Combat vs Magic

[The Crazy Animal]

Here?s one that no one mentions much why is there no interplay between magic and combat. We have spells that do things via physical means but we ignore them as acting that way. It?s always magic vs. magic resistance rather then looking at it being the effect of magic vs. ac, dr, and dodge. Should some magical spells be subject to the same rules combat is?

Examples of the types of spells I?m talking about: Boulder, Vine strike, Acid Jet, Ice breath, Fireball, Dragonfire.

Some spells could be made dodge-able even if they are still resisted by MR. While other could be physical resists. Spells where you are aiming to hurl or conjure something at a player should be subject to AC as well.

[Hagrid]

Here?s one that no one mentions much why is there no interplay between magic and combat. We have spells that do things via physical means but we ignore them as acting that way. It?s always magic vs. magic resistance rather then looking at it being the effect of magic vs. ac, dr, and dodge. Should some magical spells be subject to the same rules combat is?

Examples of the types of spells I?m talking about: Boulder, Vine strike, Acid Jet, Ice breath, Fireball, Dragonfire.

Some spells could be made dodge-able even if they are still resisted by MR. While other could be physical resists. Spells where you are aiming to hurl or conjure something at a player should be subject to AC as well.

Some spells you should be able to dodge like a boulder flying at you, fireball, etc.(unless you just stand there)  A meteor storm/hellstorm well good luck with that. :)

Some spells like boulder and vine strike are more physical and not sure how MR should come into play like it is. (magical boulder or magic vines maybe)

[The Crazy Animal]

I?d like to see it where you could set a few variables for handling the combat aspects of magic. Dodge difficulty and Hit Accuracy being the main two. The other big one would need to be the option to set the resist to be damage on armor which would let the targeted player soak the damage like it was done via a weapon.

As far as magical or physical manifestations of spells go I don?t see why there can?t be both. One spell might create the likeness of a boulder out of mana while another spell might conjure levitate and hurl a boulder. It would give use a little more variety while making spells which is fairly important when dealing with large numbers of levels.

As far as area spells go I don?t think they should be dodge-able but they could be made so they miss you based on AC or you?re able to physically resist them via damage on armour. For example I summon a small tornado into the room and it hurls objects around at you each round your AC might let you not get hit and if you do you resist it based on your dr.

[Mukami]

There is an ability in dnd called evasion (or improved evasion) that basicly lets you make check to see if a spell like fireball you could dodge the intended area to be scorched. it start so that when you pass the check you take half damage and if you fail you take full but the improved ability is if you pass you take none if you fail you take half. Thats not balanced for this game but you could work it so that if you encumbrance is below a point you can have the ability to move outta the way. It could even be an extra ability to make classes like the ninja/thief better at avoiding traps or damage. To throw out a basic, i have no intent to check how well this works, formula you could do something like:

evasion % = (caster level*5-character level)*100
if they evade then damage taken = damage delt - (characters lvl/2)

like i said verry slapped together formula (too tired to think) but it could be an idea

[DeathCow]

I'd be down for making evasion(spell dodgeing) into a ninja/mystic ability. And possibly granted by a bard spell.

[The Crazy Animal]

I agree an evasion ability would be cool.

[DeathCow]

Just need to figure out how it will work, cant be dotarded like the spell immu ability.

[The Crazy Animal]

The spell immu ability needs serious work...

What I would do is use a two ability system. One ability on the spell that matches up to the evasion ability on the character. The ability on the spell would set the default difficulty to evade the spell. That would then get subtracted or added to characters ability and we'd go from there since that would give use a fairly variable number to play with which could even handle negative evasion scores for the use in curses. As far as damage reduction goes theres so many ways we could do that. I won't get into it now.

What are the conditions that you would want to effect how evasive a character could be if they have that ability?

ENC...
Agil...
what else...?

[DeathCow]

Wisdom, Enc, Agility.  Lets try to keep it simple.

[The Crazy Animal]

Ok sounds good. I'll come up with some formulas for it.

[El_Jefe]

I was thinking about this.  I mean, a mage gets one damn swing.

one

that shouldnt be dodged.

fuck that.

[The Crazy Animal]

They don't have to get just one swing though... Look at meteor storm to name one in particular and there isn't any reason we couldn't have more spells like that.

[El_Jefe]

I guess.  yeah mete is one of the best spells.  comet and that odd fireblast spell forget what its called are based upon it being a good thing.


I still say dodge % if it is available should be a small chance.  like max of 25%.  i mean, if a level 20 something shoots a hot blast out in pvp, it shouldnt be an empty round for that mage without a good fight.

Well, some spells you should not be able to dodge.   room spells obviously.  Effect spells as well.  I mean put it in but I think it makes mages not bother to pvp ever as the chance for a complete miss of a round is pretty strong, strong enough to stop the attempt for some good pvp.

I want to see mage vs warrior pvp.  really, the fight should go to the mages if they get the first volley.  they should be incrediblly offensive and always growing scarily in that power.  defense should be based upon tricks and deception but raw AC like it is in mmud now doesnt make much sense.  mages with 88/6 ac is kinda freaky, yet they cant do as much damage as a human mystic to a monster.

that should never happen ever.

[The Crazy Animal]

I guess.  yeah mete is one of the best spells.  comet and that odd fireblast spell forget what its called are based upon it being a good thing.

I still say dodge % if it is available should be a small chance.  like max of 25%.  i mean, if a level 20 something shoots a hot blast out in pvp, it shouldnt be an empty round for that mage without a good fight.

I'd like it to have a difficulty to dodge based on spellcasting. As this would add to value of good character building and in some cases item collection.

Well, some spells you should not be able to dodge.   room spells obviously.  Effect spells as well.  I mean put it in but I think it makes mages not bother to pvp ever as the chance for a complete miss of a round is pretty strong, strong enough to stop the attempt for some good pvp.

I think this was something that was agreed upon for the most part. The trade off though for being able to miss more is they could then potentially get a damage boost on those dodge-able spells.

[El_Jefe]

that sounds good.

I thnk that SC should be the main factor in spell damage.  makes sense!  It is a good balancing thing.  A mages sc rating could up faster per level than a warlock's.  I think that could be an easy way to balance their power.  Things like dented wizard hats would be of utmost value.