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All About Wild Bolt: A Lengthy Explanation

AuthorMessage
Hero
Sep 08, 2008
712
From what I have seen so far with storm, and myth (my class) is that it is unbalanced, whether Wild Bolt was changed or not.

A Storm wizard is able to increase their Storm damage by a whopping 67%!
As a Myth wizard, the maximum damage increase I can find is 47%.

Myth wizards have a minimal life pool, barely a notch above a Storm wizard, and only 5% more accuracy than Storm.

Exactly what is so balanced about this? I mean, I do realize that perhaps I am breaking this all down way too much. I do recall the phrase "The grass is greener on the other side."

However, seeing that a Storm wizard can output a level 8 1000+ damage spell with a 60%+ damage boost, while a Myth can only manage a level 8 770 damage spell with only a 40% power boost, makes me think... are the stuns considered to be that powerful?

As far as I know, stuns are resisted by all elites and bosses. Most high end mobs will always be elite or bosses. That reduces the effectiveness of that spell by a mere 770 damage for 8 pips. Not even Life or Ice (dot) wizards hit for that little damage with a level 8 spell.

Having read that KI is always trying to balance classes and spells, I do have to say, Myth I will be passionate about until the end, but, I just don't see the balance. Myth starting at Celestia will find it downright impractical to 'call upon the aid of minions' and spending pips thusly can even cost you the duel. So, that leaves a Myth wizard and their damage.

One thing that I would love to see that would silence me forever on this 'game balance' topic is to compensate the Myth wizards' much weaker damage with upgraded and stronger minions.

Life wizards have their high accuracy, incredible healing efficiency.

Death wizards deal damage while at the same exact time heal themselves.

Ice wizards have a massive health pool.

Balance wizards being balance types cannot be shielded against other than absorbs and tower shield. Other than that, I cannot think of anything else.

Storm wizards can do massive damage. And as far as I know, have the BIGGEST power boost.

Fire wizards are capable of doing damage nearly as massive as Storm, have a rather unique and powerful debuff with their level 8 spell, and have a rather unique amount of dots they can apply to their opponents.

Myth wizards in the end can no longer rely on minions, and therefore end up relying on minimal damage. They have a minimal health pool, much like Storm wizards, an even lower damage boost, no level 7/8 AoE, and, no minions. (Did I say that already?)
The Myth school introduction states that they are soloists and rely on minions for their aid. That no longer holds true at later levels, and can basically be considered false advertising. So, that throws Myth's 'uniqueness' out of the window, and Myth just ends up being a mere damage class, with a lot lower damage.

Anyway, before I get too far carried away lol, I'll end it here. This is not necessarily a rant or a big huge tantrum, but, more my thoughts about this whole 'game balance' issue between Myth, and some of the other classes, namely Storm.

Survivor
May 23, 2010
5
Professor Falmea wrote:
Q. Now that the spell doesn't fizzle, but casts at a lower amount of damage, it eats up buffs! Did you consider this in the design?

Yes, the fact that it eats up 2 pips and uses up buffs like feint 100% of the time was considered in the balance. We had originally considered making 5 or even 10 different potential damages for this spell in order to make it match up with the original base probability of Wild Bolt. That probability being that it does big damage 10% of the time. We decided to go with a much higher probability ( 33% ) because of the point that you are mentioning above. Having the spell hit for 10 damage and use up your traps and blades is really rough, but as mentioned previously, that is the purpose of this spell. It was never designed to be a spell that you use as a staple of your spell deck, but instead as a last ditch effort for victory. By switching the spell over to give you a 33% chance for massive damage we feel it has returned to what its goal was.



Hi Teacher, I'm the student leaving all the apples on your desk. Well, one of the students. Fire is my first and favorite wizard, btw.

I didn't create a storm wizard until after the change to wild bolt. I quoted your answer on the buff-eating aspect because, as a Storm who just reached master, I'm frankly amazed that this is a problem for storm wizards.

If I'm going to play wild bolt, in quest or duel, I throw it the very first or second round. I'm rolling dice to see if I can end the fight immediately, before everyone is shielded and bladed up.

Oops, it didn't work. Oh well, back to building up a huge pip count for a game ending blast like Triton. It doesn't matter that I'm out of pips, because I can throw the bolt next round, when I'm bladeless and low on pips, to see if it scores this time. Works great in duels, because maybe, just maybe, I hit them for a grand more than we both calculated I would.

Is it because I started as fire and learned the value of chasing a Hound with an Elf?

I conclusion, I have no issue with the new bolt. It makes me an unpredictible threat no matter what my pip count is, which I think fits the spirit of storm perfectly. If I wanted to do major damage reliably while protecting a glass jaw health-wise, I'd have created another fire wizard. ;) Fire is the the offensive school for heavy planned attacks over time. Storm is the school if ya feel LUCKY. And luck don't need blades, let's throw another one.

Thanks for listening.

Explorer
Dec 05, 2010
71
Storm wizards like me need Wild Bolt! We have really low health, therefore, we need high damage. Besides, it only casts 1,000 2/3 of the times>

Katherine GoldCaster
Level 41
Master Diviner

P.S. Do people complain about Wild Bolt because they don't want to deal with it?

Delver
Jul 04, 2010
294
See, my frustration stems largely from trying to fight ice elites in celestia. Unless someone can give me a better suggestion, a sun boosted wild bolt feels like the best way to deal with them. By round 2, I'm almost always hit by either two ice colossus or two frost krakens, and if they use frost bite I can't shield.

Then since they have the power pip chance of a GM or legendary ice wizard, they will use frost kraken and frostzilla every 2 or 3 rounds and I can't shield, buff, heal, and attack fast enough to keep up. This is my experience with two diviners working together.

At least if I fizzle, I still have my pips so all I lost was my turn and not the pips putting triton or storm lord take another round or two of waiting while they spam tower shields.

Survivor
Jan 17, 2010
1
Dear Falmea thanks kingsisle for changing wild bolt because it would really tick me off in dueling pvp and fighting storm bosses in cl

Survivor
Apr 20, 2009
17
Ok So Everyone not into storm loves this move, everyone that loves storm hates the move. Although this is a step in the right direction, the job is not finished.

Make the skill 100/500/1000 2 Pips Or change it to 33%Fail/100/1000
(gears or cards do not effect fail rate) and explain it on the card.

One other thing. I am sick and tired of the (population doesnt agree%) phrase. Some times moves are made for the better of the whole not the part. Even if Majority hates the move. Good job on working towards fixing this issue. Now lets fix the fix so its fixed :P

Astrologist
Aug 13, 2009
1087
I'd say there should be a bolt that does either 250 damage, 500 damage, or 750 damage at 70% precision, costing 2 pips to cast. Who agrees/disagrees?

Geographer
Nov 22, 2010
836
Eh, hype and explanation or not, Wild Bolt is worthless. There's no reason for it to take up even one slot in a deck, there are far too many other cards that work well and do far more damage thatn Wild Bolt's max even if they're only boosted slightly.

About the only reason to use it is to play with it a couple times when it's first received just so you can say you did.