ToME: the Tales of Maj'Eyal

It doesn't seem right to buy WIZARD's infusions in Zigur.

Those aren't infusions owned by or meant for wizards. Those are just infusions that run off the Magic stat, which are colloquially called "wizard's" infusions because wizards have high Magic. Having a high Magic stat doesn't necessarily mean you're a filthy arcanist, though filthy arcanists do admittedly get the most out of that stat.

I'm pretty sure that's almost exactly what it means.

Frankly I find the stat scaling annoying - it just means I'm less likely to get a good inscription. You aren't going to starting assign stat points or collecting specific equipment just to make a temporary talent more powerful. Also, it's another unneeded penalty to classes with broad stat spreads.

What proper, upstanding, nature-abiding citizen is going to have a high Magic stat? Only a filthy wizard would. Yes, from a design perspective wizard's infusions are just one in a set of stat-scaling infusions, but from a lore perspective, the Zigur herbalist is going "hm, I'd better tailor some infusions for my good friend, the wizards." I always thought it was a little weird, too. But, you know, suspension of disbelief and all.

And yes, I also think that stat scaling should be removed. I get that it makes inscription selection slightly more complex (do I use this less powerful inscription that will get stronger later, or this more powerful inscription that will stay static?) but at the cost of making inscription quality more variable. I'd say that your luck in finding good inscriptions dictates a good portion of the game's difficulty-- going into High Peak with a 400 damage shield is way different from going in with a 800 damage shield.

If you want to make up for the loss in complexity by removing stat scaling, adding new inscription types and making certain old ones less useless would be a nice way to go about doing that.

There is also an (unused) stat for inscriptions that makes them scale with your highest stat. Adding a few of those could help with the spread.

While it's probably rare as their main stat, Ziguranth can still benefit from high Magic; it provides spell save, and a couple of Magic prodigies may be quite useful to them.

I don't see a problem with stat scaling; if an inscription scales with a stat its user focuses on, it remains useful for some levels more than normally, otherwise it's just an inscription like any other. One may dislike their average quality or their quality variance, but stat scaling has little to do with either.

bricks wrote:Also, it's another unneeded penalty to classes with broad stat spreads.

But for those classes, ego inscriptions have a higher chance to be useful; given how difficult it can be to find a decent inscription of a particular type, I believe this advantage is roughly comparable to the higher effectivity that the other classes get (at least in principle; the magnitude of the additional effect gained from higher stats may or may not be fair in this regard).

The stat requirement for Magic prodigies, as with all prodigies and anything that has a stat requirement which is checked only once, can be trivially met by hoarding +stat equipment, putting it on to meet the requirement, and then switching back to your normal setup. You can get upwards of 70 to any stat in this manner without investing a single point into said stat. Honestly this is something that I have always been saying was a broken mechanic, and it's made even more awkward with the inclusion of prodigies. Ziguranth can benefit from the Magic stat in the same way that an archmage can benefit from Dexterity, but their main stat will always be higher unless you're making a suboptimal build on purpose.

Stat scaling increases variance because half of them will be much worse thanks to scaling with your off-stat, and half of them will be way better because they scale with your main stat. It quite clearly increases the spread in quality.

donkatsu wrote:What proper, upstanding, nature-abiding citizen is going to have a high Magic stat? Only a filthy wizard would. Yes, from a design perspective wizard's infusions are just one in a set of stat-scaling infusions, but from a lore perspective, the Zigur herbalist is going "hm, I'd better tailor some infusions for my good friend, the wizards." I always thought it was a little weird, too. But, you know, suspension of disbelief and all.

And yes, I also think that stat scaling should be removed. I get that it makes inscription selection slightly more complex (do I use this less powerful inscription that will get stronger later, or this more powerful inscription that will stay static?) but at the cost of making inscription quality more variable. I'd say that your luck in finding good inscriptions dictates a good portion of the game's difficulty-- going into High Peak with a 400 damage shield is way different from going in with a 800 damage shield.

If you want to make up for the loss in complexity by removing stat scaling, adding new inscription types and making certain old ones less useless would be a nice way to go about doing that.

That was my point. Simply that it doesn't fit with the theme of Zigur.

Just as my arcane disrupting magic stave doesn't!

... an arcane disrupting magic staff would probably be better known as a "stick."

I wouldn't exactly mind more stuff like the innuendo stick for non-arcane purposes, really. Have the staff combat tree adjust to your metaclass a bit (eq for wilders, vim for corruptors, etc. Not quite sure what stam users would get, but I'd assume they'd be projecting an air bullet or somethin' sonic based or whatev'. If shattering shout can do it...) and it might be really interesting.

an extending staff like monkey magic has.

donkatsu wrote:The stat requirement for Magic prodigies, as with all prodigies and anything that has a stat requirement which is checked only once, can be trivially met by hoarding +stat equipment, putting it on to meet the requirement, and then switching back to your normal setup. You can get upwards of 70 to any stat in this manner without investing a single point into said stat. Honestly this is something that I have always been saying was a broken mechanic, and it's made even more awkward with the inclusion of prodigies. Ziguranth can benefit from the Magic stat in the same way that an archmage can benefit from Dexterity, but their main stat will always be higher unless you're making a suboptimal build on purpose.

Stat scaling increases variance because half of them will be much worse thanks to scaling with your off-stat, and half of them will be way better because they scale with your main stat. It quite clearly increases the spread in quality.

I also do not understand why items' stat checks are based on after-equip stats, not before-equip. The game keeps track of both. This, of course, can also be abused in the skill assignment.

As for having rune and inscription stat scaling, I don't see a problem with it. If I find a great non-scaling teleportation rune, I'll just use that and then replace it when I find something better - or keep a potentially better rune in my inventory until it scales. Runes and inscriptions are both cheap and light. Carrying around a lot doesn't really both my characters that much.