Make luk mage be a viable contender to lukless

[sewil]

The biggest problem with mages that I see right now is the inherent uselessness of LUK in mages. Just raising 5 INT every level gives you more MP per lvl, more M.att than if you were to match the LUK to the equipments, and you level up faster because you can train earlier at training spots. This is especially apparent in I/L mages. Considering almost all mage equipments in the game require LUK it makes you think that the intended game design is that mages should have luk, but they didn't account for maple weapons early in the game. My proposed change is to basically buff the stats of the LUK-required equipments so that it roughly evens out the playing field. Lukless still gets more MP but they trade it for a bit less of M.att.

Edited February 27, 2021 by sewil

[kiiro]

Just go lukless

[sewil]

5 hours ago, kiiro said:

Just go lukless

I am discussing game design, not the most viable mage build (which I already said is lukless). Wizet implemented mage equips requiring LUK for a reason, and that's why I feel like lukless is an exploit of flawed game design.

[kiiro]

There's not really a reason to change the game design. 1 int = 1m.att that's how the game was made so why would you turn that around so luk mage gets more m.att. The only Ppl who go luk mage for the looks anyways so if you into that just upvote the suggestion that was made so the regular items can be turned into nx items.

[Kradia]

I have mentioned this issue many times and it is a real issue that every single mage item is better off npc'd than used. It would add so much to the market if mage items were viable and there was a demand for it.

The best solution I can think of is stripping away the luk requirement for all mage armor parts, but not their weapons. They'd still require luk to equip a higher level wand/staff, but they would be gaining huge bonuses from the rest of their gear, which they can also use to equip that weapon. This also aligns with the itemization design of archers.

[sewil]

13 hours ago, kiiro said:

There's not really a reason to change the game design. 1 int = 1m.att that's how the game was made so why would you turn that around so luk mage gets more m.att. The only Ppl who go luk mage for the looks anyways so if you into that just upvote the suggestion that was made so the regular items can be turned into nx items.

As per my suggestion my concern is simply that the equips are not good enough to contend with lukless since a naked lukless with a wooden wand can deal roughly the same amount of damage as a fully equipped luk mage. Add on to that the extra MP per level for lukless and it's clear that there is something flawed in the game design. I don't want to change any mechanics concerning INT or LUK and what effects they give, I simply want there to be somewhat of an incentive to take the "intended" or the "RP" route, and I think buffing the equips slightly is the most non-intrusive way to do that. The only thing LUK mages now have over lukless is as you said, the looks, but turning the equips into NX items takes away even that.

Edited February 28, 2021 by sewil

[Bellocringe]

The only mage class that benefits from luk is f/p mage, and that is pretty much solely because of Evil Wings' attack speed and its interaction with explosion. Even for us there is no reason to really go beyond that, and in GMS there was the Poison Mushroom that fulfilled that role for lukless mages. I think Kradia's suggestion is a great one because it acts as both a small buff overall, and more importantly makes mage drops at least a little bit more exciting and valuable than what the npc pays.

[opman]

increase/add more mp bonus to mage luk armor

[sewil]

On 2/28/2021 at 1:07 PM, Kradia said:

I have mentioned this issue many times and it is a real issue that every single mage item is better off npc'd than used. It would add so much to the market if mage items were viable and there was a demand for it.

The best solution I can think of is stripping away the luk requirement for all mage armor parts, but not their weapons. They'd still require luk to equip a higher level wand/staff, but they would be gaining huge bonuses from the rest of their gear, which they can also use to equip that weapon. This also aligns with the itemization design of archers.

This suggestion would certainly work in making the mage equips more viable and more widely used, though I fear it would only help lukless builds since they can now get even more INT without much funding. The equips can also give some LUK for sure, but not enough to equip a high level weapon, and with the existence of maple weapons the benefit is just too great to not go lukless.

5 hours ago, opman said:

increase/add more mp bonus to mage luk armor

I like this suggestion, it's simple and removes the MP imbalance between the two builds, while not adding or removing any m.att.

[Bellocringe]

Another idea I just thought of is to change the luk requirements for weapons. Currently since it is always level+3, there is a net zero gain to adding luk as new weapons are obtained, assuming each weapon increases m.att by the same number over the luk requirement. If the requirement was something like 4/5 level +3 instead, higher level weapons could see some advantage. 

[sewil]

Another solution to this would be to completely remove the MaxMP increase per level up based on your current INT, and instead have a progressive increase like with Warrior (This is also how it is in the later versions of MS). Warriors don't lose any MaxHP because they have less STR so you can't really "mess up" a build like you can with mages, you'll simply deal less dmg or have less accuracy than the funded variants, but in the end if you buy the same equips there'll be no difference. This also removes incentive to restart a mage character that wasn't "perfect" since you'll be able to catch up later on by buying better equips.

Edited March 19, 2021 by sewil