Mage and priest spell damage and efficiency

[fizzix]

What's the point of all that INT if you're just going to blast your way through the dungeon with fireballs?

I always thought mages were subtle, preferring to achieve their goals through manipulation and illusion rather than through raw power and violence (unless, of course, you're a power-hungry evil mage). From that perspective, it makes perfect sense that the damage output of a mage would kindof suck.

I think, the character you described is more akin to a rogue. Trickery, perception and sneakiness are the rogue. Sneakiness, archery, perception is a ranger. Sneakiness, trickery, offensive magic is the mage. Or at least that's how it seems to be designed in Angband.

Powerdiver is right that overpowered archery is the root of the problem. Archery should be highly powered for Rangers and Warriors and no one else. Trying to overpower mage spells to make them more powerful than branded bolts is a bad idea. Weaken archery first and then strengthen the spells so the class is competitive.

One change that no one mentioned is to make SP for all classes more a function of clevel than INT (or WIS). Stat gain should provide you with a moderate boost in SP and fail rate not a huge boost in both. (I feel the same way about HP and CON)

[Marble Dice]

I thought I might see if I can use your spreadsheet to help balance DaJAngband spells, but I don't think I've ever seen an ODS file. How do you use it? (what program to use?)

You can download Open Office from http://www.openoffice.org

The spreadsheet is a bit clunky due to the data layout needs of the graphics. There's a column for each level, and a row for every spell's damage and a second row for its efficiency. The damage formulae are defined as "names," go to Insert > Names... > Define or press CTRL-F3 to access them. The graphics update dynamically, but if you want to add or remove spells, it's probably best to re-generate them, which is kind of a pain, but can be done with Insert > Chart...

Good luck, and feel free to send me a PM if you have questions.

[Bagplant]

As it happens I've been playing human mages a lot lately and find myself using offensive spells quite a bit. Mana is the main limitation so I tend to use magic missile almost exclusively up until stat gain - it's a very powerful spell in the early levels, especially with improved beam chance. Once my mana pool improves I use the elemental bolt spells quite a bit for faster kills if I know I'll be able to rest and recover mana afterward - divide and conquer is key. I do think they could use some efficiency/damage improvement, as currently once you get Raal's there's really not much reason to use them any more.

I do use missile weapons, especially early, but find them unreliable for a mage as I tend to miss a lot. I don't think branding of bolts is class defining for a mage since you get the spell so late in the game, by which stage you've more or less won anyway barring silly mistakes (mages have been powerful in the end game for as long as I've played V - the challenge is getting them there). I have yet to even find the spellbook with the brand spell in my recent games, although I haven't been below 3500' as yet.

I think ranged weapons are probably slightly overpowered in the early game and about right after that point. Slay/brand ammunition is definitely overpowered, but that's true for all classes, not just mages - my first V winner was a ranger who killed Morgoth in 40 shots without ever taking any damage.

[Pete Mack]

Orb of draining is arguably overpowered, but it's kind of besides the point: once you get max blows or good ammo damage, there's no way you want to waste mana on offense as a priest. OoD does ~150 damage vs evil. 4 blows with decent weapon does ~400+. With a good bow, you can do 200-600 damage depending on brands and slays. Save your mana for healing and defense.

[Psi]

Mages (and archery) in FA have had a complete revamp, which deals with a lot of these issues. I haven't played V much lately - does anyone who has played both care to comment?

I haven't played V mages since GoI days, but I have had a crash course in ironman paladins and rogues recently. The biggest surprise coming from FA into V has been how powerful missile attacks are - I could do so much more damage with a single pebble than with several blows from my melee weapon. Judging by the other comments here though, that will come as no surprise.

FA mages do not need to rely on archery or melee - which is how I prefer to play them. However I think the first cut of the class may be a little overpowered - or I've had too much practice.

[Nick]

The biggest surprise coming from FA into V has been how powerful missile attacks are - I could do so much more damage with a single pebble than with several blows from my melee weapon. Judging by the other comments here though, that will come as no surprise.

Yes, that seems to be the general feeling.

However I think the first cut of the class may be a little overpowered - or I've had too much practice.

Maybe the game balance issues?

[Marble Dice]

Orb of draining is arguably overpowered, but it's kind of besides the point: once you get max blows or good ammo damage, there's no way you want to waste mana on offense as a priest.

Yes, all true. My point was never that OoD wins the game for you, just that compared to anything in a mage's aresnal, it's got everything. OoD dominates the early game, it's a free ride to stat gain. When you don't have a good weapon or bow yet, you can murder uniques with it, kill groups outright, or just soften them up enough to finish with melee.

Mages can compete on groups with lightning bolt pretty well, but they have no decent source of single target damage in the early game. Priests are better at melee, better at archery, better at single target magic damage, and competitive in group damage. Maybe that's the way it should be, I don't know - but that's definitely the way it is. Priest feels like a distinct, complete, and worthwhile class from level 1 to 50. Mage feels incomplete until around level 30 (haste, branding, banishment).

[Zikke]

I think beefing up some of the more flavorful mage spells would make the class feel more unique and valuable from 1-50. Maybe having multiple of the same damage spell cause the damage to increase each time for a few turns, or increasing the usefulness of crowd control spells like sleep, confuse, etc.

The damage spells for a mage or only part of the draw of caster classes in any game. The other side is utility spells, and I think those are lacking in usefulness in Angband (not things like ID or detect monters, but things like "Cause Elemental Weakness" or being able to blind a unique for a few turns or having magic missile scale better with levels or INT gear).

[Tatami]

Uniques should be able to be confused, slept, scurred, etc. They should just snap out it quicker.

[Zikke]

Uniques should be able to be confused, slept, scurred, etc. They should just snap out it quicker.

My thoughts exactly.

[bron]

I agree that OOD is overpowered. But there is a nice potential symmetry in the classes: Warriors are strong at the start, Mages are strong at the end, and Priests are strong in the middle. Mages can do high damage/turn, but have low HP and healing; Priests have lower damage output, but have powerful defenses and healing; Warriors have lots of HP and high damage/turn, but need to go HTH. At least, that's the way I think it ought to be.

I think OOD for priests should be changed to do (level+3d6) rather than 1.5*level. And for Paladins it should be level*2/3. More to the point, it should be moved into the 4th prayer book, and Protection From Evil moved up to take its place. PfE is a sufficiently powerful prayer to get through to the stat gain levels, and far more in line with the character class. Learning OOD late significantly reduces its worth, since its damage output is not high enough.

[Atarlost]

Except that mages don't do high damage/turn apart from gamebreaking missile weapons of the sort everyone can use.

[bron]

Except that mages don't do high damage/turn apart from gamebreaking missile weapons of the sort everyone can use.

Perhaps I wasn't emphatic enough. I said "there is a nice *potential* symmetry .." and "that's the way I think it *ought* to be".

[Inquisitivephysicsguy]

I find myself playing angband mages all the time, the low damage/high mana cost in the early game has always bothered me as well. I prefer angband mages to most other equivalent versions in popular games because of all of the utility spells. Angband has some of the best utility spells that I've ever seen in a game. It could be made better, I think, if each of the spells had a multi purpose application, like... say that you have ice storm, if you cast it on a monster, it should have the effects that we're all familiar with, but if it were cast on the surroundings, then it slows the progress of advancing critters. Or, if you were to make it to a high enough level, then you could cast teleport on an empty space and produce a "quasi-portal" so that the next time that you cast teleport on yourself that you can return to that portal. It may also be cool if the game had extra environmental factors that could be created.

Say that Monsters are on a frozen lake, and that you were to cast fireball over the lake, it damages the monsters, and drowns those who can't swim.

Boosting the damage of the lower level spells would be a great plus, as well, I think.

Thoughts?

[Hariolor]

Inquisitivephysicsguy - There are several variants with these sorts of features. I'd really like to see them in *some* form in V - especially terrain effects. In fact, I second pretty much everything you said.

On a more general note - I know there's frequent rumblings regarding splitting-out/refining what is in each spellbook. Maybe the best option would be to bump up/improve the available spells a bit, then tweak what classes get what. Priests and paladins are reasonably balanced, I think - but how about letting rogues *fake* priest spells the way they do mage spells, but take away *all* direct-damage effects. Rangers might be treated similarly, making them a little more weighted towards healing and escapes (which seem pretty ranger-y to me). Mages could stay the same, but maybe take away elemental brand and enchant weapon/armor from their list? *ducks*

This would obviously need balancing - but it's the sort of approach taken in several variants, and I think for good reason. Granted, I don't do any of the actual programming work on all this, so it's easy for me to spout suggestions