Wizards: I see none, what's the scoop?

Discussion in 'Casters' started by Xerzist, Aug 19, 2020.

  1. Xerzist Augur

    It's pretty rare that I see them nowadays.

    Is their DPS no longer relevant in ToV? I considered rolling one, but if a druid will out parse me, I am not keen. Let me know your thoughts.
    Ahbed likes this.
  2. Cicelee Augur

    The perception of the wizard class is that they are being over shadowed by other classes in the burst DPS mode, which is where wizards should excel. Couple that with little to no raid utility, and being out parsed by non DPS classes, and you start to get the idea of why wizards are not coming out in great numbers...
    Banwiz, Maedhros, Andarriel and 7 others like this.
  3. StiTch.ed Journeyman

    Also, IMO they dull as hell to play compared to most other classes.
  4. Ezbro Elder

    I got outparsed sometimes by a druid on raids (amongst the others). He might have been great and me lacking, but I tried my very best too. He could also heal the group at the same time, lol. I changed mains.
    Just saw a longtime wizard buddy in the guild had changed to a different main too. 1 active wizard left in the guild now. I cannot say 100% why that is, but I believe that with little else to do than pure dps for a wizard, it's not fun that others are doing the same dps or better, and can do so much more!

    Sad part is, I want to play wizard, because it's my second oldest character and I have played him so much. I just can't justify switching mains again back to him. Less dps and less utility. Should nostalgia be the only reason to wizard?
    Leerah likes this.
  5. Xerzist Augur


    Well, early on when porting mattered - wizards served an alternative niche. But now that isn't something that can honestly be called a staple of the class. Yeah, it's nice to have ports, but it isn't required. I don't know what other utility wizards have. Maybe they need a mass raid evac for when hits the fan. That may be cool utility. Or a mass teleport ability, I can think of lots of things.

    That being said, you certainly should not be getting out-parsed by druids, although from my understanding, they are abusing a specific ability which allows the massive damage. What is your comparison to other DPS classes besides druids? Such as monk, rogue, zerker?
  6. Andarriel Everquest player since 2000

    With aa dps up there good but when not so much. my wizard got replaced with my ranger lol. Well that and i got tired of all the summoning mobs on my wizard. They make awesome porters though. wiz is my main trader and my ranger is usually binded in the baz so comes in handy. I think they need to give wizards some loving i mean there pure dps and they should be higher up.

    Andarriel
  7. Ezbro Elder

    Well my dear Xerzist, one can always debate gear and skill and the different encounters. If you want to be at or near the top at any parse, go with a different class than wizard :mad:
  8. Skuz I am become Wrath, the Destroyer of Worlds.

    I think part of the problem is there never really was any concept of a "DPS Hierarchy" within the class-design, players always had the opinion one should exist though & strongly held convictions of what it should look like & a whole series of justifications for the way that looked.

    Druids do put out some serious numbers but Wizards only averaging close to what they do while not having the debuffs, healing etc that Druids do does leave them looking under-developed so I can understand why Wizards feel neglected, Enchanters can if played really well also put out really good damage numbers too & we all know about the Necromancer power-game atm (though they are likely to see rebalancing at some point even after the epic changes).

    I still don't think the devs are all that bothered about a relative dps hierarchy, there are good arguments why that is but without one to underpin class changes the devs do gradually lose sight of where the classes stand in relation to each other and how that affects the players of those classes, Wizard has long had a problem of retaining players despite some mechanics on raids requiring some good wizards the class has seen their power relative to other ranged dps atrophy for a long time.

    Right after the Necromancer DoT revamp has been done and the class balanced I think Wizards should get looked at in more depth so that they can bring more to the table than they do right now.
  9. Ezbro Elder

    So maybe 3 different issues.
    1. DPS too low and definitely not sustainable. Raids are long now, making us even worse. Mana goes bye bye fast. Can cast cheaper spells, but dps goes away.
    2. "Dull as hell to play" as per above quote. Debatable, but the variety of spells is at least NOT there.
    3. Could use something to bring to the group other than only DPS.

    If all else fails for the devs, just upping the DPS alone, above hybrids, would give more basic dps-desirability, in group, in raid and will increase the incentive for a player to stick with wizard.

    Can we do a quick opinion about the spell lines too? We have so many spells that we dont use.
    Rain spells. Incredibly weak, could be very much fun to try to fit in if they were powerful. They even crit less than other spells. Why?
    Stun spells, who uses these? If a mob needs stun, it's probably resistant. Mobs cast instantly, can't interrupt anyway. Stun spells isnt needed in the current game.
    Cold spells. So many, and all are weaker than fire. Why? Useless fillers and/or situational.
    Low cost low damage fire spells (also applies to frost spells). Am I supposed to go to low dps spells when low on mana? Why? I will always want to nuke my best nukes.
    Thricewoven Radiance type magic nukes. Random proc chance to increase 1 spell? Why? No one uses this.
    Other magic spells. Many of them. Fire is better. We use the best claw spell (fire) which boost fire spells better. The good magic instacast nuke has a rooting the wizard penalty. Way to go for making it fun.
    Port spells. Cannot port to all zones, only 1-2 in every expansion. Why not? I know we never have, just an idea. We have so few that players always transport themselves with many different means and clickies. They are simply not used to being helped by a wizard because we can only port to a few locations.

    So now we can revisit the "no fun". part. Tons of spells you never use. The spells you "must" use does not make you that much of a competitive DPS-class even if you are a PURE dps class. This is sad.
    Banwiz, Senu and Ulrin like this.
  10. Mookus Augur

    I'm kinda done explaining all the ways the devs fail and suck...… they suck they fail.
  11. Jhenna_BB Proudly Prestigious Pointed Purveyor of Pincusions

    People share this kind of frustration at times - I promise you non-constructive posts like this cause entire threads to become ignored.

    Many of us want to see Wizards receive above all else elite burst - they really should be sitting on the throne already. Who knows what's coming in store for the class in Beta later this year. There's been a few insightful, well spoken threads in this sub-forum since ToV release. Here's to holding out hope for our dress wearing finger wigglers.
  12. Mookus Augur

    Yeah ive tried to remain positive and constructive for years... where that's gotten me is where im at now.
  13. Mookus Augur

    Btw, the only time I can recall a dev moving the balance needle for wizards was Prathun long ago when he introduced instant spells and harvests and corrected aggro and more. He's gone.
  14. kizant Augur

    Dzarn has made good changes the last few years. It just hasn't been enough to keep up with other classes. And that's especially true in regard to the DoT revamp but also true for the type of raid content that we have now.

    Plus sometimes the issue is made worse by fixing problems with the game. For example, if they ever do fix pet lag on raids, it may help us a little from having less spell casting lag, but overall it'll help those pet classes out a lot and wizards will fall further behind.
  15. Metanis Bad Company

    I think they made Wiz too dependent on other classes to peak their DPS. But any change they make now will simply unbalance the entire hierarchy. It would be fun to see a new version of Manaburn that consumes every raid Priest's mana pool but delivers God-like burst DPS!
  16. kizant Augur

    I'm pretty sure they think mana burn does god like bursts right now. That's why it's on such a long 30 minute timer...
    Lannin, FubarEQ and Skuz like this.
  17. Waitwhat Elder

    I'd like a 3-4 million damage normal nuke! Why not? Cast time, aggro and manacost can be tuned. I go boooom, must manage my own aggro and mana, and have fun doing that.It must not however be lower dps than a different rotation-style. Different style of wizards; some go big slower nukes, have to stand still to land them, and maybe others cast many small to medium pokes at the mob and more mobile, like today. Would be cool for diversity of playstyles.
    Vumad and Black like this.
  18. Cragzop Cranky Wizard

    Until the developers figure out where they want direct damage to fall in the melee-dot-dd damage spectrum first, I figure it will just continue to be general bumps in what we already have. Sometimes we'll get lucky (ie ToV claw damage boosts ... making a great spell our best spell) and sometimes it will be stuff that really doesn't matter in the grand scheme (ie ToV manaburn boost ... it's better ... you'll cast it, especially on raids ... but it's not even making the top 100 hits in a raid cycle ... and still 80k mana) ... and most of the time, it will be upgrades that you honestly cannot design a scenario where it makes sense to use.

    Wizards being the class dependent on direct damage the most feel the most pain from this lack of focus for dd, but mages and other classes feel the pain as well. Lack of effort making old restrictions mesh in current design have really hurt us. We (with druids and mages) got twincast first and the devs were so scared that they imposed all these restrictions on tc for us, which are still with us today. Meanwhile necros now base twincast dots at a better rate than wizards twin dds (7% vs 5%) with fewer restrictions. Look at classes with dds and dots ... the aa crit damage boost to dots is higher than dds ... that's just designing without having a big picture. DD AEs have also gotten progressively worse over the years.

    I do it because it's best for my raid force, but I hate that we've become basically proc street walkers, filling ourselves with every possible proc we can. 35-40% of damage is from procs on a raid cycle. No other class comes anywhere near that percentage. The game keeps reinforcing to wizards the idea that what you cast doesn't matter ... it's just how much you cast. That's what makes the class boring/dull/disappointing. I spend time and effort making the best possible rotation, adps plan, use of AEs ... and my event parse matters on chanter's dissident procs and how much a druid aura is resisted.

    What disappoints me most is that some (most? all?) developers actively play on Live and it's not like this is a big secret or needs to be teased out. It may be simply that over the lifespan of the game, the devs feel wizards are great in a lot of eras and the downswing now is just part of the life cycle of the game. But it's been a long downswing now...
    Vumad, Lannin and Micaiah like this.
  19. Cicelee Augur

    If a wizard could beat out every other class on Griklor, would that be acceptable as a start?

    Wizards should not do well on long raids, but a short one like Griklor they should shine. The problem is other classes do better on short parses (which the wizard should excel but does not), and that leaves the class feeling very underappreciated and left out. IMHO
    Maedhros, Ulrin, Lannin and 2 others like this.
  20. Ezbro Elder



    You have some nerve coming into a thread filled with frustration, coming off as a random thoughtless poster with your own personal dogma on what wizards should or should not do on raids. I'd like to counter that wizards obviously should perform equally well on short or long fights, but that the developers have let their attention slip for the wizard class for a time. Just because this flaw exists today does not mean that it is set in stone.
    Banwiz likes this.