>But cute cat pictures really get me.


http://www.ctvnews.ca/polopoly_fs/1.2880507.1461941777!/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/landscape_620/image.jpg













(sorry)

>VANKRASN39's picture

And it just so happened that on the day that VANKRASN39 posted the awful picture to the forums, that coincidentally Konacon decided to return his attention to Sorcerers to better 'balance' the class.

~Whirlin

Taverkin

So, providing deep lore training benefits - the sort that might define distinctive playstyles - is not high on the priority list? Well, that explains why my subscription has remained canceled for eight months. I still don't understand why nerfing rapid fire/immolate was a high priority while this remains a low priority.

You're correct about the desired end goal, but the project of implementing a single high end ability for each lore is unlikely to create new playstyles. It would ideally be a useful tool, but it would not suddenly be some character build that replaces existing hunting tactics or spells. More so, the reason it has been a low priority because of the focus on the next 5 wizard spell updates.

GameMaster Estild

<You're correct about the desired end goal, but the project of implementing a single high end ability for each lore is unlikely to create new playstyles. It would ideally be a useful tool, but <it would not suddenly be some character build that replaces existing hunting tactics or spells. More so, the reason it has been a low priority because of the focus on the next 5 wizard spell <updates.

Who said anything about only a single high end ability for each lore? As I've said about a hundred times, there is no way that a single spell should define a playstyle. That would be no better than rapid shock or immo!

Take your time I guess. I've been gone 8 months. I can stand to take another several years off while you figure it out. Besides, I wouldn't want you to mess anything up with a rush job. Heavens no! Never that!

~Taverkin

http://forums.play.net/forums/GemStone%20IV/Wizards/Major%20Elemental%20Circle/view/2001

Is there a reason you don't want to show us this data?

>EL:A's impact on 535 is utility and defensive. It allows you to perform non-offensive actions faster (such as foraging, searching, etc) and helps you recover from attacks which induce RT. -Estild

You sure about that? Because 506 is doing that, not 535. Whether that's intended or not, who knows.

spell active

You currently have the following active spells:
Elemental Defense I ................ 3:45:26
Elemental Defense II ............... 3:45:34
Elemental Defense III .............. 3:45:42
Elemental Targeting ................ 3:45:46
Elemental Barrier .................. 3:45:49
Thurfel's Ward ..................... 3:45:56
Elemental Deflection ............... 3:45:59
Elemental Bias ..................... 3:46:02
Strength ........................... 3:46:10
Elemental Focus .................... 3:46:58
Stone Skin ......................... 3:47:01
Haste .............................. 3:47:09
Temporal Reversion ................. 3:48:54
Natural Colors ..................... 0:00:10
Prismatic Guard .................... 3:48:57
Mass Blur .......................... 3:49:00
Melgorehn's Aura ................... 3:51:02
Call Familiar ...................... 1:42:05
Song of Luck ....................... 0:08:06
Kai's Triumph Song ................. 0:08:06

>Active spell list cleared.

>search
You don't find anything of interest here.
Roundtime: 3 sec.

>incant 506
You return to normal color.

You recite a series of mystical phrases while raising your hands, invoking Celerity...
Your spell is ready.
You gesture.
You and your group suddenly start moving light-footedly.
Cast Roundtime 3 Seconds.

>search
You don't find anything of interest here.
Roundtime: 3 sec.
Roundtime changed to 1 second.

You suddenly feel less light-footed.
>
Kave suddenly stops moving light-footedly.
>kneel
You kneel down.
>forage leaf
d100(Open): 78
As you carefully forage around you see no evidence of what you are looking for. You wonder if it could even be found in this terrain.
Roundtime: 5 sec.

>incant 506
You recite a series of mystical phrases while raising your hands, invoking Celerity...
Your spell is ready.
You gesture.
You suddenly start moving light-footedly.
Cast Roundtime 3 Seconds.

[ Celerity: +0:01:00, 0:01:00 remaining. ]
forage leaf
d100(Open): 75
As you carefully forage around you see no evidence of what you are looking for. You wonder if it could even be found in this terrain.
Roundtime: 6 sec.
Roundtime changed to 1 second.


>If a wizard is planning to hunt with offensive warding spells, Elemental Lore, Fire has a very significant impact, as illustrated by Methais.

Was this before or after you told us that 415 double cast vs. single target was a bug? Because nobody really cares very much about hitting 2 targets with it in comparison to double cast vs. one target. It's a cute novelty, but the single target double cast is much more in line with what wizards need than a double target cast.

That said, I do appreciate the fact that 415's "fix" is being delayed until these other spells go live. If nothing else, that's one thing I'm glad to see Simu has learned after the ELR disaster in regards to nerf now fix later.


>So I'm supposed to believe Elemental Lore, Air is worth training in (to "to recoup a fraction of the power they lost" or for any reason), but none of the Elemental lores are worth training in. Got it.

>"to recoup a fraction of the power they lost"

Are you suggesting that this isn't the case? If so, please explain why because I don't think anyone is going to understand otherwise.

I'm going to assume/hope you weren't speaking in a condescending tone, and instead is just a case of you just not understanding it from the perspective of people who actually play post cap wizards.

What we're saying is that at least as of right now, all this diversity you're talking about doesn't exist because almost everyone is going to go with fire/air because water and earth are still not worth investing TPs into over fire and air, except maybe for an earth/air war mage, which just reinforces the point that air lore is for the most part mandatory, be it for offense (war mage) or defense (everybody). 512 is ok (though the requirements and setup time is still too high, I mean if my math is right, it takes 200 ranks to have a 100% chance to shatter on a rank 5+ crit even, which would be acceptable if it was guaranteed to hit a vital area, but whatever), but we all know what happens when you base lore training about one spell, don't we? And nobody's really all that interested in strengthening lockpicks that we don't use because we're not lockpickers, and we're not interested in things like stone skin flaring for 15 damage after we get hit either. We're interested in things that address the underlying core issues we've had for a very long time, and nothing that's currently implemented does that. When I respecced to 101 fire/101 air, I didn't even have a second thought about it, because I'm not giving up anything meaningful by not training earth/water. In reality I probably could shave off some air lore ranks, but why bother? Even if I cut air lore in half, I still get nothing meaningful from earth lore, and water lore...I like the idea of 512, but it still requires too much setup time just to have a chance at taking half of their health. It has potential, but still needs work, as it's not worth sinking water lore into in its current state.

A large part of this is due to the fact that a lot of our core spells are trash. If Boil Earth, for example, was worth a crap and was attached to Earth Lore, I have little doubt that you'd see a lot more earth mages running around, which will hopefully be the case if whatever is in dev for Boil right now ends up being good.

And maybe I'm wrong here, but in my opinion it seems like you think everything is fine and that we should be rushing out to Stone Skin things to death and that nothing will ever be good enough for us because we just want to be overpowered death machines that can kill a whole town in one macro, when in reality we just want to be heard (as opposed to just listened to, thanks Wesley Snipes) for once and have our core issues addressed so that we don't have to work around it with band aids like rapid shock or 202 lore Immolate, since Simu is so hell bent on shoehorning wizards into being pure bolters.

You think 519 being weaker than 317/1115 is acceptable because we have mana leech. What good is mana leech when we're too dead to cast it or ended up having to leave the room because we can't kill things at the same pace as 317/1115? And this is before factoring in 240, in which cast 317/1115 become real death machines while we're still piddling away usually for around 100 damage for 19 mana a pop. Your spreadsheet "proof" that you posted the other day doesn't include several crucial factors, such as 240 or having max CS.

Back in vanilla WoW, when people started capping and getting gear, everyone's DPS was skyrocketing at a crazy pace. Except for mages. The reason for this was because at the time, the Intellect stat only increased our mana (and a miniscule amount of crit %) but not our damage. When we complained on the forums about it and how we were lagging tremendously behind other DPS classes in damage, we were told "This is acceptable because more mana = more damage" which still gets joked about to this day because it was such an incompetent and ignorant response from someone who worked for Blizzard (Tseric) where nearly everything is based around damage per second (DPS) and not longevity, i.e. casting 1 fireball for 1000 damage instead of casting 500 fireballs for 2 damage (random number exaggeration, you get the idea).

Needless to say, it wasn't long before Intellect became a damage stat as well as a mana stat. But the point I'm getting at is the "more mana = more damage" outlook seems to be similar to what you're telling us in regards to 516/519 compared to 240/317/1115, and I'm not sure how that claim could be more wrong in practice as opposed to on paper. I'm sure it sounds great on paper and all, but in practice, not at all. If a huge billion dollar company like Blizzard can get it wrong on the most popular MMO ever made, then it's hardly out of the question that a GM for a 30 year old text game can get it wrong too. Sure, the actual games are apples and oranges, but the concept I'm referring to is very apples to apples.

I genuinely mean this when I say I would love to see a full unedited log of you hunting a post cap wizard, preferably plane 4/scatter/confluence (in other words, not in OTF or Nelemar 3rd floor) using various post-nerf pure builds. I would be extremely curious to see how this goes. Then you can show us once and for all how great and wonderful all this ELR stuff is and that the nerfs weren't all that bad and we're all just overreacting and don't know how to play a wizard. Right? And for bonus points, tell us honestly how much fun you had with it.

I don't mean some automated test thing either. I mean you actually sitting at the keyboard with your macros and scripts and normal gear/training (no, you can't use a 50m xp wizard that has every skill in the game maxed) and all that, and showing us all how it's done.

>I would agree that if I had to play a "pure bolting" wizard I wouldn't be playing a wizard.

I second this. Bolts in their current state are very underwhelming and incredibly boring on the same scale that playing a non-ambushing sword & board square would be.

>I believe the only one that we're aware of are the pending changes to 925? Or have other spells been identified previously?

Konacon spilled the beans a few weeks ago that Boil Earth is being worked on also. Which I'm really looking forward to and am REALLY hoping it's not a letdown. I always thought this spell was really cool until I realized it's only good vs. players.



~ Methais

Reading the wizard nerfs:
http://i.imgur.com/hNaDm98.gif

I removed my post since Estild responded that it's WIP. Sort of makes my point irrelevant.

Doug

Methais

You sure about that? Because 506 is doing that, not 535. Whether that's intended or not, who knows.

You are correct. 506 is for the offense and utility benefit and 535 is for the defense benefit.

Methais

Was this before or after you told us that 415 double cast vs. single target was a bug?

Before. There's always been a handful of wizards who would invest heavily (100+ ranks) into EL:F because they prefer the offensive benefits over any other.

Methais

Are you suggesting that this isn't the case? If so, please explain why because I don't think anyone is going to understand otherwise.

I'm not suggesting that wasn't the case at all. I know a lot of wizards train in Elemental Lore, Air for the Haste (535) benefits.

Methais

A large part of this is due to the fact that a lot of our core spells are trash. If Boil Earth, for example, was worth a crap and was attached to Earth Lore, I have little doubt that you'd see a lot more earth mages running around, which will hopefully be the case if whatever is in dev for Boil right now ends up being good.

http://forums.play.net/forums/GemStone%20IV/Wizards/Major%20Elemental%20Circle/view/1831 :P

Methais

And maybe I'm wrong here, but in my opinion it seems like you think everything is fine and that we should be rushing out to Stone Skin things to death and that nothing will ever be good enough for us because we just want to be overpowered death machines that can kill a whole town in one macro, when in reality we just want to be heard (as opposed to just listened to, thanks Wesley Snipes) for once and have our core issues addressed so that we don't have to work around it with band aids like rapid shock or 202 lore Immolate, since Simu is so hell bent on shoehorning wizards into being pure bolters.

Methais, I engaged in this discussion for a reason. I always read every post in the profession folders for all Pures and Semis, so even when I'm not responding, I'm still listening. I don't always agree with what's stated. As in the case of 519, I decided to respond to this thread to help illustrate my stance and to give players a chance to refute it based upon why I think 519 is currently acceptable.

Methais

You think 519 being weaker than 317/1115 is acceptable because we have mana leech. What good is mana leech when we're too dead to cast it or ended up having to leave the room because we can't kill things at the same pace as 317/1115? And this is before factoring in 240, in which cast 317/1115 become real death machines while we're still piddling away usually for around 100 damage for 19 mana a pop. Your spreadsheet "proof" that you posted the other day doesn't include several crucial factors, such as 240 or having max CS.

I don't think 519 is acceptable to be weaker due to 516 at all. I think 519 costly slightly more mana than 317 or 1115 is acceptable due to 516. Why would it not be? If a profession has more mana available, it stands to reason they can spend more mana. I don't object to making a case of 240 vs 516's mana benefits though.

Methais

Back in vanilla WoW, when people started capping and getting gear, everyone's DPS was skyrocketing at a crazy pace. Except for mages. The reason for this was because at the time, the Intellect stat only increased our mana (and a miniscule amount of crit %) but not our damage. When we complained on the forums about it and how we were lagging tremendously behind other DPS classes in damage, we were told "This is acceptable because more mana = more damage" which still gets joked about to this day because it was such an incompetent and ignorant response from someone who worked for Blizzard (Tseric) where nearly everything is based around damage per second (DPS) and not longevity, i.e. casting 1 fireball for 1000 damage instead of casting 500 fireballs for 2 damage (random number exaggeration, you get the idea).

Needless to say, it wasn't long before Intellect became a damage stat as well as a mana stat. But the point I'm getting at is the "more mana = more damage" outlook seems to be similar to what you're telling us in regards to 516/519 compared to 240/317/1115, and I'm not sure how that claim could be more wrong in practice as opposed to on paper. I'm sure it sounds great on paper and all, but in practice, not at all. If a huge billion dollar company like Blizzard can get it wrong on the most popular MMO ever made, then it's hardly out of the question that a GM for a 30 year old text game can get it wrong too. Sure, the actual games are apples and oranges, but the concept I'm referring to is very apples to apples.

If anything, WoW kind of illustrates my thoughts on 516/519. Mana only matters to healers in WoD (it's not a resource limiter for DPS anymore). But if you look at each healer's spells, you see they don't all cost the same amount of mana or even heal for the same amounts, and certain healers have abilities to refund or gain extra mana. What's important is the overall numbers. Specifically, if they can all heal for 100 HPS and maintain their their ability to cast spells throughout an encounter, it doesn't matter if shaman's healing spells cost 25% more mana since they have abilities like Resurgence (gain mana on crit) to gain back more of that difference.

GameMaster Estild

>It's not a hypothesis at all. I ran actual tests.
>-DESTINY14

You keep saying this "guaranteed 1.0 casts per kill" business, but I don't see how it can possibly be true (for clerics at least).

For one thing, you're not guaranteed a spirit recast unless you have 210 ranks in SL:S. I doubt many clerics actually do this, because as you've said, SL:R is useful, too (though apparently not much in terms of lethality of 317, we're learning now). And I'm not sure even 210 ranks guarantees a spirit recast of 317, since higher level spells are supposed to decrease the recast likelihood (though I don't think the exact formula for this has ever been shared with us).

You also refer to the possible third spirit recast.. yet if this EVER happens, it means you're at something below 1.0 casts per kill (the "guaranteed" second cast should ALWAYS be enough at the 1.0 casts-per-kill level).

For a more realistic SL:S training level of 80ish ranks (which is closer to where most clerics actually are, I think), it's an 84% chance of spirit recast (not taking into account whatever the high-level-spell penalty is). So EVEN IF every high level creature could be killed by two normal casts of 317, that recast failure rate would make it 1.16 casts per kill.

What's more, not every creature can be killed that easily. Maybe if it crits or doesn't have much HP, you might get close. Otherwise, no way. +45 endroll is good, but not THAT good.

I'd be curious to see your tests, though.

AMMINAR

You keep saying this "guaranteed 1.0 casts per kill" business, but I don't see how it can possibly be true (for clerics at least).

For one thing, you're not guaranteed a spirit recast unless you have 210 ranks in SL:S. I doubt many clerics actually do this, because as you've said, SL:R is useful, too (though apparently not much in terms of lethality of 317, we're learning now). And I'm not sure even 210 ranks guarantees a spirit recast of 317, since higher level spells are supposed to decrease the recast likelihood (though I don't think the exact formula for this has ever been shared with us).

You also refer to the possible third spirit recast.. yet if this EVER happens, it means you're at something below 1.0 casts per kill (the "guaranteed" second cast should ALWAYS be enough at the 1.0 casts-per-kill level).

For a more realistic SL:S training level of 80ish ranks (which is closer to where most clerics actually are, I think), it's an 84% chance of spirit recast (not taking into account whatever the high-level-spell penalty is). So EVEN IF every high level creature could be killed by two normal casts of 317, that recast failure rate would make it 1.16 casts per kill.

What's more, not every creature can be killed that easily. Maybe if it crits or doesn't have much HP, you might get close. Otherwise, no way. +45 endroll is good, but not THAT good.

I'd be curious to see your tests, though.

This is absolutely correct and what I had alluded to in another recent post. Thanks for pointing it out. It's hyperbole in an attemptto make a point and I would I would really prefer we avoid such things, as it's not a fact or true. However, as I did state in another post, 240 can potentially lower the casts-per-kill down to 1 with dedicated training, but it's not guaranteed. But we can discuss the average outcome, and doing so, I will accept that 240+317 will kill most targets in 3 seconds of castRT. I also accept that 515+519 will do the same.

GameMaster Estild

>>That's what I'm talking about regarding bolt vs. warding flexibility, in addition to the EBP issues and the safer stance that the other pures enjoy.

Is it a relatively fair restatement of this position to say that bolting will likely never be quite as effective as CS spell casting?

Doug

You should have stayed late. . . Raw, instead of Delirious?

/shakes head

Doug

Gotta agree on the air Lore, as 502, 505, 518, are my main spells... Flavored with acid or a firebolt just to mix it up.

Just an elf about town...

>Who said anything about only a single high end ability for each lore? As I've said about a hundred times, there is no way that a single spell should define a playstyle. That would be no better than rapid shock or immo!

I think he meant it more like icing (really awesome icing, like cheesecake icing or something) on the cake.

Of course, this is assuming the builds are even worthy of being called cake. Or even pie.

>You are correct. 506 is for the offense and utility benefit and 535 is for the defense benefit.

What offense is involved in foraging?

>I don't think 519 is acceptable to be weaker due to 516 at all. I think 519 costly slightly more mana than 317 or 1115 is acceptable due to 516. Why would it not be? If a profession has more mana available, it stands to reason they can spend more mana. I don't object to making a case of 240 vs 516's mana benefits though.

Fair enough. I think for future discussion here regarding 317/1115, it should just be assumed that 240 is in effect. You know, since it has no cooldown and all <gives Rapid Fire a 3 Stooges style beating for having a stupid cooldown> and averages 317 to 22 mana per kill.

>If anything, WoW kind of illustrates my thoughts on 516/519. Mana only matters to healers in WoD (it's not a resource limiter for DPS anymore). But if you look at each healer's spells, you see they don't all cost the same amount of mana or even heal for the same amounts, and certain healers have abilities to refund or gain extra mana. What's important is the overall numbers. Specifically, if they can all heal for 100 HPS and maintain their their ability to cast spells throughout an encounter, it doesn't matter if shaman's healing spells cost 25% more mana since they have abilities like Resurgence (gain mana on crit) to gain back more of that difference.

>If anything, WoW kind of illustrates my thoughts on 516/519. Mana only matters to healers in WoD (it's not a resource limiter for DPS anymore). But if you look at each healer's spells, you see they don't all cost the same amount of mana or even heal for the same amounts, and certain healers have abilities to refund or gain extra mana. What's important is the overall numbers. Specifically, if they can all heal for 100 HPS and maintain their their ability to cast spells throughout an encounter, it doesn't matter if shaman's healing spells cost 25% more mana since they have abilities like Resurgence (gain mana on crit) to gain back more of that difference.

Right, but they also have the luxury of this all happening in long drawn out fight vs. a raid boss, as opposed to how hunting in GS works where you either kill things in a matter of seconds or you die, exacerbated by lack of an engagement system.

We don't have the luxury of time in our battles (don't confuse that to think I mean combat is too fast either), and wizards no longer have the fast killing power that we used to have to compensate for that.

And just to split hairs here on the 3x rapid 519 vs. 1x 240/317, technically 240/317 is killing stuff instantly, but has to wait out the 3 second cast time to do it again (you could also view this as instant cast with a 3 second global cooldown, which is in reality how spells in GS work, otherwise the 3 second cast time would apply before the spell is cast). 3x rapid 519 still takes 2 seconds to cast, and 1 second leftover to wait before we can cast again.

This might seem petty on paper, but I promise you wizards can, have, and will die during that extra time. I'm not going to claim that it's super common, but I'm not going to say it's super rare either.

If we can get hit during that 0.0000000001 seconds of being in offensive while stance dancing with bolts, which we all know we can and do, then every millisecond counts, which also tilts the scales, albeit slightly, even more in 240/317's favor.


~ Methais

Reading the wizard nerfs:
http://i.imgur.com/hNaDm98.gif

There is a lot of interesting thoughts on data on 519 here. I've a question for wizards as a whole for some clarity though, as mine is both casual and a warmage.

How well does Immolation work at the majority of levels, say, 20-90, in different people's experiences? It would help me with some perspective on all this, so I much appreciate it.

"There is a lot of interesting thoughts on data on 519 here. I've a question for wizards as a whole for some clarity though, as mine is both casual and a warmage.

How well does Immolation work at the majority of levels, say, 20-90, in different people's experiences? It would help me with some perspective on all this, so I much appreciate it.-Branddtjrt"

I have a halfling wizard with a CS of 530 that I have never even bothered with the old 519 and for sure haven't bothered with the new 519. He just doesn't have the CS/mana to go around using this spell. He hunts the confluence pretty well on rapid fire 504/512/ bolts and really is probably going to stay in that area for the the next year or so.

I have taken a wizard with an insanely high enhanced CS (582) and produced 195+ average end rolls and gotten 145 damage averages against crit resistant creatures (war griffins). Tolerable as a last resort all in all and with the extreme specialization it still required a bunch of mana. I was always a proponent of the spell keeping more killing cycles than what it ended up with.

Now against creatures that have low health and little crit padding it will probably prove to be useful. Now fire mages just need other spells to make up the gap I guess. Which seem to be on the way and hopefully not RSN.

GBB

Isn't a water mage the bottom of the ladder these days? I'll bet there's still ton Fire Lore mages with the new AS pushdown and 906 being ok for the low end?

Sactum of Scales going to shake training up a bit I'm betting...

Just an elf about town...

>535 Bugs

Does that include it messing with things like Siegery minis that I posted on in the other thread? 'cause I can't wait til our next annual inter-CHE/MHO siegery competition if it's still broken... I'll DESTROY the competition.

And here's a kitty wizard for you.

http://i.imgur.com/Psn5IPU.gif


~Whirlin

Immolation Replacement testing with Tremors 909 (STOMP version)

First off (and a minor point overall), the spell description on the wiki says it is an illusion but I was in fact arrested for casting it in town this morning. I seem to recall the sorcerer version (that has since moved to Arcane) was also an illusion and could be safely cast in town. So either the wiki is incorrect or the rules have changed around 'illusions'.

I tried introducing tremors as a potential opener / disabler and honestly found it increased risk more than decreased it overall. I was literally having critters stand back up immediately after Stomping (between the time I am hitting a function key to stomp and then hitting an adjacent function key to cast a spell) which means I could have cast something more effective up front to actually disabled the critter vs. wasting the (near 0) time to stomp.

True, the affected critters now have have a 7% EPB reduction (based on my current training), but this is just a nice to have for me and not what I am looking for in a disabler. It won't keep me from dying when the instant death spells are cast (e.g. sentries can cast their spells while laying on the ground).

I also tried adding STOMP into my base cast macro but then found I was stomping in a lot of situations where it didn't make any sense / wasn't useful and so was just burning the extra 3 mana over and over.

This spell also didn't seem to have any ability to knock down critters like sentries or defenders. Disclaimer: it may have an effect on these critters some of the time as I did limited testing here but it certainly isn't reliable at knocking them down.

I did find STOMP to be a cheaper way to knock over critters with a high DS that were already stunned (e.g. sirens) where I would otherwise use Call Wind but I think I will probably continue to prefer Call Wind due to the additional stance adjustment that comes with it in addition to the knockdown feature (plus there is actual RT involved with Call Wind so I can use it regardless of stun status of the critter with a reasonable expect that they will be prone, disabled, and easy to hit after my initial cast).

Tremors STOMP might be a bit more useful (and more fun) if it actually induced at least a short amount of RT. It is pretty anti-fun seeing something stand up immediately after you knock it down. Even with that add though, I think I would still find this spell lacking outside of the niche use I identified. It is something I will try using with with my warmage down the road if I ever get around to playing them again.

Next up: Open cast Slow/Call Wind combos (maybe tomorrow morning).

-- Robert

The town guard exclaims, "What do I look like, a scholar from Biblia?!"

Just realized I posted in the wrong thread so I'll move my post over to the correct thread. And yeah, it's more of an offensive boost spell of sorts. I was trying it out based on Doug's(?) suggestion/question and it is pretty much like I remembered when it first came out.

-- Robert

The town guard exclaims, "What do I look like, a scholar from Biblia?!"