[X] My Assistant

What should I do with the Unicorn Horn? Shrine it or Bazaar?

What should I do with the Unicorn Horn? Shrine it or Bazaar?

Shrine it of course.

So I'm wondering, is IA worth getting? It's pretty expensive, and I might have an outside shot of getting to IAIII (30% reduction) within say...two years at the rate I go. I ran some numbers for costs based on current stats.

Spell costs:
Haste/SV/Absorb: 58
Regen II: 143
SoL: 96
Protection: 48

Base mana: 332 (or times 1.2 = 398.4)

So essentially, I have a 58/398.4 chance to proc channeling, or 14.56%. I will basically use the channeling on Regen II every time, or heartseeker once I get to it. Since the channeling cast is worth 1.5, that means I'm getting a 214.5 (143*1.5) mana cost spell for free when it procs.

So my expected mana value is (214.5)(14.56%) = 31.23 mana

Meaning my expected conservation is 31.23/58, or 53.84%.

With that in mind, is there something I'm missing about IA that makes it so desirable, other than less pushing of buttons necessary (and yes I realize that relying on channeling proc'ing is high variance and can lead to situations with overlap on casts, but the general principal stands)?

Thanks

Shrine it of course.

So it is worth more than the Black T-Shirt? All trophies are trash.

This post has been edited by hujan86: Mar 10 2013, 03:27

IA also gives you periodic gains to supportive prof, which is helpful for making it even more mana efficient. It's also affected by spirit-stance, and the increased reduction makes it even more helpful as it's leveled up. You should at least get one IA slot just for haste, and a second is reccomended for spirit shield, but that's up to you.

Also - Shrine rewards are confirmed to be not effected by LotD right?

IA also gives you periodic gains to supportive prof, which is helpful for making it even more mana efficient. It's also affected by spirit-stance, and the increased reduction makes it even more helpful as it's leveled up. You should at least get one IA slot just for haste, and a second is reccomended for spirit shield, but that's up to you.

Gaining supportive proficiency does increase mana efficiency as a whole. But comparatively, IA gains no more from higher proficiency than just casting a spell normally does. As far as just leveling proficiency goes, I've never had IA and am at 128 for supportive, so I think in general proficiency takes care of itself if you're using a decent mixture of buffs and focus command every now and then.

I wasn't aware of the spirit stance implication. I think that is moderately helpful: instead of wasting a turn of overcharge to cast a spell at half price, it is just naturally half-price passively during the spirit stance duration.

Yeah- the main reason people get IA is to not click buttons and for the mana efficiency gained from having multiple levels invested in it.
15% is still quite a bit, since you always want at least haste and will normally also want another buff on you like spirit shield or protection

With that in mind, is there something I'm missing about IA that makes it so desirable, other than less pushing of buttons necessary (and yes I realize that relying on channeling proc'ing is high variance and can lead to situations with overlap on casts, but the general principal stands)?

Thanks

You also have to take into account the turns you would be wasting recasting those spells. Turns in which monsters are attacking you; this of course means much more on higher difficulties.

With that in mind, is there something I'm missing about IA that makes it so desirable, other than less pushing of buttons necessary (and yes I realize that relying on channeling proc'ing is high variance and can lead to situations with overlap on casts, but the general principal stands)?

Thanks

It's not a simple question. For example:
- you assume yourself only using regen2 when channeling's on. But in reality you may need to keep both of them on when you're in battle. So you'll need to add the cost of those normal regen2 in the denominator of your expected conservation.
- You assume there's no channeling outside of casting. But IA do give you extra benefit when you get channeling gems.
- using spark in IA gives enormous MP benefit.

But in general, players do go further after they get some levels of IA. Consider it an experimental result (IMG:[invalid] style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Also - Shrine rewards are confirmed to be not effected by LotD right?

Yes.

So I'm wondering, is IA worth getting? It's pretty expensive, and I might have an outside shot of getting to IAIII (30% reduction) within say...two years at the rate I go. I ran some numbers for costs based on current stats.
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Lord_Obagon & varst has good answer.

And I think there has another advantage of IA.
"Flexibility"

Example .1
Do you know Spirit Mode can reduce the cost of mana by 25% ?
Some player would take the last turn of Spirit Mode to cast the Supportive Magic on IA.
It doesn't waste much Overcharge to cast the magic and gain the benefit.

If you don't use any spell on IA, you need to pay attention to the rest of the duration.
When duration is nearly full ,it's almost useless to cast the spell at Spirit Mode.

Example .2
Special spell "Spark of Life."
it has long duration and heavy cost , but it might be triggered and then disappear.
It take a big waste when "Spark of Life." is cast and disappear soon.


In conclusion, IA provides you more tactical choice. Not only the mana conservation.

There's another inherent advantage to IA, you don't pay for the chunk of the spell you don't use. For most spells, this doesn't mean that much, though it is nice in REs and short arenas to only pay for the rounds you use. For Spark, it's a lot more due to being used on proc and needing to be renewed. The auto-renew is very nice (though less than it used to be for action economy since it only saves 2% of your Cloak time and not 20% like it used to).

I want more IA than I have, Protection's hideously short duration and high cast time really wants to be on IA, especially for mages who can't afford to not be killing shit with a cast time 0.7 spell.

This post has been edited by PK678353: Mar 9 2013, 19:43

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First, thanks for the replies to everyone. I know the formula I used to estimate mana conservation was pretty simplistic for the reasons mentioned - it doesn't incorporate the casting of the spells, it doesn't include the notion that I will be using some channelings on less expensive spells. I think the turns wasted re-casting spells I underestimated, I know that when I'm on IWTBH I get popped for half my life while just setting up buffs from time to time.

I don't really have any doubt that IA is by far superior at the 45% and 60% levels, and if we are discussing end-game solutions they seem like a must. I was more looking at it from a casual player's point of view, and trying to compare the benefit of purchasing IA with limited resources with the benefit of purchasing other potentially beneficial gear. I'll probably save up until I get to some of the higher arenas and see how things work themselves out, then re-evaluate. I think once I am able to understand the impact of heartseeker and spirit shield it'll change my mindset some.

I made a similar argument some 50 pages ago. With longer buff durations, especially from more proficiency at higher levels, procing a channeling is much more sporadic since there are less events. I still think smart use of channeling and spirit stance refreshes, as well as renewing spells at the end of rounds, can more than make up for AI with sloppy spellcasting. For example, if you always cast your buffs during spirit shield, thats more of a cost discount than just IA2 without SS discount, even before channels are accounted for. If you are vigilant in spell refreshes, I think the Rainbow Aura cound be a better purchase first.

For your assumptions, there indeed are high-level players who do excellently without having single IA.

For your assumptions, there indeed are high-level players who do excellently without having single IA.

While what you said holds reason. Name one?

T_Starrk

T_Starrk

I see. ~330 does look high level to you. Fair comment.

@Arxdewn The main draw of IA is its convenience. It's especially nice for spells that never give you their mana's worth (SoL, discussed the logic for this a while back) or spells with relatively short durations (protection comes to mind for this, although if memory serves correct it did go up a few patches ago)

Talking about spell, as a relative new player,
I am struggle to know which buff or debuff spell on getting priority
I am using shield and one hand at the moment and mostly plate with 64inf, 45 burden,
which orders should i get absorbtion, shark of life, haste next? (got all cureI&II, regen, protection, veil of shadow) and should i get any offensive spell at all?

I find buffing protection, veil of shadow, regen already eat chuck of my mp and i find myself run out of mana in higher round of arena. Any solution to that?

Is it normal that I find myself never use scroll and infusion item?
Sincerely,

This post has been edited by JudasC: Mar 10 2013, 02:48

Get haste first.
It decreases your mana costs AND makes mobs hit you less.

Attributes:

why so much wisdom? it isent that useful as a melee
poison as a melee isent that useful only to let enemy get less mana but you have silence....

1. well i dont think the dmg lose is worth that (0.04 mana and 0.0.4%hit rate per wisdom) but its your char.
2. Spirit isent based on wisdom.

If my wisdom is "too high", should I reduce it to, say 200?

And Intelligence? Reduce it below 100?