Nerfing SM

[UmarilsStillHere]

Knight vs staff mastery mage = knight has a great chance of winning
Barb vs staff mastery mage = barb has a decent chance of winning
Marksman vs staff mastery mage = marksman has a fantastic chance to win
Hunter vs staff mastery mage = hunter has a fair chance of losing
Standard Warlock vs staff mastery mage = 50/50 (depends on resist chance)
Standard Conji vs staff mastery mage = 50/50 (depends on resist chance)

This is all from the point of the "Warju" Warlocks are differant in someways and I consider Warjus more powerfull than SM locks.

A warju vs a knight, the conju can use SS+Barrier to take up the little damage a knight can do, and thats if the knight cen even get near the conju through CC spells, mostly Mind push. Conju simply needs to outlast Ao0 and they have won, Since once Ao0 is down those SM hits start to stack very quickly.

A warju vs a barb, well UM can help with most CC effects but not Mind push, a barb has little to no resistance vs magical dmg, so you will take heavy damage even trying to get near enough to land a single hit, which would most likely be "0" because of barrier+SS, With Balestra nerfed its even harder to get the mage in one spot long enough to get into Hitting range,

With both Knights and Barbs IF you can get close, IF you have mindsquasher skilled IF you have mana for it and IF it works then the fight becomes very easy. But that dosnt happen very often. (Basicaly only if the mage has poor CC/no mindpush)

A warju vs a Marks, Marks have =/greater range and close damage, Also some elemental attacks to work around SS, Ranged dmg reduction helps a lot as well. Personaly I think the Marks has the greatest chance of all class's but SS will still reduce normal hits greatly and if the warju has will doman and beetle at a decent level it will be more difficult.

A Hunter vs a Warju, well realy if a Hunter finds a Warju best bet if to try get into camo quick, since SM will tear you a new one in seconds, try wait out the buffs then hit with confuse as they start to re-cast staff magnifications. Without getting the drop on them though, as they are with many class's the Hunter is sqrewed.

A Warju vs a Warlock, Many Elemental spells to work around SS, Meteor to prevent some CC or re-buffing, SK/vamp go through SS. And Windwall to reduce Dmg, Id say a lock has a decent chance vs a warju if he has good mana spells, otherwise the warju will soon drain all his mana and leave him defenceless.

Just my Opinions, Also I know a few people who have grinded to the mid 30s without SM, since in my eyes SM isnt worth it untill you have at least 2/3 Magnifications. Mages are already faster than other class's at grinding, so they can lose a little speed to bring them down into the grind pit with the rest of us :P

[Catelyn]

Any player that obtains these items and has a ranged weapon will reap the same lux. Imagine an archer with son of the wind + rapid shot + hawk eye + godly drops.

You can't compare those too. It's so obvious i don't know why I have to even say it...

A mage can regain mana! A marks can't.
Arcane acceleration vs hawk's gaze :
1min duration for both, but 3 min cooldown for hawk's. 3sec to cast too
130 mana (i think) vs 500 mana.
500 mana for a marks is insane lol! considering u could need some spells too. As it is now, hawk's gaze is a joke, or maybe just for use when defending forts.

As for rapid shoot, it's -25%hit chance, so u need to have some high hc, and you must use short bows, range 25 or less. All of that, for 25 sec at lvl 4.

On top of that, it's 20 mana per arrow for recharged at 5. Using rapid shoot with a fast short bow and you'll see your mana bar drop like crazy. Mages have it easier with mana.

Plus, mages can have 15% more range for ever, since duration=cooldown.

As for drops, mage drops with attack speed are easier to find.

Finally when grinding, you get so many drops that repairs ain't nothing. And unless you have a big group, it's way easier to lvl using sm and some good items...

[Nightchill]

barb and knight should be able to own sm mages in no time, all they need is successful mind squash.

but uma, rest of your hypothesis is complete nonsense. especially warlock vs warju, when you're fighting vs almost always di'd zarkit and a conju which dps's even without imba items together are in a domain of 1k damage.

[Pendalf]

Sorry, but reading posts above sometimes I can not make it clear whether author wants SM nerfing or not. I suggest Asswinged Devil to make a poll here: for and against. If so, I vote against nerfing. If NGD find that some class is weaker than mage because of SM, better make this class stronger some ways and leave poor mages as they are (but more better to return them their MC because other classes are more suffer of MC nerfing than mages themselves).

[Angelwinged_Devil]

Originally Posted by Foggia

1. Balance should not depend on grinding but on pvp. Do u know how hard has barbs grinding become after 1.0.6, where piercing skill tree has been killed?

no it shouldn't, but this is so sever that it'll stop a warlocks growth big time and put them below any other class in levelling speed

2. Lvling a lock without sm is still faster than some other classes. I actually never used it to get mine to 45 and didnt fint it particulary painful.

I have levelled all classes and I can easily tell you, no. Cooldown is a big enemy here

Originally Posted by DemonMonger

It is possible to gain 100k-250k xp per hour without staff mastery using a coordinated group + areas. You can't do that with staff mastery. Plus the repais for SM are insane. Leveling a mage is never difficult....

try it with the distance between mobs, if you want to gather them first you might as well use sm, and the repairs aren't that bad if you grind naked , it's the speed I'm interested in.

Sorry, but reading posts above sometimes I can not make it clear whether author wants SM nerfing or not. I suggest Asswinged Devil to make a poll here: for and against. If so, I vote against nerfing. If NGD find that some class is weaker than mage because of SM, better make this class stronger some ways and leave poor mages as they are (but more better to return them their MC because other classes are more suffer of MC nerfing than mages themselves).

it says in the end of my initial post ^^ nerfing it at the current state will be bad to warlock levelling

[e30G]

Not really. I'm leveling a lock too and did fine without SM. I only use SM when I feel lazy to level.

Leveling a non-SM lock is still much faster than leveling a conjurer on support and faster than knights and hunters.

Cooldown doesn't hurt lock leveling much. The only time it becomes an issue is if you meet one of those super resistant mobs.

[Angelwinged_Devil]

Originally Posted by e30ernest

Not really. I'm leveling a lock too and did fine without SM. I only use SM when I feel lazy to level.

Leveling a non-SM lock is still much faster than leveling a conjurer on support and faster than knights and hunters.

Cooldown doesn't hurt lock leveling much. The only time it becomes an issue is if you meet one of those super resistant mobs.

tell me what level you are?

edit: check out the attachment, not even two level five spells of decent damage, cooldown and mana usage kills them. Together this is 615 mana for these three spells, you could always do a bit of gambling to throw in soulkeeper or vampirism but as you know these spells are resisted a lot.

[e30G]

49.

Ten character limit.

[Aries202]

Never did, and never will use SM for training, boring and slow. Less exp per minute etc etc. Sm locks dont bother me, there the easiest to kill, But sm conjurs are a pain, I really dont care if Sm is nerfed or not, but the equal cooldown/duration should change, Most buffs for other classes arent like that anymore.

[ieti]

When i grinded in high levels 40+ on efe beach i was several times with dami_pl. I was with sm setup + summon, he have classic lock grind setup. I have to say lock grinded with same or better speed than me.

Another example me again with sm + summon - pornstar with mental + summon. Again same or better grind speed for non sm mage.

The only advantage of SM is that it is more lazy way to grind. You just need to rebuff click and kill mobs.