My opinions on the wizard

[BrickleberryPi]

Having played and restarted a wizard at least 6 times and beaten the game on hard with a wizard, I can say that at the higher levels, they feel pretty overpowered. At the lower levels, not so much. They feel just right in the mid levels. My somewhat biased notes on the wizard class so far:

 

Pros:

• They can front load all their spells if needed. I see spells in terms of limited ammunition in FPS or third person shooters-- sort of like some guy who decides to use all his grenades and usable/consumable items. It's a weird analogy, but it works for me.
• Crowd control comes in a variety with access to tons of different spells. Wizards even get petrify which is the king of CC and is insanely good for what it does. You honestly have to be crazy not to take it.
• Versatile. There's a plethora of debuffs, CC, and damage spells mixed in, which is nice. I personally prefer a class that is labeled "wizard" to be more ranged AoE damage oriented than that, but I suppose that's my heavy MMO/ non-CRPG/ non-DnD background talking.
• Much more fun than playing a fighter/paladin and just standing there attacking and occasionally using a per-encounter skill.

 

Cons:

• Overpowered at the higher levels. Having per-encounter access to eight spells (four level one spells, four level two spells) can trivialize some encounters. Add in the class rings with the ability to increase the amount of uses for these spells and you're capable of steam rolling enemies.
• Inconsistency of spell usefulness while leveling. Level one spells have far more useful spells than level two spells, and level three spells seem to have far more useful spells than level four. That could be because of my playstyle though, so this may or may not be a valid point. Example: Chill Fog feels way better than post 1.03 Curse of Blackened Sight, Slicken is a no brainer and you absolutely should bring it, Fan of Flames is insanely strong for a level one compared to the level five Blast of Frost spell.
• Inconsistency of damage spell effects while leveling. Compared to a druid who has tons of Foe AoE as opposed to the wizard's FF (friendly fire) AoE, it's really sad. Also, it seems most of the really good damage spells are level one, three, five, and six. Two and four seem to be lackluster and needs some better improvements. (Perhaps an additional 2-4m range to ranged spells and Foe only AoE?)
• Petrify is insanely good for what it does. Seriously, it is crazy powerful.
• Weak at the lower levels. Because of the ability to front load spells, it also makes wizards weak at the beginning when they only have access to level one and two spells. Things really begin to shine when you get level three and higher spells.
• Buff spells only affect themselves and feel weak at times. It feels that the priests can do much more and have much better options than wizards.
• (Personal irritation) Damage spells have very low ranges. This is more of a personal preference. I like my non-touch spells having a range of 10m or greater. I do not like spells that have less than that. Arcane Assault post 1.03 is acceptable since the AoE adds up to be about 10m but I still wouldn't mind seeing a clear 10m range on it. You can probably guess my playstyle is to avoid touch spells and melee range like the plague on my wizard. Yes, that shaped the cons section of these notes and I admit to such a bias.

 

Personal notes on what could make the class feel better leveling up and not so overpowered at the later levels (warning: ranged spell bias ahead):

• Increase the range of spells so that many non-touch spells have a minimum 10 meter range.
• Reduce the amount of FF AoE on debuff spells. Curse of Blackened Sight was a good start.
• Allow Wizard buff spells to affect allies. Our spells affect ourselves yet from what I've experienced, they would better serve to buff our allies instead.
• Improve the per-encounter abilities. Grimoire Slam and Arcane Veil are weak and a waste of talent points.
• (This is highly theoretical coming from an aspiring game designer who likes to tune things and design systems): Perhaps starting at level 5 and every three levels after that, wizards get to choose one single spell that is lower than their current spell level to become a per-encounter spell with two uses. I say two because four is too much and basically allows the wizard access to effectively five level one, two and three spells. By limiting to two uses, it'll have some use like Arcane Assault but will require some planning on when to use it. Also, I don't like the idea of spamming Slicken 3+ times in a row. However, this will most likely also lead to theorycrafting and the creation of a hierarchy of what spells wizards should take for their per-encounter upgrade because some spells are just too useful per encounter as opposed to per-rest.
• Make Gaze of the Adragon (petrify) either single target or alter petrify so it isn't a ridiculous 4x damage increase. Perhaps 3x or 2.5x damage instead?
• I'm not a fan of the rolling/bouncing spells having friendly fire. I get that it's supposed to be an opener/situational, but I can't envision myself using these spells when the Cipher and Druids have so much more useful spells and with different elements.
• Instead of the current system where Wizards and almost all mages gain all equipped level one and two spells as per-encounter, allow mages (excluding cipher) to select one spell to be converted to a per-encounter spell with two uses every 3 levels starting at level 6. That way, at level 12, the mages will have 3 spells (6 uses total) that can be used per encounter. If the level cap were to be raised by 3, the mages would gain a fourth per-encounter spell. I'm not counting Arcane Assault on Wizards because it's a weak spell that mostly helps with dealing with trash mobs.
• Reduce the wizard exclusive ring bonuses in half if they are above 1. Assuming no talents, this should give spell levels one through four a total of 5 uses.

 

Random notes:

• Arcane Reflection reflects enemy spells but I usually keep enemy spell casters CC'ed long enough to take them out. Who uses this spell and what's your playstyle?
• All the melee range spells: they basically get disabled when using Citzal's Martial Power. Citzal's Martial Power increases defenses and I suppose is great for melee wizards, but wouldn't that just make you a sitting duck if you can't cast spells? Also, can you even run as a melee wizard and not die/get knocked out often?
• If Fan of Flames has such insanely high damage, then what does Blast of Frost have going for it that makes it a level five spell?
• Minor Grimoire Imprint affects other wizards and is highly situational. Why do we have such a highly situational spell be a level four spell? It's not like we're constantly facing off against other wizard enemies, are we?

Edit: Added points for clarity

Edited April 12, 2015 by BrickleberryPi

[knownastherat]

Spells are not grenades in FPS.

 

Weak at lower levels quite powerful borderline godly higher levels has spells that don't make sense .. sounds like proper mage to me.

[ShadowTiger]

I feel like casting the buff spells on other characters might be overpowered... however I agree that they are very underhwelming on their own. I think the best fix would be to dramatically increase their durations to 150/300 seconds like the food buffs...

 

I agree that grimoire slam is weak... perhaps if they made it AOE centered on the caster it would make it more useful to escape from multiple enemies.

 

Overall I don't have any serious issues with the wizard the way mine is built. But I could see how if you chose some of the less optimal spells and talents it could be frustrating.

 

I think that blindness and miasma are really good level 2 spells and more than make up for a lack of AOE damage spells. If you look at D&D, there is a similar lack of AOE damage spells at 2nd level as well. I guess my main hang up is that the Web spell seems mostly useless since the stuck condition doesn't confer major penalties and it also doesn't immobilize enemies, it just slows them down. Chill fog does the same thing but damages AND debuffs.

 

I think with a little bit of tinkering and rebalancing they could fix the minor issues but I don't think the amount/quality of direct damage spells is fine.

[BrickleberryPi]

Spells are not grenades in FPS.

 

Weak at lower levels quite powerful borderline godly higher levels has spells that don't make sense .. sounds like proper mage to me.

 

If I'm not mistaken, a lead dev really disliked tabletop mage classes (wizards in particular and I can see why) and your sentiment might seem to be one of the dev's issue. Borderline godly at higher levels shouldn't be possible. Powerful is fine, but borderline godly just doesn't seem fair to others that play or main other classes and see themselves suddenly outshined. 

 

Edit: ShadowTiger, that's the thing, I have a non-DnD background. I don't play DnD. I may have played games inspired by it, but I have never directly fully played DnD, I couldn't get into it.

Edited April 11, 2015 by BrickleberryPi

[illathid]

 

 

Spells are not grenades in FPS.

 

Weak at lower levels quite powerful borderline godly higher levels has spells that don't make sense .. sounds like proper mage to me.

If I'm not mistaken, a lead dev really disliked tabletop mage classes (wizards in particular and I can see why) and your sentiment might seem to be one of the dev's issue. Borderline godly at higher levels shouldn't be possible. Powerful is fine, but borderline godly just doesn't seem fair to others that play or main other classes and see themselves suddenly outshined.

 

Edit: ShadowTiger, that's the thing, I have a non-DnD background. I don't play DnD. I may have played games inspired by it, but I have never directly fully played DnD, I couldn't get into it.

As you can see from my signature, he merely disliked that mages classes in tabletop DnD could often be better at any given niche than classes that were dedicated to it (e.g. out tanking fighters, being better skill monkeys than rogues/bards, etc.).

[knownastherat]

Interesting, I was not aware. Well, they managed to make Barbarians, Rogues, Chanters or Ciphers borderline godly since these managed to solo the game on hardest difficulty as fist. I do not know if it should be like that or not. I do not have balance urges as I take the game as it is, as tools to my disposal, and if I do not like some tool I use another. Playing Wizard a lot lately I am satisfied. But again, I am not the one seeking balance, just fun from playing the game.

[Varana]

You list "overpowered at higher levels" as a con but your suggestions don't try to remedy that except for weakening Petrify somewhat; instead they'd lead to even better wizards at high levels.

 

I would certainly agree with most of what you've written - wizards are quite useful, they just deviate a bit from the standard "walking rocket launcher" variety. They even inherited the somewhat uneven progression e.g. of DnD wizards - very weak in the beginning but getting exponentially stronger.

I wouldn't exactly say that they're "overpowered" even at high levels, esp. compared to some other classes, but they can hold their own.

 

The wizard's buffs - I found them highly useless, as well. My wizard was not made for melee, but if someone attacked him in melee, I usually didn't bother to buff him but opted for taking out the attacker, instead.

If cast on party members, some buffs would be quite overpowered, though. They're quite strong but balanced by being restricted to characters that don't really gain much from them. Cast on other classes, the synergy effects would be quite strong.

 

My main beef with Fan of Flames is its friendly fire area of effect. Either my wizard stands in the front to cast it - which I don't want to happen. Or he hits my front line - which is equally stupid. Or I have to maneuvre him around quite a bit - which is tedious and prevents him from doing other useful stuff.

I'm not saying that that should be changed, I just think that FoF does have its drawbacks. (Which doesn't explain why it's better than most other cone spells, sure.)

Edited April 11, 2015 by Varana

[BrickleberryPi]

You list "overpowered at higher levels" as a con but your suggestions don't try to remedy that except for weakening Petrify somewhat; instead they'd lead to even better wizards at high levels.

 

I would certainly agree with most of what you've written - wizards are quite useful, they just deviate a bit from the standard "walking rocket launcher" variety. They even inherited the somewhat uneven progression e.g. of DnD wizards - very weak in the beginning but getting exponentially stronger.

I wouldn't exactly say that they're "overpowered" even at high levels, esp. compared to some other classes, but they can hold their own.

 

The wizard's buffs - I found them highly useless, as well. My wizard was not made for melee, but if someone attacked him in melee, I usually didn't bother to buff him but opted for taking out the attacker, instead.

If cast on party members, some buffs would be quite overpowered, though. They're quite strong but balanced by being restricted to characters that don't really gain much from them. Cast on other classes, the synergy effects would be quite strong.

 

My main beef with Fan of Flames is its friendly fire area of effect. Either my wizard stands in the front to cast it - which I don't want to happen. Or he hits my front line - which is equally stupid. Or I have to maneuvre him around quite a bit - which is tedious and prevents him from doing other useful stuff.

I'm not saying that that should be changed, I just think that FoF does have its drawbacks. (Which doesn't explain why it's better than most other cone spells, sure.)

 

Strange, I thought I mentioned allowing the wizard to select one single level one, two, and/or three spell as per-encounter spells each with two uses. I thought I conveyed that as an alternative. I suppose I'll edit it then.

 

Also, I'm interpreting your view of Fan of Flames' large cone as a downside hence being level one. In that case, that could also mean you're implying that small radius cones are more useful at a higher level? How does having a narrower cone for Frost Blast be considered a plus for it to be a level five spell? If Frost Blast had higher damage, or applied a debuff or two, it wouldn't be so bad as it is now.

[InAbsentia]

No spells should be per encounter abilities.  In the current implementation, it cripples the strategic level of the game.  Upon reaching level nine, I am free to use some combination of level one spells in every encounter.  This means I no longer have to worry about managing my level one spell resources, effectively eliminating a strategic layer from the game.  More damaging, however, is the fact that per encounter spells allows one to save their higher level spells until they're really needed.  At lower levels, there's a risk-reward mechanic in that the player has the option of using higher level spells in easier encounters to limit the health loss sustained by the frontline.  In turn, this allows the party to push further without using resting resources, but at the expense of spell availability.  The relevance of this mechanic diminishes post level nine because, from level nine onwards, the obvious strategy is to use some combination of level one spells in every encounter.  Level one spells are potent enough that the player can rely on them to defeat easier encounters before significant health damage is sustained (let's not forget that all the other members of your party grow in strength as they level up too.)

Selecting some limited number of spells to be per encounter abilities could work, but it strikes me as an inelegant approach with problems of its own.  For one, it risks limiting the greatest strength of the wizard: their versatility.  Forcing a wizard to pick per encounter spells forces the wizard to keep that spell in their grimoire permanently.  I suppose this problem could be subverted by having per encounter slots in the grimoire (i.e. whichever spell the player fills that slot with becomes a per encounter ability).  However, the main issue is that limiting the number of per encounter spells still has the negative consequence of making it a no-brainer strategy to spam those per encounter spells in every encounter.  This seems worse than making all x level spells per encounter, because it inherits all the problems of that system but has the further consequence of limiting the player's spell choices.
 

[Ichthyic]

it's early yet.  give the game a month or so before whinging about OP/UP classes and abilities.

I'm still playing the release version, and the only thing with the wizard I found needed nerfing they already did in the very first patch, though they did it wrong IMO.

slick was just too good, but changing it to single effect per cast was stupid IMO.  just lower the accuracy on it so more enemies save.  simple.  actually I did find it kinda odd that most spells have an accuracy buff attached to them.  feels kinda kludgy.   in fact, I think the ONLY thing you need to do to tweak the wizard... is simply remove the accuracy buffs off of most of their spells.  that would pretty much do it.

...or, leave the accuracy buffs as they are, and have that be the state for "normal".  on "hard" remove half the accuracy buff, and on POTD, remove the rest, or even give a penalty.

 

Edited April 12, 2015 by Ichthyic

[tnc]

Level 2 blindness is actually better than chill fog because it attacks will. People you want to blind are mostly melee enemies and they have lower will than fortitude.

[Wompoo]

It would seem the things Josh Sawyer disliked about DnD Wizards, is exactly what I and a lot of other peopled loved about them (they were seriously good fun to play)... or even the monster that was the Cleric (Ranger/Cleric multi). That flexibility enabled you to create a class-hybrid that you loved playing, it allowed you to solo BG2 as well (if that was your wish, was never mine ... I was a sucker for the story and companions). Over balancing classes in a single player game is not necessarily for the best, it just kills class diversity, experimentation and just plain fun (balancing classes into bland  almost linear experiences is not fun imho ). I love feeling godly in game play and in story, elements missing in so so many games... boring and tedious.

[knownastherat]

Ranger/Cleric was in todays terms gamebreaking OP borderline exploit. Stealth, Iron Skins, Insect and Doom, Fail of Ages and Crom Faeyr say hello say good bay.

 

Evolution. Look at Bioware and their lol RPG DA:I with balanced abilities on trees and all kinds of sex relationships.

Edited April 12, 2015 by knownastherat

[Odd Hermit]

Rolling Flame is a fun spell and the game could use more nonsensical and dangerous spells for those that enjoy them. I have to admit I killed my entire party except tanks with it once...

 

As for Wizard's self-buffs, they are pretty "meh" except for Eldritch Aim which is great. It's not that they're self-only that bugs me, it's that the Wizard has a lot of "I will never cast this" spells right now since no pre-buffing + limited spells/rest + buffs don't last more than 1 encounter and fights are often short pretty much defeats their purpose.

 

 

As for spells/encounter, it's something I want but I think not all spells are really balanced for it. I think casters need some carefully balanced spells/abilities for longevity without too much power. That said, it's hard to justify limiting them too much with how strong Cipher is currently, but I think Confusion/Charm/Dominate effects at least need to be toned down.

[BrickleberryPi]

No spells should be per encounter abilities.  In the current implementation, it cripples the strategic level of the game.  Upon reaching level nine, I am free to use some combination of level one spells in every encounter.  This means I no longer have to worry about managing my level one spell resources, effectively eliminating a strategic layer from the game.  More damaging, however, is the fact that per encounter spells allows one to save their higher level spells until they're really needed.  At lower levels, there's a risk-reward mechanic in that the player has the option of using higher level spells in easier encounters to limit the health loss sustained by the frontline.  In turn, this allows the party to push further without using resting resources, but at the expense of spell availability.  The relevance of this mechanic diminishes post level nine because, from level nine onwards, the obvious strategy is to use some combination of level one spells in every encounter.  Level one spells are potent enough that the player can rely on them to defeat easier encounters before significant health damage is sustained (let's not forget that all the other members of your party grow in strength as they level up too.)

 

Selecting some limited number of spells to be per encounter abilities could work, but it strikes me as an inelegant approach with problems of its own.  For one, it risks limiting the greatest strength of the wizard: their versatility.  Forcing a wizard to pick per encounter spells forces the wizard to keep that spell in their grimoire permanently.  I suppose this problem could be subverted by having per encounter slots in the grimoire (i.e. whichever spell the player fills that slot with becomes a per encounter ability).  However, the main issue is that limiting the number of per encounter spells still has the negative consequence of making it a no-brainer strategy to spam those per encounter spells in every encounter.  This seems worse than making all x level spells per encounter, because it inherits all the problems of that system but has the further consequence of limiting the player's spell choices.

 

 

That is a whole slew of problems that I didn't think of. The first thing that came to my mind was to suggest a resource system, but given the DnD influence, I believed that would be met with almost universal (and very vocal) negativity. I don't have much experience with the DnD systems, so what do you think is a more elegant approach? Could spell scaling work with such a system and not be overpowered?

Edited April 12, 2015 by BrickleberryPi

[Odd Hermit]

No spells should be per encounter abilities.  In the current implementation, it cripples the strategic level of the game.  Upon reaching level nine, I am free to use some combination of level one spells in every encounter.  This means I no longer have to worry about managing my level one spell resources, effectively eliminating a strategic layer from the game.  More damaging, however, is the fact that per encounter spells allows one to save their higher level spells until they're really needed.  At lower levels, there's a risk-reward mechanic in that the player has the option of using higher level spells in easier encounters to limit the health loss sustained by the frontline.  In turn, this allows the party to push further without using resting resources, but at the expense of spell availability.  The relevance of this mechanic diminishes post level nine because, from level nine onwards, the obvious strategy is to use some combination of level one spells in every encounter.  Level one spells are potent enough that the player can rely on them to defeat easier encounters before significant health damage is sustained (let's not forget that all the other members of your party grow in strength as they level up too.)

 

 

 

Even pre level 9 I got no particularly interesting depth from spell conservation. I can still easily rest before all tough fights. Honestly the biggest thing preventing me from using more spells is that nagging desire to save that resource. Humans are naturally loss averse and all that.

 

It's not a logical or strategic limitation honestly, you don't necessarily know what encounters are up ahead, how difficult they'll be, whether there's even a boss fight or if you're gonna end up resting without using most of your spells for no reason. Etc. etc. You just can't, and don't need to, wisely plan out how many spells you should use or conserve. All spell/rest does, in this context, is justify caster's extremely powerful spells and make players bored during less powerful fights while they conserve spells and do much less micro-management having their casters just shoot things with ranged weapons or whatever.

Edited April 12, 2015 by Odd Hermit

[MaxDamage]

Slicken is imba thats my main complaint.

 

Should become  single target.

Edited April 12, 2015 by MaxDamage

[1varangian]

Wizards are my favourite class usually in every game. I'm up to level 8 now and here's my take on the class so far:

 

 

- No staff implement? What are these little sticks I have to wield for a ranged weapon?

 

- No spell schools / domains / specializations and related items? Meh.

 

- The novelty of the massive book you are constantly holding gets old fast. The chants and casting times range from instant to short so surely you can remember 4 spells per level without having to read them from a book every time. It looks silly and cumbersome in hand. Not being able to cast anything without a grimoire item is theoretically a massive weakness for the class.

 

- 4 available spells per level? Really? All other caster classes get everything for free and complete freedom to cast whatever whenever. How is Wizard the "most flexible"?

 

- Spell durations are really short which means the impact of the Intelligence stat on duration is also fairly unimportant most of the time.

 

- Combat gets very cluttered in PoE most of the time and most spell effects don't have a visual indicator. Hard to tell what's going on without pausing all the time and examining enemies.

 

- The actual impact of the spells is much harder to tell than in the IE games since the effects are generally much weaker and there are multiple stages of success with everything (multiple stages is good but the actual results are hard to discern)

 

- Most AoE's are quite small too, making the Wizard play more like a surgeon with pause than a battlefield controller.

 

- Severe lack of defensive spells and spells to break engagement. Teleporting enemies love to gang up on Wizards and they have no means to protect themselves. Hardened Veil requires 2 talent picks and even with the Veil on Wizards get evaporated in seconds if something engages them. Arcane Veil lasts for only 14 seconds and even during those 14 seconds you're not even remotely safe.

 

- Poor spell balance. Lots of things you never want to cast like the "mirror image" line of spells that do next to nothing. Fan of Flames is absurdly powerful and Fireball is absurdly weak.

 

- Damage spells lack secondary effects. Knockdown for Fireball, Stun for Crackling Bolt etc.

 

- Scrolls are tedious to use with no scroll case and 4 quickslots. Not sure about the whole casting from scrolls mechanic. It never was the strongest point of DnD spellcasting system so why copy it in the first place. In Eora magic is channeled through the soul, not from writing on paper, right?

 

- Anyone can use Wands, Scepters and Rods for the same effect as a Wizard?

 

- Party members run into FF AoE's (and visible traps) like idiots after their targets die.

 

- All spells seem to use the same chant

 

 

 

So.. needless to say I'm underwhelmed so far by PoE Wizards.

[AncientToaster]

 

- Combat gets very cluttered in PoE most of the time and most spell effects don't have a visual indicator. Hard to tell what's going on without pausing all the time and examining enemies.

 

 

This is one of my biggest problems with the game in general, the fact that I pretty much have to live in Pause mode to see if the enemies have been affected by any of my status ailments.

[BrickleberryPi]

Wizards are my favourite class usually in every game. I'm up to level 8 now and here's my take on the class so far:

 

 

1. No staff implement? What are these little sticks I have to wield for a ranged weapon?
2.  No spell schools / domains / specializations and related items? Meh.
3. The novelty of the massive book you are constantly holding gets old fast. The chants and casting times range from instant to short so surely you can remember 4 spells per level without having to read them from a book every time. It looks silly and cumbersome in hand. Not being able to cast anything without a grimoire item is theoretically a massive weakness for the class.
4. 4 available spells per level? Really? All other caster classes get everything for free and complete freedom to cast whatever whenever. How is Wizard the "most flexible"?
5. Spell durations are really short which means the impact of the Intelligence stat on duration is also fairly unimportant most of the time.
6. Combat gets very cluttered in PoE most of the time and most spell effects don't have a visual indicator. Hard to tell what's going on without pausing all the time and examining enemies.
7. The actual impact of the spells is much harder to tell than in the IE games since the effects are generally much weaker and there are multiple stages of success with everything (multiple stages is good but the actual results are hard to discern)
8. Most AoE's are quite small too, making the Wizard play more like a surgeon with pause than a battlefield controller.
9. Severe lack of defensive spells and spells to break engagement. Teleporting enemies love to gang up on Wizards and they have no means to protect themselves. Hardened Veil requires 2 talent picks and even with the Veil on Wizards get evaporated in seconds if something engages them. Arcane Veil lasts for only 14 seconds and even during those 14 seconds you're not even remotely safe.
10. Poor spell balance. Lots of things you never want to cast like the "mirror image" line of spells that do next to nothing. Fan of Flames is absurdly powerful and Fireball is absurdly weak.
11. Damage spells lack secondary effects. Knockdown for Fireball, Stun for Crackling Bolt etc.
12. Scrolls are tedious to use with no scroll case and 4 quickslots. Not sure about the whole casting from scrolls mechanic. It never was the strongest point of DnD spellcasting system so why copy it in the first place. In Eora magic is channeled through the soul, not from writing on paper, right?
13. Anyone can use Wands, Scepters and Rods for the same effect as a Wizard?
14. Party members run into FF AoE's (and visible traps) like idiots after their targets die.
15. All spells seem to use the same chant

 

 

 

So.. needless to say I'm underwhelmed so far by PoE Wizards.

 

I cleaned your post up so I could better respond 

 

1.  I think this was a lore/design decision. Personally, I wouldn't mind if staves granted more spell casts but less spell choices and added their range bonuses to all non-touch spell ranges. That'd be pretty cool to use the staves as a sort of specialized weapon for specific spells. Example: Grimoires allow for a base 4 casts with 4 spells, why not have staves allow for a base 8 casts with 2 spells in addition to adding their reach bonus to the spells?

 

2. Yeah, coming from other RPGs, this is what really confused me in the beginning. It's not as bad now, but still I find it irritating that there's effectively no easy to distinguish domains/specializations.

 

3. I was never found of some guy carrying a magic book, but that's the lore and that's how it goes 

 

4. Wizard has tons of crowd control and damage, but I get your point that some of the design seems counterintuitive.

 

5. Never had much of a problem since the spells would be active only during combat.

 

6. That's never been a problem for me, I tend to pause a lot during combat and I enjoy doing so.

 

7. Never fully played a classic IE game, can't comment on that. The best I could do was 2 hours and even then, there were a ton of usability issues that turned me off from them a long time ago.

 

8. That's true, some are really small, others are really large, but I think a large amount of variety is good. I never encountered too many problems with "small" AoEs in general.

 

9. That level four teleporting ability is helpful. Other than that, confuse helps out too.

 

10. Absolutely. However, I suspect the spells were made that way to prevent wizards from being godly soloists.

 

12. I always assumed the use of scrolls allowed casters and other classes access to certain spells and therefore, do things they normally couldn't do but at a limited amount.

 

13. That's really puzzling. I think they wanted anyone to be able to wield any weapon and play however they want. Heh, as if that ever works incredibly well in the long run.

 

14. That can be avoided by paying close attention and making sure they don't chase other enemies until spells are done casting.

 

15. From what I've experienced, there are about 2-3 chants for each class. However, hearing the chants can get really irritating and the existence of chants feels very campy/cheesy to me.