Alternatives to Spellcasting

[Halaster]

Sometimes spell-casting is boring when you're trying to branch something.  Our expectation is that everyone playing a mage does not engage in "spamcasting" and roleplays all the time.  That said, we can all agree that sometimes that's hard because it can get monotonous and boring.

I've seen the idea floated a couple of times lately where a mage could do something to gain in a spell instead of casting, or at least have a chance to.

For example, a whiran goes to the top of a mountain where the winds are fierce and meditates there.  Or a vivaduan who spends an inordinate amount of time at an oasis.  Or a rukkian goes to some special stone pillar in the middle of nowhere and I dunno.. casts some spells on it.

I'd love to get some ideas on this from everyone, as specific or as vague as you want.  Please avoid mentioning specific spells or mechanics, but rather ideas on things mages could do.

[Kavrick]

I'm honestly still of the opinion of the method I had recommended in the past. Using components. Especially now that all full-guilds start off with component crafting, gaining power/branching checks by 'consuming' a relevant component (you can flavor it how you want, maybe you absorb it's 'mana' and that makes it inert) gives you progress towards a branch or increases the power of a spell you know. There's tons of components in the game, component crafting is cool and there are a good few elementalists which I obviously wont name that barely use components, and this will open up a new need for them.

Needing to have certain components can also add more 'active' stuff for mages to do. Rather than sitting in their room all day, they need to either go out and find the right materials for the components, forage artifacts in special, historic rooms, or pay people to do so. I think it both is more interesting and would encourage more interaction and general 'adventuring' over spamcasting.

[Halaster]

Some ideas of mine:

A vivaduan goes to a specific oasis and keeps filling it with water.
A drovian spends time in a specific deep, dark cave.
A krathi eats burned meat. 
A whiran rests on top of a mountain with strong winds.
A rukkian finds a specific, special pillar of stone in some remote location and lays their hands on it.
An elkrosian spends time in the fiercest sandstorm with nothing covering their face.
A nilazi spills the blood of an elementalist.

[Dresan]

With combat classes they need to find someone or something to get better. This interaction while at times challenging and dangerous makes it interesting and fun to get better.

Instead of just purely making it easier, which by the mere nature of this being a game is just adding more bordom. We introduce some benefit alongside some more interaction and potential risk?

A mage can meditate their spells with another of the same type mage or even better any non-mage character. During the mediation, the would be extremely vulnerable, lagged and only being able to talk and emote but would benefit from channeling and flowing their powers through someone else to skill gain.

-if its another mage of the same type, both mages gain skill.
-if its another non-mage, the mage gains skill while the non-mage gains resistance to that particular element. Maybe wisdom helps in this particular case?


On the side note, it cannot just be about mages getting easier and stronger so the idea above begins to balance out the complex relationships between mages and nonmages. If there is more magic in the IC world, there should growing resistances to it as well. With seasons, adding more elements of interaction this make sense given the changed nature of mages in the game's society.

[Down Under]

Some ideas:

-Mages that are taught/learn spells from other Mages gain more than they might on a simple fail. For Temple Gemmed, maybe that means access to NPC trainers that teach common to uncommon spells for a price.

-If a mage casts a spell on you that you know (or might come to learn later on in life), you have a chance of instantly branching that spell, based on wisdom.

-Allow a 'Branched' Mage to teach a spell from that branch to another Mage of their element.

-Allow a Nilazi to cast a version of 'Dispel Magick' that erases a random branched spell from that mage's spell list -- they can rebranch it, but will have to cast it to do so, etc. In so doing, the Nilazi gains X points in their own spells.

-Maybe certain rituals each Element can perform (codedly) that passively improves all spells by 1-5 points following the 'Learn Timer', akin to what Halaster mentioned already. Examples might be a Vivaduan watering a plant, a Rukkian crafting stone, an Elkran resting in a sandstorm, a Nilazi having a spell cast on it or doing other Nilazi Related Activities. The gains could be small and infrequent (1 / RL week) but still assist in pushing a Magicker forward along the track without requiring spam casting.

-Consider 'Group Spells' or ways that multiple Magickers of the same element might achieve a sort of symbiosis and extra learning if they cast spells together or in proximity to one another.

-Consider 'Group Spells' or ways that multiple Magickers of a different element might rub against one another, and make learning more difficult, or make spells more unpredictable/higher chances of critical failures.

-Staff-Assists: Maybe encourage biographies, explorations of magick via think/feel, and rewarding Magickers with extra skill points in their spells.

-Staff-Detriments: Maybe discourage spamcasting by removing spells or reaches or mana points if people don't RP appropriately behind their spell casting.


I'm leery of a 'LOCATION BASED' gain center, as that means you'll have all the idling Rukkians around the Pillar in the middle of nowhere. I prefer either an action-based approach (Crafting, or working with other PCs), or time-based approach (simply being alive means you passively have a greater chance of branching, akin to Learn).

It's a particularly rough hustle for Rogue Magickers, who don't have a convenient Temple to wake up and practice in day in and day out. The expectation and pressure to RP well, while also trying to practice and branch your spells, is I think even higher for those who aren't Gemmed.

I think we all know that Staff would prefer that we don't spamcast in order to branch spells; but the system, in its monotony, almost requires that at times as you try to make a PC that can survive the rigors of Zalanthas. I think this is doubly true for Full Guild Elementalists, who are really quite squishy compared to their subguild counterparts.

[Riev]

Can I just ask to clarify:

You mean something like a staff-supported "mini-quest" to cause a spell with .. to branch rather than forcing a fail by casting a hundred times?

[Down Under]

I'm honestly still of the opinion of the method I had recommended in the past. Using components. Especially now that all full-guilds start off with component crafting, gaining power/branching checks by 'consuming' a relevant component (you can flavor it how you want, maybe you absorb it's 'mana' and that makes it inert) gives you progress towards a branch or increases the power of a spell you know. There's tons of components in the game, component crafting is cool and there are a good few elementalists which I obviously wont name that barely use components, and this will open up a new need for them.

Needing to have certain components can also add more 'active' stuff for mages to do. Rather than sitting in their room all day, they need to either go out and find the right materials for the components, forage artifacts in special, historic rooms, or pay people to do so. I think it both is more interesting and would encourage more interaction and general 'adventuring' over spamcasting.

I also really like this 'Objects of Power' approach, it reminds me of Conan the Cimmerian, where Sorcerers would need to hunt down bizarre and dangerous objects of power to gain immense skill in their craft, gaining an edge on their contemporaries.

Maybe that could be achieved through charged components or artifacts of some kind; when discovered, they might grant certain boons (or detriments). Among those might be knowledge of certain spells (instant branching) or curses (cutting off connection to their element temporarily, or semi-permanently, damage to health over time, poison, inability to use the Way).

Maybe Mages could craft (themselves) a spell or knowledge of it into a component or potion, and if it is consumed or otherwise assimilated, the mage that does so would gain that spell/knowledge. It could be identified by those able to do so, and the element discerned (maybe Nilazi artifacts would appear normal/non-magickal except to Nilazi, and the same with Sorcerous artifacts).

[zealus]

I'd love this.
Anything in this.

Mini quests, words of power written in caves... lessons from each other...
Anything that fosters roleplay

[Down Under]

Sometimes spell-casting is boring when you're trying to branch something.  Our expectation is that everyone playing a mage does not engage in "spamcasting" and roleplays all the time.  That said, we can all agree that sometimes that's hard because it can get monotonous and boring.

I've seen the idea floated a couple of times lately where a mage could do something to gain in a spell instead of casting, or at least have a chance to.

For example, a whiran goes to the top of a mountain where the winds are fierce and meditates there.  Or a vivaduan who spends an inordinate amount of time at an oasis.  Or a rukkian goes to some special stone pillar in the middle of nowhere and I dunno.. casts some spells on it.

I'd love to get some ideas on this from everyone, as specific or as vague as you want.  Please avoid mentioning specific spells or mechanics, but rather ideas on things mages could do.

The problem I see here is it seems you would either be relying on Code, or Staff Intervention.

Code takes time and i'm not sure there's much bang for the buck here.

Staff Intervention takes time and coordination (and skill in seeing the PC perform the actions in the first place, or scheduling time to do so).

If there's any kind of Code intervention, i'd want it to be as broad and applicable to all elements/non-elements as possible, which to me seems to be 'time based'.

If Mage = 1 days played, add X points in T1 Spells, Y points in T2 Spells, Z points in T3 Spells.

If Mage = 2 days played, add X points in T1 Spells, Y points in T2 Spells, Z points in T3 Spells.

If Mage = 4 days played, add X points in T1 Spells, Y points in T2 Spells, Z points in T3 Spells.

If Mage = 8 days played...Etc.

If they reach a branching threshold this way, branch the spells.

This encourages longevity/playing the PC over skilling them out. If you had the assurance that yes, your mage will become powerful over time, even if you do not spam cast spells in your temple, it might alleviate the need to do so a bit.

[dumbstruck]

I like everything @Down Under said here and like it all. I especially agree with the last bit. I think the bit for how elementalists and Nilazi interact with one another seems fun and interesting and unique as well.

[Halaster]

Can I just ask to clarify:

You mean something like a staff-supported "mini-quest" to cause a spell with .. to branch rather than forcing a fail by casting a hundred times?

I was thinking more along the lines of automated things players could do in lieu of casting a spell, to get a gain in it.  It would still be on the same gain timer, but just an alternative way to get it.

[dumbstruck]

I think spellcasting, just like other skills, would get spammed a lot less if you got the skillup on a success rather than a fail. Think that literally just reversing how skillgains work would be a net benefit to everyone and since skills gains are locked on a timer you still couldn't skills up quicker than the timer. It'd also flood the IC market with a bunch less low tier crafts from people just trying to branch and make sparring a bit easier I'd think.

[Dresan]

I'll just add that unless gaining or branching with "spamcasting" is made more difficult most of these ideas will not work well to change things.

This is due to the safety and sheer convenience of hiding in a room and spamcasting while watching netflix on the side.

If no challenge, risk or interaction elements are introduced, while making spamcasting more inconvenient,  you might as well use learn feature to give every mage max skill and branch every week to four spells of their choice or made more linear.

[Lizzie]

I'd rather see a more efficient skill-gain opportunity. I don't know the code. But.

If wek to yuqa is a 20-point difference - and the usual cast would increase by 1 point...

then maybe it could be changed to 1.25 points after you reach the first 10. Or a critical success could bump it by 3 points, AND add a higher likelihood of having that critical success even if the caster has low wisdom.

Also change the random number generator (is that a dice roll?) so there's a higher chance of branching than presently - regardless of your wisdom score.

I know I've played mages where I would spend two hours spam-casting, trying to FAIL just so I could branch off a spell I really had no use for. But it'd take that long because mana regen took long - because I didn't have good enough wisdom? Dunno. I was casting in my character's temple, so there -should've- been a bonus. But if that bonus means more success, it means lower odds of branching since you can only branch off a fail.

I think that needs to be addressed, more than RP'ed opportunities to skillgain.

[FantasyWriter]

This is not a long-term solution, but there's always the option to special app with some sort of alternative plan up front, if you KNOW there is a particular branch in your tree that doesn't make sense for your character to practice.  This also doesn't help anyone who hasn't played that guild before, unfortunately, but it's -a- way.

[Down Under]

This is not a long-term solution, but there's always the option to special app with some sort of alternative plan up front, if you KNOW there is a particular branch in your tree that doesn't make sense for your character to practice.  This also doesn't help anyone who hasn't played that guild before, unfortunately, but it's -a- way.

Definitely true -- Back in the day I would definitely special apply for a guild I was familiar with and ask for T2 Spells (if I knew what they were). I've found YMMV now-a-days with apps like that, it's a new era, different Staff, etc.

I definitely think it's an interesting posit for the Special Applications Coded Advantages perhaps -- playing a Magick Guild you have Karma for, but with expanded T2 Spells instead of starting out with T1 only, so it's codified and not anecdotal?

I love all this talk about 'Alternative Ways to Gain in Spells', and maybe it's a thread of its own, but i'd also love to see 'Alternative Ways to make Magick Unpredictable'. We have critical successes/fails already in the game, and i'd love to see people way less certain that Magickers are useful and awesome. But yeah, likely worth a thread of its own.

[dumbstruck]

It might also help if you could gain on a qntlz fail which I have literally never seen happen in the many times I've had it fail.

[betweenford]

Could combine multiple methods together like going to specific Oases with a Mon Viqrol component for your random skill increase. Might make them feel more like their dnd Cleric counterparts if they're sacrificing objects of power for, well, power increases that scale with the tier of the dismantled component.

I'm partial to it being moreso tied to your environment or by risk, that way you end up creating spots where you know elementalists might hang around and you can potentially ambush them in, but it couldn't hurt to throw in sudden niche effects also contributing to it like a krathi who takes fire damage from flaming weapons or effects having a chance of skillgain when wounded by his element.

Could tie in their gains to the defiler/preserver systems too, locking people out of gaining via this method when the local environment is too defiled, in the presence of an ashen circle, or increasing the benefit of gains when someone has a high Relationship To The Land or if the corresponding area is bustling with life.

edit:
There's also a potential where rooms can be manually flagged for this like the elemental temples, where they give consistent yet inferior skill gain over time for hanging around in them; which is analogous to spamcasting without absolutely spamming anyone's terminal.

[Down Under]

Could combine multiple methods together like going to specific Oases with a Mon Viqrol component for your random skill increase. Might make them feel more like their dnd Cleric counterparts if they're sacrificing objects of power for, well, power increases that scale with the tier of the dismantled component.

I'm partial to it being moreso tied to your environment or by risk, that way you end up creating spots where you know elementalists might hang around and you can potentially ambush them in, but it couldn't hurt to throw in sudden niche effects also contributing to it like a krathi who takes fire damage from flaming weapons or effects having a chance of skillgain when wounded by his element.

Could tie in their gains to the defiler/preserver systems too, locking people out of gaining via this method when the local environment is too defiled, in the presence of an ashen circle, or increasing the benefit of gains when someone has a high Relationship To The Land or if the corresponding area is bustling with life.

It's an interesting way of putting it RE: Location Based.

All them Rukkians around the Pillar in the middle of Nowhere would sure look tasty to a Nilazi. haha.

[Dresan]

We have critical successes/fails already in the game, and i'd love to see people way less certain that Magickers are useful and awesome. But yeah, likely worth a thread of its own.

I had an interesting idea on something of the same vein.

If a mage gives someone a buff, the target of that buff would also gain some resistance for that element depending on wisdom. Drinking and eating magick creating stuff, would have similar effect. Overtime the mage would find it harder to buff that person due to their weaker spells beginning failing. They would be forced to use stronger versions for a chance at success.

This would create a potentially dangerous scenario where a mage could run out of mana before being able to buff someone during important  battles. Or worse potentially be creating a person increasingly dangerous to their kind.

High magick resistance(and only magic resistance) would be both good and bad in the current season, yes you can survive nasty spells a bit better but the beneficial spells are also likely to fail on you. Of course, this would have no effect on self casting so dwarf mages need not worry.

[talos]

I think it might be a good thing to have alternatives, because we can also limit spell branching this way as well.


We could potentially lock spells behind reputation, or quests, or select interactions that we design.


That way, we can really set the expectations of when characters should have access to certain spells, rather than just them casting a spell until it appears in your list.  We could design it so that you need to be rank 6 in the suk-krath temple clan to get access to "fireball" or something similar.

[Down Under]

I think it might be a good thing to have alternatives, because we can also limit spell branching this way as well.


We could potentially lock spells behind reputation, or quests, or select interactions that we design.


That way, we can really set the expectations of when characters should have access to certain spells, rather than just them casting a spell until it appears in your list.  We could design it so that you need to be rank 6 in the suk-krath temple clan to get access to "fireball" or something similar.

I mean...

Maybe.

I don't think rogue elementalists/magickers should be gated out of gaining spells. Maybe Temples/Temple Gemmed could have alternative methods to getting to the same result, and maybe those would be quicker or challenging in a different way. But I would hate to make it so you HAVE to be Gemmed to gain access to certain spells.

I also dislike having Staff be arbiter to who gets access to what; I sort of like that right now it's based around code, which doesn't have the same biases that a Staff member might (what is good vs bad RP, for instance).

Options are good! Alternatives are good! But I think gating is not great, particularly if it's designed around an oblique system that is neither obvious or straight-forward to navigate. We're currently trying to reduce the amount of requests (it seems) by eliminating the non-leadership character report requests / interactions between Staff and Player.

The kind of system you are describing would seem to require that level of engagement, unless you think it would be handled all IG/IC, which I would find...Difficult to imagine, really, without some kind of over the table discussion.

[Nao]

I'm not in favor of anything that is locked behind staff intervention.

Why? It'll massively disadvantage anyone who is out of the staffer's time zone. You'll also have one or two staffers dealing with dozens of mage players, someone is bound to get a lot of attention while others don't do anything different but are overlooked.

There's also more than one way to play a mage. Right now, staff is putting a lot of emphasis into digging deep into your element and such. There's not a lot of ways to do that other than - solo RP and, if you're lucky and you can find one, talking to another mage of the same type. I don't really care for it - I'm much more interested in the stigma aspect, that's the reason I play mages, not because I really want to theorize about Vivadu. Yet it doesn't really seem optional right now.

[RheaGhe]

I think, you need to look at the impetus for what causes spell spamming, and determine whether this actually redress a solution to it. Or will just create some kind of additional complexity that will not actually get used.

Personal opinions follow: If it's an option in addition too, I think if it's harder than just hitting a command 6 times, and hoping for a fail. Then pausing to emote something relatively canned... It's not gonna be a good drop in that actually goes to use. Unfortunately, the path of least resistance is sitting in your temple/apartment/cave and spam casting to max.

I think, at the same time, making the current system more gated than it already is, whether that's behind components, Roleplay in a faction or otherwise, or 'microgating quests', runs the risk of creating a situation where all but around 10% of magickers feel useless. And that would be a terrible situation to have.

The current system is imperfect, but making it harder for mages to advance, I don't think is the route the game would be healthiest in. Especially given that most full guild mages are extremely extremely squishy and reliant on others already. If you remove the ability, or gate their ability to branch, then you run into a situation where they feel even more useless for even longer.

That said...

Perhaps, a compromise could be, that if you use a component, with a specific new reach, XPND or something. It has a near guaranteed chance of learning, and consumes a component related to the spell and power level +1 of what it's cast at. With possibly a perpetually maxed mana cost.

This would give spell spammers a single command that they could do. And then get on with their RP that actually matters...

Just my two cents.

[Down Under]

I'm not in favor of anything that is locked behind staff intervention.

Why? It'll massively disadvantage anyone who is out of the staffer's time zone. You'll also have one or two staffers dealing with dozens of mage players, someone is bound to get a lot of attention while others don't do anything different but are overlooked.

There's also more than one way to play a mage. Right now, staff is putting a lot of emphasis into digging deep into your element and such. There's not a lot of ways to do that other than - solo RP and, if you're lucky and you can find one, talking to another mage of the same type. I don't really care for it - I'm much more interested in the stigma aspect, that's the reason I play mages, not because I really want to theorize about Vivadu. Yet it doesn't really seem optional right now.

Also not in favor for the Staff Intervention for the reasons you list -- it's just too 'YMMV' and reliant on schedules, on active participation for my liking. Staff Intervention should be a nicety and fun and 'on the off chance'. The more we require Staff Intervention, the more opportunity there is for the system to fail or provide opportunities for favoritism/scapegoating.

I do think there's room to explore the stigma alongside the 'diving deep' on the element, that's still RP. Solo RP, thinks/feels, playing a character rather than a stack of stats and skills, should be something all Mages/Elementalists do, at least to some extent.

I think we're experiencing a cadre of New Storytellers (relatively speaking), so they are also monitoring PCs for the first time since launch (roughly a month ago). So they are experiencing for the first time "Soandso just cast 20 times in a row without emoting once!" and having a reaction to it.

Is it a problem that people cast spells in order to fail them in order to branch them to more powerful spells? If the answer is yes...Then we are dealing with a deeper infrastructure issue.

The problem isn't (IMO) that people are casting spells in order to fail. It is that the system for improving magickal spells isn't time based, it's activity based (Must Fail in order to Succeed) alongside all other mundane skills in the game.

IMHO, don't hate the player, hate the game. It's DIKU, it's coded a certain way, and in order to achieve as a magicker, yes, you have to cast your spells enough times to fail that you get cooler, better, more useful spells. I definitely think magickers can/should think and feel inbetween casts, when they want to, emote a bit, and all of that. But it's a slippery slope too -- What about the Byn Spar? What about the Crafter trying to branch when they are almost a master, thus requiring...Many fails in order to get that last point before branching?

If anything -- I think the posits in this thread point out a potential issue in general behind branching, not having EXP / ways of spending EXP to branch skills, not having levels. It's a fundamental aspect of our code, of being an RPI, that we hide the numbers behind skills and how they improve, and keep it esoteric.

Is it 'Realistic' to say 'You must fail at this skill 40 times, precisely, in order to become a master in it?' I'm a craftsperson IRL, and all I can say is 'Absolutely not'. I don't learn through failures. I get frustrated when I fail, and I try again and typically fail a little less, but I gain much more knowledge through my successes and augmenting those successes, finding shortcuts, creating shortcuts, creating jigs that create shortcuts, and repetition repetition repetition.

That "Repetition" part is quite important -- Doing A Thing Thousands Of Times Makes You Better At It. It can also reinforce bad habits, which is maybe a digression, but i've nary met a craftsperson who said 'I got this good by failing a thousand times'. You do your best to avoid failure, not to lean into it and find more creative ways to fail as we do here at ArmageddonMUD hehe.