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>Why is this being done?
Because the Primary Magic skill was extremely overpowered. It let you kill stuff better, it let you teleport further across the word, it let you do many, totally unrelated things better if you do any of them regularly.
Elemental Lord Opieus, Master Warrior Mage of Elanthia
"For a bunch of radical empiricists, the Philosophers' system relies on a whole lot of faith." ~Armifer
Because the Primary Magic skill was extremely overpowered. It let you kill stuff better, it let you teleport further across the word, it let you do many, totally unrelated things better if you do any of them regularly.
Elemental Lord Opieus, Master Warrior Mage of Elanthia
"For a bunch of radical empiricists, the Philosophers' system relies on a whole lot of faith." ~Armifer
>>Because the Primary Magic skill was extremely overpowered. It let you kill stuff better, it let you teleport further across the word, it let you do many, totally unrelated things better if you do any of them regularly.
Good summary. It was also starting to scale to obscene ranks, and require tons and tons of boring time scripting the same spells over and over again to circle.
I doubt that will go away completely in 3.0, but the simple fact that people will need to rank from 701 to 702 instead of 1401 to 1402 should help some.
Good summary. It was also starting to scale to obscene ranks, and require tons and tons of boring time scripting the same spells over and over again to circle.
I doubt that will go away completely in 3.0, but the simple fact that people will need to rank from 701 to 702 instead of 1401 to 1402 should help some.
>I doubt that will go away completely in 3.0, but the simple fact that people will need to rank from 701 to 702 instead of 1401 to 1402 should help some.
It's faster to go to 701 in 5 skills than to go to 1401 in one, isn't it? Like...insanely faster?
Adding nothing to the conversation since 1834.
It's faster to go to 701 in 5 skills than to go to 1401 in one, isn't it? Like...insanely faster?
Adding nothing to the conversation since 1834.
>>It's faster to go to 701 in 5 skills than to go to 1401 in one, isn't it? Like...insanely faster?
Yes, especially since many (or all) of those skills can be trained simultaneously with relative ease. Old magic was broken though. How do you scale magic to 1750 ranks when you can easily cap every spell in the game with 1200 (if not even less)?
Yes, especially since many (or all) of those skills can be trained simultaneously with relative ease. Old magic was broken though. How do you scale magic to 1750 ranks when you can easily cap every spell in the game with 1200 (if not even less)?
>But 10 skills? It seems really extreme.
As opposed to...?
The skill reach in DR has been defined, basically, as 'does a unique and substantial function or group there of, that are well defined and easily identifiable' (note that's my understanding, and probably a bad one). So..we have warding. It governs warding type actions. Debilitation is debuffing oponents. Target magic? That's gnome-flinging. And so on. And bear in mind, it's not 10 entirely new skills. It's 5 existing skills and 5 new ones. Unless we're talking about different things and I'm making myself look like an idiot again.
Adding nothing to the conversation since 1834.
As opposed to...?
The skill reach in DR has been defined, basically, as 'does a unique and substantial function or group there of, that are well defined and easily identifiable' (note that's my understanding, and probably a bad one). So..we have warding. It governs warding type actions. Debilitation is debuffing oponents. Target magic? That's gnome-flinging. And so on. And bear in mind, it's not 10 entirely new skills. It's 5 existing skills and 5 new ones. Unless we're talking about different things and I'm making myself look like an idiot again.
Adding nothing to the conversation since 1834.
>>That's a good explaination. But 10 skills? It seems really extreme.
Magic used to have PM, Harness, Arcana (MD), TM, and PP. The skills changed combined Harness and PP, split PM effectively into 4 new skills (Aug, Debil, Util, and Ward), and added Sorcery into the mix with totally new functionality. Going from 6 skills to 10 isn't especially dramatic.
Additionally, the new skills fit the overarching concept of the skill merge - Each skill should be broad enough to give it reasonable avenues for development, but not so broad that doing one thing improves your ability to do something utterly unrelated. A good example of this is splitting Mech into the 5 skills. Forging is basically unrelated to carving a bow, and there's no reason being good at one should make you good at the other. In this sense, the new magic skills satisfy this requirement in the context of magic (IE knowing how to cast spells that improve your skills is mostly unrelated to your ability to summon a magnetic ballista).
Additionally, there's a game balance component - The way PM was set up, you could cast EASE until the cows came home, and then turn around and snap off a nasty debuff without having ever debuffed anything. This is the third and more complex aspect of the skill combine - Skills that you can train without risk or consequence shouldn't make you more threatening as an opponent. This is DEFINITELY not a hard and fast rule, but instead an ideal that we want to aim towards. It forces people to do the things they want to be good at in order to be good at them.
Hope that helps!
--
"The ninety and nine are with dreams, content but the hope of the world made new, is the hundredth man who is grimly bent on making those dreams come true." -E.A.P.
Magic used to have PM, Harness, Arcana (MD), TM, and PP. The skills changed combined Harness and PP, split PM effectively into 4 new skills (Aug, Debil, Util, and Ward), and added Sorcery into the mix with totally new functionality. Going from 6 skills to 10 isn't especially dramatic.
Additionally, the new skills fit the overarching concept of the skill merge - Each skill should be broad enough to give it reasonable avenues for development, but not so broad that doing one thing improves your ability to do something utterly unrelated. A good example of this is splitting Mech into the 5 skills. Forging is basically unrelated to carving a bow, and there's no reason being good at one should make you good at the other. In this sense, the new magic skills satisfy this requirement in the context of magic (IE knowing how to cast spells that improve your skills is mostly unrelated to your ability to summon a magnetic ballista).
Additionally, there's a game balance component - The way PM was set up, you could cast EASE until the cows came home, and then turn around and snap off a nasty debuff without having ever debuffed anything. This is the third and more complex aspect of the skill combine - Skills that you can train without risk or consequence shouldn't make you more threatening as an opponent. This is DEFINITELY not a hard and fast rule, but instead an ideal that we want to aim towards. It forces people to do the things they want to be good at in order to be good at them.
Hope that helps!
--
"The ninety and nine are with dreams, content but the hope of the world made new, is the hundredth man who is grimly bent on making those dreams come true." -E.A.P.
>And bear in mind, it's not 10 entirely new skills. It's 5 existing skills and 5 new ones.
Actually it's not even 10 skills. It's 9.
It's 4 old ones (PM, Harness (Is there ANYONE with more PP than Harness?), Arcana, TM)
And 5 new ones (Augmentation, Utility, Warding, Debilitation, Sorcery)
And if you're a magic Prime you get a fancy-schmancy Guild-only skill thrown in. And of those 3, one already exists (Astrology).
Kaeta Airtag
>>Actually an opinion cannot be changed or corrected. Nice try back of line.-VERATHOR
>>But it can be wrong.-Starlear
Actually it's not even 10 skills. It's 9.
It's 4 old ones (PM, Harness (Is there ANYONE with more PP than Harness?), Arcana, TM)
And 5 new ones (Augmentation, Utility, Warding, Debilitation, Sorcery)
And if you're a magic Prime you get a fancy-schmancy Guild-only skill thrown in. And of those 3, one already exists (Astrology).
Kaeta Airtag
>>Actually an opinion cannot be changed or corrected. Nice try back of line.-VERATHOR
>>But it can be wrong.-Starlear
in 2.0, my empaths had more PP than harness. basically due to perceive health. :-)
In all reality though, you guys <GMS> state that you want people to actually have practice in the <new> magic skills to gain the ranks. This is sort of like closing the barn after the horse already left. Because of magical grandfathering, the same people who had thousands of ranks of magic from casting ease in 2.0 will have those new ranks in augmentation, utility, etc with the conversion formulas.
The only way you would really get everything "fresh and new" would be a complete skill wipe across the board.
Of course, if you did that, there would be too many cancelled subscriptions, but lets be honest and call it what it is.
Moving things around. But the "haves" will still be the "haves".
An arisen dummy zombie bellows, "You will all be ssslaughtered!"
>
In all reality though, you guys <GMS> state that you want people to actually have practice in the <new> magic skills to gain the ranks. This is sort of like closing the barn after the horse already left. Because of magical grandfathering, the same people who had thousands of ranks of magic from casting ease in 2.0 will have those new ranks in augmentation, utility, etc with the conversion formulas.
The only way you would really get everything "fresh and new" would be a complete skill wipe across the board.
Of course, if you did that, there would be too many cancelled subscriptions, but lets be honest and call it what it is.
Moving things around. But the "haves" will still be the "haves".
An arisen dummy zombie bellows, "You will all be ssslaughtered!"
>
>the same people who had thousands of ranks of magic from casting ease in 2.0 will have those new ranks
This is very true, but I think like you said the only way would be to wipe everything. At the same time though there have been tons of skills throughout the years and enough changes to others that this would have to happen for to have everything be rectified. There really just isnt any way to fix the disparity thats already happened at this point, but they can move forward in the attempt to gradually balance things out in the long term.
~Tezirite Renzar Lorrani
"Power is merely a stepping stone to more power."
This is very true, but I think like you said the only way would be to wipe everything. At the same time though there have been tons of skills throughout the years and enough changes to others that this would have to happen for to have everything be rectified. There really just isnt any way to fix the disparity thats already happened at this point, but they can move forward in the attempt to gradually balance things out in the long term.
~Tezirite Renzar Lorrani
"Power is merely a stepping stone to more power."
Skill wiping is the ONLY way you can think of balancing this? I am disapoint.
The idea being if you want to be a mage that uses a lot of disablers, then sitting around casting buffs on yourself all day isn't going to make you better at disabling your enemy. I don't know why this is remotely surprising to anyone, given DR is an MMO wherein by in large, you get better at doing x by doing x. If you want to kill a hundred goblins and then allocate lvl points to lockpicking, go play Gemstone.
The idea being if you want to be a mage that uses a lot of disablers, then sitting around casting buffs on yourself all day isn't going to make you better at disabling your enemy. I don't know why this is remotely surprising to anyone, given DR is an MMO wherein by in large, you get better at doing x by doing x. If you want to kill a hundred goblins and then allocate lvl points to lockpicking, go play Gemstone.
With the exception of debilitation, there's nothing keeping someone from moving all the new magic skills at the same time as opposed to 2.0 where you just move PM.
When in doubt, http://elanthipedia.org/
When in doubt, http://elanthipedia.org/
Yeah, an important thing to remember is the 'right-sized skills' principle that we're using now. Each skill should have an easily-encapsulated definition that's neither too narrow for good development nor so broad so as to grant great benefits for minor work.
Along with this is the whole fundamental basis of DR, which is "You get better at doing something by doing it" - If you consider "buffing" and "debuffing" as different 'things', in 2.0 you got better at debuffing by buffing, and vice versa (not to mention the various other things). Finding a right-sized something that you get better at doing when you do it is a difficult and ever-changing thing, but I think the magic split is a good approximation of that size.
--
"The ninety and nine are with dreams, content but the hope of the world made new, is the hundredth man who is grimly bent on making those dreams come true." -E.A.P.
Along with this is the whole fundamental basis of DR, which is "You get better at doing something by doing it" - If you consider "buffing" and "debuffing" as different 'things', in 2.0 you got better at debuffing by buffing, and vice versa (not to mention the various other things). Finding a right-sized something that you get better at doing when you do it is a difficult and ever-changing thing, but I think the magic split is a good approximation of that size.
--
"The ninety and nine are with dreams, content but the hope of the world made new, is the hundredth man who is grimly bent on making those dreams come true." -E.A.P.
