U68 Preview 1: Wild Magic & Surges General Info

[tsotate]

Are these zones going to show up in future non-Myth Drannor content? Or can we avoid dealing with a bad implementation of my least-favorite tabletop mechanic by simply skipping this expansion and not grouping with wild sorcerers?

 

[Owlbear]

Are these zones going to show up in future non-Myth Drannor content? Or can we avoid dealing with a bad implementation of my least-favorite tabletop mechanic by simply skipping this expansion and not grouping with wild sorcerers?

From what I understand the area's (maybe not all) are avoidable too. So they kinda act like traps I guess.

 

[l_remmie]

Wild Magic = random

Magic the Gathering has taught us that the dedicated tournament "spikes" absolutely hated random effects on cards. They never play them in they can avoid it, and if they have to because they are that powerful they will but resent doing so and simply spend less time/money.
The enfrenchised DDO whale is close to that same player archetype. Its all about power and efficiency. They are a very bad target audience for this.

Making Wild Magic both powerful, fun and still random is probably completely impossible.

I'd suggest going for as fun as possible and advertise it that way too. Make sure the casuals and role players love it.

 

[Genkiba]

Easy solution, Raid leader asks no wild magic in raid. If you happen to be one, then no soup for you ...

Because DDO raids are sooo difficult.

 

[gwakkamolay]

I like the idea of Wild Magic and look forward to it as well as the new archetype. I think it would even more fun if the wild magic zones were randomized in dungeons and they were not able to be seen.

 

[nobodynobody1426]

Oh this is going to be so bad it'll be hilarious to watch. All the preemptive nerfing being applied will ensure the Very Good and Good categories are just marginally useful to downright useless, while the Bad and Very Bad categories are disasterous.

Just look at these two radically disproportionate effects.

Force Bubbles - You and all nearby allies gain a Force shield reducing damage by 95% for 4 seconds.

Rats - You turn into a rodent! You can move but not use abilities or items. You gain 50% uncapped dodge and +25 reflex saves. Last for 8 seconds.

The first would be nice in the middle of a raid boss but lets be honest a 4 second damage shield happening randomly will not make or break a fight. Especially since that damage shield can proc while your are buffing your party and thus be completely wasted.
The 8s of "do not play DDO" on the other hand can straight up kill you, your party or your entire raid. 8s of you not doing anything at all, no healing, no debuffing, no CCing, no damage. If happens during the buffing period, it's annoying and delays everything but no real impact. If it happens while you are engaging a pack of monsters or during a boss fight, game over.

 

[nobodynobody1426]

Making Wild Magic both powerful, fun and still random is probably completely impossible.

It can be done, Colors of the Queen and double rainbow give ideas on how to do it. With PnP there is a DM to mediate the situation and fudge the required rolls so that bad WM surges do not result in an unfair TPK. Not only is there no DM in DDO, but the devs frequently take the position of Killer Game Master in that they view the game as Dev vs Players with Monsters and Reapers being on team. "Dev".

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/KillerGameMaster

 

[woq]

If it happens while you are engaging a pack of monsters or during a boss fight, game over.

A normal caster being out of the fight for 8 seconds is not game over for the raid in general. If it's a solo healer, maybe - but your healer probably shouldnt be a wild mage with very bad and bad effects enabled, or perhaps shouldn't be standing in a wild magic area of effect. They clarified that these are more akin to traps or mechanics or situational, that have some amount of counterplay available to them.

But yes, in general I'd agree that the disaster potential of the bad ones and the goodness of the good ones are not aligned as they were set out initially and they've gotten a lot of feedback along those lines.


----
Suggestion:
Very Bad: Red/Purple Named hostile summon of some kind that scales with quest/difficulty. Could be a doomsphere, could be an orthon, could be a wild sorcerer kobold caster with greater prismatic spray, could be a named Reaper of some kind... Something memorable and if it's possible, something like this could even only happen if you both roll a Very Bad result and then a Very Bad roll on top of it or something like that.

 

[nobodynobody1426]

But yes, in general I'd agree that the disaster potential of the bad ones and the goodness of the good ones are not aligned as they were set out initially and they've gotten a lot of feedback along those lines.

Depending on the situation it absolutely can spell game over, just depends, but that was my point. The bad stuff has the potential to end you while the good stuff is mild at best. This isn't the only time this kind of unbalanced design has shown up before.

 

[woq]

Depending on the situation it absolutely can spell game over, just depends, but that was my point. The bad stuff has the potential to end you while the good stuff is mild at best. This isn't the only time this kind of unbalanced design has shown up before.

Yep, hope they acknowledge that to an extent. Thankfully, wild mages can avoid those results if they put in the points and others should only be susceptible to them if they make a mistake (supposedly) so that's kind of the counterargument from the Devs PoV by the looks of it. I suppose only time will tell what the end result will be in practice. I hope the absolutely awful results aren't forced on you combined with a complex raid mechanic or something of the sort, or pushing/doing those could end up being absolutely awful in the long run. Do read the fine print at the bottom of the post that was clarified by Torc at a later date (or check it from Staff Tracker).

Comes down to trusting the devs with it, I'll try to maintain a positive stance until proven otherwise. I do acknowledge the risk potential though and that has been brought up by worried players in this thread and elsewhere.

 

[nobodynobody1426]

I hope the absolutely awful results aren't forced on you combined with a complex raid mechanic or something of the sort, or pushing/doing those could end up being absolutely awful in the long run. Do read the fine print at the bottom of the post that was clarified by Torc at a later date (or check it from Staff Tracker).

I absolutely expect them to put bosses in rooms where the entire room is a wild magic zone and you are forced to fight inside of it.

 

[woq]

We are doing Wild magic!

Summary: Wild magic is a chaotic force that can be harnessed by some spell casters or appears as an environmental effect that can be found where an extremely powerful magical event occurred. The casting of spells as a wild mage or in a wild magic zone has a random chance to cause a Wild Magic Surge.

Would it be possible for Wild Sorcerer and Wild Magic Zones (or specific quests/raids) to pull from partially different wild magic surge effect pools?

Then you would have way more leeway for making more interesting negative effects and positive effects for monsters than currently without ruining the Wild Sorcerer class.

 

[l_remmie]

Wild Magic zones are a different ballpark than wildmage. It being a contained area you are warned about matters a lot. You could do some more team affecting spells like buffs/debuffs and random monster spawns. Its not grieving if its an expected quest hazard.

 

[erethizon1]

LFG posted, running quests R4-R6, no sorcs allowed.

This is the future!

Seeing as how sorcerers are the only ones that can prevent bad and very bad effects in wild magic zones, this seems like the worst solution possible.

 

[erethizon1]

Because grievers are grievers and they will lie for the opportunity to enjoy their moment of causing others grief.

The LFM’s will block out this opportunity

Of course if you are running with known friends there may be some leeway, but even i have friends that use the Oops excuse and i would not trust them with a wild mage sorc.

What exactly is it you think wild mages are going to be able to do to other players? Obviously, most of them will have the bad and very bad effects disabled (since that is pretty much a must have enhancement for anyone playing a wild mage), but even if they don't, are there any specific effects you are aware of they can do that will be bad for your party, or are you just imagining that such things will exist?

 

[DBZ]

Easiest solution don't bother

 

[The Narc]

What exactly is it you think wild mages are going to be able to do to other players? Obviously, most of them will have the bad and very bad effects disabled (since that is pretty much a must have enhancement for anyone playing a wild mage), but even if they don't, are there any specific effects you are aware of they can do that will be bad for your party, or are you just imagining that such things will exist?

The post was from the first release on lammania, i thought the negative effects could impact other group members but from what i have read since then there is no possible negative effects to grieve other players in the party. So as long as this holds true wild mage sorcs are no different than regular sorcs as far as my concerns go.

But if this were to change, then the sorc ban would go into effect immediately and if most of the population dont follow suit and do the same we will see more grieving techniques added to the game in the future.

 

[Yamani]

The post was from the first release on lammania, i thought the negative effects could impact other group members but from what i have read since then there is no possible negative effects to grieve other players in the party. So as long as this holds true wild mage sorcs are no different than regular sorcs as far as my concerns go.

But if this were to change, then the sorc ban would go into effect immediately and if most of the population dont follow suit and do the same we will see more grieving techniques added to the game in the future.

read rule #3. course they could violate their own rules but these bad/very bad are caster only and probably will stay that way for anti-griefing purposes. Anyways, back to killing vengeance reapers first to kill tanks.

 

[ACJ97F]

You will get a VFX/Sound warning a few seconds before you character becomes "hot" with a wild surge on your next cast, that will indicate...

Anyone else expect cartoon "eggplants", a flashing neon sign, or something else we can't disable? We already have forehead-sausage-detection
they still didn't add a toggle for. Hope they finally mustered enough common sense to add a graphic OFF button when they do this.

 

[erethizon1]

People are grossly overemphasizing how negative effects will be discriminated against. My sorc currently kills on average one other player character per dungeon with Enders, and no one freaks out about it.

If Wild Mage increases that to two persons per dungeon, I think it would be pushing it, but if it was only one other person per dungeon it would be ok.

Well, occasionally people drop your group in a mood because enders was killing them, but yes, overall it isn't much of a problem. Enders, however, heals the party for 1000 or more hp very frequently. It is extremely useful in exchange for its potential negative (and completely avoidable) side effect. Wild mage surges currently are not nearly as useful as enders for the risk they cause (though I am perfectly okay with the wild mage risks currently). That said, I think there should be way more upside to wild mages and it would be wise to have way more of the positive effects do huge bonuses to the wild mage's companions to keep people like The Narc from wanting to ban them from his groups.