To the dev Battle Magos is underwhelming here's how you can fix it

[Neo007]

First off great game and congratulations to the dev on what seems (judging by the early feedback) a running success.

Don't mean to be rude by telling you what to do after all your hardwork, sacrifice and very well received implementation (you'll always have some internet trolls because well its the internet).

However, that is exactly what I'm going to do, tell you how you can improve this class to make it more fun to play, differentiate the class a bit more and make it more in line with the easier to build and more powerful classes like armsmaster, rogue and ranger. You can ignore it or utilise my feedback as you deem fit (thankfully we still live in a free world...)


-spell burn is way underpowered, 6 dp cost (= skill points for those just discovering this game) with such minimal attunement gain (=mp) makes no sense. 6 dp is the equivalent of 2 levels worth of dp for a truly lackluster spell/utility. It is a self damage move on a 3 round cooldown that only scales in self damage and not amount of attunement gained.

3-6 attunement recovered at 1-4 damage plus (magical aptitude) self damage is attrocious.
even given a relatively low 4 magical aptitude thats 3-6 "mp" at 1-8 damage SELF damage for a squishy class, it only gets worse as you improve magic aptitude. The low vitality of the magos means you can only burn about 3 MAYBE 4 times (at higher levels!!) before your're just about dead and need to rest - which makes it useless since you can just rest or use a potion anyway for a MUCH better return and no risk. Potions and food for rest is easy to comeby so negligible cost by comparison. Spells cost ~5-6 attunement minimum for most offensive (tier 1!!!) spells except for the tier 1 earth spell Gnat Swarm.

Suggestions: Have attunement recovery also scale with aptitude and remove the 3 round cool down. Still high risk but also now high reward.

Also increase vitality (hp) gain per level from 2 to 3 or 4 for battle magos, regular magos can remain the same.

alternatively you could just change it from a self damage spell to enemy damage at short or melee range and keep everything else as is, it is still relatively low efficacy especially when compared to other classes. However, its now low cost to use (balanced by the potential negative of being in close range) and the cooldown gives players something to look forward to every 3 rounds if they are in range. It serves as a soft reward or compliment for melee builds which appears to be the theme of this class.

-spells cost way too much attunement for their value in battle especially considering their relatively low damage, with the regular magos not so much because he/she can be built as utility/summon ranged character. But with squishy mostly close range fire spells for a battle magos especially in the beginning, along with low health and no defensive feats its just not worth it.

suggestion: Reduce spell costs by introducing tier 2 or tier 3 spell cost reduction feats for Battle Magos, you could make them work only with melee spells to further emphasize and empower the melee mage theme. A straight up spell cost reduction for both magos classes (at least for high risk melee and close range spells) would work but this way gives more build variety and depth while still rewarding player for high risk play. Where as current implementation is just punishing like banging your head against a wall so you can claim your head is harder - I may be one of the few which that level of needless "difficulty" might spur me on for a bit but for most its just a turn off.

Alternatively, or concurrently you could give Battle Magos unique feature of being rewarded with 2 attunement with each cascade. Barely anything on its own but incrementally can make for a powerful class with a cascade + magical aptitude build that can proc 4 spell casts a battle. The proc nature of it and limited attunement makes it balanced, but gives as big a dopamine hit as actual gambling when you do "hit the jackpot".


-Damage per round is underwhelming compared to other classes especially considering limited attunement.


Suggestions: (See above) Implementing most of the suggestions above would already bring the battlemagos inline with more powerful classes while not making it instantly more powerful just rewardingly viable as a melee mage.

New suggestion: use lore skill to determine enemy resistances to further differentiate mage classes so they ad unique utility, since they get lore buffs anyways since you need mage spells to exploit elemental weaknesses "it just works" . Also give Battle magos elemental melee spells for each school that scale and function similarly to flaming fist. They dont need to be the exact same but having tier 1 or tier 2 spells will reward a build that diversifies by allowing them to have spell options for each enemy weakness.


Ultimately, you would still need to build a good character even if you implemented all or nearly all of these magos buffs for the class to benefit and strategy would still be important along with utilising other class synergies. Even with all these suggestions implemented the class wouldn't eclipse the early or end power of an armsmaster allowing the armsmaster ,and other classes, to still shine in their categories.


However, the above changes would also increase potential *viable* options in combat for the magos which goes a long way towards (and in my opinion more important than) making the class more powerful or as powerful as the other melee classes.

[PastLow]

I noticed that the spellburn ability has the "fire" tag, doesn't that mean that it would be reduced by fire resistance? In other words once you max out the fire tree you don't take damage from it?

[Neo007]

Originally posted by PastLow:

I noticed that the spellburn ability has the "fire" tag, doesn't that mean that it would be reduced by fire resistance? In other words once you max out the fire tree you don't take damage from it?

well anyone who has maxed out the fire tree could let us know. still underwhelming ability though at that point a 3-6 combat only attunement ability on a 3 round cool down wont mean much if you got 50 plus potions rattling around in your pack.

[Arclight]

I maxed out the fire tree in my playtrough as a guild-mage, and yes you dont take damage from it, sadly its a complete waste of 3 feat points as the attunement you get from it especially at higher levels is barely a pixel on the bar.

[Neo007]

Originally posted by Arclight:

I maxed out the fire tree in my playtrough as a guild-mage, and yes you dont take damage from it, sadly its a complete waste of 3 feat points as the attunement you get from it especially at higher levels is barely a pixel on the bar.

my point exactly, thanks for the info

[PastLow]

In my opinion the biggest problem with battlemagos is that they didn't lean enough into the fighter/rogue side. The current battlemagos has such a pathetic combat feat tree that it's not even worth investing in at all. The worst part is probably that there's no bonuses to light armor utilization (reducing encumbrance) despite the class getting light armor proficiency compared to the guild magos.

The end result is you end up with the exact same play style as a guild magos except with less spell selection. Considering that Guild magos should have close to 2 maxed skill trees by the end game, this is actually a huge downside.

In my opinion the best way to fix the class would be to give it light armor utilization and a mini backstab bonus. Battlemagos already has evasive and fancy footwork, that's basically 90% of what you need to make a backstab build work, aside from the backstab ability itself of course.

You could replace the arcane font tree (replacing it with a downgraded Thief's "Survival" Tree), the useless awareness bonuses from the trickster tree (replacing it with backstab damage), and the spell burn skill (replacing it with backstab initiate). Also, rather than Fire, the class should specialize in AIr spells for the defensive and mobility buffs and teleports air spells give, which is perfect for a rogue build.

With these changes, Battlemagos would have roughly half the damage output of a thief combined with half the utility of a guild magos, instead of just being half a guild magos as it is currently.

[Neo007]

Originally posted by PastLow:

In my opinion the biggest problem with battlemagos is that they didn't lean enough into the fighter/rogue side. The current battlemagos has such a pathetic combat feat tree that it's not even worth investing in at all. The worst part is probably that there's no bonuses to light armor utilization (reducing encumbrance) despite the class getting light armor proficiency compared to the guild magos.

The end result is you end up with the exact same play style as a guild magos except with less spell selection. Considering that Guild magos should have close to 2 maxed skill trees by the end game, this is actually a huge downside.

In my opinion the best way to fix the class would be to give it light armor utilization and a mini backstab bonus. Battlemagos already has evasive and fancy footwork, that's basically 90% of what you need to make a backstab build work, aside from the backstab ability itself of course.

You could replace the arcane font tree (replacing it with a downgraded Thief's "Survival" Tree), the useless awareness bonuses from the trickster tree (replacing it with backstab damage), and the spell burn skill (replacing it with backstab initiate). Also, rather than Fire, the class should specialize in AIr spells for the defensive and mobility buffs and teleports air spells give, which is perfect for a rogue build.

With these changes, Battlemagos would have roughly half the damage output of a thief combined with half the utility of a guild magos, instead of just being half a guild magos as it is currently.

great points, there are a lot of ways to improve the class another poster pointed out that that the solo dev had several more classes planned originally, I suspect the gap in the Battlemagos abilities is because he left development room for these other classes so they could shine(he had several classes planned including an Assassin class and Augur class so wonder how that might have looked) then pulled them before full launch. Who knows maybe he plans to release additional classes as a dlc later depending on reception of the game or other factors.

[Candyman2000]

Originally posted by Neo007:

Originally posted by PastLow:

In my opinion the biggest problem with battlemagos is that they didn't lean enough into the fighter/rogue side. The current battlemagos has such a pathetic combat feat tree that it's not even worth investing in at all. The worst part is probably that there's no bonuses to light armor utilization (reducing encumbrance) despite the class getting light armor proficiency compared to the guild magos.

The end result is you end up with the exact same play style as a guild magos except with less spell selection. Considering that Guild magos should have close to 2 maxed skill trees by the end game, this is actually a huge downside.

In my opinion the best way to fix the class would be to give it light armor utilization and a mini backstab bonus. Battlemagos already has evasive and fancy footwork, that's basically 90% of what you need to make a backstab build work, aside from the backstab ability itself of course.

You could replace the arcane font tree (replacing it with a downgraded Thief's "Survival" Tree), the useless awareness bonuses from the trickster tree (replacing it with backstab damage), and the spell burn skill (replacing it with backstab initiate). Also, rather than Fire, the class should specialize in AIr spells for the defensive and mobility buffs and teleports air spells give, which is perfect for a rogue build.

With these changes, Battlemagos would have roughly half the damage output of a thief combined with half the utility of a guild magos, instead of just being half a guild magos as it is currently.

great points, there are a lot of ways to improve the class another poster pointed out that that the solo dev had several more classes planned originally, I suspect the gap in the Battlemagos abilities is because he left development room for these other classes so they could shine(he had several classes planned including an Assassin class and Augur class so wonder how that might have looked) then pulled them before full launch. Who knows maybe he plans to release additional classes as a dlc later depending on reception of the game or other factors.

Just add a sling in just like bg and that would balance mages out nicely.

[Andhaira]

Spellburn needs to be fixed; it obviously needs to add attunement bonus to the attunement gained like it adds attunement bonus to the vitality lost. In fact, to make it viable at higher levels it should add/subtract TWICE or even THRICE the attunement bonus in vitality & attunement, but be usable once per combat. Sort of like a last ditch attempt by a Magos to turn the battle around at the cost of almost dying.

Arcane Rush should also be tweaked a bit; maybe it gives a temporary boost to the Cascade stat or makes the next couple of spells auto cascade.

Other than that the Battlemagos needs proficiency in medium armor should be able to straight off start in the Swords tree, rather than have to waste points on Light Blades. It should have full access to all Swords trees as well as medium armor prof. Also, 4HP / Level, if not 5.

Thing is, the BM is already MAD; unlike dedicated melee or mage/priest classes it will need to split its attributes instead of specializing. Same with Feats. So its already paying a price for hybriding, ensuring it won't dominate the niche of any other class. No need to further penalize it by making it pay more feat taxes (i.e. wasting points on light blades before going into swords)

[Frostfeather]

I don't think it can be fixed. There are too many fundamental issues, unfortunately.

[Ace-Of-Blades]

Originally posted by PastLow:

In my opinion the biggest problem with battlemagos is that they didn't lean enough into the fighter/rogue side. The current battlemagos has such a pathetic combat feat tree that it's not even worth investing in at all. The worst part is probably that there's no bonuses to light armor utilization (reducing encumbrance) despite the class getting light armor proficiency compared to the guild magos.

The end result is you end up with the exact same play style as a guild magos except with less spell selection. Considering that Guild magos should have close to 2 maxed skill trees by the end game, this is actually a huge downside.

In my opinion the best way to fix the class would be to give it light armor utilization and a mini backstab bonus. Battlemagos already has evasive and fancy footwork, that's basically 90% of what you need to make a backstab build work, aside from the backstab ability itself of course.

You could replace the arcane font tree (replacing it with a downgraded Thief's "Survival" Tree), the useless awareness bonuses from the trickster tree (replacing it with backstab damage), and the spell burn skill (replacing it with backstab initiate). Also, rather than Fire, the class should specialize in AIr spells for the defensive and mobility buffs and teleports air spells give, which is perfect for a rogue build.

With these changes, Battlemagos would have roughly half the damage output of a thief combined with half the utility of a guild magos, instead of just being half a guild magos as it is currently.

Pretty much fully agree with this post. Hope the dev see's it and thinks the same.

As far as the skill tree's go it would make sense if one was geared more towards a mage/thief BM, like the Trickster Tree, and have another geared more towards a more fighter/mage BM.

As it stands it seems like the intention was to make the BM a fighter that dealt most of it's damage through fire spells. How it's playing, and I'm having fun with it, is as an agile de-buffer, with air spells, that helps my thief pull off more backstabs and gets in to position to help pin down enemies. It's fun but it's clearly gimped.

[Neo007]

Small update dev responded to message on discord basically saying that mana burn is not working as intended so at least he's noticing the feedback about magos (in this case specifically mana burn).

Pray or sacrifice a virgin or two to your favourite gaming god that the magos actually gets some love from this (mine is RNGeezus)

[andersonm]

yes, developer said that mana burn should NOT hurt you scaling up with your attunement.

One option for battle magos would be to reduce the cost of fire spells with each cascade. It would make for a nice "serial cast" / spend all your mana / repeat fireball type of playing. Maybe all spells but then swarm of gnat would be very cheap. Or all spells but to a minimum of X.

[Neo007]

Originally posted by andersonm:

yes, developer said that mana burn should NOT hurt you scaling up with your attunement.

One option for battle magos would be to reduce the cost of fire spells with each cascade. It would make for a nice "serial cast" / spend all your mana / repeat fireball type of playing. Maybe all spells but then swarm of gnat would be very cheap. Or all spells but to a minimum of X.

agreed, will need to update my write up at some point, the battle magos needs even more tuning to be relevant in later levels. The class just doesn't scale well even with all my proposed buffs. Was trying to be balanced and restrained in my suggestions the class is just so gimped its almost funny.

[Andhaira]

Originally posted by andersonm:

yes, developer said that mana burn should NOT hurt you scaling up with your attunement.

But will it add attunement bonus to attunement points provided? I have no issue with it hurting, in fact I think it should hurt more (maybe 2x attunement bonus or 3-4 times) as long as it provides a similar number of attunement points. It can be used once a battle or something, or even once per rest, to avoid scamming it.

Currently, at mid range or higher levels the amount of attunement provided by Spell burn is negligible.

[KlausKerner]

I agree, also started with the battle magos and I don't feel like I can really contribute much except lore and crafting
combat contribution is horrible