Echoing other comments in that I really hope the Wizard starts out as, and remains the direct damage spell king of the game. Pre-Kunark Wizards easily held the title with the speed and low (relatively) cost of Conflaguration and Ice Commet. Subsequent expansions led to the dilution of the Wizard and in my opinion, other caster classes were given arguably superior damage capabilities. I have fond memories of organizing my EQ spell book by damage type. A page of ice spells, fire spells, bolts, etc.
I've always enjoyed the Wizard DD "meta" where I had to know the encounter, my tank's ability to hold aggro, the amount of hate generated by my nukes, and when I could drop the heavy hitting nukes. I've seen it in other games as well sadly where the "big number" hits from Wizards were rivaled by more consistent DPS classes. Wizards can bring some utility to a group with roots (as seen in the pre-pre-alpha stream) and a variety of damage types, but the one thing I hope is that the single huge hits (outside maybe backstab) are in their realm.
Some of the more fun fights I can remember where Sorcerers (Wizards) were way out in single target hits was in Vanguard. There were a few different elemental mobs in APW where you had to choose which type of elemental DD to use. There was a fight also in Vanguard (drawing a blank on the name), but it was for looting an egg involved in a flying mount. Some mobs would spawn and some DDs would show absurd numbers in damage. Was fun to see those numbers, but also needed some attention of what DD to use and when.
DynamiteFizzlebum said:Echoing other comments in that I really hope the Wizard starts out as, and remains the direct damage spell king of the game. Pre-Kunark Wizards easily held the title with the speed and low (relatively) cost of Conflaguration and Ice Commet. Subsequent expansions led to the dilution of the Wizard and in my opinion, other caster classes were given arguably superior damage capabilities. I have fond memories of organizing my EQ spell book by damage type. A page of ice spells, fire spells, bolts, etc.
Agreed. Not only were other casting classes reaching parity to the wizard but we were falling far behind the damage output and survivability of rangers and rogues. Wizards faced far greater reductions in damage because every boss mob was red and that mean much higher spell resists, far greater in penalty than rogues faced. And as AEs increased in severity our limited hitpoints became a detriment. 'Glass Cannon' although great in the early days and fine for group content fell short in later raid content.
Early on in EQ I was playing a wizard in a group and generally out damaged anybody in the group when I had Mana, Later on I learned that being able to do a huge amount of damage in a short span of time was more important in a group setting. A Wizard had to control the urge to pound everything into dust and be constantly low on mana; of course aggro control was necessary. A Wizard had to be the insurance policy for the adventure group. Let the group fight and help things along a bit but when real danger to the survival of the group happened you would unleash a torrent of damage that was unmatched; and if it came to it evacuate the group if the healer called for it, or evac if the healer died and it looked like a wipe. In some certain situations the wizard would kite a mob or burn one mob down as the wizard saw fit to do. After many hours of discussing our roles in our particular group while camping, this was the role of the Wizard in our group. Of course we had some great AE spells too that came in handy.
I feel like the Wizard should be able to unleash 20 seconds of mind boggling damage and be about as armoured as a bag of pudding for the trade off. The wizard should also have the finest robes available in the game as far as stats and apperance.
Sky