Spells!
Joey
Member Posts: 201
So I've played Baldur's Gate II almost exclusively as a spellcaster for near on three years now, so i have a fair bit of experience with magic. So, hear are my suggestions/pointless ranty opinions on it.
*Stoneskin scales too well. Make it cap at 8 skins @ level 16 and only apply to +3 or lower. Introduce a "Magical Ward" spell at level 8 that protects against +4 or lower and doesn't cap in the number of skins you can accumulate.
*No (useful) element spells at higher levels! There should be Improved Fireball around level 8, Lightening Apocolypse level 9, etc. You get the idea.
*There needs to be a Greater Magic Missile. If the animations in BG2: EE will be anything like Icewind Dale II then all the better. Level 5, 1 missile every 5 levels, 3d3+5 per missile. Obviously tweak the numbers around if you like but you get the idea.
*Quadrupple the price of Robe of Vecna but have useful lower-level robes, since the ones at the moment are pretty awful. Increased casting time, +10% damage to elemental/death robes.
*The current wizardry rings are pretty crappy atm. Buff the current rings to make them more useful, also at least one high-tier magic ring granting bonus high level slots and reduced casting time.
*Greater elemental spheres, castable at higher levels, that give a meaningful damage resistance and deal decent damage.
*Minor weaken magic resistance. Even if it's only 1% per level, you need something at the lower end to help with yuan-ti et al.
I'm sure there will be more as and when i think about it. Feedback and critisism welcome!
*Stoneskin scales too well. Make it cap at 8 skins @ level 16 and only apply to +3 or lower. Introduce a "Magical Ward" spell at level 8 that protects against +4 or lower and doesn't cap in the number of skins you can accumulate.
*No (useful) element spells at higher levels! There should be Improved Fireball around level 8, Lightening Apocolypse level 9, etc. You get the idea.
*There needs to be a Greater Magic Missile. If the animations in BG2: EE will be anything like Icewind Dale II then all the better. Level 5, 1 missile every 5 levels, 3d3+5 per missile. Obviously tweak the numbers around if you like but you get the idea.
*Quadrupple the price of Robe of Vecna but have useful lower-level robes, since the ones at the moment are pretty awful. Increased casting time, +10% damage to elemental/death robes.
*The current wizardry rings are pretty crappy atm. Buff the current rings to make them more useful, also at least one high-tier magic ring granting bonus high level slots and reduced casting time.
*Greater elemental spheres, castable at higher levels, that give a meaningful damage resistance and deal decent damage.
*Minor weaken magic resistance. Even if it's only 1% per level, you need something at the lower end to help with yuan-ti et al.
I'm sure there will be more as and when i think about it. Feedback and critisism welcome!
2
Comments
I don't find anything crappy with the wizardry rings in BG2. Extra spells are always welcome regardless of their level.
Otherwise they are interesting suggestions.
I'd personally cap RoV to only affect spells of 6th level and lower, as per the Alacrity spell (7th: reduces cast times by 4 to a minimum of 1, of spells 6th level and lower, for 4 rounds), and cap cast speed to a minimum of 1. Weapon speed can reach 0, but cast speed never can (or at least isn't supposed to), except for spells activated by a contingency.
The wizardry ring does exactly what it's supposed to. At least the BG1 version..the BG2 version is made-up.
There are stronger versions though, one for each spell level up to 5th. And 3 combo rings that affects 1-2, 1-3, and 4-5. The combo rings though are so rare they might as well not exist as are the 4th and higher rings.
50% chance of 1st level (01-50)
27% chance of 2nd level(51-77)
10% chance of 3rd level(78-88)
4% chance of 1-2 level (89-92)
3% chance of 4th level (93-95)
2% chance of 5th level (96-97)
2% chance of 1-3 level (98-99)
1% chance of 4-5 level (100)
I wouldn't mind them being added, and then when you get the Ring of Wizardry in BG2, it rolls from the table to see which one you get.
There are already plenty of low level spells for dealing with magic resistant creatures...they're called summons and buffs (or buffed summons for extra fun). Magic resistance exists purely to inconvenience spell casters, and only truly powerful spells can lower or by-pass it by design. Consider it fair, since even level 1 spells can massacre non-magic resistant creatures easily.
The only caster who is lacking in spell variety are druids. Arcane casters and clerics get so much spell variety it's hard deciding exactly which spells you want to use, since all but a couple spell levels have WAY more good spells then you have slots to cast them (or slots to pick them, in the case of sorcerers).
Now that said....Illusion and Enchantment and Necromancy did get screwed a little on spell variety, Illusion especially, lacking basically all the spells that make the school actually good except Simulacrum. Necromancy is lacking some of their lower level reanimation spells and other niceties. And Enchantment lacking their higher level spells.
Also Abjuration is missing Mind Blank, which is a travesty, since it's a core-book spell, where as Chaotic Commands is not.
(they basically gave Chaotic Commands Mind Blank's ability, in place of it's own...even though CC's real ability was pretty bad ass. Prevent Commands, Suggestions, Charms, Domination, confusion, Power-Words spells/effects, and any of those spell/effects cast on the warded creature are reflected back on the caster, with no reflection limit).
The rings of wizardry feel a bit redundant once you're unlocking 8th and 9th level spells. I always find myself swapping out mage rings for other more useful buffs, Ring of Gaxx or Protection. It'd be cool if there was a high-tier ring, maybe you could keep ROV at current cost, make it -3 to casting time and stick -1 to spellcasting on a Ring of Mastery, along with +5% damage on all spells and +10% Magic Resistance.
I agree that there should be some more spells for the underused schools, and a lot more love for druids. Never quite found a use for them except for insects and maybe elemental princes; that doesn't seem terribly convincing on its own.
The main reason the rings aren't so powerful, I think, is that resting is super easy in BG2 and carries practically no penalties/inconveniences. I don't know how it is handled in PnP, but I'm pretty sure that resting in a hostile dungeon every second fight is not how it's intended to work.
Pre-ToB, the RoV was just ok and was fine for it's price.
Chain Contingency having an instant cast time instead of it's proper 2 turn (not round..TURN) cast time, IA having a made-up effect, and Chaos-shields stacking are what breaks RoV.
Resting in a dungeon in PnP is about like resting in a dungeon in ToEE. Suicide (or close to it).
Personally I'd like to see more variations of the Bigby hand's spell. How about Bigby's Bitchslap? Pretty please =p
By the way: I don't find IA overpowered in its current form, but rather necessary. Without it, mages would pretty much never be able to compete with the damage output of melee classes, simply because they have 1 spell per round and fighters have up to 10 attacks. There's other problems involved that cause this disparity of course, but I find IA to be an acceptable remedy a lot of the time. I guess PnP works differently on so many levels that there's just problems upon problems compounding errors in BG, resulting in weird configurations and interactions that shift relative power so much.
Well...do keep in mind, only a handful of people were ever supposed to get Deidre in the first place....and it's pretty clear that most of her gear is just flat broken (I do agree that the Robe is FAR too easy to get).
Joluv on the other hand is actually pretty well balanced stuff.
Without WWA, a GM'd fighter is capped to 3 attacks single, 4 attacks DWing, 5 with 1 speed weapon, 6 with 2.
Haste and IH are mage spells...and you can attribute those extra attacks directly to the mage, instead of the fighter, since the mage's spell is what caused that extra damage. Mages are fine with 1 spell per round. It's why Contingencies and Spell triggers exist.
Add in that you can always rest and repeat in the next battle and it becomes an auto-win for late game mages. I don't know how, or if, that could be balanced. Banning people from resting in dungeons would break wizards since they simply don't have enough spells to be useful in all battles, whereas your tanks can simply get healed and march on.
My own rest limits require resting in an inn, and only when the party is fatigued.
The main issue about mages is knowing when magic is needed and when it isn't. And wands and ability to cast from scrolls exist for a reason you know.
In a less snarky tone, a moot point since NO ONE, except probably me, plays a single class, if a dual/multi is available. BG just makes it so easy, even for fairly extreme builds to be attained, that there's really no reason not to unless you're using a class that has uninterrupted scaling or roleplaying. (since I stopped modifying/rerolling my stat rolls, it's become extremely rare to end up with the stats needed to dual)
From a PnP standpoint, down time for dual-classing is HORRIBLE, because it could be weeks or months, or maybe even years before you got anywhere near being able to use your old class without penalty if you were a higher level build, such as a 9 dual or 13 dual. Now, unlike BG though, you never lose your old abilities, you simply gain no xp for any encounter/situation you rely on them, until you've surpassed your old class. (assuming you even had the stats to dual in the first place).
Demi-humans though had little reason to not take a multi. They were race capped the same as if they were single class (though if they had REALLY high scores the single class could go a up to 3 levels higher). And the leveling rate was almost negligible. And unlike a dual, you didn't need godly stats and had no downtime. Though your options for kits were limited, since a kit had to be specifically mentioned as a valid combination or it wasn't available.
BG though, a 9 dual is a joke. And a 13 isn't too awful, especially if you play with a smaller party. And if you have no qualms about abusing the hell out xp sources (kicking out partymates, scribe/erase/rescribe, ambush farming, etc) you can do it even sooner.
And the issue with Fighter>X dual proficiencies.
I'd also like to see some more novelty spells to prank your enemies. Stuff that wild mages get on occasion, but you can control them. Like cantrips, summon squirrels, or alter appearance (change enemies to shimmer like the guy in nashkel carnival). It would be useless in battle but fun to play with.
2.) Many enemies are immune to one or several elements in the game, so they wouldn't be used that much to start with. It's a great idea and i'm all for having more of them in the game, but i'll still go with spells like skull trap instead.
3.) I think greater magic missile would be over the top. There is already ways to make the normal magic missile very powerful and get a crap loud of damage out of them, so the greater version would end up being disgustingly powerful.
4.) The robe of Vecna isn't hard to get to start with. There is so much money floating around in BG2 that the only limit to it is yourself. I pay 120 000 to gaelen (mod) to get any help from the thiefs, and that amount you can get quite early.
5.) The high level spell slots are so powerful that giving you any more of them will just make the gap between an arcane caster and the other classes just bigger. 1 extra level 9 spell can mean that you can refresh your whole arsenal of spells in combat (wish)
6.) Elemental spheres would be nice for flavor, but i don't see any use for them.
7.) This isn't needed. You get lower magic resistance early, and those few % won't make much of a difference. And you have some great summoning spells that should easily take care of the enemies that are immune or have magic resistance.
With mages and clerics, I find that being one spell level behind their pure-classed counterparts if they take another class, is an unwanted handicap through significant portions of the game's story material, and that handicap is a strong disincentive for me to multi. Dualing makes the handicap even worse.
As for the mage's magic system itself, I think it's pretty good as it is. It's certainly the best and most interesting of any crpg I've ever played.