I was thinking about this the other day, and the conclusion I can up with made me question the concept of a melee wizard.
When I think of a melee character, I generally think of two requirements.
1) A character who stands at the front line.
2) A character who primarily relies on melee attacks for damage.
Now look at the current concept of the melee wizard. She does stand in front line, but only slightly more so than a standard wizard. And through lower difficulties, spectral blade does seem to kill things. But what of higher difficulties? Spectral Blade, the only melee move for the wizard, hits for absolutely diddly.
The only way you have any hope to actually kill things is to use some other offensive spell that actually does the killing, while you stand in melee pretending that spectral blade is anything more than a bad joke. Meanwhile the wizard gets polluted by spells that otherwise sever no purpose, just so a small minority can imagine themselves as a melee wizard.
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One is never hurt by being given additional choices, only by taking them away. A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
You call it a melee wizard, I call it a battlemage, so I have no problem if I have to use another spell. But, in any case, you are going to have a trade off between damage and defense. What you are looking for is something having a high defense with a high damage output. That's really not going to happen. What you are doing when you create a battlemage is you are trading damage for defense so that you can run into the middle of a mob.
The other thing is that Spectral Blade is not going to do diddly. Compare it to some of the other spells. 105% multi-target vs. 110% single, 95% bi- or tri-target, 150% for the first target then 45% for the second. Those are just the signature spells which are free with no cooldown. If you compare against spells with a cooldown, you are likely to get more DPS. For example, Frost Nova does 75% multi, but has a 12 second cooldown. If you can cast Spectral Blade once a second hitting only once each time, your Frost Nova would have to hit 5 targets to match.
If you compare to something that does raw damage output, like Fireball, you can essentially cast that twice before you run out of AP. That will be good for taking out a single mob, but not for continuous battles. Even if you build your character around that skill and get lots of AP regen, you are giving up on defense, which means you might not be able to last long enough in Inferno for it to matter.
Really, it's just a matter of playing style. I'd prefer to be in the battle rather than kiting. If it takes a bit longer to kill off a mob, that's fine with me.
Currently the only qualification for a melee wizard is Spectral Blade + Magic Weapon. Without some sort of offensive melee oriented spell, I do not see how anyone can claim it is technically a melee wizard.
That guy got his ass kicked, and that is only Hell.
Blizzard love to use the word viable in WoW, and I got to tell ya, there is a huge difference in what they consider Viable and what actually works. Shamans were considered Viable TANKS in vanilla.
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One is never hurt by being given additional choices, only by taking them away. A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
I don't know what you want to make it a "true melee" wizard.
We have some low-range spells, several defensive spells and we have magic weapon.
Id rather they just delete the whole idea, I think Jay Wilson likes this flavor build so we are just kinda stuck with it.
Lots of the wizard skills are polluted by skills that are medicore at best for a standard wizard build, just so the Melee Wizard can be half-ass viable. See my comment above about what Blizzard considers viable! Personally, idk what they can do to fix it, but as is it just kinda blows for everyone.
I think blizzard is aware of this as well, which is why we have a couple extra skills.
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One is never hurt by being given additional choices, only by taking them away. A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
I dunno, I personally don't think having more melee oriented spells "pollute" the wizard skill selection. It's just choice.
Regarding the video I don't think he got his "ass kicked". Yes it was close, but I think that is just due to the game being hard overall. Also, did you see how fast those spiders were? Even if he wasn't a melee wizard they would've been all over him, so a melee oriented build probably worked out in his favour that time.
Additionally. Indigo Rune Spectral Blade if you don't like melee spells.
Oh, and don't compare WoW viable to Diablo viable.
Another edit: Based on the reaction from the crowd in that video I think there's more people other than Jay Wilson who likes this flavor build..
Its not choice, its lack of choice. There are numerous skills, I would not touch with a 10 foot pole unless I wanted to play a melee wizard. Its like there are two classes forced to use the same set of skills.
What is Obsidian Frost Nova is good for if not for a melee wizard? Melee Wizard oriented skills definitely do exist, otherwise your melee wizard wouldnt even be possible, never mind viable.
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One is never hurt by being given additional choices, only by taking them away. A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
Its not choice, its lack of choice. There are numerous skills, I would not touch with a 10 foot pole unless I wanted to play a melee wizard. Its like there are two classes forced to use the same set of skills.
What is Obsidian Frost Nova is good for if not for a melee wizard? Melee Wizard oriented skills definitely do exist, otherwise your melee wizard wouldnt even be possible, never mind viable.
Well, then that's your choice?! With runestone variations we have over 100 different skills. We can only have 6 at a time. You cannot argue that you want all of them to be "viable" to the playstyle you prefer?
They have packed the skillset with skills that are useful for lots of different situations and builds. If you don't like the ones which are more oriented towards melee, then don't pick them. You have plently of choice left.
Its not choice, its lack of choice. There are numerous skills, I would not touch with a 10 foot pole unless I wanted to play a melee wizard. Its like there are two classes forced to use the same set of skills.
What is Obsidian Frost Nova is good for if not for a melee wizard? Melee Wizard oriented skills definitely do exist, otherwise your melee wizard wouldnt even be possible, never mind viable.
Well, then that's your choice?! With runestone variations we have over 100 different skills. We can only have 6 at a time. You cannot argue that you want all of them to be "viable" to the playstyle you prefer?
They have packed the skillset with skills that are useful for lots of different situations and builds. If you don't like the ones which are more oriented towards melee, then don't pick them. You have plently of choice left.
Why not? That is true for everyone else.
I do not see any Fireballing Barbs running around, no melee Witch Doctors stabbing away, no holy nova Demon Hunters healing people...etc.
Only wizards have to split skills with some 180 degree out of character flavor build.
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One is never hurt by being given additional choices, only by taking them away. A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
Why not? That is true for everyone else.
I do not see any Fireballing Barbs running around, no melee Witch Doctors stabbing away, no holy nova Demon Hunters healing people...etc.
Only wizards have to split skills with some 180 degree out of character flavor build.
One could argue that since the Wizard also has a few more skills than those classes we can afford having some that are more niched.
You want all skills and their runed variants to be useful for a mid-long range caster? Sounds boring in my book..
Only wizards have to split skills with some 180 degree out of character flavor build.
The flavor of the Wizard is that they use their arcane power to wreak massive havoc. It doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the range at which this is done. As far as balancing concerns go, typically close range abilities need to be more powerful to account for the increased risk you take in being closer to monsters. They also will need to spend more skill slots on defensive survival based skills instead of offensive gunslinging ones. It is certainly within flavor for some wizards to be adept at close range, powerful, wide area attacks while other wizards choose to focus on longer range more pinpoint accurate spells. That youtube video shows just such a close range wizard, without truly being a "melee" wizard.
A "melee" wizard would be a wizard that walks up and hits things with a sword, which is completely out of character and it doesn't appear that this is the intent of the developers. From my understanding, they have developed a battle mage, which I am all for.
Why not? That is true for everyone else.
I do not see any Fireballing Barbs running around, no melee Witch Doctors stabbing away, no holy nova Demon Hunters healing people...etc.
Only wizards have to split skills with some 180 degree out of character flavor build.
Jay has mentioned this before. The main reason for even having melee builds for a wizard is because it was very popular in D2.
You might not like the skills but many many others did. And again since battlenet is online they were able to track the popular builds for both Wizard and Barbarians which explains why many of the more popular skills are included in D3.
The flavor of the Wizard is that they use their arcane power to wreak massive havoc. It doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the range at which this is done. As far as balancing concerns go, typically close range abilities need to be more powerful to account for the increased risk you take in being closer to monsters. They also will need to spend more skill slots on defensive survival based skills instead of offensive gunslinging ones. It is certainly within flavor for some wizards to be adept at close range, powerful, wide area attacks while other wizards choose to focus on longer range more pinpoint accurate spells. That youtube video shows just such a close range wizard, without truly being a "melee" wizard.
Ok couple problems here,
#1 You will not have more survivability , as I can use any skill you use. Except I am not forced to use Magic Weapon, giving me an additional skill. I also have added survivability by being at ranged.
#2 The ONE melee oriented spell currently does pitiful dmg. The other sort of melee oriented spells, explosive blast & wave of force, do not exactly shine in the dmg compartment either.
A "melee" wizard would be a wizard that walks up and hits things with a sword, which is completely out of character and it doesn't appear that this is the intent of the developers. From my understanding, they have developed a battle mage, which I am all for.
So a battlemage is a melee wizard that pretends to melee....how is that an improvement?
That still means there are 2 classes fighting for the same skills.
You might not like the skills but many many others did. And again since battlenet is online they were able to track the popular builds for both Wizard and Barbarians which explains why many of the more popular skills are included in D3.
I do not care if they do it, just do it better.
It sucks for all around atm. The majority get diluted skills, and the minority get a "viable" build.
Oh, and don't compare WoW viable to Diablo viable.
Another ridiculous rule. Why is that? Why cant we use relevant background information about Blizzard Entertainment to formulate a more unbiased opinion? Ohh because its devastating to your argument....gotcha.
Heck if anything, viable has a much lower standard in Diablo than WoW. In WoW your game play affects numerous other people, but in Diablo you are only playing for yourself.
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One is never hurt by being given additional choices, only by taking them away. A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
I do not care if they do it, just do it better.
It sucks for all around atm. The majority get diluted skills, and the minority get a "viable" build.
You're right that the main 2 skills for a melee wizard would be Spectral Blade + Magic Weapon. How exactly is this weak? That's 126% weapon dmg before adding any runes. And it procs 3 times per hit so you'll obviously want weapons with proc effects and is spammable since it is a signature spell.
That's 2 spell slots out of 6. Depending on how you choose Runes/passives, you could easily drop a meteor or Blizzard every few seconds and continue to spam spectral blade. Slow time or Mirror Image might be great for getting out of sticky situations.
The idea here is being a "melee wizard" not a melee warrior. A wizard has other options instead of always and only using weapon attacks. My personal melee wizard will probably use Frost Hydra as my secondary attack, which with Prodigy should allow me to drop one every few seconds. Sounds like a very viable and effective build to me right now.
No one outside of Blizzard in house testers can verify as to the effectiveness of the skills or builds right now. You're making very general references about "wizard skills are polluted by skills that are medicore". In beta the wizard seems perfectly fine, and in Lvl 60 PvP those lucky enough to test it were putting the wizard as the number 2 or 3 in terms of fave characters for PvP.
I will be making a Melee wizard and she will only use normal Attack and magic weapon. I think she will do fine in Infernal. I will also be playing a Melee Witch Doctor as well and both will be Hardcore.
I think the Wizard is one of the most powerful melee characters. We will find out when the game is released.
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On Strike and supporting Fallout 4 Mod Makers
Some fallout 4 mod makers have had their mods stolen and uploaded and downloaded on Bethesda's site for the Xbox One.
I think explosive blast will be the basis for the melee wizards. 455% Weapon damage is quite good actually (Alabaster Rune). You can also abuse other strong close range spells like frost nova and mirror images.
Currently the only qualification for a melee wizard is Spectral Blade + Magic Weapon. Without some sort of offensive melee oriented spell, I do not see how anyone can claim it is technically a melee wizard.
That guy got his ass kicked, and that is only Hell.
Blizzard love to use the word viable in WoW, and I got to tell ya, there is a huge difference in what they consider Viable and what actually works. Shamans were considered Viable TANKS in vanilla.
in what world do you live in did he get his ass kicked? in D2 hell ANY melee classes health CONSTANTLY went down up down up downnnnn uppppp downnnn uppp. from life steal. so your smoking crack if you think he "got his ass kicked". lmao
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"once the pretty hardcore gamers we had testing inferno found it fairly difficult, we then we doubled it" -trolololol jay wilson
I will be making a Melee wizard and she will only use normal Attack and magic weapon. I think she will do fine in Infernal. I will also be playing a Melee Witch Doctor as well and both will be Hardcore.
I think the Wizard is one of the most powerful melee characters. We will find out when the game is released.
double fail. melee wizards main life steal will come from spectral blade runed (100% crit dmg lvl 7). witch doctor melee isnt a possible build he has only spells and summons. he has ZERO melee skills/passives.
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"once the pretty hardcore gamers we had testing inferno found it fairly difficult, we then we doubled it" -trolololol jay wilson
Oh, and don't compare WoW viable to Diablo viable.
Another ridiculous rule. Why is that? Why cant we use relevant background information about Blizzard Entertainment to formulate a more unbiased opinion? Ohh because its devastating to your argument....gotcha.
Heck if anything, viable has a much lower standard in Diablo than WoW. In WoW your game play affects numerous other people, but in Diablo you are only playing for yourself.
epic fail. wow builds cant deviate but a few talents here and there. you pick 1 of 3 specs and the talents dont drastically change your gameplay or viableness*. :P. and even back in the day (vanilla+) there was very few builds per class that were decent, which in my world viable = decent. dont know your definition of it. lol
VS. diablo 3 where the amount of possible builds reaches the multi trillion mark and viable builds seems to go well into the thousands from the workings of the talent/rune system thats currently in place. those two games are completely uncomparable in many many aspects and the viable builds aspect is by FAR number 1 in the "cant compare" catagory. lol
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"once the pretty hardcore gamers we had testing inferno found it fairly difficult, we then we doubled it" -trolololol jay wilson
Wal-Mart is a pure wizard.
Southern States is a battlemage.
Wal-mart naturally has things that Southern States carries, but not much.
However, Wal-mart could incorporate all the merchandise within southern states. The problem is, that it would take up an enormous amount of space, and force them to remove other more popular items from the store. The customers who come to Wal-mart have little to no interest in products sold at Southern States.
So keep Southern States out of wal-mart. If there is enough demand for Southern State products, then build a Southern States, do not ruin the Wal-Mart.
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One is never hurt by being given additional choices, only by taking them away. A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
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When I think of a melee character, I generally think of two requirements.
1) A character who stands at the front line.
2) A character who primarily relies on melee attacks for damage.
Now look at the current concept of the melee wizard. She does stand in front line, but only slightly more so than a standard wizard. And through lower difficulties, spectral blade does seem to kill things. But what of higher difficulties? Spectral Blade, the only melee move for the wizard, hits for absolutely diddly.
The only way you have any hope to actually kill things is to use some other offensive spell that actually does the killing, while you stand in melee pretending that spectral blade is anything more than a bad joke. Meanwhile the wizard gets polluted by spells that otherwise sever no purpose, just so a small minority can imagine themselves as a melee wizard.
A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
The other thing is that Spectral Blade is not going to do diddly. Compare it to some of the other spells. 105% multi-target vs. 110% single, 95% bi- or tri-target, 150% for the first target then 45% for the second. Those are just the signature spells which are free with no cooldown. If you compare against spells with a cooldown, you are likely to get more DPS. For example, Frost Nova does 75% multi, but has a 12 second cooldown. If you can cast Spectral Blade once a second hitting only once each time, your Frost Nova would have to hit 5 targets to match.
If you compare to something that does raw damage output, like Fireball, you can essentially cast that twice before you run out of AP. That will be good for taking out a single mob, but not for continuous battles. Even if you build your character around that skill and get lots of AP regen, you are giving up on defense, which means you might not be able to last long enough in Inferno for it to matter.
Really, it's just a matter of playing style. I'd prefer to be in the battle rather than kiting. If it takes a bit longer to kill off a mob, that's fine with me.
Blizzcon 2011 Diablo3 Panel
http://youtu.be/u-Zd7YD3uuM?t=9m24s
That guy got his ass kicked, and that is only Hell.
Blizzard love to use the word viable in WoW, and I got to tell ya, there is a huge difference in what they consider Viable and what actually works. Shamans were considered Viable TANKS in vanilla.
A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
We have some low-range spells, several defensive spells and we have magic weapon.
Lots of the wizard skills are polluted by skills that are medicore at best for a standard wizard build, just so the Melee Wizard can be half-ass viable. See my comment above about what Blizzard considers viable! Personally, idk what they can do to fix it, but as is it just kinda blows for everyone.
I think blizzard is aware of this as well, which is why we have a couple extra skills.
A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
Regarding the video I don't think he got his "ass kicked". Yes it was close, but I think that is just due to the game being hard overall. Also, did you see how fast those spiders were? Even if he wasn't a melee wizard they would've been all over him, so a melee oriented build probably worked out in his favour that time.
Additionally. Indigo Rune Spectral Blade if you don't like melee spells.
Oh, and don't compare WoW viable to Diablo viable.
Another edit: Based on the reaction from the crowd in that video I think there's more people other than Jay Wilson who likes this flavor build..
What is Obsidian Frost Nova is good for if not for a melee wizard? Melee Wizard oriented skills definitely do exist, otherwise your melee wizard wouldnt even be possible, never mind viable.
A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
Well, then that's your choice?! With runestone variations we have over 100 different skills. We can only have 6 at a time. You cannot argue that you want all of them to be "viable" to the playstyle you prefer?
They have packed the skillset with skills that are useful for lots of different situations and builds. If you don't like the ones which are more oriented towards melee, then don't pick them. You have plently of choice left.
Why not? That is true for everyone else.
I do not see any Fireballing Barbs running around, no melee Witch Doctors stabbing away, no holy nova Demon Hunters healing people...etc.
Only wizards have to split skills with some 180 degree out of character flavor build.
A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
One could argue that since the Wizard also has a few more skills than those classes we can afford having some that are more niched.
You want all skills and their runed variants to be useful for a mid-long range caster? Sounds boring in my book..
The flavor of the Wizard is that they use their arcane power to wreak massive havoc. It doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the range at which this is done. As far as balancing concerns go, typically close range abilities need to be more powerful to account for the increased risk you take in being closer to monsters. They also will need to spend more skill slots on defensive survival based skills instead of offensive gunslinging ones. It is certainly within flavor for some wizards to be adept at close range, powerful, wide area attacks while other wizards choose to focus on longer range more pinpoint accurate spells. That youtube video shows just such a close range wizard, without truly being a "melee" wizard.
A "melee" wizard would be a wizard that walks up and hits things with a sword, which is completely out of character and it doesn't appear that this is the intent of the developers. From my understanding, they have developed a battle mage, which I am all for.
You might not like the skills but many many others did. And again since battlenet is online they were able to track the popular builds for both Wizard and Barbarians which explains why many of the more popular skills are included in D3.
#1 You will not have more survivability , as I can use any skill you use. Except I am not forced to use Magic Weapon, giving me an additional skill. I also have added survivability by being at ranged.
#2 The ONE melee oriented spell currently does pitiful dmg. The other sort of melee oriented spells, explosive blast & wave of force, do not exactly shine in the dmg compartment either.
So a battlemage is a melee wizard that pretends to melee....how is that an improvement?
That still means there are 2 classes fighting for the same skills.
I do not care if they do it, just do it better.
It sucks for all around atm. The majority get diluted skills, and the minority get a "viable" build.
Another ridiculous rule. Why is that? Why cant we use relevant background information about Blizzard Entertainment to formulate a more unbiased opinion? Ohh because its devastating to your argument....gotcha.
Heck if anything, viable has a much lower standard in Diablo than WoW. In WoW your game play affects numerous other people, but in Diablo you are only playing for yourself.
A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
That's 2 spell slots out of 6. Depending on how you choose Runes/passives, you could easily drop a meteor or Blizzard every few seconds and continue to spam spectral blade. Slow time or Mirror Image might be great for getting out of sticky situations.
The idea here is being a "melee wizard" not a melee warrior. A wizard has other options instead of always and only using weapon attacks. My personal melee wizard will probably use Frost Hydra as my secondary attack, which with Prodigy should allow me to drop one every few seconds. Sounds like a very viable and effective build to me right now.
No one outside of Blizzard in house testers can verify as to the effectiveness of the skills or builds right now. You're making very general references about "wizard skills are polluted by skills that are medicore". In beta the wizard seems perfectly fine, and in Lvl 60 PvP those lucky enough to test it were putting the wizard as the number 2 or 3 in terms of fave characters for PvP.
I think the Wizard is one of the most powerful melee characters. We will find out when the game is released.
Spectral Blade will be just your standart attack.
in what world do you live in did he get his ass kicked? in D2 hell ANY melee classes health CONSTANTLY went down up down up downnnnn uppppp downnnn uppp. from life steal. so your smoking crack if you think he "got his ass kicked". lmao
double fail. melee wizards main life steal will come from spectral blade runed (100% crit dmg lvl 7). witch doctor melee isnt a possible build he has only spells and summons. he has ZERO melee skills/passives.
epic fail. wow builds cant deviate but a few talents here and there. you pick 1 of 3 specs and the talents dont drastically change your gameplay or viableness*. :P. and even back in the day (vanilla+) there was very few builds per class that were decent, which in my world viable = decent. dont know your definition of it. lol
VS. diablo 3 where the amount of possible builds reaches the multi trillion mark and viable builds seems to go well into the thousands from the workings of the talent/rune system thats currently in place. those two games are completely uncomparable in many many aspects and the viable builds aspect is by FAR number 1 in the "cant compare" catagory. lol
Wal-Mart is a pure wizard.
Southern States is a battlemage.
Wal-mart naturally has things that Southern States carries, but not much.
However, Wal-mart could incorporate all the merchandise within southern states. The problem is, that it would take up an enormous amount of space, and force them to remove other more popular items from the store. The customers who come to Wal-mart have little to no interest in products sold at Southern States.
So keep Southern States out of wal-mart. If there is enough demand for Southern State products, then build a Southern States, do not ruin the Wal-Mart.
A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!