I suggest increasing the pip capacity. Our wizard is surrounded by an entire dueling circle yet we still only have 7 pip slots. Why not increase the pip slots so that our pips can go around the entire dueling circle? Alongside an update like this, it would also be a good idea to add a star spell that could double the amount of pips you get per round while it's active. So while this aura is active, you'd get 2 pips per round (ofc with the chance of them being power pips) instead of merely 1.
Additionally, the pip conversion stat should be abolished and instead pip conversion should happen automatically for wizards of all levels without any stat needed. Having pip conversion as a stat is silly if you think about it. What if we found out that the damage displayed on our attack spells is actually much lower than what's advertised, and to solve this, KingsIsle introduces a sun enchant to increase a spell's damage to the damage that's actually displayed on the card? That would obviously be silly, but that's exactly what was done with pip conversion. So yeah, pip conversion shouldn't require a stat, instead it should be done automatically (perhaps with an option to disable it in the settings, since I know some people don't like pip conversion).
I know shadow pips were introduced so we wouldn't hit the pip maximum, but that's only a band-aid solution, so the pip maximum should definitely be increased still.
Quicken is the aura you are mentioning, but only mobs currently have access to it. The spell costs 4 pips and doubles your pip gain for 4 rounds.
I do agree we should have more than a bar of 7 pips, but I also agree with KI that more than a bar of 7 pips is unnecessary and difficult to balance. However I did come up with an idea a while ago: Force Pips!
Force Pips would be the next phase of Power Pips as they are equivalent to 3 pips, however they are not 3 pips but act as a second bar of pips on top of your Power Pips and require 14 pips to start accumulating. For example: if I had 3 Force Pips and 4 Power Pips, any spell including mastery spells would use the 3 pips from the Force Pips first, then proceed to use your Normal and Power Pips as usual; Scarecrow (7 pips & mastery) would use the 3 Force Pips and 2 of the Power Pips, and Rebirth (7 pips & non-mastery) would use the 3 Force Pips and 4 of the Power Pips.
This would allow a player to have up to 21 pips, and I really don't think we would need ore than that. Also X-Pips spells would need to be changed to 1-14 pips if necessary.
Quicken is the aura you are mentioning, but only mobs currently have access to it. The spell costs 4 pips and doubles your pip gain for 4 rounds.
I do agree we should have more than a bar of 7 pips, but I also agree with KI that more than a bar of 7 pips is unnecessary and difficult to balance. However I did come up with an idea a while ago: Force Pips!
Force Pips would be the next phase of Power Pips as they are equivalent to 3 pips, however they are not 3 pips but act as a second bar of pips on top of your Power Pips and require 14 pips to start accumulating. For example: if I had 3 Force Pips and 4 Power Pips, any spell including mastery spells would use the 3 pips from the Force Pips first, then proceed to use your Normal and Power Pips as usual; Scarecrow (7 pips & mastery) would use the 3 Force Pips and 2 of the Power Pips, and Rebirth (7 pips & non-mastery) would use the 3 Force Pips and 4 of the Power Pips.
This would allow a player to have up to 21 pips, and I really don't think we would need ore than that. Also X-Pips spells would need to be changed to 1-14 pips if necessary.
Why is increasing the pip capacity unnecessary and difficult to balance? Under the current system there will come a time when normal pip cost and shadow pip cost are completely maxed out. That's an issue because KI would have to stop releasing new spells unless they increased the pip capacity.
Why is increasing the pip capacity unnecessary and difficult to balance? Under the current system there will come a time when normal pip cost and shadow pip cost are completely maxed out. That's an issue because KI would have to stop releasing new spells unless they increased the pip capacity.
I would rather see the introduction of Cantrips than increase the normal pip amount. Whether Cantrips be "Light Shadow pips" or "Trips" as in Triple pips (a super power pip that counts for 3 in school and power pip out of school). I am intrigued with both systems.
There is also still room to expand on the shadow pip front, (currently limit is two, but some mobs can get the full seven again)
Why is increasing the pip capacity unnecessary and difficult to balance? Under the current system there will come a time when normal pip cost and shadow pip cost are completely maxed out. That's an issue because KI would have to stop releasing new spells unless they increased the pip capacity.
they would have to be REALLY careful to keep things balanced (something they have a track record of not doing), and would need to have a REALLY good explanation for why we're still starting with 5 pips (something they've gotten better at over the years; explaining their logic). If we havent gotten wands with 2 starting power pips yet, even if for PvE only, we are never getting it. With the start of Aquila and Khrysalis, we now have +1 power pip wands at level 30, and +1 regular pip on spell books. We've had that for many years, and there has never been a wand which yields 2 starting pips, let alone 2 power pips outside of test realm (when Celestia was test realmed, 11 years ago).
Why is this important? Because monsters start with more power than we do, and bosses tend to start with max pips and tons of health. So, imagine a boss with tons of health, cheats, 30 starting pips (counting shadow pips), and multiple minions. Is this REALLY outside the realm of possibility? I think not.
Why is increasing the pip capacity unnecessary and difficult to balance? Under the current system there will come a time when normal pip cost and shadow pip cost are completely maxed out. That's an issue because KI would have to stop releasing new spells unless they increased the pip capacity.
Let's compare Ice to Storm at 14, 21, and 28 pips for regular and shadow hits. Storm: ~2.76x Damage & 1.6x CD Ice: ~2.57x Damage & 1.5x CD
So imagine a 6-6.5k difference of raw damage before buffs and resistances, THAT'S INSANE!!! If both were to blade twice, the damage difference would be ~11,000 damage so of course it would be extremely difficult to balance the game at that point. 14 pips is already a good stopping point, but if anything there should not be more than a 21 pip capacity.
Also KI could create spells that boost or change the effect of other spells (similar to how mutate currently does) so it's not a big issue.
they would have to be REALLY careful to keep things balanced (something they have a track record of not doing), and would need to have a REALLY good explanation for why we're still starting with 5 pips (something they've gotten better at over the years; explaining their logic). If we havent gotten wands with 2 starting power pips yet, even if for PvE only, we are never getting it. With the start of Aquila and Khrysalis, we now have +1 power pip wands at level 30, and +1 regular pip on spell books. We've had that for many years, and there has never been a wand which yields 2 starting pips, let alone 2 power pips outside of test realm (when Celestia was test realmed, 11 years ago).
Why is this important? Because monsters start with more power than we do, and bosses tend to start with max pips and tons of health. So, imagine a boss with tons of health, cheats, 30 starting pips (counting shadow pips), and multiple minions. Is this REALLY outside the realm of possibility? I think not.
That's a good point. I definitely agree that increasing the pip capacity would have to be accompanied with ways for us wizards to collect pips faster. That's the reason I suggested making the Quicken aura trainable (and probably at a lower pip cost too, 2 pips max). Adding more starting pips to gear would also be a good idea.
So imagine a 6-6.5k difference of raw damage before buffs and resistances, THAT'S INSANE!!! If both were to blade twice, the damage difference would be ~11,000 damage so of course it would be extremely difficult to balance the game at that point. 14 pips is already a good stopping point, but if anything there should not be more than a 21 pip capacity.
Also KI could create spells that boost or change the effect of other spells (similar to how mutate currently does) so it's not a big issue.
Well, the damage increases wouldn't necessarily have to increase in the way described. Not all spells have the same amount of damage per pip even within the same school.
Also, most max level wizards already reach insane levels of damage even now. So long as the difficulty of the world + the stats of gear adjusts to it, it can work out I think.
I would rather see the introduction of Cantrips than increase the normal pip amount. Whether Cantrips be "Light Shadow pips" or "Trips" as in Triple pips (a super power pip that counts for 3 in school and power pip out of school). I am intrigued with both systems.
There is also still room to expand on the shadow pip front, (currently limit is two, but some mobs can get the full seven again)
Both could also be done, assuming there are additional changes to ensure balance with the new system as others have pointed out in this thread.
Also if we ever get 2 shadow pips hits for our schools, then that would be equivalent to 7 pips of extra damage for a maximum of about 21 pips of damage.
Quicken is the aura you are mentioning, but only mobs currently have access to it. The spell costs 4 pips and doubles your pip gain for 4 rounds.
I do agree we should have more than a bar of 7 pips, but I also agree with KI that more than a bar of 7 pips is unnecessary and difficult to balance. However I did come up with an idea a while ago: Force Pips!
Force Pips would be the next phase of Power Pips as they are equivalent to 3 pips, however they are not 3 pips but act as a second bar of pips on top of your Power Pips and require 14 pips to start accumulating. For example: if I had 3 Force Pips and 4 Power Pips, any spell including mastery spells would use the 3 pips from the Force Pips first, then proceed to use your Normal and Power Pips as usual; Scarecrow (7 pips & mastery) would use the 3 Force Pips and 2 of the Power Pips, and Rebirth (7 pips & non-mastery) would use the 3 Force Pips and 4 of the Power Pips.
This would allow a player to have up to 21 pips, and I really don't think we would need ore than that. Also X-Pips spells would need to be changed to 1-14 pips if necessary.
This isnt entirely true though. We CAN get it, but only through gear. According to W101 Central, you can get a maycast version of it (as well as Impede which causes the target to not gain any pips for 4 rounds) on the Battlemage Staff and Shield (level of gear 100+). Since they're maycast, it doesnt matter what the pip cost is though (which is good). If we were to get a trained version, I agree that the cost should be lowered (for either spell)
Well, the damage increases wouldn't necessarily have to increase in the way described. Not all spells have the same amount of damage per pip even within the same school.
Also, most max level wizards already reach insane levels of damage even now. So long as the difficulty of the world + the stats of gear adjusts to it, it can work out I think.
True, utilities and AoEs decrease the damage, but the values I calculated only apply if both wizards have the same multipliers.
At 21 pips the damage would be 11.6k for the Storm and 6.7k for the Ice. The Ice would need two 35% blades/traps or a Feint just to match the Storm's damage, meanwhile the Storm would only need a single 45% blade/trap to bring the damage difference to 10k.
The damage-resist-pierce-health balance for PvP works out well considering shields and such, but it becomes unbalanced when looking at PvE.
If we had more useful utilities for PvE then it might be possible to reasonably increase the pip capacity, but as of now I see it as unreasonable.
That's a good point. I definitely agree that increasing the pip capacity would have to be accompanied with ways for us wizards to collect pips faster. That's the reason I suggested making the Quicken aura trainable (and probably at a lower pip cost too, 2 pips max). Adding more starting pips to gear would also be a good idea.
I wonder what people would think of gear that yields pips to follow PP chance, or just yield power pips on their own? Like, upgrade the decks to give power pips instead of regular pips for PvE.
