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[Phenoixblizzard]

I never really relied on critical for much so I doubt these changes will affect me very much. As for the stat realignments for each school, I'll adapt. As an ice wizard it can't be too hard to do so. Carry some TC blades and maybe start carrying some traps (ice and elemental since I never trained feint) as well. Keep an eye on gear stats and pick out only the pieces that are comparable to my present gear. I probably won't be as much of a glass cannon as I am now, but a glass cannon I can still be if I try hard enough.

[JaredSpellFrost]

Ice can still be the school with the highest HP......through absorbs. Absorb stacking (with incredible resists slowing damage), can be just as useful as it is in Beastmoon (fulfilling tank role anyways).No one has used several of Ice's spells in the past (absorbs, taunt, etc); seems that could change with the revisions in the system.

Absorbs are fairly useless spells for Ice Wizards, as they take away all of your Pips. If you're hitting, you won't be using Absorbs- why throw away all of your Pips after you have finished blading and trapping up to hit..? And if you're playing Support, Absorbs again take away all of your Pips to essentially only block damage from a single hit for a single person. Legion Shield, Tower Shield, and set shields outperform Absorbs by a mile here.
Ice Wizards instead rely on their high Resist and Health to be able to tank hits while they blade/trap up to hit. We need more rounds to prepare a hit than any other school, and therefore need more Health/Resist than any other school. If KingsIsle is truly set on removing this key aspect of Thaumaturges, than we better get ample compensation in the forms of increase Damage, Critical, Power Pip, and Pierce!

[Kingurz]

Absorbs are fairly useless spells for Ice Wizards, as they take away all of your Pips. If you're hitting, you won't be using Absorbs- why throw away all of your Pips after you have finished blading and trapping up to hit..? And if you're playing Support, Absorbs again take away all of your Pips to essentially only block damage from a single hit for a single person. Legion Shield, Tower Shield, and set shields outperform Absorbs by a mile here.
Ice Wizards instead rely on their high Resist and Health to be able to tank hits while they blade/trap up to hit. We need more rounds to prepare a hit than any other school, and therefore need more Health/Resist than any other school. If KingsIsle is truly set on removing this key aspect of Thaumaturges, than we better get ample compensation in the forms of increase Damage, Critical, Power Pip, and Pierce!

??? But if you are the tank, you don't need to hit, so those pips aren't necessarily wasted. Now that Taunt is much more effective against PvE enemies, the absorbs become much more effective. Also, Legion Shield and Tower/school shields are 1 and 0 pips....they really aren't getting in the way of the absorbs if you are shielding your teammates (in fact those could be cast while you pip up for absorb).

[JaredSpellFrost]

??? But if you are the tank, you don't need to hit, so those pips aren't necessarily wasted. Now that Taunt is much more effective against PvE enemies, the absorbs become much more effective. Also, Legion Shield and Tower/school shields are 1 and 0 pips....they really aren't getting in the way of the absorbs if you are shielding your teammates (in fact those could be cast while you pip up for absorb).

In PvP, "X Pip" spells are a risk- you forfeit all of your gained momentum and hope for the best. When I use Judgement in the Arena, I aim to kill- otherwise I'll be left with no Pips and an opponent who's ready to hit. With Ice and Frozen Armor, it is slightly different- if you're playing Support you won't feel that underlying pressure to be able to hit. However, you still need Pips!
If you carry a Life mastery, you'll need Pips for heals, making Ice Absorbs irrelevant. And even if you are going full Jade, X Pip Absorbs aren't worth it! The Pip economy of the Arena dictates this.

A max, 14 Pip Frozen Armor will only absorb a total of 2,450 damage (Assuming you get lucky with your Power Pips, which if you're Jading is highly unlikely). Your opponent(s) can then cast a zero Pip Pierce, a three Pip Shatter, a two Pip Steal ward, a 6(4*) Pip Earthquake, a 6* Pip Mystic Colossus, or have a pet maycast Shatter for free. You will always have lost more Pips than your opponent, making this spell a total waste of Pips.

Another example of the "Pip economy" in action is Bubbles. Our regular damage bubbles only cost 2 Pips. Our special Pierce/Critical Bubbles cost 4 Pips. Say I cast Katabtic Wind- my opponent can then spend two pips less and replace my Bubble- leaving me down on Pips and tempo.


This is why Towers, Legion Shields and set shields are so much better. Legion Shield is not a selfish spell, and allows you to ward your entire team in one round! Set shields are fantastic as they not only force your opponent(s) to either remove them through utility or through their school specific hit, but they help nullify any blades your enemies(s) have as well! And Tower Shields are to be preferred as they cut the incoming damage by half for zero Pips- usually forcing duelists to remove them before striking.
One last thing to note- if a Wizard is Jading, they should never rack up 14 Pips! Jading isn't just about zero Pip shields, its about spamming Smokescreen, stunning, spamming (Virulent)Plague, healing, and more. Thus, you won't have the Pips you need to effectively cast Ice Absorbs.



*They can cast Earthquake at 4 Pips if they have an Aftershock TC. Mystic Colossus is technically 6 Pips and a Shadow Pip, but is still a strong shield breaking spell. I did not mention Elucidate and Simplify as those are incredibly rare, retired TC nobody in their right mind would use up

[JakobTheWizard]

??? But if you are the tank, you don't need to hit, so those pips aren't necessarily wasted. Now that Taunt is much more effective against PvE enemies, the absorbs become much more effective. Also, Legion Shield and Tower/school shields are 1 and 0 pips....they really aren't getting in the way of the absorbs if you are shielding your teammates (in fact those could be cast while you pip up for absorb).

@JaredSpellFrost I completely agree with you. As a player with a level 130 Thaumaturge, I know exactly what you're saying. Sadly, I can't even remember the last time I used my X-pip absorb. The problem is exactly what you said, it only puts an absorb on 1 wizard, and it uses all of your pips. KingsIsle really needs to add more AoE absorbs and shields for Ice, as that is the Ice School's identity, protecting themselves and their team via shields, absorbs, tanking by using taunts and their high health and resistance. The Life School's identity is healing, that is how they protect their team, Ice is all about tanking and warding damage with shields, absorbs, health and resistance. @Kingurz You really think that tank wizards don't need to hit? Every school needs to hit, unless you have someone else to carry you through all your quests. As for the new Taunt mechanic, we do not even know if it's going to ban AoE attacks while activated, and if it doesn't, it's almost as useless as the taunts we have now.

[Happy Fun Ball]

A max, 14 Pip Frozen Armor will only absorb a total of 2,450 damage (Assuming you get lucky with your Power Pips, which if you're Jading is highly unlikely). Your opponent(s) can then cast a zero Pip Pierce, a three Pip Shatter, a two Pip Steal ward, a 6(4*) Pip Earthquake, a 6* Pip Mystic Colossus, or have a pet maycast Shatter for free. You will always have lost more Pips than your opponent, making this spell a total waste of Pips.

And then there's the drain spells, which render absorbs completely useless, no matter how much the amount. You see this often in Beastmoon when a death form drains your health despite having a complete circle of orbiting shields.

[edward sky]

I'm okay with the critical being capped, and I'm okay with it being more formulated than it was. Perfectly makes sense to me.

I'd even stretch to say I'm okay with the multiplier of critical depending on block is fair. (Whether it's 2x - 1.5) whatever.

But I refuse to accept that heals needed the same treatment as far as it not being x2 or not... Depending on my own block or my targets? I just don't think it's the way to go. As much as I can see it being a way to "restore some class uniqueness" it's a messy way of doing it.

Just my 2 cents, other than that I like Karamelle overall, I'm still just an old timer not liking change that just makes the gameplay seem all that more complicated and RNG.

[Tanner Hex]

This is good information. I'm fine with 100% critical going away, since it wouldn't go through 100% percent of the time anyways. I also didn't really like min/maxing for 100% critical rating either.

From a purely PvE perspective I'm a little uneasy about the idea of block reducing healing, however. I get Ratbeard's reasoning, but not all high damage hits are necessarily criticals. Hard hitting cheat attacks like Devourer's spit up attack, or non-critical hits still boosted by strong blades and mob outgoing damage/pierce like you would see from Corporal Tenni'syn. In these situations players with high critical block would be taking similar damage to everyone else but would get less healing. Unless critical block is always found together on gear that also provides high resistance so these players are taking less damage overall. It seems like the devs are receptive to feedback though so if it doesn't work out maybe they'll revert it or figure something else out

[DV8ONE]

Good stuff eric. Just curious after reading the intent of the new heal vs block mechanic. Will this effect deaths drain spells. Having a death wiz, I've been working on both improving the characters critical/ damage. Which in turn increases the heal return. But as death is often called upon for there spells doing damage to themself..i.e. dark pact, sacrifice, juju etc. For this reason I also try to obtain as much resist and block to death. Nothing worse than killing yourself with a critical dark pact.

To that end, if this heal to block mechanic is going to effect drains. It would in effect destroy the school of death in my eyes.

[Eric Stormbringer]

Good stuff eric. Just curious after reading the intent of the new heal vs block mechanic. Will this effect deaths drain spells. Having a death wiz, I've been working on both improving the characters critical/ damage. Which in turn increases the heal return. But as death is often called upon for there spells doing damage to themself..i.e. dark pact, sacrifice, juju etc. For this reason I also try to obtain as much resist and block to death. Nothing worse than killing yourself with a critical dark pact.

To that end, if this heal to block mechanic is going to effect drains. It would in effect destroy the school of death in my eyes.

As far as I know, drain mechanics operate independently of heals so in theory it shouldn't be affected. However, that's a great question to ask the Devs!