User:Fro/Potential fix

Potential fix for Ritualist Spirits

I'm not sure I believe if it's possible to balance the defense spirits properly in the current game without a 'major' overhaul. I'm not so lazy as to not offer a suggestion however :)

It's far safer and easier to balance single target prots, so a possible solution is to make them target specific allies, as questionable as that is. First of all, the problem spreads further than just the singular skills, so I'll try and list the most pertinent issues...

• 1. Creation Time:

Prohibitive in a dynamic game that favors disruption.

• 2. Spirit Forests:

They can clog up the battlefield, rendering melee mobility a problem. entirely Unacceptable.

• 3. Spawning Power:

Is just not that good. It does however have the power to fix both of the issues above. It can make these new, more powerful spirits the preserve of the ritualist, balancing them by force attribute spec., and offering arbitrary rules to govern them all.

Proposed game changes

Only 1 Ritualist Binding Ritual can be used by anyone player at any time. All 3 second creation Ritualist binding rituals become 4 seconds.

• Spawning Power changes:

For every 3 points of Spawning Power, you can use 1 additional Spirit at any one time. For each point, creation time of spirits is reduced by 6%. For every point you also receive +2 armour (non-stacking, maximum 24), and +4 health while carrying an item.

This is pretty drastic I agree, but would come with changes to the descriptions of all the ritualist binding rituals to make them more active use, rather than drop & forget, passive use. The creation time adjustments is to make 5 second cast spirits about 1 second at 13 attributes. 4 second spirits will be slightly under that, but essentially about the speed of 3/4 cast skills. At the lower break-point of 9, 5 seconds becomes slightly over 2, and 4 becomes just under 2. At the splash ranks of 4 (left over points of twin-spec), 5 becomes just under 4, and 4 becomes 3.

So... Big attribute investment let's players use the 5 second guys at more active speeds, while the normal,

splash rank let's people use them mostly like before (3 second creation times mostly), with a slight improvement to the 5 second ones.

The packet-carrying buff is to support flag runners, and give Ritualists more unique qualities there. The non-stacking clause of the additional armour, and maximum is to prevent skills pushing AL too high. So Kaolai for example won't result in warrior eclipsing armour.

Example skill changes

I'll focus on the 2 main types of Ritualist spirits. Protective and offensive (don't much care about these, but they are affected as well so...).

• Shelter:

Firstly, why make Shelter a spirit version of Prot Spirit? A good question, but since it's kinda' useless as it is, let's see what we can do. If it's cost structure were different, and it's durability decreased, it could function a little differently and look something like this:

10 | 4(or 5) | 10

Binding Ritual. Create a Level 1...7 Spirit. Target ally within its range cannot lose more than 10% maximum health and gains +4 health regeneration. When this Spirit prevents damage, it loses xx...xx Health. This spirit lasts 2...8 seconds.

The idea here is to make it fast enough (with high spawning) to support actively, but still not be as durable as monk prots. The idea is that at something like 14 spec, 4-6 warrior swings at the same target (just Frenzy c-space even, no skills) will consume all the defensive ability of that cast, while 1-2 on the actual spirit will clear it much faster. The number of strikes on the target are damage independent, while damage to the spirit is not. For example a strong caster hit would ideally nuke it completely in one blow of an average 100 damage skill.

So. it's not too strong to bog things down or replace monks, but could still find some use as monk support in heavy pressure environments. there are other issues, I won't bloat this with anymore than I already have, but this is the general idea. (Another potential idea is to keep some of this but adjust it to a much smaller AoE, and balance accordingly...)

• Bloodsong:

Probably the most obvious gun-turret spirit. The proposed change for activating the attack guys (since the spirit change would break them) affects this more than most since it's life-steal, so I'll make an example suggestion:

5 | 4 | 10

Binding Ritual. Create a level 1...7 Spirit who dies after 2...5 attacks or after 5...30 seconds. Attacks by that Spirit steal up to 10...45 Health.

Essentially it has limited attacks but can be used more often. It also has increased life-steal (similar in number to Nightmare Weapon. The numbers are probably off, but that's the general gist of the idea.

I'm not entirely convinced by this long wall of text personally, but this is an attempt to not just say 'spirits suck...'. I'm saying 'spirits suck... bu heres something that might work...'. A lot of people are going to absolutely hate these (for perhaps good reason) but here it is... So... 'Ducks under flame-proof shield' Discuss... ^_^ -Fro 14:33, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

What's this... "10 | 4(or 5) | 10 "

Are you suggesting a spirit that lasts 10 seconds... is worth spending a third+ of that time to cast? Is this a joke? On top of that, rits are already the singly most interrupt-prone class, what with their already huge spirit casting times, and nearly complete lack of blocking skills. Not to mention this drastically increases the energy cost of keeping spirits up, in a class with little or no energy management via their primary. HP while carrying an item is just going to kill them when they have to drop the item btw. Good ideas... if you're not playing a rit, which you're clearly not. MrGrendel 21:06, 20 April 2008 (UTC)