Can you guys please do something with the balance school?? It's such a great class to play, I have been maining it since like 2011 - but man, it really has no place to fit in team play.
It wasn't meant to be the strongest hitter, or have the greatest blades, which is why is was never sold as a solo class. It's supposed thrive in teams, yet is completely outclassed by death for some reason.
Death, who is the best solo class in the game with god-like survivability, is also the best support class as well. You guys reduced v. plague from 3 pips to 2, making it castable every round if wanted. Self damage was changed to moon, which removed the 'penalty' for supporting others. Completely unstoppable in solo and team play currently.
And lastly, no offense really, but I'm sure we call all agree that Power Nova looks like complete dog breakfast. Anyone playing a balance from start to max (including new players' experience) will use that spell more than any other as their main hit - and that's what it looks like..
With that being said, I still love the game and thank you for many years of entertainment.
I agree, please do something about balance. I am also a balance main ever since I started wiz in 2012. and I feel like balance lacks so much. Even though balance is quite flexible, it sacrifices greatly for it with weak hits and weak blades. Sure balance has small shareable heal and balance blades are shareable but its not fair that they're so much less than everyone else's. But it seems like everything Balance was meant to do Death does better- good hits, good HP, self sufficient and supportive. Death is kind of superior to most schools. And as far as Super nova...eh. The appearance of Ra makes up for Super Nova but Ra's damage is too weak for the amount of pips, and Chimera is just too many pips for a small increase, so I don't bother. A change would be nice and please don't take away balance of power (spell).
I main Death, I don't disagree so far. I do think that changing self inflicted damage to moon damage was a mistake. When the self damage was death element, I had to be careful with my blades and I actually used death shields. Death damage also happened to make those spells scale in cost with my current power level. If I had a high death damage % then my healing or blade-granting or pip-giving was going to exact a higher health cost from my wizard.
There was something flavorful about paying health as a cost in order to do what other schools did. It justified the power of those spells. Moon damage is not significant at all later in the game. There is no risk, no need for strategy. The death wizard knocking themselves out, in order to revive the life wizard, was dramatic. Does that happen anymore?
A school's penalties should not be removed. The penalties are part of why players select a specific school to play. The balance school suffers most when any school's penalty is reduced. Balance has a harsh penalty, mediocrity. As versatile as it is, it just can't compete with the other schools, unless those schools have equally harsh penalties. Death became known as the solo school because they didn't deal as much damage as the elemental schools, but they could keep themselves alive. Death could perform support functions in a group, but they had to put themselves at risk to do so. While their lower damage attacks could heal themselves, death wizards suffered from a low health pool. including a death wizard in a group wasn't always optimal. Storm wizards on the other hand used to have a tiny health pool and terrible accuracy. Storm wizards had to learn to play around frequent fizzles. If you included a storm wizard in a group you had to keep them healthy and you had to be prepared for their spells to fizzle multiple times. The upside to a storm wizard was that they dealt the most damage, full stop. Including a storm wizard in your group could end the battle quickly, one way or the other.
these days, at higher levels, everyone is fairly healthy, accurate, and can support each other with little trouble. There are no gaps for a balance wizard to fill in higher level play.
I feel that the developers need to remember to increase a school's flaws at the same rate that they increase that school's power level and efficiency.
I main Death, I don't disagree so far. I do think that changing self inflicted damage to moon damage was a mistake. When the self damage was death element, I had to be careful with my blades and I actually used death shields. Death damage also happened to make those spells scale in cost with my current power level. If I had a high death damage % then my healing or blade-granting or pip-giving was going to exact a higher health cost from my wizard.
There was something flavorful about paying health as a cost in order to do what other schools did. It justified the power of those spells. Moon damage is not significant at all later in the game. There is no risk, no need for strategy. The death wizard knocking themselves out, in order to revive the life wizard, was dramatic. Does that happen anymore?
A school's penalties should not be removed. The penalties are part of why players select a specific school to play. The balance school suffers most when any school's penalty is reduced. Balance has a harsh penalty, mediocrity. As versatile as it is, it just can't compete with the other schools, unless those schools have equally harsh penalties. Death became known as the solo school because they didn't deal as much damage as the elemental schools, but they could keep themselves alive. Death could perform support functions in a group, but they had to put themselves at risk to do so. While their lower damage attacks could heal themselves, death wizards suffered from a low health pool. including a death wizard in a group wasn't always optimal. Storm wizards on the other hand used to have a tiny health pool and terrible accuracy. Storm wizards had to learn to play around frequent fizzles. If you included a storm wizard in a group you had to keep them healthy and you had to be prepared for their spells to fizzle multiple times. The upside to a storm wizard was that they dealt the most damage, full stop. Including a storm wizard in your group could end the battle quickly, one way or the other.
these days, at higher levels, everyone is fairly healthy, accurate, and can support each other with little trouble. There are no gaps for a balance wizard to fill in higher level play.
I feel that the developers need to remember to increase a school's flaws at the same rate that they increase that school's power level and efficiency.
Please don't say increase the school's flaws. I like the idea that the playing feild is more leveled later in the game.
I have been playing balance for years. I love balance, it heals, shields, blades, traps and kills. What can it not do? I've played solo on my balance from level 1 to level 160, can take a while in some battles but I get there lol. I think balance spells need a little more oophm to them lately. I dont disagree about the death school, love my death wizard lots also. I do think balance school is underestimated a lot and kinda overlooked by KI rather often. I really wish KI would give balance school a bit more love once in a while. I also see a lot of balance wizards who dont seem to realize all the potential their balance wizard has. Wish we could change that also.
"I love balance, it heals, shields, blades, traps and kills" I agree, but every other school can do those exact same things as well.
"What can it not do?" Unfortunately, it can't support as effectively as a death, which is really odd. Trust me, no team is asking the death wizard to step aside to make room for a balance instead.
The issue isn't whether or not balance is a capable fighter, the issue is that everything balance can do death does better for some reason.
Balance can heal a teammate with an overtime heal < Death can heal a teammate instantly.
Balance can cast a universal blade on a teammate < Death can cast 2 universal blades on a teammate.
Balance can cast a universal trap. Death gets a universal trap..
"But death has to hurt themselves to cast some spells" When the devs changed self damage from death to moon, they removed the entire point of those spells existing in the first place - they are supposed to come with a cost. 250 moon damage to a wizard with 10k health is not a reasonable cost to completely overshadow the game's main support school (balance).
Why even change dark pact from giving 1 blade to 2? Not only giving 2 universal blades in one turn, but changed to moon damage as well lol.
Why change v. plague from 3 pips to 2? Was 3 pips asking too much to be able to shut down the entire enemy team? In it's current state, v. plague can be cast every round without a loss in tempo.
Death has gained tremendous buffs to it's utility set over the years, and the decisions to do so have come off extremely arbitrary. I don't see how it makes sense for a class to be the best at solo survivability AND the best at team support as well. Like honestly, what are the cons of playing death?
Last example I'll give:
For one pip death can -20 on the enemies. For one pip balance can +20 on friends.
For 2 pips death can -40 on the enemies. Think balance will get a +40 on all friends for 2 pips? Won't happen, and I suspect the rationale along the lines of "+40 on all friends for 2 pips is way too OP", while at the same time seeing nothing wrong with death cutting the entire enemy team's damage in half for 2 pips.
Anyway, I'm not holding my breath that the devs will attempt to correct any of these spell balancing issues. On one end of the spectrum you have schools like ice and myth who are literally begging for some decent utility so they can be viable in teams, and then on the other hand you have death which basically just does everything you can imagine with no cons whatsoever.
. I like the idea that the playing feild is more leveled later in the game.