Thoughts on magic in Mortal Online 2

Eskaldar

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Jun 25, 2020
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Hi everyone.
While waiting for the addition of magic to the game, I would like to know what new spells you would like to see in the game? I also want to share with you my ideas in this direction.

Most of you probably know how animals could be controlled in MO1: taming, the domination school of magic, and necromancer-summoned creatures. But what if you were given the ability to not just give orders like stand, attack, or follow me to the creature you control, but to directly control it as your character, to see the world from its eyes? Many of you have seen in the series "Game of thrones" such characters as VARG. Imagine if there was such magic in MO 2? Well, or many played WOW and there the priest has a mind control spell. I'd like to see something like this in MO 2, wouldn't you?

In the history of the Slavs, there was a Prince, the Magician Vseslav'evich. And it was not just a Prince, but a Prince who could turn into a wolf, i.e. he was a werewolf. In other MMOs there is such magic and I thought, imagine how it would be possible to implement this in MO 2? Turning into a wolf, a bear, or even a bull. How about this?

What to say, magic in MMO should not just be for show, it should be useful and fit into this world. I've always liked realism or something like it, although sometimes it can make the gameplay much more difficult. You don't know what I mean yet? I'm talking about the night in MO 2. What is in the first and second part of MO night is what makes you tense, whether it's moving from one city to another or exploring new territories or even fighting at night. All this is very difficult to do when you are walking or riding and you are surrounded by pitch darkness. The maximum that can be seen is a couple of steps and then if there is a torch. In this regard, I always wondered why not add the magic of a "cat's eye" to such a realistic world. What is this spell? It's just being able to see at night, almost like during the day. An example is the game DMoMM (Dark Messiah of Might and Magic), where the character has the very first spell.

In addition to the "cat's eye", you can add a spell such as: magic light (a glowing ball that follows the magician and illuminates the path).

Here I would also add "breathing under water", "walking on water" or, for example, turning water into ice. What is the latter for, you may ask? For example, you want to cross a river or lake. Then you can freeze the water under your feet and create a road of ice to cross the river / lake in a straight line.

I remember the developers talking about crowd control spells when the MO1 was being created. They didn't want to add this kind of spell. However, imagine a "quicksand Sarduca" spell that would work over an area (AOE). You could create real quicksand traps in the path of your enemies, forcing them to go around or get stuck in these Sands.

I remember meeting Ritualists in MO1. And it seems that MO1 was supposed to have ritual magic. But it didn't happen. And I've thought about it more than once. How it could be implemented. What rituals could be performed and so on. For example, I think it would be very interesting if the ritual would require the power of not one magician, but several. When 2, 3, 4 or more magicians combine to create something truly powerful and deadly that 1 Mage would not be able to do.

Imagine a picture: your Clan / Guild is attacking an enemy castle. The enemies disappeared behind high and strong walls, which you have repeatedly tried to take, but to no avail. And then the battle mages come out and begin their infernal ritual. They create a circle in the center of which they place a young, wild and unbridled stallion. The start of the ritual. The power that your 3 mages create is so strong that the animal is torn apart in wild agony. The soul of the animal rushes and rages with all its might, but the magicians combine their efforts not to let the soul out of the circle and subjugating it for a short time, direct all the rage of the spirit in the right direction. Towards the enemy's castle gate. The spirit breaks out of the circle in the right direction and, rushing through the clearing, flies into the gate, after which there is a deafening explosion, as if a stone was fired from a manganon.

The power of spells in MO1 could be seen in elementalists. I really like the idea of this school and how it is implemented. However, in MO1, there are a lot of attacking spells or spells that help in the attack, while there are not so many defensive spells. What gives you protection from magic in MO1? The psy parameter, reducing damage at a high parameter or giving a chance to resist. Next, Magic reflect is a spell that acts as a buff, i.e. it is hung on itself or a friend and weighs 15-30 minutes. If a spell is flying at you, the spell will be returned back to the person who threw it at you. The spell is worth not to say that much, but not a little. At the same time, it is unlikely that you will be able to use it actively, which means that you only have Heal for protection. Yes, there is still Corrupt, but this is just a DOT that deals periodic damage and does not allow the enemy mage to cast until he removes it from himself. I would like to see more opportunities to protect against magic with spells. What would it be an active spell, by the type of block / parry in a foot soldier. How can this be implemented? For example, I remember the well-known Skyrim and the Mirror spell. When playing as a mage and countering other mages, you constantly had to use a similar spell. But since there is a reflect in MO1, I think I would change this spell so that it would not reflect the spell back, but simply absorb it. The principle is simple. As soon as you see that someone is going to throw a spell at you, you press this spell and hold the button so that the spell hangs on you. If an enemy spell hits you, instead of taking away 50 life points, you lose 50 mana points.

Speaking of protection from magic, I came up with an idea, and why the game does not have for example spells that create an area without magic. The Sorcerer class has something similar in TESO. Well, or for example, you could add the spell "Silence", which is imposed on the enemy magician, he would not be able to cast spells for a certain period of time.

I understand that these are just my ideas and someone may not like them, but someone will like them. That's why I created this theme. Please join the discussion.
P.S. I would be happy to see the developers ' opinion on this topic.
 
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Eldrath

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Jun 18, 2020
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the Jungle. Meditating on things to come.
I think turning into an animal is probably easier to balance than controlling one. So I would love for that to be a part of animism, when ever that school comes.

As for PvE I would prefer if there are enemies that magic users are extremely good at dealing with. Spirits, ghosts, minor demons, wood creatures. Thus a mage would have his own niche in PvE that makes sense from a lore perspective. It also creates another incentive to roll a mage since you might want to limit certain creature to ONLY take damage from magic.

Obviously any kind of stun against players is out of the question, but could work against mobs.

As far as pets (tamed, magical, dominated) go I think they need to be less powerful, cost less skill points to control, less time to grind for (ideally next to no grind, but rather walking the wild) and be more distinguished from each other. This way they will be a fun addition to a combat build rather than the main feature and skill based combat can be center. If pets are expensive, take hundreds of skillpoints to control player WILL demands for them to be so powerful that skill will be overshadowed.
 
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MaDeuce

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I would like to bring a Novel Mage to life in this sandbox, Seeing that discovery is the quest and outcome of this game.. Character creation for a Mage and its life experience should be considered when extracting creativity into art. I believe when dabbling in recipes, the creative ingrediencies should add flavor... Not just Spice. If you have a spell... It must have been in your Mortal life purpose to have it. Variety for the casual masses.. Rarity for those who dabble and seek for Mortal life purpose. Donation to advance Sir, as the arts are time consuming..
 

ElPerro

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Jun 9, 2020
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Do I want more magic in MO2? Yes. But I want it balanced. The things you are suggesting are WAY too different, OP, or just straight up not likely to ever get devoted enough development time/money to ever be made. Light spells already exist in different forms in different magic schools. Elementalism has a light spell that is decent. Water breathing is also in Elementalism. Magic reflect should STAY how it is and NEVER become a buff. Night vision is already in the cladd gifts for Sheevra.

What this game needs is more skill based shots for magic users like how archery is. Leaving ecumenical the way it is in MO1 for MO2 would be terrible considering every character has increased run speed to as fast as some slower mounts from MO1. Leaving the spells the same would make magic in pvp and PVE 50% harder because of the lack of range and ability to even keep up in a fight based purely on the need to STAND STILL and cast. Not to mention PVP is now faster in a sense because of the run speed changes and there are a lot more ways to break line of sight now because of the terrain.

What magic needs is a way to combat rushing melee characters or fast aggressive mobs. Whether it’s a stronger corrupt, like hands or roots coming out of the ground to massively slow down the enemy and pull on them... or like an ice/slippery area type spell that causes mobs and players to get knocked down... There is little to no CC, only 3 heals (technically 4), and a handful of spells that actually affect PVE in MO1.

You would die to even a bandit in MO1 if you tried with ecumenical even with completely maxed stats and getting the jump on the enemy while also landing every hit. Maybe a stoneflesh spell is needed for mages... give us increased defense for a duration that goes up while we have less armor on (which honestly isn’t even what I want but it would help with PVE) or give a greatly increased PVE damage bonus on mobs (strictly mobs not players). Even the PVE bonus wouldn’t be enough now though considering how fast stuff moves and the range of engagement. Something like a crocodile would be able to run up on you and slaughter you as a mage with 0 chance of you even getting away if magic stays as is. The increase in player speed and mob speed is apparent and magic AT THE MINIMUM needs a big range buff or we will be stuck trying too hard to get too close to an enemy and have no time to get away, forget about killing the enemy.

Magic is strong in Ultimate Online... Bring that sense of power to MO2. We should feel capable and confident as maxed out mages, not like squishy heal bots because that’s all people are in most cases within MO1.

??????

But player speed has decreased? By a shit ton? Are you making this statement based on the ingame runspeed? Because thats not the same as MO1 btw. Henrik has confirmed that its slower than MO1. Its gonna be insanely easy to hit other players with hitscan spells now. If anything they should reduce the range on long-range spells like fireball or remake them as projectiles with unlimited range. But Henrik hates projectile and skill shots for spells, at least for small scale, since it would end up with "balls flying everywhere" like Darkfall (his words not mine), it seems SV just wants to copy and paste ecu from MO1 and be done with it for release.

The whole standing still to cast is gonna suck ass with no double tap, altho there might be a dodge skill hopefully...

As for PvE I agree with what Eldrath said and have suggested it before, certain mobs should be very week to some types of spells. If not then mages are gonna be completely gimped at release, as there wont even be taming to get pets for farming lol
 
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billbonty

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??????

But player speed has decreased? By a shit ton? Are you making this statement based on the ingame runspeed? Because thats not the same as MO1 btw. Henrik has confirmed that its slower than MO1. Its gonna be insanely easy to hit other players with hitscan spells now. If anything they should reduce the range on long-range spells like fireball or remake them as projectiles with unlimited range. But Henrik hates projectile and skill shots for spells, at least for small scale, since it would end up with "balls flying everywhere" like Darkfall (his words not mine), it seems SV just wants to copy and paste ecu from MO1 and be done with it for release.

The whole standing still to cast is gonna suck ass with no double tap, altho there might be a dodge skill hopefully...

As for PvE I agree with what Eldrath said and have suggested it before, certain mobs should be very week to some types of spells. If not then mages are gonna be completely gimped at release, as there wont even be taming to get pets for farming lol
I didn’t even know the speed was lowered lol i’m Just going to straight up delete my post and say instead that i’d rather not rely on pets for farming at all. If I’m a magic user I want to farm with magic and rely on my spells.
 

Grisù

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Sep 3, 2020
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Wow many ideas here, all interesting someway, but there are some characteristics that doesn't really match my tastes.
First of all i do never agree with PvP/PvE discrimination in skills build in a sandbox game, it makes me feel like playing some copy-paste theme park where you have different level, gear and skill for PvP and PvE.
In a Sandbox game i expect to have to try different gears, skills, magics to finally build up my character, matching my play style while being efficient versus whom I'm going to fight, player or AI.
For me would be really disappointing finding myself in a situation where being forced to choose always magic in PvE and always melee in PvP for the sake of efficiency.

Totally agree with magic weakness but both for AI creatures and players, where creatures weakness are fixed in most cases meanwhile players weakness/resistances are equipment dependent based on materials and item quality with multiple values for each "element"(maybe even as clade gift).
Same for magic skills to emulate how melee block and parry works but for countering magic instead.

Magic shields are fine especially if differentiated by damage type or "element" where they reward a wise choice and punish a worse one.
Very stupid (don't care about numbers) example:
Magic shield "A" drains 1 MP every 10 seconds, redirects 70% of blunt damage to MP instead of HP and reduce it by multiplying for 0.1 (only the redirected damage); meanwhile same Magic shield "A" with piercing damage redirects only 50% to MP but this time reducing it by multiplying for 0.5 .
Same logic for magic / "elemental" damages for different types of magic shields.

I honestly dislikes when a "buff" it always positive, never has a downside, can be casted mindlessly and in the worst case it was only a little loss of MP, but prefer when it adds more depth and knowledge requirements to be mastered and become a powerful weapon in the right hands.

Negative even for the reflecting shield that even if you are looking away, if a spell hits your back it automatically goes back to sender.
Reflecting magic like parrying (obviously by a preventive skill activation with limited window time) could be nice but i fear it could transform battles in infinite Tennis matches.

Lastly I'd like to if some of you could clarify me what do you intend for hitscan, for me means: the right moment I click if the crosshair is on the target I've a confirmed hit.
Even I played Darkfall and hated the numerous pyrotechnics magic balls floating in the sky or roaming around battle areas, but if the way of countering it has to be making "guns" in a medieval fantasy alike game, I dunno why bother to practice archery, or who am I and what am I doing here!?

I apologize for the wall of text to those who will dare to read all my personal bu*****t thoughts.
 

Aesorn

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As we all know, Mortal Online is heavily(understatement) inspired by Ultima Online. I believe for PvE mages we should take even more inspiration from how it works in that game. I only know a lot about Ultima Online: Outlands(the most popular pserver) so I will be talking about that... PvE mages are viable but they have to spend lots of their skillpoints into skills that buff their damage in PvE mostly. They can farm great but will be lacking skills to help them survive and such in PvP so even though they will do a bitmore dmg in pvp they will be a "glass cannon" of sorts and not considered nearly as good in pvp as a mage with more defensive skills.

I believe this would be a good way to create mages that are good at farming in PvE without disrupting pvp but problem is you would need different numbers to be effected in pvp / pve for example in UO Outlands the skill "Eval Intelligence" increases your damage in PvE by 25% but only 5% in pvp.... So they stack multiple skills with this type of discrepancy so they do a bit more dmg in pvp but don't have enough skill points to get pvp skills that help them survive to compare to MO this would be things like Defensive Stance.

So in conclusion, the way PvE mages can be viable is if you had specific skills that were much better for PvE mages without effecting pvp nearly as much. Otherwise just make magic do lots more dmg in PvE... this is how it works even in WoW with dmg comparing PvE to PvP numbers so shouldn't be a issue for new players to understand this concept. Though from a realistic standpoint it makes no sense which is why I suggest skills instead.
 

billbonty

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Nov 17, 2020
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I believe this would be a good way to create mages that are good at farming in PvE without disrupting pvp but problem is you would need different numbers to be effected in pvp / pve for example in UO Outlands the skill "Eval Intelligence" increases your damage in PvE by 25% but only 5% in pvp.... So they stack multiple skills with this type of discrepancy so they do a bit more dmg in pvp but don't have enough skill points to get pvp skills that help them survive to compare to MO this would be things like Defensive Stance.
I agree and would like to further add to this. What if we made it so that animal lores also add damage (when using magic) to that creature type? Up to like +50% at lvl 100 or something like that with the genus of that species adding +10% magic damage at lvl 100 (parent skill)? This would be easy to implement for SV and wouldn't require a full on rework of any system. Let's say they also give mages about a 10% boost in damage or something like that overall to the capability of our spells in combat... I feel like this would balance out the lack of damage in PVE, make magic a little scarrier in pvp (considering humans can stack up to a +25% magic resist that has an aoe effect wtf???), and hopefully remove the desire for people to run to taming or domination to farm PVE content.
 

Mauganra

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Nov 21, 2020
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Ultima Online didn't focus on the elements much, rather it focused on damage or ability per level, 8 being the hardest all coming in under one skill, Magery. This is why Magic in UO is so good, no paths, just give you everything in one book. Where as if you look at WOW, there is a heavy focus on the elements, and path picking most certainly removes maneuvers and PV combos.

The one thing that UO lacked in the early days, was spell channeling. It wasn't until later that you could have channeling with weapons and shields.

One of the games that does something Unique is Path of Exile, and you can make many combinations of abilities through gem skills that you place in items. However, there is a heavy focus on elements here too, but you can mix and match them to make some cool combos. This is a con for UO Magery, having all magic under one skill means there is no way to mix and match skills for combos. But in UO you can only cast one magic spell at a time.

Perhaps to keeping magic to one skill means one spell at a time, but if you did do this, you could introduce the spell requirements, such as lumber jacking at level 80 is a requirement for casting Strength buff, or having GM Alchemy means you can do more elemental spell and or physical damage.

Also, wands, staves and scepters are a good idea.
 

ElPerro

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Jun 9, 2020
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Wow many ideas here, all interesting someway, but there are some characteristics that doesn't really match my tastes.
First of all i do never agree with PvP/PvE discrimination in skills build in a sandbox game, it makes me feel like playing some copy-paste theme park where you have different level, gear and skill for PvP and PvE.
In a Sandbox game i expect to have to try different gears, skills, magics to finally build up my character, matching my play style while being efficient versus whom I'm going to fight, player or AI.
For me would be really disappointing finding myself in a situation where being forced to choose always magic in PvE and always melee in PvP for the sake of efficiency.

Totally agree with magic weakness but both for AI creatures and players, where creatures weakness are fixed in most cases meanwhile players weakness/resistances are equipment dependent based on materials and item quality with multiple values for each "element"(maybe even as clade gift).
Same for magic skills to emulate how melee block and parry works but for countering magic instead.

Magic shields are fine especially if differentiated by damage type or "element" where they reward a wise choice and punish a worse one.
Very stupid (don't care about numbers) example:
Magic shield "A" drains 1 MP every 10 seconds, redirects 70% of blunt damage to MP instead of HP and reduce it by multiplying for 0.1 (only the redirected damage); meanwhile same Magic shield "A" with piercing damage redirects only 50% to MP but this time reducing it by multiplying for 0.5 .
Same logic for magic / "elemental" damages for different types of magic shields.

I honestly dislikes when a "buff" it always positive, never has a downside, can be casted mindlessly and in the worst case it was only a little loss of MP, but prefer when it adds more depth and knowledge requirements to be mastered and become a powerful weapon in the right hands.

Negative even for the reflecting shield that even if you are looking away, if a spell hits your back it automatically goes back to sender.
Reflecting magic like parrying (obviously by a preventive skill activation with limited window time) could be nice but i fear it could transform battles in infinite Tennis matches.

Lastly I'd like to if some of you could clarify me what do you intend for hitscan, for me means: the right moment I click if the crosshair is on the target I've a confirmed hit.
Even I played Darkfall and hated the numerous pyrotechnics magic balls floating in the sky or roaming around battle areas, but if the way of countering it has to be making "guns" in a medieval fantasy alike game, I dunno why bother to practice archery, or who am I and what am I doing here!?

I apologize for the wall of text to those who will dare to read all my personal bu*****t thoughts.
Yeah hitscan is exactly that, think of a game like CSGO. In MO1 you would charge a spell and then just click on a target and a spell animation would play like a homing misile to the target. For some spells I didnt mind it but for others it just felt bad, like fireballs.

Alot of spells in Darkfall did look silly and had too many bright colors that wouldnt fit this game, but not sure why they couldnt make some cooler more realistic looking spell projectiles for MO2.

As for the reflective shield spell, it could take mana dmg on impact so you wouldnt be able to just spam it and ping pong spells all day.
 

Handsome Young Man

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This is how I see it.

Hitscan = Less damage, but more reliable and accurate.

Projectile = More damage, but less reliable and less accurate.

AoE = Based on the amount of time to channel / pre-cast, should determine the effectiveness of the spell. Long channels / pre-cast should have big, hard hitting effects. Short channels / pre-casts should do very minor things. Could even have spells scale off of channeled time. As in, earthquake does more damage the longer it is channeled up until it reaches it's full cast time (Example time, 10 seconds).

Also maybe an unpopular opinion, but I think there needs to be a clear discerning line between spell casters. Some spell casters should be able to front line, some need to be in the midline, and some in the backline to support. What I mean by this is perhaps a mage who can use 'Stoneskin' like abilities and deals with Geomancy, so melee isn't as effective against him, then midline would be your typical Ecumenical spells of both support and damage, then a backliner who is full support. Has tons of healing, even shielding spells.
 
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Bernfred

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there is a very addictive system guild wars 1 used :
you choose 2 different classes/traits and every class has hundreds of spells so you can combine spells from 2 big pools BUT you can only change your spells before a fight/match or in cities. this way you was forced to build a build with the best fitting 8 spells from hundreds and too powerful combinations between 3 main classes where not possible this way.
people will talk about builds and when you change one spell in your set like the ultimate you can change the playstyle/effectiveness of the whole build for example.
i can give a 100% that a system similiar to this is super addictive.
 
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ThaBadMan

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Yeah hitscan is exactly that, think of a game like CSGO. In MO1 you would charge a spell and then just click on a target and a spell animation would play like a homing misile to the target. For some spells I didnt mind it but for others it just felt bad, like fireballs.

Alot of spells in Darkfall did look silly and had too many bright colors that wouldnt fit this game, but not sure why they couldnt make some cooler more realistic looking spell projectiles for MO2.

As for the reflective shield spell, it could take mana dmg on impact so you wouldnt be able to just spam it and ping pong spells all day.
For magic shielding I would like a active drain active shield. So you hold the shield and it drains your mana. Makes you have to time it in order to get protection and as low mana drain as possible.
 
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Necromantic

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They already have en expansive list of spells defined by spell scrolls we got for the many schools in the past.
I'm not sure they are looking at any more than those. If you want just look them up, the info on them is public even if for most we only know the names.
 

ThaBadMan

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Thats one thing I dont want back in MO2, the whole placeholder items for years with literally no use. Most scrolls are still useless and will be useless once the game dies.

If you gonna pre make scrolls like in MO for MO2, please dont put it anywhere near the game until you know that school is coming within 2 months max before the school is finished and working in the game.

I know the game needs content badly but thats not a excuse to throw in useless shit for no reason other than to say you gave us players content.
 
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Necromantic

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Well, yes, I literally had hundreds of scrolls of all kinds, collected in preparation. I'm not saying I want that back. I'm just saying those give you an idea of what kind of spells they are planning to implement.
 

ThaBadMan

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Well, yes, I literally had hundreds of scrolls of all kinds, collected in preparation. I'm not saying I want that back. I'm just saying those give you an idea of what kind of spells they are planning to implement.
Yes thats true.
Most collected them for the future that never came. Very bad design choice by SV.
 
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microphone113

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Ultima Online didn't focus on the elements much, rather it focused on damage or ability per level, 8 being the hardest all coming in under one skill, Magery. This is why Magic in UO is so good, no paths, just give you everything in one book. Where as if you look at WOW, there is a heavy focus on the elements, and path picking most certainly removes maneuvers and PV combos.

The one thing that UO lacked in the early days, was spell channeling. It wasn't until later that you could have channeling with weapons and shields.

One of the games that does something Unique is Path of Exile, and you can make many combinations of abilities through gem skills that you place in items. However, there is a heavy focus on elements here too, but you can mix and match them to make some cool combos. This is a con for UO Magery, having all magic under one skill means there is no way to mix and match skills for combos. But in UO you can only cast one magic spell at a time.

Perhaps to keeping magic to one skill means one spell at a time, but if you did do this, you could introduce the spell requirements, such as lumber jacking at level 80 is a requirement for casting Strength buff, or having GM Alchemy means you can do more elemental spell and or physical damage.

Also, wands, staves and scepters are a good to see kitchen rules in pickleball
The scrolls were literally hundreds of different kinds, collected in preparation. That's not something I want back in kitchen rules in pickleball . Those give you an idea of the kind of spells they plan on implementing. read more here https://thetennispredict.com/15-best-tennis-overgrip-for-sweaty-hands/
 
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Hodo

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The scrolls were literally hundreds of different kinds, collected in preparation. That's not something I want back in kitchen rules in pickleball . Those give you an idea of the kind of spells they plan on implementing.

Arise Serpentor! ARISE!!!!!!!

Damn you must be a Necromancer to dig this 2 year old thread up.
 
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