Elemental Buffs spells Last only 10s?

[Azmodeus]

Can i get it higher ? can someone post how long they got just so i know how high it can reach.

I cant apply elemental effect on any enemy as it only lasts 10s and im on 18 Fire Virtue Using Flame Weapon.

[Hanzo]

Originally posted by grandma_moses:

Originally posted by Hanzo:

Even if you somehow put 5% in piece you'll get 100 + 7 * 5 = 135. 10 * 1.35 = 13.5 so 3 seconds is not that big

It's 35%, which is a sizable increase. You can make any number sound small if you formulate like you do. :)

That said, even with no upgrades, it's still ABC for damage like in every game. Always be casting. And when you watch a boss fly away and you stand there for a second doing nothing, you could have always just applied that buff and it would never leave you worse off, it will always be better than having any sort of downtime. Always.

It IS small if we speak in absolute numbers. Maybe passive worth it or you could get other benefits, but in general 13.5 seconds is not much

[Катюша]

Elemental buffs are definitely worth it, especially when used against an enemy's weakness. As all enemies seem to have an elemental weakness.

For example Lighting Weapon destroys Shuigui and Zhupolong, as well as the larger fat axe wielding humanoids. It absolutely makes the Assassin enemies and most humanoids a joke too, as it seems to go through their guard.

The duration is definitely lacking, but if you want perpetual elements on your weaponry, then just embed it.

I find it's best to weave buffing in during combos when high Spirit. Good opportunity to do so is after Fatal Striking the enemy, as they are getting up.

There is one thing I have noticed about elements. There is no longer Discord, right? Is there an equivalent in this game?

[Khryst]

Originally posted by HighLanderPony:

Sounds cool, wish the game explained ANY of this.

it sorta does.

but you have to look at what each debuff does in the documents>effect icons.

For example look up Heaviness and it says Lowers Lightning resistance, increases spirit damage received.

and each of them have that.

[Arani]

Amazing tips here. I'd really love to make a build that just specializes against every element, at the same time. Weapons can handle 1 element each, and then we still have 4 spell slots. Ideally it would be fun to get spells for ranged nuking, melee survival and high damage like that stone slab thing, something against multiple enemies at once and finally the heal / damage ignore buff. That way no matter what the game threw at you, you'd be prepared in one form or another.

This all reminds me of Neverwinter Nights gameplay back when it came out ages ago. It had such amazing features I really wish would have made it to mainstream gaming. Friendly fire meant that the spells could be kept at their original strength, and for example fireballs would absolutely destroy everything in a room, including your own party. That's why you wanted elemental protection spells, so you could cast them on your melees while they were charging ahead, and then if need be, you could nuke the entire room pretty much killing or seriously harming anything in there. But my most memorable ability was the counterspell. At any time you wished, you could just forego normal casting and focus on countering a specific spellcaster, as long as you had the spells required to counter theirs, you would automatically use them whenever they tried to do something. Basically you'd both be nullifying each other, but your warriors would be free to wail on them while they were defenseless.

I really hope future DLC's and ng+ modes will feature portions with extremely aggressive environmental magics and casters, where playing a caster yourself would be a completely different gameplay experience as you would counter them and retaliate.

[SpeedFreak3]

LevelUps in wood virtue will increase your spell duration to a maximum of 150% when maxed out.
Like the special effects on gear, this aint much but but since having at least some amount of wood virtue to increase your HP it can add up a few seconds.

[HighLanderPony]

Originally posted by kblaze13:

Originally posted by HighLanderPony:

Sounds cool, wish the game explained ANY of this.

it sorta does.

but you have to look at what each debuff does in the documents>effect icons.

For example look up Heaviness and it says Lowers Lightning resistance, increases spirit damage received.

and each of them have that.

Yeah, I'm aware of that but look at what the person wrote – It's as long as a short novel, yet the game barely touches on the subject.

[D. Flame]

Magic over all is useless in this game. Buffs, AoEs, and damage skills all suck. I am level 40-something. I have every single stat point in Earth, and they still do terrible damage, less that a basic attack from my spear.

They don't even stop enemies. Like I got the ground spikes hoping it could be used against charging tigers. The just pass right through it, take pathetic amounts of damage, then hit me anyway. The Quick sand that is supposed to pull enemies together, ends so quickly, it is almost impossible to use it tactically.

Game has trash balance.

[Electro]

All the weapon buffs actually last 8-8.2sec by default. But mine lasts 17sec.
On a Wood build it's amazing because it scales with my weapon as the main stat and also increases Lightning damage. And the weapon buffs damage depends on the amount you have in that element. With how long my buffs last, it's also cutting the cost to keep it up by 53% as well as the fact I am casting it less to spend more time dealing damage and getting spirit instead of casting it again and again. Then just dump all my excess spirit into the Spirit Attack which I always have too much of as I only use my Spirit on this 1 buff when playing solo. I got 175.1% spell duration, +20.3% Positive Effect and 349 Lightning Attack Power in total with my 99 Wood and 23 Metal. Going to go 99/2/2/50/1 at level 150 and switch over to The Great Talent of a King's Advisor set when I get 5 star pieces. The Lightning damage makes up a big portion of my damage and also increases the amount healed from Absorb Vitality. I have absolutely no problem keeping my weapon buff up at all times.

Also builds that relies on keeping up buffs should always have imo at least 20 Metal then more points into Wood or Metal to make it more cost effective. Preferably making 1 of these 2 stats as the main to bring to 99. And not like there is really anything else to spend spirit on, as pure offensive spells and Martial Arts suck compared to mashing normal attack with a weapon buff and Spirit Attack.

[Zeph]

Originally posted by Arani:

A lot of people talk about using buffs, weapon or otherwise. Personally I've found them so useless I haven't bothered. Saw some guide about how fire elemental buffs are great against Ayoe so I tried that in ng+, and no matter how much I spammed that and the fire AoE burn I couldn't even build up the burn debuff on the enemy, and that's exactly in line with all my other experiences. I'm no expert here but it seems that unless you really, *really* build for it, status effects are largely useless. Granted, if you want to try using them you should know spells in general work differently from the usual here and even with the few good buffs we have you're not supposed to cast them once before the fight and that's it. Instead, the idea is to cast them inbetween the enemy combos, and then use deflects and attacks to build up your spirit again.

But I would say your points are better invested in the few defensive buffs that matter and the few offensive spells that actually scratch something. :D

Absorb Vitality is very popular. While it seems useless and barely heals anything with normal attacks, if you use it before you do crits it'll actually restore a lot of your health. And in line with the above, it's fast enough that you can just ignore it and only cast it when the enemy spirit is broken, just before you go in for that crit.

Then by the time you play the game through you'll finally get access to Perfect Restoral which is a real game changer, as it simply makes the next attack that hits you be completely ignored. Including staggers and everything. While it's spent even when you block, it stays on through deflects. Against random normal enemies it's great because they tend to sneak in a staggering attack or a crit through your combos, and this lets you just keep on wailing. It turns most fights that would be a fight, into a onesided stomp. It's even better against bosses since almost every boss only has a few moves that are really dangerous and hard to deflect. You deflect what you can normally, and this will make sure that the instant or tricky red attack that alone usually kills you, will do nothing at all. After the buff procs and is dropped, you can cast it again and resume attacking faster than the boss can recover.

Imposing slab is very situational, but its amazing for getting some breathing room, and against enemies weak to earth it does a ton of hp and spirit damage.

And last but not least, there's Ominous Chill. Which is arguably the best ranged offensive spell in the game. It's really slow and requires the enemy to stay still to hit them, but it hits like a truck and with most bosses it does a ton of spirit damage AND is one of the very few exceptions to the whole status buildup issues, since 2-3 of those will usually chill the enemy (pun intended).

I've tried most of the other spells too but because we're limited to 4, these are typically the best picks I've found.

Aoye uses water attacks, why would fire help? ou gotta consult the diagram thing in the tutorial menu but Earth is the counter to water. Stone elemental is what you wanna shoot for.

Same goes for people, if they buff poison, thats metal so go fire. If they go Lightning, thats wood so go Metal, etc etc.

[Arani]

Originally posted by Zeph:

Originally posted by Arani:

A lot of people talk about using buffs, weapon or otherwise. Personally I've found them so useless I haven't bothered. Saw some guide about how fire elemental buffs are great against Ayoe so I tried that in ng+, and no matter how much I spammed that and the fire AoE burn I couldn't even build up the burn debuff on the enemy, and that's exactly in line with all my other experiences. I'm no expert here but it seems that unless you really, *really* build for it, status effects are largely useless. Granted, if you want to try using them you should know spells in general work differently from the usual here and even with the few good buffs we have you're not supposed to cast them once before the fight and that's it. Instead, the idea is to cast them inbetween the enemy combos, and then use deflects and attacks to build up your spirit again.

But I would say your points are better invested in the few defensive buffs that matter and the few offensive spells that actually scratch something. :D

Absorb Vitality is very popular. While it seems useless and barely heals anything with normal attacks, if you use it before you do crits it'll actually restore a lot of your health. And in line with the above, it's fast enough that you can just ignore it and only cast it when the enemy spirit is broken, just before you go in for that crit.

Then by the time you play the game through you'll finally get access to Perfect Restoral which is a real game changer, as it simply makes the next attack that hits you be completely ignored. Including staggers and everything. While it's spent even when you block, it stays on through deflects. Against random normal enemies it's great because they tend to sneak in a staggering attack or a crit through your combos, and this lets you just keep on wailing. It turns most fights that would be a fight, into a onesided stomp. It's even better against bosses since almost every boss only has a few moves that are really dangerous and hard to deflect. You deflect what you can normally, and this will make sure that the instant or tricky red attack that alone usually kills you, will do nothing at all. After the buff procs and is dropped, you can cast it again and resume attacking faster than the boss can recover.

Imposing slab is very situational, but its amazing for getting some breathing room, and against enemies weak to earth it does a ton of hp and spirit damage.

And last but not least, there's Ominous Chill. Which is arguably the best ranged offensive spell in the game. It's really slow and requires the enemy to stay still to hit them, but it hits like a truck and with most bosses it does a ton of spirit damage AND is one of the very few exceptions to the whole status buildup issues, since 2-3 of those will usually chill the enemy (pun intended).

I've tried most of the other spells too but because we're limited to 4, these are typically the best picks I've found.

Aoye uses water attacks, why would fire help? ou gotta consult the diagram thing in the tutorial menu but Earth is the counter to water. Stone elemental is what you wanna shoot for.

Same goes for people, if they buff poison, thats metal so go fire. If they go Lightning, thats wood so go Metal, etc etc.

Yeah I got that. I have a pic on my desktop now that I consult with magic stuff, since it makes zero sense beyond water > fire. Fire counters metal? Yeah no, it really doesn't. It counters wood, but not in this game. Earth counters water? Like.... how? And then metal counters wood as in lightning, when metal is literally a conductor. While lightning is strong against earth - you know the thing that grounds lightning and makes it useless. Speaking of metal, it's called that but there's nothing metallic in there. It's all just poison. Why isn't it just called the poison element? And even then, why do you have like 5 different poison bubbles, what's the difference? It's all the same "throw a blob of poison", why have 5 different versions of the exact same thing? It's not even melee poison vs. ranged poison vs. aoe poison. It's just the same AoE blob of poison with different animations. And why is wood, ie. lightning, named wood when there's nothing wood-like there either? Like, absolutely nothing about that makes any kind of intuitive sense and most of it is the polar opposite of how physics or chemistry work.

You would at least think they arranged the spell schools in the game in an order that countered each other? You know, so you could easily check "ok this page is fire, and the next is metal, ohh and the next is wood? No. It's all arbitrary there too.

You have to literally unlearn everything you know about how stuff works, and constantly refer to a cheat sheet of what counters what, to understand how the elemental counters in this game work. xD

[D. Flame]

Water beats fire: obvious
Fire beats Metal: fire makes metal softer, melts it, etc.
Metal beats wood: like an axe cutting down a tree, or a lightning rod redirecting lightning
Wood beats earth: plants force their way through the soil
Earth beats water: water is absorbed by earth

[Hanzo]

Originally posted by Tiasmoon:

Originally posted by Hanzo:

Ayoe uses Ice/Water so probably Earth will aim for vulnerability

So they were using a Virtue the boss was highly resistant too?

I cannot be sure, because they could have different element defense, but probably they will have biggest stat in water, which gives res to fire. The game allows you to remove debufs from yourself if you use counter element and also provides additional spirit gain. So if they are burning they could easily remove this status with Ice/Water attack

[Tiasmoon]

Originally posted by HighLanderPony:

Originally posted by kblaze13:

it sorta does.

but you have to look at what each debuff does in the documents>effect icons.

For example look up Heaviness and it says Lowers Lightning resistance, increases spirit damage received.

and each of them have that.

Yeah, I'm aware of that but look at what the person wrote – It's as long as a short novel, yet the game barely touches on the subject.

The game doesnt need to. The stuff written here is something players can figure out on their own based on the information the game provides. Which can be find in the information topics in the menu.

I guess one fault then, would be that there is no tutorial of the menu..

[Kashra Fall]

Originally posted by Tiasmoon:

Originally posted by HighLanderPony:

Yeah, I'm aware of that but look at what the person wrote – It's as long as a short novel, yet the game barely touches on the subject.

The game doesnt need to. The stuff written here is something players can figure out on their own based on the information the game provides. Which can be find in the information topics in the menu.

I guess one fault then, would be that there is no tutorial of the menu..

The main fault is having no dojo this time around to actually test things. It looks like we SHOULD have one, aka the guy who said "I train new warriors, but you don't look like you need it." but it might be a DLC content drop later, who knows?

[Arani]

Originally posted by D. Flame:

Water beats fire: obvious
Fire beats Metal: fire makes metal softer, melts it, etc.
Metal beats wood: like an axe cutting down a tree, or a lightning rod redirecting lightning
Wood beats earth: plants force their way through the soil
Earth beats water: water is absorbed by earth

Actually good point. So the "logic" is basically how a 2:nd century person would view it. Fire is used to bend metal to its will etc. the rest of being as you said, basically a layman's view from that time. It actually does make sense from that PoV. I still don't understand why metal is really poison, or wood is really lightning, but I suppose some kind of similar perhaps cultural logic exists there too.