Magic build is too powerful

[adirdesire]

First off, I want to say how much I’ve been enjoying the game! The RPG mechanics are fun and flexible, and the spell system in particular is a blast to experiment with.

That said, I’ve noticed a potential balance issue when heavily investing in the Magic stat. A specific combination of spells allows me to become virtually untouchable, making most combat encounters trivial—even against high-level bosses and i'm playing on the hardest difficulty.

Here’s the combo I’m using:

1. impenetrable Shield – Negates the next hit entirely. The issue is that it can be recast instantly and repeatedly, faster than enemies can land attacks.

2. Flame torrent – Costs very little mana, deals AoE damage, burns enemies, and pushes them back. It’s extremely effective at keeping enemies away without any real downside.

3. skeleton army – Summons multiple zombies that fight for me. They seem to overwhelm enemies quickly and infinitely as long as I keep casting.

The result: I’m constantly protected, enemies can’t get close, and I have an ever-growing undead army doing the work for me. It makes the game feel unchallenging, even at higher levels.

I’m not sure if this is working as intended, but it feels like the magic build is significantly more powerful than strength or other paths. I’d love to see some balance tweaks in the future to keep the gameplay engaging across different builds.

there is also the matter of winter crone's wrath, which is a shotgun on a tap and a sniper on long press. basically makes the bow pointless.

but still, Thanks for all your hard work, and I’m looking forward to what’s next!

[wei270]

i agree even on a melee build i often just pull out the first bleed speed i get and bleed the enemy when i ran out of stamina,

melee build is much more reliant on stamina compare to magic build, you need stamina too attack and def and you are constantly at risk, while with magic you pretty much use 100% of mana for offence and still have stamina for dash. and you are alot safer compare to melee.

you need a proper risk and reward system, right now melee is like high risk, with the same reward as magic, but magic has almost no risk.

[Bakedlays]

I think it's working as intended because there doesn't appear to be much if any monsters that scale to your level. So pretty much any min-maxed build is going to get to a point where you break the game even on the highest difficulty. I've been playing as a dual wielder with light armor/stealth archer, and once you max out the healing and stamina restoration part of the critical tree (level 10ish) you can pretty much stand still and endlessly auto-attack vs anything except bosses, and if you can stealth attack a boss I was able to one-hit a few with head shots. In fact, the only point in the game where it felt difficult was the spike at the beginning of Act II because I was getting one-shot by some things, but once I got the red death skill tree I could literally not be killed by anything and attack endlessly. Magic might hit that overpowered point more quickly, but I think the game just needs a higher difficulty level because if you do all the quests you seem to get over leveled at a certain point.

[Johnny Wolf]

Becoming overpowered I believe is an intended feature. It's a reward for exploring the game and using it's systems. You can stomp anything in Act 1 and then get your ass beat in Act 2 with the same build.

[tshrimp]

Than I really stink. However, I as I play through the game and leveled up to get more powerful and do okay, but far from easy for me. But I did have to level up and do side quest to get there which is how it should be, but maybe it is just my build, but I am not overpowered at all.

[Lanterno]

Battle mage here. I can't say I'm having the same experience. Im getting bodied.

[Desna]

I fail to see how summons are of any uses personally. For me, they never get a chance to help in combat unless i just stand there and wait for them to catch up. Waste of max mana imo.

[Johnny Wolf]

Originally posted by Desna:

I fail to see how summons are of any uses personally. For me, they never get a chance to help in combat unless i just stand there and wait for them to catch up. Waste of max mana imo.

Summons can be used to boost your own power if you spec into it. They are useful, but their AI is really stupid. Battlemages are quite strong and don't die easily.

[M19*Haunter]

Originally posted by Desna:

I fail to see how summons are of any uses personally. For me, they never get a chance to help in combat unless i just stand there and wait for them to catch up. Waste of max mana imo.

You can summon them onto the heads of enemies and they will fight. Or bodyblock, sometimes its even better, lol.