton]

The Sigils still aren't good; they fell a bit low on the priority list relative to other things. If there are simple number tweaks we can make to make them more worth using, we're all ears.

How about instant cast and shorter cool down? It's been so long since I actually used a sigil - it would take a lot to get my wizard to stand still for any amount of time - but if I remember right isn't there a bit of a casting animation? What if it came out quickly like Energy Burst?

[Iriale]

Can you make energy sheath a selector type spell, so we dont have to reset it over and over.

I don't know that this will fit into the timeframe we have, and there may be balance concerns. Will need to talk it over with the team

While doing this leaves the true fire shield spell in a bad place, this need comes from the current design of the raids. In two raids (RTSO and killing time) an electric shield is needed. In the new raid of sharn we need a fire shield. And in none of those raids have this shield is optional: the damage we receive is too high to do without it. Not even for the toons with evasion.

Understand that if you designed content where this kind of thing would be an aid to people with low MRR rather than something mandatory even for tanks with bazillons of MRR, we would not need something like that. The problem of balance is brought by the design of the current raids, which require yes or yes the shield, before this change in itself (which, effectively, nullifies once again the access to the spell and makes it too easy for toons with high MRR other content class than raids)

[Shadow_Jumper]

While doing this leaves the true fire shield spell in a bad place, this need comes from the current design of the raids. In two raids (RTSO and killing time) an electric shield is needed. In the new raid of sharn we need a fire shield. And in none of those raids have this shield is optional: the damage we receive is too high to do without it. Not even for the toons with evasion.

Understand that if you designed content where this kind of thing would be an aid to people with low MRR rather than something mandatory even for tanks with bazillons of MRR, we would not need something like that. The problem of balance is brought by the design of the current raids, which require yes or yes the shield, before this change in itself (which, effectively, nullifies once again the access to the spell and makes it too easy for toons with high MRR other content class than raids)

FWIW unless you’re the tank in KT you don’t need energy sheathe.

I spend most of my time flipping between fire sheathe and cold sheathe; the latter being to guard against 2k dmg polar rays in r10 quests.

[LightBear]

Fatesinger tier5 Bladesongs sonic of 2d6 seems a bit light.
The sphere thought seems way better than what we used to have.
Greater Shout as a tier 6 is absolutely useless, make it an aura effect that ticks once every second and you have a winner, everything at that tier is supposed to be some epic ability that whirls the fights in your favor.
Maybe change it into Epic Fortex: You are surrounded by a whirling wall of sound strangely attracting enemies to come and dance with you (Save against Will or Otto's irresistible dance). Once every 6 seconds a thundering clap of boom dealing 6d6 sonic damage in a wide range around you can be heard. Every foe around you caught in the blast zone of your awesomeness is knocked to the ground (Save against Reflex) or Dazes them when they make the save and aren't dancing yet??????

Magister sigils are slow to cast and have a somewhat limiting range if I recall correctly. What they do isn't all that great nr wise and right now it says we can only have one sigil active at a time the wording could use a bit more work on what the actual limitations are, like can you stack different sigils or not. The Sigil of Energy Negation could use a wider protection range in the types, right now it should read basic elemental negation instead of energy, imho. If it stays like this then at least add elemental absorption to it. If anything is added to sigils GFX in the future I'd ask for a circle that displays their effective range. The summons don't do all that much, maybe spread some love there?

Overall welcome changes.

[Iriale]

FWIW unless you’re the tank in KT you don’t need energy sheathe.

I spend most of my time flipping between fire sheathe and cold sheathe; the latter being to guard against 2k dmg polar rays in r10 quests.

and who asked for this change, Anuulifier, has some of the best Khyber tanks. And he is now forced to reset draconic destiny every time he changes raid, because the devs design the raids in such a way that even the tanks need a spell that should be the way that the toons with low MRR would survive. And for RTSO and THTH the shield is not optional for anyone

[Iriale]

I'm not here to stop anyone from putting 100% of their points in DCs. I think it's boring, but that's not especially important. You do you.

I didn't say that! I said I find only taking DC increases at the cost of a lot of other cool things boring.

Of course it is boring to spend all your points in DC, but if you are a caster you must have a functional DC. Currently in Sharn only my main who is a complecionist with a maximized DC (equipment, build, past lives, all the spellcasting benefits of the reaper trees) has no problems. My alts, with less benefits, have DC problems. As soon as I start to discard DC bonuses in them to add other funnier things, they begin to enter the field of the useless. So if you design DC enhancements too expensive, in the end there is no room for anything else. Only with my main I can allow myself to be capricious with some things, and even so, according to what difficulties, I could regret that decision.

Consider, Steelstar, changing the ability selectors of all the EDs (not only arcane ones). So they cost 1 ap and that each ED offers the 6 abilities. This would help a lot, and not just the casters. Those melees that care about the tactical DCs would also to be happy. The hybrids would be a little more viable. And do not forget that nowadays the weapon combat uses all the characteristics, and not only the classic ones of str and dex, so it is a change that would benefit everyone.

On another topic I read that you said that there would be a problem of balance for lowering the cost to 1 ap. What problems? Maybe +1 to one ability was a great thing in 2012, but seven years later there are many other things that add MUCH greater powercreep. Please lower the cost of these abilities and expand the selectors, so that the EDs better reflect the game as it is in 2019

[janave]

I don't think I've ever said this before, but.. Draconic might be in for too much power. This coming from somebody that loves power creep and huge damage numbers. I mean feel free to ignore me, because it's going to be fun to see the numbered (maximized+empowered energy burst!!!)

This ED pass probably makes me more excited than the Sharn expansion did, and it is very good. Really hope this makes it into the game in the not too distant future, so much good stuff I don't even know where to begin.

1000 standing fire spell power (assuming Sharn and Ravenloft items)
+300 meta magic power
1d15+15 ~ 23 damage

Caster Level:
30 Base CR
3 Evocation Master
3 Red Dragon Spell Knowledge
2 Arcane Augmentation
1 Coalesced Magic

Master of Knowledge (idealistic to keep at max stack, especially in a group)
90 uni power
60 critX

Arcane Supremacy
100 critX

Fire Scion
25 critX

Event Robe Clicky
25 critX

Well Spring
150 uni power
20 critX

base x power x crit
(23 x 39) x (15.4) x (4.3) => 59 399


Very late here so i could probably made a few mistakes here and there


This is my current attempt with a similar setup on live, obviously not idealistic numbers:

(Combat): You hit Daask Brute for 42,237 points of fire damage. (non helpless)

I have an epic red dragon helmet on, but does not register +3 CL for energy burst fire. (as per combat log) Interestingly enough arcane augmentation +2 works fine.


In real gameplay ( as in not a wilderness) I rarely see above 30 000, timing everything together is clumsy.


Very barely 2k DPS with the average setup above. You can do better with spellbook rotation, of course that is more expensive as it should be.

[PsychoBlonde]

For Go Out With a Bang . . . this ability is basically impossible to use as it stands because you're likely to get killed if you hit the health requirement. And you HAVE to take it to get Energy Burst.

I would also suggest making the abilities in the entire line (energy sheath, Go out with a bang, energy burst) have a single rank that costs 2 points instead of 3 ranks that cost a point each. Either that, or disconnect them.

I'd suggest making Go Out With A Bang into a MODAL ability that, when toggled, fires AUTOMATICALLY when you hit 50% health, up to 1 time per minute.

I'd also suggest making Fatesinger have Dex, Int, and Cha as stat options instead of strength and cha.

Harmonic Resonance: 20 points of sonic vulnerability are pretty garbage . . . or is that 20%? It's hard to tell. Also, I'd suggest making this straight out vulnerability instead of sonic vulnerability.

Suggest making Intoxicating Resonance affect enemies that ATTACK you instead of enemies that HIT you. Or making it clear what "strike" actually means (hit or attack)

Third Harmonic Chord should be, at a MINIMUM 3/6/9 PRR not 1/2/3. Other epic destinies give 5/10/15 PRR for similar investment, for crying out loud!

Otherwise these changes look pretty solid. I approve!

[GramercyRiff]

I'm not crazy about some of these changes but they are changes.

I love the Arcane Sphere changes though. I never thought I'd see the day when I look at Fatesinger and think...yeah I think I'll run this ED right now. Arcane goes from being terrible to great.

[janave]

For Go Out With a Bang . . . this ability is basically impossible to use as it stands because you're likely to get killed if you hit the health requirement.

I'd suggest making Go Out With A Bang into a MODAL ability that, when toggled, fires AUTOMATICALLY when you hit 50% health, up to 1 time per minute.

I had a similar thought before on this.

[Iriale]

For Go Out With a Bang . . . this ability is basically impossible to use as it stands because you're likely to get killed if you hit the health requirement. And you HAVE to take it to get Energy Burst.

I would also suggest making the abilities in the entire line (energy sheath, Go out with a bang, energy burst) have a single rank that costs 2 points instead of 3 ranks that cost a point each. Either that, or disconnect them.

I'd suggest making Go Out With A Bang into a MODAL ability that, when toggled, fires AUTOMATICALLY when you hit 50% health, up to 1 time per minute.

I'd also suggest making Fatesinger have Dex, Int, and Cha as stat options instead of strength and cha.

Harmonic Resonance: 20 points of sonic vulnerability are pretty garbage . . . or is that 20%? It's hard to tell. Also, I'd suggest making this straight out vulnerability instead of sonic vulnerability.

Suggest making Intoxicating Resonance affect enemies that ATTACK you instead of enemies that HIT you. Or making it clear what "strike" actually means (hit or attack)

Third Harmonic Chord should be, at a MINIMUM 3/6/9 PRR not 1/2/3. Other epic destinies give 5/10/15 PRR for similar investment, for crying out loud!

Otherwise these changes look pretty solid. I approve!

I agree with this, especially with For Go Out With a Bang. When you are very hurt the first reaction is to heal and / or to run away from the enemies, not to activate an offensive ability. For Go Out With a Bang needs to be activated passively to be viable; its cooldown should be what balances the use of this skill, not its activation by the player

[GramercyRiff]

I want Harmonic Resonance to be straight up vulnerability too. It's more epic after all.

[Damian]

Any chance Enthrallement and the new Siren song can be fixed and work with oozes, undead, contrcuts, vermins when we have the fatesinger cores?

thx

[Cantor]

For Go Out With a Bang . . . this ability is basically impossible to use as it stands because you're likely to get killed if you hit the health requirement. And you HAVE to take it to get Energy Burst.

I would also suggest making the abilities in the entire line (energy sheath, Go out with a bang, energy burst) have a single rank that costs 2 points instead of 3 ranks that cost a point each. Either that, or disconnect them.

I'd suggest making Go Out With A Bang into a MODAL ability that, when toggled, fires AUTOMATICALLY when you hit 50% health, up to 1 time per minute.

I'd also suggest making Fatesinger have Dex, Int, and Cha as stat options instead of strength and cha.

Harmonic Resonance: 20 points of sonic vulnerability are pretty garbage . . . or is that 20%? It's hard to tell. Also, I'd suggest making this straight out vulnerability instead of sonic vulnerability.

Suggest making Intoxicating Resonance affect enemies that ATTACK you instead of enemies that HIT you. Or making it clear what "strike" actually means (hit or attack)

Third Harmonic Chord should be, at a MINIMUM 3/6/9 PRR not 1/2/3. Other epic destinies give 5/10/15 PRR for similar investment, for crying out loud!

Otherwise these changes look pretty solid. I approve!

I second these suggestions.

[btolson]

Go Out With a Bang is definitely not very useful, but given the name, it seems that getting yourself killed is part of the intended design.

It's exacerbated in reaper when 1 shot can easily be 75% to 100% of your HP. There's not enough granularity in incoming damage for it to be viable.

Maybe if it using it also gave you a ~6 second buff that extends your range of unconsciousness by... a LOT. Maybe 1000. For 6 seconds, I think that's OK. You go out with a Bang... but still stay standing for 6 seconds and see if you can get healed enough to stay standing longer.

Or else activating it gives you a good chunk of temp HP, so you can essentially heal and attack simultaneously.

[Cetus]

The DC benefits of magister are practically a no-brainer. It seems to me that draconic, as nice as the improvements to it are, will mostly be a toy-destiny for low reaper content.

You simply cannot compete with magisters high DC's in higher skull content with the changes draconic is currently receiving. Dreaconic needs evocation DC bonuses and spellpoint cost reductions *at minimum* in order to make DPS spellcasting compete with that whopping DC increase from magister. Nuking through high skull content is painful on spellpoint pools. It is much more cost effective and party desirable to CC and instakill instead.

[Grace_ana]

The DC benefits of magister are practically a no-brainer. It seems to me that draconic, as nice as the improvements to it are, will mostly be a toy-destiny for low reaper content.

You simply cannot compete with magisters high DC's in higher skull content with the changes draconic is currently receiving. Dreaconic needs evocation DC bonuses and spellpoint cost reductions *at minimum* in order to make DPS spellcasting compete with that whopping DC increase from magister. Nuking through high skull content is painful on spellpoint pools. It is much more cost effective and party desirable to CC and instakill.

It would make sense for, instead of draconic being the blaster tree and magister being the DC tree, having draconic being the blaster/evoc DC tree, and having magister be where the other DCs and spell pen live. That would better define the two playstyles.

Edit: Perhaps have cores 1, 3, and 5 have 5% crit multi and cores 2 and 6 have +3 evoc/conj DCs each. That would even out the available DCs with magister, and losing some crit multi would balance that.

[pjw]

I just ran some DPS tests on my Wizzzard and I was definitely wrong about him having abysmal DPS. He just has relatively poor DPS: approximately 3k. That's using decent gear, no metas (to save SP) etc.

With the new Draconic crit enhancements, that will go up by about 20% (while the new Arcane Tempest is cool and all, it doesn't represent much DPS boost). That's pretty much it tho.

So my current thinking is:

• I still think there is a place for a spell cooldown reduction. Perhaps draconic should have 5% cooldown reduction per core for evocation and conjuration spells? This would be about a 50% DPS increase.
• Perhaps the Sigil of Battering Spellcraft could give double the Spell Power, and perhaps reduce cooldowns by 10%?

Also a question: metas now apply to energy burst. Are they free?

[Bronko]

Fatesinger

Cores:

• Core 1: Fatesinger's Rep: Each core grants you +10 Melee Power, +4 Ranged Power, +25 Spell Points, 10 universal spell power, +1 Arcane Caster Level, +2 Effective Bard Levels and +2 Maximum Bard Songs. You also gain Inspire Courage if you didn't have it before.
• Core 2: Glitter of Fame: +1 All Stats and all saves
• Core 3: Harmonic Resonance: Attacks have a chance of building up Resonance on your enemies, increasing their Sonic vulnerability and reducing their Armor Class by 2 per stack (max 10)
• Core 4: Intoxicating Presence: Enemies that strike you have a chance to be Fascinated.
• Core 5: Grandeur: Friendly spellcasts bestow bonus AC (+3) and PRR (+3), offensive spellcasts now build up Harmonic Resonance (internal cooldown)
• Core 6: Majesty: You are now immune to Charisma Damage, do not suffer from Arcane Spell Failure, also +25 Universal Spell Power

I will miss the old Fatesinger ED. I'm willing to give the new one a shot but my suggestion: keep the Eschew Materials metamagic effect that Harmonic Resonance currently has. Unless there is a performance issue involved I think that removing it is an unnecessary nerf to that core ability.

[janave]

I just ran some DPS tests on my Wizzzard and I was definitely wrong about him having abysmal DPS. He just has relatively poor DPS: approximately 3k. That's using decent gear, no metas (to save SP) etc.

With the new Draconic crit enhancements, that will go up by about 20% (while the new Arcane Tempest is cool and all, it doesn't represent much DPS boost). That's pretty much it tho.

So my current thinking is:

• I still think there is a place for a spell cooldown reduction. Perhaps draconic should have 5% cooldown reduction per core for evocation and conjuration spells? This would be about a 50% DPS increase.
• Perhaps the Sigil of Battering Spellcraft could give double the Spell Power, and perhaps reduce cooldowns by 10%?

Also a question: metas now apply to energy burst. Are they free?

I think 3000 DPS can be surpassed but it would empty the mana bar in a few encounters. One of the strength of Wizard over Sorcerer is that we can fit each level 9 damage spell into the rotation without debuffs. Casting Meteor, Acid Well, Thunder and Iceberg is pretty solid damage (granted the target takes full damage). Especially when all the crazy crit multiplier is stacked up.

Cooldown reduction sounds good but needs to be weighted, if not, it actually buffs Wizards way more than Sorcerers relatively. I dont find the cooldowns too heavy on nukes to be honest.

Good idea on Battering Spellcraft, It could use a large bump, I doubt it will make necro mages take this.

Specifically for Wizard evokers, I suggest adjusting Master of Knowledge, so it stacks faster, and decays a little less.

Current:
Your Arcane Bolt and Arcane Blast spells now grant you one stack of Mental Honing (+3 Universal Spell Power, +2% Spell Crit Damage) when cast. This effect can stack up to 30 times. One stack is removed every 6 seconds.

Suggested:
Stack size max: 20
Effect: 5 spell power, 3% Spell Crit Damage (very minor buff to work out the numbers)
Stack interval: 9s

This would make it much much easier to build up, and keep at high stacks.


Not a bad idea to make Go out.. passive, but it could be remotely triggered by archers and casters, so much of the time it would be just heating air.