Wand Blast (powerset idea)

Hello, it's me again. I talked with a few SG mates and one of the things we would like to see is a Wand Blast powerset. I mean why not? There are already some animations and wand models in game, and it would give a nice new item based attack set for blasters and defenders. Plus it can be applied to both scifi and magic (even if the suggested names below are more magicy) - in fact it would be nice to see tech wands too.

When I thought about Wand Blast I tried to do something a bit different from regular sets while not going over the board. The set has much common with Archery in that it lacks the secondary effect for most attacks while others are unique to the set. There are three things going for Wand Blast:

• Damage versatility (energy, negative energy primary, with elements showing up)
• Wand charges (ability to draw power from wand)
• Higher base accuracy (as it's a weapon set)

Wand charges are something that the wand replenishes slowly and this can not be improved by any sort of recharge bonus. At most there can be three charges. These are used by two powers: Draw Power and Power Cascade. These are probably something that would require some testing to get right.

The primary idea behind Wand Charges is to offer some way to recover endurance on lower levels which is, at least for me, one of the primary annoyance factors in game. Once you get stamina they are still useful both for endurance, and later for the nuke. I also think they add something that is unique for the wand set.

Here are the powers for the Wand Blast:

• Mystic Bolt (minor ranged energy damage)
• Mystic Blast (moderate ranged energy damage)
• Conflux (moderate targeted AoE cold, electricity and fire damage)
• Draw Power (draw a charge for a damage buff and endurance)
• Hex (extreme ranged negative energy damage and random debuff)
• Bind (ranged immobilize)
• Leech Life (moderate ranged negative energy DoT and self HoT)
• Vortex (targeted AoE negative energy DoT and reverse repel)
• Power Cascade (extreme PBAoE energy damage, hits depend on charges)

Mystic Bolt is your regular first tier power with standardized damage, recharge, and end cost. Does not have secondary effect but has higher base accuracy. Does energy damage.

Mystic Blast is your regular second tier power with comparable damage, recharge and endurance cost. Does not have secondary effect but has higher base accuracy. Does energy damage.

Conflux takes the place of first AoE which exists in most sets. It's a targetted AoE which inflicts part cold, part electricity and part fire damage. Combined damage is moderate with 16s recharge. I imagine this looking like three different streams of elemental energy moving in a circular path until they hit the primary target. Has higher base accuracy but no secondary effect.

Draw Power drains one charge from the wand and gives short term damage buff (aim level) as well as restores some endurance (25% self). Has 10s recharge as damage buff has 10s duration, but depends on wand charges which replenish much slower. The idea of this power is to give low level prestamina endurance recovery! The animation of this power could be the Rikti cure "hold wand up" while energy focuses on the tip.

Hex is high damage ranged negative energy attack. Think will domination level damage. This also applies a random "curse" which is either damage, resistance or defense debuff. The base debuff should be a bit higher than regular blaster attacks since it can not be enhanced, neither can you apply debuff IO sets to it since the curse is random. Has higher base accuracy.

Bind is regular ranged immobilize. No damage on this and no secondary effect. Has higher base accuracy.

Leech Life dishes out moderate negative energy DoT and heals the caster over time. Think life drain here except without -to hit component and also as a DoT. Has higher base accuracy.

Vortex is a location AoE that spawns pseudopet which draws nearby enemies in (reverse repel) while inflicting minor negative energy damage over long duration. Think Ice Storm here. Has higher base accuracy.

Power Cascade is the crashless PBAoE nuke of the set. It inflicts up to three hits of energy damage depending on how many charges the wand has. When I think about this power I imagine the Static Overload PBAoE attack that Arachnos Heavy Blasters do, only that the caster is holding wand up while arcs of power shoot from it.

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I don't really have anything to say on the set, but the thread title made me think of powers that shoot wands.

Which amuses me.

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Head of TRICK, the all Trick Arrow and Traps SG
Part of the Repeat Offenders
Still waiting for his Official BackAlleyBrawler No-Prize

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Themed without being locked? Works for me.

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I like the idea of themed sets but I think I'd prefer them if they were designed as additional sets under the Power Pools category. That way all AT's could get them if they wanted and it would add a lot more flexibility to character customization. Also since power pol sets only have 4 powers we the devs could in theory make two sets in the time it takes to make a single primary or secondary AT set.

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This should be an animation option with other blast sets rather than a whole set.

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A game is not supposed to be some kind of... place where people enjoy themselves!

I think I'm with Chaos on this one. Though the set itself is quite a cool idea, I think it would please more people and have a LOT of concepts open up if we got wand animations that could be used with regular blast (and other) sets.

The set is pretty cool, though =]

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Interesting idea. Especially the 'Draw Power' power. I'm a big fan of non-vanilla BU/Aim powers and think this would fit thematically.

BUT!...I think it needs more limitations. This power has the potential of giving the user 150% endurance if you can slot it for END Mod. That's 1 1/2 blue bars. Also, you can slot it for rech so it's up around every 5 sec? I understand the charges are not affected by rech buffs but that's still a full bar of endurance in a bit over 5 sec.

I propose, rather than +END it gives the user a +recovery buff for however long would be balanced. Secondly, make this power non-stackable so you couldn't get too high of a +dmg/recover buff.

Thirdly, we'd need to look into the whole 'charges' deal. How would that work? Off the top of my head, I was thinking it could simply placed a temp power on the user or simply a variable buff like Rise to the Challenge/Invincibility. What would this do? Well, when you click 'Draw Power', it would place a power on you with a duration. That duration is the time it takes one 'charge' to recharge. Of course, the +dmg/recovery/whatever will only last for the 10sec but the power itself will linger longer. The rub is, you can only stack the power 3 times. If you have 3 on you and use Draw Power again, you'll get a 'Fizzled' pop up.

Another possibility with this type of set-up is, you can have variable buffs with each charge. The 1st charge might give you +dmg/recover and grant some endurance back (25%). The 2nd charge would only grant +dmg/recovery as well as perhaps a bonus to the debuff in a power like Hex. The 3rd charge would be just +dmg/recovery.

Moving on, it's an interesting powerset. Can't say I'm a fan of using wands (my imagination is always thinking of ways to screw around with concepts. I'd start thinking of characters that use magic rings/mystic gloves or something...) but the powers within the set have merit. The only other big issue is Vortex. There isn't currently a way to make a 'reverse repel' effect, AFAIK. Unless it teleports nearby foes into a targeted location maybe?

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