Mage-er Change

[Derakon]

I think you're expecting to be able to kill too many enemies...and also that the priest and mage should have roughly equal killing ability at any given point in the game. Mages are challenge classes; in fact I'd say they're probably the hardest class in the game. They have terrible early game capabilities and only middling killing ability at any point. In exchange they get loads of utility spells. They are all about cherrypicking your fights and avoiding or ignoring everything you can't deal with, which is a lot! Early on you do this through detection and stealth, then later through Teleport Away, then in the late game through Banishment and Destruction.

Meanwhile, priests are, to my mind, the second-easiest class to win with (after the paladin, which Timo only claims is hard because it is so easy that he gets bored...yeah). That's not so much due to Orb of Draining, though it certainly doesn't hurt. 0% fail 300HP heals starting in the early midgame counts for a lot too.

I should probably have stated my expectations on the various class challenge levels earlier, and I apologize for that. You're trying to say "The mage should be able to deal with all these monsters with resistances to his only attacks" and I'm over here saying "the mage having crappy resisted offense at this stage is half the fun!"

For what it's worth, my first inclination on all cavern levels is to just get the hell off them as quickly as possible. It's very difficult to control the terrain on these levels as they're almost completely bereft of chokepoints. Find the closest stairs and leave, or just recall out if you have to. They're not quite as dangerous as ZAngband's "arena" levels (which were completely open) but they come about as close as is possible without looking completely unfair...

(Which isn't to say that they should be removed just yet; it can be an interesting challenge to deal with getting off them sometimes)

[Spacebux]

I think you're expecting to be able to kill too many enemies...and also that the priest and mage should have roughly equal killing ability at any given point in the game. Mages are challenge classes; in fact I'd say they're probably the hardest class in the game. They have terrible early game capabilities and only middling killing ability at any point.

I can list a plethora of examples where Priest spells >> Mage spells in the mid-levels of the game.

I'm not going to argue about whether a mage ought to be easier or harder than a priest.

My point, though, is one would think a mage would have more fire-power, even at level 20, than a priest. But, in reality, the way the game is structured today, a L20 mage just does not have the guns to go toe-to-toe with a priest. As far as I have played D&D, Dikumuds, ad nauseum, I have never seen situation where the Mage class had inferior attack spells compared to the Priest class.

Yes, the Mage class is a challenge. No question or argument there. That - again - is not my point.

Please, for the 4th time: the elemental attack spells of mages are either under-powered for their lack of ability to do decent damage on non-resistant mobs, or the priests are over-powered with Orb of D. As you pointed out in an earlier post, !s of Restore Mana are quite prevalent in the current edition---making the 7mana per Orb vs. 4mana per Bolt argument even weaker, in my opinion. Orbs, are also guaranteed to hit other, nearby mobs. Acid Bolts sometimes become beams, and only hit other mobs IFF they are in a line. "Line up, Boys!" Which does not happen often, as Group Mob mentality has reformed to be smarter in the AI category. ... Especially with a radius 3-ball Orb at L30.

I should probably have stated my expectations on the various class challenge levels earlier, and I apologize for that. You're trying to say "The mage should be able to deal with all these monsters with resistances to his only attacks" and I'm over here saying "the mage having crappy resisted offense at this stage is half the fun!"

Well, that is part of it, yes. I also know that if the mage had a mid-level mana bolt/ball/cone type spell, several others would cry foul that the mage would be too easy.

That would not be as much an issue IF we moved to a spell-scroll system.

[Nick]

IIRC Frazband did something like the "add-spells-to-book" thing.

[Taha]

I used to play high elf mages, and that isn't a challenge race with high int, decent hp and see invisible. But with my recent hobbit mages, plus the new open levels I totally see your point. Surviving to stairs at the other end of the level can be a beast. But for the end game, with cheap haste, double resists, runes, destruction, tele other, both banishes and rift they finish up well.

Spacebux, multi hued dragons are a very annoying for pre Raal's mages. But then again, the first and last rule of playing a mage: Mages shall run away. Its not like you lost a lot by avoiding low level MHDs, and later ones are a selected fight if you have Raal's or a wand of drain life or something. As Derakon noted, Priests have trouble with Angels and non evil monsters that group.

After the improvements to damage per mana for mages in the last few revisions, I dont see any issues with current spell choices.

Edited to add: Mages also have pretty decent ball spells by level 30. And the flexibility to choose a target and pick off one or a few at a time is a plus for a mage as well. But by level 30, my priests are only using orb to clean up low level groups that are nothing more than a nuisance to either character, and the healing / buffs are far more important. Priests with spam healing are just plain easy at that point, by far the easiest wins.
________
teen girl Cam

[cowgod]

I would also be happy with having each spell book contain one spell that you learn and permanently know when you read the spell book. I doubt that would be implemented though because it seems like it would be a significant change to game balancing.

As is, gained/learned spells & prayers are permanent. But, one must maintain a copy in-hand. Ideally, the more one casts a spell / prayer, the more efficient one ought to be at it, but that is bit of coding I don't think I our team of coders has opportunity to tackle at the moment.

What I was saying is the following: you find a spell book with one spell, you read it, the book disappears, and you now know the spell permanently with no spell book required. There could be some % change that you fail to learn the spell, but either way you don't have to carry the spell book.

It's like that in many more modern RPGs (e.g. Final Fantasy I, Geneforge, Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines), though I admit that the games I'm thinking of aren't roguelikes.

I'm not sure whether that was clear from my first post or not, but I doubt anyone's going to make this change anyways.

Acid is the most useful elemental attack - as you know - more mobs than any other have this resist hole. But it does not do double-damage to non-resistant mobs. The game does not give mage spells any *slay* ability, e.g. Mages dish it out equally to all. A Priest doesn't have to worry about whether his Orb will be resisted or not... just whether it will do double damage or not! (and whether he/she holds a blessed weapon or not...)

While warriors do get swords of slay dragon (or whatever), mages do get area of effect attacks. I'm pretty sure that warriors don't get any "sword of hitting everyone in the room at once".

Though it is a moot point if you happen to be casting fireball at something that's immune to fire.

[Spacebux]

I used to play high elf mages, and that isn't a challenge race with high int, decent hp and see invisible. But with my recent hobbit mages, plus the new open levels I totally see your point. Surviving to stairs at the other end of the level can be a beast. But for the end game, with cheap haste, double resists, runes, destruction, tele other, both banishes and rift they finish up well.

Spacebux, multi hued dragons are a very annoying for pre Raal's mages. But then again, the first and last rule of playing a mage: Mages shall run away. Its not like you lost a lot by avoiding low level MHDs, and later ones are a selected fight if you have Raal's or a wand of drain life or something. As Derakon noted, Priests have trouble with Angels and non evil monsters that group.

I listed the Young Multi-hued Dragon as a sample of what you typically find in the 1000-2000' levels. I'm not trying to say that is my only challenge or, that I find that to be the bane for mages.

For example, I also listed the Mature Blue d. It does not really matter WHAT mob you list or like to throw up as an example. When you have mobs that have 100s - 1000s of HPs, the base set of mage spells is woefully unpowered for the task. Most mage players find out you just cannot dive nearly as fast as a warrior or priest of the same player-level. Why? Generally, you are waiting for HPs to build up so you can survive better until you come across Raal's. The reason they are waiting for Raal's is because the base 4 does not have an end-all spell like the Priests have in Orb of Draining. Mages are all about getting 'Rift'... which is kind of sad. There's something wrong with that.

Rift, Magic Missile are currently the only 2 spells that are capable of 0% fail rates and un-resistable damage... most mages do not rely on Mana Storm at the end---too high a fail-rate for such a mana cost and marginal damage. Chaos Strike and Rift are the only reasonable attack options in the deeper levels. BUT--I digress....

Everyone has trouble with Angels. Angels (Seraphs, Archons, Cherubs) resist all elemental attacks anyway.

After the improvements to damage per mana for mages in the last few revisions, I dont see any issues with current spell choices.

Actually, it makes Spear of Light look silly at 6 mana... Should stay at 5 mana-per, in my opinion.

Edited to add: Mages also have pretty decent ball spells by level 30.

Those ball spells are relatively in-effective, again, in comparison with either the Orb of Draining or by simply looking at which groups of mobs one would LIKE to use them on. Fire or Ice - most of the time if you have a Troll pit or Giant pit you want to attack, you will have a group of mobs that will resist one or the other. To top that all off, there is ITEM destruction one must be weary of. The only thing ORB destroys are mobs and cursed items!!! Such a deal for 7 mana... at level 9. Would be a lot better for mages if Stinking Cloud, e.g., ratcheted up in power better. But, I doubt the Coders would agree with that.

And the flexibility to choose a target and pick off one or a few at a time is a plus for a mage as well. But by level 30, my priests are only using orb to clean up low level groups that are nothing more than a nuisance to either character, and the healing / buffs are far more important. Priests with spam healing are just plain easy at that point, by far the easiest wins.

No - actually Priest players use Orb quite frequently - no need to guess whether a mob will resist it... just whether its going to do double damage or not. Orbs are frequently used to bounce off walls to nail those annoying hounds, e.g. Mages can only hope to have a ball spell like Explosion, on-line, by the time they are chased down by a pack of multi-hued hounds.

However, my whole premise for this thread is the WANT to get away from books and move to scolls. If you have to scrounge around for a ? of Phase Door before you either put it in your book for spell-casting or for just using and burning as a one-timer spell, then you will find the mage class that much more challenging and exciting.

The earlier spells like Explosion, Acid Ball, e.g., would be find-able in DLs 25+, though maybe not learnable until one attained the proper level for it to be legible. You would not have to wait, necessarily, to find a BOOK, per se. You might find certain spells earlier, certain spells later depending on Spell Level and your RNG.

-SBux-

[Spacebux]

While warriors do get swords of slay dragon (or whatever), mages do get area of effect attacks. I'm pretty sure that warriors don't get any "sword of hitting everyone in the room at once".

Though it is a moot point if you happen to be casting fireball at something that's immune to fire.

I put the *slay* point as an example... Might be kind of cool to attempt at coding a spell designed specifically for certain mob types, but, I meant it in comparison to the "Orb of Draining" in particular because, in effect, it does possess a *slay evil* effect in its damage calculations.

Mages cannot conjure up a Magical Spear of Slay Demon which pierces any demon and does double-damage to any demon in its path, for example. All the base books for mages, have elemental attacks which the coders have put in resistances to the higher-level mobs.

[Magnate]

Note: there is NO ATTACK, no blame, not even an "accusation" of wrong-doing. I am simply trying to point out the situation.

My apologies if I chose the wrong words in trying to lay it out.

I'm sorry if I did not know it wasn't Magnate who made the changes to the floor-plans, but it did seem like that to me in an earlier post from Magnate himself.

I grovel in your general direction.

No worries - d_m is our dungeon generation maestro. I usually confine myself to objects, and often end up unwittingly infuriating Eddie, hence his claim to the job ;-)

[PowerDiver]

No worries - d_m is our dungeon generation maestro. I usually confine myself to objects, and often end up unwittingly infuriating Eddie, hence his claim to the job ;-)

Actually, I was referring to the fact that I've blamed you a few times recently for changes that weren't your fault, e.g. putting DSMs under standard armor squelch.

[Philip]

Spacebux: Have you ever played a mage? Diving is fairly dangerous for a while, but if you get Mordenkainens it's simple enough. Raal's is important sure, for more reasons than you listed, because of Meteor Swarm, which, by the way is an unresistable spell, and once you get four missiles, it gets powerful, because you have something that deals 200 damage for about 14 mana IIRC. That's twice as much as orb, which would probably deal about 110 to evil, and as you noted, there are !restore mana lying around, so who cares about mana. Rift is there so no-one gets really close. Also, at level 50, mana storm is fairly reliable, as long as you're paying attention. It's seriously cheap at 12 or so, and deals a lot of damage. I'm saying this because I have a hobbit mage at level 49, and he's doing just fine against most things he meets.

I have also won with a priest, and I stopped using orb at around level 30, or wherever you get 0% fail on Heal300. Morgoth was way easy. It was stand on rune, and heal300 or 1000 every now and then.

My plan with a mage is mana storm, if he casts something that brings me below my comfort zone, or I need restore mana or something I
just create doors. This, coupled with 5 rods of healing and 8 staves of healing, 9 staves of the magi, a few rods of drain life, a lot of wands of annihilation should do the trick, but I think that priest is simpler.

Not because of orb, but because of 0%fail heal. Oh, and banish evil, teleport away(mages have this too), alter reality, and finally, clairvoyance. Clairvoyance really screws the game up. My mage recently found the (randart) palantir. Even that is too strong. Maybe put it on a staff, which would be made unrechargeable or something. Clairvoyance lets you look at a level, and hey, look at that vault with a few unidentified rings, and a ring of speed. ivanilla had clairvoyance as map and light level, and normal detection and it was still enough to find vaults to check out, but it was a big enough nerf.

[Timo Pietilä]

ivanilla had clairvoyance as map and light level, and normal detection and it was still enough to find vaults to check out, but it was a big enough nerf.

That is what I have been suggesting for clairvoyance for some time now.

Also Arkenstone activation needs to be changed, all other lightsources reveal something from dungeon structure, Phial by lighting rooms, Star by mapping nearby and Palantir by mapping entire dungeon. Arkenstone could be more useful with combination of Phial and Star than current practically useless detection. There have been games where I have used both Phial and Star in favor of Arkenstone, and Arkenstone as swap for HL and Light/Dark resists.

[Spacebux]

Spacebux: Have you ever played a mage? Diving is fairly dangerous for a while, but if you get Mordenkainens it's simple enough. Raal's is important sure, for more reasons than you listed, because of Meteor Swarm, which, by the way is an unresistable spell, and once you get four missiles, it gets powerful, because you have something that deals 200 damage for about 14 mana IIRC. That's twice as much as orb, ...

Of course, I hardly play anything BUT mages...! I would love to diversify and play more rogues .. if they were actually thief-like.. but, that is another rant.

Look, I have been trying to compare apples to kumquats as closely as possible---while both are still on the tree, so to speak. Trying to lay grounds for the case that the PRIEST's base set of spells are far more powerful in the ATTACK category than anything the MAGE's base set of spells can muster. (This has nothing to do with tactics, nothing to do with whining that the MAGE class being too weak. OK? Are we clear on that? Probably not, but.... )

And, yes, you validate my point that once a Mage has Raal's, basically, the game is whole different game for said Mage. My POINT: get away from the book-finding-aspect of the game, and make it a slower, more gradual build-up of spell power by searching and locating spell-scrolls to ratchet up Mage power, RATHER THAN the current system where a mage practically gains 6-7 spells at a time when finding & learning a new advanced book-at-a-time.

Right now, the Mage game is like scoring a Touchdown / Try / Goal / Nailing the Wicket (my feeble attempt at being worldly there) everytime you find an advanced book. A sigh of relief, a fist pumping---"YEAH LOOK AT THE ANGABND KING-GEEK!!!"---hoo-rah moment. Sure, some Warriors get excited about finding Elvagil, a Ranger might ballyhoo about snagging a set of holy ammo, but, Mage players know the game dynamics change dramatically with a slicker-than-snot-moment when an advanced book is acquired.

I'd prefer Mages to pick up parchments and discover, "hey, there's a new spell I could learn / add to my tomb of magic." And, move on to the next challenge. The Touchdown / Try / Goal / Wicket-busting momemts will dissipate like ocean waves into a coral reef at low-tide.

... any of this getting through? (http://www.hark.com/clips/bqjbfhhxxh...etting-through)

-SBux-

[Philip]

Mages don't change with extra firepower, but with escape spells like destruct, lellevel, teleport, telother. Also, if priests are powerful, just nerf them. Remove Clairvoyance? Monster saves against dispel evil(probably not banish though)? Take away the mage-ish spells that are duplicated in the late priest books?

[Taha]

I disagree with your premise that there is a huge discontinuity there. The priest dungeon spell books are more important than the mage dungeon spell books, with good healing, detection of nonevil monsters (hounds!) and objects, teleport other all being in the dungeon books. Getting rbase / rpoison / +5 or more speed / esp / a source of teleport other are all much much bigger than another source of damage for a mid stage mage or priest.

Finding Raal's isn't a game changer for my mages; diving reasonably quickly, it almost always shows up before I can cast all the spells in it, and initially the fail rate and mana cost are prohibitive compared to the bolts I already have, which work well against most of the monsters I can afford to fight. I only regularly use 2 spells out of it once the fail drops enough anyway (rift and meteor storm). The others are occasional special cases.

I would say Resistances is more important, as is Escapes, but those aren't game changers either - Escapes saves a slot vs word of recall and tele level scrolls, and resistances helps vs anything that breathe's rbase. (Tenser's is mostly junk). Finding Kelek's so I can start the level with banish Z... now that is special, but that is true for WoG too.

The game is full of breakpoints that increase your power with one nice find. Compared to your first item of speed or ESP, a spellbook here or there isn't that big of a deal.
________
Washington Medical Marijuana Dispensaries

[Derakon]

Tenser's is useful for vastly increasing the reliability of recharging, which makes your attack wands more viable. Wands of Annihilation + Greater Recharging is actually reasonably viable against Morgoth.