273 réponses à ce sujet

[urvashi]

hardvice wrote...

 
but some kind of sneaky, stealthy, shadow-wielding mage might also work.

You mean some kind of a sneaky witch thief? 

[Wompoo]

* What do you like and dislike about the Mage?

I'll start with my dislikes first. The mage gear on human females is a shocker, they look like over weight frumpy cows... elves will always be the mage of choice ascetically. There is an insufficient number of gear design (I like the Arcon design and the Witch robe)... but the same could be said about every single class > poor. Nothing worse then paying 100 plus gold to end up with same looking armor/robe you have been wearing for 15 levels (forget about the stats, I am talking looks). A unique or rare robe should look rare/unique, not some cheap re-colour.

I love the versatility of the class, I am not a big fan of mini/maxing as the difficulty level in DA:O, for any class, is ridiculously easy... nightmare should stretch the ability of group based tactics to the limit, sadly not even close. The mage can be a CC, a classic heavy armor healer, a damage dealer, a warder, a Bladesinger and so on. The options are there. A fun class, with a lot of potential.

* Is there anything that you feel that is underpowered or overpowered on the Mage?

Underpowered: Shape shifting, you give a lot up for this (when used) casting time, the ability to use other much much more effective spells. Shape shifting overall feels like a toy not worth the effort to take.

I would like to see wisdom become the defining talent for a number of Schools/trees, such as creation. As it stands now, wisdom is not even really necessary. You will get the anti mage types complaining about the lirium chugging, but my Warrior does exactly the same with health pots, and she is seriously much harder to kill then any mage. Stats like wisdom need to become more spell focused (stats for any class are rudimentary and require practically no planning )

Cone of Cold is broken, it will always bypasses spell ward (but so does some spirit based attacks, maybe spell ward is broken as well). Cone of Cold almost never fails (fails 1 or 2 time if unlucky in a fight on nightmare) one mother of the overpowered spell. Spells are generally not so much over powered, it is the way the schools are set up... they scream cheery picking of spells, hence some schools need to be more "wisdom" oriented, with the more effective spells moved to the end of the trees.

* What are your favorite Mage specializations? What are your least favorite?

Easily Spirit Healer first, Arcane Warrior a very very distant second. Usually will take Shape shifting for the stats for secondary specialization.

Blood Mage hate, sorry RP value or not, it causes an imbalance for the AW spec... Shape Shifting neither dislike or like it is just pointless.


* What are your favorite Mage talent trees? What are your least favorite?

Creation heal line plus Glyphs and the great CC horror. sleep and nightmare.... If I have these, I am a happy camper.

[atrain69]

* What do you like and dislike about the Mage?
Likes:
     Variety of Spells
     Spirit Healer
     Arcane Warrior is ok
Dislikes
     No sustainable electric ability, like fire and ice have
     Glyphs though useful I find that the get less use in a balanced party b/c my mage barely ever gets touched
     Shapeshifter would be nice if it could either mesh with AW or if your magic ability provided bonuses to attack
          and/or defense
     AW would be better if it had at least one activated ability that included the weapon properties into the attack

* Is there anything that you feel that is underpowered or overpowered on the Mage?
Underpowered:
     Basic arcane tree; does very little to improve your abilities as a mage
     The individual trees should have a mastery ability that improves those spells just like the fighter and rogue
          have for their weapon talents
Overpowered:
     The class can be; it's east to min max yourself and make you a spellcasting god
     The basic ice talents should slow not freeze, even difficult enemies can be easily defeated if you freeze and
          shatter them.
    
* What are your favorite Mage specializations? What are your least favorite?
     Spirit Healer is by far my favorite, although I would love to see a War Wizard specialization that would have 
          more tactical spell casting abilities.
     Shapeshifter is least favorite but I already talked about this.

* What are your favorite Mage talent trees? What are your least favorite?
     I find Primal to be my favorite, in DND i've always been an upfront spell slinging mage...I just wish there was 
          more oppotunities for that without the need for lyrium potions.
     My least favorite would have to be Entropy, although I can see it's benefits and when I used Morrigan with my 
          rogue I found its uses.  I think this question is really more about play style than an actual problem with the
          class design.

[Upper_Krust]

Victor Wachter wrote...

Wrapping up our series of dev questions on character classes, we now ask about the Mage. As we continue to plan for the future of the Dragon Age franchise, we're interested in hearing your feedback regarding the different classes.

In this thread, we'd like to ask your opinions of the Mage class. You can still comment in previous weeks' Warrior and Rogue topics. We'll continue the dev questions next week with all new topics.

Would be nice to have a topic about the Monsters in the game, likes and dislikes. Though I may break the servers with the length of my reply to such a topic.

* What do you like and dislike about the Mage?

Likes

- Visually its the most rewarding class (though also see dislikes).
- Spell Combos are a great idea (though see also dislikes).

Dislikes

- The clothing looks terrible (other than Morrigans starting garb).
- The equipment choices are very limited. 
- Visually a lot of the spells lack 'punch' or 'flair'.
- Its overpowered as a class and allowing multiple mages compounds this problem.
- Certain spells are simply broken (Mana Clash and Force Field to name but two)
- Certain Spell Combos are way overpowered...fun, but overpowered.
- The ability to cast spells in the next room (which you can't even see) seems a bit like cheating

* Is there anything that you feel that is underpowered or overpowered on the Mage?

Underpowered

- Equipment definately

Overpowered

- Everything else.

* What are your favorite Mage specializations? What are your least favorite?

Okay, I've only played 2 specializations up to now, so I am not the best person to answer this question. Of the two I thought Spirit Healer was better than Shapechanger, but not much in it. Pretty good what I have played.

* What are your favorite Mage talent trees? What are your least favorite?

Favourite Talent Trees

1st: Entropy
2nd: Primal

Favourite Chains Across the Trees

- Cold...entire Primal Tree is fairly good (though the Earth chain is definately the weakest of the four)
- Glyphs
- Hexes...though the Entropy Set is excellent all round.

Least Favourite Talent Trees

3rd: Creation (though Glyphs are great)
4th: Spirit

Least Favourite Chains Across the Trees

- Anti-Magic = pointless
- Mana Alteration = pointless, except for Mana Clash
- Summoning = weak, other than Grease

[MinosFan]

* What do you like and dislike about the Mage?

I like their lore, their healing and their multitude of tricks.

I dislike their gear greatly (the hats most of all), their near-total lack of passive talents and their origin story (idiot vs snitch is not a great choice).

* Is there anything that you feel that is underpowered or overpowered on the Mage?

Even playing throught he game 3 times, I'm not really qualified to say; I've looked up the maths of Mage spells and it goes way over my head - no idea of their power level comparatively.

What I do feel is underpowered is the near-total absence of passive talents; absolutely inevitable to end up with more active talents than can possibly be supported or even fitted on the skill bar - especially if filling a specialized role like healer.
Consequently a whole lot of investment yields either no return at all, or only for a short while till the higher talent is unlocked.

* What are your favorite Mage specializations? What are your least favorite?

I always have a Spirit Healer on hand for Group Heal & Revival - though I still find it mystifying and unwelcome that a specialization has the only rez spell.

Blood Magic sure is interesting when playing a Mage, but I wouldn't trust it to an AI script.

I find Arcane Warrior interesting, but I find aggro pretty easy to manage so not really any impetus to wear armor beyond looking better.

Shapeshifter strikes me as terribly lame, and I've never found a sensible reason to use it.

* What are your favorite Mage talent trees? What are your least favorite?

I don't like the Arcane line itself - which is ironic given that has the only passives - I just find the perks small & puny when finally tracked down.

The rest of the lines all have something of merit in them in some regard, some lines are just better than others for not requiring wading through 1-3 spells you won't have the mana to use in order to acquire them.

[imikedoyle]

Victor Wachter wrote...
* What do you like and dislike about the Mage?

For rogues and warriors, the quickbar at the bottom of the screen is fine.
By the time you're playing a high level mage, the fixed number of slots provides
you with nowhere near enough options to have all your spells available.

For example, my mage character at level 20 has none of the persistient
powerups on the quick bar, no heal or lyrium potions, and still I need to go in to
the full spell list that pauses the game to select some useful spells.

The mage, at least, needs something like in the NWN games where you got
multiple quick-bars by pressing CTRL or SHIFT

Other than that, playing my third playthrough at the moment with a mage, and
having a great time.

Even on three playthroughs, with Morrigan and Wynne or my party and on this play through
my PC being a mage,  there are still some spells I havent even tried yet. Lots of flexibility
and possibilities here. Well done!

[hardvice]

urvashi wrote...

hardvice wrote...

 
but some kind of sneaky, stealthy, shadow-wielding mage might also work.

You mean some kind of a sneaky witch thief? 

LOL. Yes, exactly.

[Mirander]

imikedoyle wrote...

Victor Wachter wrote...
* What do you like and dislike about the Mage?

For rogues and warriors, the quickbar at the bottom of the screen is fine.
By the time you're playing a high level mage, the fixed number of slots provides
you with nowhere near enough options to have all your spells available.

For example, my mage character at level 20 has none of the persistient
powerups on the quick bar, no heal or lyrium potions, and still I need to go in to
the full spell list that pauses the game to select some useful spells.

The mage, at least, needs something like in the NWN games where you got
multiple quick-bars by pressing CTRL or SHIFT

Other than that, playing my third playthrough at the moment with a mage, and
having a great time.

Even on three playthroughs, with Morrigan and Wynne or my party and on this play through
my PC being a mage,  there are still some spells I havent even tried yet. Lots of flexibility
and possibilities here. Well done!

Well, you can expand the size of the hotbar (on the PC at least, I can't speak to the consoles).  Click on the right side of the hotbar, and drag it out as far as you need.  You can drag it out far enough to go across the entire bottom of the screen.

[Ponce de Leon]

Victor Wachter wrote...

* What do you like and dislike about the Mage?
* Is there anything that you feel that is underpowered or overpowered on the Mage?
* What are your favorite Mage specializations? What are your least favorite?
* What are your favorite Mage talent trees? What are your least favorite?

*I like the fact that a mage with the right spells can either kill fast, or make allies kill fast. I love area of effect spells. I hate that they need quite some lyrium potions to make a lot of spells

*Underpowered, nothing at all. Overpowered, the possibility to come out of even the nastier of situations without a scratch. Some spell combos too, like having a dual wielding rogue with coup de grace and cone of cold some group of enemies. If the rogue goes in the midle and activates whirlwind, half, if not more enemies will get instantly shattered.

*My favorite spec is the Arcane warrior : you have to really do something wrong to get killed.
My least favorite the Shapeshifter : I don't know it's uses, since the transformation makes you unable to cast spells.

*Probably the Entropy tree is my favorite. It's incredible how the spells of the tree will make enemies become absurdly vulnerable to your attacks.
My least favorite is creation. Not because it's useless, but because it's less usefull.

And since I had 4 different mages to get every single spell, I think I can say this

Hope this helped.

[leana78]

My favorite was being a rogue, so I mostly had the mage to heal and take care of the team.Which is strange when I think of it, because I always liked beeing a mage in other games.I think It seemed to me very complicated on the 1st sight. I like to understand quickly or never ,kind of...I discovered quite late the cone of cold.(in fact while reading the forums) and used it a lot ,then my rogues were shattering the icebergs(well, the mage had the fist to shutter but it takes mana..pfff)..
errr..That's all I did with my mages mostly, because I once or twice tried shapeshifting and it was craps.
Yes: They heal, heal, and hide cowardly behind the others, just when I need them to cold cone some ennemis. That's what I disliked: I never asked them to hide in the corridor not beeing able to target properly and that's what they did all the time! Always faaarrrr away behiiinnndd! Plus they could hurt my team the stupids! though my other guys would never fire an arrow in their companions arses!
I always had to take the mage myself into the battlefield all the time, that was getting on my nerves...So I dropped the stupid woman to her automatic healings to get back to my rogues:)
And mages can do so many spells that there's not enough room down the screen to have all the spells displayed, which is a pity! Next please, put more lil windows down so we can see all the possibilities. It surely would've have boosted my magic properties, as I forgot half of what they can do...

Modifié par leana78, 06 février 2010 - 08:54 .

[svenus97]

* What do you like and dislike about the Mage?

I really like the class, the best done out of all 3. Some spell are overpowered, but most are fine:)

I like: All specializations
          All spells but Disorient:)
          Well actually.... there isn't much I don't like ...

I dislike: Almost nothing, few very minor things (headgears included)


* Is there anything
that you feel that is underpowered or overpowered on the Mage?

There are deffinatley no underpowered spells, and even if there were, they would be backed up by the overpowered. Cone of Cold, Crushing Prison and Blood Wound are deffinatley overpowered, especially Blood Wound, it is like an AoE Crushing Prison.


* What
are your favorite Mage specializations? What are your least favorite?

I like them all, Shapeshifter is deffinatley least favourite, but I like it. Arcane Warrior/Blood Mage mix is the best for me,


*
What are your favorite Mage talent trees? What are your least favorite?

All of them are good but I don't like the Spell Bloom/Grease line. Earthquake maybe.

Modifié par svenus97, 06 février 2010 - 08:55 .

[Darkemorrow]

I have to disagree with the idea that mages are overpowered in general. In my opinion, there are a handful of spells that are overpowered and could use some tweaking:

Cone of Cold: Only because the freeze effect seems to always work, regardless of whether the enemy is immune to cold or not. I don't think I've ever seen an enemy resist Cone of Cold either. This spell just needs a little adjusting to make it less reliable.

Mana Clash: The concept is awesome, but the damage-per-mana-burnt ratio is just too high. You can pretty much 1-shot every mage in the game with this. Just cut the damage in half or something and it will be fine.

Force Field: Overpowered when you can use it on your tank and have them hold aggro and take no damage. The problem with this isn't the spell itself so much as the fact that enemy AI doesn't recognize when your tank is invulnerable and switch targets. A simple fix would be to have the target drop all aggro while under the protection of this spell. It would still be useable both as a crowd control ability against enemies, or an emergency protection for allies.

Blood Wound: Basically an AOE Crushing Prison. Could stand to be toned down somehow.

Arcane Warrior: The whole specialization could probably afford to be taken down a notch.

Otherwise, mages are fine. They are a fun, versatile class to play, and I don't believe they need to be nerfed in any significant way. If anything, warriors and rogues need to have their utility increased to match.

Modifié par Darkemorrow, 06 février 2010 - 09:11 .

[yasuraka.hakkyou]

oh boy...lets get crackin'...

* What do you like and dislike about the Mage? What are your favorite / least favorite talent trees?

The sheer variety is rather insane. pick and choose your favs, go all out one school and part of another, or half-n-half, etc. half of the gear is not good looking. the tevinter robes are tolerable, at least, the others are ugly, Chantry, or cover up too much. that sounds kinda pervy, but it's not like the dalish armor for wars and rogues, where it actually needs to protect them from blows. the mages could afford to show off a bit more, since a few hits are going to screw them over anyway. the twin twisting dragon staff would have been cooler with only one head twisting around a tree, or something like that. and for the love of all thingsq good and holy,  go with elder scroll style hoods.

- Primal overall is probably the strongest, or one of. I don't necessarily like how all fire spells are AoE so to speak, and the earth tree is fairly useless. Stonefist is alright, though. Earthquake doesn't do enough, and when I have gotten Petrify, I never used it. I greatly dislike the weapon enchantment spells, or at least where they are. I've seen mods that change them to single target bolts of fireball and cone of cold, but I haven't gotten them to work. also, chain lightning casted on you / your party can halve everyone's health while six reavers wail on you, but when you return the favor, it barely tickles them. not cool. don't  gimp player versions of spells while giving the enemy the souped up version, it doesn't work in this kinda game. 4 of 5

- Creation. Wynne has the most points in this school, so that's where most of my experience comes from. Anything past heal seems sorta pointless and not needed. Wynne's on tactics to use those when she can, and it rarely makes or breaks a battle. I think you could trade out the 3 enhancement auras, put the fire and ice weapons there, with another of your choosing, still end with haste, and thereby make creation better. I've heard great things about the glyphs, although I personally haven't played with them much. very cool, though. Stinging Swarm is something I really want to pick up at some point, but the early spells might be a problem, because they might not do enough. 3.5 of 5

- Spirit. some of the best CC is in this tree. force field the boss, crusing prison something at range, and mind blast if you get surrounded. simply fantastic. I've only gotten up to Virulent Bomb, but it's great fun. "and and and...POP!" lol. Mana Clash is godly and I love it, but rank one and possibly two are pointless. spell might is good for the combo, and cleanse is good I guess if somebody gets a curse of mortality, prison, or force field, but I dunno. the anti-magic tree is gimmicky and pointless IMO. 4 of 5

- Entropy. I haven't fiddled too much with this tree either. It seems decent enough, but maybe just not the school to start out with is my idea. 3.5 of 5

* Is there anything that you feel that is underpowered or overpowered on the Mage?

Dragon Age is a single player game, so not necessarily. I'm playing on hard now, and the added chance of enemies to resist spells I think evens out any OP-ness. some of the trees / spells in the various schools are UP I think, but I've talked about those.

* What are your favorite Mage specializations? What are your least favorite?

Blood mage. I'm all about just dishing out damage, and a spec that greatly increases my mana pool, gives me a flat-out insane CC spell, and single target control spell is awesome. might have been cooler if people actually reacted to blood magic, but that could just as well kill my love for it. Healer and Warrior aren't bad. Shapeshifter is a great idea balanced by horrible execution. unless the player does some wonky stat increases (magic =/=  -> strength I hear), or the issue gets patched, they're probably never going to be as good as even a full melee rogue, and tacking on ~ a 6s cast is just insulting.

I almost always make a mage first in games, and Dragon Age delivers. give us better gear, better-looking gear, and fix a few wonky things and I'm a happy camper.

[lqutois]

I have yet to finish a playthrough on my mage...how people can play this game as many times as some of them have all ready I don't know...but I love mage classes and I love the mage her so far wonderfully.

What do you like:
The power level, you start out weak as crap but I'm at level 13 now and I feel incredibly powerful as I feel like I should by the time I reach level 25...well like in old D@D I should just change my name to God.  The look of the spells is also great. 

What do you not like:
Clothes.  They don't seem ostentasious enough for me.  A mage should be about fashion since the robes are not for protection.  Bright colors, think of the posinous animals that announce their presence.  Mages should be like that...we don't try to hide we expect others to hide from us!  Cloaks...we need cloaks...cloaks with hoods would be great as well.  I can deal with a little clipping but it is possible to get rid of most of it, mmo's do so.

Favorite specilization:  Blood mage followed by spirit healer.  The two sides of the mage coin, a bad muther who will kill everyone who stands in their way and a lovey feely healer.

Least favorite: shapeshifter.  This could have been INCREDIBLY cool, but making it work was waaay to hard.  Not near enough info on it was given in the manual about how it worked.  We shouldn't have to experiment to figure out how the stats change...we should be given that information.  RPG players do read manuals we are not action gamers (thank god). 

The arcane warrior also just seemed wrong to me...a mage in plate armor??  This goes against everything I have come to expect about mages it also seems like it would make us to powerful, I mean even without being able to stand in the front lines I am almost an army unto myself.

The spell combinations are also great but many of them just don't make sense...they are not logical combinations.  The one with the force feild spell for example (now combine that one with the fire spell and that would make more sense)

I haven't gone through enough of the lines to have a best and a worst...but the circular wards turned out to be MUCH more useful than I expected.

[ArtOfMagic]

I dislike how you can't stop time itself and with extremly fast casting completly destroy everyone who dares to stand in your way a la BG 2. And I really think some spells should damage more at least

And give us Time Stop and maybe Comet please.

One more thing, come on the Mage isn't that overpowered, at least not as a damage dealer..Imo its at least more immersionbreaker to have to throw fireballs and lighting over and over to kill some pathetic bandit than to kill him with one fireball instead.

So more damage please

Modifié par ArtOfMagic, 06 février 2010 - 10:03 .

[Magus_42]

Mage is my preferred player class for RPGs, and I very much enjoyed the dragon age take on the class. It's easy to make a wizard class that acts as a machine gun, tossing out fireballs left and right. The mage in dragon age is a bit more subtle, with a focus on crowd control as much as raw damage. This is a style of gameplay I very much enjoy. I'm also a big fan of the spell combo system, and I'd really love to see it expanded moving forward. It would also be nice if you could research combos in game, rather than finding them by chance or going online.

There's a lot of talk about mages being overpowered in this game. I think the problem is that they're a little too robust. They don't really need warriors to soak up aggro, and because there's very little benefit to rogue skills in a dragon age dungeon, you can easily get away with a 2-3 mages in a 4 character party, and that becomes a problem. I think the power level of a single mage is fine, but I think the other classes need to be given more of a role, so that a good party needs all classes working together,

The most overpowered spell is obviously cone of cold. It's a strong damage spell which also serves as crowd control, and the shatter effect allows you to kill several attackers almost instantly (by triggering criticl hit abilities as soon as the cone fires). If it did two of these things, it might be appropriate for a 4th tier spell, but right now it's a bit too much. Beyond that, I can't think of any spell that's really over the top. I can't say that I've used every spell in the game, though. You felt it necessary to nerf the crushing prison spell a while back, but even that spell never really struck me as being a problem. On the underpowered side, disorient seems pretty useless, and the weapon damage modifiers never seem to be worth keeping up later in the game. Curse of mortality and the dispel path seem to be spells more useful for my opponents than me (most enemies can't heal, and there's little worth bothering to dispel). Overall, though, most spells have at least situational use.

I'm personally rather fond of the spirit tree, even with the limited usefulness of dispel and the nerf to crushing prison. I find the idea of countering the enemies plans to be rather appealing. Also, walking bomb is just fun, even if hitting more than one opponent with it is mostly just luck (unless you're silly enough to target someone in melee with your own party).

I didn't take any specializations on my mage character. Every talent point put into specialization is one less spell in my library, and none of their abilities seemed worth that trade. Spirit healer is certainly useful to have, but I've never found being the healer to be much fun. Also, why can't Wynne teach you this specialization? Shapeshiffting seemed to slow to be useful, and once changed you can't cast spells, so what's the point really? Arcane warrior could be fun if you built a character around it, but it's not a strong appeal. Blood mage isn't my style, but it at least improves your core spellcasting abilities.

[Tolkiens Padawan]

Mage is my favorite class, I went adventuring without them very few times.
SPELL DESCRIPTIONS
Heals / deals damage - very nice so far, but how much? It is okay to not give the statistics of spells, there is no spellbook in Ferelden that says "Healing heals 40 helth points" I guess, and I like realism in that way, but I felt a bit lost with spell descriptions not telling me if one spell does more damage than another or less.
SPECIALIZATIONS
Spirit healer is very interesting and powerful.
Shapeshifting is indeed quite week, most of the time I like a mage best when he is able to use his magic. For some time I sometimes shifted into a bear for a second for spell combo reasons, but when the heroes got more powerful I didn't take the time for shifting. It is still an interesting option when you don't have mana - and don't want to use a potion. However, no way with the insects, that's a bit sad. I like the concept of shapeshifting in general very much and I believe specializations should get a meaning in the story (if you have a character of spec x within your party, you get options that you wouldn't have otherwise), that could bring some very interesting use for the shapeshifter. If you want to keep the existing forms, you could give them interesting feeds - what about stealth for a wolf? The bear form has interesting feeds, perhaps it could gain more resistances and immunities (not sure if it has any powerful). Additional forms would be interesting of course. I remember the fade - that was an interesting kind of shapeshifting.
SPELLS
My favorite spell is ice cone, storm, etc are great, but ice cone is still the best. Too powerful? Well, you need some powerful spell if you are playing on hard difficulty, don't you?
Spell combos are a great thing! (Too bad I only found three of them, but good to keep them a secret, if there are more to come, don't give them away by descriptions in the spellbook, as happend with a few in DAO).
Some spells are a bit similar, there could be more variety, things like shapeshifting another creature, transforming items (no, I don't mean making a sword an icy sword, I mean making a crystal a mushroom, something like that - non combat features is something Dragon Age could get better in, concerning magic, but not only magic), etc.
DISLIKED
Too bad a mage can't choose an origin. And a bit sad the "magic classes" are only represented by the mage. Perhaps there could be another magic-using class in the future? What about the gods of the elves coming back into the world and you can play as an elven "priest" (wouldn't be quite the typical kind of priest) with the chosen gods as specializations? Or maybe blood-mages could seperate even more from the spellbook-magic and get an own class?
Is chain lightning useful? I dindn't learn it, because it says it goes from one creature to another and so on and can hurt group members. So why the hell should I risk to use it?

So, thanks for your interest, Bioware. I don't think mages are the first thing that needs upgrades, but on the other hand, they still have a lot of potential.

[3nfan7]

* What do you like and dislike about the Mage?



Nothing in particular about the class, but you see that some spell should have a casting time, like 0.5 - 1 - 1,5...istant casting throws the class to top choice at the moment.

Then specific gear for mages, apart from all the +% at damage, we've felt a lack of variety among the items (cowls,boots expecially).



* Is there anything that you feel that is underpowered or overpowered on the Mage?



Well if you question this around, basically everyone will answer that the class is overpowered.

In my opinion this became true due to the lack of casting time, or the inexistence of the global cooldown on potion drink.That makes more the game an Arcade then a "hit pause and see" game.



* What are your favorite Mage specializations? What are your least favorite?



Healing is fair in normal mode, something you'll possibly pass for DPS,like Blood Magic.

In nightmare it becomes substantial and spells like lifeward and revival gains the scene.

Arcane warrior is fair but: please we've given 6 warrior NPC...i don't want to melee rush every fight.

Shapeshifting, i don't want to comment it please.Can't believe the devs allowed that content going live.



* What are your favorite Mage talent trees? What are your least favorite?



Spirit, for the variety and usefulness of the spells. (lacks a bit of offense)

Primal should be my least, i'd never max that out cause i prefer to focus on an element rather than all...

[avantoreon]

People have already mentioned some of this stuff, but I thought I'd weigh in with my opinion.



* What do you like and dislike about the Mage?



The mage is pretty spectacular. My favorite part about the mage is that mages are extremely tactical instruments---casting the right spell at the right time can turn the tide of a battle, but at the same time mages are not very useful on their own (at least not until you're very high-level). It forces you to manage your team very well, whereas as a warrior or a rogue you can often just leave your team to their own devices.



The primary dislike is that most of the equipment you pick up isn't useful to a mage---mages don't need new swords or new suits of armor, and there are only two general classes of robes for a mage (Circle, and Tevinter). It'd be better if there were separate classes of robes, perhaps boosting a mage's aptitude for a particular sphere of magic (e.g., robes for a primal mage, robes for a healer, etc). Staff selection is also pretty limited (only three varieties, compared to five or six different swords as well as axes and maces). I know that some equipment has stuff like a +10% nature damage bonus, or +10% to healing effects received, which is cool---it'd be cooler, though, if there were bonuses like "the cost of primal spells is reduced by 10%" or something.



Also, the robes don't look very wizard-y. It'd be nice if they looked a bit more like Jedi robes or something---a long cloak/robes are fine, but with an open front so you can at least see that your character is wearing pants.



* Is there anything that you feel that is underpowered or overpowered on the Mage?



Balance in general seems pretty good to me. The higher-level primal magic spells wipe the floor with your enemies, but that's something they should do. If I'm a level 25 master wizard, I damn well should be able to do something more than just shoot lightning bolts.



The shapeshifter specialization, however, has combat damage based on strength instead of spellpower for your shapeshifted forms. And, the shapeshifter forms aren't all that interesting to turn into. To my mind, spiders and bears are only one level above giant rats on the creature coolness scale. A fully leveled up shapeshifter should be able to turn into a drake or some similarly threatening creature.



The spells in the primal school of magic seem well-balanced, except for Cone of Cold. Cone of Cold is too good at incapacitating enemies---I would either lower the amount of time the enemy is frozen (at least for higher-level enemies), or make it possible to resist it.



In entropy, the misdirection hex is a game-changer, as well as the curse of mortality. Misdirection hex is almost more useful than the death hex, because it locks an enemy down for half a battle. It feels a bit too powerful.



* What are your favorite Mage specializations? What are your least favorite?



Most Favorite: Arcane warrior. It'd be cool to even take it to more of an extreme---instead of being able to equip normal armor, have a spell which creates "spectral armor" whose defense scales with spellpower (like Rock Armor, only with it actually showing a different set of armor equipped).



The one gripe is that you have to re-sheath your weapon to cast a spell. I'd change it so that you don't equip weapons at all. Instead, your basic attack would be a melee spell, or wielding a spectral sword (similar to the spectral armor idea).



Also favorites: Blood magic is pretty awesome. There are a ton of possibilities with blood magic. It could even be expanded to its own talent tree, I imagine. The one gripe is, blood control doesn't do damage if it fails to control someone.



Least favorite: shapeshifting. It could be cool, but the forms you can turn into aren't all that interesting, and it seems like the damage scales based on strength rather than spellpower (which obviously gimps you if you're a mage).



Spirit healing is cool too, but it's much more of a utilitarian school. It doesn't seem to offer any new tactical possibilities, it just improves the survivability of your party.



* What are your favorite Mage talent trees? What are your least favorite?



Favorites:

The primal trees (fire, earth, ice, electricity).

The arcane warrior, spirit healer, and blood mage trees.

Telekinesis tree (mind blast, etc)

Mana manipulation (mana cleanse--mana clash)

Death magic (drain life--death cloud)



Dislikes:

Weakness--Mass paralysis

Heroic offense/aura/defense

[Sidney]

* What do you like and dislike about the Mage?

Mages offer the most different ways to be useful of all 3 classes.

They array of spells is good and are different enough in effect and appearance that it doesn't feel like a big load of all the same thing.

I, perhaps alone, like the look the mages have, not the same old Edwin look.

Their specializations are basically really unimpressive other than spirit healer.

There are a lot of pointless spells cluttering up their ladders, things you take just to get something much better - like all the "X" Weapons spells.



* Is there anything that you feel that is underpowered or overpowered on the Mage?

The ready access to mana potions means that mages can effectively dump everything into Magic all game long unlike almost any other class. Potions should be less easily made/bought or less useful.



* What are your favorite Mage specializations? What are your least favorite?

Spirit Healer - the best of the lot, actually adds thinsg I want.

Arcane Warrior - Too overpowered and not all that fun for that reason.

Blood Mage - Great 4th tier but worthless until then. All the blood magic ladders need to be looked at because the loss of heath in exchange for powers never seems to add up.

Shapeshifter - Takes way too long and why would I want to be a spellcaster taking on a non-spellcasting form?



* What are your favorite Mage talent trees?

All the Primals are good but the 4th level Chain Lightening is a waste of a point. The only problem is that it alsmost seems like you should only take one ladder out of this domain.

Telekenesis has 2 essential spells - Crushing Prison and Force Field



*What are your least favorite?

Anti-Magic - just never use it

Death - Don't like the effects although a lot of folks love it.

Summoning - REally not worth it compared to the best classes.

[Dlokir]

wowpwnslol wrote...

I hope the devs don't listen to most of these suggestions, based on what had been posted so far, the playerbase is laughably clueless when it comes to game balance. Once devs start listening to suggestions of bad players with who mostly RP or never played any game competitively, you know it will go downhill (see: WoW balancing the game for casuals and scrubs since WoTLK).

It's not a multiplayer game so the various classes don't need as much balancing. But when reading this thread I'm a bit disapointed by this wide majority of mage fans, not having any clue about how unbalance it is curently. And even when they are conscious of the balance breaking, many of those don't care about nerf down mages in some way. Even worse, quite many suggestions/requests tend to give them more power... like make AW true fighters with full mage power.

Modifié par Dlokir, 07 février 2010 - 03:47 .

[wowpwnslol]

Dlokir wrote...

It's not a multiplayer game so the various classes don't need as much balancing. But when reading this thread I'm a bit disapointed by this wide majority of mage fans, not having any clue about how unbalance it is curently. And even when they are conscious of the balance breaking, many of those don't care about nerf down mages in some way. Even worse, quite many suggestions/requests tend to give them more power... like make AW true fighters with full mage power.

You have people on here saying that blood wound and crushing prison are overpowered. You have people making suggestions that AW should need to invest in str in order to equip armor. You also have people saying things like "I think feature X is overpowered" without offering any explanation or presenting a situation where the particular skill is too strong/weak.

Here is how I would go about making suggestions/balance tweaks

(Example)

Spell: Crushing Prison
Balance: Underpowered
Reason: The CC component doesn't work against bosses and frequently fails against elites. It has 60 second cooldown and is tier 4.
Suggestion: Make crushing prison last 20 seconds again, but only 5 seconds on elites and 3 seconds against bosses.
Suggestion  2: Exchange CP and FF -  to make former tier 2 and latter tier 4

Spell: Force Field
Balance: Overpowered
Reason: Can be used for infinite tanking (AI problem to be honest). Can be used for walking bomb combos. Low cooldown, good duration, can be spammed by 2 mages. Tier 2 only.
Suggestion: FF should be a tier 4 spell.

[Dlokir]

It's not a Tier 4 thing that will change anything. For Crushing Prison, double effects, paralyze and damages... why not add a 3rd effect? 1.02 version is still overpowerful, not a suprise for such spell. The same goes for Ice Cone, AOE, damages and paralyze, well a 4th effect would be nice... sarcasm. Why have any surprise that such spell will be unballanced again and again?

Anyway; ok it's not about making suggestions for balancing, it's difficult to do so. It's about most suggestions that tend to request more powers and that so many (but not all) mage fans have so few clue about how not balanced is the game. Throw more mages in enemies side, give them all spells, and from this base let discuss about mages.

I don't think fair balancing is the key but there's something wrong, not sure how solve the problem.

[ArtOfMagic]

The low level spells need to do more damage at least at higher level imo. (The natur based walking bomb excluded)

Modifié par ArtOfMagic, 07 février 2010 - 05:31 .

[Among Jaliana]

I forgot to mention something in my post (page 1)

In Dragon Age Wiki, in Mage class description, it is said that "malevolent spirits that wish to enter the world of the living are drawn to mages like beacons (...)." When I first created my character, I expected that I would be drawn into the Fade every time I went to camp to rest/trade/etc. And that did not ever happen. Well, not in the camp, that is. I think this is an inconsistency between game Lore and the game itself 

The second thing I would like to see changed is the number of Mage Origin stories. To be specific, add a Dalish Elf Mage Origin, and another 2 to compensate the imbalance. For example, Surface Dwarf and Human Commoner Origin stories.
But it doesn't have to be in the next expansion. Do it for Dragon Age 2. And a Bioware example comes to my mind: the addition of the Sorcerer class in Baldur's Gate 2: ToB IIRC


Continue the good work! <3