I remember awhile back a developer saying that part of the lag/stress on servers was the amount of procs players had, resulting in a lot of lines per spell cast or what have you. With the introduction of proc augments in both TBL and TOV, players are now using a lot more proc augs. As a magician, eventually I am going to have- Proc built in on my weapon Two proc augs in weapon Proc aug in range 4-6 procs in the evolving items (including earring) And this does not even include the COTF belt, which I don't use but probably should because that proc > Threads of Potential or whatever it is called I thought of a possible solution of being able to combine all of your proc augments into one "super proc augment", but that could just mean a player could loot the same proc augment and continually combine it into the super augment. Not intending for that to happen for obvious reasons. I don't have a solution, but I am curious as to the why part of this. Why are proc augments continually being added in game, knowing the stress and lag it creates? And is there a solution if it is indeed an issue?
Don’t forget all the potential AA proc abilities and then enchanter and Druid auras. There’s a ton of traffic each spell cast.
It is too late and doesn’t make sense to do it at this point, but I think it would be cool if you had a separate augment listing and each item you equip adds to our deletes from that augment set. Essentially, equipping an item would increase or decrease the number of augments you can use so that the augments are tied to the character and not necessarily the specific items. Would save so much comparison / swapping / nightmares. We’re too invested in the current direction to change though.
I wonder if it wouldn't help if there was a way to turn off the links being generated for spells and procs.
That would only change the amount of text being reported to your logs, which you can already filter out. It wouldn’t change the actual number of spells the server has to process.
Making one big super aug would actually change class balance a bit based on that new itemization. Wizards rely on proc frequency more than total proc damage (more than other casters do) based on how Fury of the Gods works so it would basically nerf our burn. Also, a bit more to the point of the OP, I don't speak for the devs but I think they added so many new proc augs attached to *achievements* because they make very good carrots. They may add a ton of lag but a ton of players will go through the content to get more procs. A lot of people wouldn't bother with getting all the achievements if there wasn't something nice there.
Procs are one of the best ways items can be meaningful for DPS, especially casters. They're more impactful than stats, and you can grow the number of procs infinitely now that you can have multiple proc off of a swing or spell cast, lag notwithstanding. The other option for casters is adding additional foci like Eyes of Life and Decay, which don't stack and therefore cannot be rewarded to players repeatedly. That said, I think the current number is unhealthy just from a complexity standpoint, let alone with respect to lag. When I cast a spell in a raid, the following things can proc (well, I don't have the new 18/19's yet, but I will): Restless Focus, Type 19 Casting Fire, Type 18 Casting Fire, Type 19 Casting Ice, Type 18 Casting Ice, Type 7/8 non-weap TS aug proc aug, Range proc aug, Weapon proc, Weapon proc aug 1, Weapon proc aug 2, Shawl proc, MR Aura, Icerend Aura, Enchanter Dissident if it's on, Arcane Symphony, Elemental Form Fire, Elemental Form Air, and Elemental Form Earth. Some of my individual spells have additional procs: Steel Vengeance on Shock spells, Conjurer's Synergy on RS, Theft of Essence on Of Many, Chaotic Inferno has a bunch of procs, etc.. Some of the synergies (e.g. Evoker's Synergy) also have procs, and are procs themselves for their respective classes. Nearly all spell procs get a second chance to proc on a Twincast, so during a burn that's nearly 2x as many procs. I also have the following melee procs: Type 19 Assaulting Magic, Type 18 Assaulting Magic, Type 19 Assaulting Ice, Type 18 Assaulting Ice, Weapon Melee Proc, Storm Blade Strike, Arcane Symphony, Mana Infusion, Omorden's Song of Suffering, Night's Endless Terror, Jann's Light, Dissident Roar if I have a Shaman, and Allied Elemental Strike if my Spire is running. I wouldn't be surprised if there are some I've forgotten. This quantity of procs is not unique to Magicians, and many other classes have more procs. Procs aren't inherently evil; some like Synergy and Chaotic's procs add a lot of depth to the class. Some large procs can also make for more interesting spell selection; their constraints can change the relative values of spells. For example, it's conceivable that Shock could be better than our Magic bolt because of the Steel Vengeance proc, or that a proc that isn't normalized for cast time could favor instant cast spells. I think if those procs are big enough they add value. I don't think having so many procs with comparable proc rates and functionality is good for lag or enhances playing the game, though. I think a good solution would be to find a better way for items to augment existing spell casts/melee swings/heals directly, rather than proccing additional spell casts. Same thing with nuke pots. In a lot of cases, the value of procs could be replaced, for example for casters, by big Spell Damage values. If they wanted to model procs more closely, a new stat can be created that follows the exact formula for sympathetic procs, and adds a bit more crittable damage than the proc base damage to account for procs gaining spell damage and some other specific effects. The exception to this, as Renotaki pointed out, is that some classes can augment procs in some way, so just deleting them would require rebalancing. Fury of the Gods is a prime example, as are the various force proc discs many melee/hybrids have. Rolling procs into some kind of flat damage addition also diminishes the value of many of the melee AA lines to augment spell casting; the only real reason to have those is to augment procs. I don't think it'd be an easy fix, but I do think it would benefit the game from both a lag standpoint and a complexity standpoint to implement a more straightforward way to augment damage that isn't so expensive serverside.
Sancus, that’s a great post and highlights how many layers of procs there exist in this game. It’d be a difficult task, and would require in depth assessment of AAs, spells, gear, and augments. Procs have evolved to a point, where they’re the fulcrum of gameplay balance.
With how expensive it seems the pathing generation they (NPC's) require to get to mobs/players, they probably cause a decent amount too when there is a lot
Yes yes, consolidate all those swarm let's into a single super swarm pet. I don't even care if it's a little OP, just as long as I don't have to look at so many of them.
Or just delete them. That 1k (or less) dps you get from them causes you to lose more than that from lag.
You forgot Twinproc. And also any type of defensive proc, which are the worst kind due to the way the game is coded. Ever look at the spell cast window on a tank with a slow belt? That thing procs 3-4 times per combat round.
I like that there are some Proc buffs that are guaranteed chances to fire like the enchanter/druid auras, and there are some that have a chance to Proc to augment DPS. But it definitely has gotten a bit out of hand. Similar to how it was discovered that the AAs that increased DoT ticks was causing problems, they went back and just increased the base value of DoTs by what an additional tick or two would’ve provided. I think it would make sense to convert some, but not all, Proc focuses to two different things. Instead of a sympathetic DD Proc maybe a 500-1000 Spell Damage/Heal Amount/Clairvoyance modifier instead. Instead of a sympathetic DD Proc maybe a 1% base value stackable modifier. Or perhaps a 2% base value stackable modifier for specific resists. Or 1-2% mana preservation that stacks with all. I’ve long felt that the spell damage, heal amount and clairvoyance values on items are not given enough developer attention. This is one example of how paying more attention to these values could remove the need for some sympathetic procs on items and Augs. Firstly I’d like to see Heroic Wisdom add Heal Amount and Clairvoyance, and Heroic Intelligence add Spell Damage and Clairvoyance. Short of this, I’d like to see certain items offer much larger chunks of Heal Amount, Spell Damage and Clairvoyance. Other classes Heroics directly impact their primary role whether it be tanking or DPS. However casters and priests their heroics just increase their mana pool/Regen. Which doesn’t impact their primary role it may extend their stamina in doing their primary role, but it’s not increasing the amount their heals or damage spells do. Secondly I’d like to see AA lines to amplify the effect of these modifiers. AA lines to add either a flat multiplier or a chance to apply a multiplier to your Heal Amount or Spell Damage stat. For example either you get a base 2x multiplier to your Spell Damage and Heal Amount values or 25% of your casts will apply a multiplier of 5 to your Spell Damage and Heal Amount when assessing final spell value. Another AA line to increase the chance for Clairvoyance to trigger and recover you mana. For far too long this clairvoyance stat has been considered useless due to how infrequently it fires. Replace sympathetic damage procs with large chunks of Spell Damage Replace sympathetic remote heal procs with large chunks of Heal Amount Replace sympathetic alleviation procs with large chunks of Clairvoyance In summary I like all the things Sancus said.
Considering a magician's highest DPS spell relies solely on how many pets are on the mob, yes we all would be a bit perturbed if swarm pets just got eliminated. There is a better way to make both sides happy.
There can be a happy medium. There are way too many swarm pets, many of which are short duration but people use them at the same time. Just to give an example (not to pick on bards) - Song of Stone summons nine swarm pets. Six Bards in the raid casting that during a burn is 54 swarm pets alone. The requirements on Of Many are 15. The problem for Of Many is the quantity of pets alive in a raid varies significantly because most of the swarm pets come from short duration, long reuse AA. People also aren't very diligent about using /pet swarm on adds. Deleting all swarm pets is silly, but it makes a lot of sense to consolidate or remove the weak ones that got farmed out to many classes. I think a fair compromise to account for Of Many would be to add a decent swarm pet to Force of Elements that lasts ~25 seconds when accounting for Extended Swarm. It doesn't have to be amazing, just something that could live through raid AEs/ramp and does a bit of DPS. That way the peak number of swarm pets could be reduced dramatically, but the number that a raid with an appropriate number of Mages/other pet classes can sustain would increase slightly, enough to keep Of Many viable.
