A Year In Review: On Summoning Changes and A Minor Interrogation of Wizard

[wasdfqwertyuiop]

I will preface this with an apology for the wall of text and a thank you if you decide to read it.

This is probably not the forum post anyone was expecting today, but riding on the shoulders of another large update (March 11 must be a big day for big updates), I make this post one year to the day (in my timezone) from the forum announcement of sweeping changes made to summons on the server. At the time of the announcement, there was a great deal of both knee-jerk response and well-thought-out comments and concerns. It is my hope that by making this post after we have lived and worked with the changes implemented, we can avoid the sensationalism that came at the time, and that we can perform a temperature check of sorts, evaluating where we are now and hopefully getting some sense of what is to come. I place a great deal of weight on any input from Irongron, as he is the one responsible for managing the server as creative lead, and my quotes of him reflect my desire not to misconstrue any of his words. I will preface this by saying I currently play a summoner wizard, and have since just after the runic sequencers were blessedly sized down from a 2x2 item to a 1x1. I welcome input from particularly the developers and Irongron, and hope that since we have had a year to chew on this, that everyone will remain civil and reasoned. The time for reactionary vitriol is long-gone.

THE CHANGES

First, my thoughts on the changes themselves. At the time of the massive update and reversion of balancing changes to summons since the introduction of sequencers, I had my opinions, which have since been colored with time and application. I was not and am not fundamentally opposed to changes, but still I am concerned with the ‘Why?’ behind them, and think the mechanical changes boil down to a thematic question. What exactly is a summoner supposed to be?

So the reasons being are quite simply that summons (Also beyond those listed here), continue to quite simply break the game. I see this repeatedly when watching PCs in the game client, and I know that 95% of those reading this have direct experience of this too.

Essentially player characters are superfluous and almost any summoner can simply sail through PvE content behind near invulnerable summons. This doesn't just happen at high levels, but almost immediately. Game content, and gameplay is trivialized by what I consider to be absurdly overpowered content.

The sequencer update was meant to impact this, though given the resistance and just general drama that followed we agreed to make some changes, and exceptions (see the update above) while we assessed the impact of the change. Well, quite some time has passed now and it's crystal clear that the problem of overpowered summons is still with us.

By Irongron’s admission, both the sequencer implementation and the sweeping changes to summons were made because the current summons “break the game.” Regardless of the mechanical balances and number crunching, which can be tweaked, altered, and edited as much as needed, the stance towards summons and summoners must be established first to inform the direction of mechanical changes. To interrogate the mechanics without knowing the desired orientation of summoners is patently backwards.

Take the idea of a summoner following their summon through content, separated from whether the summon is invulnerable or not. Should a summoner be able to use their summon to clear content in lieu of their other spell options? There are some who have said that summons should be a tool available in your tool kit, not a lifeline you rely on for your class to function. I partially agree, I do think that they should be a tool in your kit, but the reality is that everything our characters have access to are tools in our kits. Weapons and armor, spells, summons, feats, stats, and class distributions; all are tools that we keep in our kits. The difference is that summons have been a universal tool for even those who have not ordered their toolbox in a summons-oriented way.

To me, it does not make sense to say that a summoner should not be able to rely on their summons to clear content; that would be akin to saying that a fighter should not be able to rely on their weapons and armor to clear content, because they poured their feats and other assets into attacking things where summoners poured their like assets into their summons. Similarly a caster that built their character to clear content with damaging spells and one that built to clear content with summoning spells have little fundamental difference in my eyes, so long as the dedicated summoner can't use damaging spells as well as the dedicated ‘blaster’ and vice versa. A significant level of investment should appropriately distinguish oneself from another who has not made such an investment, which summons have thus far failed to accomplish. Additionally, I believe the conception of a lack of effort from summoners comes from a place of perceived lack of contribution. If summoned creatures coast through content with their summoner standing behind them, there is a sense that the caster is not doing anything, so they should not be able to progress that way. However, the same idea applies to melee characters who run up and stand exactly where the summon would be, attacking and coasting through the content; the operation is the same. The separation of the power of the summoner from the character’s body seems to me what causes this sense of lack of trying.

If summoners are intended to be able to clear content using summons, then that should inform design decisions going forward. If they are not, and summons are only ever supposed to be a useful supplement to a character’s kit excluding them, so be it; this largely becomes moot, and I will just have to be in disagreement with it. But if summoners are supposed to be able to use their tools in the same way as others, mechanics can be adjusted so they don’t steamroll content, which we have seen in the balancing changes that were rescinded by the update. To this end, I will posit the question directly. Irongron, what is the role of summons and summoners, in your view of things? As I understand from your posts to the forums regarding this topic, you seem to believe that summoners should be able to clear content with their summons; your issue is that the summoned creatures are too powerful.

When too powerful they make the summoner, and whatever spells they used entirely superfluous. The actual gameplay becomes using the associate tool to coast along behind your creature, picking up the treasure it leaves behind.

I feel there has to be more to the gameplay, and that class, than walking behind an invulnerable summon. It certainly gives no incentive to do anything else for Wizard summoners if they can effectively overcome all content with their summons alone. I definitely don't think summons should be useless in PvE.

The issue this raises is that, as I have said, the operation of summoners and mundane martials is largely the same. You use the associate tool (if you choose) if you are playing a summoner, then you click your enemy and most of the time wait for the dust to settle, collect your spoils, and then move on. If the fight is demanding enough, in both cases, you prioritize key enemies first, you monitor your health and heal yourself/your summons as necessary, reposition, utilize choke points, and so on. And, this may be a point that we fundamentally disagree on, I think if you have appropriately invested into your summons, there isn't an issue with them proceeding through content in the same manner as martial characters of a comparable level. Those casters’ other spells will not be nearly as good as those that built for them, and so they may be superfluous in regard to damage, but that is the sacrifice they have made to have summoned creatures that provide that damage for them. You will still have buff spells, control spells, healing spells, and the like that are worth casting, just not so much as a damaging endeavor. I know that I do. Personally, I have found great effect in preparing assorted Life Transferrences with my precious few spell slots to prolong my summons, and the only offensive spells I generally prepare are instant death spells, because if my choices are between mediocre damage that won’t take out even one pack of level-appropriate enemies with my high level spells, or a chance that some of those enemies will be taken off the field, the choice doesn’t seem so much like one to me.

WIZARDS

Unfortunately, as Irongron has mentioned, wizards are in a difficult state. I could speak at much greater length, and will soon, to the limitations of our medium and the death of utility, but I will limit myself here and keep it as close to summon-related as possible, as I want this to be focused on summons. Another post on another day; as you can probably imagine, my time has been spent on this to date.

The above changes aren't intended as a solution, and there remain considerable issues to be overcome, such as:

The problem this presents for wizards, who despite all of our additional spells and features for arcane users continue to rely on summons (they really shouldn't have to)

It is an unavoidable thing that any changes to summons disproportionately affects wizards, which means that for the past year, they have come off worse than many of their peers, arcane or otherwise. There are other classes and paths that are more summon reliant than most, but as wizards are specifically called out, I will address it. An interesting idea was floated in the ten-week thread by Irongron that would see the three blade summons, which I presume are Shelgarn’s Persistent Blade, Mordenkainen’s Sword, and Black Blade of Disaster, converted to something new.

In addition to more adaptable and robust structure for the Summon Creature line spells which a developer is currently wotking on, I have spoken about a separate idea purely for wizards and sorcerers, as I think the posters here have made a very strong argument as to why these 'squishy' casters are so reliant on summons to guard them.

My current idea, which is no way guaranteed to happen as will require some scripting trickery, is to remove the 3 summoned blade spells from all spellbooks other than the above two.

These agro drawing wizard/sorc specific guarding summons will be locked in parry mode, sometimes true strike on a riposte and not function with associate tool. They would be very durable and suit casters who want to forego the regular summon spells and concentrate on offence casting. It would not leave them invulnerable, or offer any protection against archers or other casters but should mean when the mobs descend after casting that AoE the wizard gets some protection.

As soon as I have any ETA on either project I will let community know. In the meantime I'll continue to read and engage here.

This idea is actually one I find rather compelling, especially for an evocation-oriented wizard or sorcerer (whether they take the specialization or not), especially seeing as Shelgarn’s and Mord’s Sword are Evocation spells and would synergise with the spell foci they will already be presumably taking. I don’t know if Black Blade should be included in this since it is a Conjuration spell and doesn’t quite fit the same vibe as the other two, but either way this would be a very welcome addition to the ‘blaster’ style wizards that can really struggle to find room to breathe.

However, for the wizards that do opt for the traditional summon-focused style of gameplay, they are still left wanting. A framework that I have entertained and would I hope address Irongron’s concerns, and that I would like feedback from the community on, is to more clearly delineate the separation of ‘tiers’ of summoners, which I will explain. This is not the different tiers of the assorted summon streams themselves, rather in distinguishing the characters. We already have the Spell Focus bonuses, as well as the Epic Caster bonuses, and I would like to see, as has been proposed a few times, a bonus tied to the spellcasting ability of the summoner. Irongron mentioned a scalar tied to caster level, but I think that to be redundant with the Epic Caster bonus and would rather see it tied to casting modifier.

My personal intention is/was for each summon tier to scale with caster levels, so (for example) Summon VII would remain viable into epics, and even Summon I-IV would have some utility (and as such not be wasted spells in ranger spellbook). I would also like a different creature in the mix (too many elementals!).

I'm informed one of our admins has taken on a project following a similar philosophy. Once this is completed, and we have an idea of the new summon utility we'll look at boosts to sequencers (my preference here would be rhat all apply mass effects (to all the users summons, not just one (time saving), and that all also apply haste. Though again, we'll see where the update leaves thrm first.

As I see it, you could leave the base statline of summons at a somewhat lower grade, enough that they will not be able to carry those who do not invest into summoning through level-appropriate content. Having the corresponding Spell Foci of the school of the summon already provides a bonus, which at Epic Focus is not insignificant, but if the base summons were lower power, this bonus could be increased potentially, to effectively make those with the foci and those without have summons of a more noticeably different quality. The same principle could apply to the theoretical casting ability modifier bonus, which would create the distinction between those casters who prioritize Int/Wis/Cha or if they build for Constitution or some other build. A 20 Intelligence wizard and a 30 Intelligence wizard would be justified, I think, in summoning different quality summons. And for Epic Caster bonuses, those already do well by drawing the line between those with and those without epic caster levels; maybe those do more, maybe they stay the same. This would create three boxes, of sorts, you would need to check to get the best summons you can, and those missing out on any or all of them would notice the difference. By increasing the disparity between levels of investment, summons could hopefully move away from being the universal hammer in a world of nails and instead become a more focused element to choose to orient towards.

AOE SPELLS

The other large element of the changes was that the Mass Haste and (colloquially) Mass Zoo spells were updated to no longer affect summons. Unlike the mechanical balancing changes, which I can understand if applied with an ordered design philosophy in mind, this is a change that I have been unable to bring myself to agree with. I have grappled with it for a year, and still I come to the same conclusion. As I have stated, a character’s spells being one more asset they pour into their summons just makes sense to me, at least in regards to AoE spells. Perhaps unpopularly, I am grateful for sequencers and not needing to devote half or more of my spellbook to buffing my summons, and seeing as I have the three epic conjuration summoning spells, that would really become my entire spellbook. That is a terribly unfun process to engage in, especially the more summons you have, and I know I don't want to do it. Nor do I think we should have custom sequencers, that boils down to directly buffing your summons with extra steps.

Part of my dissatisfaction comes in the usefulness of the Zoo spells versus their Mass Zoo counterparts. If a caster is going to be applying one of these two, it will almost always be the single-target variety. The point is made and reiterated by others that most people supply their own buffs, often at a higher caster level versus dispelling than the actual caster would apply them, as a result of multiclassing on the caster’s part dropping their caster level lower than a mundane application, or in the case of another caster, they provide their own spells. There is little to no appetite for Mass Zoo spells, and functionally, if a summoner wants to spend their considerably higher level spell slot on a AoE variety, I think that to be completely fine and should extend to summons.

Unlike the Mass Zoos, Mass Haste is a powerful spell and valuable as a force multiplier for any group play, and will see plenty of use regardless of these changes. Providing it as a Haste-lite version to summons if the summoner is hasted has always felt awkward. A movement increase is nice to make sure your summons don't fall behind you, but without any of the mechanical gusto of the actual hastening, Mass Haste becomes more akin to the Mass Zoos in solo play, since why would you prepare a sixth (or seventh if extended) level spell where a third (or fourth) level will do? People are still going to take the spell, and it is unfortunate that while it is still useful in group play, that solo play has had the brunt of this option taken away from them.

What strikes me as particularly odd is the classification of spells by the announcement.

SPELLS AND SUMMONS

• Mass spells such as Mass Haste, Mass Bull's Strength, or Mass Cat's Grace no longer affect summons. Regular AoE spells continue to have an effect.
• Applying Haste or Mass Haste to a character now results in their summons receiving a 50% speed increase for the spell's duration.

A spell is either an AoE or it is not an AoE. To say that these are not ‘regular’ AoE spells does not make sense. If regular AoE spells continue to have an effect on summons, so should these, because they ARE regular AoE spells. And given the option between having AoE spells affect summons or not, I decidedly believe they should. Having AoE spells which ordinarily affect your party or all non-hostile entities, considering their elevated level compared to their single-target counterparts and their more limited selection compared to targeted buffs, affect summons as well just makes consistent and logical sense, and it should remain internally consistent and logical as well.

MISCELLANEOUS OTHERS

I have refrained from mentioning PVP so far in my input, because frankly I do not have the breadth of experience in PVP as many others who can speak to this matter better than I. However, I do feel comfortable saying that in my experience and that of those who have voiced theirs that summons in PVP are in a low enough state due to the prevalence and ease of access to Word of Faith that it is almost not worth considering in their current state. A Gate will apply some immediate pressure to be dealt with, and Planar Conduit can be effective, but as anyone who has gone into combat against a group that is ready to fight can attest, your summons will not survive the opening barrage of WoF. The dangers of stopping to resummon creatures mid-fight is often not worth it compared to other actions you could be taking, and eating a couple hundred damage as punishment is rarely worth whatever you're bringing into the field, especially when it may just be WoFed away anyway.

Another suggestion that has been brought up is transitioning many of the epic spells, including the summon spells, to a ten-minute timer. This is a change I would love to see. Being able to resummon your Elemental Meteor or dragon on a cooldown would be a nice quality of life feature, and the same summon would never show up in the same fight to affect PVP scenarios. I would make it function like the familiar feat, where the timer only starts once the summons are dismissed or killed, that way they can't be fielded back-to-back. I don't know if this would also allow these spells to refresh upon server resets, but that too would be nice, especially on crashes and not planned and announced resets.

While on the topic of the epic spells, and this is a slightly more mechanical note, albeit in principle rather than enumerated specifically, the epic summoning spells ought be revisited in terms of appropriate scale compared to each other. As is, they measure up poorly to each other in all respects, including but not limited to AC, AB, HP, and damage. Planar Conduit and Mummy Dust are available off the bat at level 21 (excluding Pale Master) with only 15 Spellcraft required, likewise with Dragon Knight at 22 (again excluding Pale Master). Unfortunately despite the much higher 32 Spellcraft requisite for Elemental Meteor, the spell falls far behind the others. The damage is largely negligible against epic level creature packs, and in the interim between dropping the meteor and the summon loading in and activating its auto-guard, depending on how far away you drop it, you will likely end up getting swarmed. Either it is too far away for the guard to trigger and enemies keep running at you while the summon chases, or it is close enough that they are already swarming you by the time its guard activates. Either way, it is a better move to forego the damage entirely and pre-cast the summon. And even then, its stats are so low compared to the front runner. Looking to the dragon, it is unfortunate that despite its hasted state, it does not have the survivability it should, especially for being a short-duration summon. Anecdotally, on one occasion, I have lost a fresh dragon knight with druidic sequencer to one frost giant juggernaut and one yellow mob Aurilite priestess when I tested its abilities. Neither of the non-undead epic summons can stack up to Planar Conduit, which frankly I believe to be in an acceptable place. I think it sets a good mark that epic summons can aim for, but there are few reasons currently, beyond having access to the summons, to use anything else. Because PC has two creatures, if other spells want to remain relevant, they must be amended to properly compete with their counterparts. I would like to see Dragon Knight and Elemental Meteor retooled to more appropriately embody an epic conjuration.

IN CONCLUSION

Whether my proposals are ever seriously considered or not, I would also like to ask the developers if there are any updates they can share with us. We have given the changes a good deal more than a few months to properly assess, both developer-side and community-side, so I feel it is appropriate to request this on the changes that were made a year ago. By merit of “The above changes aren't intended as a solution,” the updates were framed as a temporary measure that would be revisited in ten weeks, let alone ten months, and that they were a step in determining a better solution. I am aware development takes time; months, even years, and I know the development team has numerous things they are working on, especially evidenced by today's hefty announcements. This is not intended to be an excoriation of Irongron and the development team, whom I greatly appreciate, but being a bit blunt and honest on this is better than couching my reasoning in flowery language.

Even in the forum threads, plans for the future were discussed, but we did not receive much feedback as to the changes that were already made, instead seeing them treated as though since they were in the past that we can move on and look to different areas now. That may be and likely is not the case, but that is the impression regardless, which I find dissatisfying. If the stance is to not address for a time, and the practical application is that once that time has passed, there will not be a revisitation of substance of the topic, then it would have been better for there not to have been a ten-week beacon to look forward to. And I do not want for that to be the process, to be clear.

I believe that transparency and retrospection are important just as forward thinking is, and just ask that the investment of time of everyone involved not be left behind. I am not a confrontational person, and I dislike to see the friction between staff and players that manifests at times, especially around large updates and changes, and measured communication can do a great deal to lubricate the gears of the public relations aspect. However, I do also acknowledge the very real level of fire the developers come under for changes, including reprehensible threats against staff, and that talking more on a topic can aggravate those. Even just in forums, peoples’ hearts leap before their heads and things can get inflammatory and heated. That is why I waited to make this post, though time escaped me and I did not expect it to be a full year. So too, that is why in addition to developer input, I again request that people keep level heads in their responses, even if they are to dismantle my reasoning and points or to flat out prove me wrong.

Also mentioned in the forum threads, we have the “more adaptable and robust structure for the Summon Creature line spells which a developer is currently working on” and the aforementioned blade summon spell project (if it is feasible). If there are no updates on an ETA or on the content of those potential projects, that is more than okay, it would just be nice to know. I know that our server owner and all of our developers, designers, coders, and all staff that make this wonderful server possible are volunteers in an often thankless position, and recognize the limitations that come with a passion project. It would be uncharitable to ask you all to do a full-time job for no-time pay. Thank you for taking the time to read (and possibly contribute, fingers crossed) to my pontification, I won’t waste any more of your time. For now, until my next post.

[AskRyze]

Wow

Hoo, boy. That was a long one.

Thank you, genuinely, for writing this post. You're saying what we've all been thinking for the last year.

That said, I would like to draw a small anecdote that is all too common in game design - I used to play League of Legends. I used to play League of Legends a lot. Let me share with you an all too common experience:

Devs: Let's nerf Jax, Jax has a disproportionately high win rate right now.
Devs: Let's nerf Yi, Yi has a disproportionately high win rate right now.
Devs: Let's nerf Xin Zhao, Xin Zhao has a disproportionately high win rate right now.

Also Devs: Hey, so turns out those three characters were winning a ton because of this problematic item that they all used so we're going to nerf the problematic item.

Players: So you're going to revert changes to the characters, right?
Devs:
Players: ...Right?
Devs:

Unfortunately the fact that Wizard (and sorcerer too, inb4 cries of "BuT dIvInE bLeSsInG") has been held down under the water for the battletoads' sins is something that the developers are both entirely too aware of and unlikely to change any time soon. Fundamentally any fix that would make those classes better to play would pull them too far away from the roots of 3.0-3.5 D&D and closer toward the MMO that we're all lying about not playing on this Neverwinter Nights Enhanced Edition Persistent World Server. Personally, humbly, we need to rip the bandaid off and give wizards/sorcs a mechanic analogous to cleric's refund system to make them actually tolerable to use in the current state of play - and no, casting Flare 25 times before I get to cast Fireball once isn't it.

Were battletoads really, really strong? Absofreakin'lutely, once upon a dream. But that dream was a year ago. We've seen which classes that players feel enjoyment in playing based on the player statistics that are consistently published (Thank you again, devs, for that mote of transparency) and it is consistently the playstyles that allow you to have more uptime in both PVE and PVP content. If the content on the server is going to continue to be designed the way it has in the last 3-ish years, then players are going to gravitate toward the tools that can actually address the content as it's being given to us, regardless of what fallacious chemise of tabletop diceplay we hide the swine of mechanical execution behind.

We were told that better, more interesting options would be coming. Perhaps they still are, but it has, as you've pointed out, been a year and we are all the worse for it. For better or worse, as far as the players are aware, we have just been told "Wizards cannot play the game effectively" and been told to sit on our hands, wish upon a star, and hope that something better comes by eventually(tm).

Fundamentally, I would see the change to summon buffing reverted wholesale but we both know that's not happening.

And for those who think I am actually spending my time insulting the developers - watch more monty python, then go look up the definition of dry wit. I love what you do for the sake of the game, I just wish it didn't hurt so much when you did it.

[Edens_Fall]

Just want to give a nod of respect to you both for the posts. Both well written and thoughtful. Thank you! They were enjoyable to read.

[perseid]

I don't think the balance changes really make sense and I blame a lack of real vision. It would be defensible if the state of minion balance was something like "Unsequencered for pvp stats, sequence for pve stats". That would make sense in terms of introducing a gold sink that saves people time and is balanced around action economy. But what does breaking the game even mean here otherwise? That wizards clear too easily? This seems like a vanity issue for some perceived difficulty the server is supposed to have. Which makes no sense as a balance target when the reality is that until each person added to a party boosts drops proportionately the actual outcome is going to be people who care about money running the slimmest parties they can (or even soloing) to maximize gains per minute. Until the party size penalty to loot splits is addressed it makes no sense to focus on things like soloability because everyone who cares is calibrating all of their builds, not just summoner builds, around soloing.