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Do you think the length of battles in Wizard101 is...

Just right!
27% [35]
Too long! Speed it up!
69% [87]
Too short! I need more time!
3% [4]

Feedback Friday 2-6-15

AuthorMessage
Administrator
It's my favorite day of the week and my favorite time of that day - so let's get on with the feedback, shall we?

Today, let's talk about battles, and the time they take. Please vote on the poll and add your comments below. What do you think about the length of battles in Wizard101? Do you think that fights are just the right length? Do you think that it's too fast, and you barely have time to blink before you can pick that spell and watch it come to life? Do you find yourself tapping your fingers and thinking, "get on with it, already"?

Looking forward to the vote. Have a fantastical Friday everyone!




Standard disclaimer applies: We do not guarantee to use each and every idea submitted, and questions we pose may or may not be pertaining to things we are currently working on, or will ever undertake. Sometimes, there are just technical limitations that make changing things difficult to impossible, and though we possess all manner of magic wands here, there are technological beasts out there that are beyond our grasp. Sometimes, we may not feel it is within the spirit and vision of the spiral to add or change something. Also, we realize that some of these topics may have been addressed before in other threads - sometimes it's good to pick up a discussion again. Chances are I have read your threads and would like to hear more!

“If the Mind is like a candle, the Heart is like the sun.” Professor Falmea
Astrologist
Dec 26, 2013
1124
Wow, that's a "depends on the battle" question. Some of them are short and sweet. Other times (Sylster Glowstorm comes to mind) they can last a really long time depending on who's in your party. For the most part though I think everything is pretty well balanced.

Survivor
Jul 23, 2008
2
The whole graveyard (Malistaire) dungeon takes too long. Especially now with the death shadow spell taking forever! If I do that battle, I know I have to allocate up to 4 hours of my day which is way too long for any single dungeon. I actually had that battle take my whole day (8 hours) once when I went in with first timers. Other battles are just fine.

Survivor
Apr 03, 2011
2
Well in my opinion battles should be about all the same for example: for low players the battle is just right amount of time and for high level the battles are too short therefore the battles should focus more on damage and not critical; critical ruin the good battles. Because we have the shadow magic we do not need insane critical.

Survivor
Jun 23, 2012
12
It's fun to have a long battle, that just makes things more epic. There are short battles I can get to quick, but there are some long battles that makes things more epic. That's why I make it just right.

Mastermind
Feb 07, 2010
386
There are some places where it's acceptable for a battle to be long, particularly bosses, especially final bosses. The other issue with bosses that take longer to defeat is that they're harder in general, which is bad in this case because in Avalon the dificulty curve hit a shocking spike.

Astrologist
Aug 20, 2011
1077
TucsonWizard is right, it's depends.
  • Is my opponent casting Call of Khrulhu at all? If so, the duel is too long.
  • Is my opponent casting Eirikur Axebreaker? If so, the duel is too long.
  • Does my opponent get 3-6 turns of additional cheat spells on top of their normal turns? If so, it's too long.
  • Did I just take 15 seconds to choose my next spell even though I am stunned? That means the round was so long that I can't remember whether I'm stunned. Usually I reach that breaking point around 90 seconds, which is too long for my opponents to be doing things. Imo, a good round lasts 40-70 seconds.

Survivor
Apr 04, 2011
3
Personally speaking, I think the battles were in the "Just right" category until the creation and introduction of Darkmoor. Even with the tricks to run it faster that dungeon is a HUGE time committment and makes it difficult to co-ordinate a group together able to stay the course.

Community Leader
I feel that most PvE battles are fairly easy. In most cases, you can blade up a Storm wizard and have them use an AoE attack. The only obstacle in PvE is any attack that can remove your blades or apply a large weakness. (ie: Glowbug Squall, Efreet, etc.)

Most of the boss fights with cheats are difficult though, especially if you’re soloing. The main example of this is in Castle Darkmoor. During test realm, my team was really struggling with Sir Blackwater. It took us a long time to figure out what his cheats were before we were able to develop a strategy. Same goes for Malistaire.

In terms of PvP, it’s a mixed bag. On one hand, I lost in one turn to a storm who happened to crit a Wild Bolt and hit max damage. That is way too short and I didn’t have a chance to do anything!

On the other hand, I’ve seen many high-ranking matches in which Death wizards wearing Jade gear and ward pets repeat a combo consisting of Empower, cloaked Bad Jujus, and Reshuffle. This strategy buries their opponent in 90% weaknesses. By using the Reshuffle multiply bug and maximum Bad Jujus and Cloaks in the main deck, they will be able to cast a maximum of 342 Bad Jujus during the match. If you add in treasure card Reshuffles, this gives them a maximum of 40 more Reshuffles to work with. Upon the 47th Reshuffle, they will be able to cast a maximum of 1,349 Bad Jujus during the match. Assuming each turn takes the full 30 seconds, all Jujus are cast, and the wizard uses Empower on every third turn, the match will take just under 15 hours to complete. That is way too long.

DuelCircle Organizer. The Slowpoke Sloth is the best.
Survivor
Mar 07, 2010
3
Most of them are fine, but the ones that are 3 hours or more are way to long.

Defender
Dec 18, 2008
106
Honestly I believe the fights are just a tad bit too long. Darkmoor, Tartarus, and other higher level bosses and dungeons come to mind. In these aforementioned boss fights alone you're looking at around 20-30 minutes. For dungeons like Darkmoor and Tartarus, with all the boss cheats unless you have a good team, you're looking at an hour and a half, or more. That's just entirely too long to merit farming. Not to mention spell animations and pet casts.

Survivor
Aug 07, 2011
4
The time to select your spell is sufficient.
However, I agree with many on FB posts that having the ability to turn off the animations would be extremely helpful. Even if this is only available when you are in a battle alone, it would greatly speed up the game for most players most of the time. You could also allow it if all players agreed.
The higher up you go, the longer even the basic battles take. I have played much less lately because of the time I have to dedicate to complete even the short quests.

Survivor
Dec 27, 2011
7
I think that the questing lengths are just right, however when it comes to the big dungeons such as Tartarus and Darkmoor, it becomes FAR too long. For me Darkmoor takes around 2 hours, and I find this hard to fit it into my day, also when the battles become too long and the boss has ridiculous cheats, the game is just not at ALL fun.

Survivor
Mar 24, 2013
9
Most battles are kinda slow speed them up please.

Survivor
Jan 03, 2010
21
yes some of these battles takes along time ... especially with the cheats from any of the dungeon bosses some take too long to finish and some are so sweet and short ..it great that way when they are short .. i guess it mostly depends on your group or playing solo..
just wish we could get more short dungeons and great bosses to fight but dont make them too hard anymore then four floors of anything is just a little to long for me...

Astrologist
Aug 20, 2011
1077
man0fbass on Feb 6, 2015 wrote:
I feel that most PvE battles are fairly easy. In most cases, you can blade up a Storm wizard and have them use an AoE attack. The only obstacle in PvE is any attack that can remove your blades or apply a large weakness. (ie: Glowbug Squall, Efreet, etc.)

Most of the boss fights with cheats are difficult though, especially if you’re soloing. The main example of this is in Castle Darkmoor. During test realm, my team was really struggling with Sir Blackwater. It took us a long time to figure out what his cheats were before we were able to develop a strategy. Same goes for Malistaire.

In terms of PvP, it’s a mixed bag. On one hand, I lost in one turn to a storm who happened to crit a Wild Bolt and hit max damage. That is way too short and I didn’t have a chance to do anything!

On the other hand, I’ve seen many high-ranking matches in which Death wizards wearing Jade gear and ward pets repeat a combo consisting of Empower, cloaked Bad Jujus, and Reshuffle. This strategy buries their opponent in 90% weaknesses. By using the Reshuffle multiply bug and maximum Bad Jujus and Cloaks in the main deck, they will be able to cast a maximum of 342 Bad Jujus during the match. If you add in treasure card Reshuffles, this gives them a maximum of 40 more Reshuffles to work with. Upon the 47th Reshuffle, they will be able to cast a maximum of 1,349 Bad Jujus during the match. Assuming each turn takes the full 30 seconds, all Jujus are cast, and the wizard uses Empower on every third turn, the match will take just under 15 hours to complete. That is way too long.
This is true, Bad Juju spamming by multiplying your casts with Cloak and Reshuffle really does make PvP unreasonably long, and is imo an exploit that must be addressed in an upcoming update.

Survivor
Apr 19, 2009
4
The reason I have yet to level a wizard to 100 is because the higher I go, the longer the battles. I'm not as "strategy savy" as some players. I have also had trouble finding people to help so I'm doing these solo most of the time it seems. I have been playing almost since the beginning & I still truly love the game & story line. But when I think of maybe sitting for 3 hrs for the next dungeon, I go on to something else.

Historian
Nov 28, 2010
614
TucsonWizard on Feb 6, 2015 wrote:
Wow, that's a "depends on the battle" question. Some of them are short and sweet. Other times (Sylster Glowstorm comes to mind) they can last a really long time depending on who's in your party. For the most part though I think everything is pretty well balanced.
I agree that it depends on other factors, there isn't really a one answer fits all.

Things were just perfect in Wizard City. Battles were relatively quick, win or lose. Even if you were defeated, it's not like you had 10 minutes invested and had to start all over again.

But the last 3 or 4 worlds, mob duels tend to take a long time. Enemies start with so many pips and are casting higher level spells with longer animations in the first round. Their HP's are so high that even if players were starting with a similar pip count, we still have to go through the process of blading up in order to hit with any power.

The boss battles I do expect to be longer, so that's not something that bothers me a whole lot.

But yeah, the mobs... in the most recent worlds, a lot of days it feels like running in a dream where my legs are moving, but I'm not.

Hero
Aug 18, 2011
776
Overall it's about right, but there are a few things that could be better.

1- spell animations: there are some that are too long, like CofK. Also things that get cast often, such as Sprite, should be short. Call of Khrulhu should hit all enemies at once, the way Mali's dragon does, or at least do the swap health only once, not go up and down for every player.

2- filler fights. Some dungeons like Tartarus and Waterworks have multiple, fairly pointless fights before you get to the real bosses. I don't mind that for a quest I'm going to do only once, but it's really annoying for bosses we're going to farm. Just get us to the good stuff! The end of KR is great in this regard -- Moros, Galleries, Morganthe -- all separate. Thanks for that, I hope that trend will continue.

3- Run-in: This is one thing I'd like to take longer. It can be hard to get a team into a fight together and in the right order. An extra 5 to 10 seconds from triggering the fight to the first round starting would be lovely for boss fights. Street mobs don't really matter.

Lastly, I really dislike the new "combat idle". If I am solo or dual boxing and have to go afk for something in real life, the last thing I want is rounds to pass faster. Please remove that or let us lock it out somehow.

Community Leader
Lucas Rain on Feb 6, 2015 wrote:
TucsonWizard is right, it's depends.
  • Is my opponent casting Call of Khrulhu at all? If so, the duel is too long.
  • Is my opponent casting Eirikur Axebreaker? If so, the duel is too long.
  • Does my opponent get 3-6 turns of additional cheat spells on top of their normal turns? If so, it's too long.
  • Did I just take 15 seconds to choose my next spell even though I am stunned? That means the round was so long that I can't remember whether I'm stunned. Usually I reach that breaking point around 90 seconds, which is too long for my opponents to be doing things. Imo, a good round lasts 40-70 seconds.
In terms of choosing your next spell in spite of being stunned, I think this is very useful. You can still use your turn to discard cards and control your hand.

DuelCircle Organizer. The Slowpoke Sloth is the best.
Survivor
Oct 12, 2011
24
SierraDarkshade on Feb 6, 2015 wrote:
The whole graveyard (Malistaire) dungeon takes too long. Especially now with the death shadow spell taking forever! If I do that battle, I know I have to allocate up to 4 hours of my day which is way too long for any single dungeon. I actually had that battle take my whole day (8 hours) once when I went in with first timers. Other battles are just fine.
I echo his words, very time consuming and tiring

Survivor
Jan 18, 2010
5
TucsonWizard on Feb 6, 2015 wrote:
Wow, that's a "depends on the battle" question. Some of them are short and sweet. Other times (Sylster Glowstorm comes to mind) they can last a really long time depending on who's in your party. For the most part though I think everything is pretty well balanced.
My thoughts exactly on this topic. Most of the time the fights are just about perfect for length but some do take longer due to the boss cheats. But over all fights are well balanced for length.

Survivor
Mar 23, 2011
5
Most battles are fine in length, and hopefully, longer, more involved battles mean better gold and gear.
'Call of Khrulhu' is rather long and sometimes the people I am playing with complain about it. Maybe if he didn't submerge each time it would save some time during the animation. It's like if the scarecrow sprung up each time for each opponent, so maybe he breaks through the water once and steals health and then submerges at the end. (?) The new spells all have a sense of misdirection (as the beginning animation has nothing to do with the spell, the little boats and bugs and such) and it's cute the first time but just adds to the length of the cast and gets tired fast.
I do think there is a problem with Darkmoor throughout in that the team easily starts to fatigue at the length of time and people either bail because they get discouraged or have to log out for real life obligations. While I understand that, it is pretty horrid when you have fought a certain amount of the dungeon and get stuck facing a boss suddenly without a team of wizards, unable to finish. I guess I would hope there would be a 'team up' option with the dungeon, so if say you have gotten through Shane Von Shane v2.0 and lose some or all of your team, you would be able to finish by teaming up just before/at Undead Malistaire.
I have spent a few long hours starting and starting and starting the same dungeon and never getting to the final boss. And while a part of me wants to farm Darkmoor, I realize it is an area that will take too long and make me disappointed in other wizards playing the game. So I avoid the heartache. and don't.
I would play it more if I was assured my time investment was going to be seen through to completion.

Survivor
Jun 15, 2009
24
Darkmoor is way too long even with a full team of great players. Setting aside a few hours just to do this dungeon is ridiculous!

Defender
Aug 07, 2011
116
I'm retired and even I think the boss dungeons are getting WAY too long. They're not too long due to the spell animation -- which I love, keep that, I don't want short boring spells -- but due to the difficulty and length of dungeons. Also the mobs are fine until you hit what I call a did not collect quest. The defeat and collect quests are annoying simply because sometimes you won't get the drop all day. You should get a drop every battle, especially when you have to get three or more. Even if you only have to get one, it shouldn't take more than three battles to get it.