Wand Skill Suggestion

Given that Wands are currently horrifically devoid of useful attack skills, but are obviously meant for combat if only for the massive amount of fitting passives, I figured they could use one or two more, and preferably some that aren't already bow skills.



Arcane Mortar
Shoots a heavy magical projectile that detonates on contact with the enemy or ground.

50% Base Damage
4-7 Fire Damage
Area of Effect: 8
Double Damage on a Direct Hit
Enemies killed by Critical Explode for 5% of their maximum HP.

Mana Cost: 10

Detailed Explanation:
The projectile is fired in Arc towards where the player aimed at.
Technically, this can be done by -100% damage, +100% pierce for 1 second, if the engine doesn't support any other solutions.
Afterwards, the projectile will detonate for 200% damage on direct contact with an enemy, or explode on the ground for regular AOE damage if it didn't hit a mob on the way to the designated target or a wall was in the way.
To balance the skill and make it look more like "Artillery", a slight scatter might be useful.
I'd find it especially interesting if the projectile was slower the closer the player aimed; Not linearly, a short ranged shot should still be faster to hit than a long range shot, but still noticeable; Similarly to how split arrow will have a different angle depending on the players aim.

Scaling

Scaling should increase the fire damage and cost roughly similar to how a fireball is scaled, more expensive at later levels;
Maybe with the obligatory 3% physical damage bonus many attack skills have.



Another one for good measure:

Homing Projectiles

The Wand fires Homing Projectiles that search and follow enemies.

75% Base Damage
75% Base Projectile Speed

1 Additional Projectile
Projectiles start homing after 0.25 seconds
-19% Attack Speed

14 Mana

Zaanus:
Global chat: Mechanics for A work one way, B for another, C for a third but also with A, B uses C but not A, and D uses A&B but not C

___
Isn't a "no" better than an ignore?
Last edited by UnDeaD_CyBorG on Oct 17, 2012, 1:44:39 PM
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Both of these skills sound pretty cool to me. The mortar one is nice and slightly unusual, which makes it good
I really like both of these suggestions. It would be nice if we could get something like Dual Strike for wands as well, considering the passives available for dual wielding in the wand sections now.
"
Aezlo wrote:
I really like both of these suggestions. It would be nice if we could get something like Dual Strike for wands as well, considering the passives available for dual wielding in the wand sections now.


As I'm currently playing a dual wand wield physical damage shadow I approve of this! (although he usually gets exploded upon if I play in a sleepy mood)

As far as adding somethin to the suggestions, a wand Cone-Pushback normal attack came to my mind for onehanded wand wielding (the damage and attackspeed must be toned down of course, with great utility comes great restriciton).
--EDIT1: i make a lot of typos--
--EDIT2: english is not my native language--
Last edited by ThePlanckEpoch on Oct 18, 2012, 5:51:23 PM
Heh, currently dualwielding wands as well;
Pity they have so few skills. I wonder why Dual Strike specifically excludes Wands? Animations?

Glad to see you like 'em. ;)
Zaanus:
Global chat: Mechanics for A work one way, B for another, C for a third but also with A, B uses C but not A, and D uses A&B but not C

___
Isn't a "no" better than an ignore?
I think Dual Strike doesn't allow wands because it's supposed to be a melee attack.
well everything wands can't use is either a melee or a bow skill.
That leaves nothing for them, which is sort of why I suggest something myself;
Still, specifically excluding wands when it's already marked as a melee skill seems a bit questionable of sorts.
Dual Strike is way strong anyways, if you strike with both weapons at once there shouldn't be a speedbonus for dualwielding.^^

While we're at it, any suggestions as to how dualwielding a wand + melee weapon could work?
Maybe Ranged fire when holding shift, and otherwise just melee?
Or regular dualwielding when close in? Might even be material for a keystone.

As for suggestions, do you think homing projectiles should have a damage nerf over time? Aka, the projectile deals less damage the longer it flies, and maybe disappears after 1.25 seconds.
Zaanus:
Global chat: Mechanics for A work one way, B for another, C for a third but also with A, B uses C but not A, and D uses A&B but not C

___
Isn't a "no" better than an ignore?
Heya, sorry for the bump.
I went away for a week, then kinda forgot about this; doesn't look like anything noteworthy happened.^^
Though this is by now way old, I figured this post is close enough to not warrant a new thread.

I've been thinking about the problem of Dual-Wielding Wands, and what skills could possibly be designed for it.



The general problems seem to be:

A) The only possible skill for two weapons is essentially attacking with both at once.
There is no special Synergy between them, even skills like D2s dual strike that attacked with both weapons in succession did practically nothing else.
Cleave and Dualstrike do the same here.

B) Wands very often come with spell mods, not even counting their inherent mods that are also spell damage.
This means they are inherently less damaging than, say bows, not to mention quivers;
It would be interesting to have a skill that turns that weakness into a strength.

Also, any skill to benefit dualwielding would have fill a niche; A plain Dual Strike exists already, there's Power Siphon, Elemental Hit and Frenzy to be used for Wands.


As such, I'd suggest a Wand skill that combines both attacks into one, and benefits from spell damage.



Fusion Blast
Wand, Attack, Projectile

Infuses both Wands with Arcane Energy to launch a single devastating attack.

Mana Cost: 15

80% Base Damage
Scales with Spell Damage


Detailed Description:
The character charges both wands at once, shooting a single glowing projectile towards the enemy.
The Attack would calculate damage on the player side first, with 200% weapon damage and 40% damage efficiency; This ensures that all off-weapon equipment bonuses are only applied once to this one attack.
Then they would be applied as a single to-hit roll with the average accuracy from both attacks, and be processed normally if an enemy is struck.
Scaling would add projectile damage and Mana Cost like most skills of those types do; The Mana cost is high, but so should be the damage, making leech efficient.

This skill could allow a hybrid attack/spell build without Iron Will to be viable, by applying spell damage bonuses, or a part of it, to attacks. Principally, it could even be used on a single wand, obviously at a lower damage output; The % numbers probably aren't balanced in this suggestion.



What do you think, how could dualwielding wands be made more viable? After all, it's the only option in this game to dualwield ranged weapons, that's too good of an opportunity to just pass up.
Zaanus:
Global chat: Mechanics for A work one way, B for another, C for a third but also with A, B uses C but not A, and D uses A&B but not C

___
Isn't a "no" better than an ignore?
Mana Burst
Wand, Attack, Projectile

Highly paced arcane projectiles casting

20 mana(have to be balanced, or put in %, i like %)
4 bolts per second

20% base damage
+ (150%-(Mana Left%)) damage boost

has 3% chance to generate 20% mana
ZiggyD is the Labyrinth of streamers, some like it, some dont, but GGG will make sure to push it down ur throat to make you like it
Last edited by Sexcalibure on Nov 11, 2012, 9:52:28 AM
Hey, nice one!

Do you mean a chanting of sort, taking mana per second and creating a fixed amount of projectiles, or is that just an abbreviation of a specific attack speed?
As in, would it sort of like lmp, but in a row instead of at once, (like the multicast I suggested somewhere?), or would it just be fixed?
As far as I see it, the damage fluctuates from 10%-30% the less mana the character has?
That'd be an interesting mechanic as it requires the player to not leech too much^^
Zaanus:
Global chat: Mechanics for A work one way, B for another, C for a third but also with A, B uses C but not A, and D uses A&B but not C

___
Isn't a "no" better than an ignore?
Last edited by UnDeaD_CyBorG on Nov 11, 2012, 6:47:34 AM

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