Spell targeting broken?

[samuel_david_piper]

New to the game.

Casting an AOE spell on a creature directly targets the ground where the creature was when I cast the spell, which means the spell misses completely most of the time.

I don't remember any of the old IE games doing this - they always cast the spell on the creature regardless. This makes AOE spells incredibly difficult to target property without damaging the rest of the party or missing, as by the time the spells are ready to cast, most enemies will already have moved into melee range.

So am I missing something? Is this a deliberate feature or just bad design?

[Black_Rat]

This is deliberate... when targeting AE abilities you have a red circle and a outer yellow circle (the yellow is based on your INT) any allies in the yellow circle will NOT be hit by the spell (enemies will), but if they are in the red circle they will get hit.

[Meuh]

I had the same question when I started to play and somehow still have it. First you need to carefully check spells, some are affecting ennemies only, some affect all characters. I would tend to say choose them wisely but the the next question will be why would gale designer include so many spells that I would naturally avoid? This question still evades me.
Regarding the time, the solution is either to cast before the beginning of the combat which is not always possible since most spells are only available during combat. Second solution is to have melee tank fighter (or pets) that would stop ennemies while you cast which is the one I adopted.

I would be curtious to see how other players do.

[McKnuckles]

If they are moving then you have to aim in front of where they will be to hit them (so they run into the spell itself).

[Meuh]

Originally posted by McKnuckles:

If they are moving then you have to aim in front of where they will be to hit them (so they run into the spell itself).

Interesting approach, reminds me of Quake 3 and rocket launcher :-D
In that case it could ne a valuable addition to display speed vector of opponents during the pause on top of location circle.

[Xerberus86]

the IE games had it too, there were AOE spells and single target spells. remember glowing sphere (single target spell) and webbing (AoE) spell. now the aoe spells were ground targeted AND would harm EVERYONE (like it would be in theworld cause you ain't aiming a rocket launcher at your feed and think it won't hit you cause its your rocket launcher lol). PoE just gives you the range of that aoe spell, in the old IE games there weren't that ground targeters and you had to guess / learn the range & are of effect.

[samuel_david_piper]

After another few hours of playing, I have to say I really don't like this targeting system - trying to perfectly time getting the spell out to the right area while adjusting for monster and party movement is a total pain in the arse and makes spellcasters about as much fun to play as running the hurdles with a zimmer frame. Single target spells are the only effective spells to use because you can guarantee that they will at least strike the intended target and not be a complete waste of effort.

I appreciate that this may be some gamers' idea of challenge, but for me it's just poor design - don't get me started on having to constantly run back to an inn to rest, either. I've played pretty much every D&D game on PC that ever existed including the original IE games, of course, and they all evolved resting to something that didn't require grinding or tedious backtracking, because that just gets in the way of actually playing the game.

I also can't stand that you can only cast certain spells in combat, particularly protective spells for spellcasters - the whole point of buffs for me is that you use them before a battle, so that your characters can launch the offensive straight away. Trying to get buffs up while a horde of monsters runs towards you is not fun, particularly at low levels when some monsters are single-hitting my casters before they can get shields up anyway.

I guess I just prefer the mechanics of the older games, they weren't perfect, but PoE feels a lot like New Coke to me.

[jbridso]

Try pulling enemies using a druid Entangle and positioning tanks as they come in... gives you time to get your buffs off. Once the mobs swarm the tanks drop the big AoE lightshow on em being careful not to hit your tanks.

[DarkExcalibur42]

Originally posted by Xerberus86:

the IE games had it too, there were AOE spells and single target spells. remember glowing sphere (single target spell) and webbing (AoE) spell. now the aoe spells were ground targeted AND would harm EVERYONE (like it would be in theworld cause you ain't aiming a rocket launcher at your feed and think it won't hit you cause its your rocket launcher lol). PoE just gives you the range of that aoe spell, in the old IE games there weren't that ground targeters and you had to guess / learn the range & are of effect.

In the old IE games, targeting an AoE spell on an enemy would TRACK that foe and deliver it at the enemy's location.

If I cast a fireball at Irenicus, and he walks 10 feet to the left, the fireball will still be cast on Jon Irenicus. Not where he was standing.

[McKnuckles]

I sort of like that you have to learn to track enemy movement, and you also have to learn to not kill your teammates with a aoe spell along with getting into position to use said spell. But maybe that is just me (I sort of think the extra micromanagement makes a spellcaster more fun to play as).