Divination change suggestion

[Kaziglu Bey]

It's already been discussed before, but the Divination school kicks in way too late for the assistance it provides, especially for the tips provided by Minor Divination.

My suggestion would be to retire it as an active school that contributes to levels/MPL and instead have its spells unlocked at set points in the progression, similar to how certain stories kick in without needing random chance, at specific points. You could easily justify having Minor Divination and Foresight VERY early on in order to provide their effects to people just starting out, where they are most useful, and pace everything else out at other sensible points. Divine Storyline can be done much later, maybe even at the point Divination unlocks right now without it being too bad, but getting Minor Divination at /Temple of Darkness/ is kinda pointless for most of the results.

Or, if possible, keep Divination as a school with MPL and instead unlock the spells at set points, with subsequent level requirements, and drop Divination from Temple of Darkness to, idk, the end of the School Basement?

[archmag]

Why change something so minor to create other issues? Currently low tier spell in Divination works exactly like most low tier spells in other schools (Minor Heal and Enchant Mana Sprouts are the only two exceptions). How ofter did you use Create Water or Magic Show or Summon Mouse? They become pretty useless very quickly. Same with this spell, it gives barely any useful info and then becomes useless when you unlock all tips. It even says so in its hint ("Divination may seem a little useless at first, but its real purpose is to reveal how to trigger Storylines, which will let you advance further in the game! (Requires Lv20)").

Instead of spoiling stuff for you too early, the game lets you discover things yourself and then this spell is used to check if you found everything and covers few things which you could have missed. Imagine it was unlocked where you suggested and then spoiled all the schools which are unlocked later and even told a tip about farming Ancient Scrolls. It would be seriously out of place.

Just to change how useless spell works (which is useless intentionally based on Divination tip) you suggest to rework the whole school mechanics and develop a totally separate way for a school to work. What's the point? Is it really worth any effort to change this? What would have changed if you got all these "secret" tips earlier?

What tips are even actually secrets from that list and not some obvious knowledge? One which is good to know is about regen outside of combat. Another about events which take more time to trigger the longer you are in the run. And the final one about beating headmaster in 12 minutes. These three ones are missable and not clear without the extra tip, but all the rest are pretty obvious if you just read what you are using while you play so they don't give you any extra info, so it doesn't matter if you get them earlier or later.

[Kaziglu Bey]

I just think that a lot of the tips would benefit newer players and it's bizarre to get them at Temple of Darkness. I also suggested a way by which Divination wouldn't need to be altered that much at all.

If the tips are pointless, why have them in the game? If the tips are late, why not figure a way to have them sooner? The actual story-spoiler spell can be left where it is or even later, that's not my point.

[archmag]

Originally posted by Kaziglu Bey:

I just think that a lot of the tips would benefit newer players and it's bizarre to get them at Temple of Darkness. I also suggested a way by which Divination wouldn't need to be altered that much at all.

You suggested to remake the way the school works. It is not the same as "wouldn't need to be altered". You suggested new mechanics - school which is not tied to MPL (so decided to sacrifice production and research bonuses for this improvement) and spells that unlock based on progression instead of school level.

If the tips are pointless, why have them in the game?

To have a filler initial spell for a school which gives important tips about unlocking the stories and allows you to trigger them easier. Pointless stuff is needed so that important stuff looks important compared to it.

If the tips are late, why not figure a way to have them sooner?

They are not late, they are mostly irrelevant to any player. Do you not know that you can stun bosses to stop their strong attacks with stun potions when you unlock those stun potions? Do you not know that Conjuration school focuses on creating resource after checking few spells? Do you not know that casting a spell that makes the time flow twice as fast lets you farm twice as fast while idling? Most tips are pretty basic.

The actual story-spoiler spell can be left where it is or even later, that's not my point.

I wasn't talking about another spell. I was saying that some tips in the first spell are spoilers too if you get them before the point where the school is unlocked now.

School is useful because story hints and story triggers which it provides are important. Moving school earlier adds too many spoilers without remaking it. Remaking the school based on useless first spell is overkilling.

[Kaziglu Bey]

ok man, agree to disagree I guess

[Serpentarius]

Divination is also insanely useful later on due to the spell it unlocks at level 35, Divine Magical knowledge. A spell that grants 90 seconds of research time to a single school, castable with no cooldown. Giving access to that early would break the game, period.

Since it has no cooldown you can have it cast almost 3 times a second (minimum cooldown is 0.34) meaning every second you can get almost 4 and a half minutes worth of research from the spell when it's going full tilt.

This is not something you should have access to early and the cost of the spell wisely reflects this, even so its one of the strongest grinding spells in the game for online play. It's what gave me the push I needed to finish the game the first time, and Im pretty certain if I had access to it earlier, it would ahve made the game too easy early on and I would have lost interest.

[Etalus]

Hey I agree with OP. Should really be a more "meta" school. Give new players those tips!

[FluffySquirrel]

Yeah, getting the tips so late in the game just feels utterly bizarre to me as well. People pointing out that the level 35 spell is good .. .. like, you know you can't get to level 35 that easy right at the start of the game yeah?
Also, they could just have that spell only be unlocked by the darkness temple instead, if they wanted

There just seems absolutely no reason to lock divination off as late as it is, it's a weird choice

[Samoth]

Minor divinition needs more or better uses, it very quickly becomes irrelevant. And unlike other spells which still maybe useful in certain situations it really has no use once the clues have been opened. But, the problem lies in that, that status is forever once you've crossed the threshold. Even in rebirth it essentially is useless(s), for once we as players know the outline of the clues, or advice, etc. There simply is no situation where it can be useful. Even most of the lowliest spells has some use, even after rebirth, some function it fulfills. This one just drops off the radar. I'm on my first playthrough and I now already know all of those clues, and most all of the storylines. With more than 50% of the story revealed, minor divination goes into the minor wastebasket, after I reach the end of the game this first time. Which could be awhile. But, that spell(specifically) will never have a use again, which is unique AFAIK ATM.
As an example given using summon mouse, or water or magic show were seen as not helpful. But they are, the rate at which you can cast that spell as an advanced user overcomes to a degree that it lacks in power. We are the combat multiplier. And I would go so far as to say it is likely safer to use a horde of assistants, or whatever they are called, casting the small heal heal than 5 guys casting the big one. There is a pro-forma ratio there to be min/max'ed. This is not so for a spell like minor. It has absolutely no use afterwards. If all it did was give an indication of if a chests contents were dangerous or not, then it may still be useful after the 'tips' point
but I'd rather have a horde of pals casts the static spell then 5 casting landslide. If it were more effective. What that grants you is magnitude control and degrees of variance, not so with minor, it works or it never will. Do you see? They are different, and suggesting that the suggested way is 'bad' is also bad form. Granted you underlined with example and reference. But still, talking someone down for a suggestion and n invitation to debate is hardly a good use for either of you, or me. It was just a suggestion, the studio didn't drop everything and start working solely on this.. lighten up, have a good one!

[Samoth]

As well it has the shortest list of spell per element/type in game. Foresight at least has some use, but minor div has no applicable uses.