Current state of elementalists

[Krath]

If you have a concept that relies on a specific combination of spells or skills, for whatever reason, you could always open a request with staff and ask for assistance in picking a guild and subguild that fits.

I trust you Delirium, but I want to know from staff:

If I send a request and say I want to player a magicks subguild with "Fireball", which ones get it so I don't waste my karma, will you tell me which options available to me have the spell(s)?

[Eyeball]

you can pick a heavy combat and get magick on top of it, you can become an unstoppable killing machine with the right combinations if that is your goal.

While magick can certainly enhance a combat character, the days of the unstoppable killing machine are over. My sense is that parry and shield use have been nerfed somehow. Even someone with a fairly modest weapon skill can put hits on a master. The master will prevail one-on-one but not come out unscathed. If you bring a couple of buddies, the master will be hard put to overcome you all.

[Veselka]

I mean, as it should be?

I don't need some unstable, unstoppable 1 PC killing machine to make stories or end them. If a gang of peeps get the drop on you, shots fired.

[Eyeball]

I mean, as it should be?

I don't need some unstable, unstoppable 1 PC killing machine to make stories or end them. If a gang of peeps get the drop on you, shots fired.

Who makes the story then? Who makes a name for himself or herself? Are you going to be remembered if you're just part of a mob? Do you need to be a sponsored role to leave any memory or legacy in Zalanthas now?

[Veselka]

I mean, as it should be?

I don't need some unstable, unstoppable 1 PC killing machine to make stories or end them. If a gang of peeps get the drop on you, shots fired.

Who makes the story then? Who makes a name for himself or herself? Are you going to be remembered if you're just part of a mob? Do you need to be a sponsored role to leave any memory or legacy in Zalanthas now?

I mean, no? Look at past achievements of previous PCs. Some were sponsored roles, many were Templars, some were GMH sponsored roles, some were Independents who made a name for themselves and defied the odds. PC killing machines like Quick are remembered, perhaps rightly so, with trepidation. When you put the power of life and death into the hands of one or two PCs, yeah, shit gets kind of subjective. I don't mind Whiran or Rukkian #102 who's pretty max'd out and stirs shit up, but at the same time, the plot cycle gets old over time.

I don't mind underpowered vs overpowered, or us vs them, or the weak vs the powerful as a trope. But I see at least movement towards it not being 100% stoppable vs %100 unstoppable.

[Eyeball]

I mean, no? Look at past achievements of previous PCs. Some were sponsored roles, many were Templars, some were GMH sponsored roles, some were Independents who made a name for themselves and defied the odds. PC killing machines like Quick are remembered, perhaps rightly so, with trepidation.

No, but then you give an example of someone who made a name for himself with combat prowess by the old system.  I don't see how there will be another Quick.

EDIT: Maybe the heavy combat classes should be renamed "City Pawn', "Outdoors Pawn" and "Criminal Pawn".

[Veselka]

No, I gave an example of a PC (Elkrosian Elf) who was killed dead, and then offered a chance of making a new PC (Nilazi Vampire Race Elf) who then became a weird crazy monster Nilazi creature...

Obviously, the game is changing, and I'm glad that it isn't Staff Pets who are the ones in power. The system seems more fair to me, which I appreciate.

I also wouldn't mind at all if the class names resembled Izdari pieces. I think that would actually be pretty tight.

[Eyeball]

I'm sort of disappointed to see the ability to be a hero squelched. Read any novel and the main character stands out in ability. Who wants to read the story of someone who guarded a gate for a while and then died when a Templar led his squad out to fight spiders or something. Maybe the Templar himself would make a worthy story (i.e. the sponsored role again), but that's it.

EDIT: what does the commoner player even have left? Not strength of arms, not riches, not the ability to write a book for posterity, not the ability to become a great sailor and find a lush new land, nothing. They literally exist now to just survive, unnoticed, or be a clan pawn and die or store, forgotten. What commoner names stand out from the past several years of play? The single one I can think of is Koman Locke. Maybe Ruke. Both from sheer longevity, not from any magnificent deed (that became generally known at least), though. Alright, Albie too. Maybe it's not as bad as I initially thought.

[Hauwke]

Except, you very much can achieve near unstoppable levels in combat. You just need to pick heavy combat and grind your defense up, the problem is that heavy combat doesn't offer much else aside fighting, so they aren't chosen.

At least give it a decent amount of time since the change over for people to get to the same level OF Armali or what have you. A legacy warrior is 100% weaker at 10 days played than a Fighter is at 10 days played, regardless of the use of hack or riposte.

Armor was also changed recently, most things that are frequently used seemed to offer lesser protection to what they used to since most folks went for the highest price, lightest weight item. Now if they want protection they need weight.

Near everything has been changed, but you absolutely can still be a major powerhouse against a half dozen gith or players if you take the time to get to that level.

[Lizzie]

I think the gist of what a lot of people (including myself) are talking about, are the epic legendary legends, myths, stories, surrounding the idea of mages doing epic, legendary, mythological things, that the *players* can reach for, and look back on and say "wow do you remember when this happened? That was insane!"

Knowing that these world-changing things happened, and you were THERE to either see it, participate in it, or cause it, is what has kept so many veterans interested in the game.

But knowing that these types of things can no longer happen (A Quick, a White Rantarri, a Gin, a Sargax, an Anthinius Oash, for example) - makes the "goalposts" a bit short and vanilla.

We don't all want to BE that big legendary thing. But we do all want to have experienced the plotlines that involved it. Even if the experience was as a non-participatory witness.

The fireworks and huge displays and mass deaths and world-wide bounties on "the big bad scary enemy that is a living demonstration of WHY this is a post-apocalyptic world" is what some of us play for, and still hope to experience.

[Lizzie]

you can pick a heavy combat and get magick on top of it, you can become an unstoppable killing machine with the right combinations if that is your goal.

While magick can certainly enhance a combat character, the days of the unstoppable killing machine are over. My sense is that parry and shield use have been nerfed somehow. Even someone with a fairly modest weapon skill can put hits on a master. The master will prevail one-on-one but not come out unscathed. If you bring a couple of buddies, the master will be hard put to overcome you all.

1. They are only unstoppable when no one tries to stop them on their way up the power-ladder.
2. #1 isn't even actually true. ALL PCs have weaknesses that can be exploited. It's just that some folks with the greatest ability to do so, choose not to do so.
3. Most of the world-changing legendary characters of the past didn't become that way by PKing their way to fame and fortune. They became that way by manipulating their interactions with others - by their PLAYERS being clever enough to pull it off with their characters. The ones who add nothing to the game other than "how powerful can I be when I PK this guy" don't last long, contribute nothing of substance, and are generally forgotten.

[Brokkr]

And the conundrum.  To get remembered for crazy stuff involving magick, you are probably going to have to be in opposition to the established order.  To get remembered generally, you are going to have to smooze within the established order.

I think it is more fair to let players figure out ways to have existing magick be crazy and cool with the ideas they come up with on how to use it, than it is to hand out code that isn't available to everyone in order to make it seem crazy and cool in some instances.

[Kryos]

Going no filter on this one.  I don't do personal attacks, its not my style, but I do bring the heat.  If the hateorade gets too intense, the last part is a thumbs up.

And the conundrum.  To get remembered for crazy stuff involving magick, you are probably going to have to be in opposition to the established order.  To get remembered generally, you are going to have to smooze within the established order.

I think it is more fair to let players figure out ways to have existing magick be crazy and cool with the ideas they come up with on how to use it, than it is to hand out code that isn't available to everyone in order to make it seem crazy and cool in some instances.

Almost all the mythical characters of the past had special things done for them/to them that were not available to others.  Be it near carte blanche from their staff to do as they please while others were kept under a boot of 'no' or quite literally coded powers in some form or another given to them and not others.  Some times both.

Am I jealous:  yes.  Is it a bad thing it happened:  no.

I would like to see it continue to happen, so long as the love is spread and not condensed.  And borrowing wisdom from a friend here:  the best target/most frequent should be new players.  Not 100%, but you get the idea.

Using Jung's observational method and occum's razor one should conclude: what is, is not good enough.  This is why people want more and act in ways to try and get it.  And why, at its core, is that this is fun for nearly all types of players.

So stone walling around this weird position of not wanting to just makes the game less fun for everyone.

As for the original post:

I only have so much play time/variance on what I've done magick wise with the new mage esc.  But I can read, and I can deduce and use previous experience as well as what I've garnered to make a pretty solid statement.  The state of magick users as I see it:  bad.   But maybe not so much for some of the reasons being stated earlier.

The state of Classes and their specifically aenemic varieties that DEMAND a sub guild to be played, and feel limp without a ESC do not share a holistic design with the mage sub guilds.  In my opinion there's still some bad lays on the ESC and classes themselves, too.  And not just from a lack of things, some times the scarcity in classes has bolstered already 'bad' behaviors to even greater heights making them basically untouchable.  There's a magick subclass or two that suffers from this effect.  It needs work.  As far as I can tell, as soon as people figure one of the few of these out, there's a massive gout of their existence in the game.  Its fucking stupid.

I don't think Karma was solved right.  I don't think spend/regain of all karma solves the problem that just bores me to tears or makes me sigh every time I see it.  Nor does it leave most of the players I've talked to about it happy in the slightest (and this is always #1).  You can still more or less just repeat the 'same' character in the same position over and over and over.   

I'd be happier of lock outs were based on the karma options you pulled.  If you roll a HG with a ESG of slipknife, then WHEN YOUR CHARACTER DIES HG and Slipknife should get a 90 day lockout.  Nothing else.  I think a lot of others would happier with this too.  And as a random shot in the dark since I don't know if its true or not but just to be thorough:  this needs to apply to staff accounts for their pcs too.

[/hateorade]

I'll finish with a no filter positive side.

The direction things are moving is quite good.  The changes over the last few years and the more open and proactive stances of staff is a great thing.  Arm is a better game now then it was 10 years ago where it felt like a near dumpster fire at times, 5 years ago, or even a year ago.  But the train needs to keep rolling.  It is not done and the reins need to loosen more.

[Brytta Léofa]

The state of Classes and their specifically aenemic varieties that DEMAND a sub guild to be played, and feel limp without a ESC do not share a holistic design with the mage sub guilds.

This confused me for a sec because the new classes I've played were super functional, but I think you're referring to stuff like
  (1) craft-heavy classes (need a subguild to custom craft) and
  (2) enforcer backstab (want a subguild to avoid a big grind).

[Kryos]

The state of Classes and their specifically aenemic varieties that DEMAND a sub guild to be played, and feel limp without a ESC do not share a holistic design with the mage sub guilds.

This confused me for a sec because the new classes I've played were super functional, but I think you're referring to stuff like
  (1) craft-heavy classes (need a subguild to custom craft) and
  (2) enforcer backstab (want a subguild to avoid a big grind).

To be clearer:  I do not think all of the new classes are anemic.  But I do think a majority of them are.  There's a lot of depth in this, and I don't want to clog this thread with stuff its not about.

Editing in more clarity:  the point of the statement was that the new Classes are garbage without a sub guild and that was seemingly part of their design intention.  The mage ESC are not subguilds that match with this need except a few by I think happenstance rather than choice.

[Synthesis]

I think the 2nd and 3rd tier classes paired with a magick subguild are entirely playable.  Even then, the only thing that's really gimpy about 3rd tier (haven't played a 2nd tier class yet) is that their defense sucks.  Miscreant/'gicker is like...too much fun to even be legal.  It should be special-app only.

If you pick a 1st tier class and a magick subguild, your character is basically a killing machine.  If you can't parlay that into having fun...I mean...maybe you just don't like wrecking ass that much?

[Erythil]

Another way of dealing with these kinds of powers would be creating or distributing objects that counteract them.  Like an anti-summoning talisman, or a shadow-banishing dust, or something, idk.  It might be neat to gear up somebody with a bunch of special anti-witch kit to hunt one down.

Not sure what is stopping you?  Unless you want actual stuff that does that instead of just uninformed superstition.  Like modern day witch doctors in Africa giving fighters talismans that they believe will stop bullets, you don't need to act rationally or with physics (code) to back you up.

I meant actual stuff that actually does this, yes.  People can and do play witch hunters to varying degrees of success as-is, but AFAIK there's nothing that normal PCs can reasonably hope to get to assist them in this capacity other than poisons.  If the items were sufficiently rare and risky to harvest, just getting them could provide RP opportunities.

One thing that I wish I could have had from a QOL perspective as a mage is some transparency about which of my spells branch.  I understand that there is some secrecy about what you get on purpose, but knowing which spells I should continue training is something of an issue.  It feels weird to just keep on casting the same spell forever, wondering uncertainly whether or not you're anywhere near master level on it.  Crafters and fighters get this information, but mages do not know what skill level they are at, only their power level.

[Brytta Léofa]

One thing that I wish I could have had from a QOL perspective as a mage is some transparency about which of my spells branch.  I understand that there is some secrecy about what you get on purpose, but knowing which spells I should continue training is something of an issue.  It feels weird to just keep on casting the same spell forever, wondering uncertainly whether or not you're anywhere near master level on it.  Crafters and fighters get this information, but mages do not know what skill level they are at, only their power level.

That especially gets tedious with spells that only make sense to train at nil.

[Erythil]

One thing that I wish I could have had from a QOL perspective as a mage is some transparency about which of my spells branch.  I understand that there is some secrecy about what you get on purpose, but knowing which spells I should continue training is something of an issue.  It feels weird to just keep on casting the same spell forever, wondering uncertainly whether or not you're anywhere near master level on it.  Crafters and fighters get this information, but mages do not know what skill level they are at, only their power level.

That especially gets tedious with spells that only make sense to train at nil.

Since there's a problem with score screen real estate, you could maybe tie it into the symbol command.

A little extra message like: "You sense you have a journeyman level of expertise in this technique."

[LindseyBalboa]

... I don't think that's how the magic system works currently, one spell just randomly branching into another. In my singular experience and without going into much detail, if you just keep using your spells like you would IC, your overall power level will increase en masse eventually, so concentrating on grinding up one spell is pointless.

Also I don't see how, like, a an enforcer/viv healer that could never be poisoned and could heal themselves in a fight, isn't insanely scary as a concept. Or a miscreant/Ruk that could sneak in and then blast you into oblivion. I don't have any experience with full magic guilds, but if you take a step back and stop comparing the new sub guilds to the old guilds, they're incredibly efficient and sufficiently terrifying - except to players who lament not having all the spells possible at once and consider the new sub guilds to be sub-par.

But at that point, even if you OOCly are completely unimpressed and think the new magicker classes are lame as fuck, you're still just IC fodder when a vaguely competent magic sub guild  pops in and takes you out without breaking a sweat.

[lostinspace]

I will probably always miss old mage guilds, and especially lament the ones I never got to try in their full potential.

The sub-guilds are okay, but in my experience they are often missing out on spell interactions that were really what made the classes so cool.

Why have the "aim" spell if you don't have the shoot spell.
Is shoot really that helpful when it has a 50% chance of just killing yourself instead of the target if you don't aim first?

[Inks]

I really didn't like the old mage guilds, I especially hated my nilazi for its inability to really kill NPCs without using the (something) spell. I can do all this cool stuff with bodies but can't get enough. I really enjoy the various subs now. Also full witches op. Especially whirans.