Mechanics Suggestion: Eldritch Battery

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UnDeaD_CyBorG wrote:

As you'd still have ES, it would allow you to also pick Ghost reaver to turn life leech into mana leech. p

And if you want to make a specifically geeky build, Using Blood Magic would still draw ES before taking down life.

This is not synergy, this is simply adding overly complicated mechanics, that besides being rather iffy on whether the change would be necessary, would likely be a nightmare to code. Otherwise I believe Blood Magic would already be able to draw from shields, considering there is little to no difference between them already.

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UnDeaD_CyBorG wrote:

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EpsiIon wrote:

Its your opinion that it would make % based auras easier to use, but in actuality, it would actually nerf your ability to run many total auras, which is one of the draws of this skill.

Given that % Auras cost based on your maximum mana, if ES would function like mana, but not be mana, you could effectively reserve 100% of your mana pool and still have a casting resource left.
As such, it effective reduces the cost of % auras by however much percent of your total EB mana the energy shield makes up.
I'd call that easier usage of auras.

I could argue the inverse. Doing this would cause integer auras to cost much MORE % of your max mana, then if this nerf or change did not occur. In the end, all you are doing is trading one set of auras for another, and in the process, nerfing, quite indirectly I believe, the very core effectiveness of this ability.

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UnDeaD_CyBorG wrote:

Regarding it needing a buff or nerf, that is not a point of this thread; I ask for a complete change of the mechanic;
The devs have stated it won't be buffed, my problem with Eldritch Battery is that the skill is boring.
It more or less takes away any management of mana regeneration or hiding to fill shield, and it has practically no synergies to other keystones, neither existing ones nor suggested ones.

It's just bland.

All changes are either buffs, or nerfs, depending both from player perspective, and the niche in which it resides. In my opinion, trading the ability to run integer auras, for % auras, would be a nerf, becuase no matter how many % auras you run, it cannot exceed 100%, where as integer auras are not % based, and I can run all of them if I had adequate mana.

Its not a skill, by very definition, it is a passive. They aren't meant to be fun, they are meant to make your SKILLS (The gems) funner. The passive accomplishes this quite well. As for the mana regen, it does NOT entirely remove the management of mana regen, and the ES refill is pointless, becuase as a whole, ES is much more important then mana, as it is directly related to life and death. You trade possible 1.5k life for 1.5k mana. To nerf this skill based on its ability to reduce the need for mana regen, would be the same as to nerf blood magic becuase it reduces the need for mana regen. You still NEED mana regen items if you don't want to run leech, this skill simply allows for LESS, by raising your base mana regen.

The skill is balanced. Very precariously so. This change would remove mine and the few people who I know that use it's main incentive for getting the skill. The change is simply NOT a good one.

Tl;dr at bottom

No offense, but I have a creeping feeling you argue because you currently are one of maybe 10 people that actually uses this passive successfully.^^
Well, congratulations.
But on to the actual argument;

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EpsiIon wrote:

This is not synergy, this is simply adding overly complicated mechanics, that besides being rather iffy on whether the change would be necessary, would likely be a nightmare to code.

They'd be far easier to code than the CI Shenanigans of calculating stun based on what your hitpoints would have been.
And I'd indeed call that a synergy; You can use two keystones together to create an effect that each of them alone would not have; There's no other way to turn life leech into mana leech. The BM thing may be over the top, agreeably.

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EpsiIon wrote:

I could argue the inverse. Doing this would cause integer auras to cost much MORE % of your max mana, then if this nerf or change did not occur. In the end, all you are doing is trading one set of auras for another, and in the process, nerfing, quite indirectly I believe, the very core effectiveness of this ability.

That is a valid argument, though the difference would probably be one Aura at best. It really depends on the interpretation of the suggestion, on a point specifically that I didn't think through:

If Auras are all used from mana, you might indeed have one or two low level integer auras less. Let's not debate whether that actually makes a big difference.

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Undead_CyBorG wrote:

The Energy Shield would show up over the Mana Orb instead of the Hitpoint Orb, and be consumed with Priority, but not count towards the maximum Mana.

However, depending on how that'd be coded, would an integer Aura be consuming just mana, or reserve a part of the ES?

Ultimately, I don't actually see a problem with decreasing the cost of % Auras while increasing the cost of integer auras; getting more integer mana is actually possible with passive nodes, getting more than 100% mana is normally not.
Sure, that's a matter of opinion.

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EpsiIon wrote:

Its not a skill, by very definition, it is a passive. They aren't meant to be fun, they are meant to make your SKILLS (The gems) funner. The passive accomplishes this quite well. As for the mana regen, it does NOT entirely remove the management of mana regen,

First off, Passives, unless they add a mechanic like EEq or fundamentally chance one that is related to survivability, like BM or GR, don't make anything more "fun"; even then it's a stretch.
They make you stronger, faster, they maybe allow doing something more often in X time.
Now, certainly, EB cuts down survivability, so it has that part, but that's really only true when you have a caster character with low life; if you go up there from, say, a ranger, which turns 500 ES into mana but retains his 2k hp and good evasion, you don't actually suffer that large a drawback.
And it is absolutely beyond me how adding another aura would make the game anymore fun, it might raise dps or regen or whatnot, but fun? As an honest question, how would "fun" be defined? We can't really argue about that, anyways.

As for not removing the regeneration mechanic;
The lowest I can think of to reasonable get with EB, if using any real ES items at all, is around 1500 Mana.
With a single 20% regen node like one finds lying around in a multitude of places, that's already 30 Mana/second regen, which on an attack based char that actually has that low mana will be substituted by leech; As lower % leech is easy to get, It indeed drastically cuts down on the regeneration troubles;
Same might happen with Health regen high enough that regular mobs are no danger; It is certainly not more fun in my eyes if I can beat everything by clicking on it for several minutes.

On the other hand, a dedicated caster will give up the majority of his survivability, maybe having 1k hp left with a few nodes,
but the mana regen will likely exceed 100/second without any passives, enough to fuel a barrage of Multi Ice spears for longer than a normal blob will survive.

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All that aside, being able to have up less total auras isn't actually something I see as bad; There's been multiple statements that auras are supposed to be a choice, and so far they really aren't when it comes to integers.

~In the same way, I used CI and found it bland because it makes you invincible at higher levels, and has a clear moment where it becomes useful, instead of being a conscious choice of risk/reward; It may be for 2 levels.

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EpsiIon wrote:

All changes are either buffs, or nerfs, depending both from player perspective, and the niche in which it resides.

A buff in this context is an increase in values, while a nerf would be the opposite.
While the effect of an ability change would possible be a nerf to a specific character, the ability doesn't need to be "nerfed" to achieve that.
If I would exchange EEq and BM, but keep their names in place, it would just be completely different ability, not nerfed or buffed in the slightest, but certainly be a buff or nerf to those builds that utilize it.

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To cut a long wall of text short;
I agree that the proposal would take away the mana regen bonus.
That is sort of the point of the suggestion; To allow for more mana without raising the combat regen; With the added benefit of making auras cheaper as that seems to be the only reason to currently take it.
I know this might make a few current builds less viable; but hope that it would in turn allow more new builds than old ones get damaged;
While also making an ability that changes mechanics instead of just removing them.

The thing is, % based auras are rather easy to run without EB, becuase mana leech is horrendously powerful. The only reason, honestly, to get EB is to run % auras AND integer auras together cohesively, and to possibly, if you spec it right, eliminate the overwhelming and utter necessity of the mana leech gem.

Also, BM turns life leech into a de facto mana leech. They even get 2 kinds of leech type gems that can be used, where as mana only has one. EB is more then fine, and a majority of the people that know how and can run EV toons, would likely be ruined by this change, I know my toon would be, as well as 3 others that run on a similar principle on my friends list.

I've seen some builds take use of both CI and EB.... I am completely new to Witch, and i don't understand what the special syngery is there....

I mean, you lose all of your health, AND energy shield... Are you left with any mitigation at all? Am i missing something with a build that takes use of both of those keystones?

Thanks!

The only people who take CI+EB are default players who are swarming the screen with minions. They take CI+EB so they can have over 9000 mana and completely focus on boosting the power of their summons and their offense. They run probably every aura in the game at once and spam quill rain or 6L ice spear from-afar. They don't really care if they die in one hit, because enemies should never get in range to attack them. I wouldn't be surprised if they run totems too.

http://tinyurl.com/8vap5nf - I imagine a level 80~ build looks something like this. You have more mana and minions than you know what to do with probably.

Since they don't care about defense at all, they can wear all the summoner uniques besides midnight bargain. They also don't care about elemental resists, so they might even wear dual curse ring.

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anubite wrote:

The only people who take CI+EB are default players who are swarming the screen with minions. They take CI+EB so they can have over 9000 mana and completely focus on boosting the power of their summons and their offense. They run probably every aura in the game at once and spam quill rain or 6L ice spear from-afar. They don't really care if they die in one hit, because enemies should never get in range to attack them. I wouldn't be surprised if they run totems too.

http://tinyurl.com/8vap5nf - I imagine a level 80~ build looks something like this. You have more mana and minions than you know what to do with probably.

Since they don't care about defense at all, they can wear all the summoner uniques besides midnight bargain. They also don't care about elemental resists, so they might even wear dual curse ring.

Thanks bro

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anubite wrote:

The only people who take CI+EB are default players who are swarming the screen with minions. They take CI+EB so they can have over 9000 mana and completely focus on boosting the power of their summons and their offense. They run probably every aura in the game at once and spam quill rain or 6L ice spear from-afar. They don't really care if they die in one hit, because enemies should never get in range to attack them. I wouldn't be surprised if they run totems too.

http://tinyurl.com/8vap5nf - I imagine a level 80~ build looks something like this. You have more mana and minions than you know what to do with probably.

Since they don't care about defense at all, they can wear all the summoner uniques besides midnight bargain. They also don't care about elemental resists, so they might even wear dual curse ring.

Thanks bro