Hello, I'd first like to introduce myself. I am Dakota Ravenrunner, and I've been an avid player of wizard101 since 2012. When I first started playing the game, Avalon was the max world, and I remember being so excited for the release of Azteca. I've experienced all parts of the game, and am most enthusiastic about the following 3 topics: PVE strategies, Pet training, and house decorating. My first, and main wizard, is Balance, but I am very avid of the spirit schools as well.
In today's post, I'd like to tackle the concept of moon magic. I'll first start with an analysis of the past, and present state of it, and then move on towards what I would hope for the future of moon magic. I fully realize Moon magic is more of a backburner topic, especially with larger concepts currently in the works, such as gear auditing, spellements, and PVP. But hopefully this may come to "spark" some interest.
We, as wizards, are first introduced to moon magic in celestia, which is roughly around level 50. The concept of polymorphing as a school identity, while interesting, is admittedly very niche in practice.After all, why would you want to become something else, when you've worked so hard to achive the wizard you're currently playing? The first approach to this polymorph concept was full of flaws. A multi-turn polymorph, which completely changed your spells, health, and base stats. Often times, you'd feel weaker with the loss in damage stats, loss in health, and loss in resistances. You'd fizzle more due to the loss in bonus accuracy from your gear, and you'd obtain white pips more often due to the loss in power pip chance. The only way a polymorph of this type could ever feel impactful, was if a much lower level wizard were to utilize it. However, you couldn't train these polymorphs until you were of the appropriate level. The only real way to utilize these awful polymorphs in a meaningful way, was for a lower level player to have access to polymorph treasure cards, or have item card polymorphs, such as the dragon spear wands from the old phoenix of the hoard pack. Additionally, while the spell itself to polymorph into something is of the moon school, You'd polymorph into something that was one of the classic wizard schools. You'd only see that cool moon cast animation once, then bam! for the next 6 rounds your an ice gobbler or life treant. To reiterate, the concept of morphism for a school is questionable at first glance, and through this initial approach, was exceptionally terrible in practice. In hindsight, these very first "moon" spells felt more like a worse version of a school mastery amulet.
Fast-forward multiple years, and we arrive at Azteca. We are now becoming exceptionally strong wizards, with rank 10 combat spells, Tartarus gear, and hovering around the levels of 80-90. This world brought wonderful expansions to both the sun and star schools, but was beyond lackluster in the moon department. none of the major flaws were addressed or fixed. The polymorph spells were functionally identical to the one's we already could learn in celestial. Moon magic needed a revolutionary change, not a copy and paste. In fact, not adressing any of the issues with moon magic only made the loss in stats when polymorphing, feel even that much more hindering, since our normal stats had continue to grow for the next 40 levels.
Fast-forward a bit more, and we have the release of Khryslais, with the famed eclipse tower where we are introduced to shadow magic for the very first time. By this point in the game, we can expect to be level 90-100. This also brought a very fresh and new approach to moon magic. The multi-turn, non-moon school, stat hindering polymorphs that we knew for so long, are now re-imagined into a single turn morphing hit with fun bonus effects!The prior question of "why would you want to become something else, when you've worked so hard to achieve the wizard you're currently playing?" is no longer an issue, as the morph lasts for a single spell cast! For this reason alone, that is why I feel this change in approach to moon magic spells was so meaningful. Something interesting about these moon spells is the fact that they are now hits. and this unfortunately brought the new big issue for moon spells. While they may do life, or fire damage, they do not scale off life or fire damage stats. They instead only scale off universal damage, similarly to how shadow magic damage is buffed by universal damage. This in of itself isn't bad. In fact, I think that scaling off moon damage is the appropriate path to be pursuing, and I'd even argue that the Khrysalis shift spells should be changed from dealing life or fire damage, to purely moon damage. While this change to how a moon magic spell functions is infinitely better than the original long-term morphing design, it still has its major flaw. In one word, the issue is accessibility. There are not allot of ways to boost moon damage, and the existing ways are inefficient. Only two schools can utilize all the khrysalis moon magic spells efficiently, the balance and death schools, due to their universal buffs. This is a horrendous statistic, when 5/7 schools cannot efficiently utilize something that is meant to be accessible for everyone. Even then, I think I am rather generous when I say that balance and death can be "effecient" with moon magic hits. You are forced to use universal damage gear, which is incomparable to regular school gear, such as current day merciless and dragoon, and even prior day malistare/hades. On my max balance, When using moon magic and utilizing universal damage gear, I comfortable achieve 100-110 universal damage with what is readily available to me. This is of course inferior to having 150%+ school damage, and using your regular school gear/spells, but It's a sacrifice I'm willing to endure to enjoy the moon thematic. After all, the reason to play a game is to have fun, and I have fun using moon hits.I can also easily acknowledge that most people would NOT want to endure such a sacrifice, because losing out on so much damage is understandably not a fun thing. At the end of the day, this same concept is what made the original moon magic feel so horrendous. The loss of stats. Instead of physically losing raw stats with the old polymorphs, we now lose out on stats in the form of having to choose universal, inferior gear.
When I envision the future of moon magic, what do I see going forward? Well, a number of things. To start,a dedicated moon blade/trap would be nice, so that buffing moon damage is more accessible to all schools that aren't death and balance. I think that would address the first major issue. The second major issue is how moon magic often feels like a loss of stats, or a weaker alternative that seems silly to even be investing time and resources into. It has always felt like you have to make a sacrifice of your efficiency to utilize moon magic. This second issue can be approach through a number of ways. you can make universal damage and universal crit more widely available. However, I truly feel revolutionary level of spells or mechanics are needed to be introduced into the game, because what moon magic was in the past, and what moon magic currently still feels like, is inefficiency. At this point, the "give me more universal stats" feels like a band-aid more than anything. A third issue that I have no foresight on is the longevity of moon magic. Unfortunately, we cannot "master" moon magic, and power pips are essentially useless when utilizing moon spells. This puts a hard limit of a 7 cost moon spell. Outside of creating a "mastery of astral schools" amulet, I don't see a long future for moon magic damage. This is concerning, because I genuinely enjoy that moon magic has been a fun source of damage since the release of Khrysalis spells, but they are already in an underwhelming and inefficient state, and as power creep continues to grow with every new world, the moon spells will simply continue to fade away. Sun and Star schools don't really face these issues, as those schools have developed into purely supportive, 0 pip spells. They don't actively rely on pip usage, and they aren't trying to be a damage output in the source of star & sun magic. But moon magic does consume pips, and moon magic is a damage source.Most importantly, I appreciate and enjoy the fact that moon magic has become this, and with the right ideas, I feel the issues I've listed can be amended, and the school itself can be cultivated into something better. I genuinely hope to see moon magic develop further in the foreseeable future, while maintaining the identity of a damage source of moon magic through short-term morphism.
Hello, I'd first like to introduce myself. I am Dakota Ravenrunner, and I've been an avid player of wizard101 since 2012. When I first started playing the game, Avalon was the max world, and I remember being so excited for the release of Azteca. I've experienced all parts of the game, and am most enthusiastic about the following 3 topics: PVE strategies, Pet training, and house decorating. My first, and main wizard, is Balance, but I am very avid of the spirit schools as well.
In today's post, I'd like to tackle the concept of moon magic. I'll first start with an analysis of the past, and present state of it, and then move on towards what I would hope for the future of moon magic. I fully realize Moon magic is more of a backburner topic, especially with larger concepts currently in the works, such as gear auditing, spellements, and PVP. But hopefully this may come to "spark" some interest.
We, as wizards, are first introduced to moon magic in celestia, which is roughly around level 50. The concept of polymorphing as a school identity, while interesting, is admittedly very niche in practice.After all, why would you want to become something else, when you've worked so hard to achive the wizard you're currently playing? The first approach to this polymorph concept was full of flaws. A multi-turn polymorph, which completely changed your spells, health, and base stats. Often times, you'd feel weaker with the loss in damage stats, loss in health, and loss in resistances. You'd fizzle more due to the loss in bonus accuracy from your gear, and you'd obtain white pips more often due to the loss in power pip chance. The only way a polymorph of this type could ever feel impactful, was if a much lower level wizard were to utilize it. However, you couldn't train these polymorphs until you were of the appropriate level. The only real way to utilize these awful polymorphs in a meaningful way, was for a lower level player to have access to polymorph treasure cards, or have item card polymorphs, such as the dragon spear wands from the old phoenix of the hoard pack. Additionally, while the spell itself to polymorph into something is of the moon school, You'd polymorph into something that was one of the classic wizard schools. You'd only see that cool moon cast animation once, then bam! for the next 6 rounds your an ice gobbler or life treant. To reiterate, the concept of morphism for a school is questionable at first glance, and through this initial approach, was exceptionally terrible in practice. In hindsight, these very first "moon" spells felt more like a worse version of a school mastery amulet.
Fast-forward multiple years, and we arrive at Azteca. We are now becoming exceptionally strong wizards, with rank 10 combat spells, Tartarus gear, and hovering around the levels of 80-90. This world brought wonderful expansions to both the sun and star schools, but was beyond lackluster in the moon department. none of the major flaws were addressed or fixed. The polymorph spells were functionally identical to the one's we already could learn in celestial. Moon magic needed a revolutionary change, not a copy and paste. In fact, not adressing any of the issues with moon magic only made the loss in stats when polymorphing, feel even that much more hindering, since our normal stats had continue to grow for the next 40 levels.
Fast-forward a bit more, and we have the release of Khryslais, with the famed eclipse tower where we are introduced to shadow magic for the very first time. By this point in the game, we can expect to be level 90-100. This also brought a very fresh and new approach to moon magic. The multi-turn, non-moon school, stat hindering polymorphs that we knew for so long, are now re-imagined into a single turn morphing hit with fun bonus effects!The prior question of "why would you want to become something else, when you've worked so hard to achieve the wizard you're currently playing?" is no longer an issue, as the morph lasts for a single spell cast! For this reason alone, that is why I feel this change in approach to moon magic spells was so meaningful. Something interesting about these moon spells is the fact that they are now hits. and this unfortunately brought the new big issue for moon spells. While they may do life, or fire damage, they do not scale off life or fire damage stats. They instead only scale off universal damage, similarly to how shadow magic damage is buffed by universal damage. This in of itself isn't bad. In fact, I think that scaling off moon damage is the appropriate path to be pursuing, and I'd even argue that the Khrysalis shift spells should be changed from dealing life or fire damage, to purely moon damage. While this change to how a moon magic spell functions is infinitely better than the original long-term morphing design, it still has its major flaw. In one word, the issue is accessibility. There are not allot of ways to boost moon damage, and the existing ways are inefficient. Only two schools can utilize all the khrysalis moon magic spells efficiently, the balance and death schools, due to their universal buffs. This is a horrendous statistic, when 5/7 schools cannot efficiently utilize something that is meant to be accessible for everyone. Even then, I think I am rather generous when I say that balance and death can be "effecient" with moon magic hits. You are forced to use universal damage gear, which is incomparable to regular school gear, such as current day merciless and dragoon, and even prior day malistare/hades. On my max balance, When using moon magic and utilizing universal damage gear, I comfortable achieve 100-110 universal damage with what is readily available to me. This is of course inferior to having 150%+ school damage, and using your regular school gear/spells, but It's a sacrifice I'm willing to endure to enjoy the moon thematic. After all, the reason to play a game is to have fun, and I have fun using moon hits.I can also easily acknowledge that most people would NOT want to endure such a sacrifice, because losing out on so much damage is understandably not a fun thing. At the end of the day, this same concept is what made the original moon magic feel so horrendous. The loss of stats. Instead of physically losing raw stats with the old polymorphs, we now lose out on stats in the form of having to choose universal, inferior gear.
When I envision the future of moon magic, what do I see going forward? Well, a number of things. To start,a dedicated moon blade/trap would be nice, so that buffing moon damage is more accessible to all schools that aren't death and balance. I think that would address the first major issue. The second major issue is how moon magic often feels like a loss of stats, or a weaker alternative that seems silly to even be investing time and resources into. It has always felt like you have to make a sacrifice of your efficiency to utilize moon magic. This second issue can be approach through a number of ways. you can make universal damage and universal crit more widely available. However, I truly feel revolutionary level of spells or mechanics are needed to be introduced into the game, because what moon magic was in the past, and what moon magic currently still feels like, is inefficiency. At this point, the "give me more universal stats" feels like a band-aid more than anything. A third issue that I have no foresight on is the longevity of moon magic. Unfortunately, we cannot "master" moon magic, and power pips are essentially useless when utilizing moon spells. This puts a hard limit of a 7 cost moon spell. Outside of creating a "mastery of astral schools" amulet, I don't see a long future for moon magic damage. This is concerning, because I genuinely enjoy that moon magic has been a fun source of damage since the release of Khrysalis spells, but they are already in an underwhelming and inefficient state, and as power creep continues to grow with every new world, the moon spells will simply continue to fade away. Sun and Star schools don't really face these issues, as those schools have developed into purely supportive, 0 pip spells. They don't actively rely on pip usage, and they aren't trying to be a damage output in the source of star & sun magic. But moon magic does consume pips, and moon magic is a damage source.Most importantly, I appreciate and enjoy the fact that moon magic has become this, and with the right ideas, I feel the issues I've listed can be amended, and the school itself can be cultivated into something better. I genuinely hope to see moon magic develop further in the foreseeable future, while maintaining the identity of a damage source of moon magic through short-term morphism.
What an in-depth and analytical post on this matter. I like the detail you put into this.
I, too, have felt that Moon School Spells have not had the chance to properly develop and realize their potential. Your points are definitely worth considering, especially in regards to the difference between Shift spells and flat-out transformations.
Shift spells are definitely the direction that Moon magic is most likely to take in future. Something that I might like to see in future is the reduction of the Khrysalis Shift spells to just 2 pips instead of 3. Since Shift spells can't boost from Power Pips, and since their damage output tends to be on the lower side of today's power balance anyways, a pip reduction might make them more useful as utility spells that still have a damage output.
And on another note, more Moon spells! We've had an entire story arc (and a half) come and go since the Shift spells were introduced in Khrysalis. Seeing new additions to this often ignored school of magic might be a good way to expand its usability and the strategies of certain players.
Hello, I'd first like to introduce myself. I am Dakota Ravenrunner, and I've been an avid player of wizard101 since 2012. When I first started playing the game, Avalon was the max world, and I remember being so excited for the release of Azteca. I've experienced all parts of the game, and am most enthusiastic about the following 3 topics: PVE strategies, Pet training, and house decorating. My first, and main wizard, is Balance, but I am very avid of the spirit schools as well.
