Stoneskin Rework

[dynast]

Stoneskin gives a higher amount of AC, GDR and has a very short duration(all based on spellpower) and petrifies the player at the end of it. It cannot be used during statue form and cannot be cancelled by casting statue form. The spell cannot be cast again to refresh the duration.

[amaril]

A defensive berserk? Neat. Can the petrification be cancelled by cancellation, as usual, or is it immediate?

As is, I have a tough time imagining using this--berserk lets you kill the enemies on screen quickly, but this would not. A defensive buff is best used at the beginning of a fight, but you would want to save casting this till there are few enough enemies left that you would probably be better served by attacking them.


This is a distinct idea, but I think a phase shift that gravity anchors you could be interesting.

[dynast]

Yes, you would be able to cancel pretification with the potion, the same way you can cancel the aftereffect of rage. I thought about gravity anchor for phase shift but it is not as interesting, specially when you can abuse PoG.

[TacoSundae]

Petrify might be a bit much. Slow would work, I think.

I was actually about to suggest bringing back phase shift and having it give vertigo for a while after it ends, as well as preventing it from being cast again until the vertigo goes away.

[KoboldLord]

I don't really understand the reasoning of trying to fix buffs by making them absolute trash. If the objective is to make sure they are never used, it seems much more efficient and also honest just to straight-up remove them.

If your proposed defensive buff is worse than a brisk walk to the stairs, it is never useful. It needs to be worth investing xp, and it needs to be worth investing combat turns and mp, and it needs to do its job better than just walking away.

Exactly how much AC are you suggesting is worth being completely helpless after a short period of damage reduction? The other abilities that have similar drawbacks include a huge multiplicative damage boost and flat-out invincibility.

[dpeg]

Such effects belong on consumables, not on spells, for the reasons outlined in this thread -- starting with the OP: look what type of handicaps you have to put on a buff spell. None of that is needed on a potion (say), where simply "it's only available in a small number" is sufficient to generate decisions.

[ZoFy]

On a related note, do people actually use nerfed Swiftness with non-AE's?

[amaril]

yes. I also use ozocubu's.

[Wahaha]

On a related note, do people actually used nerfed Swiftness with non-AE's?

Pretty much the only situation where it is useful is when you're next to a melee monster, and you're not too far and not too close to stairs, and you cast swiftness to get a space between you and the monster as you walk to the stairs.
It's worth learning on many characters just for this use case.

It was kind of too good before.

[dynast]

I don't really understand the reasoning of trying to fix buffs by making them absolute trash. If the objective is to make sure they are never used, it seems much more efficient and also honest just to straight-up remove them.

Just coming up with a spell that players could use in a creative way to handle things, thus making the game more fun, though, now that i think about it, this idea is just a spellcaster's "rage".

If your proposed defensive buff is worse than a brisk walk to the stairs, it is never useful. It needs to be worth investing xp, and it needs to be worth investing combat turns and mp, and it needs to do its job better than just walking away.

Oh please, tell me what buffes are better than heading upstairs so i can make a post requesting them to be removed or turned into trash aswell.

Exactly how much AC are you suggesting is worth being completely helpless after a short period of damage reduction? The other abilities that have similar drawbacks include a huge multiplicative damage boost and flat-out invincibility.

Not enough to be too weak and not too much to be overpowered.

I honestly surprised that this post was taken this serious, considering how vague the proposal was.

[Tressol]

On a related note, do people actually used nerfed Swiftness with non-AE's?

Pretty much the only situation where it is useful is when you're next to a melee monster, and you're not too far and not too close to stairs, and you cast swiftness to get a space between you and the monster as you walk to the stairs.
It's worth learning on many characters just for this use case.

It was kind of too good before.

If you're next to a melee monster, you can usually just walk away until you're "not too far away and not too close," then cast Swiftness and get away. Also, you have Air and/or Charms trained, so you can/probably do have rMissile as well, and god forbid you can create some kind of field effect/summon to cover your retreat, making escape almost entirely trivial. :/

[crate]

swiftness is pretty much definitely good, but it is good in a very tedious way and almost all encounters are easy to begin with, so it's not used much

[ZoFy]

It totally looked i don't know how to use the Swiftness but i just never remember to do so if i learn it mid-game. If it gets used by non-AEs, Swiftness should be in a good spot balance-wise. We could give Stoneskin the same treatment and make it decrease AC after expiring. This doesn't sound like a good idea.

[tabstorm]

Such effects belong on consumables, not on spells, for the reasons outlined in this thread -- starting with the OP: look what type of handicaps you have to put on a buff spell. None of that is needed on a potion (say), where simply "it's only available in a small number" is sufficient to generate decisions.

Dosen't this apply to almost all charms?

Also, ozocubu's armor got changed in a basically similar way to OPs suggestion.

[dynast]

Best thing about ozo's armour is that you can cancel it with flame tongue.

[wizzzargh]

On a related note, do people actually use nerfed Swiftness with non-AE's?

If I didn't have any Necromancy or Summoning or Translocation spells I'd use Swiftness I guess, but that's a rare-sounding game.

[WingedEspeon]

I memorize it all the time because it works off the same schools and is the same level as rMissels, so I can cast it. it is very useful for escaping melee monsters, but most of the time by the time you can cast rMissels you don't need escapes if you are playing well.