Making Staves interesting mod

[eliotn]

Staffs don't really need more brands.

They may need combat benefits added to the brands that exist, though. Making a ton of combat oriented staffs has the same "Not many people actually care about this" problem that AM/Nature staffs do, however.

Thats another way of fixing the problem, yes. Perhaps bonuses to physical power and spell power?

[wobbly]

Could you change staffs to auto-scale of a primary stat. If Strength is highest: Physical Power & Strength (quaterstaff), Willpower: Mental Power & Willpower (nature/mind focus staff), Magic: Spell Power & Magic (mage staff). The normal spell power bonus & critical chances could change to correspond. Possibly a bad idea, just thought I'd put it out there. Would save rebalancing item probabilities or always finding the wrong staff for the character.

[eliotn]

Could you change staffs to auto-scale of a primary stat. If Strength is highest: Physical Power & Strength (quaterstaff), Willpower: Mental Power & Willpower (nature/mind focus staff), Magic: Spell Power & Magic (mage staff). The normal spell power bonus & critical chances could change to correspond. Possibly a bad idea, just thought I'd put it out there. Would save rebalancing item probabilities or always finding the wrong staff for the character.

Well others in this thread have pointed out that mindstars replace the role of nature staves, but that is an interesting idea.

[peaceoutside]

Should I make an SVN for the code I have done so far?

It's really not that much right now, it took me a while to figure out the staff resolvers stuff.

I'll probably try to work on the next steps today.

PM me for skype or other contact info.

[wobbly]

1) new talent tree may be nice, but I'd prefer weapon mastery include staffs, and replace staff mastery with something else

A bit of topic but I'd love to see all weapon masteries rolled in to 1 just to make sword & dagger a more viable option.

[eliotn]

1) new talent tree may be nice, but I'd prefer weapon mastery include staffs, and replace staff mastery with something else

A bit of topic but I'd love to see all weapon masteries rolled in to 1 just to make sword & dagger a more viable option.

Well both talents do give physical power, each of which boosts the damage of the sword and the dagger, so I think it is pretty viable already. And the talent point investment is out of 5 points, when before it was out of 10.

[skein]

Still think an arcane staff class would be fun. Something based off of an arcane blade. They are not just a little weak atm, they are very very weak. Very hard to get very far at all due to them dying at the drop of a hat. Something like this could be fun but I do think the base staves need to see a minor boost as well.

Technique/ Combat Techniques (1.2)
Technique/ Two handed maiming (1.2)
Technique/ Magical Combat (1.2)
change arcane cunning to a staff damage increase of 60% at r5 at (1.2 skill)

Technique/ Two Handed weapons (1.2 locked)
Technique/ Combat vetran (1.2 locked)

Spell / Enhancement (1.2)
Spell / Fire (1.2)
Spell / Earth (1.2)
Spell / Air (1.2)

Spell / Stone (1.2 locked)
Spell / Explosive Admixtures (1.2 locked)

Generic
Technique / Combat training (1.2)

Spell / Staff combat (1.2)
Spell / Conveyance (1.2)
Spell / Reconstruction (1.2) replaces aegis
R1 - Arcane reconstruction (just like the original)
R2 - Manasurge , like the runes
R3 - Quicken spells (like the meta spell)
R4 - Quicken equipment (passively reduces the cooldown of all equipment by 60% at r5 at 1.2)

Spell / Stone alchemy (1.0 locked)

Cunning / Survival (1.1 locked)

[SageAcrin]

They are not just a little weak atm, they are very very weak

Having cleared one, I'm forced to disagree.

They're definitely on the weaker end of the character pool, but there's definitely weaker classes(Rogue and Reaver are IMO still weaker, for instance, though I need to try a new Reaver to make sure the damage boost means as much as I think it does.). They aren't very easy to use, but your suggestion is way, way too much power. I could see, say, giving them the Meta category at 1.0, now that you mention something like it-Quickened Spells has unique synergy with the class, and Spellcraft's never bad. And Dirty Fighting probably needs some buffs.

However, your suggestion basically makes it possible to run a bomb/spell slinging +2 HP modifier mage Arcane Blade with some of the best magical offense in the game and good support abilities-kinda like Archmage with twice the HP and better crowd control/damage but less utility.

Alternatively, you could run an Arcane Blade like a Berserker with a staff, using Magic instead of Constitution and trading a bit of durability for Stone Skin+Berserker(Lemme tell you, armor booster+Berserker is great, as of b42 it's one of the best draws for Wyrmic.), using Crystalline Focus for the ability to just punch through any resistances, and generally just mauling everything. I'm not sure they're better than a Berserker at this, but they'd end up very close-and Berserker's one of the best classes in the game, and one of the Roguelike-equivalent clears.

Considering it's meant to be a fighter/mage, not a mage with high HP or a fighter with a bunch of stackable buffs they can run off the mana end, I don't think that's near the intention of the class design, to be able to pick one or the other and be one of the best classes in the game either way, to say nothing of intelligent mixing.

(Though, your idea, thanks to ditching Cunning's great spellpower boost, would make them far worse as a fighter/mage, to boot...)

[HousePet]

The egos with activatables could do with a buff. When you can just use a spell for much more effect than the staff can do, I just go with a more useful ego.

[donkatsu]

Reavers have been overbuffed, if anything. The new Corrupted Strength doubles or triples their damage output, which is just flat out absurd, and Bone Shield is useful now too. I think I was doing like 6k-8k damage per turn endgame.

Arcane Blades have Aegis. I do find them boring to play and they have some problems overcoming saves, but it's hard to call anything with Aegis 'weak'.

Dunno about Rogues; haven't played one yet.

[peaceoutside]

Mod status:

• All non-artifact staves grant +1 Project Staff
• Project staff is the same as Channel Staff except it doesn't pass through non-hostiles, the weapon damage is 60%, and the damage is based on spell power, not physical power
• The "spell / staff combat" tree is replaced with a new "spell / staff mastery" tree
• The first skill in that tree is "Augmented Staff Projection" which is a sustained talent (20 mana right now)
• While sustained, the Project Staff talent's weapon damage modifier is increased based on talent level (similar to what the Channel Staff numbers were)
• Also, the pass through non-hostiles is re-enabled while that talent is sustained
• Archmages and Necromances get the "spell / staff mastery" tree unlocked at mastery 1.0
• Alchemists get the "spell / staff mastery" tree unlocked at mastery 1.3

Next on the list is to do the 2nd, 3rd and 4th talents in the "spell / staff mastery" tree.

I'm considering making Project Staff use charges or ammo somehow.

[SageAcrin]

Reavers have been overbuffed, if anything. The new Corrupted Strength doubles or triples their damage output, which is just flat out absurd, and Bone Shield is useful now too. I think I was doing like 6k-8k damage per turn endgame.

Arcane Blades have Aegis. I do find them boring to play and they have some problems overcoming saves, but it's hard to call anything with Aegis 'weak'.

Dunno about Rogues; haven't played one yet.

Reavers still only have the one clear, this version. Same as Arcane Blades.

Damage isn't everything, and ABs do a lot of very sustainable damage long-term, as well. (Couple thousand on a basic physical is not really unusual, and it punches through resistances thanks to Crystalline Focus.)

I still feel like I need to take them for a spin for that comparison, but my kneejerk is that Reavers, with their low options, are still a little worse.

[wobbly]

1) new talent tree may be nice, but I'd prefer weapon mastery include staffs, and replace staff mastery with something else

A bit of topic but I'd love to see all weapon masteries rolled in to 1 just to make sword & dagger a more viable option.

Well both talents do give physical power, each of which boosts the damage of the sword and the dagger, so I think it is pretty viable already. And the talent point investment is out of 5 points, when before it was out of 10.

The 2 don't stack (as far as I'm aware). Knife mastery only increases PP on daggers. Weapon mastery only increases PP on swords/axes/maces (& 2HD equivelants). You have to invest double the amount of generics to use them together.

[eliotn]

The 2 don't stack (as far as I'm aware). Knife mastery only increases PP on daggers. Weapon mastery only increases PP on swords/axes/maces (& 2HD equivelants). You have to invest double the amount of generics to use them together.

Tested and found that the bonus to physical power only applies to the primary weapon's talent. The talent description makes this confusing. I think buffing physical power for both held items would give a decent buff (and tradeoff) to going sword and dagger vs. dagger and dagger. Former requires more generics to max but has more benefit to physical power, the latter requires fewer generics but less physical power.

[Frumple]

Fairly sure the weapon mastery descs are fixed up a bit in the SVN to be more clear about what they apply to, yeah.

And, iirc, the reason they only apply to specific things is to prevent silliness like an archer maxing out knife, weapon, and staff mastery on top of bow and/or sling, strictly to get utterly ridiculous physical power from the stacking. It was especially bad on random-classed enemies, of course. Seeing ** on the physpower of something like a 20th level (if that) enemy is hilarious, but terrible.

Anyway, it costs less generics to max 'em out these days. Being separate is pretty fine, I'd say.