Cold/Ice ideas and the "Wet" effect...

[Atarlost]

I don't think I like putting too much weight on being in shivgoroth form. Especially with it moved to the second tree. If wet is going to be the main mechanic the water spells should carry stun to exploit it. I also prefer geyser as a beam like it was in T2. A firehose justifies the stun better than an upwelling and also makes more sense with water conjuration since many environments don't contain water to manipulate.

[HousePet]

Even without Shivgoroth Form, you could use Ice Shards to freeze. Maybe Frozen Ground could upgrade to full freeze on wet targets?

I was going to suggest Geyser as a beam, but Flame, Mana Thrust, Lightning and Pulverising Auger are beams already.

[Delmuir]

I don't think cold needs stun as lightning already has daze. I think that's good enough.

Housepet,
I'd forgotten that freeze and stun check the same resistance. As for sniping… you could hit things around the corner just like with Chill of the Tomb.

Also, my dislike of blast freeze is predicated on the mechanics of it. Same with blinding fog.

One of my favorite spells in the game is Aether Beam because it's odd… I liked it even more when it could be placed in walls but I guess people thought that it was OP then. Most everything is a ball or beam or targeted AoE.

I like the style of play of a wildfire mage fine but I don't want another mage that plays the same way. In fact, I rather hope that cold would be its elemental opposite as well as dramatically different in play style.

That's why I conceived of Rainstorm the way I did. It wouldn't allow you to hit things beyond 10 tiles like Inferno but it would still actually affect more tiles. It's different because (depending on how it's implemented) it could alert a lot of enemies to your presence but they be walking into your Shiv Ice Storm.

Regardless of what the skills actually are, I'm just hoping to create something that plays differently than other Archmage styles.

[HousePet]

The wet->freeze->shatter combo chain doesn't have any similarities to anything else in Archmage, with the exception of using Shock to reduce stun resistance.

I'm intending for Flashfreeze to be the combo finisher, so anyone sniping with it is missing out. I also haven't specified any ranges, so it could be short ranged if it made the build more interesting. I'm not sure that 'can kill stuff from afar' is the best bit about wildfire archmages, so I don't think basing water/ice around 'can't kill things from afar' is a good idea.

The mechanics for Flashfreeze is that if freezes wet creatures or shatters frozen creatures. I'm not sure what mechanics are bothering you.

I don't understand what you have against Blinding Fog, it appears pretty much identical to Rainstorm?

[Delmuir]

The wet->freeze->shatter combo chain doesn't have any similarities to anything else in Archmage, with the exception of using Shock to reduce stun resistance.

The mechanics for Flashfreeze is that if freezes wet creatures or shatters frozen creatures. I'm not sure what mechanics are bothering you.

I don't understand what you have against Blinding Fog, it appears pretty much identical to Rainstorm?

This illustrates nicely the difference in how you and I think about the game.

I don't consider wet-freeze-shatter to be terribly relevant. It's just a three-turn combo.

I'm concerned with the mechanics of space and positioning. The strategies you need to use in how you position yourself where and the rhythm of how you play. I don't make any distinction between status effects, etc. To me, there's no difference between disables… it's all the same: set-up, disable, attack… IF the distances and mechanisms of attack are similar (beam, whatnot).

Your ideas are consistently good. Blinding Fog is good. Flash Freeze is good but they play similar in how you position yourself and the patterns. That's the part I want to change… although it's not clear if anyone else has interest, ha ha.

The reason I prefer Rainstorm to Blinding fog is that it isn't targeted and it isn't precise but it has huge range. That means that you could cast it and hit a huge number of tiles, even outside of your vision range (but still affected by objects in your way in a manner similar to cones). This produces a lot of potential advantages but also disadvantages and it would be unique as a skill in that regard.

A targeted AoE would play just like glacial vapors or any number of spells and abilities… how you position yourself, range, all of it is essentially the same.

Blast Freeze has an effect that I like but the actual means of "distribution" of said effect is dull to me. That's mostly what I like toying around with… which is why the best skill I've come up with was my Undeath Link damage sharing idea as it radically changes HOW you play the game. Suddenly you're running from a basic AoE attack but tanking Atamathon (situationally).

[HousePet]

But no other archmage build has a two turn combo, so a three turn combo at least helps to distinguish it.

As for whether the talents are used up close or from afar, I haven't specified any ranges, so there is no reason to jump to long range conclusions.
Tidal Wave, Ice Storm, Frozen Ground and Ice Shards (cos it almost always misses at long range) are all short range attacks.

Targeted AoE attacks do not automatically mean positioning isn't important. If these talents have any effect on you, like Chill of the Tomb self nuking, then positioning is very important.

If Rainstorm has a huge radius, then positioning isn't important for it.

[Atarlost]

It's also very important to not go too far in pursuit of novelty. Bolts, balls, beams, and cones are reliable and comprehensible and don't require any assumptions or interface complications like walls do.

I think the elemental trees need to become more similar, not less. Some of them are incomplete. Others have no attack spell before level 4. Wildfire is the default archmage build for a reason and while some nerfing of that element may be merited it's also a very solid example of an element done right.

[Delmuir]

I think the elemental trees need to become more similar, not less. Some of them are incomplete. Others have no attack spell before level 4. Wildfire is the default archmage build for a reason and while some nerfing of that element may be merited it's also a very solid example of an element done right.

More similar? I can't possibly disagree more.

I understand the fear of pointless novelty but I'm interested in gameplay experience. If every mage plays essentially the same, then the only difference is the color of the animation. What's the point?

I like that each element demands a different style of play. I just want to add a bit more synergy to it in order to elevate ice and storm a bit, while adding a more distinctive style.

Admittedly, my solutions may not be ideal nor may they even necessarily work. However, the principle strikes me as self-evident.

Also, what elemental category doesn't have an attack spell before level 4? Ice, Storm, Stone, Aether, and wildfire all have attack spells at level 1.

[HousePet]

I believe they mean Earth.

[Effigy]

I think it would make more sense if Pulverizing Auger was the first Earth skill, and Stone Skin was at level 4. Kind of off-topic, but since it was brought up...

[Atarlost]

Also, what elemental category doesn't have an attack spell before level 4? Ice, Storm, Stone, Aether, and wildfire all have attack spells at level 1.

Um. Are you posting when you should be sleeping or before your morning coffee or something?

Ice, Storm, Stone, Wildfire, and Aether don't have anything at all until level 10. As elements Mana/Aether and Earth/Stone both get their first attack at level 4. That's 40% of all elements that have both a locked and unlocked tree. Water/Ice have an attack that isn't actually useful for killing things in their first slot. It's technically an attack, but any attempt at a mono-element water/ice build would still have to kill things by hitting them with a stick for the first dungeon.

[Delmuir]

Ahhhh… that's what you meant. I interpreted that incorrectly. I had inferred "tier."

To that point, I don't disagree. The organization is a bit odd and can be quite irksome.

However, that's kind of off-topic. You advocating for greater similarity of layout and I'm advocating for greater diversity of gameplay. A lot of apples and oranges here.

This thread isn't about that. It's about Water, Ice, wet effect, and synergy. If you have thoughts about that, I'd like to hear them.

[Atarlost]

Ahhhh… that's what you meant. I interpreted that incorrectly. I had inferred "tier."

To that point, I don't disagree. The organization is a bit odd and can be quite irksome.

However, that's kind of off-topic. You advocating for greater similarity of layout and I'm advocating for greater diversity of gameplay. A lot of apples and oranges here.

This thread isn't about that. It's about Water, Ice, wet effect, and synergy. If you have thoughts about that, I'd like to hear them.

It's sort of applicable in that Glacial Vapour does not stand alone as an attack. It's okay heavily leveled with shiv form, but that's level 12. It's evolved from a luxury swarm buster in T2 when the first water spell was a beam and water was just a utility skill for everyone but geomancers anyways. It's a bit more lethal than that, but it takes so long to kill even most critters that it's just not useful.

There are two styles of chaining at this time. Distortion style chaining is almost order invariant, but the first talent can't self trigger because the cooldown is as long as the duration. The tree really isn't very good until level 8 because the second talent is a form factor that needs heavy investment to get decent range. Water's second talent has a better form factor for viability at low investment, but that's still not having a useful tree until after the first dungeon if it relies on the wet effect to be useful. The other chaining is heterogenous chaining like the mindslayer's psionic striking tree or whatever it's called. That's terrible. The tooltips are overlong and the chaining again can't happen until level 4 and you have to pretty much max everything.

I think the first water talent either needs to self-chain or not rely on chaining.

I'm also pretty strongly opposed to fancy form factors like the mana and aether trees use. Bolt is okay if the projectile speed is high. Beam (invariant range) and Ball are better. Cone is good but only with heavy investment and therefore isn't first talent material. Beams with scaling range like pulverizing auger kind of suck at low investment too, but can be okay as long as they're not a first talent. Chaining is iffy, but neither water nor ice would make sense with that form factor anyways. Bursts are iffy. They're nice on something like a wyrmic that wants to get in the enemy's face, but not so nice on an archmage that doesn't. DoTs are iffy and the longer they're spread over the worse they are.

Right now Water/Ice is pretty bad.
Glacial Vapour: good form factor, terrible low level damage and that as DoT and though fully invested the total damage is nice it's spread over even more time.
Freeze: good form factor and damage, but the cooldown is bad and gets worse.
Tidal Wave: Bad form factor, bad damage. The form factor could be okay if it moved at 200% or more speed. The old Geomancer directed waves from T2 did so it should be possible.
Shivgoroth Form: Tooltip fails to give stats for Ice Storm, but it's DoT in short range so it's not a very offensive attack.
Ice Shards: The form factor is ruined by the abyssmal travel speed, but the damage would be good if it could ever hit anything.
Frozen Ground: Iffy form factor, but it's okay with heavy investment.
Shatter: good damage, but does nothing at all unless chained.
Uttercold: not an attack talent.

Compare that to Fire/Wildfire with solid level 1, and 10 talents, an outstanding level 8 talent, a level 4 talent that would be solid if it weren't bugged, only one truly bad talent out at the end of a tree, and a nice utility talent. Yes Flame and Flameshock are DoTs, but Flame is only over 3 turns and Flameshock is a debuff. It would be better if the burn and stun were split so high saves or stun immunity didn't block the damage, but that's more bad implementation than bad design.

Ideally we'd have no bad talents at all, but we should at least aim to get at least 3 solids by level 12 to be a viable choice next to fire/wildfire.

I'd put either a beam, bolt, or rad 0-1 ball at level 1 with cooldown not higher than 4. I think that's always the right choice for a how HP mod ranged caster class. If it relies on chaining to be useful it should be cooldown 3 or even 2 and self chain, but I really don't think it's possible to build a level 1 self chaining spell that is neither over nor under powered.

I'm starting to think that looking at just one element isn't going to get anywhere good. What we should be trying to do is come up with five play styles first and then try to redesign all of the elemental trees at once.

[HousePet]

But if they are all independent, then we don't need to do them all at once.

Also, we need to not be too ambitious about making them different. In the end they will still have the same generic talents and are still Archmages. If they become too different then it becomes 5 classes instead of just one and it become harder to invest in multiple elements, which should be a viable option.

[Atarlost]

But if they are all independent, then we don't need to do them all at once.

Also, we need to not be too ambitious about making them different. In the end they will still have the same generic talents and are still Archmages. If they become too different then it becomes 5 classes instead of just one and it become harder to invest in multiple elements, which should be a viable option.

If they aren't done together you'll just wind up with retreads the way wetting is just a retread of the stun resist reduction in the storm tree.