General balance situation of Icesus.

[yoz]

How about adding more caster-oriented eq that directly boosts the caster's damage instead of the traditional +stats? This would help balance out benefits from weapons to melee characters.

There already are the "serpent scale" itehms which are supposed to boost mage damage. I had few of those items and frankly noticed no effect in the damage compared to my int items.

I would not trade spmax for more damage.

The benefit is +-0

We need caster weapons that give +all spell damage etc with caster stats to compete with weapons or something if this seems like a good solution.

[osma]

There already are the "serpent scale" itehms which are supposed to boost mage damage

I would not trade spmax for more damage

(In the interest of full disclosure, The following, while on subject, would benefit me as much as it would mages.)

FYI, serpent scale items are intended to be caster equipment, while wyvernscale is supposed to be melee equipment.

I have seen epr and con effects on wyvernscale, so serpent scale would likely produce +Int or +spr effects. This is in addition to the items reasonable armor class and the +% spell dam that serpent scales gives mages.

(I have only produced one faerie dragonscale, and it added to a broad array of mage spells (+ acid spells). so these might help casters as well, complete unknown atm)

I don't yet know because serpent scale is more difficult to get then wyvernscale. If people would be kind enough to remember that hydra (bush), swamp hydra's, and cyrohydra's can be skinned, I would appreciate it. These skins can be sold to me, or sold to shop like any other skin, giving a slight additional cash. And if i can start to get a regular supply of serpent scale items, i can start selling (more) useful mage items.

[pfloe]

I agree that basic melee damage has gotten out of hand and it costs too little ep, especially now that half the mud can cast coven dreams. If epcost was increased, that'd mean the run durations for offuparties would be shorter, and might mean that casters would get into those parties as well since they wouldn't be at 0% sp for half the run.

Another thing is that exp making is so risk free that it reminds me of doing cow runs in diablo, except some people actually died doing cow runs. There's really no room for debilitating effects and fancy special moves for players when the monsters don't really fight back anyway. Their skills do insignificant damage for most part, I think atleast the strike skill should be added to the basic skill set for almost any weapon wielding mob, and 200k mob should strike way harder than 50k. If they happen to cast spells it's dart or something, where the most scary thing that can happen is that you get a wound and need to stop for bandaging. The monsters hardly ever crit. You have to have monumentally bad luck to die doing exp without stupidity involved, and with this easy mobs it even takes a special kind of stupid to manage to die for the most part. So more high damage spells and skills for exp mobs please, then you can think of adding debilitating effects for various guilds to overcome these new obstacles. The end result should be more interesting game play for everyone and more player interaction required to optimize your exp gain.

Consider fudging the exp tuner a bit: The upper limit for exp worth could considerably higher, but drop down to current levels from even one kill and take 24h or something to regen back up unless the mob is killed again.
The extra exp for rarely killed mobs would maybe lure people to kill those occasionally, especially small 2-3 man caster def or other combos who typically kill few big mobs and then regen, I could see using this to increase their exp gain. This would also mean that since it'd be generally be the harder to reach or harder to kill mobs that had this bonus, leading skills and knowledge could actually increase your exprate beyond learning what to kill in tavern, cenedoiss and glacier. Also or instead could consider in future adding harder monsters to areas, with abilities that a skilled leader could cope with and in return the exp worth would be bigger.

[yoz]

I agree that basic melee damage has gotten out of hand and it costs too little ep, especially now that half the mud can cast coven dreams. If epcost was increased, that'd mean the run durations for offuparties would be shorter, and might mean that casters would get into those parties as well since they wouldn't be at 0% sp for half the run.

Another thing is that exp making is so risk free that it reminds me of doing cow runs in diablo, except some people actually died doing cow runs. There's really no room for debilitating effects and fancy special moves for players when the monsters don't really fight back anyway. Their skills do insignificant damage for most part, I think atleast the strike skill should be added to the basic skill set for almost any weapon wielding mob, and 200k mob should strike way harder than 50k. If they happen to cast spells it's dart or something, where the most scary thing that can happen is that you get a wound and need to stop for bandaging. The monsters hardly ever crit. You have to have monumentally bad luck to die doing exp without stupidity involved, and with this easy mobs it even takes a special kind of stupid to manage to die for the most part. So more high damage spells and skills for exp mobs please, then you can think of adding debilitating effects for various guilds to overcome these new obstacles. The end result should be more interesting game play for everyone and more player interaction required to optimize your exp gain.

Only thing that kets me/my partymembers killed is me not paying attention to the mud at all (which is how i usually exp, watching movie and just leading the same old areas) or just by stupid mistakes. Like drowning regnad =D

Only monsters that sometimes kick back are the monsters with coven spells. When it crits, its a byebye.

I wouldn't still go above bolts for normal monsters.

Bolt is fine, Blasts,Balls/tornados etc not.

Great feedback tho!

Consider fudging the exp tuner a bit: The upper limit for exp worth could considerably higher, but drop down to current levels from even one kill and take 24h or something to regen back up unless the mob is killed again.
The extra exp for rarely killed mobs would maybe lure people to kill those occasionally, especially small 2-3 man caster def or other combos who typically kill few big mobs and then regen, I could see using this to increase their exp gain. This would also mean that since it'd be generally be the harder to reach or harder to kill mobs that had this bonus, leading skills and knowledge could actually increase your exprate beyond learning what to kill in tavern, cenedoiss and glacier. Also or instead could consider in future adding harder monsters to areas, with abilities that a skilled leader could cope with and in return the exp worth would be bigger.

Brilliant text again from you.

Thanks for the output. The extra exp idea sounds awesome.

[pfloe]

Only monsters that sometimes kick back are the monsters with coven spells. When it crits, its a byebye.

I wouldn't still go above bolts for normal monsters.

Bolt is fine, Blasts,Balls/tornados etc not.

Bolts, blasts, balls, tornados also would be viable, if they would take long enough time that they can be avoided either by fleeing or by applying various current or future spellbreaker skills or other methods that require players to actually play and keep an eye on things. The idea is to increase the level of interaction, which in turn would give more room for players to shine with both their character skills and 'playing skills' and game knowledge.

Although I don't especially like unavoidable instakill spells/specials, certain amount of unpredictability should be present and hence I think exp monsters should crit a bit harder and maybe rarely spawn with extra spells or astronomical strike skills or throw molte vat of lave at you.

[yoz]

Bolts, blasts, balls, tornados also would be viable, if they would take long enough time that they can be avoided either by fleeing or by applying various current or future spellbreaker skills or other methods that require players to actually play and keep an eye on things. The idea is to increase the level of interaction, which in turn would give more room for players to shine with both their character skills and 'playing skills' and game knowledge.

Yes perhaps. But icesus random flees kinda screws the concept of flee avoids.

Although I don't especially like unavoidable instakill spells/specials, certain amount of unpredictability should be present and hence I think exp monsters should crit a bit harder and maybe rarely spawn with extra spells or astromical strike skills or throw molte vat of lave at you.

That is so true.

[solar]

I'm not particularly keen about nerfing soloing/melee/offexp to such a degree that by lowering the party rates it would also widen the chasm between the current expleaders and the rest of the mud, who'd need to spend more effort to cross the distance the previous players have already gone by offtank exping.

But I guess it's an inevitable evil if expmobs were made more dangerous.

I'm also not in favour of eq playing a still larger role in casters' rockingness. +spell damage stuff from eq should be a bonus, not a necessity. (Of course, it becomes a necessity after there is no other way to improve)

Lack in playability shouldn't be fixed by tuning/focusing on eq, because that would only benefit those who have it, not that they would mind >:) We saw what 'mere' tune did to playability and popularity of shifters. 20m investment is not as attractive a choice as a reincarnation is.

And for a clarification: What do you deem an 'expmob'? 100k+ mobs, at least according to the exping areas listed in some previous reply, right?

But yeah, perhaps mobs could indeed employ extra tactics than just kick/headbutt/dart. Maybe make them use 'shield parry' the maneuver, whirl-a-lot if wielding two weapons etc. Not just have fancy stuff be a special_hit()

And uh, I'll get me coat.

[yoz]

I'm not particularly keen about nerfing soloing/melee/offexp to such a degree that by lowering the party rates it would also widen the chasm between the current expleaders and the rest of the mud, who'd need to spend more effort to cross the distance the previous players have already gone by offtank exping.

so what? there SHOULD be a chasm between the low exps ones and high exp ones. Melee needs to be tuned anyways in way or other. Now you are not talking in general view,just defending your own fondness in offreincs

I'm also not in favour of eq playing a still larger role in casters' rockingness. +spell damage stuff from eq should be a bonus, not a necessity. (Of course, it becomes a necessity after there is no other way to improve)

Eheh. Eq already plays the biggest part in effectivity. That how it has always been and will be.

Lack in playability shouldn't be fixed by tuning/focusing on eq, because that would only benefit those who have it, not that they would mind >:) We saw what 'mere' tune did to playability and popularity of shifters. 20m investment is not as attractive a choice as a reincarnation is.

Mere is not a necessary item. Its just a cheap item that is maybe the best shifter eq (dunno about warscythe). And somehow everyone seems to have a fixation that a shifter can not work without meres. And that is nothing but bullshit.

[goderic]

Thinking of the mage balance situation, one approach not yet mentioned is to uptune Rite of Power, perhaps giving it a longer duration. Rites, as is, are ok one-shot gimmicks, but could be much more interesting.

[moraq]

Rites are cool. There could be a few more of them for mages. Should you have a great idea for a new rite drop me a mudmail or tell if I'm unidle (impossible!)

[goderic]

Rites are cool. There could be a few more of them for mages. Should you have a great idea for a new rite drop me a mudmail or tell if I'm unidle (impossible!)

Since I'm in the forum right now, I'll just pitch an idea here, if I may!

Rename the current Rop / RoS as 'minor' rite of whatever, and implement a 'Major' rite that would have a duration of a variable amount of time, or better yet, a variable number of spells cast. The exact duration would naturally be based of stats and percentages.
Also, could the 'extract magic' spell be tweaked to merge multiple magic jellies into one? Or to drop jellies along with hearts to merge them all into a bigger jelly?

[rha]

Considering exp making of casters to par with offs, maybe mages magical campfire,sorcerer vortex,and healer smoke spells could be uptuned? So casters get short runs, but also regen faster in that way they could keep up with offs. And the smoke spell uptuned could be specified for spregen, so its not abuse for offs.