Summoned: Staff of the Magi (and the rest of the FT Staff line)

Just checked through my spell book to confirm my recollection that I never bothered to buy any of the mage staff summoning spells.

I bought Iscalda's Staff for a few plat at an early stage and that beats the hell out of anything I could ever summon. I did (eventually) get the Summoned Staff of the Magi spell, but the only use it was ever put to was for giving away to total noobs.

Since it appears to be policy that Mages are not EVER to be allowed to summon any weapons that are actually useful (ie compare with weapons that are readily available at minimal cost), I suggest this thread may as well be closed.
 
Bridger said:
Since it appears to be policy that Mages are not EVER to be allowed to summon any weapons that are actually useful (ie compare with weapons that are readily available at minimal cost), I suggest this thread may as well be closed.
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manchild petulance
 
Bridger said:
Just checked through my spell book to confirm my recollection that I never bothered to buy any of the mage staff summoning spells.

I bought Iscalda's Staff for a few plat at an early stage and that beats the hell out of anything I could ever summon. I did (eventually) get the Summoned Staff of the Magi spell, but the only use it was ever put to was for giving away to total noobs.

Since it appears to be policy that Mages are not EVER to be allowed to summon any weapons that are actually useful (ie compare with weapons that are readily available at minimal cost), I suggest this thread may as well be closed.
Click to expand...

Thanks for your constructive comparisons and additions to this and other threads. As your ideas are perhaps TOO good, and as to not overshadow and intimidate other posters, I'm going to ask that you refrain from sharing further ideas. I hope you understand.
 
Making it 1h will go a very long way towards making it worth summoning, even on a simple swap in and out basis.

I also suggest giving it a proc (one different from the current rune standard). Combine that with the switch to a 1her would give it added utility as a pet weapon. Which is where I think it would really shine, if modified appropriately.

There are lots of options for procs to toss on them, so I'll stay pretty general here.

1. Debuffs
2. longer duration buffs (similar to what we see in items like needlefist, though probably not quite that long).
3. Damage procs
4. Short duration or temporary buffs (similar to items like the Warlord Breastplate, or a short duration large resist buff for example.)

It would also be kind of neat to see specialty items for pet classes that summon weapons with various uses added to appropriate difficulty mobs (similar to what we see in rack of seeker darts for example). Enough classes with viable pets certainly exist to make it a worthwhile to implement a few here and there. But I digress.

Since intcasters are pretty much incapable of hitting the ground with a melee weapon, even if they are lying on it bleeding out , I don't think adding a proc to the weapon would imbalance things at all (healer use being a possible caveat, but chances are they will have access to more powerful things already anyways), since it would pretty much only get triggered by the pet using the weapon. Further, since pets aren't getting anything from the FT, it being a mana battery is still perfectly fine.

A further suggestion that kind of ties in with this is a way to unequip items from pets. Something like /cm unequip <slot>. That way, the owner could decide between items on the fly, adding a bit more strategy to pet classes, without the needing to completely resummon, and stop people from just handing your pet random bits of junk, and it for some reason refusing to wear anything else (Tacotown loves shovels for some reason, I don't get it either. Despite looking hilarious with them, it does get old).

Personally I think people would be far more willing to purchase more expensive weapons for pets given a way to remove it when going into fights where pet or character survival is unlikely or uncertain. The item would pop back into your characters inventory (not sure if that was completely clear above). Also I'd suggest (if this is even possible in the first place) the command be unusable in combat to prevent just unequipping at the last second in order to save a weapon pre-death.
 
Thanks for your constructive comparisons and additions to this and other threads. As your ideas are perhaps TOO good, and as to not overshadow and intimidate other posters, I'm going to ask that you refrain from sharing further ideas. I hope you understand.
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Deserved I guess - So please accept my apologies.
 
With what Aisling said about adding a /cm command to swap out gear on pets, a good example is the eqemu server "the hidden forest". They allow you to summon a class bot ( personal paladin, cleric, etc....) that you can use /commands to upgrade gear with.

A merchant has readily available free gear, which makes good starting gear, but as you do quests (and repeat them for your bot) you have the ability to remove it exchange gear on your bit at will. Would be nice to check it out and see if its something SoD could replicate
 
Upon further review, we are apparently VERY loathe to give out a 1h FT3 anything. FT3 for casters in a single slot is in fact still pretty damn rare. So the stats are going to have to change somewhat.

We also don't want yet another reason to want a mage in town but not in the field.

To throw further discussion points out there, lets take the for comparison, and recall that there are 1 worse and 3 better hammers than this. Hammer of Judgement (56).

Taking Aislings thoughts into account, I'm also expanding the discussion somewhat to include the other summoned weapons. And before you ask, the 2 hour recast time is dumb and wont stay, though reagent cost may increase slightly.

Dagger (1) - You have to start somewhere I suppose. I think its better than your starting gear, so that's something, but this won't change.
Fang (12) - Pretty comparable to your staff of tracing, but with hp rather than mana, making it better for pets (assuming you can't find a nice halberd somewhere). Unlikely to change.
Spear of Warding (20) - Saves, HP, and AC. As a pet weapon this isn't terrible.
Sword of Runes (29) - Stat wise it is inferior to the spear of warding save for it's rune proc, which probably doesn't really make up for it's bad stats. This is obviously meant to be a tanking weapon of some kind. Damage is too low to affect a pet at this point. Has the rune proc.
Dagger of Symbols (39) - This somehow manages to have even worse than the previous one stat wise. The ratio is supposed to mean it's better, but it doesn't help the pets, and even the most untwinked player would have better by this point. Proc rate seems to be roughly the same (minimal).
Blade of Power (64) - Pretty good stats and at least it looks awesome. Proc rate seems to be roughly the same (minimal).
Spear of Power (64) - Same stats, same proc, but at least this one can argubaly be useful to a player sometimes. Proc rate seems to be roughly the same (minimal).


Dagger and Fang won't be changing. So we'll ignore those. But lets have some fun with the rest. Lets even out the stat progression.

Lets call the swords defensive, as they all have a rune proc.
Lets then call the spear offensive, and change the proc to something damaging.
Lets then call the staves utility, and give them misc self procs. (I can't seem to find anything appropriate at the moment, so would be up for suggestions on that front.


Summary
Dagger (1)
Staff of Tracing (8) - 1h | +5cha | rec level 4 | + some self proc
Fang (12) -> Fang of Tracing for consistency sake
Staff of Warding (16) - 1h | +10cha | rec level 12 | + some self proc
Spear of Warding (20) - add Ignite proc | minimal proc rate
Staff of Runes (24) - 1h | +10cha | rec level 20 | + some self proc
Sword of Runes (29) - add 5 sv all
Staff of Symbols (34) 1h |+10cha | rec level 30 | + some self proc
Dagger of Symbols (39) - +25 hp | replace proc with Ignite | +proc rate
Staff of the Magi (55) 1h | +10cha | rec level 50 | -1FT | + some self proc
Blade of Power (64) 6 sec recast | 2 pearl reg | +proc rate
Spear of Power (64) 6 sec recast | 2 pearl reg | replace proc with Ignite | ++proc rate

Thoughts and complaints welcome, this is still probably a few days from being near final.


As for the unequip thing. It doesn't seem impossible, but I'd have to take a look at how pets do items. Given Zaela's familiarity with that part of the code and her recent boredom, perhaps it's something she'd like to take a look at. Whether current pet gear is balanced around being irretrievable is not something I'm currently up on.
 
There aren't a whole lot of items that are Defined by their procs (Chestplate of the Warlord, summoned hammer line being exceptions), so I am VERY wary of this change. I'm also not sure why you would have to maintain a recommended level on any of the staves with FT going out the window.

Crippling the FT on these staves makes me sad. I feel that giving significant FT and minimizing the stats on them (or taking out the stats on them completely) makes them unique items which might have applications in long duration situations (tmaps, easy grinds come to mind) but non-ideal for challenging content requiring the stats of a real weapon. Giving these staves stats and a proc (which I think Aisling was suggesting as an addition to the FT, not as a replacement) and removing their FT will make the staves rather boring in my opinion.

If FT were to come back onto the staves, you could incorporate the LONG LONG recast time on them so as to make them more of a personal weapon for use situationally. This I would like very much, not sure how other magicians would react.

If FT is gone for good, I would say reconsider the +element damage to give these staves flavor. Again, the arbitrary stats with proc does not seem very appealing to me
 
Re-read my summaries. I said FT 3 on a 1h is a no go, and noted that in the stat adjustments. Didn't say anything about FT 2.

On re-read myself I could see where what I wrote could be confusing. The idea is to knock it from FT III to FT II to be better in line with how we handle itemization. There is about 1 FT III 1h weapon for casters that I know of, and it is far from trivial to get, despite it's tier. Aside from the staff of the Magi, there is no intention of editing the other staves FT YET.
 
Cyzaine said:
Re-read my summaries. I said FT 3 on a 1h is a no go, and noted that in the stat adjustments. Didn't say anything about FT 2.

On re-read myself I could see where what I wrote could be confusing. The idea is to knock it from FT III to FT II to be better in line with how we handle itemization. There is about 1 FT III 1h weapon for casters that I know of, and it is far from trivial to get, despite it's tier. Aside from the staff of the Magi, there is no intention of editing the other staves FT YET.
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Understood, thank you! If it isn't deemed too OP, please keep +element damage in consideration as well
 
Idea for self only proc: How about something like Force Shield?

It could help to absorb any damage incurred by accidentally raining yourself - especially if you are within melee range. Although, 100 is probably too low to offset the higher level damage at level 50+. But then again, how many mages are meleeing 50+?

And as far as pet un-equipping, I think a command to un-equipping would be great - even if the item is destroyed. Returning the items may be too OP. The command should not work if the character is guest locked either...
 
Cyzaine said:
Staff of the Magi (55) 1h | +10cha | rec level 50 | -1FT | + some self proc
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Instead of a self proc could you make this a clickie with charges? (similar to ring of flight) Perhaps a clarity-line for casters that don't have access to Enc buffs or don't want to head back to town (5-6 mana regen "Clarity" maybe or if you are feeling generous "Clarity II" for 11 mana)

Most mages are not going to be doing melee since their primary DPS are rains...so a weapon proc seems unlikely to be used much.

Thanks for taking the time to look at these.

Faldeney
65 Wizard
 
The proc idea is really more for the pet than for the mage, ideally forcing a choice between sword of power, spear of power, or staff of the magi. If it was going to be something for the mage, proc/clicky probably wouldn't be the way I'd want to go, unless someone comes up with something good.
 
I love the idea of having to make choices with weapon summoning for pets, Cyzaine. Although the weapons of power are mostly used for pets they are still usable by PC's and can be fun when dual-wielded by a non-twink.

I was hoping for a similar utility for caster classes, the stat change and 1HB you added went along way in doing this. Still hoping for a caster usable spell effect if there is any way to do it.. :D

That being said, a good differentiator for a staff could be adding a random Debuff proc. This fits the class as the mages have one of the best debuffs in the game and this would cause the Mage to have to choose between something that Defends, Damages or Debuffs. Or using a combo of 2 of them.

Fald
 
I actually took a crack at coming up with some summoned alternatives a while back and I thought mana whisper would be a cool proc to add to the staves at some point.
 
So I was thinking about this. Fire is a pretty common type of spell for things to be resistant against (see, bloodfire wing fr, fire grotto, emberflow, plane of fire, plane of torment, tower of tarhyl, thaz fire wings, etc), but problems are going to be found with any one resist type. I was thinking maybe add a resist adjust, but that runs into other problems. Then I thought of the clicky idea, then I thought of that ring in the rust that changes configuration, so how about each of the highest weapons comes with a clicky on it that swaps to another version of the weapon allowing quite a bit more strategy for them. Something like this.

Summoned: Lance of Combustion
Slot: PRIMARY SECONDARY
Skill: Piercing Atk Delay: 22
DMG: 15 AC: 10
Effect: Summon: Pike of Glaciation (Must Equip. Casting Time: 2.0) Charges=1
Effect: Ignite (combat)
DEX: +10 AGI: +10 HP: +50
MR: +10 FR: +10 CR: +10 PR: +10 DR: +10
Recommended level of 47
WT: 0.0 Size: Medium
Class: WAR PAL RNG SHD BRD ROG
Race: ALL

Summoned: Pike of Glaciation
Slot: PRIMARY SECONDARY
Skill: Piercing Atk Delay: 22
DMG: 15 AC: 10
Effect: Summon: Lance of Combustion (Must Equip. Casting Time: 2.0) Charges=1
Effect: Shock of Ice (combat)
DEX: +10 AGI: +10 HP: +50
MR: +10 FR: +10 CR: +10 PR: +10 DR: +10
Recommended level of 47
WT: 0.0 Size: Medium
Class: WAR PAL RNG SHD BRD ROG
Race: ALL

Realistically I think 2 elements would be enough for the proc switches, no real need to hit absolutely everything. In addition I think it would be pretty neat to do the following:

1. Split up the resists

Spears: Fire or Cold resistance depending on version
Blade: Disease or overall (for this I mean the current 10x5 types) depending on version
Staff: Magic Resist or Poison

This would add another dimension of strategy to the choice of weapon (though may cause some problems with player use).


2. For staffs. One version = debuff (maybe a -10 to all stacking with malosini debuff?) One version= buff/misc of some sort. If mana whisper could be somehow adapted so the pet could proc the effect on the caster that might be something for the 2nd version, though that might be a bit much.

3. Blades. One version= current runeguard proc, other version= short term defensive buff. For the short term defensive one I have a few ideas.

A) Ac buff similar to warlord bp
B) Spell mitigation buff

I like the second idea a bit better, bit more diverse.

4. Keeping with the theme of offensive and defensive for spears and blades respectively:
A) Spears lose the Agi, gain strength instead
B) Blades lose the Dex, gain Sta
C) Spears lose the AC, gain a little in ratio or something else to take up the dps a tiny bit. Maybe a tiny boost in ac for the blades.
 
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If we remove the FT from staves, could we get a level 16-20something version of a mod rod to replace the FT loss?
 
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