Damage spells are too weak.

[Zelse]

playing on POTD

 

This mostly concerns Druid,Wizard (and Priest) and only their damage (offensive) spells. Chanter and Cipher both got at least 1 acceptable spell and since both chanter and druid dont use [spells per encounter] you can just reuse that one good spell over and over without issues just like the ability classes.

 

Spells for utility are great, spells for buffs/debuffs/healing and summons are great. Damage spells are mostly terrible.

 

- cast time is waaaay too long (7 sec+ on some spells)

- cast time is often frontloaded making the spells more likely to be interrupted which in turn makes you LOSE the spell entirely (i.e. 4-6 seconds cast 3 second recovery compared to most abilities that take about 0.5 sec, good spells in the game are all 0.5 sec casts)

- many abilities get accuracy bonuses while offensive spells get none making them significantly more likely to miss

- spells often target reflex or fortitude both of which are MUCH higher than deflection most of the time

- there is no good way to reduce reflex or fortitude without spending MORE spells before or gimping weapons (weapon modals) while there are a ton of efficient ways to reduce deflection and all of them benefit not only your offensive spellcasters but everyone in the party

- damage for many spells is too low considering how terrible offensive spells are to begin with. Weapon damage and especially weapon abilities stomp offensive spells in terms of dps. 

- spells dont benefit from group damage buffs like chanters +15% fire for weapon attacks or paladins shared flames of devotion ot anything else for that matter that could be achieved by multiclassing and stacking bonus damage (like soul whip + lightning strikes)

- Spells are extremely limited since you only get 2 per level. So the characters that use normal resources can spend these on their best ability over and over again. With spells you only get you best ability 2 times (1 time right after you get it which is horrendous, meanwhile ability users get maximum value right when they can grab something new)

- Spell penetration is (for the most part) not that good. So even if you find someone you can hit with your vs. fortitude spell, chances are he basically just shrugs them off.

- For the same reason spells rely MUCH more on power level (for penetration especially). Making them worse in the early and midgame since getting top quality weapons is really really easy even early on.

- Full casters have no useful passives and obviously lose a ton of inhand potential because of that.

- nuking enemies is much more important than overall dps, making some of the dot spells that have a lot of damage over a long time effectively irrelevant

- friendly aoe on some doesnt help either...

 

Even if some spells have good numbers all of the other things hold them back

 

/discuss

 

Please exclude exploits and that one super useful damage spell in the game you found (there are a few but most druid/wizard/priest damage spells are awful because of the aforementioned reasons) Like ningauths whatever found in his special grimoire.

Please consider that needing other characters or items to make an offensive caster work is effectively just gimping your party in some other regard.

 

Suggested solutions: Give all damage spells +accuracy (A LOT like 20 or sth). This would deal with the biggest issue spellcasters currently have. Spells arent lost when the initial cast is interrupted.

Edited June 17, 2018 by Zelse

[AeonsLegend]

In many games mages and such are weak early. Spells become stronger later. I do agree that most of the spells are a tad weak. Still Minoletta's missile barrage can one shot most enemies. I think they toned down their power in favor of per encounter use.

[Zelse]

In many games mages and such are weak early. Spells become stronger later. I do agree that most of the spells are a tad weak. Still Minoletta's missile barrage can one shot most enemies. I think they toned down their power in favor of per encounter use.

There is no spell by that name in the vanilla game.

 

I assume you are refering to the rank 9 Spell Minolettas missile salvo or a special spell that can only be found in one of the tomes. If so please enlighten me where to find it.

 

Either way you still only get 2 casts. You probably miss anyway because youre rolling against reflex, and whatever damage number the missile spells below rank9 in the game have is just pathetic. My auto attacks do the same amount. A character that does nothing until max level is not well designed.

 

Btw i hit enemies for 120+dmg openers at lvl 13 and they are still above 50% hp.

 

Maia crits fampyrs with accurate wounding shot at level 15 for 81+33fire weapon bonus+chanter passive + 18raw (and they dont really care about it actually) (at 4.8 seconds total action time attack+recovery). Ohh and some where mid ranks she also gets a bounce for 50% damage. So yea, total of somewhere around 200 damage in 1 shot.

*edit: im not even sure chanter passive applied might have been pure weapon fire bonus LUL, those were the numbers i got either way

 

Meanwhile my offensive spells cant even hit the guys (10% to hit)

Edited June 17, 2018 by Zelse

[Sobric]

There are at least 3 good minoletta spells available. The one that bounces is incredibly good when empowered.

 

Edit: and they target deflection too

Edited June 17, 2018 by Sobric

[Zelse]

There are at least 3 good minoletta spells available. The one that bounces is incredibly good when empowered.

aight ill give you bounding missiles thats A decent spell,not great but decent, but as i said in the initial post. 1 decent spell doesnt carry the class. (We are actually doing that one exact thing. Talking about that one good spell that you found in between all the crappy ones)

 

at level 15 i get 8.5 penetration before buffs on bounding misslles with aloth as fighter/mage. Which is objectively terrible and pretty much not doing anything against anyone. Even after food you get 10.5

(for comparison legendary sabres at that level have 11 pen base)

 

they dont get accuracy bonuses either (see opening post)

and you get a total number of 2 casts per fight

 

Fun fact: The missiles are one of the few spells that targets deflection (making them slightly less crappy) --> see initial post as well.

 

all the things still apply

 

edit2: let me give another example. I just rolled a vanilla graze auto attack (-50%dmg) with monk fist + tarns respite offhand: 21 + 4fire (chanter) + 3 (freeze weapon bonus) +3 (lightning strikes)

 

so a full hit would have done 62 damage at 3.2 total action speed and i can do that an unlimited number of times. I mean wut? Why would i want spells for damage?

Edited June 17, 2018 by Zelse

[Shadenuat]

 

 

Youh just cast some aware buff & a debuff maybe, wait until they all hit your invulnerable tank and destroy.

[Zelse]

Nah not feeling it. 

 

80 damage isnt much at all. (The guy in the middle literally doesnt care...and show the champ skele next time ). You get 2 casts. Skeletons and ghuls generally have horrible defensive stats. 

Also, full custom party, base stats?

 

But yea if you guys are fine with it. I guess theres no point in disagreeing.

Edited June 17, 2018 by Zelse

[1TTFFSSE]

Spells are actually balanced in terms of damage. casting time though could be a bit faster, like 33 percent faster. Scroll/Arcana use, on the other hand, is still too strong. no need to use real spells when scrolls are way stronger and faster to use on a high arcana character at the moment. 

 

Also to the poster above 70 damage may not be much but on a group of adds it is quite a bit if you hit 5-8 enemies at once.

Edited June 17, 2018 by 1TTFFSSE

[Zelse]

There are at least 3 good minoletta spells available. The one that bounces is incredibly good when empowered.

 

Edit: and they target deflection too

 

I assume you are refering to the rank 9 Spell Minolettas missile salvo or a special spell that can only be found in one of the tomes. If so please enlighten me where to find it.

 

Either way you still only get 2 casts. You probably miss anyway because youre rolling against reflex, 

 

 

missile salvo targets reflex according to the wiki just as i wrote, good thing we cant easily access skill trees  *hinthint* 

Edited June 17, 2018 by Zelse

[Shadenuat]

It's about 900 damage per cast since it's AOE. it's just an 11 level gal, no empower, ring +10 acc on fire but that's all the "build".

But even without AOE you can nuke **** hard with minoletta spells. Penetration rises with your power level as you gain levels, just target lowest enemy armor with a correct spell or even graze them do deff.

You don't get 2 casts, there are damaging spells on every level

Everyone has similar stats, you just have to use buffs/debuffs right

Even champ got hit due to conversion of grazes. And so what? If you kill everything with spells but 1 dude standing, you win.

I had druid fury do 200k damage per playthrough with companions

 

Monks/Rogues are OP though since they can do crazy damage while being single target DD, which makes casters who target multiple enemies look meh in comparison. (this run so far: Lina 72400, Monk Helwalker 63900, generally wizard kills chaff, monk focuses down 1-2 most threatening targets with stunning fist; but sometimes I just select>left click which means fighters do better, I don't micro every caster to it's best at all times)

 

Only thing I find bad design is that single target/difficult to land spells have same accuracy as fireballs. Derp touch/line/cone/ninagauth's bolt should have bonus accuracy compared to circle spells.

Edited June 17, 2018 by Shadenuat

[Zelse]

It's about 900 damage per cast since it's AOE. it's just an 11 level gal, no empower, ring +10 acc on fire but that's all the "build".

 

But even without AOE you can nuke **** hard with minoletta spells. Penetration rises with your power level as you gain levels, just target lowest enemy armor with a correct spell or even graze them do deff.

You don't get 2 casts, there are damaging spells on every level

Everyone has similar stats, you just have to use buffs/debuffs right

I mean in this specific instance you only get 1 cast because you had to set it up with expose vulnerabilities otherwise im pretty sure the 7 penetration base fireball does get penalized heavily (probably at 50% less damage at that point since its always rounded down as far as i have seen) against one of the lowest armor enemy types in the game.

 

Kappa

 

So your other rank 3 spell is already gone

 

Whatever, let the thread die... Ill just stick to inhands. Theres clearly not many people who agree at this point in time.

 

Also LUL at 900 damage packs

Edited June 17, 2018 by Zelse

[Shadenuat]

But dude Expose Vulnerabilities base time is like 20 sec base. And it helps EVERYONE in party since it's -deflection, -armor, it's an AOE interrupt too, targets will, so why not cast it

 

Also it's kinda strange to say oh you had a debuff, well, yeah, for wizards u stack this; for fighters you stack uber items best perks best classes etc. until you can post beautiful pictures of you killing some stronk dude while you're level 20 packed with best metagamed ****.

Wizard/Druid don't need this, they're good all game just because they have spells.

 

But meh Fireball is already 10.3 (lol 0.3) pen since it's power level + scion of flame + whatnot

Edited June 17, 2018 by Shadenuat

[Suen]

Unfortunately this is by design, and they will not change it. 

The whole magic system has been rebuilt around the idea that the players should use the same one or two spells over and over again. So unless you stick to "that" spell, you gimp yourself (but anyways there is a good chance that they will nerf any spell deviating from mediocrity)

It's crappy, it's boring, and intended. 

Edited June 17, 2018 by Suen

[Zelse]

But dude Expose Vulnerabilities base time is like 20 sec base. And it helps EVERYONE in party since it's -deflection, -armor, it's an AOE interrupt too, targets will, so why not cast it

 

But meh Fireball is already 10.3 (lol 0.3) pen since it's power level + scion of flame + whatnot

The penetration really doesnt help (the deflection is great tho for your NON SPELLCASTERS *hint hint* since getting more pen after you already do 100% is generally not getting anywhere (double the enemies armor in pen is mostly unrealistic/not worth)

 

Also you now have to at least hit 2 rolls (expose and fireball) which makes it soo much worse.

 

Scion of flame is another one of these great examples why spellcasters suck actually. Like you have to spend 1 ability point for 1 pen for EVERY DAMAGE TYPE?? (fire is obviously king just because of the ring). Just make it 1 talent for all spells like cipher.

 

Also im not sure how you get 10.3 pen base at level 11 on fireball. I have 8.5pen on minolettas bounding missiles at level 15 (4 higher than you if what u said is true). Min. Bd. Missiles is the same spell rank and has the same base pen. Scion of flame should put you at around 9 at best.

 

Tenacious and food are great ways to go around these things anyway but still curious. Pen food is kinda expensive early on and the good might inspirations are hard to get outside of monk.

 

I kind of want you to show off a screen doing something similair against some of the hard encounters that actually matter...

Like the Death guard under beraths temple, or the the fight immediately after getting the coronett of waves out of the water. Both of these are undead as well so you should be able to at least hit them. Kappa

But to be fair it wouldnt change anything for me either way even if you could pull it off Most encounters that matter arent designed in a way that you can carefully set up and aoe by funneling everyone into a choke and melees are low priority. If i die its almost always to casters and/or gunners/archers. And these guys dont clump up for a 15 enemy 900 damage fireball.

 

meh, i think i should go to sleep D:

 

Unfortunately this is by design, and they will not change it. 

The whole magic system has been rebuilt around the idea that the players should use the same one or two spells over and over again. So unless you stick to "that" spell, you gimp yourself (but anyways there is a good chance that they will nerf any spell deviating from mediocrity)

It's crappy, it's boring, and intended. 

 

I dont think its that simple. Nobody would bother making a ton of spells and improving the effects only to make it all terrible on purpose. I think they actually believe spells are good. Im mostly just trying to convince the devs to reconsider their standpoint

 

Also that is a really nice avatar ^_^

Edited June 17, 2018 by Zelse

[Shadenuat]

I kind of want you to show off a screen doing something similair against some of the hard encounters that actually matter...

Spoiler

It's actually p. easy, you just need 1 character with escape/leap who you will use to get the item. Rest can wait/prebuff anywhere else while you pull mobs around some stairs.

 

try this u cannot do it;

but even if you do whole game like it, I don't believe u

 

OK.

Edited June 17, 2018 by Shadenuat

[Zelse]

 

I kind of want you to show off a screen doing something similair against some of the hard encounters that actually matter...

Spoiler

It's actually p. easy, you just need 1 character with escape/leap who you will use to get the item. Rest can wait/prebuff anywhere else while you pull mobs around some stairs.

 

 

Yea i can see that working. It is cheesy af tho. Might as well reset combat and just walk away entirely if the encounter can be reset. Or go invisible or sth and just walk away.

Edited June 17, 2018 by Zelse

[Shadenuat]

Didnt know it was cheesy when I did this on my 1st playthrough with no savescumming simply because it was Eder who acted as a sacrificial lamb to touch the strange thingy, as he had highest con/athletics. Once death came I clicked escape on him since he was fighter/rogue. Hilariously encounter also somewhat broke since I only found 2 last skeletons after I killed first pack only later.

 

You can totally pull ranged enemies around LOS blockers just like melees, although I usually kill them after melees stick to tank with my rogues/monks/barbarians/ranged dudes.

 

Some spells are weaker than others is true though. I think Wizard's 1st level spells are the example of how every level of spells should be. There's literally no completely useless stuff there. You want almost everything.

Edited June 17, 2018 by Shadenuat

[baldurs_gate_2]

Chillfog is very strong. Maybe the strongest early game spell. It even blinds enemies. Empowered Minoletta" Concussive Missile (PL IV) can even kill a group of Eoten in one cast and you get it with Level 10 at Multiclass.

 

I agree that 2 casts for one PL are not enough. It was enough with brilliant aura, but it does not exist anymore. And they should make more passives i agree.

[Celan]

I found my druid to be pretty weak. It was disappointing, especially because you were pretty effective in PoE1. I ended up acting as support spellcaster most of the time, which I did not sign up for.

[baldurs_gate_2]

I found my druid to be pretty weak. It was disappointing, especially because you were pretty effective in PoE1. I ended up acting as support spellcaster most of the time, which I did not sign up for.

Yeah, that 40 raw damage plague of insects with 22 alchemy every 3 seconds is pretty weak lol

[Yosharian]

I almost never found damage spells to be worth it unless they did Raw damage.  I took Silent Scream and Disintegration because they do Raw damage and so they are useful against tough enemies.

 

Otherwise, it's far more effective to get disables or debuff spells that last a long time, and significantly boost the damage caused by physical attacks (from the caster of the spell, even).

[Zelse]

Please exclude exploits

 

Plague of insects and alchemy is clearly an exploit. 

 

 

 

I found my druid to be pretty weak. It was disappointing, especially because you were pretty effective in PoE1. I ended up acting as support spellcaster most of the time, which I did not sign up for.

Yeah, that 40 raw damage plague of insects with 22 alchemy every 3 seconds is pretty weak lol

 

 

 

Chillfog is very strong. Maybe the strongest early game spell. It even blinds enemies. Empowered Minoletta" Concussive Missile (PL IV) can even kill a group of Eoten in one cast and you get it with Level 10 at Multiclass.

 

I agree that 2 casts for one PL are not enough. It was enough with brilliant aura, but it does not exist anymore. And they should make more passives i agree.

 

Chillfog starts at 5 penetration. It is a great spell for blinding enemies and only on tekehu since he gets it as FoeAoe rather than regular Aoe. And as i said in the starting post, yes there are some good utility spells in the game.

The damage numbers you will get out of a spell that starts at 5 pen are (almost) ALWAYS going to be terrible on POTD. Even with expensive food+penTalent+tenacious you barely make 10. Most enemies after the first island have more than that. It also targets reflex without accuracy bonus so on average you wil graze 1-2 enemies out of 5 without heavy prebuffing for acc.

 

You have to put in crazy amounts of work just to make this thing somewhat okay damage wise. Its not worth. Even with how mediocre many spells are. This one is particularly bad at dealing damage. (Still a great spell for the blind tho!)

Edited June 18, 2018 by Zelse

[Manveru123]

Empowered AoE spells are plenty powerful. It's a problem in the early game because you have very little spells, but mid-to-late game and when you grab that +1 spell uses grimoire, it's fine at the moment. A ulu thenn!

[Celan]

 

I found my druid to be pretty weak. It was disappointing, especially because you were pretty effective in PoE1. I ended up acting as support spellcaster most of the time, which I did not sign up for.

Yeah, that 40 raw damage plague of insects with 22 alchemy every 3 seconds is pretty weak lol

 

You think a player having to have 22 points in a skill for a spell to be effective is a legitimate argument?

Edited June 18, 2018 by Celan

[Zelse]

Empowered AoE spells are plenty powerful. It's a problem in the early game because you have very little spells, but mid-to-late game and when you grab that +1 spell uses grimoire, it's fine at the moment. A ulu thenn!

 

Ill give spellcasters Empower thats for sure. Only spellcasters really benefit from empower, some of the missile spells in particular are probably the best thing to be empowered in the entire game.

Im also not aware of a +1spellcasts grimoire? That sounds quite good! Where is it / what is its name?

 

 

 

 

I found my druid to be pretty weak. It was disappointing, especially because you were pretty effective in PoE1. I ended up acting as support spellcaster most of the time, which I did not sign up for.

Yeah, that 40 raw damage plague of insects with 22 alchemy every 3 seconds is pretty weak lol

 

You think a player having to have 22 points in a skill for a spell to be effective is a legitimate argument?

 

If it wasnt an exploit that will probably eventually get fixed (might take a while since its likely related to keywords which might be difficult depending on how they coded it) i would agree with him. Dumping all skill points in the upper tree to get spells that literally win the game for you by themselves after casting them once sounds pretty worth it to me. Literally you cast 1 time and everything dies.

 

Its broken.

 

It might still get beaten by the monk/ranger multishot+crit build which is slightly less exploity but just a broken combo/design oversight. But in the end neither of these should be used by anyone who wants to actually play the game rather than facerolling content because 2 things were overlooked.

Edited June 18, 2018 by Zelse