Arcane Wonders Forum
Mage Wars => Player Feedback and Suggestions => Topic started by: exid on October 14, 2017, 12:45:34 AM
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i don't like spellbind!
-> you get +1 planning
-> you get a infinite spellbook multiplicator
I like the first point that brings a good tactical opening (with limitations on the type or subtype)
I think the second point is overpowered! The game looses its finite spellbook points strategic limitation.
Spellbind should be errated, saying: you can plan one more spel with the type or subtype limitation, and when used the spell is discarded (keeping the quickcast spellchanging?).
Reactions? :D
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I think that is a very interesting suggestion. I wouldn't mind trying it out in a few games. I doubt that it gets officially errata'd though.
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i don't like spellbind!
-> you get +1 planning
-> you get a infinite spellbook multiplicator
I like the first point that brings a good tactical opening (with limitations on the type or subtype)
I think the second point is overpowered! The game looses its finite spellbook points strategic limitation.
Spellbind should be errated, saying: you can plan one more spel with the type or subtype limitation, and when used the spell is discarded (keeping the quickcast spellchanging?).
Reactions? :D
While Zuberi's probably right and it won't get errata'd, I too hate the infinite reusability of spellbind
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in my group (of 2!) we decided today to discard the bounded spell after casting and possibly bind a new one each planning
I'm happy to see I'm not the only one to dislike the spellbind!
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I don't know what the game would look like without spellbind, whether it would be more fun and varied or not. You can get around a mage wand with a spellbound minor heal using poisoned bloods and arcane wards and wardstones, or just baiting their dispels with other enchantments. Although, spellbind might be part of the reason that basically every spellbook still uses hard removal for dealing with equipments rather than relying more on other options. Drop item, curse item, disarm, or simply negating the effects of whatever equipment with spellbind that they are using, like using poisoned blood to stop minor heal mage wand. Thing about a spellbound spell is that they have to cast it again every time they want to use it.
Without spellbind it might also become harder to deal with armor stacking though, since you would need to spend more spell points on a third or fourth acid ball, and if your armor stacking opponent removes the corrodes you can't reapply them.
Then again, doing this might give piercing attacks more of a chance to shine.
Another option would be to introduce some other cost for the spellbind, like lowering your innate life by 1, or taking 1 damage every time you use it, or just adding the bound spell's level to the mana cost after the first use.
Spellbinding objects put the enemy mage on a clock. They have to either make the bound spell useless or remove the spellbinding object. And the former tactic probably tends to work better for early to mid game, while the latter is better if you want to outlast the spellbind user.
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Yeah I am with Exid on this as well. I think Spellbind with Mage Wands are a bit powerful. I kind of wish instead of Spellbind, we had wands that had specific spells on the card. So instead of an Elemental Wand, we had a Wand of Flame Attack that would have a fire attack printed on it (much like a weapon card).
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Yeah I am with Exid on this as well. I think Spellbind with Mage Wands are a bit powerful. I kind of wish instead of Spellbind, we had wands that had specific spells on the card. So instead of an Elemental Wand, we had a Wand of Flame Attack that would have a fire attack printed on it (much like a weapon card).
I think this is an interesting idea, but I wouldn't want to add it to Arena since it would require many more equipment spells than in the current meta for the same effect. Right now players have the ability to customize their spellcasting weapons with the Spellbind trait within the limitations of each equipment. I prefer this option.
However, as a compromise AW might consider using Coshade's idea for the Academy product line and keep the Spellbind trait out of Academy play. This provides players the option to play with either or both options by mixing product lines rather than requiring an errata.
Thoughts?
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Yeah I am with Exid on this as well. I think Spellbind with Mage Wands are a bit powerful. I kind of wish instead of Spellbind, we had wands that had specific spells on the card. So instead of an Elemental Wand, we had a Wand of Flame Attack that would have a fire attack printed on it (much like a weapon card).
I think this is an interesting idea, but I wouldn't want to add it to Arena since it would require many more equipment spells than in the current meta for the same effect. Right now players have the ability to customize their spellcasting weapons with the Spellbind trait within the limitations of each equipment. I prefer this option.
However, as a compromise AW might consider using Coshade's idea for the Academy product line and keep the Spellbind trait out of Academy play. This provides players the option to play with either or both options by mixing product lines rather than requiring an errata.
Thoughts?
But Academy and Arena aren't quite the same game. If spellbind is a problem in Arena, telling people to just try Academy instead doesn't solve that problem.
For those of us who do think that spellbind is unbalanced how would you fix it? My worry is that cards like dispel wand are made totally irrelevant by mage wand with dispel and reveal magic. The only reason to ever run dispel wand at this point is if you're a warlord and you don't want to use harshforge construct nor rely on other harshforge spells.
Another possibility is to place greater limits on the type of spells that can be spell on to certain equipments. Like, make it so that elemental wand can only be used for attack spells in an elemental school, or mage wand can only cast minor incantations.
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I like the idea of limitation.
the worst spellbind is the mage wand: you take 1 dispel, 1 desenchant, 1 teleport, 1 heal, and your wand will become the perfect tool for every situation, needing no reflexion, no idea, no choice, from your side.
in the contrary, the the wand of healing, that allows you to heal or remove condition every turn, is totally limited to that. no problem for me.
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My biggest issue with the mage wand is that they can bind any incantation. Basically, you can wait and see what you need in the game and then go for infinite dissolves, dispels, teleports, ...
I dont have any issue with helm of command for example. Its always the same subtype.
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I'm going to shift from the popular perspective on here about the Wands here. I really like both the extra option to cast something and the longevity it adds. it is powerful but that's what Mage wand and elemental Wands are for. I think in a tournament style timed format they can't really utilize its full capacity. Now outside of timed format yea it starts to become more powerful.
Looking at from a thematic since the options of an elemental Wand makes perfect sense to have those options. The Mage wand is in a similar boat in being at least in the beginning the wizard had ultimate flexiblity in other schools of magic and in the narrative of the game it made sense to have those options.
The last reason I like spell bind is that it offers creativity in books and allow flexibility to mages who need those types of options. I.e the control Mage play style. Also Wands are really awesome for those who can use steal equipment and there of course other options to limit or get rid of Wands.
Without those Wands and the current rules for them the control mages don't have the flexibility they need to be viable in competitive play. They still have flexibility with other spells.
I will say since the development of the game with Additons of other types of Wands, the dissipate mechanic, the need to wizard and wizard tower. It has allowed more potential to make creative options for card creation to allow balance and flexibility for some of the options listed above.
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Here's a thought. Why not just increase the Mana cost of mage wand and elemental wand to 6 instead of 5? Or increase their level to 3. Something I notice is that they are both quite powerful for mere lv2 spells. Problem is that increasing their level means drop item won't work on them. But there is no way mage wand should be as easy to cast as a mage staff.
I wonder how much more possible spellbooks would be viable if spellbind weren't like it is.
The problem with drop item is that it only works for one round against mage wand or elemental wand, since the wand user can just spend a quick action to pick up their wand again.
Curse item is probably just as good at dealing with wands as drop item. Use curse item and the longer they have mage/elemental wand in play the more damage they will take. And they can't replace the equipment unless they destroy the current one. Problem is, they will replace it. Curse item is lv2 dark, so most mages will be better off with dissolve/crumble still. So they have to (effectively) use a quick action to replace the wand, or they'll keep taking damage in the case of curse item, or they'll be unable to use it in the case of drop item.
You could also give elemental and mage wands the epic trait.
I think I personally would prefer something that can make the equipment disabled, but which isn't so easy to deal with. Part of the problem with drop item is that wand user can use a single quick action to remove it. But drop item is also lv1, which means you can afford more of them (as a mind mage, anyways) and if you include three or four you can just keep reapplying it. Problem here is actions. Forcemaster has nothing to recast the drop item except herself. Then again, you could put disarm on a spore, and I suppose having in school qc creatures helps with the actions.
The problem with disarm is that it goes away at end of round by itself without costing the enemy mage any actions.
Hmm. Maybe drop item+enfeeble? That way they have to choose between moving and picking up their wand.
It still seems like mage wand and elemental wand are constraining spellbook design space. I'm not sure how well other ways of dealing with equips like drop item and curse item can fix that.
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I'm going to shift from the popular perspective on here about the Wands here. I really like both the extra option to cast something and the longevity it adds. it is powerful but that's what Mage wand and elemental Wands are for. I think in a tournament style timed format they can't really utilize its full capacity. Now outside of timed format yea it starts to become more powerful.
Looking at from a thematic since the options of an elemental Wand makes perfect sense to have those options. The Mage wand is in a similar boat in being at least in the beginning the wizard had ultimate flexiblity in other schools of magic and in the narrative of the game it made sense to have those options.
The last reason I like spell bind is that it offers creativity in books and allow flexibility to mages who need those types of options. I.e the control Mage play style. Also Wands are really awesome for those who can use steal equipment and there of course other options to limit or get rid of Wands.
Without those Wands and the current rules for them the control mages don't have the flexibility they need to be viable in competitive play. They still have flexibility with other spells.
I will say since the development of the game with Additons of other types of Wands, the dissipate mechanic, the need to wizard and wizard tower. It has allowed more potential to make creative options for card creation to allow balance and flexibility for some of the options listed above.
Dispel wand is made completely irrelevant by mage wand with dispel and reveal magics on the side. Wand of healing is made completely irrelevant by mage wand cure and mend. Mage Wand and Elemental wand probably don't increase the number of viable spellbooks, but rather decrease it. I'm not sure I've seen anyone use wand of healing since the priestess set came out, now that I think about it. And there definitely isn't any reason to use dispel wand anymore now that the warlord set is out, since the warlord was the only mage that ever had any reason to use it and he has other better options now.
The only reason control books need unrestricted spellbind like mage wand and elemental wand is probably because other books use them too. Without them you would simply have to spend more spell points to include more copies of attack spells and incantations.
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Unfortunately there is no good way to solve the issue. For tournaments and casual play it is just part of the game. When a Thunderdome or other tournament that is worldwide happen it is just something you expect and have to react to. There are ways to counter it, but it takes a lot of pre-planning. I was pretty impressed by some of the books that were a bit faster in play to eek out enough damage to win in the ADMW earlier this year.
What is interesting is I don't mind Elemental Wand as much compared to Mage Wand. At least with Ele wand there is a tendency to get closer to ending the game. Sometimes I see players just pull out a teleport wand just to live longer in a losing game. There is a lot to analyze here, but in general I have always thought Dispel Wand should be 1 sbp. The balancing I think was done was that Dispel Wand is 2sbp, while Mage Wand with Dispel is 3, so you lose more book building with it. After time has passed I think most players don't see the negative of this as being to big of an issue.
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What is interesting is I don't mind Elemental Wand as much compared to Mage Wand. At least with Ele wand there is a tendency to get closer to ending the game. Sometimes I see players just pull out a teleport wand just to live longer in a losing game. There is a lot to analyze here, but in general I have always thought Dispel Wand should be 1 sbp.
Agreed 100%
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How about making the spellbind power a one-shot thing?
That is, the wand in your book is a blank slate, waiting for a spell to be bound to it, but once one is bound, that's it. the spell cannot be swapped out. You have effectively made a Wand of Teleport, or a Wand of Dissolve, or a Wand of Lightning Bolt.
That way you would get the power to adapt to the game situation you find yourself in, but do not have a completely mutable toolbox at your command for every time the game state changes.
That would work for me, I think.
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That is, the wand in your book is a blank slate, waiting for a spell to be bound to it, but once one is bound, that's it. the spell cannot be swapped out. You have effectively made a Wand of Teleport, or a Wand of Dissolve, or a Wand of Lightning Bolt.
you don't have the building thinking, but at least you have to think during the game!
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How about making the spellbind power a one-shot thing?
That is, the wand in your book is a blank slate, waiting for a spell to be bound to it, but once one is bound, that's it. the spell cannot be swapped out. You have effectively made a Wand of Teleport, or a Wand of Dissolve, or a Wand of Lightning Bolt.
That way you would get the power to adapt to the game situation you find yourself in, but do not have a completely mutable toolbox at your command for every time the game state changes.
That would work for me, I think.
What happens when I return wand to spellbook by casting other item on its slot? Maybe even other wand.
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What happens when I return wand to spellbook by casting other item on its slot? Maybe even other wand.
That is a good question.
I would make two immediate suggestions:
1) the spellbound spell goes back into the book with the wand, and if the wand is recast the spell comes back out with it (and if the spell card gets used in the meantime the wand becomes inert).
2) putting it back in the book resets the wand which, if recast, can have another spell put on it.
The former is in my view the better option but is also the higher trust/higher memory option.
The latter basically increases the cost of changing the bound spell both in mana and action (since it will require another equipment spell (and its action) as well as a fresh cast of the wand).
(of course, this question also opens up a bugbear can of worms of mine about the ability to replace equipment back into the book, but that is for another day)
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I am perfectly happy with the Spellbind trait as is. Wands in particular are why I have Dissolves in my books. As with anything, there are ways around it. I would even have been happy with Wizard's Tower retaining Spellbind, if it weren't for the silly no cost replacement during planning.
A wand gains you less functionality than Mordok's Tome, in that you have to pay mana to change out the spell with a wand (whether by replacing the wand with another, or using the quick action plus mana). In addition, nothing happens to the planned spell if the book gets dissolved. Are we now getting rid of the book, now that it's just recently come out?
Creatures with Spellbind all of a sudden see much less use if spellbind goes away. Personally, I see a lot of harm that comes to the game from modifying or eliminating spellbind.
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Whats the problem with spellbind? i don't get it?
The first thing everyone and their grandma does when they see a wand is to shit their pants and make a plan on they can remove it as soon as possible.
The only time you should bother destroying a wand is if you play a long undo book yourself. And in those instances the game is about undoing and outlasting anyway. Spellbind doesn't change much there either because 1 player will run out of key cards faster regardless of the spellbind trait.
In all other scenarios, just be happy that your opponent paid 5 additional mana to teleport/dissolve/dispell/whatever.
Either Turn up the tempo and apply even more pressure, or play around it.
Opponent played magewand + dispell against your curselock - put out (1 more) Enchanters stone.
etc etc.
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Whats the problem with spellbind? i don't get it?
The first thing everyone and their grandma does when they see a wand is to shit their pants and make a plan on they can remove it as soon as possible.
The only time you should bother destroying a wand is if you play a long undo book yourself. And in those instances the game is about undoing and outlasting anyway. Spellbind doesn't change much there either because 1 player will run out of key cards faster regardless of the spellbind trait.
In all other scenarios, just be happy that your opponent paid 5 additional mana to teleport/dissolve/dispell/whatever.
Either Turn up the tempo and apply even more pressure, or play around it.
Opponent played magewand + dispell against your curselock - put out (1 more) Enchanters stone.
etc etc.
+1
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If you like quick games, spellbind is not a problem: you will kill your opponent quicker than his heal-wand heals him, and you won't have time to use more than 4 copies of youre spells.
For quick books, a spellbind is only a third planning.
but if you like to open the building possibilities for more long games, there is spellbind more powerfull.
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If you like quick games, spellbind is not a problem: you will kill your opponent quicker than his heal-wand heals him, and you won't have time to use more than 4 copies of youre spells.
For quick books, a spellbind is only a third planning.
but if you like to open the building possibilities for more long games, there is spellbind more powerfull.
It seems you always have the option that Jacksmack pointed out to just "play around it."
I think there is a difference between more powerful and too powerful. I agree that certain spells will be more powerful in long games rather than short games. For example, Spawnpoints and Sunfire Amulet come to mind as very powerful in say a game lasting 20 to 40 rounds. However, I don't see this as a problem. If you are designing a spellbook for a long game strategy, then you need to have a counter for those spells that are stronger in a long game. The counter may not always be another spell, but perhaps a shift in game tactics or tempo.
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Would like to remind everyone again that the spell point system makes it so that things that would otherwise imbalance gameplay usually imbalance deck building instead. The problem here, if it's a problem, would not be how difficult it is to counter spellbind objects during a game, but rather the constraints it places on future card design and spellbook design. More strategic diversity makes for more fun metagames, and Mage Wars stands out from other similar games in large part *because nobody has ever managed to successfully count all of the possibile viable strategies for a given meta*. I suspect that if spellbind is a problem, it won't be easy to spot right away, especially if new sets are released at a fast enough rate to refresh the meta before people start running out of viable deck ideas.
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