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[2018 Q1] Invoker Barrier
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Ty



Joined: 26 Jan 2017
Posts: 79

PostPosted: Wed Mar 01, 2017 8:20 am    Post subject: [2018 Q1] Invoker Barrier

I am having a hard time understanding how barrier, a spell outside the body and supposedly dependent on mental capacity (not physical, of course, it is a spell of protection outside the body) is greatly negated through a race's vulnerabilities. It only makes sense to me that an invoker's barrier would be focused on the vulnerabilities of their race so the mind and mana can protect the body. It could take a bit more out of the mind than usual, sure, but for barrier to have no effect at all is off-putting.
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ivindel



Joined: 20 Nov 2015
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 01, 2017 8:29 am    Post subject:

It's to prevent gnome invokers from owning everyone. Lol
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Davairus
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Joined: 16 Jan 2004
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 01, 2017 9:00 am    Post subject:

Spellcasting is a very "deus ex machina" thing where you see mages casting all these spells to solve their problems, the classic case of this being the illusionist spell "knock" that just unlocks doors without needing keys. Or like, oh hey I have no boat, that's ok, I will cast a flying spell. Or, oh shit, I am getting creamed, I will recite my heal scrolls. Spells could by the same logic cover simple weaknesses, which they do for some attributes already, with stuff like the armor spell to add some protection, the giant strength spell to buff low strength and trivialize the weaken spell a bit, etc. However, the vulnerabilities are not meant to be simply solved weaknesses that can be easily trivialized. Its the laws of the universe, even magic has constraints. There has to be an order and its vuln > imm > res with a wide consensus from myself and the rest of the game's designers on that matter.

There are important reasons for it to go through, mostly as ivindel mentioned above it is the game balance. Its not just the weapon damage, but the fact that if we don't enforce that order of importance, these barriers would quirkily manage to block necro and shaman maledictions that have a physical damtype also. (Personally, I think if I was starting over on those shields from scratch, I would have made barrier/mana shield behave completely differently.. I would make damage done vs barriers ignore your entire armor class, sanc, whatever else, completely, just deal full damage. multiply it even more by vulns, and then block it with some coefficient that shits on your mana pool to the fullest extent players can tolerate and still feel reasonably cheerful. The lowest levels of the game aren't set up in a way that makes this an easy fix).

Well with that said... that does leave us some other options. A cabal power, for instance, or rare items. I do believe we would have a revolt over a cabal power that strong, and these rare items would be very coveted and considered "hoarded", although this is something we could do if we want to. We could definitely do that, like adding a magical rain-coat that makes dwarf safe against water (there's already a rain-coat in the game that doesn't do this), adding ways for fire giants to avoid their vuln with a thermal-proof jacket, etc. The creators here have so far just find it to be a poor idea to try, its the bottom line. Another option is to just not have a physical vuln on gnomes.

At the very least, this information about order of resistance checks deserves an important place in the helpfiles.
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Ty



Joined: 26 Jan 2017
Posts: 79

PostPosted: Wed Mar 01, 2017 9:30 am    Post subject:

I understand that and agree with most of it, to be honest. What I'm trying to put across is that physical attacks should not outright shred barrier, no matter the vulnerabilities. What I suggest is taking a bit more mana to defend against those racial vulnerabilities as opposed to mostly bypassing them entirely.
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Ty



Joined: 26 Jan 2017
Posts: 79

PostPosted: Wed Mar 01, 2017 9:34 am    Post subject:

Fighters have their tricks, mages have theirs. Berserkers slam a door open while an illusionist somehow fools metal tumblers in a lock to open. Illusionists fool the mind, I have no idea how they fool a mindless lock.
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Merlandox



Joined: 31 Mar 2016
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 01, 2017 1:39 pm    Post subject:

Why should a rain-coat protects you against a tsunami that a mage cast against you? You'll still die wearing a raincoat in a tsunami. Just needs more water to achieve it.
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Merlandox



Joined: 31 Mar 2016
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 01, 2017 1:48 pm    Post subject:

Ty: I stand by the argument that this entire thing of "how does an illusionist fool a mindless lock" thing in a fantasy game entirely useless conversation to have because this argument never ends.

Why can a elf berserker slam open a door but not a giant warrior? For that matter a giant shaman? Does size matter to slamming a door?

So yeah, illusionist are mages, mages learn the arcane ways. Illusionist just to a lesser extent thus they can only "knock" with a small burst of arcane magic to unlock the lock. While mages MELT the lock with hellstreams. (ok they don't have that ability to melt locks), but I think you get my point.
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tayyah



Joined: 20 May 2011
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 01, 2017 1:50 pm    Post subject:

invokers are strong as f. gnome even more so. if you take the base stats and than add in the 5 practice a level and all the trains into hp you can easily aquire 1khp and 1300 mana with minimal eq.... that's terrifying. you just have to deal with the mace. for one. always use a sword or a dagger. there is a cure light staff. cure light potion and scrolls of cure (energy scrolls) hit and run if you need to. if you notice your eating to much dmg you have word and teleport at your disposal.
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Ergorion



Joined: 16 Mar 2007
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 01, 2017 5:41 pm    Post subject:

Barrier used to be a healer spell. All invokers used to have to deal with physical damage anyway.
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Davairus
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Joined: 16 Jan 2004
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 01, 2017 6:25 pm    Post subject:

Eh.. I literally said in the first sentence I wrote that all spells are "deus ex machina".. spells are contrived and fall apart under scrutiny. Maybe it follows the so-called rule of cool or something. When I first saw knock, it left a sour taste in my mouth because I had spent 3 days training to pick locks - I actually found it very annoying, until I played an illus. But whats older than saying "open sesame" to unlock a door? I assumed it makes some kind of hobgoblin illusion that picks the lock for you. It'd make sense if you saw it in Harry Potter I'm sure.
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Olyn
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Joined: 23 Jul 2008
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 01, 2017 8:05 pm    Post subject:

Knock is traditionally a transmutation spell, which is a school closely related to illusion. Other notable transmutation spells our illusionists wield are haste, slow, and enlarge.
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Nycticora



Joined: 09 Feb 2013
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PostPosted: Thu Mar 02, 2017 4:48 am    Post subject:

Nah I don't think the deus ex machina argument applies. We can rely on consistency of game mechanics to provide the framework for judging how well this spell fits the system.

Ty says his interpretation of the spell is that it is a barrier that interposes itself between an attack and you. That interpretation suggests the barrier should block physical damage because the damage never reaches the caster, and if you apply the same line of reasoning I think it applies to avian invokers damaged by disease through mana shield as well. Ty is thinking of the spell like a bubble that surrounds the caster and blocks the incoming attack. I think this interpretation seems consistent with the mechanics of the spell and its description in help files.

Mana shield and barrier have two functions: 1. to subtract mana instead of HP when you take an attack, and 2. to cut the numeric damage of the incoming attack (it uses less mana than it would have used in hp).

Vulns usually multiply damage. I think it would be most consistent if the amount of mana damage you took for an attack was multiplied by the vuln, but mana was still subtracted instead of HP (function 1). The damage should still be cut by function 2 of mana shield as normally. But the vuln should be a multiplier on that mana damage.

I think it is a little strange to consider a spell that converts HP damage to MP damage as "immunity". I don't agree that barrier and mana shield confer "immunity".
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Andrael



Joined: 15 Jan 2013
Posts: 779

PostPosted: Fri Mar 03, 2017 12:33 am    Post subject:

I always thought it should be played out how Nyct just described it, with the except that Avians don't take extra disease damage anymore, I believe that was changed when the sword trapped in ivy got changed, since they have a massive weakness to plague now. Not meaning to derail.
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Ty



Joined: 26 Jan 2017
Posts: 79

PostPosted: Thu Mar 09, 2017 8:09 pm    Post subject:

So does barrier give any protection at all? Reduced damage? Or is it just going straight through it without a thought?
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Davairus
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PostPosted: Thu Mar 16, 2017 8:02 am    Post subject:

Post won me over.
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BlackWidow



Joined: 24 Apr 2014
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PostPosted: Thu Nov 16, 2017 4:16 pm    Post subject:

As Morgolta I used mana shield and barrier to confuse my opponents.

Barrier is physical damage immunity, sort of like slapping a layer of vulcanized rubber on your person which peels off as it gets scraped by sharp objects, and cracks slightly when blunt objects hit it. It's something like coquina: it won't AVOID damage so much as ABSORB the energy which goes into the attack. It also won't insulate you from electricity or fire. Also, the shield spell is a lesser barrier. In the case of gnomes, well a sclub is going to hurt a child even if they have rubber clothes on them.

Mana shield is more like having jello or cellophane as your skin and bubbles coming out when you take magic damage. Mystic tendrils will shatter the mana shield too, as you're basically crackling a cellophane wrapper (think bubble wrap) and this pops the bubbles in one go. The jello also acts as insulation from the elements: fire, water, and electricity to name a few obvious ones. It's almost like energy containment in either case. Dark elves likewise get no protection from light with mana shield as their underground nature means the glare still burns their skin like the sun's rays will heat an asphalt surface.

Do these analogies make more sense? Also, neither of these will remove vulnerabilities... Yay for logic in a fantasy setting.
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Dogran
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PostPosted: Sat Nov 18, 2017 3:43 am    Post subject:

I remeber morgolta... lol
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Olyn
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Joined: 23 Jul 2008
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 24, 2018 1:43 pm    Post subject:

What if barrier allow half of relevant vuln damage to hit the invoker and still resulted in the full amount of drained mana?
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Nycticora



Joined: 09 Feb 2013
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PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2018 4:20 am    Post subject:

nah needs to just multiply the mana damage dealt I think
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Olyn
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PostPosted: Tue Feb 27, 2018 5:11 pm    Post subject:

The last time I played an invoker, I remember the mana loss on barrier/manashield to be pretty insignificant in PK. It only really mattered tanking winter and high end mobs. It's going to be tough to find a balance that works as a real mana drain in PK and doesn't make it worthless in PvE.
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