Clarity

I propose an improvement for clarity: Decrease its mana reservation, increase mana regeneration significantly, and disable usage of Mana Flask as a penalty.

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cownotme wrote:

I propose an improvement for clarity: Decrease its mana reservation, increase mana regeneration significantly, and disable usage of Mana Flask as a penalty.

That doesn't sound like a downside at all when it'd be buffed a lot with your changes, plus you can just turn it off, chug a pot then recast it.

Clarity by itself is not enough to 'take care' of the mana problem, but it's a very big help. A witch (or a templar that is spell-focused) may really want to use Clarity even in the 50s simply because they should have enough mana regardless, and that 'mana leech' needs both a green slot and dex, and green slots aren't that easy to have with Templars or Witches that you can simply go "i'll use Mana leech instead of LMP/GMP/Fork".

This skill is crazy bad as of 10.1e. Suggestions/conclusions are first, then the discussion.

Even though the usefulness of the clarity effect is in question, I would not suggest to change it to give % mana regen. But it does need rebalancing at the top ranges to make its reward worth the reservation.

I suggest turning clarity into a %% based aura, even though it gives a flat return on investment. The sheer amount of flat mana being reserved is more than any other aura, percentage or otherwise (unless it's in a pure int EB caster...).
I'd suggest make it a 40% aura, which puts it in the middle of where you have it now (less if you're not using EB or massive mana boosts, more if you are).

at lvl 13 it is hoarding 300 mana. Not a percentage, but a flat amount. If I max it out, it will hoard 440 mana.

Some math:
Max mana 1000:
Therefore %% reserved is 44%. This is higher than ALL other auras IF you get your mana to 1000.

Case study:
Eldritch battery, cross class dex/int. Hybrid gear, lvl 56.
max mana is 950.
The %% reserved for clarity at lvl 13 is 33% (ish).
If I take off Eldritch battery, max mana is only 600 ish.
Which means the Clarity reservation is 50%!
For curiosity, this toon will invest in 80% more mana regen, not increase clarity anymore, and gain another 8% max mana node. So max mana won't go up by much, but the regen will go up substantially.

Also, I'd suggest you look at the mana calculator Zaka has created. Basically gives you an uptime on your main skill, and shows you what the effects of boosting various different stats re mana are. What I found was that after you get to about 600 mana, the current clarity progression is useless to boost higher, and it is more beneficial to stack mana regen increase nodes.

The case study above, the calculator showed that 20% increase mana regen would boost uptime of a skill by 5.3%, compared to clarity increast of 1 level boost uptime by <2%.

Now considering that the people who can access the higher levels of clarity (with it's current reservation amounts) are those with very high mana pools, the current clarity progression is sub par by a long shot to investing in + mana regen, and worse than +mana on gear of 60, and + mana 8%.

i would not change it to %-based. the reason: this would make the player have to decide whether or not to level it up or not. also it would weaken it for templars and witches but not the other classes since it wouldnt stack with %-mana nodes anymore. imo it is fine as it is. It makes my shadow able to use 3 life and 2 utility flasks with no mana ones requiered. You can use it to archieve balance with high mana pool turning your 500 mana into 100 and making you perfect for kiting-casting

edit: erm i mean wouldnt require the choice from the player if he levels up or not sry

I've used clarity the entire lifetime of my witch and I see nothing wrong with it at all. I see it as a niche aura for characters that want to spam +mana and get a decent amount of +mana regen rate. (ie CI builds)

Turning it into a percentage reserve aura would ruin my witch and ruin lots of potential builds out there that rely on it NOT being percentage based.

I have reached a gear level where the mana reservation is irrelevant as I have a big enough mana pool and reduced mana gem level. I essentially do not care about my mana anymore just like any blood magic user or eldritch battery user except for adding more auras. My gear isn't exactly great nor am I that particularly high level either. The spell is in a fine position.

The real problem in clarity is that +mana regen can be a little annoying to get and that CI builds themselves just don't compare well at all with blood magic/HP builds.

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M3phisto wrote:

i would not change it to %-based. the reason: this would make the player have to decide whether or not to level it up or not. also it would weaken it for templars and witches but not the other classes since it wouldnt stack with %-mana nodes anymore. imo it is fine as it is. It makes my shadow able to use 3 life and 2 utility flasks with no mana ones requiered. You can use it to archieve balance with high mana pool turning your 500 mana into 100 and making you perfect for kiting-casting

edit: erm i mean wouldnt require the choice from the player if he levels up or not sry

I think you got confused by what I said, I meant turn it into a % reserved aura. Leave it giving a flat mana increase.

How much mana do you have mandena? and are you using a maxed out gem for your level? before the reduced mana support, how much as a %% is clarity reserving from your mana globe?

What builds are you talking about using clarity that would not be better off with it being %% based reserved vs the flat bloc of mana it is reserving now? I can only think of..... nothing. Low mana pool people that need the flat regen increase would be better off as they will have more unreserved mana with a %% based aura compared to now. High mana people it's a waste of investment to get clarity to max level, as you get more regen by increasing mana even more, or boosting your mana regen (either through passives, or on gear).

+mana regen is actually quite plentiful. I've got a moderate amount on the skilldrasil, and that gives me +100%. On gear, you can easily get another 200%. I'm not sure where you're going with the whole CI vs health/regen/BM thing.

Basically, what is it targeting? The peeps who can use the high level are better off not maxing the gem level, and instead investing in even more +mana or + mana regen. The people that need the flat increase to mana regen, can't get enough max mana to use the top levels of the gem, but if they do get enough max mana to use it, they are in the same boat as above, where it's better to invest in alternatives! Hence why I suggest make it a %% reserved aura. It can be used by low mana peeps to boost their mana regen subtantially, and high mana peeps might lose more of their mana total, but will be able to max the gem to get the most benefit possible.

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Vipermagi wrote:

By turning it into a percent-reserve, low-Mana users get a super cheap, inordinately powerful boost to their Mana regen, obviating the need for any other source of Mana management.

With the current implementation, low-Mana users can still use it just fine. Just keep it at a lower level. Whatever. It's still plenty powerful even if it isn't nearly maxed.

"High mana people it's a waste of investment to get clarity to max level, as you get more regen by increasing mana even more, or boosting your mana regen (either through passives, or on gear)."
This does involve dedicating gear or passive points to Mana. Not always ideal.
Additionally, the percent-Regen bonuses also multiply Clarity's bonus.

on point one, I would have thought that is the main point of clarity. To give low mana peeps a reasonable regen ability.

on point two, it's powerful until you get to 3L skills. After that you either have tons of mana which make clarity almost pointless, or you don't have enough mana to keep leveling clarity.

on point three, you're right on both counts. However the spreadsheet took into account the fact that mana regen increases multiply clarity's flat regen. Some clarity is good. But I'm not leveling my gem any more as it is worthless vs investing a bit more in passives or gear.

So do you see this gem as a way for high mana users to get just a bit more regen? Or is it supposed to help low mana users have a usable regen, supported by mana leech, or run low cost skills, or some small passive investment to help it along? Or another use for it I missed?

Note: at level 13 (which is 300 mana reserve), it gives 13.4 mana regen/sec. This is not enough to sustain a 50 cost skill half the time. Got low mana? clarity will be useless. Put a BM gem on it, it will cost more health, but HP max and some regen nodes will easily cover the cost. Already got 600+ mana? Why bother with clarity? everything will be dead before you run out of 600 mana, and it will regen fast enough before you get to the next mob. that 300 mana chunk might mean you can't kill that rare before running out of mana.