[.11] How were Celestial casters for the playtests?

[Gandian Ravenscroft]

So, I might have simply missed it, but I haven't seen much for feedback regarding playing a full Celestial scholar during the assorted playtest games. With the creation of Channeling and separation of wands from spell slots, Celestial casters took a bit of a hit on what they can dish out each day with the same amount of build compared to the 1.3 ruleset, and I'm really interested to hear what people who went full Celestial thought of how things went for them.

 

[Polare]

I played my (pretty high level) Celestial caster Polare at one playtest so far, where I tried a United Blow build (but still primarily a caster). Overall, it felt cool, but I strongly suspect I'll likely stay more "throw packets" and less "swing at 'em" for character reasons.

As a "lots of columns" C caster without United Blow, I don't know that I'll memorize Evocation, but there are DEFINITELY times that I'll Flex Cast to it. There are tons of battles where I find myself e.g. all Binding and Sleep against Spectral undead, who don't care about either, and I'll happily drop down to Evocation for those otherwise-useless spell slots. It's a great backup effect group, though I don't know about Evocation as a primary memorization group without either Combined Strike or United Strike to really leverage it. Between Flex Casting and Spell Swap I'll definitely use Evocation, but I don't know that I'll memorize Evocation. It is definitely much more effective, though, due to the general lowering of monster Body Points.

Without a doubt I'm losing a ton from Channeling going in instead of "free" Wand damage. I feel that's definitely for the betterment of the game, though, because throwing 20s from my wand for "free" all day long (in 1.3) is pretty directly against the original intent of Wands. I'm definitely going to dabble in Channeling - probably taking 1-2 columns' worth of build - so I can toss out my 5s and 10s in long battles and save the "burst" of my spell columns for critical moments. I don't know that I'll take a Channeling pool of more than about 400, though, as that gives me 80 packets a day at 5 damage to plink away and contribute, which feels like plenty for that purpose.

-Bryan

 

[Ryan W]

I played a Celestial Caster at 3 playtests so far, each with a tweaked build. My 1.3 character is a formal specialist with a 5th column and 65 formal. First playtest was a 9th column and 35 formal. I had lots of spells that were resisted through out nearly the entire weekend, except for when I used evocation. I was augmenting my storms and using potency, but the hit points enemies had still felt scaled for 1.3 rather than a 2.0 game. Second game I dropped down to 8th column and 45 formal. I didn't rely on take out effects assuming they'd be resisted and mostly focused on damage. Without the storm augmentations, storm spells are more of a liability since they make you prone and easily targeted, but they're by far the best use of 9th level spells in combat. For Seattles recent (omg so good)playtest, the build I went with had 5 1/2 columns with 45 formal and a 500 channeling pool. While the scaling of the event was amazing, I ran out of everything I could throw halfway through the big fight before logistics saturday, rendering me useless, and then I used 80% of my cards resources in the 1 big fight we had saturday night after logistics.

We had fewer than typical celestial casters for the playtests. My final analysis is that Celestial Casters have a difficult time ranking up as the burst damage class they're meant to as they don't have the sustain, and fighters are better damage dealers since they can swing/shoot damage unlimited all day long and burst with slays and eviscerates against larger enemies. I'm worried about lower level casters in the new system. Earth scholars heal and do straight body damage against undead who can't defend as well against healing. I wouldn't have lasted as long without the rituals I had available to me for sure. It's a very fine line that plot teams have to scale for in order to not hand out too many spell defenses for scholars.

 

[MaxIrons]

I played a Celestial Caster at 3 playtests so far, each with a tweaked build. My 1.3 character is a formal specialist with a 5th column and 65 formal. First playtest was a 9th column and 35 formal. I had lots of spells that were resisted through out nearly the entire weekend, except for when I used evocation. I was augmenting my storms and using potency, but the hit points enemies had still felt scaled for 1.3 rather than a 2.0 game. Second game I dropped down to 8th column and 45 formal. I didn't rely on take out effects assuming they'd be resisted and mostly focused on damage. Without the storm augmentations, storm spells are more of a liability since they make you prone and easily targeted, but they're by far the best use of 9th level spells in combat. For Seattles recent (omg so good)playtest, the build I went with had 5 1/2 columns with 45 formal and a 500 channeling pool. While the scaling of the event was amazing, I ran out of everything I could throw halfway through the big fight before logistics saturday, rendering me useless, and then I used 80% of my cards resources in the 1 big fight we had saturday night after logistics.

We had fewer than typical celestial casters for the playtests. My final analysis is that Celestial Casters have a difficult time ranking up as the burst damage class they're meant to as they don't have the sustain, and fighters are better damage dealers since they can swing/shoot damage unlimited all day long and burst with slays and eviscerates against larger enemies. I'm worried about lower level casters in the new system. Earth scholars heal and do straight body damage against undead who can't defend as well against healing. I wouldn't have lasted as long without the rituals I had available to me for sure. It's a very fine line that plot teams have to scale for in order to not hand out too many spell defenses for scholars.

So, I noticed this as well. CC spells are of limited use, especially with ripping from Slow/Bind. Evocation still seemed lackluster. And Celestial channeling seemed underpowered as well (but less likely to be resisted).

The fight I expected to see C Casters do well at (elemental fight) didn't seem to care if it was C damage or not. I think elementally attuned creatures should get the undead treatment (high natural armor/resistance to physical attacks) and take opposite element as Body. Other than that, spell defenses in general should be lower on everything up to LT level of monster.