Werewolf Illusion Disappearing

[Tordail]

[Brohg]

Heh, such a backward decision. It's the stat buffing that's the problem, Pact of the Wolf was totally fine before real benefits were pasted on top of it.

[Retron]

Hah! Might have guessed you two would be in here gloating.

I'm going to be doing everything in my power to make sure that illusion stays with Pact, even if it's hived off to another buff. Yes, I'm againt any changes being made (the AA is fine as it is, as I've said a zillion times before) but congrats guys, you won I guess.

I'm going to propose the following to Elidroth:

Pact of the Wolf (base rank, the one people get purely for the illusion) stays as-is.
The HP/mana ranks cast the HP/mana buff as-is (minus the illusion), but also autocast the base rank of Pact of the Wolf.

I could put up with losing a buff slot to keep you guys happy.

[Sowslow]

[Tordail]

[Retron]

[Sowslow]

[Tordail]

[Retron]

[Sowslow]

[zorgothx]

No more bear form?

It's a good change in general, but this stinks for me as I am still rocking the SoD Raid charm that gains power when you use illusions (great heroic stats). I need to switch illusions every half hour or so to get max benefits. Now I suppose I will have to go farm another clicky besides my Iskar mask. =/

[Retron]

[Brohg]

[Jabobtha]

Hmm I wonder if we can get them to move the hit points off of slot 11 so that we could actually use the new mounts (other than the hobby horse) that supply stats. It was something I didn't push for before because it made sense that we couldn't ride a mount in werewolf form (even though we could cast an illusion over it that would allow us to.) But now that the illusion is going away I would like to be able to ride my Venomous Raptor saddle. I would have gotten the Whirligig Flyer Control Device as well but since it didn't stack with pact I didn't bother with that hell camp.

While I enjoy the werewolf illusion I am not sure I would waste a spell slot on it for no real benefits. I did like having it so I could use some of my LoN illusions that provide benefits and then cast werewolf over it but alas I guess I will run around as a red gargoyle or an ogre pirate rather than a werewolf so I still won't run around as myself for many more years /shrug.

My other fear with the removal of the illusion is what they will do to the duration. Since it was a permanent buff but would drop if you zoned because of the illusion. So will it be a permanent buff until you die or will it at least get a long (4-5 hour) timer placed on it.

I am happy that the illusion is being removed from group pact, since that was the biggest complaint I had about it and rarely use it anymore. I never saw the annoyance because I was always in single pact but I could see being made huge and then shrinking (large group of werewolves are frowned upon in raids so have to group shrink right afterward) every 10 minutes could become annoying.

Anyhow I will mourn the loss of my fun fluff illusion that later had useful stats added to it and thus became something you had to have instead of something just for fun...especially when it became 1600 hp/m.

I don't see why they couldn't introduce a "race" aa for people that prefer to be their own race. They did it with tinkering mastery so it could be something as easy as that. Make the task something like make a potion of your race and hand it in to Soandso. Then the reward is something you can click that will grant you an aa that you can click to get your race illusion. Several of these AAalready exist in game on rogues so it would just be a matter of adding shaman to them and maybe making a couple other races (i forget what races rogues can get through AA and do not have access to my rogue atm to check.) This would let those of us that want the werewolf illusion keep it and let those of you who don't be able to be your race. I do not understand how removing the werewolf illusion from pact is going to save any resources since enchanters have a werewolf illusion as well so it will have to stay in the global file and still exist in the spell file.

[Retron]

[Brohg]

My problem with it is design oriented and always has been. If it's okay for shaman to gain 1600 more hp and mana (which I won't debate) through AA, then AA already exist to add hp & mana. the buffs should just be part of those, General Sturdiness and Mental Whatever. Spend AA - have more hp & mana. Done. Having a button and buff slot do it is wasteful of gameplay territory that other functions need.

[Samanna]

Brohg makes sense. Again.

[Retron]

[warador]

this is bs i love the werewolf illusion . you rarely see me without it on . if u dont like it dont use it there are other ways to get the hp mana with all the clickys out there now. i hate how a few people bitching and moaning get deicide they speak for all shaman and crusade to get it removed . it takes the choice away for those of us that like it

[Tordail]

[Retron]

[Tordail]

Is it really that hard for you to write a post without taking potshots at people who disagree with you, Retron? It's like you purposely write with the intent of being rude and condescending while trying (and failing) to stop just short of being outright inflammatory. It's difficult to wade through your little barbs to find your point.

I get that you credit yourself with singlehandedly getting benefits added to Pact. Fine. Whatever you want. The fact remains that Nodyin's decision to add HP/Mana to Wurine, and then to exacerbate the problem by duplicating the mistake with Pact, was wrong. If they wanted to have an AA illusion for us, great. If they wanted to give us stats through AA, great. Then do these things - but don't force people to use Illusion: Noob every time they want to play their character to the fullest extent possible.

[Retron]

[WaringMcMarrin]

I understand people are not happy with Pact of the Wolf and the changes coming to illusion AA's in the near future but what is arguing about wether or not it should have been created/have stats added to it in the first place going to accomplish?

[Retron]

[Brohg]

I don't have a zillion reasons why you're wrong, but I do have more thoughts to contribute.

Among them: no one was confused as to the evolutionary history of Pact. Certainly neither Tordail nor I; we're intimately familiar with Pact's story. Knowing something's origin doesn't infuse that thing with rectitude.

As to the argument presented in your "Now, the reason why" paragraph, I have several things to say. First, I'll refute a pair of faulty premises:
1) EQ has not always been about opportunity cost. The first bare opportunity to buff lock oneself didn't come until Velious-ish(?), and was then basically a silly trick, taking ranger buffs and splitting up Aegolism and having bard songs and such. Buff management wasn't a thing until the very endgame of PoP with Form-of click buffs. At Everquest's inception and through many years of play, the fifteen starting buff slots were plenty. The number was chosen as equivalent to infinite, a limit players wouldn't ever be constrained by, like the stat cap of 255.
2) The litany of effects you cite aren't valuable or powerful. All of the potions, Wards, Form-ofs, all the non-Flappy familiars, Shrunken Gobbo ear, Tunare belt, et al & etc - they're minor edges a character can gain with disproportionately high overhead cost with their bookkeeping and buff slot occupation. A player trying to gain every advantage available must certainly use each of them, and can be criticized for laziness if not pursuing those edges while among elite company, but that doesn't make the effects either objectively or relatively powerful and it doesn't make them good for game play.

There are caveats to the above, naturally.
re:#1) The magician forms you cite are indeed an application of opportunity cost, but their conflict is with other magician forms. Like a D&D druid's Wild Shape ability or the EQ druid's black & white wolf forms or melee characters' disciplines, they're a "stance" for the mage. Choose fast recovery power, or choose nuke power, or choose physical toughness, or choose...the other one, whatever that is. There's no such trade off for shaman or beastlords, no such cost. A magician with the Form AAs chooses between almond and walnut but can't have both. A shaman pushes the lever to get his cashew. There's no reason for the shaman to choose to not get his cashew, no real cost, but observing that, one has to question the value of even presenting the "choice".
re:#2) Wizard familiars are a top-down flavorful design, and any power they have is entirely appropriate when looked at that way. Indeed even more of a wizard's power might appropriately be tied to them, if they're seen as the finger-wiggler parallel to beastlord Warders and magician's invoked elemental minions, instead of just an alternate version of Clarity. An appropriate but unrealized parallel for priests would be a holy talisman or totem or spirit guide. I don't think it would be inappropriate for shaman to gain appreciable power from the company of our wolf pets, for instance.

My real point with the above pair of observations is that mechanical parallels between the abilities of magician and wizard with shaman Pact are incidental to their design. A tradeoff of toughness for some other attribute could (perhaps should, I'm not arguing that here) be expressed some other way than additional hp for mages. Drawing power from a familiar, as an idea, isn't inextricable from additional mana pool for wizards. There's a French phrase that applies and express it somewhat better: they have raisons d'etre apart from their specific mechanics. Latin: added stats are not the sine qua non for them. When Pact of the Wolf just imbued the shaman with werewolf-ey qualities (nocturnal ferociousness, animal hunting ability in the form of ultravision, seeinvis and haste) in exchange for the appearance of werewolf-ey-ness, there were literally no complaints. In the progress of your campaign for parity with a poorly designed bst AA and in the years since, that flavor has been entirely lost. What's left is only the part that should never have been.

For parallel structure, a sum up:

tl:dr? It doesn't matter where they came from. Game abilities are not people, which is to say they are not an end in themselves. Their existence is not sufficient reason for their existence.

[warador]

[Retron]

[Underlord]

I do hope that they do decide to make this two seperate buffs, one illusion and one stats. It is very nice having this illusion for our pets. I really like getting to see my minion holding mage weps with the use of Group Pact of the Wolf. I do agree as for players they need to make them able to select the option to have the illusion or not, but being our pets dont have hands I like the ability to give him some. hehe.

[Conchenn]

[Tordail]

[meadal]

Nevermind.

[bundler]

I am curious about using the group version of pact as an MGB?? I have never gotten it that I can recall, but cannot fathom why as it has a nice bump in stats. I read here about other things using that slot on different characters, but where I REALLY think this will be nice is if it works on all pets with the Pet Affinity AA. I haven't tried this yet, just wondering out loud here, first.

[Brohg]

Pact of the Wolf has what Lucy calls "Target Type: Group v1", which means it automatically and only hits the caster's group. Buffs that can be MGB'd are "v2", which translates to "targeted group". The v2 spells have an additional flag that can keep them from being MGB'd; this afflicts the Maw line and incidentals like Group Perfected Levitation, which (you can test trivially next time you log on) can be cast freely out of group, or on another group, but not MGB'd.

[bundler]

Thanks, I was hoping it would be useful to cast in situations where things were not going well so as to pump everyone up to hopefully win, and avoid a wipe, sigh.

[feradach]

I personally don't care if it's MGBable or not. I just want it to stack with mounts that have HP/mana. I've posted on the EQ forums about this as well as submitted /bug reports, but what is really the best way to get this on the developer's radar?

[bundler]

I am trying to find a way to get Sony to let us have the benefits of a mount AND use an illusion, sigh.

[Sowslow]