The current, sad, state of casters

[molotov.]

I watched the whole nerdcommando video - almost 4 hours - and the state of the casters - wizards, priests, ciphers and druids - are sad to see.

Wizards: they lack power, for example, the fireball spell, a classic, only does 30 AOE damage and has a penetration of 7 with a caste time of 9 seconds, yes 9 seconds. The solution is simple, more power, 9 seconds for 30 AOE damage? No. How about 50 AOE damage? Well... or they can have a fast cast time, but that would affect the entire balance of the game.

Priests: surprisingly they lack spell options, this wasn't a problem in PoE 1, I really don't know what happened.

Ciphers: they need to do damage to gain focus and then wait 9 seconds to cast something that will last 15 seconds... it's just better to make a dual class and use that amazing passive of 40% damage bonus.

Druids: they are the best casters in the moment, well... that is not saying much, they are only good because their heals and buffs are fast enough, in this way they can actually do more stuff in the middle of combat, but their caster damage dealer is horrendous, the game don't even have a subclass for that.

I didn't mention the Chanters because they are, imo, one of the best classes right now, their subclasses, beckoner - 4 ogres - and the Skald are amazing.

I'm not a big fan of casters - I even have a topic defending the fighters -, but hey... It will be impossible to use Aloth if the wizard class is that bad.

Any ideas on how to remedy the situation?

[dragubaba]

I like the idea of wizards having to really conjure their spells with time. But yeah, you need to make that worthwhile by making those spells hurt.

Edited November 28, 2017 by dragubaba

[Skaddix]

I am all for more casting time but we might as well go back to Per Rest if it takes 9 seconds to do 30 damage with crap penetration that essentially means its basically be doing no damage. Wizards and Ciphers got taken to the woodshed.

[dunehunter]

I agree caster should have long cast time, but why they have long recovery time too? I assume a warrior will need a break after sword swing, but casters are just chanting magic spells and they don't need to recover after casting.

 

I assume in previous game the caster has faster cast time so for balance concern they also have same recovery time as warriors, but in POE 2 they are downtuned to have longer casting time, then this old recovery mechanism need to be updated too.

Edited November 28, 2017 by dunehunter

[Gromnir]

deadfire does have long casting times, which is glacial by poe standards. from our pov, the casting times extension is a fine balancing effort by obsidian in spite o' the understandable lack o' popularity.  why take thrust of tattered veils?  was a throwaway spell in poe, but in deadfire the high penetration and fast cast make it useful for interrupts... and interrupts is obvious much more useful 'cause o' the casting times.

 

penetration. is not a caster-specific issue, but it affects casters disproportionate. the new penetration scheme, if working as intended, is o' questionable merit.  offensive casters is handicapped by the need to overcome foes with armour which typical exceeds penetration.  the means for a caster to overcome penetration is not only inherent limited, but the more anemic spell catalogs means a caster is even less likely to have situation useful spells.  to be an effective caster, every spell must needs either be high penetration or penetration irrelevant.  functional choice is reduced considerable, which don't jibe with the goals espoused by the developers.

 

priests do have paltry spell lists, but this issue is being addressed. however, priests are affliction killers...which is poor understood at the moment. afflictions alone would make 'em must-haves in any Gromnir party.  priests is predictable dependable healers, with the new unified health system makes more significant rather than less. dire blessing, a single spell, is actual the most important force multiplier in the game at the moment. dire blessing returns grazes to the party which is meh for weapon users, but is a huge difference for cc/debuff casters. 

 

ciphers do have long cast times, but their main issue is, as is most classes, linked inextricable to penetration. can build focus quick even as a vanilla cipher if you take the right weapon and the cipher-specific penetration talents. don't take the right talents and weapon? screwed.

 

druids have numerous high penetration spell options and their heals may current be better than priests. no need to fix'em. 

 

chanters are actual op. we hate poe chanters, but at the moment, playing without a chanter is self-gimpage.  a skald with a spear is gonna be drowning in invocation opportunities, and the armour debuff and paralysis invocations are needing nerfs... or at least they is additional evidence as to how borked the penetration mechanic is. the chants, given the casting time issue noted already facing other support classes, is also comparative more significant in deadfire than poe.

 

so, priests need tlc, which they is getting, but the remaining caster issues identified is a result o' wonky penetration.

 

HA! Good Fun!

Edited November 28, 2017 by Gromnir

[molotov.]

deadfire does have long casting times, which is glacial by poe standards. from our pov, the casting times extension is a fine balancing effort by obsidian in spite o' the understandable lack o' popularity.  why take thrust of tattered veils?  was a throwaway spell in poe, but in deadfire the high penetration and fast cast make it useful for interrupts... and interrupts is obvious much more useful 'cause o' the casting times.

 

penetration. is not a caster-specific issue, but it affects casters disproportionate. the new penetration scheme, if working as intended, is o' questionable merit.  offensive casters is handicapped by the need to overcome foes with armour which typical exceeds penetration.  the means for a caster to overcome penetration is not only inherent limited, but the more anemic spell catalogs means a caster is even less likely to have situation useful spells.  to be an effective caster, every spell must needs either be high penetration or penetration irrelevant.  functional choice is reduced considerable, which don't jibe with the goals espoused by the developers.

 

priests do have paltry spell lists, but this issue is being addressed. however, priests are affliction killers...which is poor understood at the moment. afflictions alone would make 'em must-haves in any Gromnir party.  priests is predictable dependable healers, with the new unified health system makes more significant rather than less. dire blessing, a single spell, is actual the most important force multiplier in the game at the moment. dire blessing returns grazes to the party which is meh for weapon users, but is a huge difference for cc/debuff casters. 

 

ciphers do have long cast times, but their main issue is, as is most classes, linked inextricable to penetration. can build focus quick even as a vanilla cipher if you take the right weapon and the cipher-specific penetration talents. don't take the right talents and weapon? screwed.

 

druids have numerous high penetration spell options and their heals may current be better than priests. no need to fix'em. 

 

chanters are actual op. we hate poe chanters, but at the moment, playing without a chanter is self-gimpage.  a skald with a spear is gonna be drowning in invocation opportunities, and the armour debuff and paralysis invocations are needing nerfs... or at least they is additional evidence as to how borked the penetration mechanic is. the chants, given the casting time issue noted already facing other support classes, is also comparative more significant in deadfire than poe.

 

so, priests need tlc, which they is getting, but the remaining caster issues identified is a result o' wonky penetration.

 

HA! Good Fun!

Precisely my dear Gromnir, penetration is the main issue in here. It's complicated, with the new system, armour is actually important and I really like this aspect, but it's killing one of my favourite characters, maybe putting some more penetration in the spells?

[cheesevillain]

In the next update, they're tuning down penetration, giving more spells to priests (and druids, iirc).

Hopefully they'll crank up the damage for spells a little more.

 

Are these the fixes you're looking for, or would you want something more than this?

[KDubya]

What if you adjusted the elemental armor values for all armors and for the creatures?

 

In PoE it made sense to have armor affect everything as it was just a DR to be overcome with damage, Now that is not the case.

 

Why does wearing metal armor help at all against lightning damage? Or protect against fire as well as it does against a sword which is what it was designed to work against?

 

If they can go through and re-adjust the elemental armor values that'll help with the penetration issues. Maybe add elemental penetration passives to casters as abilities or as part of certain Grimoires?

 

EDIT ADD - you could have metal armor work better against weapons but not as well against spells, while light armors (non-metallic) like hide could be better against elemental damage and worse against weapons.

Edited November 29, 2017 by KDubya

[ArcZero]

The big issue to me is not being able to reselect your target after casting a spell. In PoE1, you often could select the spell again and reposition it several times before the casting time finished. In deadfire, the spells are immediately locked out and so much as budging an inch wastes the spell slot. This combination is just too punishing when a spell like fireball has a 6-second cast time and friendly fire.

[Lamppost in Winter]

The big issue to me is not being able to reselect your target after casting a spell. In PoE1, you often could select the spell again and reposition it several times before the casting time finished. In deadfire, the spells are immediately locked out and so much as budging an inch wastes the spell slot. This combination is just too punishing when a spell like fireball has a 6-second cast time and friendly fire.

 

You can shift a single-target spell much the same as the AoE retargeting. But I agree that it's quite annoying when you end up having to cancel your spell or reposition your character that you just lose the spell.

[cheesevillain]

Josh on the Nov 30 twitch stream said they were reducing the casting times of some spells for the next beta.

[rjshae]

Why does wearing metal armor help at all against lightning damage?

 

Mmm... ever hear of a Faraday cage?

[Yosharian]

The big issue to me is not being able to reselect your target after casting a spell. In PoE1, you often could select the spell again and reposition it several times before the casting time finished. In deadfire, the spells are immediately locked out and so much as budging an inch wastes the spell slot. This combination is just too punishing when a spell like fireball has a 6-second cast time and friendly fire.

I thought you could move around and retarget spells during their casting time in Deadfire?

[Gromnir]

 

Why does wearing metal armor help at all against lightning damage?

 

Mmm... ever hear of a Faraday cage?

 

which would only be helpful in the case o' full-plate armour under limited conditions.  

 

no helmet = screwed

flesh makes contact with armour = screwed

 

scale, chain, brigandine, breastplate, etc is offering zero electricity protection, and you better make certain your padding under the plate isn't wet or soaked with sweat or... whatever.

 

'course deadfire is a game, so reality has very little to do with the question.  best not to start down the teh rehul path or everything 'bout deadfire will unravel.

 

gonna wait to see how the changes to penetration affect the game before we make recommendations for change.  particular with the limited spell catalogs available to casters in deadfire (although wizard grimoires would appear to be a possible significant end-around to such limits) the limited elemental vulnerabilities o' critters and armours is gonna be resulting in a few peculiarities resulting from metagaming/knowledge.

 

as an aside, have always said elemental spells is lazy design, but will address later when we have more time.

 

HA! Good Fun!