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Sorcerer Elementals in PVM


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#1 Hokubokosni

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Posted 21 December 2011 - 10:02 PM

As a sorcerer, I've always felt that our elemental summons have been a challenge to keep alive. In my original build, I had planned on not getting spirit cure because I figured I'd just resummon one if it died. About an hour after getting my first summon, I changed my mind and threw points into it as soon as I could. That was fine for the most part, aside from full screen MVP attacks, I was usually able to keep my summons alive through a mob long enough that I could spirit cure it back up to health.

However, in light of the recent patch and 'visit' to monster stats, I feel like this has become an even larger problem. I went down to Scaraba to do the turn-in and as usual brought out my Agni for fire-based Psychic Waves. A scarab gets on my Agni and he starts taking 1200-1500 per hit; while I'm in the middle of casting psychic wave to save poor Agni from his fate, a second scarab spawns. Before I even have a chance to finish Psychic Wave and spam Spirit Cure, poor Agni has already been brutally murdered by a "mob" of two scarabs (keep in mind, my 1 fire PW isn't enough to kill the scarabs so they're still alive as well).

I'm just guessing numbers here, but I'd say Agni level 2 has roughly 12-15k hp. Granted, I have not maxed spirit sympathy, so the extra 4 skill points there would be an additional 20% hp and give him ~17k? So how is it that I'm supposed to make any sort of use of my spirits on maps where I can level when at any given point in time (ESPECIALLY during an increased spawn turn in event) 1-2 mobs can spawn and murder my elemental before I can even finish a cast? Also, even if I COULD spam spirit cure, it only heals Agni by 10% of my hp which'd be about 2700-3000 (thanks for the HP nerf, by the way, that also didn't help our case), at the cost of taking that hp/sp from me; pretty difficult to keep up, not to mention while I'm spamming spirit cure, I cannot attack and more are still spawning. Even in a full party setting, it's very easy for these scarabs to spawn and target our pets and murder them before we can really do anything about it.

It was bad enough that most MVPs worth using our elementals on have a full screen attack/AOE spell (earthquake/hell's judgement/etc) that will nuke the snot out of them and make it so we can't depend on our summons, now we can't even depend on them in normal leveling environments. I will be the first to admit that they can be very powerful - making our psychic wave elemental based, and ventus giving a 1 sec cast reduc, and even the armor "endows" for tanking purposes combined with insignias. But the fact that a super-novice could take one of these things out is really disheartening.

My proposed problems with Sorcerer Elementals are thus:

1. There is no real "AI" for these, they don't run, they don't try to avoid monsters, they just stand there and take it. This is further complicated by:
2. You cannot control their movement. They will stand there until you move a certain number of tiles away, then they will move based on that - You can't move them to avoid mobs, it's a real pain to position them in a corner to minimize spawn on them (unless you're camping the same spot, you can expect that they WILL run ahead of you and get mobs of their own).
3. Their hp is ABYSMALLY low - for being a 3rd class skill which takes a fair number of skill points to get and materials to summon EACH time, you would think they'd at least hold up a little better than a level 99 character in these "3rd class" maps.
4. The ONLY option to heal them is through Spirit Cure which has a cast time, takes a fair amount of the caster's hp/sp, and restores a pathetic amount of hp to the elemental (ie: it barely outheals one scarab hitting it, if two come along, they will outdamage your heals and you will be left with 0 hp/sp yourself in 9 casts); plus while you're spamming this, you have no options for attacking and remedying the situation - you can TRY to whack the mobs with your staff and hope and pray they change to you (and that no more spawn and go after your poor pet).
5. They are costly to summon (3 or 6 rough stones, or 1 pure depending on what level you use) - this isn't really a problem since they are fairly powerful, but if we have to resummon them every other mob, then it is both costly and difficult to manage your inventory weight to keep a 'fair' amount of summon stones.

I'm not saying change all of the above; I'm not looking for overpowered elementals that can't be killed. I'm not looking for elementals to become like homunculus', and I honestly can't speak for implications in PVP as I do not meddle in the WoE or PVP scene, but I do think that the current state of things leaves elementals completely lacking in PVM (unless you already totally overpower the map, obviously my elementals are not going to die to orcs). Again these are 3rd class skills and you would expect them to be moderately useful to places where 3rd classes go, not summon and have it die 10 seconds later. I strongly think this is an issue that should be evaluated and discussed until some sort of balanced solution can be determined and implemented.

Edited by Hokubokosni, 21 December 2011 - 10:03 PM.

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#2 EvilLoynis

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Posted 22 December 2011 - 07:27 AM

I agree with you on almost everything here so +1 (would +10 if I could -_-)

When I first heard about Sorc's Spirit Summons I will admit I had a couple different views. When I learned that they had such annoying levels with 3/4 modes and different skills on each mode/lvl it annoyed the hell out of me.

I mean one of the ways to help them survive a bit longer would be to use lvl 3 guys, but they don't help PWave at all!

And what is with you not being able to Heal them? Or not even being allowed to be healed by Priests? Really stupid considering how fragile they are.

Secondly they have a Duration aside from surviving monster hits. This also increases with levels put in but is WORTHLESS because for 3 out of 4 them you really only want level 2's for PWave primarily. Putting that extra skill point in it does NOTHING for your lvl 2 summon.

Also i really hate how quickly monsters Target them Even when my Sorc is casting. I mean monsters are NOT supposed to be that intelligent. They are supposed to atk the one who is casting the powerful spell, not the supporter that merely enhances it.

Then they even put a pretty high Reuse Delay on the summons as well which doesn't really make sense.

The "Balances" pretty much just made every even WORSE than it was.

I really think that Spirits may need to become like the pets that don't actually have offensive abilities but just boost you. You could decrease their duration as well to help make up for it.
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#3 Seraphiel

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Posted 22 December 2011 - 09:59 AM

GravityKR really failed with the summons. They should have used something similar to "the homunculus" system for the summons. This way they would be actually useful; and what's the most important, it would be a real FUN playing sorcerer class.

Each summon would have different base stats on birth, each sorcerer could store one summon of each element. They would evolve to their higher forms - lv.70(2nd form), lv.130(3rd form). You could always level only the one of them to 150, but getting 4 to that level would make your character more versatile.

Sometimes, I feel like GravityKR is really lazy and kills the FUN of the game intentionally...

I don't know if iRO could request such a "big" change to the summon system, but it would be nice. I'm sure that most players would be satisfied with "homunculus" like summon system. I don't think it's that much of work for GravityKR. They already have homunculus system, summons already have stats and skills. All it takes is a wise and logical combining of the two. The new summon system could be a part of the next episode expansion 14.3 or 15 whichever episode will be the next (kRO is at ep 14.2: Eclage).

#####################################################################################

On the side note, I always wanted to have an ability to increase homunculus's/summon's stats the way I like. Just like our main characters. This way we could make different builds for our homunculuses/summons.
They could have their own stat growth per level, plus some stat points per level to distribute by a player.

RO might be an old game, but it still has much bigger potential than other, newer mmos. It could be polished here and there (improving summons and homunculus or even pet system is one of those unpolished things) without really adding new, hurried and unbalanced content that sometimes is worse than what we already have, and all it takes is improving it.

I really wish Gravity didn't develop RO2 and instead invested the money into RO1. They could have upgraded the game's engine, graphics and effects along with some game's systems. But well, it might be too much to expect something like that from a Korean company...

Edited by Seraphiel, 22 December 2011 - 10:21 AM.

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#4 GuardianTK

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Posted 22 December 2011 - 12:50 PM

About your problem in Scarabas, Hokubo:

Have you tried using Flee enhancing equipment and stat foods? Your character's Flee directly influences your Summon's Flee at the time of summoning. Just pop the equipment temporarily before summoning a spirit, summon the spirit, then re-equip your original equipment. See if that helps with your summoning's survival in certain pvm environments.


My Sorc build has quite a bit of Agi in it, and it has helped even my Lv2 summons Flee normal mobs. This includes post-balance. Although you have to keep in mind that your Base Levels also affect a summon's stats.

Edited by GuardianTK, 22 December 2011 - 12:51 PM.

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#5 TheSquishy

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Posted 22 December 2011 - 12:58 PM

If you don't have a lot of flee at the time of summoning, don't expect to keep your summons alive.
Their stats are based on your own and agi is a must for a summoner as TKguardian advised.

I also agree that summons do need some sort of basic AI, nothing as detailed as a homun is needed just basics

-Attack this/don't attack that
-Move here

These smple commands would be a huge improvement compared to we currently have.

Edited by TheSquishy, 22 December 2011 - 12:59 PM.

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#6 EvilLoynis

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Posted 22 December 2011 - 01:47 PM

Does anyone else think that Spirits having 4 different "Modes" is really stupid?!
They have Standby, Passive, Defensive and Offensive modes.

I mean first off WHY HAVE OFFENSIVE?!

Lvling past level 100 is RARELY done 1 vs 1 so why have something thta would only be useful then? And even then they would be no match for a monster at the same level.

Also Leveling a Spirit should have just added abilities to each mode.

My Example will be Agni and his Passive abilities.

Current Agni Passive abilities are:

Lvl 1
- Increases the damage of Fire Bolt and Fire Wall by 10%.
- Adds +60 Equip ATK.

Lvl 2
- +10% Added on to warmer
- PWave Damage +20% and Changed to Fire Element
- Adds +120 Equip Attack.

Lvl 3
- Auto-cast level 5 Fire Bolt at about a 25% chance.
- 50% chance of using Red Blood or Yellow Gems when Casting Endow Blaze or Volcano
- Adds +180 Equip Attack. - I actually believe this may deserve the soso label as it only boosts YOUR Attack.



Now Considering these it would be EASY to see which are really useful. GREAT Bonus's in BLUE, worthless ones highlighted in red and soso in green.

Now Is it really to much to have perhaps each level add one of the Blue ones? As it is you lose out on SOOOOOooo much using lvl 3 passive compared to lvl 2 that it's just stupid.

Can you not see perhaps level 1 being the atk boos of 180, lvl 2 that plus, say the warmer boost (which could be changed to ALL Fire skills +10%), and level 3 being the PWave boost and change plus the others?

I so hate the Red ones that are pretty useless. I mean how much are you really going to be counting on that 50% chance of stone saves? Or really do you even want your PASSIVE Spirit even casting anything?! Just makes no sense that they make the skill so much worse if you actually bother to level it up.

I really think they went about these skill in a stupid manner. I mean leveling a skill is supposed to make it better not make it useless and forget everything from the previous lvls.

This would be like forgetting all your Mage skills when becoming a Sage lol. Higher levels are supposed to give better rewards not the otherway around.

Edited by EvilLoynis, 22 December 2011 - 02:00 PM.

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#7 GuardianTK

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Posted 22 December 2011 - 01:57 PM

I mean first off WHY HAVE OFFENSIVE?!

Lvling past level 100 is RARELY done 1 vs 1 so why have something thta would only be useful then? And even then they would be no match for a monster at the same level.

Also Leveling a Spirit should have just added abilities to each mode.


I suppose it's for the fun factor. At least I'm having fun watching my Summons attack with 193aspd. With some Agi in your build, you can actually do pretty good just watching your summon just killing things on its own.


I wish Summons are allowed to help attack Emperiums though. Would be nice to have a 193aspd buddy helping to break.

Edited by GuardianTK, 22 December 2011 - 01:58 PM.

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#8 EvilLoynis

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Posted 22 December 2011 - 04:30 PM

I suppose it's for the fun factor. At least I'm having fun watching my Summons attack with 193aspd. With some Agi in your build, you can actually do pretty good just watching your summon just killing things on its own.


I wish Summons are allowed to help attack Emperiums though. Would be nice to have a 193aspd buddy helping to break.



I really have to ask, what level are you?, what creature is your Spirit killing and on what mode? Also which spirit ofc?

Oh and what are your stats?
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#9 GuardianTK

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Posted 22 December 2011 - 07:10 PM

I really have to ask, what level are you?, what creature is your Spirit killing and on what mode? Also which spirit ofc?

Oh and what are your stats?

My Sorc's 150/50. As for what Summon I'm using....Let's just say all of them can get 193aspd on Spirit Control 3. xD I only have Aqua3 and Ventus3 though. If I were a pure Hindsight/Spellfist Summoner Sorcerer, I'd have gotten myself all 4 Summons if I wanted to.

As for stats, I reset not long ago and have absolutely no Agi in my build. My Summons can still Flee just fine with the right equips and +Flee/Agi foods though, considering how my Base Level affects my Summon's Flee. I tried going to Scaraba and it was doing fine killing things here and there. Obviously I'd have to support it eventually though, because killing things 1x1 means you're gonna get mobbed on a turn in map.

I can show you in-game sometime if you want me to. :3 You're on Valkyrie server, right?
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#10 RuneLightmage

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Posted 28 December 2011 - 01:06 AM

I have had a 150 battle sorc (not spellfist/hindsight- I said battle people). He's got a heck of a lot of agility. My summons flee mobs (more than 3 monsters) just fine, go at it with 193 atk speed and I use them in attack mode a lot. Why? Because I can't kill mobs easily or efficiently with the renewal system. Having a summon also fighting and killing really helps. But ultimately, if I am getting mobbed, I have to wing. It's honestly a pointless catch 22. Fighting a single monster now is stupid. Fighting a mob gets me killed. I can't fight mobs but only single targets. Yay renewal!

Anyway, I use level 3 agni all the time...as in, almost exclusively. I don't care about levels 1 and 2 very much. Sure, from time to time I need them. But more often than not, I have agni on passive for the damage boost or I have him fighting in aggressive mode. Also, level 5 firebolt autocast in additional to my 25% chance (or maybe it is 27%) to cast whatever I set on hindsight is nice. I swing so fast that It's like I have a link on when I use double bolt....I don't go around linked anymore (except to MVP).

Much of the arguments for summons are largely based on people who are playing Warlocks *cough* I mean, sorcerers who cast aoe spells.....(same thing).

If you're talking from the point of view of every single sorcerer on the server with the exception of the 5-6 who chose to explore the non-warlock-like aspects of the class, your arguments would be entirely different.

I'd HATE to deal with the suggestions for the pure Warlock sorcerers. Why would I want agni level 2 at all in pvm, for +20% psychic wave damage, bonus warmer healing (fine if camping, I guess) and 120 equipment attack?

I fail to see, logically, why I would choose to summon that at all when I could just pick level 1 or 3 and get more or roughly the same damage.

And why pick level 1 if the damage is similar but the summon is weaker? No. For me, I have to pay an arm and a leg and get the most powerful summon. I pick level 3 because it's got a bunch of good stuff I can use. Just like level 2 is FAR more useful for you warlocks. ^_^

1 second cast time reduction is more or less meaningless to me. So what? I cast my already slow spells kind of faster. I care more about just Attacking faster or something that helps me in a fight. Help me flee or help me autocast or increase the damage of them.

My point is that there are more than one type of sorcerer.

There's plenty of things that enhance battle sorcs but like summons, they are clumsy to use and have stupidly short durations (summons have good durations at least). Like was said before, if you want summons to survive in pvm, get some agi or wear flee boosting gear. I'd venture to say, just wear whatever gear gives the stat you feel you need.

Though, I imagine the hp such either way because most sorcs summons have WAY more hp than mine since casters tend to have lots of vit. And yet they complain that their summons die easily. I have very low vit and hp boosting gear. My summons rarely take damage at all. But they do die fast once they are being hit and I have mastered the summoning skill tree.

I propose something along the lines of quest skills. One skill to select a single summon to enhance. Get a general and useful buff for it and maybe a new evolution. Subquest skills that enhance specific packages of aspects of the selected summon allowing for it to be customized to taste. Ie, one subskill being 'attack booster' making it do more damage, more often, and more accurately' and another being 'survival of the fittest' where it gets bonus hp, defense, flee, and resistances'. Another could give it superior casting and mp regenerative capabilities and finally, the last could be a specialization which is an enhanced version of some developers pet feature for each category (ie more strengthen the existing abilities each level grants). You could select 3 total quest skills.

This keeps the system the same and lets them just add bonuses to compensate for the missing and important aspects.

But honestly, there are better ways. I guess. I'm also really tired so not thinking as crisply as I should. But I would honestly like to see this fleshed out more. We need a change to the summons for the better.

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#11 TheSquishy

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Posted 28 December 2011 - 02:03 AM

@RuneLightmage

Seems like you really hadn't been deep enough in the pvm situation to appreciate what all levels
of your summons can do for you as a non-caster sorc.

If you built your sorc proper you should have 70-80 int and 80-90 str for your type of sorc.
There's a difference between playing a build and playing a build successfully. If you played your sorc in a way
that you couldn't get the full potential from all of your skills, well that's too bad.

But yes summons do need attention from devs but KRO has shown no real interest in revisiting them.
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#12 GuardianTK

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Posted 28 December 2011 - 06:26 AM

They really should allow us to Striking our own Summons for that extra oomph.

Edited by GuardianTK, 28 December 2011 - 06:27 AM.

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