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Changes to Wild Bolt Spell - a Civilized Chat

AuthorMessage
Survivor
Dec 06, 2008
41
You know, I am GLAD they , quote, "Nerfed" the Wild Bolt spell. You guys dominate the pvp rankings (Next to balance, of course) and yet you complain about a little teency weency change that gives the other schools a chance at getting the warlord title without teeming up with grandmasters vs. newbies (No offence to people under level 10). I think you should be thanking Kings isle for making the p.v.p fun for all wizards. The fact that p.v.p is not cluttered by storm wizards going for 10,000 damage aganst a Life wiszard that is just trying to get their ranking up after a glitch that wiped out their ranking to -10 or a fire wizard that just wants to get the fancy looking princess gear without buying crowns! I belive that is compleatly fair.

Kudos for whoever just read my essay on this subject and kingsisle for being fair!

p.s. did you notice the only people complaining are storm wizards?

Survivor
May 05, 2009
39
p.s. did you notice the only people complaining are storm wizards?

Umm... that's because we're the only wizards that this change affects in a negative way.

If we're talking about being fair and balanced I say take one useful spell from every school and "fix" it like Bolt was "fixed".

Old Bolt
New Bolt :(

Survivor
Mar 23, 2009
11
I think the new Wild Bolt spell misses the spirit of the Storm school. To me, its always been about sacrificing accuracy and health for the opportunity to score amazingly high damages for a relatively low pip cost. Like any wizard school, as you get higher levels, you are going to search out the equipment that best overcomes your weaknesses, and Storm is going to try and reduce the fizzle rate as much as possible.

I don't exclusively use Wild Bolt, but it is one of the tools in my deck depending on what my battle requirements are. When going into battle, I set up blades and traps, select a spell that should do the damage I expect, and either score or fizzle. If I fizzle, I can cast again the next round with whatever spells are left in my hand.

Wild Bolt is an extremely low damage spell for Storm school standards, and reduces the number of pips available next round. When fighting in Celestia, I've gotten monsters that start with 4 power pips, and both of my opponents cast their school's level 48 spell the second round. Storm's low health can't recover from a barrage like that, especially when going second. The only compensation is to be able to score some big damage quickly, try to take one of the monsters out and heal before the next 7 pip spell comes our way.

The only real solution to fix the Wild Bolt problem, along with the several other changes made recently to fix PvP issues that adversely affected PvE players, is to have two different rule or card sets for each type of play. I understand this probably would be a major rewrite of the game engine, but it is the only solution that can maintain the spirit of all the schools, while making adjustments for the different styles of play.

Explorer
Aug 14, 2008
66
First off, I'm not a Storm wizard. I do not wish to be Storm anytime soon, so this really doesn't effect me.

I know a lot of people are very upset with this change, and I get what you're saying. The 2-4 pages I've read show some really good points about how the spell is "useless" now. (I read all the pages, but only about 2-4 of them actually had a point to them. The rest were just people complaining and whining, just saying how they hated the spell.)

I'm pretty sure that Storm wizards have a right to be upset, but it seems as though you think Wildbolt is, or was, the only spell that mattered to Storm! Yes, I know most of you used it a lot, which I don't even know why, but you still have other strong spells to use traps and blades on. As I see it, the only reason you don't use those spells is because it isn't as powerful.
It isn't 1,000 damage like Wildbolt was.

And about KI not listening, that is not true at all. We all know they have lives, and more on topic they have many more problems to deal with. This isn't the only problem, and it is definitely not the biggest problem. It seems like it, with tons of upset players, but its not the biggest problem in the game.
It doesn't seem like they're listening, but they are. Which is kind of saying a lot.

Survivor
Oct 24, 2010
3
Maybe I missed it, but I haven't seen anyone actually break this thing down by the numbers. It's what KI obviously does for each spell in an effort to maintain balance. Of particular importance is expected damage per pip. Almost every single spell lies between 80 and 120 damage per pip multiplied by the success rate (so, most of the time the final is between about 70 and 90 expected damage per pip).

The expected damage per pip for a Wild Bolt is now 129.5 health per turn (unmodified by gear, etc) -- That is [(1000+100+10)/3]*.70/2 or the average damage for using the spell times the 70% success rate divided by two (pips). That is actually much higher than the other storm spells and any other spell in the game:

Thundersnake - 87.5 exp. pip per turn
Lightening Bats - 92.75 exp. pip per turn
Storm Shark - 93.2 exp. pip per turn
Kraken - 96.24 exp. pip per turn
Stormzilla - 96.6 exp. pip per turn
Triton - 97.44 exp. pip per turn
Wild Bolt - 129.5 exp. pip per turn

What about wasting blades and traps? It might feel lousy to "lose the traps and blades," when it happens, but put 10 or 20 or 30 traps and blades on wild bolt spells versus the same number on another spell and the expected damage over time will still be about the same. The lower damage bonuses will be average out by the highest damage bonuses when the bolt works. Arguments involving traps and blades don't make sense here.

What about having gear that affects your accuracy? This is actually were the real "nerf" seems to come in. Do the algebra:

{[(1000+100+10)/3]*(.70+x)]}/2] = (.10 + x) 1000

And you can find out that x = .041 (if I did the math right), which equals the amount of accuracy improvement that yields equivalent damage under the old and new system. Under +4.1% accuracy, and the new system is actually advantageous. Above that, and the old system does progressively better damage.

As the accuracy bonus goes up, the difference becomes pretty drastic. At +10% you have an expected 148 per pip under the new system and 200
under the old system. At +20 accuracy you have 166 under the new system and 300 (!) under the old -- barely half the damage.

What about other spells? Take Stormzilla. Add 10 percent accuracy and you have 138 (avg. damage per pip) *.80 (success rate) instead of 138*.70
This increases the expected damage per pip from 96.6 to 110.4. Compared to the new wild bolt 148 per pip, this is still a lot less damage, and compared to the old one (at 200) very little at all.

The new wild bolt strictly speaking, is almost 50% more powerful over time under most conditions than the other storm spells. The old one was as much as 200%-300% powerful with heavy accuracy gear. This actually suggests that to bring it in line damage-wise, another pip should be added, which would subtract the damage per pip by about 50 percent and put it in line with other storm spells.

That being said, maybe dealing with the randomness is worth having the thing do 50% more damage over time than the average storm spell. But, if I figured this stuff out right (if not, somebody feel free to check it over and let us know), no argument can me made on alone on the expected damage of the spell - whether it involves PvE or PvP.


Survivor
May 24, 2009
19
I love the new bolt. Add gargantuan to it and you are assured of 250damage for two pips( before gear boost of course ). It's like they gave storm bats a 33% chance of doing 1250 damage. How can you not like that. And for all those who complain about building up blades and traps, just to have them wasted when bolt hits for 10, why are you balding and trapping for bolt? By the time you do all that you have more than enough pips for triton. KI please keep the new bolt.

Armiger
May 10, 2010
2080
oj2552 wrote:
arollison wrote:
I think the change is adequate and fair, and I will tell you why. There is no other school that has the opportunity to do 1000+ damage with 2 pips. I am a balance gm and I have to wait 5 rounds (if I get power pips each round) to hit judgment at 1000, not including gear, pet and boosts.

If you were to change wild bolt back to its original state, I would not be upset, however, I believe requiring more pips would even things out. Perhaps since all the storms are complaining (even though they have lord and triton), KI will change the bolt back to its original state. If they do, I hope they will require more pips. It takes the other schools building up pips to do any damage too.


i agree with this kinda becuse i am a ice student and we will never ever geta chanse to hite 1000 with any cards and also i think that it should come back but with more pips to.


Ok, let me confront both of these individuals on their posts. First off, Balance. OH, it takes you 5 whole rounds to do 1000 damage with no boosts? Oh yeah, and where is the shield that prevents us from taking 70, 80, or 90% of that damage. Oh wait, there is none.

Next, Poor little Ice guy. With 3500 health, almost double that of Storm, you really need to complain? Plus, you get resist all armor!

You complainers make me sick. Whine whine whine, look at the positive things about your schools, stuff that nobody else gets. Storm, had Power, quickly, that was their bonus, not nullified, by whiners. Well, not totally nullified, but without a Damage of Time spell (DOT), it does make things very difficult for storm, especially since everyone has storm shields and High Health.

Survivor
Nov 14, 2009
5
I just want to say that I think you did make the right choice on the changes of the wild bolt. Although it's not a 100% guarantee that we all will get 1000 damage hit, it's better in percentage that the wild bolt will work. But if we all be patient, you may be surprise that the 1000 damage will work. That's my opinion.

Survivor
Feb 25, 2010
11
:( I would like to ask KI to refund the over $50 I spent on mega snacks and pet energy trying to level up a pet for accuracy to use on wild bolt. If I could get paid for the hours I wasted doing this, you would owe me close to $550. I am so upset that you gave us a spell and have turned it into a useless piece of garbage. I can see banning the spell from pvp, but to take away a spell after so many of us wasted countless hours, tons of gold and tons of CASH trying to get accuracy for it is wrong. Whoever did this to the storm masters should be ashamed of his or herself. You DON'T give an awesome spell to someone and then reduce it to rubble due to poor losers in the pvp arenas. I either want the original spell as it was or I want my $50 back. I have spent a fortune on several accounts on this game and have brought a lot of customers to you. Now I want compensation. Change our spell back and ban it from pvp.

Delver
Sep 26, 2009
227
It seems all that the other schools are really complaining about or are liking the change for is pvp. All the storm wizards are talking about Pve, can KI just make bolt back to how it was but make it not enchantable? like the blue cards we get from clothing or pets or wand. I am not saying i like the change, but as i said before the enemies are still hitting with 1000 damage about 8/10 of the times i or my friends get hit. Can you change that??

Now for pvp, with 70% accuracy we can just use it hmm idk the most a storm deck can hold is what 7-10 copies of a spell? We will just use bolt 7-10 times and that still kills with it hitting at least 4-5 times.

Think about some other strategies storm. You can make it through this change.

Armiger
May 10, 2010
2080
Firestarter75 wrote:
I love the new bolt. Add gargantuan to it and you are assured of 250damage for two pips( before gear boost of course ). It's like they gave storm bats a 33% chance of doing 1250 damage. How can you not like that. And for all those who complain about building up blades and traps, just to have them wasted when bolt hits for 10, why are you balding and trapping for bolt? By the time you do all that you have more than enough pips for triton. KI please keep the new bolt.


Ok, so, you say you are a storm wizard and you like the "New Useless Bolt!"

Ok, very interesting. Here is an idea. Take your storm and delete him. Then, make a new storm and play the game again. Do you even remember when you got the spell? Do you remember, doing everything you could to get the spell to work? Well, it will work now, same as your other spells, but, oh wait, you don't have gargantuan at that level. So, you will waste 2 pips on 10 damage. OH Gee, Good for you. Yeah, I want to see you in PVP. lol

Honestly though, all kidding aside. Changes were made to wildbolt because of the accuracy enhancements in celestia (And Largely due to the complainers in PVP). Yet, people have gone from training accuracy boosts, to damage boost, to get gargantuan to add 250 damage to the spell. Yes, this does work and will give you 260, 350, or 1250 damage for 2 pips. Yet, if Unstoppable +30% accuracy, and the +10% accuracy over 4 rounds were not introduced, then storm would not be at that high of an accuracy with wildbolt. 10 initial + 20 sniper + 30 gear = 60% + 10 pet = 70 at best

Yes, this is a lot, but people would have had to work very hard to get here to get that. So, honestly, why change what has and always has worked?

Defender
May 17, 2009
144
cmullins wrote:
p.s. did you notice the only people complaining are storm wizards?

Umm... that's because we're the only wizards that this change affects in a negative way.

If we're talking about being fair and balanced I say take one useful spell from every school and "fix" it like Bolt was "fixed".

Old Bolt
New Bolt :(


Yeah! Lets fix all the other schools! Here are some suggestions.
Balance: Make judgement do 10 per pip
Ice: Make their clothes not be able to give any resist and make ice armor protect with 10 per pip.
Fire: Reverse the damage on immolate and make efreet put the weakness on you.
Life: Kiss forest lord good bye
Death: To ____ with beguile and make crow do 150
Myth: Make medusa not stun and make earthquake remove every charm/ ward on the battlefield.


Survivor
Jun 05, 2009
31
dwoodwell1 wrote:
Maybe I missed it, but I haven't seen anyone actually break this thing down by the numbers. It's what KI obviously does for each spell in an effort to maintain balance. Of particular importance is expected damage per pip. Almost every single spell lies between 80 and 120 damage per pip multiplied by the success rate (so, most of the time the final is between about 70 and 90 expected damage per pip).

The expected damage per pip for a Wild Bolt is now 129.5 health per turn (unmodified by gear, etc) -- That is [(1000+100+10)/3]*.70/2 or the average damage for using the spell times the 70% success rate divided by two (pips). That is actually much higher than the other storm spells and any other spell in the game:

Thundersnake - 87.5 exp. pip per turn
Lightening Bats - 92.75 exp. pip per turn
Storm Shark - 93.2 exp. pip per turn
Kraken - 96.24 exp. pip per turn
Stormzilla - 96.6 exp. pip per turn
Triton - 97.44 exp. pip per turn
Wild Bolt - 129.5 exp. pip per turn

What about wasting blades and traps? It might feel lousy to "lose the traps and blades," when it happens, but put 10 or 20 or 30 traps and blades on wild bolt spells versus the same number on another spell and the expected damage over time will still be about the same. The lower damage bonuses will be average out by the highest damage bonuses when the bolt works. Arguments involving traps and blades don't make sense here.

What about having gear that affects your accuracy? This is actually were the real "nerf" seems to come in. Do the algebra:

{[(1000+100+10)/3]*(.70+x)]}/2] = (.10 + x) 1000

And you can find out that x = .041 (if I did the math right), which equals the amount of accuracy improvement that yields equivalent damage under the old and new system. Under +4.1% accuracy, and the new system is actually advantageous. Above that, and the old system does progressively better damage.

As the accuracy bonus goes up, the difference becomes pretty drastic. At +10% you have an expected 148 per pip under the new system and 200
under the old system. At +20 accuracy you have 166 under the new system and 300 (!) under the old -- barely half the damage.

What about other spells? Take Stormzilla. Add 10 percent accuracy and you have 138 (avg. damage per pip) *.80 (success rate) instead of 138*.70
This increases the expected damage per pip from 96.6 to 110.4. Compared to the new wild bolt 148 per pip, this is still a lot less damage, and compared to the old one (at 200) very little at all.

The new wild bolt strictly speaking, is almost 50% more powerful over time under most conditions than the other storm spells. The old one was as much as 200%-300% powerful with heavy accuracy gear. This actually suggests that to bring it in line damage-wise, another pip should be added, which would subtract the damage per pip by about 50 percent and put it in line with other storm spells.

That being said, maybe dealing with the randomness is worth having the thing do 50% more damage over time than the average storm spell. But, if I figured this stuff out right (if not, somebody feel free to check it over and let us know), no argument can me made on alone on the expected damage of the spell - whether it involves PvE or PvP.



Your math is horribly flawed because KI's is.The new wild bolt does not,
I repeat, does not hit 33% of the time at 1,000 damage.It hits somewhere
between 7 and 15%.Listen, we storm wizards have acually USED this spell
and I will tell you what you seem to have missed completly.We KNOW that
around 85% or more of the time we are simply wasting our pips and turn to
cast it.It does NOT DO ANYWHERE NEAR 50% damage over time than
the average storm spell. This new version is a disaster.Why do you think
that the vast majority of storm wizards have removed it from there deck?
Experience using it is the answer.We know that this version is in fact a
detriment.Why KI simply doesnt cap the accuracy at a reasonable % is
truely beyond me.

Survivor
Aug 03, 2010
20
Charyl wrote:
:( I would like to ask KI to refund the over $50 I spent on mega snacks and pet energy trying to level up a pet for accuracy to use on wild bolt. If I could get paid for the hours I wasted doing this, you would owe me close to $550. I am so upset that you gave us a spell and have turned it into a useless piece of garbage. I can see banning the spell from pvp, but to take away a spell after so many of us wasted countless hours, tons of gold and tons of CASH trying to get accuracy for it is wrong. Whoever did this to the storm masters should be ashamed of his or herself. You DON'T give an awesome spell to someone and then reduce it to rubble due to poor losers in the pvp arenas. I either want the original spell as it was or I want my $50 back. I have spent a fortune on several accounts on this game and have brought a lot of customers to you. Now I want compensation. Change our spell back and ban it from pvp.


What she said

Survivor
Aug 03, 2010
20
Spiritshadow wrote:
can KI just make bolt back to how it was but make it not enchantable?


Taking away the ability to enchant a Wild Bolt just makes no sence, read the 7 and a half pages before this on why, dozens of reasons have been posted.

Armiger
May 10, 2010
2080
Shannoony wrote:
First off, I'm not a Storm wizard. I do not wish to be Storm anytime soon, so this really doesn't effect me.

I know a lot of people are very upset with this change, and I get what you're saying. The 2-4 pages I've read show some really good points about how the spell is "useless" now. (I read all the pages, but only about 2-4 of them actually had a point to them. The rest were just people complaining and whining, just saying how they hated the spell.)

I'm pretty sure that Storm wizards have a right to be upset, but it seems as though you think Wildbolt is, or was, the only spell that mattered to Storm! Yes, I know most of you used it a lot, which I don't even know why, but you still have other strong spells to use traps and blades on. As I see it, the only reason you don't use those spells is because it isn't as powerful.
It isn't 1,000 damage like Wildbolt was.

And about KI not listening, that is not true at all. We all know they have lives, and more on topic they have many more problems to deal with. This isn't the only problem, and it is definitely not the biggest problem. It seems like it, with tons of upset players, but its not the biggest problem in the game.
It doesn't seem like they're listening, but they are. Which is kind of saying a lot.


Obviously you are not storm. Storm does have other spells that does 1000 damage, it's called triton. Secondly, our school does not have a Damage over time spell, so we need to be able to hit hard and make another finishing attack if our first one fails. This is where wild bolt came in at. See, storm, unlike all the other schools, has less than 2000 health. So, we need to be able to attack quickly and powerfully in order to kill and stay alive. Wild Bolt, is now a waste of PiPs, unlike all the other schools.

Secondly, for you to defend KI by saying they "Are" Listening? How can they be listening, if 62% voted, saying that they do not like the new wild bolt and yet, KI did change it? Players here and all over have complained about the new "Useless Bolt", yet, they said they are listening, but are not going to change bolt back. But they are listening? Listening to what exactly?

Survivor
Jun 25, 2009
2
what would make this spell better would be make it do 10, 100 1000 over three rounds. storm could use a good shield eater :D

Survivor
Oct 24, 2010
3
Your math is horribly flawed because KI's is.The new wild bolt does not,
I repeat, does not hit 33% of the time at 1,000 damage.It hits somewhere
between 7 and 15%.Listen, we storm wizards have acually USED this spell
and I will tell you what you seem to have missed completly.We KNOW that
around 85% or more of the time we are simply wasting our pips and turn to
cast it.It does NOT DO ANYWHERE NEAR 50% damage over time than
the average storm spell. This new version is a disaster.Why do you think
that the vast majority of storm wizards have removed it from there deck?
Experience using it is the answer.We know that this version is in fact a
detriment.Why KI simply doesnt cap the accuracy at a reasonable % is
truely beyond me.


You are right that my math is based on the assumption that information that KI has provided about the spell is correct.

If you think that assumption is wrong, then you need to make a case for why KI would provide misleading information. Either:

1). They are capable of creating a complex interactive MMORPG, but are incapable of putting together a random number generator that successfully picks between three numbers (10, 100, and 1000) in a random fashion.

2). They intentionally want to mislead Storm Wizards into believing they are getting a better spell than they have.

Please, pick which it is and explain if that is your argument.

Let me offer a third explanation. There a lot of anecdotes about how Wild Bolt fails too often. Sometimes this might seem to be the case, because the sample size being "tested" is small, and statistical blips happen. There is a 13% chance, for instance, of getting 5 "crummy" wild bolts in a row. That's means more than 1 in every 10 times you cast five in a row, they will keep coming up short.

But there's also a psychological side to things. I used to play poker quite a bit, and when an opponent got lucky and drew a winning card at the end, you almost always remembered that fact a lot longer than the time that you did the same. In other words, you remember the fizzles that happened (especially at key times) much more than the times that spell worked.

When people provide anecdotal evidence about things, the only thing you can rely upon is that they WILL overestimate the failure rate versus the success rate of any phenomenon, whether its the likelihood of a plane crash or a spell not working in a game.

The only way to really find out is to fire the spell off about 100 times and write down the success rate when it hits. If the number ends up between about 24 and 40 (again, even at 100 times you can have sample variability), then its working. If not, then I'll reconsider those first two explanations.


Survivor
Jun 05, 2009
31
dragonfire10 wrote:
You know, I am GLAD they , quote, "Nerfed" the Wild Bolt spell. You guys dominate the pvp rankings (Next to balance, of course) and yet you complain about a little teency weency change that gives the other schools a chance at getting the warlord title without teeming up with grandmasters vs. newbies (No offence to people under level 10). I think you should be thanking Kings isle for making the p.v.p fun for all wizards. The fact that p.v.p is not cluttered by storm wizards going for 10,000 damage aganst a Life wiszard that is just trying to get their ranking up after a glitch that wiped out their ranking to -10 or a fire wizard that just wants to get the fancy looking princess gear without buying crowns! I belive that is compleatly fair.

Kudos for whoever just read my essay on this subject and kingsisle for being fair!

p.s. did you notice the only people complaining are storm wizards?


Oh my, where to begin on this one!!!? LOL Oh forget it its FAR too easy. And
my laughter is shaking my laptop. :)

Survivor
Aug 05, 2009
9
accioliv88 wrote:
I think that this, even though is random, is good.

Professor Greyrose wrote:
We've listened to our community, done internal balance testing and had exhaustive discussions about the spell Wild Bolt, and have change the Wild Bolt spell based on this research.

Wild Bolt will now have 70% accuracy and do 10, 100, or 1000 damage.

We will continue to monitor how this impacts the balance of the game, as well as listen to all players feedback.

We ask that you take some time to play with this version of Wild Bolt before jumping to conclusions. It's truly a Wild Bolt now!

All posts regarding this change MUST go in this thread, other posts will not be approved. Let's keep it civilized, constructive and creative please.


Why? Because now the accurancy is up, and you won't use a card and have it fizzle. There is more of a change a spell ill get out. Instead of no spell if it fizzles at 10%, now there is a bigger chance you won't fizzle at 70%.

When the old Wild Bolt fizzled, which there was a good chace it would, you got no spell. Now, with 70%, there is more a chance that you'll actually get a spell. I asked myslef a couple seconds ago while reading this, "Would I rather have no spell or a spell, even if it is only 10 damage?"

Lets say there is a bad guy with 700 health. You use the old wild bolt. Nothing, a fizzle. He still has 700 health.
Now you use the new wild bolt, and it comes out as 10. He has 690 health left. If you got 100 first, then he would have 600 health left.

So now I suppose I'm asking you: "Would you rather have no spell at all, or a spell, even if there is only 10 damage?"


The problem with this, and I think most people will agree with me (as it has been stated before), is that casting a TWO pip spell for TEN damage is a lot worse than fizzling and getting nothing.

I for one would much rather have a small chance at doing large amounts of damage than a fairly good chance at doing next to nothing. At worst, with the old bolt, you would fizzle and not lose anything, just gain another pip and continue from there (building to kraken, stormzilla, triton, and the likes). However, with the new bolt, the worst case scenario is much more drastic (and happens almost as much). As others have stated, losing two pips for ten damage is more than worthless as that is the lowest damage of any spell in the entierty of the game (much less for the level you have to be to even acquire the spell). Not only have you dealt the lowest amount of damage possible, but you have to wait 1 or 2 MORE rounds just to get the pips back. This amount of time could mean defeat for the wizard. Even doing 100 damage is worthless for a 2 pip spell.

This "fix" does not work for any pip cost as 10 damage is only good for a rank of 0, 100 is only good for 0-1 (maybe 1 1/2), but 1000 is almost too good for anything lower than rank 5 with an accuracy of 70%.

The old Wild Bolt worked fine in PvE although it might have been abused in PvP, but the new "bolt" doesn't work anywhere, it is a completely useless change to a spell that didn't need it.

Please KI, I know that all of the technological genius behind what makes Wizard101 a fun and enjoyable experience for all can figure out a solution to make both the PvP community and the substantially larger PvE community, happy.

Survivor
Aug 05, 2009
9
rupertjames wrote:
Ok so what we all want to know is, is it really 33% chance of each hit?
Some think that KI are being honest others don't, so the question is what are the results? Being scientific I recorded 30 hits of wild bolt against lost souls and these are my results.

I was wearing no boosts and these were plain wild bolts.
So out of 30 it fizzled 9 times - that is 30% (totally correct)
And out of the 21 times it hit
1000 - 6 times (28.5%) lower
100 - 5 times (23.8%) lower
10 -10 times (47.7%) much higher

Showing that according to my short test that wild bolt isn't faithful to the card but hits lower more often!
On a possitive note - wild bolt now has a 19% chance of hitting 1000 as opposed to the previous 10%! But it is pretty much locked because you can't effect the chances of hitting between 10, 100 or 1000

But... as I realised, hitting 10 (especially for storm) is totally unrealistic, so a great alternative would be to set wild bolt so that if it hits 10 or 100 it doesn't use blades, traps or any other boosts - that would be great!

Please realise these are totally accurate results, i have in no way changed or misrepresented what i recorded, however only 30 tests isn't very many and one might easily obtain very different results if they tried it themselves, in fact i encourage everyone to do this test and to post their results here! The more you do the more accurate the statistics will be!


I went ahead and tried this using the same stipulations, (no boost to accuracy, damage, etc), and here were my results.

After casting wild bolt 60 times on lost souls, here is the data I gathered.

I fizzled 16 times (26.66%): Dev. (Deviation from standard): -3.34%

Of the 44 times bolt worked, it did:
10 damage 12 times (27.27%): Dev. -6.06%
100 damage 20 times (45.45%): Dev. +12.12% (Whoa!)
1000 damage 12 times (27.27%): Dev. -6.06%

So, even with the lower than normal percentage for the ten damage, I did 100 or less damage 72.72% of the time it worked, deviating more than 6% from standard. Also, I agree with you that even 100 damage is WAAY less than anything a storm wizard should be doing for the cost of two pips.

Explorer
Aug 14, 2008
66
darthjt wrote:
Obviously you are not storm. Storm does have other spells that does 1000 damage, it's called triton. Secondly, our school does not have a Damage over time spell, so we need to be able to hit hard and make another finishing attack if our first one fails. This is where wild bolt came in at. See, storm, unlike all the other schools, has less than 2000 health. So, we need to be able to attack quickly and powerfully in order to kill and stay alive. Wild Bolt, is now a waste of PiPs, unlike all the other schools.

Secondly, for you to defend KI by saying they "Are" Listening? How can they be listening, if 62% voted, saying that they do not like the new wild bolt and yet, KI did change it? Players here and all over have complained about the new "Useless Bolt", yet, they said they are listening, but are not going to change bolt back. But they are listening? Listening to what exactly?


Obviously, I'm not storm. I know how to play one though, from my mom's wizard. Just sayin'. Yes, I know you do not have a DoT spell, save for Storm Hound, so I get that. But can't your other spells work just as well as Wild Bolt did? Plus, technically, wouldn't they be more reliable since they have higher percent of hitting?

And I'm defending KI because this is their game. They don't have to take the community's thoughts into consideration if they think their choice is right. Sure, they asked and a lot of people voted no, but they still have power to make their own choice. That's most likely what happened. They don't have to change it back if they don't want to/feel that they've made the right decision. But, believe it or not, they do take consideration to what we say. They can't implement everything we say, or do what we want them to. I think that we should just trust them to do what's right, since they have a lot more experience with running their game than any of us do.

Geographer
Dec 14, 2009
916
Shannoony wrote:

And I'm defending KI because this is their game. They don't have to take the community's thoughts into consideration if they think their choice is right. Sure, they asked and a lot of people voted no, but they still have power to make their own choice. That's most likely what happened. They don't have to change it back if they don't want to/feel that they've made the right decision. But, believe it or not, they do take consideration to what we say. They can't implement everything we say, or do what we want them to. I think that we should just trust them to do what's right, since they have a lot more experience with running their game than any of us do.


A major wrong assumption here:

When a game goes online it becomes the customers game,not the people who created it. Without the customer,there would be no game. To ignore your player base is a recipe for disaster.

Survivor
Oct 16, 2009
9
Shannoony wrote:
darthjt wrote:
Obviously you are not storm. Storm does have other spells that does 1000 damage, it's called triton. Secondly, our school does not have a Damage over time spell, so we need to be able to hit hard and make another finishing attack if our first one fails. This is where wild bolt came in at. See, storm, unlike all the other schools, has less than 2000 health. So, we need to be able to attack quickly and powerfully in order to kill and stay alive. Wild Bolt, is now a waste of PiPs, unlike all the other schools.

Secondly, for you to defend KI by saying they "Are" Listening? How can they be listening, if 62% voted, saying that they do not like the new wild bolt and yet, KI did change it? Players here and all over have complained about the new "Useless Bolt", yet, they said they are listening, but are not going to change bolt back. But they are listening? Listening to what exactly?


Obviously, I'm not storm. I know how to play one though, from my mom's wizard. Just sayin'. Yes, I know you do not have a DoT spell, save for Storm Hound, so I get that. But can't your other spells work just as well as Wild Bolt did? Plus, technically, wouldn't they be more reliable since they have higher percent of hitting?

And I'm defending KI because this is their game. They don't have to take the community's thoughts into consideration if they think their choice is right. Sure, they asked and a lot of people voted no, but they still have power to make their own choice. That's most likely what happened. They don't have to change it back if they don't want to/feel that they've made the right decision. But, believe it or not, they do take consideration to what we say. They can't implement everything we say, or do what we want them to. I think that we should just trust them to do what's right, since they have a lot more experience with running their game than any of us do.


Were paying customers and if they want our money they need to keep us attracted to this game if a lot of people who are affected by it said they don't like it and neither do I. I think they should make a new wild bolt that is not enhanceable and does 1000 damage and has 33% accuracy and your gear doesn't affect its accuracy.

Astrologist
Jun 04, 2010
1008
dwoodwell1 wrote:
Maybe I missed it, but I haven't seen anyone actually break this thing down by the numbers. It's what KI obviously does for each spell in an effort to maintain balance. Of particular importance is expected damage per pip. Almost every single spell lies between 80 and 120 damage per pip multiplied by the success rate (so, most of the time the final is between about 70 and 90 expected damage per pip).

The expected damage per pip for a Wild Bolt is now 129.5 health per turn (unmodified by gear, etc) -- That is [(1000+100+10)/3]*.70/2 or the average damage for using the spell times the 70% success rate divided by two (pips). That is actually much higher than the other storm spells and any other spell in the game:

Thundersnake - 87.5 exp. pip per turn
Lightening Bats - 92.75 exp. pip per turn
Storm Shark - 93.2 exp. pip per turn
Kraken - 96.24 exp. pip per turn
Stormzilla - 96.6 exp. pip per turn
Triton - 97.44 exp. pip per turn
Wild Bolt - 129.5 exp. pip per turn

What about wasting blades and traps? It might feel lousy to "lose the traps and blades," when it happens, but put 10 or 20 or 30 traps and blades on wild bolt spells versus the same number on another spell and the expected damage over time will still be about the same. The lower damage bonuses will be average out by the highest damage bonuses when the bolt works. Arguments involving traps and blades don't make sense here.

What about having gear that affects your accuracy? This is actually were the real "nerf" seems to come in. Do the algebra:

{[(1000+100+10)/3]*(.70+x)]}/2] = (.10 + x) 1000

And you can find out that x = .041 (if I did the math right), which equals the amount of accuracy improvement that yields equivalent damage under the old and new system. Under +4.1% accuracy, and the new system is actually advantageous. Above that, and the old system does progressively better damage.

As the accuracy bonus goes up, the difference becomes pretty drastic. At +10% you have an expected 148 per pip under the new system and 200
under the old system. At +20 accuracy you have 166 under the new system and 300 (!) under the old -- barely half the damage.

What about other spells? Take Stormzilla. Add 10 percent accuracy and you have 138 (avg. damage per pip) *.80 (success rate) instead of 138*.70
This increases the expected damage per pip from 96.6 to 110.4. Compared to the new wild bolt 148 per pip, this is still a lot less damage, and compared to the old one (at 200) very little at all.

The new wild bolt strictly speaking, is almost 50% more powerful over time under most conditions than the other storm spells. The old one was as much as 200%-300% powerful with heavy accuracy gear. This actually suggests that to bring it in line damage-wise, another pip should be added, which would subtract the damage per pip by about 50 percent and put it in line with other storm spells.

That being said, maybe dealing with the randomness is worth having the thing do 50% more damage over time than the average storm spell. But, if I figured this stuff out right (if not, somebody feel free to check it over and let us know), no argument can me made on alone on the expected damage of the spell - whether it involves PvE or PvP.


You make some very interesting points. However, it seems as if you are considering it in too mathematical (I didn't think I would ever say that in my life) a fashion, particularly where you say that "Arguments involving traps and blades don't make sense here." In terms of raw mathematics and statistical analysis, your assertions are quite astute. However, people don't just keep hitting the same spell over and over again. Based on the characteristics of the spell, they work out some sort of "strategy".

Putting PvP arguments aside for a while, the primary strategy I observed for wild bolt users was to use it while they were building pips, knowing that if it hit, it would finish the job. If it didn't, they didn't have to waste rounds resetting blades and traps to hit the next enemy. The change that KI made to the spell renders it all but useless in that strategic sense. Consider this:

66% of "successful" hits with the new bolt cost you one round for the failed hit, another round (or two depending) for the lost pips, and a round for every blade or trap it wasted. If we define tactically benign as only costing you a round when a spell fizzles, then this spell is tactically benign 30% of the time, tactically effective 23.33% of the time, and tactically detrimental 46.66% of the time. What's more, it becomes increasingly detrimental (hitting 66.66% at 100% targeting and above) as your accuracy increases which is counter to EVERY other spell in the game from a tactical standpoint.

For a class with the lowest health and highest damage, this spell now runs entirely contrary to the quick kill style required to survive in the world as a storm player. While I agree that constant use of the spell over time will give you the statistical outcome you're discussing, I think you're completely failing to acknowledge the tactical impact of this change on the typical caster.

On an entirely different note... How are you calculating your expected damage per pip numbers on spells with random damage ranges? Are you calculating them based on the median damage for each range? I don't have the spell information in front of me to work it out myself at the moment.