After the arms lore change to pvm, both beserker and resistance talismans (even though you don't see many defense dexers), clearly melee has received a very sizable dps boost. I don't look at this in a negative way, as tweaks and changes to pvm only offer further diversity and depth into more enjoyable gameplay and events. Upon making a decision whether which meta path I wanted to take, back when the knowledge was little known of the maximum potential of fully trained and geared meta characters - the reason I chose mage is because it seemed like the most unique and interesting, mainly after reading the description for the "vivify" relic. However after a very long time of playing a meta mage, I find it's become pretty stale just ebolt railing mobs over and over with basically no other mechanic involved.
I feel like trying to balance these three talismans in terms of dps may be the wrong approach to reaching overall appeal for each talisman. Beserker is clearly the up close, fast paced, damage dealing talisman that mows through monsters with the risk of getting blown up yourself. The resistance talisman clearly has it's purpose even though it isn't as popular, a fully trained one really can do it's job well at taking damage. Now for the mage talisman, I feel trying to compare itself to the "other" dps option would only cause more problems than not, when trying to achieve equal balance. My proposal is to view the mage talisman as more of a "utility" option, making it a middle ground of both the beserker and resistance choices where we can do some damage - not surpassing a beserker in single pvm combat, but instead allowing options for group pvm play.
I really like where the relics are at for the mage right now, except for vivify. Yeah it looks cool and it's now harder to dispel, but I find more often than not, it's just a mana sink, has a chance to fail (normal daemon), you lose half your mana and then when you actually use the normal daemon, as long as it's not getting dispelled it basically serves the same function, just a little body block for you to spam your ebolt. Currently with the lower dps output meta mages are dealing, I feel like that's totally fine, as long as Vivify gets reworked, here's an idea:
In conjunction with 120 scribe, crafting the summoning scrolls (except for ev) grants 100% success rate in creating a vivified creature and giving a property to each summon:
Earth Elemental - give it the current resistance to dispel as it is now, and an increased armor rating. Melee damage the same as a normal earth elemental.
Air Elemental - stays in the same place as it was summoned, like a corpser or reaper. (useful for immobile bosses like harrower)
Fire Elemental - does what a pyroclastic/snow elemental does with a low damage 1-3 damage aoe every x seconds. (useful for lower stages of champ spawns)
Water Elemental - ebolting or casting an offensive spell on this summon procs a shadow disciple OR has a small chance of using less regs per cast.
Summon Daemon - Make it just as squishy as a normal summoned daemon, but give it some melee capability.
The fact that you aren't gunna waste mana healing these, and that they will eventually die, get dispelled, or run its timer gives them a sense of balance.
I feel this would give the incentive of creating more meta mages, despite losing out on dps or the investment costs, simply because it may just be more fun to play. I also don't like the fact that talisman mages are basically forced to acquire rare and expensive slayer books just to feel competent, and even though I own three I feel like the nerf is fine and wouldn't even mind a bigger nerf as long as vivify is reworked. I'd like to see more of us meta mages out there pvming and doing events!
I feel like trying to balance these three talismans in terms of dps may be the wrong approach to reaching overall appeal for each talisman. Beserker is clearly the up close, fast paced, damage dealing talisman that mows through monsters with the risk of getting blown up yourself. The resistance talisman clearly has it's purpose even though it isn't as popular, a fully trained one really can do it's job well at taking damage. Now for the mage talisman, I feel trying to compare itself to the "other" dps option would only cause more problems than not, when trying to achieve equal balance. My proposal is to view the mage talisman as more of a "utility" option, making it a middle ground of both the beserker and resistance choices where we can do some damage - not surpassing a beserker in single pvm combat, but instead allowing options for group pvm play.
I really like where the relics are at for the mage right now, except for vivify. Yeah it looks cool and it's now harder to dispel, but I find more often than not, it's just a mana sink, has a chance to fail (normal daemon), you lose half your mana and then when you actually use the normal daemon, as long as it's not getting dispelled it basically serves the same function, just a little body block for you to spam your ebolt. Currently with the lower dps output meta mages are dealing, I feel like that's totally fine, as long as Vivify gets reworked, here's an idea:
In conjunction with 120 scribe, crafting the summoning scrolls (except for ev) grants 100% success rate in creating a vivified creature and giving a property to each summon:
Earth Elemental - give it the current resistance to dispel as it is now, and an increased armor rating. Melee damage the same as a normal earth elemental.
Air Elemental - stays in the same place as it was summoned, like a corpser or reaper. (useful for immobile bosses like harrower)
Fire Elemental - does what a pyroclastic/snow elemental does with a low damage 1-3 damage aoe every x seconds. (useful for lower stages of champ spawns)
Water Elemental - ebolting or casting an offensive spell on this summon procs a shadow disciple OR has a small chance of using less regs per cast.
Summon Daemon - Make it just as squishy as a normal summoned daemon, but give it some melee capability.
The fact that you aren't gunna waste mana healing these, and that they will eventually die, get dispelled, or run its timer gives them a sense of balance.
I feel this would give the incentive of creating more meta mages, despite losing out on dps or the investment costs, simply because it may just be more fun to play. I also don't like the fact that talisman mages are basically forced to acquire rare and expensive slayer books just to feel competent, and even though I own three I feel like the nerf is fine and wouldn't even mind a bigger nerf as long as vivify is reworked. I'd like to see more of us meta mages out there pvming and doing events!
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