Green Monster Games - Curt Schilling

Wow check out these results. I don"t PvP much but will again soon, but this is disappointing to see as someone hoping to PvP as a Shaman.

Not a Shaman in the group. (And no Pally either!)

Oh DAMN! I just noticed there is ONE Shaman and it"s in the WINNERS 3v3 team! SWEET! Enhancement spec you think? Haven"t looked but I am curious to know the spec.


WoW -> PvP -> 2008 World of Warcraft Arena Tournament Information

Quick search seems to show this team comp is resto sham, spriest and UA affliction lock. Not sure it"s this, since I can"t seem to find the team on armory.

He"s resto running with UA lock and a shadow priest. There were a few enhancement/rogue/druid teams running though.

As for shaman in arenas, they are generally one of the less represented classes because they only work in a few specific comps and are very easy to counter/lockout.

If you"re really hoping to PvP as a shaman, these are some of the more popular teams:

2v2:
Resto Shaman / Warrior

3v3:
Resto / Warrior / Ret
Resto Druid / Warrior / Enhancement

In 5s, you could run any spec. Resto in a 2345(6) which is sham/priest/pal/war/mage(lock). The shaman can also be elemental in the 2345(6). You could also run elemental with a 4 DPS team. You can also run enhancement with a cleave team, which is pal/druid/enh/rog/war.

I hated playing my shaman in the arena.

Is it possible to get away from mana as a stat? I always hated running out of mana on my mage in pvp and then sitting there with my thumb up my butt.

There has to be some better system. Your fun should not be limited to 2 minutes because of a game mechanic.

The idea is to move more towards energy style systems. There"s still resource management/decision making, but it becomes more of a twitch/arcade style experience rather then a "Well, oops shit I"m out of mana. Now I just get to sit here and cast once every 15 seconds now I suppose" experience.

Zehn - Vhex said:

The idea is to move more towards energy style systems. There"s still resource management/decision making, but it becomes more of a twitch/arcade style experience rather then a "Well, oops shit I"m out of mana. Now I just get to sit here and cast once every 15 seconds now I suppose" experience.

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Yeah, you could move it towards a more Magic: The Gathering style mana system.

You may be able to throw 5 or 6 spells in succession but then you"re "tapped out" for a short amount of time while you recover from the strain. Strategy would be similar to playing a Rogue properly in WoW, managing your mana and knowing what you can cast and when.

Might be cool, or it could be a disaster. Who knows. It would certainly change the way caster abilities and items are designed.

Yeah I like how rogues/warriors work in wow much more so than all of the mana using classes. There is an ebb and flow to combat with those classes because the power needed for their abilities doesn"t start out as some full pool you exhaust and are then worthless.

These systems should be extended in a next gen mmo to cover mana as well imo.

Mana is a resource right? I look at mana management as part of the "skill" involved in playing the class. Given that Latency has to be a factor, no matter how small it is a factor, isn"t "resource management" something that could/should/needs to be part of the "skill" in playing an MMO?

Getting even the slightest bit into twitchy is a scary proposition if you need to assume that everyone is hooked up and connected and the playing field is even, cool, but that"s a HUGE assumption that I don"t think you can make right now.
A few years from now who knows.

How challenging is an endless mana pool or endless rage? Fun, maybe early on, but how friggin" sleepy does that become and how fast?

There are certainly some potentially cooler ways to implement "mana" or magic power and whether it"s an inherent or gathered resource pool, but if you are staying in the non-twitchy area it sort of makes it have to be a certain way no?

Well I"m not saying endless rage/energy, I"m saying there should be ways to gain mana/rage/energy during combat to execute more powerful abilities.

Let"s look at a mage in AV...Say you are skilled enough to never put yourself in a position to die yet after a few minutes of killing people you are out of mana. The solution now is to run far away and look for a place to drink, whereas a rogue simply executes some more low powered abilities to rack up some energy and gets to stay right there in the fight. The mages options once out of mana are to die/run away and out of the fight for several minutes, while the rogue just gets to keep fighting.

Can we agree one is fun, one is not?

Daezuel said:

Well I"m not saying endless rage/energy, I"m saying there should be ways to gain mana/rage/energy during combat to execute more powerful abilities.

Let"s look at a mage in AV...Say you are skilled enough to never put yourself in a position to die yet after a few minutes of killing people you are out of mana. The solution now is to run far away and look for a place to drink, whereas a rogue simply executes some more low powered abilities to rack up some energy and gets to stay right there in the fight. The mages options once out of mana are to die/run away and out of the fight for several minutes, while the rogue just gets to keep fighting.

Can we agree one is fun, one is not?

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Sounds like the only difference is you are asking for faster mana regen with smaller mana pools and low damage no cost nukes to fill when mana is gone and recharging. That would be identical to how you are describing the rogue.

And what is fun to you is not fun to another, is not fun to the next. You cannot just say one system is "fun" and another is not unless you preface it as your opinion. I am sure Curt is well aware of that though from reading this forum alone, we can"t agree on anything, just look at VG for proof of that.

you must also keep in mind mages can front load damage and warriors and rogues back load damage. you are really opening a HUGE balancing can of worms with this approach IMO, not saying it cant work but fuck it would be tough with today current class structures.

I was actually working on a system that would make spellcasting duels more exciting, but I"m not sure it would work in practice.

Basically, you would still have a normal mana pool we"re all used to that you deplete as you cast. However, you have certain spells that are sort of like a Rogue"s "finishing moves" that, when fired, start a sort of back and forth exchange between the two mages. The target of the spell would have a few seconds to react with a "counterspell" and then you would in turn be able to react with your own counterspell. All the while these counterspells are also causing damage and consuming mana for each mage. Other abilities could be used in between these to create a strategy for forcing your opponent to let the original spell resolve. If it does, you gain a huge surge of mana back and the opponent takes a large amount of damage plus whatever effect the "finisher" had attached to it.

Granted, this was being designed for a smaller multiplayer game based on spellcasters and not really an MMO, but it might be interesting to tweak it some and make running out of mana less annoying - the better you play the more mana you will get back. Right now it wouldn"t work in an MMO simply because of the large scale PVP battles, if a Mage hit you with a finisher and you were trying to fight 2 other dudes, you might not have time to switch back to him. Still, I think something similar has potential, just needs to be reworked.

The single greatest aspect of playing a warrior is on the fly rage management. The ability to gauge and manage your rage supply sets warriors apart by light years, and really opens the door up for true skill advancement without being absurdly twitchy to the point of FPS standards. It"s what I consider to be core to the heart of the MMO genre right now -- this is a hobby entirely about management and organization and time, and the rage/energy mechanics are the ultimate embodiment of those aspects.

James said:

The single greatest aspect of playing a warrior is on the fly rage management. The ability to gauge and manage your rage supply sets warriors apart by light years, and really opens the door up for true skill advancement without being absurdly twitchy to the point of FPS standards. It"s what I consider to be core to the heart of the MMO genre right now -- this is a hobby entirely about management and organization and time, and the rage/energy mechanics are the ultimate embodiment of those aspects.

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Though the real solution to the mana issues is to just recruit hundreds of people. That way when you run out of mana you can just swap someone in.

Sorry...couldn"t resist. 8(

Zehn - Vhex said:

Sorry...couldn"t resist. 8(

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He says as the cocks fall out of his mouth...

Rage and Energy/Point systems are awesome. Each class should be unique like this. I"m very interested in the rune system DK"s are going to have.

Ngruk said:

Mana is a resource right?

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Well it"s taking the decision making and moving it to the short term rather then the long term. Long term decision making creates balance issues. Let"s put it this way...

Compare Rogue vs. Warlock. Assume they both do the same dps. The warlock will eventually run out of mana, the rogue never will. So the warlock gains no advantage for having a limited resource pool. Rogue is henceforth "overpowered."

Now let"s assume that the warlock does more dps until he runs out of mana. In short burst fights this makes the warlock overpowered with the consideration that the longer the fight lasts the more useless the warlock becomes more in line, unless a fight goes really long and then the rogue is overpowered.

It seems just simpler to just make mana a non-issue and the resource management should be more about "If I use this nuke now, I won"t be able to snare for 2 seconds" rather then, "If I use this nuke now and then 20 more times, I won"t be able to nuke anymore for 20 seconds."

I hope Zehn never makes a game.

I hope so too. I"d have to take a cut in pay and work shittier hours. Fuck that noise.