So, here was the change note from the October 2018 patch: - Wizard - Changed ranks 19-23 of Mana Burn to deal direct damage rather than percentage based damage and fixed an error that prevented the ability's debuff from blocking additional Mana Burn spells from landing. Well, I've now tested using 4 wizards...one with MB at 23, one at 20, one at 19, and one at 18....using a combat dummy in the guild hall. Here's what I found. If any MB buff is on a mob, all versions of Mana Burn will bounce. It does not matter if the MB buff is lower or higher than the new one trying to land...it just gives you a system message and will not let you press the button. ***Important Note: While ranks 19-23 leave a buff on the mob that will add damage to the next 500 casts for 2 minutes, the 18 and lower ranks will leave a buff on the mob for 1 minute. This 1 minute buff will also block all other versions of Mana Burn, even the ones that add damage. So if you have an open or alt raid, please make sure that your wizards only cast MB at ranks 19 or higher...if at all... Next question you might have is, can we increase the amount of damage our Mana Burn does? YES YOU CAN! If you cast rank 19-23, you will receive (absolutely free) your spell damage divided by 3 added to the big nuke. So if you have 1800 spell damage and max (23) Mana Burn, you will see a whopping 2,800,600 damage. Ranks 18 and under do not seem to be affect by your spell damage number...just the listed amount from aa. As far as other adps, I tried with a druid, enchanter, bard and ranger's adps firing and still got the same result as without. If there is something else you think I didn't test, please feel free to let me know.
I transferred over to a wizard, so I am still semi new to the higher levels of the class. 2.8 million is not bad, how does manaburn compare with shadowknights free 3.4 million harm touch? It seems weird to me a tanks free ability does more damage, not calling for nerfs, if anything raise up manaburn higher. Pretty sure harm touch is not blocked by other harm touches also. Maybe someone who has played the class longer can give some insight.
Later ranks of mana burn have a component that increases the damage of spells that land on a target. It's a pretty large number too, expecting 500 hits within two minutes, so it's designed for raid targets. Equal ranks considered, mana burn has higher damage potential than harm touch, at 13 million vs. about 7.6-10.3 million at their highest ranks, respectively. (The higher number for harm touch is with first spire running, though I'm sure there are other ways to make it hit even harder.) But it's far from a significant difference. That 2.7 million gap can be closed in a negligible instant with a raid force. What are the expectations of mana burn? Reading through the various opinions, it sounds like mana burn is expected to be the largest nuke and should be killing things instantly. To me, mana burn doesn't completely seem like that kind of desperation ability, whereas harm touch always has been. I can see how character-wise it is expected that wizards, being the premier DD class, is expected to have a large DD that surpasses all other classes' by far. But the class has also been shifting toward a minor DD support role, whereas shadow knights have always been a selfish class, which they inherit from necromancers. Likewise, shadow knights make up a small portion of raid forces, whereas there can usually never be enough wizards. When you try to compare mana burn vs. harm touch, it's clear that the two have different contexts. Yet it doesn't seem like the damage amounts are adjusted for the different contexts, where group mobs have maybe a few million HPs and raid targets maybe have billions of HPs (I guess. I'm not really sure here). But then again, you aren't expected to take down raid targets in under 30 seconds like you are group targets either. I'm torn since I play both classes. I guess I do wish mana burn could hit harder, but it's because I'm no longer a raiding wizard and the spell is pretty useless to me. Wizards can easily make up that 2.8 million damage in a few regular spell casts. Maybe the restrictions are in place because wizards can continue to cast DDs of significant damage, while shadow knights just have that one big one. Or maybe mana burn is a desperation move, but more in the sense of making use of extra mana that would go to waste rather than trying to kill the target before it overwhelms you. I dunno, I'd like to hear from those with more insight too. I'm just kind of rambling and questioning myself here.
Mana Burn is by far the worst return for resource (hp/mana/end) in the game. I cannot think of anything that comes close. With full adps, Ethereals can even surpass the damage from MB (because except for spelldamage/3, nothing modifies the number). Unless you are a raiding wizard, I would put gaining this below any of the focuses for spells that you might even think about using. I've got parses with modified 5M+ harm touches...(sheesh...I'm even more disappointed now) That said, it IS useful in the raid game (not huge, but a positive) and perhaps the right named with the right group (for the wizard who can take a 70k mana hit). I don't want to speak for Kizant, but I think he's mainly referring to the fact that the current state of MB means you cannot waste either the front nuke or the 500 charges now which means you can attempt it without fear. At various times through its current incarnation, that has not always been the case. Mana Burn in its current form should have the mana cost removed and be an every 36 minute big nuke/adps for wizards. Nothing would be impacted. No one would main change or add wizards because of this change. But it would fit the class and make the aas spent worthwhile. If they want to add a mana to damage conversion, make it a straight 1 for 1 aa. Spend 1 mana for 1 point of damage. Here's the twist, make the number go high. So at max level, have a 50k mana cost, but a 50k base nuke...that is modifiable with all the adps stuff. Which gives wizards there BIG BANG but gives it a real cost. (...and the number of wizards in a raid should always be governed by druid and chanter access...oh, and if you get a bard too...so, so good...)
I find myself often try to find some rationale for this. It's such a low return for the resource. It has a long cooldown. The damage is produces is easily reproduced through normal spell casts. Maybe the key is in the name "mana burn." Maybe the point of it is to dump the mana that would've otherwise gone to waste say, if a target were to die sooner than you could use your remaining 70k+ mana. I do much prefer your idea though. I totally would main change for a 50k-based nuke.
Yeah, I just meant it's pretty good as far as how stacking with other mana burns work and whether you lose mana or not, etc. The ability itself is OK at best. It was completely useless for many years and now it at least has some limited use so I won't say it's terrible or anything. The damage really should be higher. I always thought you should at least be able to 1-shot a trash mob in a low tier zone with it. You could originally but then Mana Burn was only 'good' the first few months it existed.
I remember it being used in bad situations back in the, to reduce the number of adds fast. Was only used a few times pr evening in a group setting, but always with an aweinspiring effect in the team, when a giant would fold over and die...
This has always been the problem with manaburn. If you remove the manacost, it's not really *manaburn*, just a large nuke on a long recast timer. (Which realistically is fine, but doesn't quite fit the spirit of the ability and is something they seem dead set against doing for god knows what reason). If you make it do the actual damage it should for the mana it uses, it would be gamebreakingly powerful. At the time Dzarn finally upgraded it after the previous AA dev let it languish for a decade, a Wizard could do approximately 50 million or more damage (on a burn) for the amount of mana it used. There was no way he would give a class a 50 million damage nuke, so the idea was floated that it give only a few million damage directly and the remaining would come from adps. The thought process was that other people wouldn't complain that the big bad Wizards were the best class on the parse because the nature of the adps would boost *everyone's* dps and thus there would be nothing to complain about. That was a wee bit...naive. Dzarn was still new-ish and not yet jaded and didn't foresee that people in this game will about anything and everything. Thus it was nerfed a few times, most notably the adps portion changed not to crit which cut the overall damage by almost 75%.
This thinking is the reason stuff is unbalanced in the modern game. Mana Burn hasn't been like that in such a long time. Paladins have the same issue with Slay Undead and I'm sure there are some other examples of long time class abilities that have stood neglected/underpowered because people have long memories, but no sense of passage of time. The time to be an old fart is after the game has stopped updating...then you can fondly remember killing giants with Mana Burn 15 years ago. Until then, keep your head in the present and actually look at what things are doing when recommending new things and commenting on current.
Apologies, it was not meant as a recmmendation, I really hope no one would take recommendations from me on wizards, or any other classes than mages (and even on that class, just barely). I would assume that it was obviously old-fart’s-chit-chat not to be taken seriously in any form, other than a fond memmory.
The golems in PoFear would like their Death Touch renamed... I don't disagree with anything you stated. Past facts are facts. And there are at least 5 other things I would focus on wizards now before even considering adjusting Mana Burn now that it is at least in a stable state. (#1 on the list for me - spell consolidation). But the fact is that the current model for Mana Burn is pretty pointless. Let's make that a "free" once every 36 minute ability and put it to bed. And then let's see about getting an actual big bang directly tied to mana use...either the devs are going to be interested or not. But we stop trying to fix something that's been shattered into pieces and is now duct taped to death. "free" = negligible cost...70k is not that
No apologies necessary. My tone was harsher towards you that intended and you got caught in frustration AE. You have nothing to do with the current state of Mana Burn and it's nice you have a good EQ memory with it. I do think that ancedotes/memories matter far more than intended on these boards...and the devs do read them. You can tell by their language and what they focus on when asked questions about updating/changing things. We're human.
The anecdotes/memories are important because this game is too complicated for a single person, even the developers, to remember all the reasons why something was done. It's doubtful they save large amounts of notes on every little detail. Plus Mana Burn is a good example of a long dead ability that's been revitalized so you may not want to just give up because something isn't useful for a few years. It seems to me that having the debuff prevent us from spamming Mana Burn on a single target solves the main problem with balancing the ability. So, they should be open to a modest improvement in the nuke damage.
