Theoretical Sorcery Update

Discussion in 'Gotham City (General Gameplay)' started by Apollonia, May 13, 2021.

  1. Apollonia Dedicated Player

    This came from a conversation about new powersets. It tangented onto how the existing ones could use some love... and here we are. People often see the game's VFX and comment on how dated they are and the game looks. So, I wanted to see how I would approach this problem. I started on Sorcery back in Nov and worked off and on between my own projects.

    Then in a related conversation Panderus posted this:
    Which was the exact conclusion I came to while analyzing them on my own. So, it gave me some motivation to finish.

    This is more a proof of concept than intended to be full concept art — proof that there is room for interesting updates, that meet fan expectations and more closely correlate to the IP; with a little creative thinking.

    Some of these "new" powers didn’t need visuals really. I felt like just a noted description was obvious enough. I created mockups of ones I thought needed visual explanation (mostly the new and reimagined or replaced ones).

    tl;dr Pretty pictures at the bottom for people who don’t have the time to read. Please note these are my rough point form notes. They may seem harsh but it’s just that way for conciseness while I worked. No disrespect is intended. Here’s my process for those interested:

    Overview: Launch power and doesn’t benefit from modern design/development practices. Many powers are named things, and have vague VFX that don’t communicate their function, and recycle VFX between other powers in the set, making the powers difficult to distinguish from each other and unmemorable. Also many powers are duplicated, redundant, or are unappealing and get unused. Why make 24 powers if only 14 ever get used bc they ugly :p The set works but isn’t compelling. Not inspired by an Iconic DC character concept. Looks. feels and plays like a generic fantasy trope magic powerset. There’s no wow factor to the power driving anyone to want to play as the power.

    Good:
    • Visually striking colour palette.
    • OG pet gimmick.

    Bad:
    • Many powers are duplicative, redundant or repetitive.
    • Most powers feel generic, are uninteresting, aren’t what a fan expects from this power vs the IP. Thematically it has no connection to the IP.
    • several powers use very underwhelming concepts & VFX
    • It’s a generic fantasy magic power not based on iconic DC characters’ abilities, despite having lots of iconic options to draw inspiration from.
    • Thematically it has lots of potential as a support powerset to synergize with most other powersets, but its potential isn’t being used.

    Plan:
    • Choose iconic characters to draw inspiration from.
    • Identify powers that are unappealing, redundant or otherwise need to be replaced or updated.
    • Update key powers to better fit the source material thematically.
    • Update VFX to support iconic and thematic changes mentioned above.
    • Include types of abilities players and fans of the genre expect from a DC Comics “magical” power.
    • Include new powers to setup PIs with other powersets.

    Solutions:
    • Consider graphic pollution and attempt minimal intrusive visuals where possible.
    • Include a common visual element to relate the powers in the set but don't reuse VFX between powers.
    • Iconic Inspirations -> Constantine, Zatanna, Circe, Dr Fate, Tala, Felix Faust, Mordru
    • Add, revamp, and refresh key powers as noted below.

    Scrap (and replace with totally new powers):

    1) Arbiter of Destiny (SC). Transform into ugly giant bat. BAD Revamp / replace power.
    2) Baleful Transmogrification. (SC) ugly mutant dogs. BAD Revamp / replace power.
    3) Final Ruin beam. Redundant w. Vengeance. BAD Revamp / replace power
    4) Karmic Backlash. AoE knockback. duplicate small CoP circle. BAD Revamp / replace power.
    5) Shard of Life. blasts target with CoP circle vfx. drops rock. BAD Revamp / replace power.
    6) Soul Barrage. barrage of soul projectiles at your enemies. Duplicate of Soul Bolt. BAD Revamp / replace power.
    7) Offering. Restores Power over time to your pets. BAD Revamp / replace power.
    8) Condemn blasts target looks like WoD vfx BAD Revamp / replace power.

    NEW Powers:

    1) Golemancy (SC) Replaces AoD. Summon a Golem. (Update VFX) Use giant Constantine Golem from artifact mission.
    2) Necromancy (SC) (Replaces BT). Raise a group of spirits to fight for you. (New VFX)
    3) Smoke & Mirrors. Inspired by Zatanna. Create illusory copies (that taunt target and drops aggro of caster) of you or a teammate that taunt. (New VFX)
    4) Bind enemy. Wraps target/s in magical chains (or vines) and holds them. Sets up crushing PI (New VFX)
    5) Cold wind blow. AoE of cold wind freezes target/s in nearby. Sets up freezing PI. (New VFX). VFX inspired by Avatar.
    6) Djinn’s Breath. Cast magical fire. Sets up burning PI. Tap x3 for “Soul Barrage” functionality. (New VFX)
    7) Occlumancy. Magically hypnotize nearby opponents to fight for you. Hypnotizes enemies or cleanses hypnotized (mind controlled) allies in the area. (New VFX)
    8) Obscure. AoE blinding smoke prevents nearby attackers from attacking for a short time. Smoke disappears while target remains blinded. (New VFX)

    Revamp & Redo (total) powers.
    • Mystic Bolt (was Soul Bolt). blast bolt of energy at your foes. OKAY. (New VFX)
    • Soul Storm. OKAY does not communicate function. Karmic Backlash duplication. Make AOE magic storm. Taps 3x add additional souls to storm. (New VFX)
    • Spirit Ward (was Boon of Souls). Shield you and allies. OKAY (New VFX)
    • Transcendence. (SC). cast a powerful spell of protection. you and group are healed and shielded. OKAY (New VFX)
    • Charmed (was Ritualistic Word). Heal you and up to 3 group members. OKAY (New VFX)
    • Grand Summoning. (SC) Summons all pets to fight simultaneously. BAD. Update: unleashes the demon Nergal to fight for a short time. (New VFX) Note* Nergal is generic Wrath Demon placeholder.
    • Transmutation duplicates COP vfx. Generic magic blast. nothing transmutes. BAD. Update: Inspired by Mordru. Transform your enemies into helpless trees, rocks, etc. (New VFX)
    Refresh (update VFX to fit new set — all powers now start with a circle spell on the hand/s) powers.

    • Hexed (was bad karma) [state] PI. Current FX is too intrusive. (New VFX)
    • CoD/CoP Too intrusive. (New VFX) Circle stays on ground plane. Disappears. Sigils remain with dust and glow floating up.
    • Invocation of Renewal. group heal
    • Karmic Suspension. Lift your enemies into the air, dealing damage while restoring Supercharge. Good.
    • Soul Siphon cone pull. not communicative of function BAD. Change to use eating anim. VFX suck in.
    • Soul Well floating totem GOOD
    • Vengeance beam GOOD. Add finisher (Final Ruin) functionality. Include distinct hit VFX for “finished” targets.
    • Weapon of Destiny hands glow. GOOD.
    • Rejuvenate. instantly heal Health to yourself and the most injured group member. OKAY.
    • guardian, watcher, fury. unattractive+not conceptually neutral. Too many floating Eyes in the game now including the Emerald Eye of Ekron. BAD. (Update VFX) Replace with Will-o-the-Wisp models.
    • Polymorph. target turns into mutant dog. BAD (Update VFX) - change to small pig (Circe)
    Credits:
    Circle Spells & Sigils found online.
    Character art from DCUO.
    Pig was random Google find.
    Soul faces from stock photography.
    Mystic Bolt heavily based on (was losing steam) something found on Pinterest.
    Used a Zatanna pic from a comic for the lotus pose.

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    I'm fully aware this won't appeal to everyone but feel free to offer your thoughts.
    • Like x 23
  2. Beastmaster Well-Known Player

    I actually would really like this concept it gives that magical appeal and flare it so desperately needs, can't say I like the pets designs tbh I think I prefer each to look differently so it easier to identify them, colour swap just seems bland in my opinion but you yourself said it won't appeal to every one. The different runes are really nice though it also gives it that magical feel like your incanting different spells.

    Theoretically this would be a great update visually and aswell as for diversity in animation aspect. Now we come to inevitable part this refresh would be alot work to do for the devs could they probably do it, sure it will take a little bit of time especially if your technicallly adding new animations to already existing assets.

    For me i'm all for this. Whether it be noted by the devs or chimed in on is another matter kinda hope it does really but it seems unlikely but you never know.
    • Like x 2
  3. Kilbane Active Player

    Wow great job putting in the work on these suggestions.
    I don't play my Sorc alot because it's just underwhelming. It doesn't feel very magic like, and the pets are somewhat uninspired and underwhelming. As to your suggestions on specific spells/abilities, I can't really comment in detail since again I don't play my sorc very often.

    Agro dumps in this game aren't super useful though (they can be used to gimmick certain fights). I like the animation concepts, but in game play I don't see it being helpful. Maybe as mirror as a SC that duplicates your abilities for a short time.

    I really like the idea of the different runes effects for the different spell types. I'd like to see the sorc as a pure pet class that would make it pretty unique, but... every MMO I've ever played that has a pet class, it becomes almost universally unbalanced so there is a definite danger in that.

    Not a fan of the dumpling pet model you've proposed but I still appreciate the effort. I do wish Fury looked different, maybe like one of the spirit mobs from Specter alert/area. Or, originally in Greek mythos a "Fury" was essentially a Harpy that'd be ok to as a summoning/binding type theme, but the harpy sound effects would get old quick.

    I feel Guardian is too similar to Brick. In fact, a lot of the ability animations are too similar to Earth now that I think about it. I don't know exactly what kind of model for it, I can't think of a current in-game model to fit the bill for Guardian in my mind.. but it really should be something not gemstone/earth like, more ethereal or magical construct like. Maybe similar to the Legion HQ construct but smaller.. that'd work.

    I always wondered why the golem Constantine summons wasn't a SC. It's awesome, even though it's basically just Guardian super sized.

    Anyway, just wanted to say once again, great effort on your suggestions.
    • Like x 1
  4. Mentaldope40 Dedicated Player

    Amazing work, those Demons you can summon as pets has always been an option I wanted for my villanious Sorcerer, I always felt that we were getting the most generic version on Sorcery just for the sakes of balance issues, Imagine a 1000 SC were you can call Lucifer, Trigon or Etrigan to do one attack and just bounce lol.

    also speaking of Tala, I do think Tala needs more content, shes pretty underated and powerful imo, shes like the Creepy Zatanna or something.
    • Like x 1
  5. Kuno Loyal Player

    Amazing job, so well done and I'm completely agree with you.
    I love sorcery but the VFX was not updated like the elementals (fire, ice) back then when they upgraded the visuals of those powers.
    It really shows the age. And I agree the runes is the way to go for the theme of the powerset.
    Those pics with the powers even the pets, it would look amazing, I'm all for this. I hope a devs notices this and they can take some notes.
    Thanks Apollonia.
    • Like x 1
  6. Magnificent Loyal Player

    That and the OP's revamp touches on something I've advocated for a while now: power reskin packages we could purchase with SC. Eventually I would like to see a system where we could mix and match skins from different packages. This would give each player far more customization options within their powersets while also making gobs of money for DI.

    That said, I don't want to derail this thread any further after all the hard work Ap put into it. I hope the Devs take a long, hard look at this.
    • Like x 3
  7. Elusian Crowd Control

    I love Arbiter. Unique. No scrap!
    Final Ruin is not redundant, its the powersets finisher ability. No scrap!
    Shard of Life had a good revamp. The iteration before was horrible. No scrap!
    For single target Condemn offers a unique approach. No scrap!


    Sorcery has one major issue and thats projectile attacks. The base numbers for the damage is based of the fact they would always hit the target which they dont. On my alt its disgusting to see how even the own powers can knock up targets which will make the projectiles to miss in any follow up attack. The own powerset is sabotaging its damage because of a horrible implementation of projectiles that is over 10 years pretty much unadressed.
    • Like x 4
  8. Dark Soldier Dedicated Player

    I like
    • Like x 1
  9. DCUO Post Loyal Player

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    • Like x 1
  10. Wildcat Committed Player

    cool, like the idea

    since PS3 is no longer holding us back, why not?
    • Like x 2
  11. Quantum Rising Committed Player

    Love the updated visual effects except for the Fury, Guardian and Eye changes. Those are fine imho.

    Don't 100% agree with all the power changes though. Also a lot of your changes are pushing sorcery into a pure summoning power set. I have a few armories for my spec toon. One pure summon, one pure spell and one hybrid. They're all pretty competitive but your changes would completely nerf the spell side of sorcery.

    Vengeance and Final Ruin are completely different powers. They look similar but are SUPPOSED to be used in different situations. I would make Final Ruin a bit more bombastic visually.

    Grand summoning- disagree. Changing this to a single summon would completely nerf any source shard users. Instead of buffing 3 summons you only boost one. Major nerf to those that paid to boost their source shard to 200.

    I do like the Nergal idea though. And I had a similar idea a long time ago. Using your name... what I would do is change Transmutation into a Form Change into Nergal (like the Ice supercharge). In Nergal DPS form you auto cast soul well and CoD on use, form change attacks as well as increased crit chance. In healer stance form change would turn you into Lagren, a more angelic version opposite of Nergal. In healer stance you auto cast CoP and soul well again, in addition you gain immunity to control attacks and uninterruptible for the duration of the supercharge. CoD/P and Soul Well in changed form would have higher base values.

    Guardian summon- get rid of it altogether. Haven't thought of what can replace it right now but this summon is pretty useless as a DPS or healer.

    Arbiter- power itself is ok. Graphic is horrible. Would just change this into an aura specific to the sorcery power set. Think the red swirling aura when you get Fury but change it to something special like a silver and gold sparkling helix that swirls around you when arbiter is active.
    • Like x 1
  12. Apollonia Dedicated Player

    Hi everyone,

    Thanks for the replies. Also thanks for being constructive even when you didn't like something you saw. There's a lot of really interesting feedback here.

    I was super tired when I posted and forgot to mention a couple points that weren't in my notes. A big one is the direction I approached this from. I feel the powersets really don't reflect the IP. None of them do really. The launch powers especially. So, we have iconic characters loosely related to all of the powers but it feels shallow. For example, Celestial powers don't look anything like when the Spectre uses his powers but it's supposed to be based on him. Or maybe, you choose a power based on your fav character that uses that power too, but most of the time you can't find any powers in that powerset that your fav character does. Sorcery was a really good example; lots of magic users in DC but the power didn't let you do any of the signature powers of any of those characters. This isn't very fun to me. So, I took time researching character powers to bring those into the set because I really believe players expect to be able to do those things when they sub to DCUO, make a character and choose those powers. I think they're at least somewhat disappointed when they see they can't.

    The other big point is that when I do something like this, I'm working with a sort of head canon of the perfect game. In it, this is a refresh and I replaced some lacking powers, but it could also be part of a powerset style for sorcery. I say this bc in an ideal version of the game, someone could pop on this style and turn off parts they don't like. So, like, if they really liked mutant dogs they could keep that one off but still use the rest. Or a person could keep their vanilla Sorcery while another could have a fancy style like this and both could be happy. So, this is never really supposed to be super rigid. If that makes any sense. :)

    Now to answer some of your points...
    Thank you. Yes, you really tuned into what I was trying to do.

    It's okay about the Wisps too btw. If I'm being honest, I'm not totally married to them. The pets specifically were something bothering me though. Because of their horror/heavy metal aesthetic being so specific it's really hard to do a lot of character concepts with them So, I wanted to go with something neutral in appearance and I knew I wanted something simple and glowy. The glow because they're easier to spot in a crowd. I wasn't being lazy with the recolour though, I just honestly think it's more fun to imagine it's the same pet changing colour depending on their mood/function (that's also a Wisp thing ;)).

    More classic Wisps were what I had in mind, but I remembered the Devs did those amazing Wisps for spring and thought a reskin would be at least an upgrade. :) But of course, mileage will vary ;)

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    To your point; definitely, there's work involved. Panderus touched on it in his replies a few times. I honestly think we all know the game needs it though. In a superhero game costumes, powers and cool moves are the most important things and first things fans will look for and judge the game by.

    Thank you. I feel you. I also have a Sorc character shelved bc she breaks my heart when I use her powers. They're just not fun to me.

    Oh you make an excellent point about the Smoke & Mirrors. You're right. Some people really enjoy powers like that though. Our league leader pops his decoy often and he's a high performance player. Also, I did play with the idea of that power also being a shield. So, damage would distribute across your Illusions and only apply to you when they're all broken. I would enjoy that.

    It's funny about the pets. The game launched with the Spectre instance skulls as Fury. And I agree about the Earth similarities. I do think the game should have a dedicated pet class for players who want it, but I don't think it should be Sorcery or Earth. I always imagined a "Beastmaster" type powerset based on B'Wana Beast and Vixen where you would summon exotic animals to fight alongside you, or in Vixen's case channel their abilities. ;)

    Thank you too. We can bond over Tala. She's so much fun. Her character model really needs some love :p

    Thank you Kuno. After we had that exchange in another thread a few weeks back I was so fired up I went back into doing some of these that night. I knew we'd agree from that chat. :) And I'm really glad everyone is liking the runes or Circle Spells. They were a no-brainer since every magic user in DC and Marvel books uses them these days. :)

    Yes. Dear Zod yes. We've had that talk so many times obv. When I talk about them I describe them as Powerset Styles but, we're talking about the same thing. And it's not a derailment at all. We should be talking about all this stuff. :)

    Sorry. No ugly bats for you! :p
    Final Ruin is the exact same power as Vengeance except when the target is under 35% health. So, that's why it went. You'll see in the notes the functionality was moved to Vengeance. ;) I could of dropped Vengeance instead though. Either way same thing.
    Shard of Life. So dumb. Sorry. hehehe a crystal falls from the sky. It's just so cartoonish like from a Roadrunner episode. Plus it has no connection to the IP. The slot was an easy one to drop in favour of something cooler. Same thing with Condemn.

    You make some excellent points about bugs with Sorcery worth discussing, but the goal of what I did was concept not balance or bugs. My focus is fun, compelling and cool. So I didn't get into any of that stuff. I only made sure any functionality I took out was replaced. Like the Soul Bolt vs Soul Barrage. Tap 1x for a bolt and additional times for more bolts and the "barrage". Gave me back more slots for new powers.

    lol Thanks :)

    Thank you. And Amen :)

    Thank you.
    • Like x 4
  13. Apollonia Dedicated Player

    First, Thank you...
    It's true to some degree. The power use to be divided between casting and summoning but I didn't strictly adhere to this since the distinct trees were done away with. Overall, I made an effort to keep the variety of both though. They'll roughly be equal. To your larger point about viability, any changes to powersets (which are coming down the road) will change people's loadouts. It's just the nature of it.

    Like I mentioned to Elusian above, the 2 powers are effectively the same thing. One is fine both are redundant. I moved the finisher function to Vengeance. I could have easily kept Final Ruin and removed Vengeance instead. End result is the same thing and no functionality is lost.

    This is a fair criticism. It's a balance issue though so not a concern. My focus is on concept. I'm not making any statements about damage amounts and so on. It's implied they'd be tweaked for balance.

    Oh definitely, there's tons of places you could go with it, but I wanted to stay closer to the source material. Nergal is an iconic antagonist demon for John Constantine.

    Thought of this too. Would give back slots.

    I considered it but one of my goals was to reduce graphics pollution.
    • Like x 2
  14. KneelBeforeZodd Dedicated Player

    Really like the ideas. But I like the pets we have right now and although Id like a visual update on them, a enhanced version would be more than enough, I like Fury and Guardian design a lot. Everything else is pretty cool.

    Powers visual update is def on the top 5 issues the game will have to face if it wants to keep going for 10 years. There are mobile games with better animations than some of the OG powers. I really really wish they started working on this soon, even if it takes 2 full years.
    • Like x 1
  15. Apollonia Dedicated Player

    I missed this one last night. sigh

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    • Like x 1
  16. Mentaldope40 Dedicated Player

    I agree with the skins being an option for those who would rather keep og Sorcery, if I had the choice as a villain alt I would go with the Demon Supercharge, since most of our magic Villains or even Heroes are associated with Demons in some way, but we both know Sorcery is op in the comics and should have a bit of what every power has like teleportation, reflect pain etc. But I get it the Developers wanted to make every power to have a grabbing gimmick to it, I just rather a more true source if anything like you said.
    • Like x 1
  17. Isif Committed Player

    These are some great ideas and love the artwork. Sorcery is my main healing power, so I support any love that may get it some well deserved attention. After the revamp it seemed like all the complexity got sucked out of the power.
    • Like x 1
  18. Apollonia Dedicated Player

    Thank you. In an ideal world we'd have a style manager UI and we could have our cake and eat it too. ;) I wouldn't be surprised if they were working on something like this already. :)

    Oh I did consider stuff like teleportation too actually. But again, in my head canon, we have a dedicated teleportation movement mode that would have attacks related to teleporting already. AND it would also have styles for it too... so you could have updated visuals from this set and matching visuals to the teleportation movement. So it's all thematically aligned. ;)

    Thank you. :)
    • Like x 2
  19. Aduzar Light Dedicated Player

  20. Aduzar Light Dedicated Player

    The images of spell, present, make me a lot has a magic that could be adapted for characters like Constantine or see Doctor Fate (more for Constantine I think), it is still magic, but of a "different origin.
    I would love to see this kind of magic come to the game, especially compared to Constantine with its diverse runes.