Gift/Enhance etc type spells suggestion

[Guaran]

Repost of an old idea: Auto-effect level-buffs, for anything castable on someone. Let me explain the idea again, which was partly born from the severe 100 spell limit of ages past.
Say you are a level 100 healer, and have Gift of Alacrity 5 spell scribed. To avoid having to have tier 1 thru 4 of this spell scribed also, the spell, when cast on someone, would automatically determine the highest level the player can meet requirements for, and grant that effect/gift.

Would be good for gifts, enhances, raises, wards, and resists.

Less hotkey clutter (assuming you currently do have multiple tiers of gift of alacrity scribed)

Easy buffing of group members.

Less spells scribed, especially ones that may not be used all that often. Room for more spells as a bonus effect.

I suggested this way back when I also suggested that higher tier formulas should contain the lower tier products as well. They implemented that idea, maybe now they can take another look at this suggestion?


Edit: Take the same example, but say you switch to Shaman, level 50. The tier 5 gift alacrity scribed spell, would still be useable, but the maximum castable benefit would be tier 3 version.

So those types of spells, once scribed, would do 2 checks. 1) check casters level to determine maximum castable effect.

2) determine targets maximum useable effect.

3) grant the lesser effect determined by the first 2 checks.

So neat and tidy...

[Sigi]

Love it!

[Drasdil Redin]

As a Paladin that loves buffing anyone I run across...from New Tris to the deadlands, I love this suggestion. It's a pain to either a) take up so many key bar buttons that you have nothing left or b) open up the knowledge window, filter by appropriate tier, select and cast individual spell, run after person because they've moved since you started....select and recast... ;-)

[Ferah]

Please!, to say the least... I would happily hack this in if I had the chance :P

[HAG]

DEVs - look at this NICE idea!

[XanderAZ]

Count me in for a please!

Comment on the second part, it may not make sense to allow for this as it may lead to requesting it of other spells. Not sure how easy it would be to restrict "buffs" as with wards/resists it is not limited to augmentation line. Example: I scribed: Thunder Cloud V and decide to start out Guardian, should I really automatically get Thunder Cloud I?

[Gremblthrg]

This idea would also be good with 'flame attack', 'ice attack', 'energy attack' spells, in addition to wards/resists/raises/enhances/surges/gifts already mentioned. It wouldn't work so well for any offensive spells, though, since those are quite often teched. For any boons or gifts, it would make buffing people alot easier.
-Grem

[Safire]

this would work for buffs and such yea and get rid of the need to have all the teirs of stuff laying around and might actually clear up some peoples lag

[Chaldor Itieles]

could get a little complex to code, in cause of the entity jungle to find out, but if the database has the right connections to filter all lower types of a buf out in one query, this should be possible.
And maybe its going to get easier to implement as first thought

With other words: would love to see that in game :P

[Nexxus]

Not to play Devils Advocate, but what about the techs?

You'd effectively be using t5 techs on a t3 spell if cast on a lvl 40.

[AA0]

Actually, the devs stated it was always designed that you could add t5 techs to lower tier spells but it would invoke a penalty, that was just never set up right.

[Guaran]

Not to play Devils Advocate, but what about the techs?

You'd effectively be using t5 techs on a t3 spell if cast on a lvl 40.

Thats possible I suppose. But how many spells of this type are even teched? For gifts, raises, and enhances, these Cleanse and Fortify are about the only ones used. Cleanse tech is capped at tier 3 anyway. Fortify is niegh worthless effect, only adds armor to Dragons that I know of (requires base armor stat). For these 2 techs, if you have lvl 100 healer and they go off, well that could just be considered a positive side effect of multiclassing. Fortify V isn't going to make a level 50 shaman overpowered.

Another option would be to check the tier's of techs applied as well, if any. And make teched boons restricted to the tier of the highest tech. This would still be a huge improvement, as the work around for the player would be to have the teched version, and another unteched version scribed as well. Teched boons are fairly rare, few would be affected. Cleanse teched raises are all that stand out in my mind.

Or, simply exclude teched boons from being castable in a lower tier altogther. Either way not a big deal.

Elemental attacks, wards, resists aren't techable that I can recall.

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Since a gift type spell ALREADY checks the target's level when casting. and since ALL spells check casters skill level AND adventure level (and adventure class) already, it seems this suggestion could be coded with just a few changes to how the algorithm works. Pretty please??

[Solanaceae]

Fortify is even more useless in that it conflicts with enhance armor/raise armor. Besides that, I recall that the techs on a spell can proc even if the spell itself doesn't succeed. I've had cleanse go off before even though the actual effect of the spell was blocked.

[AmonGwareth]

Smeglor may correct me here, but without additional tech this is not possible currently. A Tier 5 version of a spell has no concept of lower tiers of itself. They are completely separate objects in the database.

[Maneso]

This may be a stupid question (my highest spell-chucker is level 14), but lower tier buffs don't overwrite the higher tier ones, correct? So why not just hotkey all the tiers in order, highest to lowest, under one button. Since the level check comes after you finish casting, there shouldn't be a stop-action involved, and you'll just keep casting until one sticks. Granted, it makes buffing take a little longer...but it frees up hotkeys, and you can always make seperate buttons for your most common buffs (i.e., the one your guildie always asks for)

[Guaran]

One of the points/benefits, was not having to have a spellbook with 45 spell-slots used just for gifts. At the time the original suggestion was made, 100 spells total was the limit. It has since been raised, but the point still remains. If you multiclass even a little, with multiple tiers of attack type spells, room runs out quickly for gift of health 1, etc. Myself I only have a few tier 3 gifts scribed, some t4, all t5. and when a new spell needs scribed, those lower tier versions are first to be deleted.

[AA0]

Those hotkeys would also end up casting t5 for someone, then the 4 lower tiers on them as well which won't stick but still be cast.. not good.

[Ferah]

Smeglor may correct me here, but without additional tech this is not possible currently. A Tier 5 version of a spell has no concept of lower tiers of itself. They are completely separate objects in the database.

That was the impression I had from this end, however even so it is still simple (I think!) presuming a base version of the spell can be cast, I am guessing that they are in the db and failing that could be put in, *wink*

Basically I just want it to do something like this:

If the (teched or not) T5 does not stick, try an unteched T4 version of the same base spell, if not that that then try a unteched T3, and so on down the line.


The sacrifice we make to free up spell slots is reflected in the loss of the techs for the lower level improvised versions.

For the majority of gifts/enhance/raise this is not a problem as far as I know.

[Guaran]

That would work great! Simply drop the techs when casting results in a lower tier effect being needed. If the caster is say only lvl 75, or the target is only level 75, just cast gift of health 4 unteched automatically without worrying about the techs.

Perfect

[Eni]

Would be just 5 different target effects for a t5 buff spell. Should work as same already works with multiple teched items.