Caster Weapons (in General)

Forgive me if someone has already posted this idea before, but why not have caster weapons, like in every other RPG? The classic image of a mage with his staff, or a cleric with his mace, a shaman with a totem, or even a magician with a wand... Almost all spellcasters have a magical focus, and having a cool staff, or krys, or rod, that improve spells, would be awesome.

Nayab and I ccame up with the same idea a long time ago(he started it.....lol) We ended up with Staffs and Orbs. The idea was shot down saying it would make DDs(inspecific) and Mages in general too powerful.

focus items have been brought up before and usually shot down by jon in the past. i think this is due to the fact that magical and physical damage are unique in this game and thus difficult to see the balance.

magic has some benefits in that it always hits and can only be diminished by the plus on armor, not base ac. it also has some drawbacks in that its item boost are on a non-linear cost curve that gives diminishing rewards based on money spent and is only one hit per turn. i think the mage shield is also a pretty large downside to magical damage.

physical has the benefit of being able to hit multiple times and having a linear cost upgrade path. the downsides are that it can be diminished by both base and additional ac, and it can be quite affected by the specialty crossbows.

it is easy to say that one is better than the other but much harder to prove. it is also easy to speculate that one will, as the game continues to grow, outpace the other. in my opinion, neither has happened yet and it really doesn't appear that one is truly pulling ahead of the other.

if we want a system that is always balanced, then the mechanics would likely have to become identical with the only difference being in name. that can seem like a good idea but it really just takes away choices that we now have, in my opinion.

i believe it is for that reason that we really won't see jon going over to making either damage type more like the other.

When all damage was bought in line to be linear (bar UC...) there ceased to be a reason for not having Mage weapons.

Other than Jon didn't want them.

That's it really, and no amount of discourse could change that.

From the FAQ, FORS section:

Q: Mage staffs would be cool to augment magical power!

A: private explained why this is dumb with more patience than I would:

Tanks: Can become more powerful than mages, but cost lots of money to maintain. Mages: Tend to be cheaper than tanks, but also tend to be less powerful (and less able to deal with armor penalties)

I think this provides a nice balance between spending money on your chars and spending exp on them; I see no reason to change it.

I agree with Jon's reasoning for not having mage weapons.

I figured someone would've suggested it already, but I didn't think it was a "retarded" suggestion.

Since the stated reason for not implementing this is that Jon doesn't want people to have to pay CBD to upgrade their mages, why not make the caster "weapon" behave more like armor in terms of upgrading. Just something for a mage to hold in his hands and not feel empty-handed. Or maybe even make it provide a flat (small) bonus and not be upgradeable at all.

Anyway, I still think it'd be cool.

And another thing, mages still have armor, and they can upgrade it to become more powerful, so, like a tank, they can upgrade themselves by spending CBD.

I understand as to why this is not going to be, but I always will support the idea for one, even if it only cost usd to buy and it only grants 1% increase to DD with no upgrading and -10 to AC ^_^

I would think caster weapons would be fine IF they had a penalty.

Something like negatives to skills equal to the positive to DD.

I'd be cool with a flat % increase to DD or for enchanters ED/EO, that gave some sort of penalty to even it out.

An interesting idea would be an increase to one school of magic and a decrease everything else. Like a mages staff gives a 10% flat bonus to DD spells but a 10% penalty to all ED/EO/AC/Evasion. Basic -5 ac penalty for holding one kinda like the HoC. Either it cant be upgraded, or maybe upgrades decrease the penalties by .5 for each + to a max of +10.

A few good ideas concerning this subject started by Nayab:

http://www.carnageblender.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=002mut

Maybe then the idea brought up in that thread I believe by you Zen was to not make it upgradable or a flat % but a base amount. This would greatly reduce the stagnant lower levels for nubs and ncbs. something to the effect that the wand would grant say 100k lvls of what ever DD is trained. ( the amount is for kicks) 100k in FB yields something like 8k in effect. im not on what the battle dmg would be on 20HP 0AC

I could make it so that a weapon amplifies the DD you cast and the DD you receive :)

Makes you very vulnerable to your own kindred.

So more in line with the aof in some sense..

yes

I like that idea NS

That is interesting NS, How about an opposite twin as well? (Meaning absorbs some DD but Lowers yours as well) Either way this would be something really really cool to have!

are we talking about a linear or non-linear upgrade cost here?

I like NS's idea.

I also think chances are its going to be a flat amount, just like the BoE.

I thought the BoE change was a good call. Mine was the first one up high and the boost was insane!