As things stand now, there is little benefit to obtaining 5 ranks in a skill for the cost of the points ( it's likely worse for semis ). Instead I find myself using 200 CMAN points for a single offensive maneuver that is more roleplay than use.

Auvreaian, your Combat Maneuver training is as follows:

Skill name Mnemonic Ranks
Mighty Blow mblow 1
Sunder Shield sunder 4 <-- JUST THIS ONE
Charge charge 3
Subdual Strike sstrike 3
Specialization I wspec1 3
Weapon Bonding bonding 5
Combat Mobility mobility 1
Combat Toughness toughness 2
Bull Rush bullrush 2
Surge of Strength surge 2
Parry Mastery pmastery 3
Cunning Defense cdefense 5
Spell Parry sparry 3
Griffin's Voice griffin 2
Whirling Dervish dervish 2

Available Combat Maneuver Training Points: 1

There are some absolute wonderful maneuvers out there, but I can't justify them in the end game because they are too slow. Instead, I ply my points to become as defensible as I possibly can. Coup rocks the proverbial socks! 8 seconds, though?

Really?

Introducing Maneuver Mastery!

Within 10 levels under and over the user's current level, any endroll in increments of 25 over the base result of 125 should reduce the RT of said action by one second with a maximum reduction of 3 seconds ( no cman should be shorter than 3 seconds because balance ). There's a catch, though. Require 5 ranks in the said skill to activate. 4 ranks to make the increments of 50 instead to promote the dedication of points into a skill if you are more forgiving.

Using coup as an example, at 4 ranks if my endroll is 160, the RT is lowered to 7 seconds. At 5 ranks, that same endroll would allow the user to accomplish the same feat with a 6 second roundtime.

It's never going to be as efficient as 3 seconds of soft RT, but it would make the choices more interesting.

~James/Auvreaian

Not running out of mana (for swinging weapons) used to be considered a limiting factor, but there are now things like "+40 mana recovery potions" (through Alchemy) available--and these can work in combination with 'mana pulse'--or "take a sip to get mana" (also through Alchemy).
So generally speaking I agree that there is very little (if any) enforced parity from that standpoint.

The other significant hindrance to spellcasters was always maneuvers, so encumbrance was the metric to look at. Between spells that specifically reduce it--clerics with their "You Carry Lot Coin", or sorcerers with Phase, and so on--and outright encumbrance reduction (like in the SimuCoin store)...
Yeah, those aren't nearly the threat they used to was.

I tend not to think that the "lack of CMan skill"/weakness to the maneuvers is enough of a vulnerability to casters.

I think the biggest design problem with CMANs is they are almost all one on one affairs with 5 seconds of rate. Its not the rate in vacuum, its in combination with the one on one nature.