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Date:    2019 Oct 31 08:23
To:      all
From:    ivey
Subject: blasters in xp groups
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Was just thinking about the imbalance between blasters and hitters in groups designed
for high level xp.
Give me the choice between 2 hitters and 4 blasters, I'll pick the hitters every
time, asuming the hitters have powerful nonorm damage weapons.
When running high level group xp for an extended time, blasters are at a huge disadvantage.
Some of the reasons for this are:
1) mana is much more costly to get back than movement.
There is no second wind equivalent for mana and no spell like refresh/rejuvenate
to give it to an ally.
Of the ways to get it back, petition angel heal has a favor cost and a 5 minute cooldown
between uses.
It also is usually saved for the healers, not the blasters.
The other option is restoration consumables, usually potions, which are not easy
to mass produce. They also have a drink limit.
2) Mana is further used during groupcasting, whereas movement is not.
People with more mana i.e. blasters, lose more mana from GC rituals. Most
groups can't afford to not be sanced while fighting, so those gc rituals
are necessary and cost a lot of mana to keep up over the group's lifetime.
3 blasters also have access to minions, but these are of limited use in groups because
they will often lower the xp the group gets for killing the mob while up.
They also do not grant xp to the tank if the tank rescues the minion, and
they also leech hp from people using area heal that could have gone to hurt
players instead.
4 Blasters can resort to channel casting when their mana is low, but the
damage over time of the channelcasted spells is much lower than that of a
hitter. 5 in many high level group areas, nonorm damage is the most
effective damage since even stock mobs are created with resistances to
everything.
Consider mobs on Gionasi, say, and you will see that most of them are at least somewhat
resistant to everything.
A 0% resistance to something is considered to be a vulnerability.
The only fully nonorm damage spells are from the inflict
wounds/chasten/harm group, but since they are cleric spells, and clerics
are usually relegated to healing, they are rarely used.
Against this, hitters do have a single disadvantage, that they have to carry many
weapons in order to be as versatile as a blaster with their spells.
This has become less of a problem in the past with the advent of extremely powerful
nonorm damage weapons.
Possible sollutions:
This issue would require radical changes to address fully. Some of the ways we could
start looking into it include:
Increasing the mana gained from casting restoration, especially at lower levels.
This would encourage people to brew lower level ones instead of buying and selling
pods.
Increasing the drink limit
Magnifying spell damage when multiple group members cast the same spell, similar
to the way tempest works. Would encourage teams of blasters to work together. (combos
such of these are limited to two spells right now)
Lessening the xp penalty of damage dealing minions
Creating spells for mages, necros or druids that does nonorm damage

I am sure there is plenty more to add to the discussion so feel fee to reply.


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