Pick a skill/spell/commune/etc. that is pretty good at some level, but at some later level isn't worth using anymore. Explain why.

We'll discuss and maybe adjust some of them.

Certain spells that can be cast via items like "lupine aspect" that
can't carry over into shape. It would be nice if they did or could
be learned like exotic skills because essentially, once you get a
shape, it's useless.

There's a few that are pretty misleading that I'd not pick if I had known how marginal they were going to be. A good example is tainted blood - it's very expensive and only offers at 15% resistance, I'd have not gotten that if I knew it was so poor. Another example is balanced percussionist shaving off pulses of lag instead of a full round of lag when you miss - pulses getting shaved off does effectively nothing useful for me ever.

15% resistance to poison and disease is something I would strongly consider if I ever intended to fight neo-shamans, especially with the popularity of the Venom path. As an innate resistance, it isn't something that miasma can just dispel. I may be off the mark here, but I'm fairly sure that poison/disease resistance helps you save against the relevant spells and effects.

The problem is that APs have so many awesome edges that this one looks comparatively unappealing, and I'm okay with that. Not everything they get needs to be stellar.

This is exactly why I personally hesitate to talk exact numbers -- I actually think tainted blood is really good. I don't know that I'd personally play half-elf or half-drow A-P, but if I did I'd pick it 9 times out of 10. You would shrug off poison and disease better than anything but a duergar A-P, and that's not a joke.

Slept = full spelldown, fillet=poisoned. If I did halfie A-P again, I'd pick up all my favourite edges first (shield eyes, mudslinger, sightbinder, steal sight, spine of the akragaka, cursebringer) and probably finally get round to trying to figure out what excisor of pain does before taking tainted blood.

Do I take the fact you wouldn't play halfie A-P as indication that the +1 int/wis isn't enough to raise spell level above human?

>Do I take the fact you wouldn't play halfie A-P as indication
>that the +1 int/wis isn't enough to raise spell level above
>human?

It would, actually.

It's more that I'm more inclined to play fire or duergar or d-elf. Just more my style for whatever reason.

If you're not going to farm for edges to the point where you have 35 of them, you have to pick and choose what you'd rather have. For me taking Spine was way, way more useful than taking TB because I still got plagued first try against a shaman every time.

Now, I'd probably take it eventually but I had an idea that it was going to cover a gap for me and instead it just precluded me from getting other edges for 5 levels or so.

It also doesn't reduce poison damage like true poison resistance does, again a bit disappointing in that respect.

The way I read the helpfile I assumed I'd have duergar poison/plague resist and getting +15% purely on saves just wasn't worth the amount of edge points it cost me.

It is a two round possible damage possible plague/blind/red vision/shield/ect. commune that does a tiny bit more damage than dispel evil/good/fatigue and less damage than demonfire and can sometimes hit you. It needs to be dropped to one round or have a serious increase in damage. Also it doesn't heal enemies like it is supposed when cast. It says your blessings aren't used for others or something.

Is there some trick to this skill as I was never been able to get it to work?

I've used it...it just generally seemed to stink *at* working. Overrun was the one I never figured out over three Chieftains.

Just delete it and move phase door to it's level, or in between somewhere.

I know it was already on your list from the projection thread six months ago, but still.

Will o the Wisp. Does anyone use this spell?

Flash: I don't know if my memory sucks or what, but I swear this spell used to not be nearly useless vs other players at some point or another.

Stealsight: Seems like it always just excessively fails, maybe just me though.

Flash has some situations where it is very useful. I cannot imagine wanting to not practice it.

But it really could use a removal of the spell saves component.

If you could land it repeatedly at hero it would be more useful but it can take 5-6 casts to land it on the current hero meta where everyone stacks -40 svs spell.

Making it a spell version of blindness dust (which doesn't check spell saves as I recall) would make it much more useful when your goal ISN'T to simply 2 round your target.

> Making it a spell version of blindness dust (which doesn't check spell saves as I recall)

Nope. It gets a normal spell save.

But it still accounts for why it has always been so obnoxiously situational, they are the same skill but it's 2 rounds for conjurers.

Really there needs to be a way to take less retaliatory melee hits.

If it weren't for that, people would use it every fight. It's meant to be situationally useful.

I'll give you an example, I'm going to flash a transmuter most of the time. They don't want to cast cancellation to cure it because they'll lose half/all their spells and their ocular enhancement makes them vulnerable to it and flashing them prevents spam disrupt/flee/disrupt/flee.

On the other hand I'm not going to do it to a room full of warriors. I'm not going to do it to an assassin. I am going to do it to a paladin probably (wrath/flee/wrath/flee) even though they can try to heal it or anyone that I want my minions to tank instead of me.

To redirect people from the outter onto you with your archon. Or to redirect foes from groupmates to yourself.

Until then...I won't have an archon! I'll be evil so #### my groupmates :).

nt

I would say it's certainly one of the main (but not only) reasons to use it.

I was like 'hey that mob is tracking me to this dead end and I'd like a little longer for it to reach me so I can rest up' so I dropped a will-o-wisp in front of me. Unfortunately the mob reached me the very next tick after it reached the will-o-wisp room, ruining my smug feeling of having derived a tiny benefit from an incredibly niche skill.

I went down the list and tweaked some of these. Details to follow on the code forum.

Shapeshift (spell):

I don't know why ANYONE would ever use this once you get shapeshift skill. The spell costs WAY more mana, has WAY more lag, both in casting and reverting from, and can only be done outside of combat, whereas the skill has very low mana cost, pretty short lag in using, and virtually no lag reverting from, and it can be done mid-combat. There have been several times when I knew I had a really good group and had already spent some time gathering a large pile of offensive wands, that I just skipped right over practicing shapeshift spell and just used horns of the bull and offensive wands (or a marble statue piece) right up to level 28.

Benefit for skipping shapeshift spell:

Conserve 1 or 2 practice sessions (depending on int)
No chance of level skill gains going into shapeshift spell where they'll be a complete waste 14 levels later.


Defensive partial shifts:

I almost never practice any of these. I can usually just gather enough -ac gear that low level mobs can't even touch me until I start getting into mid-teens, and then I have access to forms which supercede partial shifts. I realize that they can still be used to increase survivability SLIGHTLY when not in form, but I'd much rather save the practices to help me get an extra training session later, and play cautiously to eliminate, as much as possible, dangers while unshifted.

Benefits for skipping defensive partial shifts:

Conserve several practice sessions
No chance of level skill gains going into stuff I'll likely never use once I get forms.


Claws of the Lion:

I know that Zulg said he fixed this spell so that it would work better a couple years ago, but even after that fix, I still see no real use for it. Even when playing a felar shifter that starts out with 100% hth, I still never hit with it. I can be sitting there, swinging at elves south of darsylon, and rarely hitting them with claws, then wield a weapon (ANY weapon that I have basic proficiency with), and suddenly start hitting with regularity. Zulg said that hitroll counts for a lot with this, but wielding a normal weapon, I clearly don't have to worry about that nearly as much.

Personally, based on what I've seen this spell do WHEN it actually works, I think this could be a really cool spell, even later on in life, if it actually hit reliably. There are times when I'm with a group, under water, and I don't have aquatic or amphibious forms, but I still want to help out the group somehow. As it stands, I usually just faerie fire and use horns of the bull, and fumble if applicable. If I'm lucky, I might get my hands on a staff of striking, and I might have some offensive wands left over from lowbie levels. I think this is a situation where claws of the lion might be preferable to horns of the bull, if it could be dependable. If we're talking about making things more useful, we might even consider letting it cause bleeding, or even let it allow the shifter to use the RAKE command with rake damage scaled appropriately for the spell (i.e. I'm NOT talking about making it equal to rake from a lion or grizzly, obviously).


Tail of the Lizard:

The usefulness of this spell is overshadowed by a combination of flight and control translucence. I suppose there might still be some small benefit of having it up while unshifted if someone runs in wielding a spear/staff, polearm, or whip/flail and starts combat with a legsweep or lash, but again, I'd much rather just be paying attention and shift or leave before combat can start.

Nep beefed it a while back (and some of the other partial shifts).

>Shapeshift (spell):
>
>I don't know why ANYONE would ever use this once you get
>shapeshift skill. The spell costs WAY more mana, has WAY more
>lag, both in casting and reverting from, and can only be done
>outside of combat, whereas the skill has very low mana cost,
>pretty short lag in using, and virtually no lag reverting
>from, and it can be done mid-combat. There have been several
>times when I knew I had a really good group and had already
>spent some time gathering a large pile of offensive wands,
>that I just skipped right over practicing shapeshift spell and
>just used horns of the bull and offensive wands (or a marble
>statue piece) right up to level 28.
>
>Benefit for skipping shapeshift spell:
>
>Conserve 1 or 2 practice sessions (depending on int)
>No chance of level skill gains going into shapeshift spell
>where they'll be a complete waste 14 levels later.
>

You're absolutely correct. Zulg made it very skippable when he left shifters have shapeshift skill and the controls without needing it.

I will certainly address this.

I always thought it would be cool if the spell made it so you had the chance of your form being stronger in some way.

But there are many ways to address this.

Edit: Typing is hard when drunk.

n/t

I feel like it's probably underpowered, but I still use it when ranking and when people come to retrieve.

I'll agree with leverage.

Poison darts might be a little on the weak side, but I don't think it's too far off where it should be.

i kind of want to include this one because it's use (melee damage) greatly tapers off around 42. it'd be cool if it at least had some passive, non-damage bonuses.

>i kind of want to include this one because it's use (melee
>damage) greatly tapers off around 42. it'd be cool if it at
>least had some passive, non-damage bonuses.

What would this still do that didn't have something to do with melee hitting/damage?

When barehanded with perfected predator stance you could:

Bearcharge as if one size larger - but not more than giant+1 size (so enlarged giant would get no bonus).

Serpentstrike with bare hands. Give it an echo where you bite your opponent, and chance to cause bleeding.

Have one-round lag on backrake, instead of two.

based on the skill?

getting bashed would allow for a riposte

trip would allow a strike at ankle

throw could be pushed away (like h2h spec)

for beastmasters. it's ok in the 20s to tame a mob and follow, but no one has found any mob that is worthwhile for 40+.

it might be ok at 35 to catch 30s to 40s ranking groups and do some ok damange, but it has no purpose later on.

it does nothing against flying characters (arials, cloud, windwalk, maran, muters, shifters, healers, some shaman), is mitigated some by footwear, and is weak as a whole. if it had a wall of thorns type function it'd be better but it's main use is in the 30s to tack on damage with an ambush and hope to outright kill someone.

Have you had it since whenever I mentioned ipgrading it on the code changes board?

eviscerate and then disappeared if i remember correctly

the others were flown over

**edit. plains just gives up so much with the loss of snare. pursuit is cool but by level 45 it's not that great against the classes you'd want to pursue because of word of recall. plains rangers can't see hidden thieves/assassins so they're pretty much free. so you're left with a retarded plainsrunning skill (really? really.) and bramblepit, the latter of which would be a great level 20 skill.

I'd really love for this skill to be like sprint or run from shapeshifter forms. ie, few spaces in one direction with no timer.

Well, it's damage, lag, and malediction.

I'd consider giving it some kind of reduced effect on fliers but I don't know if that's really preferable to fliers ignoring it until someone gets hit for the full monty?

I'd like to see it last longer than someone just hitting it once and then disappearing. Seems the best fix for it to me.

Then it can be both a pit and a lattice of interwoven brambles so fliers can still be snagged in it.

is to persist, regardless of how many times someone or someones walks in and out of it. like briartangle but better

**edit - thanks for tweaking it however you decide though

Now... Normally I wouldn't post on a class I'm not overly familiar with (which doesn't say much to begin with, but hey.) But Haven seems to be pretty pointless once you get Sanctuary since it's more DR and you can commune it on others.

I get that having Haven at 100% extends the duration of Sanctuary, but past that, it's never used for... Well. Anything.

I think Haven would be moderately more useful (IMO,) if it offered something more along the lines of -sv stuff. Like poison, etc, and could be used on others as a "group" commune similar to Favor of the Sun (which should be made mutually exclusive, rather than Sanctuary)

So... co 'haven'
You close your eyes and hum for an instant.
X shimmers briefly as *deity* grants them safe-haven from harm.
Y shimmers briefly as *deity* grants them safe-haven from harm.
You shimmer briefly as *diety* grants you safe-haven from harm.

Aff-
Commune Haven modifies resistance to poison by X for y hours.
Commune Haven modifies resistance to paralysis by x for y hours.
Commune Haven x hours (being the Damage Resistance, but should be replaced by Sanctuary when it's put up.)

Granted, like this it functions like an all-around Aegis, so Haven should be a lesser Sanc/Aegis, and affect the duration of both when you commune the appropriate supplications -after- using Haven.

My two cents about the ability, anyway.

I still use haven after getting sanctuary, depending on how mana-starved the character is and some other considerations.

But mostly I'm looking for abilities that you would never practice if you somehow started at 40 or hero or whatever, and haven I don't think is in that category.

Luring the fight.

There's a diff. between scanning and seeing the white aura and not(thinking they are unprepared).

This is mostly due to circumstance - at hero levels people stack so much SvS that dirt kick with the edge is nearly always a better option than blindness with the edge. As a mid-rank A-P I can use things like blindness and curse tactically, but at hero a round not spamming iceball is a wasted round against anyone who's anyone.

Beastmaster tame, first and foremost.

I can maybe see it providing some utility at midlevels with the snow leopard,
even though I would never use it due to reasons I've already mentioned.
At hero it's completely useless.

Bearkin has some utility at mid levels but is useless at hero. On my last beastmaster
I didn't practice it.

Predators stance is very good at low/mids, but not anywhere near as good
at hero for many reasons.

Improvise weapon for savages.

I liked it when I was practicing my weapons. Sure wouldn't hurt to get it earlier, though.

Sometimes you don't have a natural weapon or weapon of a specific type, and this may provide you with one.

Plus, get the edge and you no longer worry about blind + disarm stripping you of your parry skill.

And I'm actually curious as to what "other benefits when in desperate combat" the edge gives.

Thrust is cool.

Slice is awesome.

Pierce? Never found a use for it.

Charge I think some time ago there was a cap put on the damage charge could do before N level. Using it generally got me killed. I'm willing to accept I might just be too stupid to use polearms but I'm hoping it's not just me.

>Pierce? Never found a use for it.

It was improved somewhat in December, along with a bunch of other skills.

>Charge I think some time ago there was a cap put on the damage
>charge could do before N level.

I'm not aware of this being the case.

Charge I would agree falls out of use by most characters, but polearm warriors and champions at a minimum always have good uses for it.

Not that I'm going to ever argue that cleave needs some love, or that AP is weak in general... But I just had a thought about maybe being able to cleave with appropriate polearms as an edge? Based on charge + cleave + polearm + strength. Call it brutal charge or something and have it add a round of lag?

Maybe something similar for rangers with ambush and charge?

Sorry, pipe dreaming.

nt

You'd think so, but I've found that Piercing dissonance is better than even Apocalyptic overture, since the Overture rarely deals damage on par. They need to fail their save HARD to get hit with the UNSPEAKS.

Vibrato deals less damage, and has a weak lag (or low chance to lag).

I'm not sure I agree. Piercing Dissonance is three rounds of lag and is only slightly more damage than Vibrato. I believe it is also 10 less mana than vibrato. Basically, at hero, the mana difference isn't going to mean as much to me and I'll take the slightly less damaging vibrato with a chance to lag because I can sing it 3 times in 6 rounds to vibrato's 2 times.

The edge for Piercing dissonance is pretty lame too, in my opinion. At first, I thought that every time it shattered glass it would lag the opponent. That didn't turn out to be true. It lags you. Then I thought, well, if I can shatter a return potion or something it might be worth it, but, it isn't. It works so rarely you can't count on it, and then you're also looking at 3+ rounds of lag. Seems more like a flaw to me.

I never see anyone choose to use piercing dissonance over vibrato in pk at hero ranks. And I only used it in PvE if I'm trying to conserve mana.

Apocalyptic is a different story. To me, it really depends on the match up between you and the enemy. I'll sing it all day long against a giant or other low int race because chances are your going to get the doom version. Other times you are just rolling the dice and probably better off going with vibrato. Although, I will say when I played Jutley, 23 chr epic bard, I hit dooms often on just about anyone, including elves. It seems to me that there is a big threshold between 22 and 23 chr when it comes to people making the save with this song.

It's not the best, but it is piercing damage as opposed to blunt, which actually has some use in some rare situations.
I believe sleek black rods are obsidian, which means piercing dissoance with the edge can technically shatter them, though I'm not sure if they will in practice cause I've never tried it in a PK.

I find use for dissonance at hero, but generally I'd agree, more often I'm working with vibrato/apocalyptic in PK.
Piercing can be fun though. Greater earth shielded invokers for example, since it becomes your only real damage song to them :)

Tsunami (shaman, druid, invoker) - fights on water are pretty rare and you almost always have a better damage option even if not maybe an area damage option

Drown - maybe let this work (not as well) in rooms that have a water source in them like a spring or fountain, all it ever ends up being used for is spamming, its not even useful for ranking since almost all mobs in places it can be used are immune to water damage.

Shifter partial shifts - while in theory they could be worthwhile if you want to use wands/staves/scrolls out of form at higher ranks the fact you spend almost your whole life in form generally means you have a 75% parry skill so you fall over like a wet blanket without overprepping in any case you would actually want to use out of form tactics.

Maybe I am crazy, but I find hooves of the gazelle insanely useful early on though it definitely drops later..

>Tsunami (shaman, druid, invoker) - fights on water are pretty
>rare and you almost always have a better damage option even if
>not maybe an area damage option

Shaman don't have tsunami anymore; I would agree that it's pretty marginal for druids and invokers, if only because of how rare water fights are.

>Drown - maybe let this work (not as well) in rooms that have a
>water source in them like a spring or fountain, all it ever
>ends up being used for is spamming, its not even useful for
>ranking since almost all mobs in places it can be used are
>immune to water damage.

I actually think Drown is pretty decent as-is -- when relevant, it does a LOT of damage. I have PKed at hero with Drown.

>Shifter partial shifts - while in theory they could be
>worthwhile if you want to use wands/staves/scrolls out of form
>at higher ranks the fact you spend almost your whole life in
>form generally means you have a 75% parry skill so you fall
>over like a wet blanket without overprepping in any case you
>would actually want to use out of form tactics.

I can agree that for most shifters partial shifts are pretty marginal at higher levels. I'll think about that one some more.

...and they may suck and you may say "Blah, this sucks".

1) How about if you master a partial shift spell (any of them), you can have that shift up + 1 other shift. IE, you get claw of the lion to 100%, you can now have claw of the lion and horns of the bull up at the same time.

Make it so you can only do this once you learn the shapeshift skill

2) At hero, I see no reason why my shifter shouldn't be able to have all the partial shifts up. Really? My level 51 hero who knows like 6 different animals can't have tail of the lizard, claw of the lion, and fangs of the serpent up at the same time? Where's the IC logic of that?

How about continuing to make these more useful and make it so for every 10 or 15 ranks a shifter can keep up 1 more (so if its 15 at level 45 they can have up 3)

Upgrades

Hooves of the gazelle - random chance to footstomp in combat
Paws of the cheetah - better chance at dodging and somewhat decent boost to evade
Tail of the lizard - automatic legsweep with your tail in combat (I don't think an out of form shifter getting auto trip lag is that crazy)
Horns of the bull - At higher levels have a chance to cause bleeding
Fangs of the serpent - At higher levels have a chance to do emetic poison instead of normal
Claws of the lion - At higher levels start to do auto rakes that have the 1 round lag
ears of the bat - it stays when a shifter shifts into form but loses 80% of its remaining timer each time they shift

...though I may tone them down slightly.

But yeah, even though I just deleted my first character in 9 months I'll likely be rolling another soon, probably another shifter.

I'm not opposed to some form of multiple partial shifts up at once, but that's a bigger project than I'm going to tackle today. It's more complicated than it sounds.

LOL

Crack flesh - Don't see any reason you would use this at later level as a transmuter. I categorize this (like with many invoker powers) as a 'beginners' spell that you throw in as a means of explaining how you learned harder spells later on down the road. Maybe someone will have a reason I don't know about (and will be glad to hear) as to why you would use this in combat once you have mental jolt much less the various disruptions.

Toughened skin is another good example from transmuter class - its basically useless as a svirf as you can inh stoneskin and useless as a transmuter once you can use corporeal hardening.

Sheen of stone (invokers) becomes pretty much useless once you can fairly easily get stoneskin.

>Crack flesh - Don't see any reason you would use this at
>later level as a transmuter. I categorize this (like with
>many invoker powers) as a 'beginners' spell that you throw in
>as a means of explaining how you learned harder spells later
>on down the road. Maybe someone will have a reason I don't
>know about (and will be glad to hear) as to why you would use
>this in combat once you have mental jolt much less the various
>disruptions.

Really its main function is replaced by corporeal softening.

>Toughened skin is another good example from transmuter class -
>its basically useless as a svirf as you can inh stoneskin and
>useless as a transmuter once you can use corporeal hardening.

Toughened skin is to stoneskin as haven is to sanctuary.

>Sheen of stone (invokers) becomes pretty much useless once you
>can fairly easily get stoneskin.

Does anyone really keep stoneskin up for life? At least, the non-limited sources I'm aware of have drawbacks that give me pause.

The spammable skills to get the brawling skill are all (in my humble opinion) worthless at most levels (kick maybe not so much on a healer..). The only value they seem to have is unlocking the brawling skill - which I've never done as I find it completely too tedius.

Good for flavor - yes

Mechanically PVE/PK wise...not so much (unless a healer)

I think practicing these (beyond getting brawling) could be made at least somewhat useful past the lowbie ranks by an edge that made elbow or knee sometimes fire automatically in combat (not kick, though, IMO that would perhaps be too much free damage for an edge). Additionally they could still miss as if entered manually.

In fact I thought the 'skilled brawler' edge did just this, but after looking at numerous logs of characters with the edge (source PBF) and not seeing a single elbow/knee entered or otherwise in them, it must not be what the edge does (or is it bugged?). The wording in the help file (below) is rather ambiguous, actually if the last "and" in it were "or", it would be more in line what I thought it does. Also it seems to suggest you'd have to be using weapons, though it'd be strange for it not to fire when using hth, i.e. actually "brawling".

So maybe this could be changed, or an edge added that does this? And also made available to all classes that can get brawling, as I think currently it's warrior only.


SKILLED BRAWLER

A warrior with this edge who has studied the use of their physical weapons with the skill of brawling can sometimes land an elbow and knee technique almost simultaneously.

I read that as - when you throw an elbow, you can sometimes also throw a knee and vice versa. In other words, a hopelessly useless edge for most people who have something better to do with their attack commands.

.

I think every warrior would practice elbow/knee just to get the edge if you automatically did elbow/knee in combat.

Well, that's a matter of balancing how often it fires (and might still miss) and edge cost. I don't think everyone would prac them and then pay the edge points for it (instead of something else you might want) just to get a free elbow or knee once in a while.

Were all improved last month, so I'm inclined to not tinker with them more yet.

>Were all improved last month, so I'm inclined to not tinker
>with them more yet.

As in how they were improved? I mean, would YOU now use them in high level PK...? (well, any level PK, but since we're talking about making them useful in the later ranks)

Actually now that I think about it, a rather simple improvement to elbow/knee (that would make at least me use them; though I still kind of prefer the automatic elbow/knee edge idea) would be to have them cause a minor malediction for a couple of hours in the high ranks, along these lines:

Say, from L30 upwards:
- randomly either -2str, or -2dex
- knee for 3hrs
- elbow for 2hrs (since it's weaker/quicker)
- can be stacked with each other (but not with itself, e.g. only one 'knee affect' at a time)
(- in fact, why not also a weaker -1str/-1dex affect before L30)

The randomness of the stat affect would be a sort of balancing factor, so when deciding to throw a quick elbow/knee in a fight you'd always have to roll the dice for the affect you might want (though it would be nice to have an echo about which one landed, e.g. "You weaken X with your elbow/knee strike"). Also if you think the stat affect should not be guaranteed to land on a hit, IMO it should at least have a (very) high probability of doing so.

(As an added bonus this would also make 'skilled brawler' edge useful, if it indeed is simply getting knee+elbow for only elbowing)

-Lightning bolt is killer at lower levels, but garbage later on (even with Thunderbolt which seems to never work). Same goes for chill touch (I know it can reduce strength but if you're doing that above level 30, you're doing it wrong).
-Dispel good and dispel evil are pretty lackluster later levels. Demonfire and the new shaman damage abilities just outshadow them.
-I know Afflict has some buffs from paths, but in general it's not worth getting compared to demonfire.
-Famish is pretty lackluster as well. Once you hit the mid thirties, you've got almost ten maledicts to land besides famish and usually once you land key ones like plague/curse/blind, you mainly want to spend your mana on keeping them there (energy drain) or trying to catch up on the damage fight (demonfire). Landing something that forces you to eat is pretty lackluster. If it drained movement...
-Also really can't think of a reason a shaman would ever use a polearm.

-Dispel good and dispel evil are pretty lackluster later levels.

I use them a lot if I am fighting something immune to demonfire or if demonfire seems to really suck in a certain situation (fighting demons or underwater are situations that come to mind)


-I know Afflict has some buffs from paths, but in general it's not worth getting compared to demonfire.

Afflict is awesome for other reasons. I used to skip it until I figured it out.

-Famish is pretty lackluster as well. Once you hit the mid thirties, you've got almost ten maledicts to land besides famish and usually once you land key ones like plague/curse/blind, you mainly want to spend your mana on keeping them there (energy drain) or trying to catch up on the damage fight (demonfire).

It's affect linger a bit even once you eat compared to plague or poison which can be cured immediately

-Also really can't think of a reason a shaman would ever use a polearm.

Pincer staff or Thunderlance are the two that come to mind for me.

-I know about the immunity problem (granted I usually take Inquisitor) but even in those cases, most paths have a damage ability now that works.

-If you're talking about the -regen, yeah I know, but still not worth it imho. I know that certain paths can now make it bleed and such which I guess is nice, but Soviatos had no use for it.

-It's not worth the command in my opinion, I'd much rather do energy drain or something that'll hurt them more directly than hoping scratches will do it later.

-I'd much rather wear a shield and a no-disarm weapon than those two, assuming you have access to everything. If you don't, sure, but those don't come close to something like humansunder + boiled leather.

nt

Rangers, in general, lack for good AND useful skills or spells after level 40. I'm looking at you, timed attack. Take out explorer pounce (for Outlander leaders, really), savage blow, and wolves: they have none.

Armor is just the most useless, especially since I remember when rangers got the shield spell (back when shield just gave more armor, and no DR.) I'd add in thrust, charge, and pierce, since none of them are any better than the stuff rangers can already do, without being a spear/staff spec (or having the inherent potential to get the warrior edges related to these skills.) Pugil's probably ok.

Rangers, in general, need one or two neat things to use, regardless of spec or terrain, in the warrior OR mage column, after 40.

.

nt

It's pretty amazing - seriously.

.

I forgot rangers even had armor. Maybe we should just make barkskin another -20 AC and take it out.

n/t

Get rid of armor so people aren't wasting practices on it, if nothing else. And something above 40 for everyone!

Early assassin kicks are quite obvious: many of them stop being worth anything once you get higher up, which is a bit sad considering how painful they can occasionally be to spam up. Especially wheel kick, side kick and scissor kick lose hard since they're just damage+varying chances of lag; sweep kick has the marginal bonus of dropping moves too IIRC.

Maybe something could be added to the above 4 to make them worth busting out once in a while even at hero. More mv. loss for sweep kick? Wheel kick becomes 1 round with somewhat less damage? Side kick can feint? etc.

Wheel kick (no lag, little damage), side kick (some possible lag i think, little damage), scissor kick (lag, bad damage does not compare to double spin) to be specific.

I would never use those ever once I get mountain storm kick, double spin, or rising phoenix kick, because it is better. More damage, more lag.

None of those kicks have any special effects that I can tell. Wheel kick is probably the worst.



I almost want to retract my post because these skills are really not good at any level. :P I would rather be tripping.

I've gotten kills with those at low level, but you are absolutely right that they suck at high level. After I get MSK/RPK I never use scissor kick. After I get side kick I never use wheel kick. Wheel is particularly bad in this regard.

Some other items include the shifter skills.

For transmuters you have adrenal surge (surpassed by adrenal burst and mental jolt) and toughened skin (surpassed by stoneskin since they don't stack).

For anti-paladins there's chill touch with honorable mention for elbow knee and kick since you only practice those to get brawling (time waster skills) and those apply to orcs, rangers, thieves and warriors too honestly.

Invokers have tons of skills like this (cyclone, etc) just by the nature of their class.

Those were all the ones I could think of but I don't play healers and bards so maybe they have more.

>I've gotten kills with those at low level, but you are
>absolutely right that they suck at high level. After I get
>MSK/RPK I never use scissor kick. After I get side kick I
>never use wheel kick. Wheel is particularly bad in this
>regard.

Side kick, if I remember correctly, can sometimes lag you 3 rounds to use, whereas wheel is always 2, so it has that going for it.

But I agree that mule kick is about the first kick I would ever use at hero, currently. I wonder if there's any good solution to that that makes all the kicks good for something.

>Some other items include the shifter skills.
>
>For transmuters you have adrenal surge (surpassed by adrenal
>burst and mental jolt) and toughened skin (surpassed by
>stoneskin since they don't stack).

Surge has the advantage that you can cast it on other people.

Toughened skin I addressed in another post.

>For anti-paladins there's chill touch with honorable mention
>for elbow knee and kick since you only practice those to get
>brawling (time waster skills) and those apply to orcs,
>rangers, thieves and warriors too honestly.

Chill Touch I would agree is pretty niche. Maybe I can adjust it to scale better.

>Invokers have tons of skills like this (cyclone, etc) just by
>the nature of their class.

Yeah you can only do so much with a class that has like 40 damage spells.

A few ideas to improve assassin kicks at low level.

One idea for wheel kick is that once mastered it has a small chance to interrupt certain skills (blackjack, ambush, backstab, bash) basicaly skills that require the user to get in close phsyically to initiate combat. This would only work when the user tries to initiate combat. The thought behind this is that being the first kick an assassin learns it should be second nature to respond immediately (without thought) to an incoming attack with this kick.

This also means you don't actually have to 'use' wheel kick its just a nice add-on that would give it practical utility making it worth mastering. Martial trance should significantly increase the success rate of this.


I'd have 'sweep kick' when mastered be a skill like 'bag of tricks' that allows for a vsariety of effects in combat. I'd also throw in additional effects on top of that if the assassin is in a martial trance. For example:

Mastered sweep kick should have a chance to feint,-mvs, and give target a slight 'soften' effect.

Mastered sweep kick while in martial trance should increase the previous effects and in addition allow for a chance for a free second kick.

I think I used mule kick at hero to redirect onto someone who had fled and returned while I was fighting at the outer. Maybe. I might have used it while raiding to pull into combat someone who was just standing there.

At hero I pretty much only used doublespin, axe, rising phoenix and maybe mountain storm if I didn't want the "hits all" affect from rising phoenix. And mule maybe...three times.

n/t

Even with extra damage from ground control, I wouldn't use throw once I got MSK. Too many weaknesses (hand specs, protective shield, two round lag, can't engage with it). Kicks really killed throw.

Over MSK if you are sure they are not protected.
Maybe I'm wrong on that though. ^_^

If I remember correctly, skill for skill throw is more reliable than MSK, so it has a little bit of a niche.

I believe characters with the throw edge beat some of the drawbacks, too. Granted, that comes at an opportunity cost of other style edges, including the kicking one which gets us back to the same place.

What, if anything, would make throw better without in turn invalidating MSK?

Maybe give it a bonus vs enemies that are a size smaller than the assassin. Better success rate, damage, lag, or malediction etc. The rationale being that a smaller opponent might be easier to toss, control.

Correct me if I am wrong, but doesn't throw have a chance to inflict malediction via ground control? Seems like a useful niche to me - relatively few skills both lag hard AND maledict.

If your enemy is still in good fighting shape by the time you kot and kans them, you won't have time to rely on throw to hurt them more on a ground control.

Most fights I did kot->MSK or kans->MSK or kot->kans->MSK or just MSK spam or owaza double spin or owaza MSK. I always assumed MSK was more reliable than throw - sure felt that way. MSK also hits significantly harder than throw (MANGLES/DEMOS), so even on a tanky guy you can take half their health or more just with MSK spam.

I used a lot of throw on opponents I knew I was able to. I always found the chance maledict/extra lag from ground control appealing.

I would of course use MSK on mages/priests/h2h warrior etc

but throw is my goto for

paladins/rangers/thieves/non h2h warriors/AP's

>> What, if anything, would make throw better without in turn invalidating MSK?

If I remember correctly, skill for skill throw is more reliable than MSK, so it has a little bit of a niche. -->> The use case right there seems quite strong. To boost it further.. Maybe reduce the lag on a failed throw somewhat making it more like trip?

Throw might have a higher success rate than MSK. MSK does more damage. However, if your throw and ground control are juiced via edges then it might be more even. Plus throw has the chance of a str/dex maledict. Depending on your footwear your kick damage may not be blunt either; throw is blunt.