Magickers and Nil Reach.

[Bogre]

If I have to risk my character's life just so that I can branch "cast silk underwear" from my first-tier "cast give-victim-a-booboo" then I'm gonna risk it on a PC, and try for some actual interaction.

I'm pretty sure this lasts for 1-2 of awesome mage concepts getting slammed by even newish mundanes before you start figuring out ways to get powerful before messing with PCs.

I definitely wouldn't go pick a fight with some random person in the wastes with an unskilled mage. Just like I wouldn't attack them with a half day warrior to practice disarm. The idea of burning a concept on 'practicing spells' on PCs is pretty unpalatable to me. Plus, that supposes that your characters are sociopathic, suicidal, or a combination, and most mage characters -aren't- in fact evil overlords. I mean, some of my mage concepts were little better than warped near-humanoids chained to their element, but even they weren't running around looking for a PC to start casting on.

I really think changing nil, by all that's been said, is rife with unintended consequences. Limiting it to een or pav or something sounds like it could work, but then your just present yourself with: mages needing to cast spells at -high- power to gain and suddenly pav fireballs everywhere.

And I wouldn't be naive to think that players are going to be so restrictive of themselves to never cast a combat spell if they are a peaceful person. I mean - what if you have something you want down that magickal path that is fitting for your character? I think the majority of people are going to find a way to use it / practice it, just like they find creative ways to use other skills as mundanes to practice. I mean, it sounds -cool-. Oh, you're a peaceful mage? You don't know how to shoot a fireball. That's legit. But many players are going to use it, just like they will find stilt lizards / other ways to advance.

My mages for the most part do not use nil to train up. When I'm playing a mage, I try to cast things that make sense. Now - I definitely will try to find situations in which they are used, but using nil is not anathema .  I dislike sitting in a room and casting 'x nil dumbly dumb' me. It just feels like a labor, a twinkish one at that, and hard to explain ICly.  But I've only ever branched two mages, and only PK'd with one, so I'm not the levelling authority here. I tend to use nil in some situations as like, my mage 'holding back,' or summoning a force and then releasing it. I've had some cool emotes, thinks and feels from using the nil reach. There are some spells in which practicing quietly nil is just better. As in the previous mention, who wants to run into 50 instances of X magickal thing because some new witch needed practice?

[Kryos]

Something of interest to me here would be comparing the vote results at this time(38 10 4 4 7)to post results.  Without checking, as I am too lazy to do it, I would suspect a vocal minority as I've observed in a few other threads.  But, that's just a guess.  Also the noise factor that might create.

P.S.  My vote is yes.  Because if you can't trust someone to use nil reach reasonably, why do they have mage karma?

Edit:  Here's a tally from the first page.  Not attributing who to what and so on, as it is not meant to be defamation.  Just a quick summary trying to be unbiased as could be.

Posts

Yes: 5

No: 3

Gemmed: 1

Branch it: 2

Redundant or off topic Posts:  9

[Chettaman]

My argument was going to be for taking nil away - but then Kryos blew my mind with the freedom to choose.
We should keep 'nil'.

I would agree that "nil" should give less experienced gained or something. Or maybe they should both be different skills perhaps. Nil and un. ... or maybe they are...?

[Armaddict]

Half jesting:

Nil should have a random chance of not-nilling.

"You accidentally blast yourself in the face!"
"You cast that high duration spell you can't remove.  *Nelson laugh*"

[lostinspace]

I think removing nil might be a solution, but only as part of their effort to redo the guild skill trees. If Mages lose nil then I believe they should certainly start with more than a handful of their spells available.

[RogueGunslinger]

I think removing nil might be a solution, but only as part of their effort to redo the guild skill trees. If Mages lose nil then I believe they should certainly start with more than a handful of their spells available.

This is a very interesting idea. Some magickers have very guild-defining spells they don't get until 1-2 levels down the branch tree. Starting with them for survivability and utility would be cool.

[frankjacoby]

Removing nil will make it so that magickers have to go out "into the world" more often to "level their spells", if I understand it correctly.

It should in theory add more danger, and thus more meaning/more feelings of accomplishment to the player, to becoming a powerful magicker.

Again, as I pointed out, let's stop those house guards from sparring then, noone managed to address that since I posed it.  Force the house guards to go out there to fight for real, no sparring, I guarantee noone wants to sign up for that, or even the Byn, no practicing rescue in safety in the compound or any weapon training.

[BadSkeelz]

I addressed it.

[Is Friday]

I read somewhere in this thread that Is Friday has great fucking ideas.

[lostinspace]

Removing nil will make it so that magickers have to go out "into the world" more often to "level their spells", if I understand it correctly.

It should in theory add more danger, and thus more meaning/more feelings of accomplishment to the player, to becoming a powerful magicker.

Again, as I pointed out, let's stop those house guards from sparring then, noone managed to address that since I posed it.  Force the house guards to go out there to fight for real, no sparring, I guarantee noone wants to sign up for that, or even the Byn, no practicing rescue in safety in the compound or any weapon training.

Sparring is still very dangerous, characters die in training accidents all the time, but I've never heard of a mage in a temple dying while casting at nil. As it is now I don't want nil to be removed, I find it to be a very important tool for early game gicks, especially up until the point they branch their 'oh shit' spells and can leave the their lairs/temple safely. If nil is removed, I feel that something else will need to change. Above I recommended having the witches start without nil but with more spells immediately available, broadening and shortening their skill tree.

What if mages didn't learn nil, but instead when they mastered un learned a random reach, or a reach based on their class? I'm not even sure what they are, but I heard there are a few of them floating around out there.

[Molten Heart]

One thing that might help is if the un reach started at novice skill level and allowed for learning "real" magick.

[Jingo]

Sparring is still very dangerous, characters die in training accidents all the time

This is something that shouldn't even be half as common as it is in the game.

[hyzhenhok]

Sparring is still very dangerous, characters die in training accidents all the time

This is something that shouldn't even be half as common as it is in the game.

It's not common. It basically doesn't happen unless someone makes a dumb or OOC mistake: disconnections, mercy off, sparred with a half-giant, tried to train outside the sparring hall, etc. KOs happen fairly often, but deaths? No.

Saying magicker training should be dangerous because sparring is dangerous is ludicrous. Sparring is not "very dangerous."

[The Silence of the Erdlus]

I remember Silteye not being aware of his own strength and almost two hit KOing my unmanifested witch once during sparring. Luckily he didn't land the second hit. He did end up killing Metekillot though.

Nil reach is kind of stupid but I can't think of any bandage or solution. I did think of maybe adding an interesting for-show effect to some spells but that's like the casting echo effect, completely ignored by the player and the gameworld. If you're a rogue rukkian in an apartment in Storm, are you going to freak out when your first spell 'makes the ground shake' after paying 1000 for a game month of rent? No. No one's going to notice and knock on the door with guards. It also stifles creativity, what little creativity people are inspired to produce when they're sitting there casting.

[The Silence of the Erdlus]

What if nil reach had a 2% chance of having some form of coded penalty every time you cast?

What would the penalty be? A steep drop in one of the four stats? An inability to leave the coded room for a game hour? Both, at random?

[Jihelu]

I really dont get the hate for nil reach and I've read most of y'alls posts.

It's a way for magickers to train up skills.
It's the sparring weapons of magick.
I could see, maybe, having it have to have a valid target even though its nil.
IE:
Cast nill fireball, but have to cast it at someone.
So you still need a target...like a dummy or something, but you dont actually fireball the thing.

But just removing it is meh.

[evilcabbage]

maybe nil can branch first and second tier spells, but no longer helps to branch higher tier magicks?

sounds like a cabbage plan to me.

[Warsong]

I really dont get the hate for nil reach and I've read most of y'alls posts.

It's a way for magickers to train up skills.
It's the sparring weapons of magick.

You can't max out a warrior from sparring for two weeks. The difference in progression between magick and mundane characters is so insanely vast that it's frankly silly. Mundane fighters improve so slowly that people are afraid to take risks because they're losing so much work if their character dies, and magickers improve so fast that it's more compelling to be reckless and trigger-happy as you can get back to where you were in a short enough time that it doesn't feel daunting.

It just feels intuitively wrong that it's mages who have that privilege while warriors have to be ultra-careful and meticulously plan their power growth so as to not get in trouble and lose it all. It fells kind of... completely backwards. Nil seems like the thing that causes this problem, at least on the magick side of the equation.

[Jihelu]

You could just make nil SUPER slow in learning spells and keep progression the same.
IE:
Lets say it takes two weeks, prob less, to level a magicker using nil.
Make it take 8-10-20-30-however high you want it to go.
But keep un the same

[Rokal]

What if nil reach had a 2% chance of having some form of coded penalty every time you cast?

What would the penalty be? A steep drop in one of the four stats? An inability to leave the coded room for a game hour? Both, at random?

I don't really think this is a good soloution.

The point of the ideas behind removing the nil reach is to stop them from being cooped up somewhere still, a mega stat loss or inability to leave the room kind of adds on to that. People use Nil to avoid having to wait to head out and Rp/adventure/ect.

[Jingo]

Sparring is still very dangerous, characters die in training accidents all the time

This is something that shouldn't even be half as common as it is in the game.

It's not common. It basically doesn't happen unless someone makes a dumb or OOC mistake: disconnections, mercy off, sparred with a half-giant, tried to train outside the sparring hall, etc. KOs happen fairly often, but deaths? No.

Saying magicker training should be dangerous because sparring is dangerous is ludicrous. Sparring is not "very dangerous."

No it's not common. But it's common if the only person in you clan to spar is a 100 day warrior. And you aren't a 100 day warrior.

And then that 100 day warrior lags out after he bashes you.

It has happened to me. It's another broken system.

[Inks]

It's common enough to be a concern when you spar others.

[Kryos]

I don't see a reason to push discussion on changing up nil reach when there's basically a 2 to 1 in favor of keeping it, against all other options.  Opinion of the unspoken seems clear.

[Jingo]

Funnily enough, I misread the question and voted no.

[Asmoth]

On the subject of maxing magickers in two weeks, I have never done that, because I feel that it would be super twink spam casting mode to do it, but even if I had freedom to twink, that still doesn't make a magicker invincible.

I've been killed on well branched magickers with tons of days by random wildlife because most magickers don't train up combat.  So yes can a magicker kill you in one spell, sure.  But most times a Bynner can just bash them and cut them to death before they can cast a spell.

So they are totally glass cannons.  Removing Nil would make them need to go out and cast fireballs at critters and people over and over, which I don't think I'd like.  Is nil perfect? Nope but removing it would break the development of many magick guilds.