Suggested Change to Vancian Casters

[JerekKruger]

Well, they have a point. Like I didn't even bother to use most priest spells in PoE until my third or fourth playthrough because you got so many new ones at each level up that you just ignored them mostly.

Oh I know, I was the same, but I'm not really sure how the change improves that.

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

I think the idea is that by introducing abilities one at a time, people can learn the abilities more gradually, and also you can make each individual ability better and more interesting. Gives players more time to learn the system. 

 

In terms of "helping players master the system" I think it's probably a smart change but it leads to some balance issues, as above. 

Edited December 6, 2017 by Dr. Hieronymous Alloy

[JerekKruger]

But if players weren't willing to read through all their new spells on levelling up in Pillars, are they really going to read through their options upon levelling in Deadfire? My guess would be no.

 

By the way, I was replying on my phone earlier so didn't respond to your suggestion of giving more low level spells at higher levels. I think that would be an improvement but it would still presumably leave lots of higher level spells unavailable and it would be a bit messy to implement from a UI point of view.

[lonelornfr]

I just got the beta and i tried it for like an hour, so i'm by no means an expert on the new system, but i must say i was really disappointed in how spellcasters work this time around. I really like flexibility in a caster and they lost that somewhat in PoE 2. Also i seemed to notice status effect having much less effect than in PoE 1, like blind only reduce your deflection by 3 ?

 

I could be wrong, but i dont think the people that played and enjoyed the original game, and are eagerly awaiting Deadfire were somehow hoping that it's sequel would be an oversimplified version in which each character use the same 3-4 powers every encounter ad nauseum.

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

Blinded is still fairly effective (perception and accuracy penalty, longer recovery, shorter range) but Paralyze is a lot less effective than it was, yeah.

 

I think we can assume that the spells all currently have placeholder values for cast time / duration / effect etc.

 

I agree that casters need a wider power selection but I suspect that will get tweaked too.

[zealotstim]

Yeah I would really like more spells for lower level spells. Casters just feel so weak rn, particularly with things like missiles being resisted to hell due to not penetrating armor. Really need more casts to be worth it.

[KDubya]

The old system from PoE at least gave you the option of not abusing rest and marshalling your spell use such that you'd save the good ones for when you felt like you needed them. It suffered from the typical 'rest abuse' that every RPG with Vancians suffer from but at least you could self regulate.

 

Now with per encounter and limited per level its a whole different vibe. In the Beta I've taken to console leveling up to max level, nine and having the game scale the encounters to try out higher level abilities. At level nine a pure Wizard gets nine spell casts per encounter, two at each level one to four and one at five. In a typical encounter you will probably kill everything before you run out of spells, at higher levels that will be even worse.

 

Instead of this bastardized Vancian per encounter system, why not just go to a recharging mana system and be done with it?

 

At high levels you will have so many spells that'll just be the same thing over and over - 

• From stealth initiate combat with either biggest nuke or best CC
• Self buff with instant cast Infuse then Fleet Feet, and then Liengrath's displaced image, maybe an ironskin as well
• cast next most powerful nuke or CC until either enemies are dead or you run out of spells repeat as needed

It'll be like PoE playing a Vancian as a rest abuser but with only half the casts per level.

[Wormerine]

A mana based system (which is essentially what OP suggests) is fine and I would have no issue if Obsidian would go with it. The current system though actually works pretty well. I do enjoy that I have to make a choice of which spells i want to cast. If you want to cast Moore spells from the same pool you can do that with empower system. I think it’s works fine and has its advantages.i would rather prefer if Obsidian would focus on polishing a solid base they have built so far till release, rather than reinvent the wheel at this point. Also, it gives wizards/druids/priest mechanic different that ciphers & chanters.

[tinysalamander]

If you want to cast Moore spells from the same pool you can do that with empower system.

 

I’m not sure there is an empower option to double spell power every 24 seconds

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

 

 

Now with per encounter and limited per level its a whole different vibe. In the Beta I've taken to console leveling up to max level, nine and having the game scale the encounters to try out higher level abilities. At level nine a pure Wizard gets nine spell casts per encounter, two at each level one to four and one at five. In a typical encounter you will probably kill everything before you run out of spells, at higher levels that will be even worse.

 

I

 

 

Is level scaling actually implemented? I thought about this but wasn't sure it was implemented to the point where I could accept the results as reliable. 

 

I kinda feel like spell balance is so messed up right now that it's functionally impossible to test it until they do a balancing pass on durations and effects and casting times. One reason I've been posting more than playing

[Quillon]

It also seems odd from a lore perspective that a highly powerful Wizard can't choose to cast their lowest level spells more than twice.

Won't the low level spells get more powerful with power levels indefinitely and won't truly stay as "low level spells"?

[demeisen]

​

Apparently from what Josh has said on SA, the problem is that if you give players a big pile of spells on levelup, it's too much for most people to process and most spells end up never used or ignored.

 

While I realize why Josh's argument might be a valid goal from one POV, ​I'm not a fan of that line of reasoning.  Much of the magic of POE1 for me (and I think many others too) was that it didn't go down that "most people" mass-market road.  It was faithful to the often complex spirit of classic RPGs, while legitimately improving UI clunkiness and dynamics that legit needed improving.  What the above argument classifies as "too much for most people to process", others see as the very core appeal of the class, bringing interest, situational flexibility from a large spell catalog (even if only partially available at any given time - another level of interest), and satisfying mechanics differences relative to other classes.  It had a different vibe to it that's being eroded now.

​

​I'm not too happy with the new direction.  It admittedly seems consistent with Josh's argument above.  I just don't feel like it's an improvement, and it significantly alters the feel of the Vancian-ish classes in a way that gives me too much of an "action RPG" vibe.

​

[Erik-Dirk]

 

Apparently from what Josh has said on SA, the problem is that if you give players a big pile of spells on levelup, it's too much for most people to process and most spells end up never used or ignored. 

I think the idea is that by introducing abilities one at a time, people can learn the abilities more gradually, and also you can make each individual ability better and more interesting. Gives players more time to learn the system. 

 

In terms of "helping players master the system" I think it's probably a smart change but it leads to some balance issues, as above. 

As one of the players who were totally baffled by all the priest spells in POE1 I have to say this seems like a really terrible solution. If players have to spend points at level up to buy new spells then doesn't this provide a further barrier to understand the potential of different spells? Especially if a we have other passive options available instead of trying different spells.

What's was wrong with the cipher system? where we had to choose a spell or two at level up. And received separate points to spend on other abilities.  It's still a gradual learning curve, locks out some spells, but allowed a casual gamer to easily explore different strategies.

This solution won't overly impact the serious gamers who'll take the time to carefully plan spell progressions and explore during multiple playthroughs or the very casual gamer who never tried the other spells in POE1. However will likely result in a larger negative experience for the semi serious gamers.

Edited December 21, 2017 by Erik-Dirk

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

Iv'e been thinking about this and I think the answer is to change the "casts per level" advancement path so that instead of 2/2/2/2/2 etc it moves in a tree, i.e., at 20th level you have 5 level one and level 2 casts, 4 level 3 and 4 casts, 3 level 5 and 6 casts, 2 level 7 and 8 casts, and 1 level 9 cast. That is, five casts that are either level 1 or level 2 powers, four casts that are either level 3 or 4, etc., for a total of 15 casts in any single fight, only one of which can be a top-level power. 

 

Set up the progression in a tree so that you've always got more low level casts and your top level casts are always a scarce once-per-fight resource. 

 

Reason being, right now top level vancian casters can simply flood the map with powers -- a level 20 wizard has 40 spell casts to play with per fight; they're functionally post-scarcity. 

 

Note that casts per level is a different thing from powers per level etc.

Edited December 21, 2017 by Dr. Hieronymous Alloy