#Arcanist BIG issues:

18 messages · Page 1 of 1 (latest)

spring gust
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I have 30 hours so far playing with friends, and Arcanist feels WEAK, worse than Warrior, by a factor of three (at least)

TLDR: Very low damage, very low ammo, very hard to regain ammo, can't craft upgrades, skill tree is confusing.

Most of the passive tree is a lie or badly worded, the following examples:

-"Rod speciallist": It says it unlocks an alternative AOE attack, but what it does is unlock a heavy attack with more dmg, I don't notice the AOE on enemies, never gotten two hits out of it, but it does do SELF damage and FRIENDLY damage.

-A lot of the skills like "unstable magic" and "rod maintenance" mention "Wand" and "Rods" when in game we only have STAFF or BOOK, this causes confusion and thinking of " I guess I didn't get a wand yet?"

-Fire mastery gives up to 45% dmg while all other cap at 30% for the same skill points.... Why?

-"Accumulated Energy": This node says and I quote >Opponents HIT by magic explode after death, wounding comrades< ... Well it doesn't. I belive it does work on killing blow if it's with magic, but honestly it's hard to tell, feels worthless.

Another problem is general damage, we have limited ammo, VERY hard to gain more, and we can't craft new ones. We cant apply RUNES, just another aspect of warrior being better than arcanist.

IF I could respeck out of arcanist, I would.

sick fiber
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agreed, my arcanist friend is basically useless in fights

buoyant sluice
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yea, i fought against one of those Elite Lords that has immortal minions (1 skull required to upgrade the altitude) and he was immune to all magic and ranged attacks.. such nonsense

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need at least one early game perk that gives slow ammo regen to magic items as arcanist

unique creek
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Also I feel like the reflect shield never hit the enemy.

opal thunder
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Arcanist have big issue like they are not cheap in fight. Wands cost a lot of green dust and books also. Increse damage and green dust power it will be better

solar junco
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I agree. Have a lot of additional points:

  • Early game you are useless: Rod damage amp and book range have no impact since they require a relatively rare drop early in the game. Best T1 is Alchemy, and unless you already know the biomes needed for the Alch table, you are stuck with 0 skill points.
  • Damage output does not scale well, and is entirely useless against certain bosses. T2 Fire Wand with a few points in Fire damage amp can hit for ~15 to 26. A Bronze axe (around the same time in the game) can backstab for 200+ damage. No potions (that I am aware of) amplify your magic damage. Certain bosses are immune to ranged damage.
  • Damage consistency is poor: Green dust is hard to find, and components that can be Processed into green dust are also rare. All of the relevant things you can do with Arcanist tree compete heavily for scarce resources. Potions go quickly, and provide a good benefit to your Warrior friends, and are usually better econ-wise than getting to deal an extra ~160 damage in a fight.
  • Tomes and Rods doing status effects don't scale with anything. (At least, as far as I can tell. Why do 6 DoT when I can just hit them with a Hatchet for 60+?)
  • Tome consistency is poor: Getting healing power skill is impactless without finding a Healing Tome, which you will quickly run out of charges for. Additionally, Lifesteal rune will outpace your Tome over time anyways, and offers too much sustain. I do think small Tome range is good.
  • Class has an identity, but too many of its offerings are outscaled by other trees. Stam Tome on allies or Stamina potions are harder to find/make and offer too little compared to the plentiful Stam Regen food/drinks. Healing is outscaled by Lifesteal rune, food, and Shield/Parry. Parry has in-built stun, and Arcanist sometimes has CC that is mediocre (Slow, or Frost Nova). Engineer class has infinite sprint for some reason.
  • Are there any Alch ingredients where you care about all 3 effects?
solar junco
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Some things I wish were in the game:

  • Heavier emphasis on enabling a teammate. It would be awesome to Totem Shaman buff your allies, and allow you to do something after you spec'd into ranged magic and ranged damage against the Range immune boss. I wouldn't even mind if the early/midgame of Arcanist is mostly buffing/healing/shielding an ally, or doing some form of CC to enemies
  • The ability to make some fundamental Tomes or Rods. Rare Rods/Tomes can be cool goodies to find in Golden Chests, but having to sit on Skill Points while waiting on a wand feels horrid.
  • More Relevant Alchemy Effects...like 70% of the effects are Elemental resists, and not once has it been relevant. I wish it was, because potioning up before a boss fight is a cool feeling.
  • More enemies with ranged magic attacks/ranged attacks in general, and more aggressive melee attackers. I understand that some of the restrictions that exist on Ranged damage are because players have a boat that flies, but I think that more difficult combat scenarios makes the game more exciting, and it would be nice for ranged damage to have a place in the game other than "do some damage before the enemy gets cleaved by your Warrior mates". An enemy Skeleton Necromancer/BuffMage would very cool. So would swarms of flying enemies that attack your boat.
  • Either allow the Rod attacks to do friendly fire, and slightly more AoE, or let the attack go through allies.
  • More useful non-combat "utility" Arcanist skills. The Rune Skill feels weird because only the armor you are wearing can be enchanted with a very medium effect, and before that anyone can enchant anything with a full rune. "Harvest +1 magic item" might be nice. Or "out of combat, you and nearby allies move X% faster".
  • Arcanist relevant armor modifications. I would love a +5 Fire damage robe, and other effects like it.
limber granite
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The Arcanist is heavily reliant on mage armor with high elemental damage and passive, I remember having to deal over 120 damager per heavy/charged attack on my fire scepter but that takes time to cast vs melee weapon damage, but yeah it is underwhelming at the moment, I think the only viable use of magic weapon is supportive like, curse, heal,restoration, shield buff and summoning magic ( though I haven't seen 1 book of summoning yet while playing but found a lot of AOE books like blaze and lightning)

solar junco
limber granite
# solar junco I wasn't even aware there *were* Mage specific armors, I'll have to keep my eyes...

You can craft them through schematics or get them from chests I think you can get those mostly on cemeteries, but yeah 120 per heavy attack is nothing for fast light attacks of melee.

The armor is called Adept Mage Armor and Wraith ones (dropped by wraith lord) and I think mage armors are only up to novice tier ( considering mages in other games mostly use light-medium but not heavy )compared to heavy armor that warriors can use that can be advanced and Expert.

All magic weapons so far, we got them from golden chests

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so far we've only seen staves and scepters which is novice-advanced respectively same with spell books, no expert tier has been found yet

limber granite
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prime example of mage armor but this is lowest in the mage set

image.png
solar junco
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Sick, thanks for the info! How do the stats feel? Do they feel relevant, or are they not that great?

limber granite
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I don't play mage atm I just kept things magic in the storage just in case i switch roles. they should feel relevant if you +10 the set and get the +% damage you needed

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it's like having lifesteal on your weapon or accessory piece and will only be relevant if you have steel(expert) weapon that is +10

solar junco
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Sure, but Lifesteal on a warrior means you get free stuns on parry and sustain in fights. Do you feel like it competes with what Warrior can do

shadow shoal
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the only way i found the arcanist usefull is to use the ice spell to lock the enemies, and the bookthat reduces armor so my warrior friend can kill them easly, and the healing spell,
the book that say make enemies fight each other dont work at all, i always cast and no enemies start to fight themselves, firebook is totally useless because dont do any damage, the only other book i found usefull is the one that removes debuffs from players,
arcanists only work as support so far, is quite ok if u are on a multiplayer with an warrior, but is very frustrating to fight alone, rods dont feel usefull at all, also damage books dont work when casting on stairs, making killing those shaman goblins really really easy