Out of combat positive/negative energy regeneration

[bpat]

In theory they degen so you don't start fights with full energy and you need to use talents to gain energy. In practice you autocast Barrier or Twilight Surge and start fights with full energy anyway. Since the degeneration just adds some tedium, we may as well remove when out of combat it so autocasting isn't needed anymore.

[HousePet]

In practice I've never needed to autouse a talent to have a reasonable amount of energy to play with. How much are you resting between battles?

[bpat]

I autocast when no enemies are visible and I just autoexplore like that. It only takes 3-4 casts for my level 18ish character so I usually start fights with maximum energy.

[Patashu]

Maybe you want this addon:

http://te4.org/games/addons/tome/qt-resource-tweaks

"This addon gives all characters 0.2 regeneration for mana, vim, psi, positive energy, and negative energy; it also gives all characters -0.1 regeneration for equilibrium. As these resources can be replenished easily (such as with items) there is no reason to prevent them from regenerating naturally. Additionally, the resting speedup for health/mana/stamina is applied to these resources.
Classes that already have non-default resource regeneration (such as mage and psionic classes) are not affected; this addon does not give mages 0.7 mana regeneration.
This addon gives all characters water breathing. They can still suffocate in walls, from constriction, and so on. In light of this, the following egos are no longer generated: of the deep, of the depths."

[HousePet]

So have you tried not autocasting? I don't know about Insane difficulty, but it isn't necessary to do it on normal.

I am not however, suggesting that there isn't a small issue with it being slightly beneficial to do. But I don't think that making the resource similar to others is a good solution.

There are two separate issues that Anorithil have with their resource system.
1: As discussed above, is that there is a benefit to circumventing the decay.
2: Converting Positive into Negative wastes a turn.

Removing the energy decay would address both issues, but then we end up with a mage with two bland resource bars. Only removing the decay on only the Positive looks like it might help, but it doesn't really change the current situation at all.
The best solutions I've been able to find so far are;
1: Give a benefit to not having full resource bars. Something like a decent defensive bonus for having low energy, which converts into an offensive bonus near max energy.
2: Create a range of spells that cost Positive and generate Negative. Moon themed with light and dark damage seems appropriate.

I don't think this totally removes the possible benefit for having generation talents on autocast, but some people will do tedious things for the slightest benefit, and this hopefully makes it more fun to play it the proper way.

[bpat]

Not autocasting is pretty bad since you often only get one spell off before having to use Twilight. In particularly bad cases, you may really need Starfall for the stun and not have enough energy since you used it all in the previous fight. I agree that Anorithil should have spells that spend positive energy and generate negative energy, but also I don't see the hard in giving the energies regeneration only outside of combat (max life, no enemies visible). This way they would still decay in fights but not make autocasting necessary.

[HousePet]

The decay rate is so low that I could frequently spam all the circles at the start of each battle. *checks costs* Oh, that is only 40 of each...
But still, are you resting for a hundred turns between battles?
Even with only 1 point in Twilight sets your decay point to 22% of you maximum, which is about 39 by level 50. With 5 points it decays to about 60.
If I really did end a battle with no negative energy left, I just hit Twilight before pressing autosplore.

The problem with having decay only function in combat is that it would need to be a higher amount to make it meaningful.

[ohioastro]

You get a benefit from doing something tedious, and if you're not careful the autocast ends up doing something annoying like killing NPCs in towns. I think that +/- reserves should regen to full between battles, and that if they don't there should be a useful gameplay reason for it. Particularly at the beginning of the game you will start battles unable to cast anything unless you autocast, and that's a real handicap.

[Mordy]

Another option is to make the energy regen skills just not work outside combat. It'd require more retuning for sure though :p

[HousePet]

I'm trying to think of a way to work it with the energy bars starting at full and decaying strongly in combat, but it keeps ending up as a complete rewrite of the celestial mechanical theme.

To explain:
So we start each battle with full energies, but lose some each turn regardless of what we cast. But we can cast specific things to get an energy boost. So we need battles to be over quickly or we end up fluffing around with generation instead of blasting.
But then look at celestial talents: Circles, Corona (the bolts are slow), Light, Shadow Blast, Searing Light... Its a lot about doing damage over time and surviving long battles.
Do we really want to change that?

[bpat]

I was thinking that Anorithil could have just one energy bar which slides towards positive or negative depending on talent usage. Of course this would require a complete rework so it isn't really feasible currently but perhaps it's something to think about. Anorithil probably is due for a rework but I don't have a solid idea of what that would look like yet.

[HousePet]

We've been through a single bar system before. It has merit, but I personally quite like the potential interactions you can do with two bars.

Edit: I should clarify this.
Its not really the number of bars that is the issue here, so changing it won't solve anything.

[bpat]

True, it lets talents like Corona work. Perhaps a shifting bar would be better suited for a new class rather than an existing class, if any.

[Cat Zangetsu]

maybe add a multiplier to how fast u degen and have it so that the multiplier decreases whenever u take damage for positive, and deal damage for negative - this way only meaningful actions in battle will give u access to the most powerful abilities over a sustained number of turns

[HousePet]

I sort of tried a shifting bar for Hate in a rework attempt. But I burned out.