Wizard Subclasses

[ChaosPT]

So... recently there was a new minor boost to the Wizard subclasses ( +2 power level )

Does it make it more alluring or is it still too much of a needless headache?

Edited July 16, 2018 by ChaosPT

[Verde]

Two forbidden schools are still too much, and some subclasses get crushed like Conjurer.

[gkathellar]

Evoker is an even better pick for blasters, on account of only really missing out on some debuffs, Arcane Veil and Chill Fog, while the +2 PL provides disproportionate benefits for damage spells and a small chance to double cast is phenomenal.

 

None of the others are worth a damn because the stuff they miss out on is still far too important (often specifically to them), their special abilities are mostly trash, and a lot of their spells see very limited returns for a bit of extra PL.

 

Edit: Josh Sawyer does not just hate wizards. They're still one of the strongest, most versatile classes in the game. The problem is that their subclassing mechanic was pulled straight from the IE games and it very clearly shouldn't have been, because where those games had eight types of spell Deadfire has only five.

Edited July 16, 2018 by gkathellar

[ChaosPT]

Edit: Josh Sawyer does not just hate wizards. They're still one of the strongest, most versatile classes in the game. The problem is that their subclassing mechanic was pulled straight from the IE games and it very clearly shouldn't have been, because where those games had eight types of spell Deadfire has only five.

I mean it more as a joke than anything else... but you do have to agree that decisions made in the name of balance have been detrimental to some aspects of the classes.

Deleterious Alacry took a bit to return to the old action speed % boost format, from the simple nerfed version of a Dex Inspiration for example

 

With any luck they'll reduce opposite schools to just 1

Edited July 17, 2018 by ChaosPT

[arkane83]

The problem with losing access to opposite schools in exchange for power level is that not every spell benefits the same from PL. Multi projectile damage or a damage over time spell is way more power level hungry than a fixed bonus spell with a duration.

 

Opposite schools should have -3 power level and recovery penalty but still be usable.

 

That would give a 5 PL gap between specialized schools and opposed schools. You would still really want to avoid your opposed schools, but could manage a lower duration mirror image if your a conjurer.

 

I think the real problem with my idea is that evokers are really strong as is. Fix 4 broken specialties to make the fifth overpowered. Maybe we just need better/more unique specialist only spells?

[gkathellar]

Really, they should have done something like this. It's a much better approach that plays far more to the way players will want to focus on a narrower aspect of wizards' enormous versatility.

 

 

 

Edit: Josh Sawyer does not just hate wizards. They're still one of the strongest, most versatile classes in the game. The problem is that their subclassing mechanic was pulled straight from the IE games and it very clearly shouldn't have been, because where those games had eight types of spell Deadfire has only five.

I mean it more as a joke than anything else... but you do have to agree that decisions made in the name of balance have been detrimental to some aspects of the classes.
Deleterious Alacry took a bit to return to the old action speed % boost format, from the simple nerfed version of a Dex Inspiration for example

With any luck they'll reduce opposite schools to just 1

 

I'm not even sure they're balance decisions, so much as "ooh we have this cool new subsystem that unifies everything, let's use that instead," decisions.

 

The problem, in my experience, with cool new subsystems that unify everything, is that they never do all of the things you want them to.

[Loren Tyr]

I do like the exclusion of schools personally (though I'd like the spell selection in general to be widened a bit; same with Druid/Priest as well by the way, just to give some more options if you do want to specialise in specific types), but definitely they need to rework the PL boosts on spells such that they all get a nice boost from it. Probably, at the moment they're just relying on general rules for generating that too much (eg. +X% to healing, +Y projectiles, etc.), without balancing that out better for individual spells (and some spells could have cool individual PL effects as well of course).

[gkathellar]

Part of the reason school exclusion worked in BG2 was because the playstyles of others schools were actually pretty surprisingly viable. I recall the old BW forums ages and ages ago, when Alesia_BH ran her solo ascension challenge with a transmuter, which locked her out of necromancy and abjuration spells. This poked a pretty big hole in a lot of high-end BG2 spellcasting tactics (which she was extremely proficient in), so she made up for her lost defenses with extensive use of unusual tactics like turning into a mustard jelly for melee. This was possible because BG2 had the classic do-anything-wizard, so even if you lost access to a couple of tricks, there were always more.

 

This is less viable in PoE, where wizards are more limited in scope, and for good reason - I totally agree with JS that the Batman Wizard is toxic for games, while the God Wizard is pretty much ideal. It's true that adding lots of additional wizard spells would help make specialists viable ... but it would also benefit universalists pretty significantly in being able to do anything and everything forever and ever. I suppose you could add specialist-only wizard spells (actually pretty trivial to do from a game architecture perspective), but I have concerns about making wizard into five different classes.

Edited July 17, 2018 by gkathellar

[Loren Tyr]

That's true, certainly. I wouldn't want the five spell classes to get too broad in that sense, missing out on a particular class should definitely put a dent in your arsenal, it should genuinely be specialisation in that sense. It's more that certainly at higher spell levels, there can be rather a lack of spells in certain schools. For example (not counting spells in special Grimoires, I don't have those to hand atm), Illusionists have no spells at all at levels 7 and 9. And at level 4 they only have Confusion, which in it's PoE2 form is hardly the most appetizing of spells.

 

Obviously Illusionists can also use Transmutation and Evocation spells, but you'd want the backbone of an Illusionist subclass to be the Illusionism spells. And it should certainly be possible, without losing the unique flavour and capabilities of the schools, to at least give them useful things to do at each level. And the same, to varying degrees, with the other schools. And to a lesser extent with eg. Druids and Priests as well, obviously those don't specialise in the same degree but there is certainly a degree of that going on with different classes of spells (also via items of course). 

 

So indeed, I agree that the different schools / specialisations / spell classes shouldn't become too broad, but I think more depth can and should be added to them without that being a risk.

[heldred]

Evoked or Vanilla are my current picks.

 

I’m sure you can make the other classes work or just do it for flavor. The trade-offs just aren’t balanced enough outside of Evoker (for me).

 

To be fair, there are bigger balancing issues in the game, but worth revisiting later since the current penalties are rough.

Edited July 17, 2018 by heldred

[knownastherat]

Part of the reason school exclusion worked in BG2 was because the playstyles of others schools were actually pretty surprisingly viable. I recall the old BW forums ages and ages ago, when Alesia_BH ran her solo ascension challenge with a transmuter, which locked her out of necromancy and abjuration spells. This poked a pretty big hole in a lot of high-end BG2 spellcasting tactics (which she was extremely proficient in), so she made up for her lost defenses with extensive use of unusual tactics like turning into a mustard jelly for melee. This was possible because BG2 had the classic do-anything-wizard, so even if you lost access to a couple of tricks, there were always more.

 

This is less viable in PoE, where wizards are more limited in scope, and for good reason - I totally agree with JS that the Batman Wizard is toxic for games, while the God Wizard is pretty much ideal. It's true that adding lots of additional wizard spells would help make specialists viable ... but it would also benefit universalists pretty significantly in being able to do anything and everything forever and ever. I suppose you could add specialist-only wizard spells (actually pretty trivial to do from a game architecture perspective), but I have concerns about making wizard into five different classes.

 

Toxic? How can it be toxic in a single player game? 

 

So Josh ... does not "hate" Wizards, he just thinks Wizards from "the beloved Infinity Engine games" were toxic, do I understand it correctly?

Edited July 17, 2018 by knownastherat

[Tanlaus]

I agree that wizards from the IE games could be OP. Spell triggers, immunities and contingencies made them virtually unstoppable.

 

I also agree with Loren Tyr that some specialists really suffer from lack of spells at certain power levels.

 

Another thing that really hurts- in my opinion- but might not show up initially is that most people who really know the ins and outs of this game play on POTD where things like CC spells seem to take more of a hit than DD spells. So evoker is still viable where illusionists (for example) suffer.

[knownastherat]

You agree with something that was not said here. 

 

https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/toxic

 

The fact that they were very powerful did not prevent BG2 to be regarded as one of the greatest games ever made, so how can they be toxic? That is complete nonsense, respectively reversed euphemism for "I did not like them". 

[ChaosPT]

This is less viable in PoE, where wizards are more limited in scope, and for good reason - I totally agree with JS that the Batman Wizard is toxic for games, while the God Wizard is pretty much ideal. It's true that adding lots of additional wizard spells would help make specialists viable ... but it would also benefit universalists pretty significantly in being able to do anything and everything forever and ever. I suppose you could add specialist-only wizard spells (actually pretty trivial to do from a game architecture perspective), but I have concerns about making wizard into five different classes.

 

 

I disagree, while its true the Wizard concept has the potencial to do anything and everything, it has a particular effective deterrent... it's hassle with little gain

 

> Try to have a little of everything... you'll be too spread out to be effective

> Buff yourself to ridiculous heights - you're still a subpar fighter, with just better defensive effects

> Blast your way forward, and you better pray its dead before you run out of bullets

> Utility spells - great out of combat and for convenience, but still eating slots from a rather small resource pool

 

Most of these result in the Wizard either using too many turns for set up, or having too many tools for so little slots and not having the best spell for the situation at hand. Because naturally, he focused on what gives him a better shot at staying alive

 

On paper the Wizard is indeed a god, but in practice it needs alot of circunstances going its way to be godlike

Edited July 17, 2018 by ChaosPT

[Tanlaus]

BG2 was great for a lot of reasons. Honestly I don’t think game balance was one of them. I’d be willing to bet the vast majority of BG2 players didn’t hang out on the bioware forums discussing game mechanics.

 

And again, if you are playing this game for the first time on its core setting, it’s plenty easy to lose fights just based on not having mastered the game mechanics. It’s also plenty easy to make any single class, subclass or multi class combination to finish the game with.

 

Balance becomes more of an issue if you’re playing at higher difficulty and have mastered the game mechanics.

 

Should it be addressed? Yes.

 

Is it easy to address? No. It’s a complex game with a lot of variables. Summing a balance issue up with ‘Josh Sawyer hates wizards,’ is neither accurate nor productive.

[ChaosPT]

Is it easy to address? No. It’s a complex game with a lot of variables. Summing a balance issue up with ‘Josh Sawyer hates wizards,’ is neither accurate nor productive.

It has been mentioned that is the joke option...

And its mostly to address the fact the subclasses are not worth consideration aside from Evoker, because they are just crippling.

Its not a matter of flavor or preference... The subclasses hamper your non-evocation wizard the way they're designed right now

 

 

We're not arguing wether you can clear the game with them or not... but rather the point of them existing like this, since its the choice between a small spell list (to which the player has little control over due to grimoire mechanic) and a severly handicapped smaller one

And you clearly never been to the bioware BG forums... a lot of non-kit thief bashing

Edited July 17, 2018 by ChaosPT

[Tanlaus]

I have been to the bioware BG forums. My whole point is the BG games weren’t really balanced all that well either.

 

I do feel like this game needs more balancing.

 

I do agree that most wizard subclasses aren’t worth it.

 

My whole point is that speculating about Josh Sawyer’s feelings in wizards isn’t helpful to balancing them.

 

There have been some good suggestions in this thread though.

[grayrest]

The problem is that their subclassing mechanic was pulled straight from the IE games and it very clearly shouldn't have been, because where those games had eight types of spell Deadfire has only five.

 

The problem isn't losing two schools but rather that the upside isn't worth the downside. I'd strongly consider a Conjurer if the bonus was +100% conjuration duration, if conjured weapons never timed out, or if +2 PL on conjuration was good. I could then sub Arcane Veil for the main Illusion deflection spells and be in a decent spot. I've thought less about the other schools but I did see a wizard mod that gave buffs that looked more reasonable.

[Verde]

Well with all subclasses you should get an automatic spell per level PLUS a unique ability. Conjurer's familiar is laughable and needs an overhaul. Also Enchanting is actually decent but doesn't it completely lose spells at high level?

[gkathellar]

Toxic? How can it be toxic in a single player game? 

 

So Josh ... does not "hate" Wizards, he just thinks Wizards from "the beloved Infinity Engine games" were toxic, do I understand it correctly?

 

I'm not really seeing where you're getting the idea that I'm attacking BG2 from - the thing I specifically called toxic was a D&D 3.5 wizard handbook discussing a build archetype in which a wizard has a tool on their figurative "utility belt" for every situation. I find that broad archetype creates a bad play experience in games, single-player or not, because it renders some character types totally irrelevant or at the very least redundant with others that can also do other things. BG2 didn't really have that problem except at a relatively high degree of skilled play, which is what it is.

 

And to be clear, toxic is my word choice, not his. If you prefer, substitute "bad for the play experience" - I thought my meaning was clear, but apparently it wasn't. I've seen statements he's made to the effect of "wizards should not be able to do absolutely everything because magic," which I agree pretty strongly with. YMMV.

 

The fact that they were very powerful did not prevent BG2 to be regarded as one of the greatest games ever made, so how can they be toxic? That is complete nonsense, respectively reversed euphemism for "I did not like them". 

 

Are you asserting that BG2 was a great game, so all of its design decisions were great and should be replicated? I'm just seeking clarification, I have nothing to say to that.

 

 

This is less viable in PoE, where wizards are more limited in scope, and for good reason - I totally agree with JS that the Batman Wizard is toxic for games, while the God Wizard is pretty much ideal. It's true that adding lots of additional wizard spells would help make specialists viable ... but it would also benefit universalists pretty significantly in being able to do anything and everything forever and ever. I suppose you could add specialist-only wizard spells (actually pretty trivial to do from a game architecture perspective), but I have concerns about making wizard into five different classes.

 

 

I disagree, while its true the Wizard concept has the potencial to do anything and everything, it has a particular effective deterrent... it's hassle with little gain

 

> Try to have a little of everything... you'll be too spread out to be effective

> Buff yourself to ridiculous heights - you're still a subpar fighter, with just better defensive effects

> Blast your way forward, and you better pray its dead before you run out of bullets

> Utility spells - great out of combat and for convenience, but still eating slots from a rather small resource pool

 

Most of these result in the Wizard either using too many turns for set up, or having too many tools for so little slots and not having the best spell for the situation at hand. Because naturally, he focused on what gives him a better shot at staying alive

 

On paper the Wizard is indeed a god, but in practice it needs alot of circunstances going its way to be godlike

 

Uh ... yes? Did you click the links? The "God Wizard" concept is specifically a battlefield controller who sets things up for other party members to shine, originally created for as a group-friendly optimization model for a game where wizards can outshine the rest of the party if they want to. It's not god in the sense of being all-powerful, but rather in the sense that it arranges things. I think it's a very good model to aim for, and I find that both PoE games tend to favor it and this is something I like.

 

To be clear, I'm not saying wizards in Deadfire do the Batman thing, I'm saying I think it's a problem when wizards in games do the Batman thing. Both PoE1 and 2 do a pretty good job of averting that while still allowing wizards be versatile.

 

BG2 was great for a lot of reasons. Honestly I don’t think game balance was one of them. I’d be willing to bet the vast majority of BG2 players didn’t hang out on the bioware forums discussing game mechanics.

 

And again, if you are playing this game for the first time on its core setting, it’s plenty easy to lose fights just based on not having mastered the game mechanics. It’s also plenty easy to make any single class, subclass or multi class combination to finish the game with.

 

Balance becomes more of an issue if you’re playing at higher difficulty and have mastered the game mechanics.

 

Should it be addressed? Yes.

 

Is it easy to address? No. It’s a complex game with a lot of variables. Summing a balance issue up with ‘Josh Sawyer hates wizards,’ is neither accurate nor productive.

 

QFT.

[InsaneCommander]

Well with all subclasses you should get an automatic spell per level PLUS a unique ability. Conjurer's familiar is laughable and needs an overhaul. Also Enchanting is actually decent but doesn't it completely lose spells at high level?

 

Unique spells for the subclasses would make them much more interesting. And although Conjurer is not a summoner, I wish they had more summon creature spells.

[dunehunter]

 

This is less viable in PoE, where wizards are more limited in scope, and for good reason - I totally agree with JS that the Batman Wizard is toxic for games, while the God Wizard is pretty much ideal. It's true that adding lots of additional wizard spells would help make specialists viable ... but it would also benefit universalists pretty significantly in being able to do anything and everything forever and ever. I suppose you could add specialist-only wizard spells (actually pretty trivial to do from a game architecture perspective), but I have concerns about making wizard into five different classes.

 

I disagree, while its true the Wizard concept has the potencial to do anything and everything, it has a particular effective deterrent... it's hassle with little gain

 

> Try to have a little of everything... you'll be too spread out to be effective

> Buff yourself to ridiculous heights - you're still a subpar fighter, with just better defensive effects

> Blast your way forward, and you better pray its dead before you run out of bullets

> Utility spells - great out of combat and for convenience, but still eating slots from a rather small resource pool

 

Most of these result in the Wizard either using too many turns for set up, or having too many tools for so little slots and not having the best spell for the situation at hand. Because naturally, he focused on what gives him a better shot at staying alive

 

On paper the Wizard is indeed a god, but in practice it needs alot of circunstances going its way to be godlike

Lol I guess u never played the wizard in bg2 correctly, thus u are under the impression they are only good on paper.

[Bloemkool1]

Like most other people in this thread i also believe that specialist wizards, including evoker, suck. The reason is simple, you give up a lot of versatility for little to no gain.

 

Its also very sad to realize that the actual power of wizards lies in the use of the grimoires. The best wizard builds are built around using the "perfect" grimoire / set of grimoires so you have to select as little spells as possible during level up, using those points for other things. (like your multi class). It also does not help that grimoires hold some of the best special spells in the game, but those at least have to be offset with a little extra spell selection on your part.

 

The game by design pushes you to try to create a spell less wizard relying on books whose contents you can not really control and requires players to heavily metagame in order to create the best possible wizard out of it, further making specialization undesirable as most grimoires contain spells of opposing schools (best example is Concelhauts grimoire, which does not let you cast all Concelhaut spells as a transmuter (all spells are transmute except for the missiles)

 

So add lack of proper itemization to the list of why specialists suck as well.

 

Now don't get me wrong, i actually like the idea of wizards being a book worm, but it does present some in game challenges the way it is implemented here.

 

My solution for the wizard schools would be a simple one, give them the trickster treatment, a few choice spells at selected levels defining their role and gameplay. This should / could include full attack options for classes where that would be appropriate, and does allow for adding some "broken" stuff like for instance invisibility to illusion giving each school more of a specialist feel (unique tricks) while still being focused on casting. Also unique abilities should be both active and usable, so no more free mirror image (boring as hell) or Ogre why is this even still in the game level of suck, indulge the fantasy, if my lvl 20 transmuter can turn into a dragon who cares, its awesome and not worse then a single minoletta instagibbing the endboss of the game anyway.

 

And with this i will slink back into the modders forum where i know someone will actually fix this instead of us arguing in circles and nothing happening whatsoever.

 

ps. Why can we cast most damage spells outside of combat but any sort of prebuffing is disallowed? Makes no sense whatsoever.

[Manveru123]

Keep it coming guys, Evoker needs to be buffed, I want to destroy things even harder <3

[kilay]

Like most other people in this thread i also believe that specialist wizards, including evoker, suck. The reason is simple, you give up a lot of versatility for little to no gain.

 

Its also very sad to realize that the actual power of wizards lies in the use of the grimoires. The best wizard builds are built around using the "perfect" grimoire / set of grimoires so you have to select as little spells as possible during level up, using those points for other things. (like your multi class). It also does not help that grimoires hold some of the best special spells in the game, but those at least have to be offset with a little extra spell selection on your part.

 

The game by design pushes you to try to create a spell less wizard relying on books whose contents you can not really control and requires players to heavily metagame in order to create the best possible wizard out of it, further making specialization undesirable as most grimoires contain spells of opposing schools (best example is Concelhauts grimoire, which does not let you cast all Concelhaut spells as a transmuter (all spells are transmute except for the missiles)

 

So add lack of proper itemization to the list of why specialists suck as well.

 

Now don't get me wrong, i actually like the idea of wizards being a book worm, but it does present some in game challenges the way it is implemented here.

 

My solution for the wizard schools would be a simple one, give them the trickster treatment, a few choice spells at selected levels defining their role and gameplay. This should / could include full attack options for classes where that would be appropriate, and does allow for adding some "broken" stuff like for instance invisibility to illusion giving each school more of a specialist feel (unique tricks) while still being focused on casting. Also unique abilities should be both active and usable, so no more free mirror image (boring as hell) or Ogre why is this even still in the game level of suck, indulge the fantasy, if my lvl 20 transmuter can turn into a dragon who cares, its awesome and not worse then a single minoletta instagibbing the endboss of the game anyway.

 

And with this i will slink back into the modders forum where i know someone will actually fix this instead of us arguing in circles and nothing happening whatsoever.

 

ps. Why can we cast most damage spells outside of combat but any sort of prebuffing is disallowed? Makes no sense whatsoever.

 

Agree, btw it's not an easy change to do, you have to redo all the progression tables. Btw Extended Spell add some Invisibility spells (and other D&D classic spells) you can try it.

About spell out of combat i agree, but if you unlock all of them the game become a joke. (If you wanna try PM me i have a Mod to do that)

 

Edited July 18, 2018 by kilay