Alright, I'll give out my impressions as I go along, so bear with me if my opinion swings as I go about this...
First impressions: Other then fun, druid seems slightly counter intuitive at the start, they basically have to rush points into str/mag just for better staff combat, or rely on having ONLY prism-light for an attack, since nothing else is available right off. Seems to gimp them just a bit, but not by huge amounts, and the staff combat is strong enough to get you through a few levels. Might NOT be on higher difficulties however.
Early game, cost on some of these sustains seems abhorrently high, and they have a LOT of sustains. If the idea is to provide multiple builds, each using different sustains, this might work, but each sustain individually seems rather weak. However, they also scale with spellpower, as does everything, so I suspect I will see some improvement as time goes by. It might be worth considering, if they are supposed to synergize the sustains and run lot of them, you might want to look at adding some sort of ability that reduces the burden of EQ fail rates. They already have to deal with HIGH base EQ for there sustains, and the spells they have aren't cheap. (And, as mentioned above, seem to start fairly weak, but I'm betting on scaling improving the damage later on.)
Staff combat seems to be stacking up nicely, and the armor training substitute seems to work well, if aimed at light armors. Perhaps a small Def bonus would be in order, given the basis of the build. I haven't yet had the opportunity to check and see that it only works on non-metal armor yet. (Especially some of the LARGER but non-metal armors, like the Thaloren Wood Cuirass.)
If they are meant to rely on gems for ranged combat, especially early on, we might need to look at offering them more sources for them. Only having the natural gems you find lying around to get ammo from could be VERY limiting, especially later in the game. Perhaps extracting some from mindstars, as someone else suggested, though we also don't want to turn them into alchemist clones. Deserves more thought.
Zephyr may also need to be examined for strength. If that scales with spellpower as well as I'm betting on some of the other stuff doing, it could be too strong later on, It's already up to around a +20% to me, with the same penalty on enemies. That's a 40% difference in speed, and if that gets much larger, it could get hugely out of hand, doubly so on yeeks.
More thoughts to come, though can we get this added onto the site, so it will validate?
EDIT: Alright, Lua engine just coughed up a lung when I tried to cast water spout on a halfling slinger in the arena.
Code: Select all
[LOG] Halfling slinger activates Rapid Shot.
[LOG]
[USERCHAT] channel serial data rbd tome 526
[LOG] Druid casts Waterspout.
[SPELL CRIT %] 2
[SPELL CRIT %] 2
Adding entity 39502 after 2812
[SOUND] loading from /data/sound/talents/tidalwave.ogg :=: sound "/data/sound/talents/tidalwave.ogg" : <static>
checkHit(smooth) 10.293718494948 24 => chance to hit 29.668060531985
checkHit(smooth) 10.293718494948 24 => chance to hit 21.091456283157
[LOG] #ORANGE#Halfling slinger shrugs off the effect 'Slow'!
[LOG] Halfling slinger speeds up.
[LOG] Halfling slinger shoots!
[ARCHERY ACQUIRE TARGETS WITH] rough leather sling huntsman's pouch of iron shots
[PROJECTILE SPEED] :: 10
[SHOOT] speed 0.59615803337814 => 596.15803337814
[SHOOT WITH] rough leather sling huntsman's pouch of iron shots
Adding entity 39503 after 38884
[LOG]
[LOG] Halfling slinger shoots!
[ARCHERY ACQUIRE TARGETS WITH] rough leather sling huntsman's pouch of iron shots
[PROJECTILE SPEED] :: 10
[SHOOT] speed 0.59615803337814 => 596.15803337814
[SHOOT WITH] rough leather sling huntsman's pouch of iron shots
Adding entity 39504 after 38884
[LOG]
checkHit(smooth) 10.293718494948 24 => chance to hit 29.668060531985
checkHit(smooth) 10.293718494948 24 => chance to hit 21.091456283157
[LOG] Halfling slinger slows down.
[PROJECTOR] starting dam 20.792851810956
[PROJECTOR] after difficulty dam 20.792851810956
[PROJECTOR] res 0 1 on dam 22.872136992051
[PROJECTOR] after resists dam 22.872136992051
[PROJECTOR] after flat damage armor 22.872136992051
[PROJECTOR] final dam 22.872136992051
[PROJECTOR] starting dam 20.792851810956
[PROJECTOR] after difficulty dam 20.792851810956
[PROJECTOR] res 0 1 on dam 22.872136992051
[PROJECTOR] after resists dam 22.872136992051
[PROJECTOR] after flat damage armor 22.872136992051
[PROJECTOR] final dam 22.872136992051
checkHit(smooth) 24 10.293718494948 => chance to hit 78.908543716843
[KNOCKBACK] from nil nil over 1
Lua Error: /engine/utils.lua:1751: bad argument #1 to 'line_base' (number expected, got nil)
At [C]:-1
At [C]:-1 line_base
At /engine/utils.lua:1751 line
At /engine/Actor.lua:292 knockback
At /mod/class/Actor.lua:1070 knockback
At /data/damage_types.lua:1073 projector
At /engine/interface/ActorProject.lua:196 project
At /data-druid/talents/gifts/seas.lua:183 on_hit
At /engine/Projectile.lua:230 act
At /engine/GameEnergyBased.lua:131 tickLevel
At /engine/GameEnergyBased.lua:62 tick
At /engine/GameTurnBased.lua:46 tick
At /mod/class/Game.lua:1041
---------------- Stack Dump ----------------
2: table // 8be5ed8
1: table // 8be5ed8
--------------- Stack Dump Finished ---------------
[LOG] #UID:2812:0#Druid hits halfling slinger for #1133F3#23 cold#LAST#, #aaaaaa#23 physical#LAST# damage (total 45.74).
[LOG] Halfling slinger shoots!
[ARCHERY ACQUIRE TARGETS WITH] rough leather sling huntsman's pouch of iron shots
[PROJECTILE SPEED] :: 10
[SHOOT] speed 0.59615803337814 => 596.15803337814
[SHOOT WITH] rough leather sling huntsman's pouch of iron shots
Adding entity 39505 after 38884
[LOG]
Hope that helps with that issue. Didn't seem to be knocked back by that, and using cave in on the following turn seemed to knock it in an odd direction as well... And cave in shouldn't be knocking around anyway. (Edit again: And the bug is reproducible on the arcane blade in the arena as well.)
EDIT: (YET AGAIN) Crystal healing claims it needs 2 talents already known to learn, but with only prism-light known (1 point) and nothing else, the game says that I *CAN* learn both crystal healing AND the previous talent Strengthen bones, despite having no points in either.
EDIT: (10:49 PM, March 4 2013) A LOT of tier 4 talents don't list any EQ cost. For instance, prism-nature, bolts from the blue, and Aurora.
Since there's flags for metal/material, eventually smelting might be possible?