Magic Requirements Options

[Melanthe]

Well, to be devil's advocate, I don't like it at all. ;) If you do it, it certainly should be implemented for every class (not just mages), and either way, I think it would create one of those "privileged class" social things which would encourage looking down on other newer less powerful players; I think it would discourage teamwork and helping others out; I think it would encourage a powergaming mindset and drive the desire to discover exploits; if someone wins by an exploit or hacking, that means the GM's are going to be drawn into difficult-to-handle situations.

I think a competition ladder, which is what you mean basically, is fine and appropriate for a shooter game that isn't a PW, or as a private competition within guilds, etc. But as as an intrinsic part of a persistent world, in which "prizes" and status are openly awarded by the game to exceptionally powerful players, I think it's going to cause a lot more trouble than it's worth.

Overall I just think it's not an idea that I'd like to see in an MMRPG.

:)

[Mole]

Well, my competition ladder idea has seemed to strike up a lot of debate. It sounds like there are enough people who find the ladder system undesireable.

The problem is that I'm not seeing other ideas.

The problem that we need to solve is this: how do we make magic "special" in the game?

I'm NOT saying that the ladder idea is the best idea. Currently, it's the only idea that we've been entertaining. What are some other ideas?

[Mole]

This is in response to one of Jerky?s long posts?. :)

Yes, a defeated mage will want to challenge as soon as they can; and this would be expected. This would need to be built into the system. With my idea, the defeated mage would loose a few levels of skill. It would take them some time to get back enough skill to be able to challenge again, assuming they already knew of a high level mage.

One of the big problems with this ladder system is that it does force people into PvP. Forced PvP is not a good thing. The only justifiable thing about this PvP is that it affects the high level players only. Is that a good reason? I don?t know.

Yes, a player?s skill would drop. That would be bad, especially after seeing how hard they worked just to get to that skill level in the first place. If you only allow X number of mages at a certain level, then when a player looses a duel, somebody?s skill has to drop. Otherwise you end up having more than X players at that level and that defeats the purpose of having a ladder system in the first place.

I?ll admit that this ladder system has some flaws.

You also talk about this system dividing people into 2 groups: those that will level grind to do anything to get to these high levels, and those that won?t ever want to play a mage because they know they won?t invest the time to become ?the best?. My answer to this is why don?t we come up with a second option for the high level players?

Maybe we can have 2 options for the high-level mages. When a mage reaches a certain skill level, their trainer can tell them that the time has come for them to pursue one of 2 paths.

Option 1 could be the PvP ladder system that we?ve been talking about. With this option the mages will be able to gain ?really cool? spells that they can cast all by themselves. These spells will be way cooler than anything they have so far, but they will have to go the ladder route.

Option 2 could be a non-PvP system where mages have to work together in teams to get the ?really cool? spells to work. We allow players choosing this option to learn the ?really cool? spells (or maybe even different ?really cool? spells from option 1) but they can?t cast these spells unless they link with other mages (following option 2) who know the same spell. We can have a minimum number of mages that need to link for the spell to work. The more mages that link with each other, the more powerful the spell damage or effect.

Option 2 gives players a non-PvP way to do things. They can still learn cools spells and such, but they will be forced into teamwork in order to get the spell to work.

One thing we?ll have to think about -- will this option cater to powergamers?

I?m not saying that this is the best way. I?m just throwing out ideas and responding to feedback. I do like this new idea though, as it forces people to work together and team up.

[Kerwik]

I also feel it would be wonderful if spell power could be based on casting time as a modifier to its effect. In order to give your lightning blast that ungodly power you desire, you may have to focus/meditate/concentrate for quite some time before casting it. Casting before you are ready could allow you to cast a faster, yet weaker, version of the spell. With such a system in place, it would make sense for mana/power to be drained during the focusing, not just instantly dumped with the casting.
The way in which you could alter your focus time would have to be worked out. Holding a key to focus and selecting a Hotkey to cast the spell would be the easiest way (assuming the client can send the power/spell info to the server on the cast. im not a tech person so that may have made no sense).

I like the idea of clicking the icon or pressing the key that would begin the casting of the spell, then have it slowly 'charge' until it reaches full power then automatically release, or have you click the icon or press the key again to release it prematuraly so it does less damage. This way you could be off a little ways and begin casting the spell, then if the thing gets too close to you, you can release the spell on it before it gets a chance to hit you and disrupt your spell. It will be weaker, but at least you'll have gotten to use the spell at all. Of course, there should be some spells that won't have any effect at all unless you go through the entire cast... but you can still press they key again to interrupt them in mid cast in case you have to run away. Like if you were fighting something that could kill you in one hit and it was getting too close, you'd want to interrupt the spell so you could run away and try to cast it again from a little further away.

[IngeniousMask]

I definitely like the idea of magic being unique. Here's my idea about a way it could be implemented:

I think the biggest reason magic is often rare in fantasies is because it is extremely dangerous. People fear what magic will do to them. The ones who take chances are those who will pursue magic. The lucky ones will succeed very quickly...while the unlucky may face damage and even death. Even for the lucky ones, there is always the possibility that magic can go horribly wrong. Basically, if you are persistant and like tapping the unstable force known as magic, you can eventually learn it, but risks will always be present.

I think that all magic should be divided into certain schools. Each school of magic is then connected with a Plain of Magic.....like Necromancy is tapped by accessing the Plain of Death, Healing by the Plain of Life, Invisibility by the Plain of Shadow, etc. At low levels, mages cast spells by tapping into the energy of the plain. The higher the mage gets, the more in tune with the plain he becomes, so the more powerful he can become. The highest level mages can even warp to the plain and walk around.

Now, magic involving plains falls into the category of High Magic. High Magic is powerful but extremely dangerous. When a mage accesses his plain, his body is essentially becoming a channel for the energy to reach the physical world. Thus a mage always risks disaster when tapping into his plain. Of course, different spells require different amounts of energy..thus the higher energy spells have more of chance of causing damage and even death to the wizard. I don't know if we will include permanent death or damage in project wish, but one way to turn many away from magic is to create the possibility for a magic accident to permanently scar their character....lowering an attribute, preventing them from gaining certain skills, etc. Also, as a wizard improves his skills in that school of magic, he is able to better channel the energies of the plain without risk.

To implement a limited number of powerful mages, each plain has a certain number of spots for "Ascendents" or "Demigods" or "Archmages" or whatever you want to call them. Lets say there are five tiers. Each level allows access to unique spells. In order to reach a higher level of ascendency you must defeat the mage who holds that position. Note that you are not forced to enter the quest for Ascendency. If you are not one of those 5 mages..you are are still very powerful, you just don't get a few of their unique spells or the title.

I also think that anyone should be able to cast any spell, but if you have a mage skill of 10, and attempt a spell of skill 20...the power consumes your character and pretty much kills him. However, you can attempt to cast a skill 15 spell. The power will probably ravage your body, doing tons of damage, but you could get the spell off, doing a lot of damage to your enemy. This will add a sense of strategy, suspense, and epic battles to spell casting. Of course, you could always stick to skill 10 spells and play it safe.

Besides High Magic, there is a lower level of magic. This includes simple cantrips, healing spells, small buffs, and everyone can learn to access this without being at risk.

There should definitely be an active part of spell casting. Too often is it click and wait for the bar to fill up. A play should press a key to cast the spell. The bar then fillls up as they prepare to cast. There are certain release points they can press the button again to cast the spell. A blast spell could have 3 levels of power....the longer you wait, the more powerful the spell becomes. But, there are only certain moments you can press the button to cast the spell. If you wait to long to cast a spell at a power of one, then you are interuppted as you are charging up to power two...tough luck. This adds more strategy to combat. It also forces grouping because a mage must rely on his fighters to tank while he casts the spells.

Well, its late, and there is my magic rant. Enjoy.

[Zephir62]

In my view of a fantasy game - there should be a logic behind everything except the divine. Having "magic" draw it's energies from specific reagents, each kind of reagent having different kinds of power to them. Combining different reagents, or leaving them by themselves could cast different spells. In addition to the reagents, mantra's should be spoken to activate the "magic" within the reagents, causing the energies to flow out of them.

You might argue that logic and fantasy are polar opposites of eachother, and should never be mixed, but sometimes the best fantasy is the best is because if you search hard enough, you can understand why things happened, and that everything has a history behind them. You see Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy, and you can read them and have a good time, but what makes them so special in my opinion is because there's so much thought put into it - there's books upon books that could be made of the histories mentioned on the side of the trilogy alone.

Or maybe I'm alone in this thought..?

[xardy]

Don't know if any1 has brought this up but when casting a spell i would like to use the system from black and white where you make a symbol with your mouse. Your cast time would the time you need to make the symbol. More advanced players would be able to cast faster then noob players. And its also in players hand on how fast it goes.This would make spellcasting more interactive imo then just clicking a spell and whaiting for it to cast.

But to not make the cast to fast there should come a small casting animation afther you made the symbol with your mouse.

Another idea that i have is to be able to have a spell ready to cast. You cast the spell on advance but don't release it. When you see an enemy you can release the spell on it without any casting time. But when you are holding a spell you cant do stuff like crafting, meelee combat and sutch. Also your mana won't fully regenerate. When you don't want to use the spell you can return it to your mana pool making it so that almost all your mana returns.