I had thought that since these were AA abilities that they wouldn't cost any mana. But I was noticing my mana going down in fights when using them in between other nukes, so I tested it and Force of Will is costing 1214 mana, as are Force of Flame and Force of Ice. I looked it up on ZAM - http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/spell.html?spell=37017 (I'm level 101 and am casting Force of Will XV). It does list a mana cost for each level of the ability, but I was surprised that there was a mana cost.
They didn't cost mana originally, nor were they intended to cost mana originally. They were changed a year or so ago because DBG in their infinite wisdom couldn't understand the difference between Bard group mana regen being broken and Wizards mana usage being broken. Only one of those things was true, and it wasn't the second one. They fixed the real issue: Bard group mana regen being stupidly high, but still hit Wizards for no reason because they thought they didn't use enough mana.
Slightly off topic, but I would really appreciate it, if they let gear focus affect forces, at the very least spell-range-focus. Currently, if I want to do my best damage I need to move so close to the target that I can't take advantage of the spell-range-focus, that I have. It would give me more flexibility in raid-positioning during burns...
I thought it was so that force would be affected by buffs like Frenzied Devastation, Arcane Destruction, Arcane Fury, Twincast...
You thought that? Before you checked and found out that it doesn't do that because they remain level 254?
What are you talking about? The only one of those I mentioned that has a max level limit is twincast, but it only becomes ineffective at >=255. And where are you seeing that force is a level 254 cast anyhow?
For a short while that was the case. When they first added a mana cost they were actually affected by those AA-abilities, that annoyed a lot of wizards since they couldn't use forces without using up counters. Those counters were better spend on etherals(or other high-damage nukes) rather than the small force nukes, making force-nukes ineffective in most burn scenarios. They changed that in the following patch, such that they were not affected by AA-abilities at all, but they still used mana... Now we can at least use them on burns without "wasting" counters, provided that we got the mana for it. The mana consumption is still an unneeded nerf imho.
AA Abilities, like forces, are level 254 which does prevent worn foci, like duration extension, from affecting them. However, forces are additionally flagged as not focusable, which was done to prevent them from using charges of ITC/FD/AD/etc. FWIW: [41729/16708] Force of Will XVIII Classes: WIZ/254 Skill: Evocation Mana: 1750 Target: Single Range: 250' Resist: Magic -25 Reflectable: No Trigger Spell DS: No Focusable: No Casting: 0.5s 1: Decrease Current HP by 15985 Text: You strike by force of will!
Ok a few quick questions. 1. Wiz force lines arent affected by any AA now, or just by ones that use counters? 2. Does twincast (spell version) work on wiz force lines? 3. Is the mage force of elements AA line in the same situation?
Either way they're still worth using. Just ease up once you see mana starting to be an issue. And if you know it'll be a long fight and you won't be able to use them a lot then time them with your main adps like any other spell.
We didn't "let" them get away with anything. The devs do as they want, and any illusion that players actually have a say in the matter is just that: an illusion.
You can probably find threads on it if you search. It made most of us very unhappy. Which made the devs reevaluate everthing, forcing them to do their due diligence. They decided that they had made the right decision. This took the greater part of a second.
Yep. A lot of the basic stuff works fine like auspice, IoG, 2nd spire, etc. Without getting into details about SPAs and everything you could just try stuff on my app. Hit the checkbox for AA Force Nukes and add ADPS from the drop down or turn on the different caster synergies. You'll see that mage synergy has no effect for example. I don't test it a lot but I think I got most stuff covered. http://dps.kizant.net/
