new patch ench charm

[ziahh]

Kanras: New charm duration and lull critical failure checks.


more info plz ?

[Uthgaard]

Charm should be balanced. Lower levels won't get raped so hard, higher levels won't have cruise control to xp.

[eriamjh]

Charm should be balanced. Lower levels won't get raped so hard, higher levels won't have cruise control to xp.

Read: Continuously keeping a charmed pet at high levels will now require both hands and at least one foot.

;)

[Dweed]

Safe to assume this is for necros and druids as well?

[ziahh]

i can only speak for myself but charm wasnt op b4 this patch in my opinion. i have had alot of break after only a few sec of charm and countless death soloing, it is risk vs reward. Some pet last longer some i just cant charm long enough and will continuously break. will see with this patch. All i ask is that spell reflect what the spell was back in the day of kunark and not hate because poeple think its op.

[Popt]

gonna make my last 42% a bit more challenging :(

[choklo]

I can't count how many times dark blue charmed mobs have broken charm after a 1-2 mintues(or less) at higher levels. I have 255 cha when I charm. Most of these mobs can kill a chanter in 1-2 seconds at high levels too. I don't see how this is over powered now.

I hope this nerf affects druids and bards too, but even so, it hurts the enchanter much more:

Bards can snare, run ultra fast, and wear heavy armor. They have little risk when charm breaks.
Druids can just kite the mob if it breaks with sow and snare. Again, they have little risk.
Enchanters have no armor, low hit points, can't snare, and take a long time to recharm. We have a huge risk of death.

[ziahh]

have to take into account that when charm broke you have in fact 2 mob on you to get rid off...with my 1100hp and cloth i will die 50% of the time when that happen and my pet have 67% haste .../shout dead man walking !

[Popt]

protip: use rune

[choklo]

protip: use rune

OMG! Problem solved! :/

[ammut]

have to take into account that when charm broke you have in fact 2 mob on you to get rid off...with my 1100hp and cloth i will die 50% of the time when that happen and my pet have 67% haste .../shout dead man walking !

Don't you see something wrong with being able to solo with a 67% hasted mob that DW for 150dmg a pop?

[choklo]

Don't you see something wrong with being able to solo with a 67% hasted mob that DW for 150dmg a pop?

If charm hardly broke, yes. The way it is now, charm breaks often and enchanters don't have the kiting abilities of druids and bards. It also takes a long time for the charm spell to cast. If you recall, our two stuns were destroyed in the last patch, making recharming much more dangerous.

[Popt]

If charm hardly broke, yes. The way it is now, charm breaks often and enchanters don't have the kiting abilities of druids and bards. It also takes a long time for the charm spell to cast. If you recall, our two stuns were destroyed in the last patch, making recharming much more dangerous.

Yes, Whirl was destroyed, however Color Slant is just as viable except the recast is longer. Tash > Color Slant > Charm makes it very easy to recharm. It only sucks if Color Slant resists

[Uthgaard]

I can't count how many times dark blue charmed mobs have broken charm after a 1-2 mintues(or less) at higher levels. I have 255 cha when I charm. Most of these mobs can kill a chanter in 1-2 seconds at high levels too. I don't see how this is over powered now.

I hope this nerf affects druids and bards too, but even so, it hurts the enchanter much more:

Bards can snare, run ultra fast, and wear heavy armor. They have little risk when charm breaks.
Druids can just kite the mob if it breaks with sow and snare. Again, they have little risk.
Enchanters have no armor, low hit points, can't snare, and take a long time to recharm. We have a huge risk of death.

And I hope it makes everything more accurate to the classic timeline. Nothing more, nothing less. Hop in a time machine and go lobby the original eq devs about their design decisions if you don't like the advantages and disadvantages of each class.

[choklo]

And I hope it makes everything more accurate to the classic timeline. Nothing more, nothing less. Hop in a time machine and go lobby the original eq devs about their design decisions if you don't like the advantages and disadvantages of each class.

If this is indeed what happened on live, then it's a moot point. I didn't play a chanter back then.

[Dach]

Nerfs that are not necessary and completely SUCK are certainly classic.

Well done.

[ziahh]

well last patch reduce the enchanter class ability to solo to almost zero. here a log of the last fight i had...

http://pastebin.com/WpUgFqez

recap here to make thing easier :

[Sun Apr 17 17:29:02 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun Apr 17 17:29:38 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun Apr 17 17:31:26 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun Apr 17 17:32:02 2011] Your Boltran`s Agacerie spell has worn off.
[Sun Apr 17 17:32:44 2011] Your Boltran`s Agacerie spell has worn off.

there might have more break in the log... and this is only 1 fight. i got screenshot that i can post that are as bad as this fight.

[ziahh]

well last patch reduce the enchanter class ability to solo to almost zero. here a log of the last fight i had...

recap at the bottom to speed shit a liltle.

http://pastebin.com/WpUgFqez

recap here to make thing easier :

[Sun Apr 17 17:29:02 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun Apr 17 17:29:38 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun Apr 17 17:31:26 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun Apr 17 17:32:02 2011] Your Boltran`s Agacerie spell has worn off.
[Sun Apr 17 17:32:44 2011] Your Boltran`s Agacerie spell has worn off.

there might have more break in the log... and this is only 1 fight. i got screenshot that i can post that are as bad as this fight.

[yaaaflow]

Yep that certainly resembles classic more than the pre-patch charm durations did.

[nalkin]

woooooooo! love to see the chanties QQing after their long insanely OP journey to this point. Enchanters were without a doubt way to OP. It took forever to get whirl nerfed and that was insane. But still after that the charm was insanely OP. Being able to charm the most powerful pets in game, then haste them, and keep them charmed for 15 min +.

[Jigga]

I remember charm killing BB guards quite easily around 49-553ish as an ench on live on tz while i waited to get into a KC AE group.

[ziahh]

enchanter charm on live was very unstable at low lv and as they grow stronger in lv their charm began being more stable. the only high lv charm that is unstable is the lv 60 that only last a few sec but the enchanter is being able to pet monster above lv 53

here is lucy data on boltran agacerie that clearly shown that the duration should last betwin 6 to 7.5 min ( duration shorter since we can charm lv 50-53 monster )
http://lucy.allakhazam.com/spell.html?id=1705&source=Live

also , allure spell last longer. here lucy data on it : 14.8 mins @L46 to 20.5 mins @L65
http://lucy.allakhazam.com/spell.html?id=184&source=Live

so in my opinion spell patch no 7 was right on.

and for more info the historical data on charm that goes back to 2002.
http://lucy.allakhazam.com/spellhistory.html?id=184&source=Live

thx you.

[Aisi]

If you're going to nerf enchanters in the name of classic then change the hate value on mez, AE stun. Mez DID NOT have this high of a hate value in classic. And AE stun did very little to almost no hate in classic.

I'm positive you guys had no idea what the hate values were and just guessed but they're way off. I can't prove this (I've tried searching numerous times) since hate values unlike patch notes aren't easy to find but I played an enchanter since release and very rarely in the high levels did I have to chain root with people taunting to get a mez'd mob off of me when warriors taunted before breaking. It's sort of ridiculous here!

Tash = extremely high hate. higher than on here
Mez = medium hate (much lower than on here)
AE color stun line = low hate
Slow = medium hate
Charm = high hate (not sure but about right on here)

[saucer]

I think this has been a long time coming.

[ziahh]

woooooooo! love to see the chanties QQing after their long insanely OP journey to this point. Enchanters were without a doubt way to OP. It took forever to get whirl nerfed and that was insane. But still after that the charm was insanely OP. Being able to charm the most powerful pets in game, then haste them, and keep them charmed for 15 min +.

no go see the data on lucy, you have no idea what ur talking about.
http://lucy.allakhazam.com/spell.html?id=184&source=Live
Duration: 14.8 mins @L46 to 20.5 mins @L65

[nalkin]

no go see the data on lucy, you have no idea what ur talking about.
http://lucy.allakhazam.com/spell.html?id=184&source=Live
Duration: 14.8 mins @L46 to 20.5 mins @L65

Is that classic data though? Anyway, even if that is true 15 min is way to OP and it shouldn't be like that. Better put that LFG tag on...

Keep QQing I love it. love enchanters getting nerfeddddddd!!!!!!!!! :) :) :)

[ziahh]

Is that classic data though? Anyway, even if that is true 15 min is way to OP and it shouldn't be like that. Better put that LFG tag on...

Keep QQing I love it. love enchanters getting nerfeddddddd!!!!!!!!! :) :) :)

obviously ur not a caster your iq is to low...

[nalkin]

obviously ur not a caster your iq is to low...

/lfg on :p

[danus]

I can't count how many times dark blue charmed mobs have broken charm after a 1-2 mintues(or less) at higher levels. I have 255 cha when I charm. Most of these mobs can kill a chanter in 1-2 seconds at high levels too. I don't see how this is over powered now.

I hope this nerf affects druids and bards too, but even so, it hurts the enchanter much more:

Bards can snare, run ultra fast, and wear heavy armor. They have little risk when charm breaks.
Druids can just kite the mob if it breaks with sow and snare. Again, they have little risk.
Enchanters have no armor, low hit points, can't snare, and take a long time to recharm. We have a huge risk of death.

What he said.

[Blingx]

I can't count how many times dark blue charmed mobs have broken charm after a 1-2 mintues(or less) at higher levels.

I hope this nerf affects druids and bards too, but even so, it hurts the enchanter much more:


I chuckled at this.

The higher bard charm already has a duration of 12-18ish sec if you are lucky. Though I have not tested bard charm to see if this does indeed affect them, assuming it did we would be seeing duration of 0-6s possibly. Baseless finger pointing makes the rest of the claim, well, baseless.

On the other hand, going by
"higher levels won't have cruise control to xp" - Uthgaard
my thought would be this doesn't affect bards because this was not the case for us.

[ziahh]

http://i215.photobucket.com/albums/cc235/photogore/EQ000118.jpg

[ziahh]

http://i215.photobucket.com/albums/cc235/photogore/EQ000112.jpg

[Splorf22]

On the one hand, I've long considered enchanters a bit OP. I was able to solo the King room in Guk at 52 even without whirl, whereas a 6 man group of 50s without an enchanter could easily wipe there. And I can't really consider it to be some amazing talent on my part, just pacify / paralyzing earth / charm.

On the other hand, if I didn't have the portal in the back it would unquestionably have been an XP loss. If there are enchanters charm soloing at 50+ for xp without a) being at a zone line or b) being outdoors with SoW they are a hell of a lot more skilled than I am. Charm break on a 45+ pet is *ugly* - you'll take 200-300 damage in the best case, and 1000-1500 if you get a resist on color flux or you get bashed. And if you look at the log, you will notice that the enchanter that posted is in fact duoing with a cleric. Charm breaks in groups are even worse because the mob you are fighting isn't rooted, so usually it will come after you as well (or summon you). In fact I would say with the changes to taunt charming in a full group was dead anyway.

It's been 10 years, but I don't remember enchanters permacharming pets in groups, so the changes may be somewhat classic, although Haynar told me that the charm code here was completely rewritten from eqemulator. Ultimately I think that if your goal is to have a hard game where the mobs are a lot stronger than the players, you just can't have a cool class like an enchanter with abilities like calm and charm.

[Ropethunder]

I was able to solo the King room in Guk at 52 even without whirl.

You can't compare a camp with ubiquitous number of spawns to charm kill one PH with a zone line at your back to the much more dangerous dungeon crawling variety.

Honestly, charming stuff was dangerous for soloing but it wasn't overpowered. It was perfect with plenty of unexpected charm breaks. Sure, you could get a pretty solid charm if you use it on something 10-15 levels below you. But that wouldn't be considered "cruise control to xp" as some have said it is.

Charming takes a lot of mana and is not as amazing solo exp as people think it is when you factor in charm breaks, med breaks, regen breaks when you take hp damage, and the plat sink for runes.

Higher level charms was perfect before this patch. And in Kunark mobs hit so hard that I would already only ever charm while in a group. A charm break means you get nailed even with Rune V up.

What was the reason for this change? Why was it considered overpowered?

[Fazlazen]

It's been 10 years, but I don't remember enchanters permacharming pets in groups, so the changes may be somewhat classic, although Haynar told me that the charm code here was completely rewritten from eqemulator. Ultimately I think that if your goal is to have a hard game where the mobs are a lot stronger than the players, you just can't have a cool class like an enchanter with abilities like calm and charm.

I think your memory is off on this point. I clearly remember enchanters keeping a charmed frog for hours in sebilis on live.

The nerf to calm/paci/lull was right and it was in fact OP. This is what allowed us enchanters to break in camps and it made many encounters trivial. Whirl, I was actually happy when whirl till you hurl was nerfed, because it wasnt right.


However, charming, from the testing I've been doing last night, seems way off. I dont think a single one of my charms lasted for more than 5mins, breaking often under less than 30seconds, and these charms were done on tashanian'd 10 lvls undercons in Charasis, with 255 charisma at lvl 57. I was in North wing with a necro at that time, keeping both our pets tashed, and he could not believe how much longer his charms were lasting compared to mine. (<Vesica Dei> dont remember his name, lvl 57 necro.)

Let's not forget charming is one of the main ability of the enchanter class.

Maybe it makes us OP, then so be it, thats the way the game was designed.

Just wait until we start raiding velious and all that is asked of us is to clarity and to click our epic, you'll get your last laugh.

faz

[Brinkman]

Just want to throw this in here, Im a necro, and it seems my charms are breaking alot sooner than normal as well. I had 4 charm breaks in 2 minutes, Mob was 11 lvls below me.

I could just be coincidence, but It might be affecting all charm spells, not just enchanters.

[Nedala]

Just want to throw this in here, Im a necro, and it seems my charms are breaking alot sooner than normal as well. I had 4 charm breaks in 2 minutes, Mob was 11 lvls below me.

I could just be coincidence, but It might be affecting all charm spells, not just enchanters.

It is supposed to affect all charms.

Anyway it seems off, i had quiet a lot charmbreaks b4 this nerf, but now it just breaks all the time and is pretty much useless, idk if thats really how it should be.

[Throb]

I have to wonder how many people applauding this nerf actually played an enchanter past 50 and used charm. I considered myself pretty good at it, and even in a group with a charmed pet, to AFK or get distracted for even 30 seconds could mean your death. I had allures sometimes last the full duration, but I also had some charm breaks after less than 10 seconds (albeit those were rare). To summarize, the duration of the spell was already extremely erratic at times, and if your charm happened to break on a large pull you're trying to mez, it was already highly probable you'd nearly die or wipe.

As of now charming is essentially useless. Charming should be dangerous, but not broken beyond practicality as it is currently. If you want to nerf it, fine, but can we tone it down a bit? Even with tash and malo on a light blue mob, it would not stay charmed for more than 2-4 mins, usually breaking within 45 seconds and quite often within 10.

If your plan is to make enchanters nothing more than mez and buffbots ala Plane of Sky, you're well on your way.

[ziahh]

You can't compare a camp with ubiquitous number of spawns to charm kill one PH with a zone line at your back to the much more dangerous dungeon crawling variety.

Honestly, charming stuff was dangerous for soloing but it wasn't overpowered. It was perfect with plenty of unexpected charm breaks. Sure, you could get a pretty solid charm if you use it on something 10-15 levels below you. But that wouldn't be considered "cruise control to xp" as some have said it is.

Charming takes a lot of mana and is not as amazing solo exp as people think it is when you factor in charm breaks, med breaks, regen breaks when you take hp damage, and the plat sink for runes.

Higher level charms was perfect before this patch. And in Kunark mobs hit so hard that I would already only ever charm while in a group. A charm break means you get nailed even with Rune V up.

What was the reason for this change? Why was it considered overpowered?

thx you , you reflected my thoughts on this one. since iam french canadien i cant really make solid post and arguing the point. all enchanter i spoke to agreed that the new charm data is really fucekd up and have negate any ability to solo what so ever. we really need a roll back on that 1 ><

[ziahh]

Let's not forget charming is one of the main ability of the enchanter class.

Maybe it makes us OP, then so be it, thats the way the game was designed.

Just wait until we start raiding velious and all that is asked of us is to clarity and to click our epic, you'll get the last laugh.

faz

AMEN

[Splorf22]

You can't compare a camp with ubiquitous number of spawns to charm kill one PH with a zone line at your back to the much more dangerous dungeon crawling variety.

Honestly, charming stuff was dangerous for soloing but it wasn't overpowered. It was perfect with plenty of unexpected charm breaks. Sure, you could get a pretty solid charm if you use it on something 10-15 levels below you. But that wouldn't be considered "cruise control to xp" as some have said it is.

Charming takes a lot of mana and is not as amazing solo exp as people think it is when you factor in charm breaks, med breaks, regen breaks when you take hp damage, and the plat sink for runes.

Higher level charms was perfect before this patch. And in Kunark mobs hit so hard that I would already only ever charm while in a group. A charm break means you get nailed even with Rune V up.

What was the reason for this change? Why was it considered overpowered?

I think if you had read more than 10 words of my post you would realize that we agree on just about everything, except perhaps the basic design philosophy of everquest.

[lyyfeleech]

In HS this morning I had 6 breaks in 4 minutes. I just pulled out a normal pet after that. Necro charm seems broken now.

[nalkin]

I am not sure how it was on classic but I do know that being able to keep a pet charmed on avg for 15min+ is OP. Pre-nerf enchanters were essentially mages with stronger pets and the ability to CC. How is that not OP?

[Splorf22]

BTW Nalkin you are totally wrong about enchanters keeping pets for 15 minutes. I almost never got 'your tashania spell has worn off' unless either the pet was >10 levels lower than me, i.e. lower level than a mage pet, or maloed by a shaman.

Thinking some more, I think Verant nerfed Whirl and Lull very poorly. The right way to do it would be to really increase the recast time. Lulling 1/2 mobs at a camp isn't a big deal, the problem is when you can just pacify a huge encounter.

[Uthgaard]

You're exactly correct in fact Verant is soooo concerned with making their $10.00 a month that they don't want the players to truly have fun. Where's my chain lightning or delayed blast fireball? Where's my robe of the archmagi? Where is my staff of the archmagi? The monk is cracking people in the jaw for 500 and i'm over here struggling to hold a stupid baboon charmed with my 240 charisma for more than 3 seconds. HELLO FAIR? This staff is as gay as all the rest of the stuff that dropped in Kunark and VOS for us. 2hb WTF?

Just thought I'd throw this out there. Happened across a random charm rant on Shissar Nullifier Staff that VS drops. They're all over the place. :)

[Glitch]

I am not sure how it was on classic but I do know that being able to keep a pet charmed on avg for 15min+ is OP. Pre-nerf enchanters were essentially mages with stronger pets and the ability to CC. How is that not OP?

Says the mage. ;p

Through the scope of this project (launch -> Velious), chanters were just OP. Everyone knows it.
Charm right now isn't -as- unusable as everyone is claiming. It's still brutal, but not pathetic. It should be more reliable than it is currently, while slightly less reliable than it was a week ago.

Especially post-Tashanian, charm is supposed to be fairly stable, and stacked tash+malo should generally get you a full charm.

BUT I guess we need documentation to prove it? :(

[Lasher]

When i played ench during live. You needed like max cha, tash and malo for it to be super reliable. Max cha and tash from what i recall would let you keep a mob charmed for like one 3-5 mins but you would get alot of instant breaks that would bring the average duration down. Killing norrath guards that were around lvl 40-45 i could keep a guard charmed for about 1 fight. I hardly recall having one charm last more than 1 fight. Eventually i think in pop they gave ench aa's to help charm, Total domination and you would see longer charms but mobs where hitting so hard and your buffs were so much better than you could kill 2 or 3 mobs before your pet was close to dieing and you needed to memblur him so he would super regenerate health

[ziahh]

enchanter charm on live was very unstable at low lv and as they grow stronger in lv their charm began being more stable. the only high lv charm that is unstable is the lv 60 that only last a few sec but the enchanter is being able to pet monster above lv 53

here is lucy data on boltran agacerie that clearly shown that the duration should last betwin 6 to 7.5 min ( duration shorter since we can charm lv 50-53 monster )
http://lucy.allakhazam.com/spell.html?id=1705&source=Live

also , allure spell last longer. here lucy data on it : 14.8 mins @L46 to 20.5 mins @L65
http://lucy.allakhazam.com/spell.html?id=184&source=Live

so in my opinion spell patch no 7 was right on.

and for more info the historical data on charm that goes back to 2002.
http://lucy.allakhazam.com/spellhistory.html?id=184&source=Live

thx you.

all the info are there.

enough says ... this is how it is suposed to be.

[kanras]

BUT I guess we need documentation to prove it? :(

Correct. Ways to get any mechanic changed, ranked:

1) Provide significant time-relevant data. (For charm, anything post-POP will be ignored entirely)
2) Provide time-relevant class discussion.
3) Provide time-relevant comments.
4) Perform an effective pagan ritual.
5) Offer personal anecdotes. If you've proven in the past that you'll throw around wild claims any time a class you play gets nerfed, these will be ignored entirely.
6) Make a delicious sandwich, watch the grass grow, or pretty much any other activity that doesn't actually annoy us.
7) Offer personal opinions on how it should work.
8) Threaten to quit playing the affected class.

[Nedala]

I am not sure how it was on classic but I do know that being able to keep a pet charmed on avg for 15min+ is OP. Pre-nerf enchanters were essentially mages with stronger pets and the ability to CC. How is that not OP?

15min + charms were FAR from average. Average, especially in kunark, was probably 5 mins, imo charm was perfectly fine the way it was, now its just useless. I already noticed a lot more charm breaks in kunark dungeons than in classic prior to the patch. I just can't believe ench charm was this weak on live with cha on cap.

[Throb]

Just thought I'd throw this out there. Happened across a random charm rant on Shissar Nullifier Staff that VS drops. They're all over the place. :)

You're exactly correct in fact Verant is soooo concerned with making their $10.00 a month that they don't want the players to truly have fun. Where's my chain lightning or delayed blast fireball? Where's my robe of the archmagi? Where is my staff of the archmagi? The monk is cracking people in the jaw for 500 and i'm over here struggling to hold a stupid baboon charmed with my 240 charisma for more than 3 seconds. HELLO FAIR? This staff is as gay as all the rest of the stuff that dropped in Kunark and VOS for us. 2hb WTF?

That entire paragraph is nothing but hyperbole. If you guys make changes based on stuff like that, well I digress.

[redghosthunter]

Wow and we are still seeing Charm rage... I've been pulled into many of these threads... The ENC OP threads date back almost a year now... Look for yourselves. Nurfing of the class is not a new thing... Ya dont like it dont play a ENC.

Why dont we just eliminate the ENC class? that way we will not have years of rage ??? Even if that happened-- there be new cries of OVERPOWERED ... beastlords or something anything to bitch .

[Blingx]

Charm
Charm (12), Beguile (24), Cajoling Whispers (39), Allure (49)
Truly one of the most awesome spells in the enchanter arsenal, as well as one of the most dangerous. With one cast, a power-hitting, high-hitpoint, created-to-challenge-players-in-groups mob becomes your pet. Capable of dropping mobs more powerful than itself, or several in a row that are weaker, especially with your assistance. However, this mob is yours for a purely random duration; at any moment you could be the only thing near the top of the ex-pet's hate list. Truly, the risk versus reward is extreme in both directions. An amazing power both in solo and group situations, granting the ability to transform a deadly attacker into a powerful ally. Duration will always be randomly generated, though is seems a higher Charisma will help lower resists on your initial cast. Level-caps on the target mob are the real difference between the various charms, as Charm only allows you to affect up to a level 24 mob; after that you must use Beguile, which bears a larger mana cost, and greater casting time. With each upgrade, it takes more mana to charm your target, and a longer casting time to establish your hold.

This page (http://xornn.tripod.com/Spells/spell.htm) looks like the last time the spell lists were edited were pre-kunark (top spell level of 49). Too old?

[Blingx]

From the top
# Charm resist rates are minorly impacted by higher Charisma.
# Charm duration is random, and not visibly affected by Charisma.
# Charm is a massive aggro producer.
# Charm is broken by duration expiring, turning invisible, or if dispelled.


Charm Solo
Lineup: Nuke, Charm, PB Stun, Root, Single Mez, Attack Slow (Edge), MR Debuff, Swap Slot (Rune)

Primary damage is obviously your strongest nuke. Charm is a selection typically based on what level you need to charm. Always use the lowest version of charm (12th Charm, 24th Beguile, 39th Cajoling Whispers, 49th Allure) you can, to conserve mana. (The exception is at 53rd when you aquire Boltran's Agacerie, and it's fast casting time, but let's stick to pre-51 here.) The Color Stun is whatever version you need to cover the recast for your charm. Color Flux with Charm, Color Shift with Beguile, Color Skew with Cajoling... (wrong here... you have to mez after you start using Cajoling... more later). Root is the key to recharming instead of dying, as you keep the enemy mob rooted at all times--thus when charm breaks only the ex-pet rushes you. Your Single Mez should be your strongest version (especially after breaking charm and needing to med for a bit before killing pet or re-charming), but after you need Cajoling Whispers to charm, you'll find that Color Shift doesn't buy you enough time, even if you backpedal a long way off. At this point it's necessary to use Mesmerize (level 4) to hold the mob still while you cast your charm. I typicaly drop Mesmerize right into the single mez spot, and honestly don't even need to mesmerize much. Usually charm will hold through two fights, so just don't press your luck going for the third.....

...
Honestly this is about all there is to the real essence of charm soloing. There's more to it than just this, but that's the stuff you need to know... the rest you pick up with experimentation. Word to the wise:

You will have horrible charm durations. You will be chased to zone or die horribly. You will get a train on you that you can't do anything about. And non-smokers die every day.

(You will also get the hang of it, and have amazing stories to tell about that one pet that killed 5 mobs in a row and you finally had to blur it because it was too tough to nuke out still.)


Tactics (http://xornn.tripod.com/Tactics/charm.htm) alittle more updated with reference to a 53rd spell.

[ziahh]

Wow and we are still seeing Charm rage... I've been pulled into many of these threads... The ENC OP threads date back almost a year now... Look for yourselves. Nurfing of the class is not a new thing... Ya dont like it dont play a ENC.

Why dont we just eliminate the ENC class? that way we will not have years of rage ??? Even if that happened-- there be new cries of OVERPOWERED ... beastlords or something anything to bitch .

Dude... We're not on a server where poeple make change to fit their own opinion to what ever they think a class should be. this is a replica of
what ever was the class back then ( 1999 - 2002 or so ). Sony made the enchanter class the way they are and with each expension all class become more powerfull. its mostly like i would claim that backstab is op thus nerfing the ability to use it. You dont nerf a class skill that make this class unique. rog have invs and backstab , ench can charm...Leave it the way it used to be. i posted all the raw data earlier that come from lucy. Those data goes back to 2002.Make it classic again.thats's all we ask.

[Lasher]

SPell allure

http://replay.waybackmachine.org/20020704055606/http://eq.castersrealm.com/spells/spelldescriptions.asp?Id=142&Page=1
Unbelievable - Brainslayer (1/28/2001)

Due to having multiple enchanters in our groups, I was able to play around with this spell on a recent fire giant raid in solusek b. I never relized how powerful it was before until I casted it on Warlord Skarlon. He was charmed for atleast 5 min. It was the funniest thing when when a fire giant warrior began to summon him, the entire dungeon nearly died laughing, but so did I when he broke the spell.



WOW - Cassie (1/28/2001)

I cast this on a Dark Ritualist in the MM tower the other day for grins, and it was lasting upwards of 5+ minutes. To give you an idea of how long this lasts, two of my buds had time to duel, the loser got rezzed, and then medded to full all w hile the pet remained charmed. This wasn't a one-time shot either. I've noticed this routinely lasting for 4 to 5 minutes before breaking (though I've sometimes had it break after 20 seconds LOL) Not only that, in the new patch as of today we will get a message when Charm is going to break. WOOHOO!!!!! No more sudden surprises when that Hill Giant or Seafury is about to turn on you :) The run of chanter twinks with each patch continues.


seafury 38-42 and dark ritualist 33
XICOTL, By Ordeith (1/28/2001)

Xicotl in MM is a wonderful target for this spell, hits for 100 max, casts spells, tons of HP...*grins* I charmed him and he was soloing half of the garden area around the damph, spell held for around 10 mins also, with 200 cha of course.

according to alla xicotl is a 41 mob

[Blingx]

From teh 4th Circle (http://xornn.tripod.com/Circles/4th_circle_%2812-15%29.htm) to teh 12th Circle (http://xornn.tripod.com/Circles/12th_circle_%2849-50%29.htm)

Charm - Here it is. The big dog. When you cast this, the target mob (max level 25) becomes your pet to command. NPC mobs hit much harder, have more hitpoints, and basically outweigh all PC pets in every way. If two mobs fight (one as your pet) and you slow the enemy, your pet should win the fight, though almost dead. Then you kill your pet for full experience. No class can touch our adaptiveness in soloing with this method, and few will encounter the excitement. Dropping double-blues with little mana use and your full attention requires is a real rush. It's also extremely hazardous. While at a point and time I felt that Charisma was the end all be all of charming, my ways have changed, and Drekaar solos charm style with 85 Charisma.

Allure - Charm upgrade, new cap of level 50 mobs. This spell will use 245 mana to cast, and has durations just like the last 3 charms. It just targets bigger stuff now--and takes 6 seconds to cast. Research spell with Nitilims Grimoire pages 378 & 379.

[ziahh]

.[/QUOTE] Allure - Charm upgrade, new cap of level 50 mobs. This spell will use 245 mana to cast, and has durations just like the last 3 charms. It just targets bigger stuff now--and takes 6 seconds to cast. Research spell with Nitilims Grimoire pages 378 & 379.[/QUOTE]

false

Allure
Classes: ENC/49
Duration: 14.8 mins @L46 to 20.5 mins @L65
http://lucy.allakhazam.com/spell.html?id=184&source=Live

[Blingx]

false

Classes: ENC/46
Duration: 14.8 mins @L46 to 20.5 mins @L65
http://lucy.allakhazam.com/spell.html?id=184&source=Live

http://lucy.allakhazam.com/spell.html?id=184&source=Live

source=Live

source=Live

source=Live

Unless I am mistaken~

[ziahh]

since poeple cant read previous page

here the raw data since 2002

http://lucy.allakhazam.com/spellhistory.html?id=184&source=Live

[ziahh]

since poeple cant read previous page

here the raw data since 2002

http://lucy.allakhazam.com/spellhistory.html?id=184&source=Live



and OMG look at the duration!!!

2002-09-04 11:33 Changed Durationtext from 15.7 mins @L49 to 19.0 mins @L60 to 15.7 mins @L49 to 20.5 mins @L65

huh what! 15min.7 -19min before 2002 ...

[Blingx]

Allure - Duration: 14.8 mins @L46 to 20.5 mins @L65
http://lucy.allakhazam.com/spellhistory.html?id=184&source=Live
2002-03-07 11:32 Initial Entry


Allure - Charm upgrade, new cap of level 50 mobs. This spell will use 245 mana to cast, and has durations just like the last 3 charms. It just targets bigger stuff now--and takes 6 seconds to cast. Research spell with Nitilims Grimoire pages 378 & 379.
http://xornn.tripod.com/news.htm
Wednesday, October 31, 2001 - Added this news page so people can actually see if something new has been posted. Finished the 15th Circle (53) and began work on the 16th Circle.

Also "This web-site was last updated Thursday, February 28, 2002"



Perspective: Release date(s) December 4, 2001 Shadows of Luclin

[ziahh]

Allure - Duration: 14.8 mins @L46 to 20.5 mins @L65
http://lucy.allakhazam.com/spellhistory.html?id=184&source=Live
2002-03-07 11:32 Initial Entry


Allure - Charm upgrade, new cap of level 50 mobs. This spell will use 245 mana to cast, and has durations just like the last 3 charms. It just targets bigger stuff now--and takes 6 seconds to cast. Research spell with Nitilims Grimoire pages 378 & 379.
http://xornn.tripod.com/news.htm
Wednesday, October 31, 2001 - Added this news page so people can actually see if something new has been posted. Finished the 15th Circle (53) and began work on the 16th Circle.

We dont care about some internet site that a guy made a sunny sunday out of boredom. the lucy data are all the change that has been made on live server since 2002 and even earlier.

[Blingx]

We dont care about some internet site that a guy made a sunny sunday out of boredom. the lucy data are all the change that has been made on live server since 2002 and even earlier.

Dedicated Enchanter makes website describing Enchanter class at time of interest = we dont care. gotcha.

Internet Site Guy Made Initial Data
December 4, 2001 Shadows of Luclin
Lucy Initial Data
October 29, 2002 Planes of Power

[baalzy]

Ziahh, keep in mind that charm duration is the maximum duration.

[Lasher]

All those are stating is the max duration which you would see on live if you charmed somehting green or if the mob was few lvls below you tashed and malosini on it

[Blingx]

eqcastersrealm (http://replay.waybackmachine.org/200012091902/http://eq.castersrealm.com/spells/spells.asp?Class=Enchanter)
Allure Single Target Random Duration Charm Spell (Level 50 Cap) Alt. Research. 245

Max Duration: 8 minutes (July 01)

[Attos]

From what I remember on live charm would last ~1 fight or about 6 minutes.

It would often break before then but that's why you rooted the mob you were fighting and didn't haste your pet and killed it after 1 fight.

Charisma more effected the resist rate of a mob to charm and not the duration. Duration was determined by a repeated MR/Level check.

I feel like it might be a little overbalanced right now - shouldn't be getting 6-8 20 second charms in a row but letting a chanter and a cleric group with a pet that only breaks every 15min - super op. Hasted pet + cheals and CC makes duoing any camp a breeze and although I've enjoyed it on both my chanter and my cleric it seems that time has come to an end.

[Aisi]

I don't have a problem with the charm and whirl changes. They feel exactly in line with how things were in classic as far as I can remember.

But come on, fix the hate values for our spells. PBAE stun and mez should not have this much hate associated with it. I don't know where you got your values from but :( sigh it's not classic at all. I overlooked the problems with mez feeling so off when I was overpowered and had a pet dishing huge damage in groups but if you're going to take away those things at least look into lowering the hate on mez and PBAE stun to their classic values (which I know no one knows, but it's definitely not this high).

[nalkin]

15min + charms were FAR from average. Average, especially in kunark, was probably 5 mins, imo charm was perfectly fine the way it was, now its just useless. I already noticed a lot more charm breaks in kunark dungeons than in classic prior to the patch. I just can't believe ench charm was this weak on live with cha on cap.

Ehh idk. When i grouped with Glitch a few weeks ago and I malad the mob, that thing would last forever. Probably over 20min. Maybe I am not remembering correctly or Glitch can say better, but it seemed to last a very very long time. And to have such certainty with that strength of a pet seems OP to me. IMO it should last around 6min on average. If that was the case then I agree it should be reverted back to that.

I do have a bit of a sour taste in my mouth from seeing enchanters soloing so easily for the past year with whirl and charm being way OP. I remember just sitting in kedge watching enchanter chain whirl undertow with charmed seahorse and the seahorse took near 0 damage. Same thing with Estrella. It was just incredibly easy for enchanter to kill these camps which a group would have difficulty doing.

[Glitch]

I'm also a super pro and forced recharm a lot with hide, so I never took damage between charms.
Charm certainly wasn't a guaranteed 15minutes last week, but it was happening too often (without malo). As I said before. It should be a bit less reliable than that, but certainly not as unreliable as this.


It's funny. When I went searching the net for documentation, and limited my search for classic era posts, so few of them mentioned using tash before charm, and even less recommended malo. lololol
No wonder they got charm breaks. I swear it's mainly an issue of everyone suddenly knowing how to play vs. ignorant 1999 era players. :D

Still, the smarter posts claimed that charm was generally good for about two fights, where it's about time to break charm manually and swap pets anyways.

[Nedala]

Well 2 fights sounds about what i did prior to the merge. Maybe it was too op but now you can only dream of 2 fights without a break. 5 minutes would be totally ok but now it seems to break 1-2 times each min (if solo without malo).

[Malrubius]

Correct. Ways to get any mechanic changed, ranked:

1) Provide significant time-relevant data. (For charm, anything post-POP will be ignored entirely)
2) Provide time-relevant class discussion.
3) Provide time-relevant comments.


This post contains all the time-relevant data (and links to such) that I am aware of...

http://www.project1999.org/forums/showthread.php?t=6733

As a bonus, it also has classic-era statements from Verant about CHA's effect on Mez and Lull.

HTH

[Uthgaard]

Lucy also does not go to 2002 'and earlier'. It goes to March 2002, and that's it. Beside that, you can spam links to spell data all you want. Nothing in the spell data determines the reliability of the charm. That's all handled by the server's checks vs charisma and magic resist.

As far as any posts from that time frame referencing charm being unreliable being hyperbole, ubiqitous posts including stats, durations, and frustration with charm identical to the condensed raging on this thread don't exactly contradict the change. So far the extent of the argument for changing it back has been unsupported anecdotes of "I remember this". The only tangible documentation that has been provided in this thread, at all, is documentation of its notorious unreliability.

It's not going back the way it was, you'll just have to accept that. If you think it should be more reliable than it is now, start posting something to back that up with a relevant timestamp.

[nalkin]

I'm also a super pro and forced recharm a lot with hide, so I never took damage between charms.

Pro~. Well that would explain why I thought it was so long. Though still, if it was not difficult to re-charm then that still seems a bit OP to me. I also think Glitch may be right with what he said below this post about how people know more about what they are doing. It probably wasn't as OP as it used to be because people were still figuring things out, and now with all the pros on here it changes things.

5 min avg I am fine with that and think that is fair. Like I said though, when whirl was pre-nerf watching an enchanter play made me sick to my stomach at how easy it was. So I am still smacking my lips from the bitterness...

[Jigga]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

SPell allure

http://replay.waybackmachine.org/200...?Id=142&Page=1

Quote:
Unbelievable - Brainslayer (1/28/2001)

Due to having multiple enchanters in our groups, I was able to play around with this spell on a recent fire giant raid in solusek b. I never relized how powerful it was before until I casted it on Warlord Skarlon. He was charmed for atleast 5 min. It was the funniest thing when when a fire giant warrior began to summon him, the entire dungeon nearly died laughing, but so did I when he broke the spell.


Quote:
WOW - Cassie (1/28/2001)

I cast this on a Dark Ritualist in the MM tower the other day for grins, and it was lasting upwards of 5+ minutes. To give you an idea of how long this lasts, two of my buds had time to duel, the loser got rezzed, and then medded to full all w hile the pet remained charmed. This wasn't a one-time shot either. I've noticed this routinely lasting for 4 to 5 minutes before breaking (though I've sometimes had it break after 20 seconds LOL) Not only that, in the new patch as of today we will get a message when Charm is going to break. WOOHOO!!!!! No more sudden surprises when that Hill Giant or Seafury is about to turn on you The run of chanter twinks with each patch continues.


seafury 38-42 and dark ritualist 33

Quote:
XICOTL, By Ordeith (1/28/2001)

Xicotl in MM is a wonderful target for this spell, hits for 100 max, casts spells, tons of HP...*grins* I charmed him and he was soloing half of the garden area around the damph, spell held for around 10 mins also, with 200 cha of course.

according to alla xicotl is a 41 mob

Was posted earlier but no one commented on it, kind of shows some testimonials from ench from around that time which seems better than someone just posting lucy data

[Malrubius]

Lucy also does not go to 2002 'and earlier'. It goes to March 2002, and that's it. Beside that, you can spam links to spell data all you want. Nothing in the spell data determines the reliability of the charm. That's all handled by the server's checks vs charisma and magic resist.

As far as any posts from that time frame referencing charm being unreliable being hyperbole, ubiqitous posts including stats, durations, and frustration with charm identical to the condensed raging on this thread don't exactly contradict the change. So far the extent of the argument for changing it back has been unsupported anecdotes of "I remember this". The only tangible documentation that has been provided in this thread, at all, is documentation of its notorious unreliability.

It's not going back the way it was, you'll just have to accept that. If you think it should be more reliable than it is now, start posting something to back that up with a relevant timestamp.

Hi Uthgaard. Just for the record, I agree with you, and the links and comments from 99-02 that I linked above do indeed point to an unreliability that I think should be there.

I was just hoping it may be useful (if sparse) data from "back in the day" as you guys tweak things further.

From what I have read of the recent changes, it sounds like you guys have taken a big step in the right direction.

[Treats]

Posting here that charm was not OP before is way off. Before this last patch it was kind of ridiculous. I soloed in Chardok through half of 58 and nearly all of 59 using charm and died once. If you do not consider that OP I'm not sure exactly what your definition of it would be. Even having charms consistently last five to seven minutes would be pretty overpowered. I'll explain what tactics I used below and why:

Typical session in Chardok soloing. Buff (having Rune V up at all times was a must, 254 Charisma), use air elemental illusion, and invis to front gate. Target mobs in the lev tunnel, calm. Run across and use Level 4 Mesmerize to mez pet I wanted. Tash pet and charm. Wait for mez to wear off, 24 seconds. 99% of the time my pets would be casters. Most of them could go through two to three melee (Janissarys, Myrmidons) per charmed pet. I made sure I never fought caster on caster (this was the one time I died when I made this mistake I think). While pet was fighting melee mob I always made sure that mob was tashed and rooted. Reroot as my pet (caster) nuked and unrooted so if charm did happen to break I could remez/retash/recharm. When pet was low, pet guard and run a little ways away to invis. Mez/Nuke until dead. Once current pet was dead, calm around melee and repeat with another caster.

My pet fighting summoning mobs and Templars (shaman that cast their fucking dots on my pet) was a big nono and I rarely ever did this. Having a pet that summoned increased the difficulty. As long as I had the mob it was fighting rooted and stood directly behind my pet (so he wouldn't summon me if he broke) it was doable without too much more risk.

On average I would say each one of my pets lasted 5-7 minutes (Except for the occasional Aruspice that could go through three to four mobs) before they were low hp and out of mana so I could kill them. I would get charm breaks from time to time but they were VERY RARE. What I described here could probably still be done although it would definately not be as fast. You would end up blowing alot of mana on recharms and runes. Having a consistent 5-7 minute charm on a pet would basically be the same as pre-patch using these tactics.

[metax]

charm is still op myself as a necro am able to still solo com 2nd and 3rd floor with ease thx for nerf tho

[Lazortag]

Posting here that charm was not OP before is way off. Before this last patch it was kind of ridiculous. I soloed in Chardok through half of 58 and nearly all of 59 using charm and died once. If you do not consider that OP I'm not sure exactly what your definition of it would be. Even having charms consistently last five to seven minutes would be pretty overpowered. I'll explain what tactics I used below and why:

Typical session in Chardok soloing. Buff (having Rune V up at all times was a must, 254 Charisma), use air elemental illusion, and invis to front gate. Target mobs in the lev tunnel, calm. Run across and use Level 4 Mesmerize to mez pet I wanted. Tash pet and charm. Wait for mez to wear off, 24 seconds. 99% of the time my pets would be casters. Most of them could go through two to three melee (Janissarys, Myrmidons) per charmed pet. I made sure I never fought caster on caster (this was the one time I died when I made this mistake I think). While pet was fighting melee mob I always made sure that mob was tashed and rooted. Reroot as my pet (caster) nuked and unrooted so if charm did happen to break I could remez/retash/recharm. When pet was low, pet guard and run a little ways away to invis. Mez/Nuke until dead. Once current pet was dead, calm around melee and repeat with another caster.

Yeah I basically used this strategy on my Enc whenever I played him. Ridiculously fast leveling because you pretty much get to kill mobs twice as fast (since you get to level off your own pet once it gets low and you just invis). It was fun and all but definitely OP.

[Daldaen]

http://eq2.thedruidsgrove.org/archive/eq/t-2545.html


Charming dogs in Chardok was a nice shot in the arm for my bank account from 58-60 too. Easily got 30k worth of loot at the exit.

I'm with Geddine. I let my charmed dog fight a few Sarnaks and when he's almost dead, invis and kill him with a root.

My personal experience with charming dogs there makes me "think" that charisma +100 definitely made a difference. With 110-ish cha, I rarely had charm wear before the dog's demise.


Post from a few months before PoP release.

[Coril]

Let's turn this question around.

Where is the evidence from pre-2002 that justifies charm being in the state it is today?

I ask this question I see two arguments being made in this thread. First, that enchanter charm was overpowered. That might be true. But it seems to be irrelevant to the mission of the server; game balance is a historical concern. Or as Uthgaard said, go argue with Verant devs in your time machine.

So, if the concern isn't game balance, then it's to approach more historical accuracy with the break of charm. Where is the historical evidence to support that charm should break so quickly, often instantly, with this sort of frequency?

[casdegere]

I played an Enchanter on Live up to nearly 65. I did not Solo much. It did not offer the XP or the safety of a good group. It was difficult and mana intensive. I did use Charm at the earlier levels though.

The Enchanter was primarily Mez/Haste/Crack/Debuff. Charming in a group was just not happening.

[Popt]

Quick question- charmed pets are not dual wielding like they did pre-patch. Is this intended or was it a mistake after the change to player pets? It doesn't seem logical that a pet would stop dual wielding just because it becomes charmed

[kanras]

NPCs don't naturally dual wield. They shouldn't have been naturally dual wielding because they were charmed. Give them weapons if you want them to dual wield.

[Popt]

Gotcha, thanks

[Caravelle1]

If you're going to nerf enchanters in the name of classic then change the hate value on mez, AE stun. Mez DID NOT have this high of a hate value in classic. And AE stun did very little to almost no hate in classic.

I'm positive you guys had no idea what the hate values were and just guessed but they're way off. I can't prove this (I've tried searching numerous times) since hate values unlike patch notes aren't easy to find but I played an enchanter since release and very rarely in the high levels did I have to chain root with people taunting to get a mez'd mob off of me when warriors taunted before breaking. It's sort of ridiculous here!

Tash = extremely high hate. higher than on here
Mez = medium hate (much lower than on here)
AE color stun line = low hate
Slow = medium hate
Charm = high hate (not sure but about right on here)

I agree with the agro part, I was in a crypt group, I was testing to see when I could tash. at 70% if I tashed, the mob would run at me, stay agroed on me till about 60%, then I couldnt sit or cast a DD on the mob or it came back at me, this was with a level 54 warrior tanking

[Glitch]

Here's a post from PoP era, where they apparently decided to nerf DPS on charmed mobs in new zones because of how disgustingly OP charm was. Important parts bolded.

From FoH forums,
http://www.fohguild.org/forums/90145-post124.html
03-28-2003, 10:45 AM #124 (permalink)
Goshan
Registered User

Join Date: Jul 2002
Posts: 6
-1 Internets
charm itsself is NOT broken. Charm is the victim of a changing environment and thusly needs to be modified to keep pace with that environment. I have been using charm for many years in much the same way I use it now. Before any expansions were released, enchanters were soloing the ghoul lord and fire giants area with charmed pets. When kunark was released, we kept pets in groups in Sebilis that doubled the entire groups experience over a 4 or 5 hour experience grind. During Velious, we could charm giants in Kael that easily netted twice the exp normally recieved in an experience group. Velious is where the environments started to change and become much more favorable to charming. Once equipment and player stats started reaching the proportions they did in velious, the risk of charm became trivial. The only problem with Velious and Luclin was that there were not many areas where charm soloing was much more effecient then grouping. So most enchanters ignored the ability.

Now we have Planes of Power. There are quite a few things in this expansion that make charming too good to ignore.

- Zones typically have wide open spaces where you can outrun mobs
- Mobs are spaced farther apart making solo pulling trivial.
- Mobs dont summon
- Mobs have generally low hit points and defense.(This would seem to be the charm equalizer. But doesnt work)
- Mobs have extremely high ATK and max hits.

Because of these factors, the risk vs. reward is out of whack. When an enchanter can get an aa in 17mins by 2boxing a cleric outside of the group vs grouping and getting an aa every 1-2 hours, there is a problem with risk vs reward.(yes its possible. I have done it at a sustained rate).

Back before kunark, we would go solo fire giants for the thrill. IT was damn scary because a charm break at the wrong time meant about an 80% chance of death. With POP, a charm break at the wrong time means you cast the following spells: wom, run til spell gems refresh, mez your pet, retarget the prey, cast root. If it knocks your rune off, pop eldritch rune and root. ZERO risk. none, nada. You have to be a complete and utter idiot to die to a situation like that.

But bringing back the idea of summnoing mobs makes my skin crawl. It was a cheesy tactic. It would make charm mostly useless and not worth the time because it will only take 1 charm break to kill an enchanter. Granted, you may escape if charm breaks when no prey is in camp, but if there is prey in camp, you are dead. One wom resist on either your prey or the pet and your dead. Even if you do manage to get wom off, by the time you do, your hp will be so low, the prey will bloodlust onto you and you will be toast before you can do anything about it. If mobs were to summon again, to make charm useful, we would have to be compenstated with an instant low resist root or something.

So the real problem is not charm. We have been using charm exactly how it was designed since inception. The real problem is the environment.

Of the points listed above:

- Wide open spaces: Changing zone designs is out the the question
- mob spacing: Might be possible but would have unforseen consequences
- Summoning: Think I have covered this one
- Low hit points and defense: cant really do anything here. It would unbalance every other class.
- Extreme ATK: ding ding ding! We have a winner.


Typically enchanters haste their pets. Given a dual wielding pet with haste and a 2boxed druid for heal/snare, charming is the only way to experience!(Hello all you tactics people! And you know who you are :P). So Verants first idea with the 1% slow was a pretty good one but didnt go far enough. These mobs even without haste and dual wield, can tear through their brethren pretty easy. Especially with a botted druid or cleric to heal it. Dire Charm was limited in level for a reason. If you could of dire charmed an Illis and dual wielded and hasted it, a single enchanter could of cleared jugs in Sebilis and given the protector a run for his money. So Verant level limited Dire Charm to 47. The reason they did that was because mobs of that level and lower didnt have enough ATK to do amazing feats.

The reason I use Dire Charm as an example is simple. The risk vs reward of a high level pet that was perma charmed was deemed out of whack by Verant. Basically, given the environmental variables mentioned above, you have the same situation. Mobs that are permacharmed with very little risk. Even thoguh they do break, a broken pet in wide open pop zones is pretty trivial to recharm.

Given this logic, the reasonable thing to do would be to add an effect to charm that lowered a mobs melee level to a much lower level(I am thinking 57). Kind of like those ae's in the spell database that lower a characters spell casting level. This would greatly reduce their attack and defense. It would still allow us to dual wield and haste where it was allowed, but their average hit would be for much less. When charm broke, because the effect was part of the charm it would wear off and the mob would go back to its normal level. This doesnt increase the risk of charm but it lowers its overall effectiveness which is really the problem anyway. This would still allow enchanters that like to solo, to be able to solo. But you wont be able to earn AA at astronomical rates. I still think it should be faster then a group but only slighly so. MAybe 50mins or so per aa. It also addresses melee issues that an enchanter makes them somewhat worthless in groups.

In conclusion,

Charm does need to be modified so that a charmed pet cannot melee for many multpiles of what the best equipped melee can do. I dont see the problem with charm being in its duration or utility. Its another tool in the enchanters toolbox they can use for crowd control. I dont want it removed.

The only problem I see with this are the tier 2 and 3 raid level events that take cod into account. For those tiers cod is an extremely useful tool against Agnarr, Upper cod, Bertox, Rydda, Upper Bot mini's, Mithaniel Marr, and of course Rallos Zek. Some of those encounters would need to be toned down very slightly in their intensity.

[Caravelle1]

As a chanter who use charm from level 30 until level 56 let me share some stats on charm before and after patch.

Level 30-40 with around 215 CHA charms held rediculously well, I remember charming a yellow con minotaur in guk, and it held nearly the full duration. I could charm even/yellow pets no problem.

level 40-45 things started to even out, I would say even con and 2 levels below me were very diffucult to charm, lasted on average 2-3 minutes with malo. At 45 I would try and charm Zol knights because they were level 40 and would hold better than dar.

level 45-50 even con mobs became harder to charm. I had 255 CHA at this point. the only exception to holding lvl 47-50 mobs at level 50 was with malo.

at 50 holding a level 43 or below mob I would have considered safe and lasted full duration 80%. level 44-47 was risky, they would hold full duration about 50%. level 47-50 was probably 0-10% full duration. WITH malo, however, it raised the hold to 80% or so I would guess.


50+ charming actually seems to get easier at this point, I can understand the frustration of people. at level 55 I was able to, without malo hold a level 50 mob charmed for full duration probably 50% of the time. As an enchanter who used charm whenever possible I can admit that it was overpowered at the 50+ level.

After the patch, I can hold light blue mobs on average 0% full duration, at level 56, level 39 mobs are lasting an average of 2 minutes.

I think that a chanter nerf was needed, however, charm as a utility tool has been not nerfed, but effectively removed from the game. It seems like there is a lot of chanter hate because we had it so easy, and that warrants a complete obliteration of our most powerful ability. Charm was not as good on live during this era than it was on P99,
however,
it was NOT this bad. at level 56 I should be able to hold a mob that is 15 levels below me for more than one minute IMO, and THAT is me talking from a classic standpoint.

[Coril]

I agree with the agro part, I was in a crypt group, I was testing to see when I could tash. at 70% if I tashed, the mob would run at me, stay agroed on me till about 60%, then I couldnt sit or cast a DD on the mob or it came back at me, this was with a level 54 warrior tanking

True.

The reason that charm felt more "okay" to me in terms of sheer enchanter balance was because Spell Aggro in general on p99 is much, much worse than it was in live.

Mez agro, tash agro, and aoe stun aggro is so high that to use them is just to abandon the hopes of tank regetting aggro for significant time. God help you if you tash, mezz, and slow a mob. That was my habit during live, and during kunark era I remember I would get hit a little for the trouble, but tanks would grab aggro pretty quick. Now? It's rather a joke.

I think that if spell aggro in general were reduced, the frustration of the non-charming enchanter group role would be greatly improved. For both the enchanter and the tank.

[Coril]

I tried charming 5 times last night with a Cha of 230 ish. 55 enchanter.

4/5 of the charms on sub 50 mobs broke under 30 seconds. This is not classic; it is pointless.

[Malrubius]

I tried charming 5 times last night with a Cha of 230 ish. 55 enchanter.

4/5 of the charms on sub 50 mobs broke under 30 seconds. This is not classic; it is pointless.

I agree that that sounds broken - but it could have just been bad luck with only 5 casts.

Based on results so far, my GUESS is that the sweet (classic) spot is probably somewhere between where it was before and where it is now.

I'm guessing that there should be something like a 2% chance per tick for charm to break as a baseline. The things that can raise or lower this, in order of priority, would be...

1 - Level difference (caster-target). For example, if the mob is green, the ChanceToBreakPerTick goes down by a factor of 10 (.20%). If Red, it goes up to 20%.

2 - Spell level seems to have an influence also, since in classic, it was far more common for high-level chanters to get full duration charms than fully twinked low-level chanters. The spell may just change the base value.

3 - MR of target. For example, for every 1 MR below some default, the ChanceToBreakPerTick is dropped by a correspondingly tiny amount.

4 - CHA of caster. For example, for every 1 CHA above some default, the ChanceToBreakPerTick is dropped by a correspondingly tiny amount (an even smaller amount than #3 though).



A baseline of 2% ChanceToBreakPerTick would mean charm would average 2:30 (25 ticks would mean 50% odds of a break by then). This would allow you to get unlucky or lucky and it can always break instantly or last full duration.

[baalzy]

I agree that that sounds broken - but it could have just been bad luck with only 5 casts.

Based on results so far, my GUESS is that the sweet (classic) spot is probably somewhere between where it was before and where it is now.

I'm guessing that there should be something like a 2% chance per tick for charm to break as a baseline. The things that can raise or lower this, in order of priority, would be...

1 - Level difference (caster-target). For example, if the mob is green, the ChanceToBreakPerTick goes down by a factor of 10 (.20%). If Red, it goes up to 20%.

2 - Spell level seems to have an influence also, since in classic, it was far more common for high-level chanters to get full duration charms than fully twinked low-level chanters. The spell may just change the base value.

3 - MR of target. For example, for every 1 MR below some default, the ChanceToBreakPerTick is dropped by a correspondingly tiny amount.

4 - CHA of caster. For example, for every 1 CHA above some default, the ChanceToBreakPerTick is dropped by a correspondingly tiny amount (an even smaller amount than #3 though).



A baseline of 2% ChanceToBreakPerTick would mean charm would average 2:30 (25 ticks would mean 50% odds of a break by then). This would allow you to get unlucky or lucky and it can always break instantly or last full duration.

I'm going to address point 2. There was already a link posted early and I'm not in the mood to dig it up, but the level of the charm only affects two things:
1) The maximum duration
2) The maximum level of the charmed mob

Uber twinked lowbies were likely experiencing shorter charm durations due to a smaller difference in mob lvl vs. caster level. At level 20 a blue mob is at most like 5 levels lower than you. At level 50 a blue mob can be as much as 12 levels lower than you.

[Glitch]

Not to mention that most charm guides suggested swapping to a lower level charm spell for mana efficiency.

[Dagner]

I feel its hard to sit here for those who aren't enchanters or are just wanting a nerf with a straight face and think that what charm is now is completely fair.

I was just messing around in dreadlands and karnors (at lvl 55, with some of the best gear available) and I couldn't get a charm to last more than 30 seconds on anything, using allure or boltran's, on blue or light blue mobs.

I think the biggest problem was that charm was lasting the full duration too consistently compared to live. Now, it is breaking far too consistently, far too early. Nerf charm, fine. Don't make the spell useless.

I know it's really hard for the devs to mirror live and what we all remember, but anyone sitting here saying that this is the way it was is just saying that to spite some inner hatred towards the enchanter class. What charm is now currently on p99 was not live. What charm was a week ago on p99 was not live. I hope this point echos through to those who aren't listening.

Also, please keep in mind that this is not 1999. We are not all noobs anymore to every zone, every spell, every mechanic, every npc.. and I could go on. Playing and knowing a class for over 10 years and learning the ways to properly do a fight and learning and reading strategies over long periods of time is going to help the average enchanter play and do things better. It took time for people to build up the balls to go and try and solo camps, learn the strats, figure things out and do it better. While this might not be a large percentage of why enchanters seemed overpowered on p99, it definitely takes up some percentage. It's probably a reason on whole why there are a lot of good players here.

This is all just food for thought. I appreciate the fact that uthgaard and others are actively trying to make it a more fair, balanced, and fun game, however. I know in time they will make it right.

[ziahh]

1

[ziahh]

1

[ziahh]

quote

03-28-2003, 10:45 AM #124 (permalink)
Goshan
Registered User

Join Date: Jul 2002
Posts: 6
-1 Internets
charm itsself is NOT broken. Charm is the victim of a changing environment and thusly needs to be modified to keep pace with that environment. I have been using charm for many years in much the same way I use it now. Before any expansions were released, enchanters were soloing the ghoul lord and fire giants area with charmed pets. When kunark was released, we kept pets in groups in Sebilis that doubled the entire groups experience over a 4 or 5 hour experience grind. During Velious, we could charm giants in Kael that easily netted twice the exp normally recieved in an experience group. Velious is where the environments started to change and become much more favorable to charming. Once equipment and player stats started reaching the proportions they did in velious, the risk of charm became trivial. The only problem with Velious and Luclin was that there were not many areas where charm soloing was much more effecient then grouping. So most enchanters ignored the ability.

Now we have Planes of Power. There are quite a few things in this expansion that make charming too good to ignore.

- Zones typically have wide open spaces where you can outrun mobs
- Mobs are spaced farther apart making solo pulling trivial.
- Mobs dont summon
- Mobs have generally low hit points and defense.(This would seem to be the charm equalizer. But doesnt work)
- Mobs have extremely high ATK and max hits.

Because of these factors, the risk vs. reward is out of whack. When an enchanter can get an aa in 17mins by 2boxing a cleric outside of the group vs grouping and getting an aa every 1-2 hours, there is a problem with risk vs reward.(yes its possible. I have done it at a sustained rate).

Back before kunark, we would go solo fire giants for the thrill. IT was damn scary because a charm break at the wrong time meant about an 80% chance of death. With POP, a charm break at the wrong time means you cast the following spells: wom, run til spell gems refresh, mez your pet, retarget the prey, cast root. If it knocks your rune off, pop eldritch rune and root. ZERO risk. none, nada. You have to be a complete and utter idiot to die to a situation like that.

But bringing back the idea of summnoing mobs makes my skin crawl. It was a cheesy tactic. It would make charm mostly useless and not worth the time because it will only take 1 charm break to kill an enchanter. Granted, you may escape if charm breaks when no prey is in camp, but if there is prey in camp, you are dead. One wom resist on either your prey or the pet and your dead. Even if you do manage to get wom off, by the time you do, your hp will be so low, the prey will bloodlust onto you and you will be toast before you can do anything about it. If mobs were to summon again, to make charm useful, we would have to be compenstated with an instant low resist root or something.

So the real problem is not charm. We have been using charm exactly how it was designed since inception. The real problem is the environment.

Of the points listed above:

- Wide open spaces: Changing zone designs is out the the question
- mob spacing: Might be possible but would have unforseen consequences
- Summoning: Think I have covered this one
- Low hit points and defense: cant really do anything here. It would unbalance every other class.
- Extreme ATK: ding ding ding! We have a winner.


Typically enchanters haste their pets. Given a dual wielding pet with haste and a 2boxed druid for heal/snare, charming is the only way to experience!(Hello all you tactics people! And you know who you are :P). So Verants first idea with the 1% slow was a pretty good one but didnt go far enough. These mobs even without haste and dual wield, can tear through their brethren pretty easy. Especially with a botted druid or cleric to heal it. Dire Charm was limited in level for a reason. If you could of dire charmed an Illis and dual wielded and hasted it, a single enchanter could of cleared jugs in Sebilis and given the protector a run for his money. So Verant level limited Dire Charm to 47. The reason they did that was because mobs of that level and lower didnt have enough ATK to do amazing feats.

The reason I use Dire Charm as an example is simple. The risk vs reward of a high level pet that was perma charmed was deemed out of whack by Verant. Basically, given the environmental variables mentioned above, you have the same situation. Mobs that are permacharmed with very little risk. Even thoguh they do break, a broken pet in wide open pop zones is pretty trivial to recharm.

Given this logic, the reasonable thing to do would be to add an effect to charm that lowered a mobs melee level to a much lower level(I am thinking 57). Kind of like those ae's in the spell database that lower a characters spell casting level. This would greatly reduce their attack and defense. It would still allow us to dual wield and haste where it was allowed, but their average hit would be for much less. When charm broke, because the effect was part of the charm it would wear off and the mob would go back to its normal level. This doesnt increase the risk of charm but it lowers its overall effectiveness which is really the problem anyway. This would still allow enchanters that like to solo, to be able to solo. But you wont be able to earn AA at astronomical rates. I still think it should be faster then a group but only slighly so. MAybe 50mins or so per aa. It also addresses melee issues that an enchanter makes them somewhat worthless in groups.

In conclusion,

Charm does need to be modified so that a charmed pet cannot melee for many multpiles of what the best equipped melee can do. I dont see the problem with charm being in its duration or utility. Its another tool in the enchanters toolbox they can use for crowd control. I dont want it removed.

The only problem I see with this are the tier 2 and 3 raid level events that take cod into account. For those tiers cod is an extremely useful tool against Agnarr, Upper cod, Bertox, Rydda, Upper Bot mini's, Mithaniel Marr, and of course Rallos Zek. Some of those encounters would need to be toned down very slightly in their intensity.


Thx you !
this is how i remember it on live and to the guys that said this :
quote
I'm going to address point 2. There was already a link posted early and I'm not in the mood to dig it up, but the level of the charm only affects two things:
1) The maximum duration
2) The maximum level of the charmed mob

Uber twinked lowbies were likely experiencing shorter charm durations due to a smaller difference in mob lvl vs. caster level. At level 20 a blue mob is at most like 5 levels lower than you. At level 50 a blue mob can be as much as 12 levels lower than you.

your right on . charm atm is totally useless and broken.

[Nollo]

That post is not proof and you don't include the link to where it was made. You also copied it incorrectly and it's annoying as shit to read. In conclusion you are a little retarded I think.

[ziahh]

i couldnt quote a quote so if that make me a retard then so be it. iam sure you could be as much retarded since you cant reead the previous page. there is a link to what i quoted...

and there is it since u cant read the previous post :
http://www.fohguild.org/forums/90145-post124.html

[Blingx]

Here's a post from PoP era, where they apparently decided to nerf DPS on charmed mobs in new zones because of how disgustingly OP charm was. Important parts bolded.

From FoH forums,
http://www.fohguild.org/forums/90145-post124.html

Possible problems with this source(Goshan) are the fact that it is a post about charm in 2003 with no cites to any of his claims about how charm used to be. There is a 2 year gap and multiple expansions between his present charm and how he remembers charm.

I am not saying what he says is false, I am simply saying his credibility is low... Sorta like his post count.

Edit:
He says "'we' would solo fire giants" for the thrill with an 80% chance of death if charm broke at the wrong time.
definition of 'we' would be nice:
(1)enchanters as a whole
(2)me and my friend (insert healing class here) <--- common mistake of many solo claims using "we"
(3)me and 5 spectators (rest of group, their contribution to my soloing the FGs was negligible obv)
ect.

He also mentions a botted cleric/druid to heal making charming better, leading me to believe definition (2) was his intent.

[ziahh]

ur right about the 2 yeah cap. not debating that but the guy that posted back in 2002 or 2003 talk about how he recall charm being in the previous expension and the original era. That i think is what is relevent about that post.

[Blingx]

ur right about the 2 yeah cap. not debating that but the guy that posted back in 2002 or 2003 talk about how he recall charm being in the previous expension and the original era. That i think is what is relevent about that post.

Ya it sorta makes sense but before we start searching out scientific data on memory clarity over a period of time lets just agree that 2 years and multiple expansions and countless patches will have an effect on remembering exactly how an event really went down.

His recollection of 'soloing' may have been before a major change to charm or after a major change to charm. His recollection could be of "that one time I was bored and all velious mobs were dead so I went to FGs/GhoulLord/ect." His recollection has a high chance of being cloudy(in his favor or against it) most likely in his favor or he would not use it in his argument of course.
A cliche saying may be, "Close, but no cigar."

[ziahh]

Edit:
He says "'we' would solo fire giants" for the thrill with an 80% chance of death if charm broke at the wrong time.
definition of 'we' would be nice:
(1)enchanters as a whole
(2)me and my friend (insert healing class here) <--- common mistake of many solo claims using "we"
(3)me and 5 spectators (rest of group, their contribution to my soloing the FGs was negligible obv)
ect.

now when he refer to we he is refering to the enchanters not a group.
this is what he says:
Back before kunark, we would go solo fire giants for the thrill. IT was damn scary because a charm break at the wrong time meant about an 80% chance of death.

doubt solo means a group here...

[ziahh]

Last combat i had :

express
---------------------------------------------------------------
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:06 2011] You begin casting Allure.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:03 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:08 2011] You begin casting Allure.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:21 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:31 2011] You begin casting Allure.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:39 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:09 2011] You begin casting Allure.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:34 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:41 2011] Insufficient Mana to cast this spell!
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:42 2011] You begin casting Gate.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:48 2011] LOADING, PLEASE WAIT...
[Thu Apr 21 00:48:04 2011] You have entered Trakanon's Teeth.
----------------------------------------------------------------

i dont even have time Debuff and re mem spell that charm break ><

Full Fight :


[Thu Apr 21 00:44:59 2011] Logging to 'eqlog.txt' is now *ON*.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:02 2011] You begin casting Tashanian.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:03 2011] A sebilite golem glances nervously about.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:03 2011] Mcbard tells the guild, 'basilisks = ph'
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:06 2011] You begin casting Allure.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:08 2011] Midious tells the guild, 'Nachtmystium consent'
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:10 2011] Your Mesmerize spell has worn off.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:13 2011] Targeted (NPC): a leprous scarab
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:13 2011] Right click on the NPC to consider it.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:14 2011] a sebilite golem tells you, 'Attacking a leprous scarab Master.'
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:15 2011] Your Mesmerize spell has worn off.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:15 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 121 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:16 2011] Targeted (NPC): a sebilite golem
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:16 2011] Right click on the NPC to consider it.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:17 2011] You begin casting Wonderous Rapidity.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:22 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 147 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:24 2011] A sebilite golem begins to move with wonderous rapidity.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:28 2011] Spell set Allure-Kill loaded.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:28 2011] You forget Allure.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:28 2011] You forget Wonderous Rapidity.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:29 2011] Beginning to memorize Color Skew...
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:29 2011] A sebilite golem bashes a leprous scarab for 13 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:29 2011] You have finished memorizing Color Skew.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:30 2011] Beginning to memorize Allure...
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:30 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 64 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:30 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 85 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:30 2011] You have finished memorizing Allure.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:31 2011] Woodelfw tells the guild, 'rods in back'
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:31 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 147 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:32 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 116 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:34 2011] A sebilite golem kicks a leprous scarab for 3 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:35 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 116 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:37 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 105 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:37 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 74 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:38 2011] A sebilite golem kicks a leprous scarab for 4 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:41 2011] Woodelfw tells the guild, 'the other back'
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:41 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 126 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:41 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 110 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:42 2011] You can't use that command right now...
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:42 2011] Your spell fizzles!
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:43 2011] You begin casting Color Skew.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:43 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 85 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:44 2011] Jynira tells the guild, 'i like it when they run when im holding rods :)'
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:45 2011] A leprous scarab is stunned by scintillating colors.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:45 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 136 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:46 2011] Auto attack is on.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:46 2011] You crush a leprous scarab for 2 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:47 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 131 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:47 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 74 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:48 2011] A sebilite golem kicks a leprous scarab for 7 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:48 2011] Your target is too far away, get closer!
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:49 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 49 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:49 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 49 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:51 2011] Auto attack is off.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:52 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 90 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:52 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 126 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:54 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 147 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:56 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 147 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:45:57 2011] A sebilite golem kicks a leprous scarab for 14 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:00 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 105 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:00 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 74 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:02 2011] A sebilite golem bashes a leprous scarab for 11 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:02 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 85 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:03 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:06 2011] Tasloin tells the guild, 'basilisks are not ph'
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:06 2011] Targeted (NPC): a sebilite golem
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:06 2011] Right click on the NPC to consider it.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:08 2011] You begin casting Allure.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:11 2011] Heartbeats tells the guild, '...thats...what...she...said'
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:15 2011] Targeted (NPC): a leprous scarab
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:15 2011] Right click on the NPC to consider it.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:16 2011] a sebilite golem tells you, 'Attacking a leprous scarab Master.'
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:16 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 100 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:16 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 105 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:16 2011] A sebilite golem kicks a leprous scarab for 8 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:18 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 116 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:20 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 79 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:20 2011] A sebilite golem bashes a leprous scarab for 12 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:21 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:22 2011] Tasloin tells the guild, 'broog can be one of the spawns sometimes'
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:25 2011] Targeted (NPC): a sebilite golem
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:25 2011] Right click on the NPC to consider it.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:26 2011] You begin casting Fetter.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:28 2011] Your eyes stop tingling.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:28 2011] A sebilite golem's feet adhere to the ground.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:31 2011] You begin casting Allure.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:37 2011] Targeted (NPC): a leprous scarab
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:37 2011] Right click on the NPC to consider it.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:38 2011] a sebilite golem tells you, 'Attacking a leprous scarab Master.'
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:38 2011] A sebilite golem kicks a leprous scarab for 3 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:39 2011] Midious tells the guild, 'anyone else need a drag?'
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:39 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:40 2011] Your strength fades.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:40 2011] Heartbeats tells the guild, '<-- enchanter buffs'
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:41 2011] Targeted (NPC): a sebilite golem
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:41 2011] Right click on the NPC to consider it.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:43 2011] Insufficient Mana to cast this spell!
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:44 2011] Insufficient Mana to cast this spell!
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:46 2011] You forget Calm.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:48 2011] The pulsing energy fades.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:49 2011] Heartbeats tells the guild, 'i know mad ppl just got rezzed'
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:57 2011] Targeted (NPC): a sebilite golem
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:57 2011] Right click on the NPC to consider it.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:01 2011] Beginning to memorize Gate...
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:01 2011] You have finished memorizing Gate.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:05 2011] Insufficient Mana to cast this spell!
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:05 2011] Your spell is interrupted.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:06 2011] Insufficient Mana to cast this spell!
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:09 2011] You begin casting Allure.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:16 2011] Targeted (NPC): a leprous scarab
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:16 2011] Right click on the NPC to consider it.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:17 2011] a sebilite golem tells you, 'Attacking a leprous scarab Master.'
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:17 2011] A sebilite golem bashes a leprous scarab for 11 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:19 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 74 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:19 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 141 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:21 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 147 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:21 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 49 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:25 2011] Myuharin beams a smile at froglok kor shaman
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:25 2011] Myuharin says 'Ahhh, I feel much better now...
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:26 2011] A sebilite golem bashes a leprous scarab for 13 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:27 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 131 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:32 2011] A sebilite golem hits a leprous scarab for 59 points of damage.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:33 2011] You begin casting Fetter.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:34 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:35 2011] You can't use that command while casting...
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:35 2011] A leprous scarab's feet adhere to the ground.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:41 2011] Insufficient Mana to cast this spell!
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:41 2011] Your spell is interrupted.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:42 2011] You begin casting Gate.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:48 2011] LOADING, PLEASE WAIT...
[Thu Apr 21 00:48:04 2011] You have entered Trakanon's Teeth.

[Pezmerga]

I think what Glitch said earlier made sense. How many Chanters on live back in the day were using tash AND malo for charmed pets?

[Lasher]

In groups? Most imo. I know i always tried to get malosini line on my charmed pet if i had a mage/sham. I used to duo BoT mini bosses with mage as an ench quit well

[Glitch]

Well, BoT was in some expansion long after I stopped playing. By then, people figured out how to play. The point I was trying to make is that in 1999, people didn't understand the game mechanics as well as they did later on and may not have known how critical MR was to charm.

[Pezmerga]

In groups? Most imo. I know i always tried to get malosini line on my charmed pet if i had a mage/sham. I used to duo BoT mini bosses with mage as an ench quit well

Yeah sorry about that, I meant early on in EQ. Everything was trial and error so people didn't always use the best tactics. It isn't proof, but obviously using Malo and Tash will make Charm seem OP'd compared to not using Malo.

[Blingx]

Yeah sorry about that, I meant early on in EQ. Everything was trial and error so people didn't always use the best tactics. It isn't proof, but obviously using Malo and Tash will make Charm seem OP'd compared to not using Malo.

I would be inclined to believe this, however, this line of thinking is also in direct contrast to what many pro-charm posts have been saying. Namely the "I can't solo xx anymore," "Back in my day we solod xx for fun," "ect."

Where are the "malo + tash and my charm is less or equal to charm without malo or tash." posts/logs/ss/data.

[Murphy]

I think what Glitch said earlier made sense. How many Chanters on live back in the day were using tash AND malo for charmed pets?

Why wouldn't they use both magic debuffs when in the guide they mention remezzing / rooting / stunning? Honestly I don't think they were so stupid as to say "Hey don't bother debuffing MR as much as possible since all these spells work 100% of the time". Now whether or not they made a connection between -MR and charm duration is another story, but I doubt all players in the year 1999 - 2001 were autistic.

[fauxreigner]

I'm a little late to the party here, and I'm admittedly not contributing much to this discussion when I make these points, but here it goes:

1) Anecdotal evidence of how long/short a charm lasted isn't extremely helpful, nor is anecdotal evidence of how long someone's charm lasted in 1999-2002. Unless we compile and analyze some rather huge data sets from some time in 1999-2002 and come up with probability distributions of how long charm lasted, we're not going to accurately describe how things worked in the old days.

It seems like these changes are being made based on anecdotal evidence and argued against based on anecdotal evidence. Although it's all we have, it's not very fruitful.

2) Mostly an iteration on point 1. Since players use different tactics on this server than on live in the 1999-2002 era, we are comparing apples to oranges. Cliche description, I know, but that's exactly what it is. Until we either have the original source or some extensive data to interpolate how long charm should have lasted, there's no rigor in anyone's argument.

If the goal is to balance the game, then the devs can do whatever they want. If the goal is to emulate 1999 exactly, we need to send some statisticians back in a time machine. Otherwise we're just turning knobs until the picture looks clear.

[Brain]

Someone just email McQuaid and ask him if charm should last 30seconds 90% of the time or have a genuine SOLID CHANCE of lasting up to the max duration.

kthxbai

BTW: To all the dev's out there who contributed to this charm nerf...

There's a huge difference between "fixing" an OP'd spell and destroying it's utility completely. And you guys just crossed the line. So thank you, thank you so much - you're making the gaming experience of 1/14 of your player-base a heck of a lot worse.

*golf clap*

[Striiker]

2) Mostly an iteration on point 1. Since players use different tactics on this server than on live in the 1999-2002 era, we are comparing apples to oranges. Cliche description, I know, but that's exactly what it is. Until we either have the original source or some extensive data to interpolate how long charm should have lasted, there's no rigor in anyone's argument.

Well, not true. While the debate is centered around the higher level charm issues, I had issues with charm doing exactly the same thing I did on live in early 2000. Back then, I could charm very effectively in North Karana at around level 16 or so. On this server, it was pointless (if it landed, it dropped very quickly.. 1 or 2 ticks). My characters were as close to identical as possible with perhaps a few very minor gear differences (in that I was better equipped on P1999). I used the identical tactics and it was a complete failure. So, I would not be so quick to dismiss the anecdotal evidence offered.
I know that we can't base the server upon this because people may intentionally or unintentionally skew things into the positive.

[eriamjh]

Someone just email McQuaid and ask him if charm should last 30seconds 90% of the time or have a genuine SOLID CHANCE of lasting up to the max duration.

This is the problem that isn't being properly addressed. Resistances just do not scale properly and never have. It may be because of different spell effects having different, wrong hard-coded resistance offsets leading to overall skew, or it could be a number of other things like resists being out of an expected 400 for PCs instead of 255. Regardless of the actual faults in the code, NPCs just CHEAT when it comes to resisting charm duration now. It is just ridiculous and can easily be demonstrated in two simple example:

Druid swarm line dots: All classic swarm line dot spells have a -100 magic resist check offset. This is equivalent to a level 50 enchanter and shaman stacking their best tash+malo on the mob before you try to cast a non-offset, magic-based dot on it. Because of this -100 magic resist offset, swarm line dot spells are virtually never resisted against blue con mobs. This is a well established fact. The rate is literally 1-2% or less unless the monster is only a few levels under you or has naturally high resists. If a -100 magic resist offset mod on these spells effectively reduces their resist chance to nil, then it should substantially improve charm duration so long as it lasts.

Necro heat blood line dots: Heat blood has a -100 fire resist offset which also makes it virtually unresistable. If you don't believe me just try heading down to befallen at level 50 with less than 100 fire resist and you will get dotted by those damn level 10-20 necros much if not most of the time at a THIRTY LEVEL difference. Again, a -100 resist offset virtually eliminates resists on the heat blood dot line spells both PC vs general monsters as well as NPCs vs virtually any player. The few exceptions all have innately high FR or are designed to be fire immune.

Now what is the deal with charm? Charm is not supposed to have a 2 minute average duration at -100 MR just like it isn't supposed to have a 10 minute average duration for stupid enchanters that don't believe in tash. Most non-boss monsters in the emu database I browse don't even HAVE 100 MR to begin with, yet they fair remarkably well at resisting charm duration even when I have 10+ levels over them as they effectively have _negative_ magic resistance.

What needs to be fixed here seems obvious. So long as the moster has both tash and malo on it charm should last more like an average duration of 10 minutes out of its _20 minute max duration_ than the current ~2. Once malo wears off you lose at least 2/3 of that random extra duration, and the other 1/3 once tash fades. Both last less than 10 minutes which is still less than half of charm's duration at 60 anyway.

[ziahh]

Someone just email McQuaid and ask him if charm should last 30seconds 90% of the time or have a genuine SOLID CHANCE of lasting up to the max duration.

kthxbai

BTW: To all the dev's out there who contributed to this charm nerf...

There's a huge difference between "fixing" an OP'd spell and destroying it's utility completely. And you guys just crossed the line. So thank you, thank you so much - you're making the gaming experience of 1/14 of your player-base a heck of a lot worse.

*golf clap*

yeah i have totally stop playing till this get fixed. if not i can say at least i had fun with eq while it last.

all i can say is that it was working as intended ( pre nerf ). charming a mob in sebilis that was like 10 lv below me is the reason the grip was holding that long. at 53 with the spell files no7 i chalenge you to charm a krup and hold that grip for a long time. it just wasnt holding very good. just the way it was supposed to be, now charm is totally useless...

[Lazortag]

yeah i have totally stop playing till this get fixed. if not i can say at least i had fun with eq while it last.

all i can say is that it was working as intended. charming a mob in sebilis hat was like 10 lv below me is the reason the grip was holding that long. at 53 with the spell files no7 i chalenge you to charm a krup and hold that grip for a long time. it just wasnt holding very good. just the way it was supposed to be, now charm is totally useless...

You're seriously going to quit over this? Really?

[ziahh]

You're seriously going to quit over this? Really?

havent played more then 2-3hours since the nerf, the class is dead, if you like to buff play a shaman lol

my enchanter is dead at 58 atm /cry

[Brain]

the class is dead, if you like to buff play a shaman lol


Exactly...

Charming was what sparked the original motivation to play the chanter class. I hate sitting around in groups ONLY mezzing/crack/haste and occasionally slowing... Charming made it challenging and exciting to play the class.

Was charming a tad bit too "safe" pre-nerf? Yes - something every honest enchanter will admit to.

Unfortunately, the changes made via the nerf were overkill. Rather than balancing the spell line you simply changed "flipped it" from OP --> Gimp.

Uthgardy-poo already stated charm will "NEVER GO BACK TO THE WAY IT WAS!!!!!!!" - and it doesn't need to. But it does need to be looked at again and fixed. The randomness of breakage is simply unplayable, especially with upper level mobs in high tier dungeons.

(Want a quick fix to make the enchanters happy? Since Charm lasts about 30-45secs avg, just make the mana cost of Charm spells 5 or 10, that way we won't go OOM until the 2nd or 3rd fight)

You're seriously going to quit over this? Really?


Why is that so hard to believe? Think any monks would quit if the FD skill was changed to a 3 minute recast or 10% success rate?
What about clerics losing res? Or Cheal?

The point is, the ability to charm high level, dangerous mobs for long periods of time RELIABLY was a CLASS DEFINING ABILITY of Enchanters. Bards/Necro's can mez. Shamans/bards can haste. Bards can mana regen. Clerics/pallies/wizards can stun. What's unique about enchanters? Illusions and a badass Charm.

If one of the core abilities of your class becomes obsolete, then yes, refusing to play the class anymore isn't consider "rage quitting."

[Lazortag]

I still find my enchanter fun. If you needed an overpowered charm to enjoy the class then I feel sorry for you.

Also, just a bit of advice: you should focus more on gathering evidence than posting about how you're going to quit because of the changes, because the former actually accomplishes things, and the latter just trivializes your cause.

[ziahh]

I still find my enchanter fun. If you needed an overpowered charm to enjoy the class then I feel sorry for you.

Also, just a bit of advice: you should focus more on gathering evidence than posting about how you're going to quit because of the changes, because the former actually accomplishes things, and the latter just trivializes your cause.

i have posted more then anyone on this thread. read all page. iam not rage quitting. i made an enchanter to charm and solo since i was playing 1 in kunark when it was release. now the class and dead and iam not starting another toon. i had fun. it was free and i enjoy it. time to move on till it get fix ,if not no biggies.

and btw you still like enchanter .. you got a lv 23.... get 1 to 60 soloing for a start then get back here. ;P

[Brain]

Evidence? Memory is evidence bonehead, unfortunately it's not accepted here. (Unless you're a dev!)

I want to know what prompted this change/nerf in the first place?? Obviously you guys don't have any "legitimate" classic evidence regarding charm so why change it? Perhaps it was the crying about how enchanters were OP'd?! Or did you guys just "feel" it was OP'd based purely on your opinion? Really? Please tell me why it was changed. Maybe pre-nerf charm coding WASN'T classic so ya'll felt the need to change it, based on no real data, to make it "feel" more classic...

In any case, I think the dev's are a bit hypocritical atm (from an evidence-required-for-change standpoint) - it did not "balance" charm in any way, and with the extremely high mana cost associated with each cast, charming has become utterly useless.

Who are YOU to classify something as being overpowered?

[chr0nix]

From http://replay.web.archive.org/20020810214646/http://eq.castersrealm.com/spells/spell.asp?Id=121

With a mere 156 charisma, I've found this spell just lasts all day long. This weekend I used beguile a lot, leveled up to 39, and used this one a whole lot more. In dozens of charms, I had one instant break and one or two resists; every other time it lasted the length of the fight, and I was able to break it at my leisure with invis. In certain instances this is better than mez for group crowd control

And that is with the lvl 39 charm.

We need charm to work like it was in classic. I have never had a full duration on charm since the patch, even on green lvl 1-5's. (Some even broke within 1-2 minutes which is ridiculous)

On a scale from 1 to 10,

Charm before patch was a 10

After patch is a 1

Classic - 5

[Brain]

Charm wasn't a 10, if 10 is perfect... Charm has been nerfed twice on this server, this being the second...

But yeah, not really sure what other kind of evidence you dev's are looking for.

Excellent post chron, thanks

[Blingx]

From http://replay.web.archive.org/20020810214646/http://eq.castersrealm.com/spells/spell.asp?Id=121

With a mere 156 charisma, I've found this spell just lasts all day long. This weekend I used beguile a lot, leveled up to 39, and used this one a whole lot more. In dozens of charms, I had one instant break and one or two resists; every other time it lasted the length of the fight, and I was able to break it at my leisure with invis. In certain instances this is better than mez for group crowd control

And that is with the lvl 39 charm.

We need charm to work like it was in classic. I have never had a full duration on charm since the patch, even on green lvl 1-5's. (Some even broke within 1-2 minutes which is ridiculous)

On a scale from 1 to 10,

Charm before patch was a 10

After patch is a 1

Classic - 5

What this does:
This makes a valid argument for the level 39 charm Cajoling Whispers. Has anyone tested the level 39 charm Cajoling Whispers to see if it does or does not behave this way?

What this does not:
This does not make a valid argument for any charm other than the level 39 charm Cajoling Whispers.

[Beauregard]

Here is a thread from 2003 on FoH Forums. (http://www.fohguild.org/forums/mmorpg-general-discussion/8059-best-worst-classes-each-expansion.html) On the first few pages they discuss a rather recent (luclin maybe) nerf to charm. That obviously won't happen here for 2 reasons.

1. We will never see Luclin besides looking in the night sky.

2. Charm could not possibly get any shittier.

[chr0nix]

Saw this post (http://www.project1999.org/forums/showthread.php?t=35049)under the server patch and believe it belonged here.


http://wiki.project1999.org/index.php/Xornns_Enchanter_Guide and
http://wiki.project1999.org/index.php/Xornn's_Enchanter_Spell_Guide

These were stolen from a Tripod page. It looks like Xornn started in late kunark (he had breeze), hit 50 around Velious, and took a break until Luclin at 56.

Some quotes:

Under charm soloing he says 'honestly I usually get 2 fights in easy using attack slow as the edge'.

'That's all there is to it, really. Charm sometimes holds for 5 minutes. Other times it holds for 5 seconds.' [note: that was about the L12 spell even!]

'Charm soloing is very dangerous now, and if you do choose to fight this way, it's important to consider this factor--if the average charm is 2.5 minutes (reasonable with my experience), can your pet finish the fight with your pull in that time? At one point in charm soloing, about 40 to 50, mobs you charmed could kill two other mobs before charm broke. You will find with the colossal increases in total hit points of the mobs, even the heavy hitting charmed pets have trouble finishing a fight in under three minutes. Dealing with a charm break is practically expected at this point, unless you are able to locate a set of low hit point mobs that will carve each other up quickly. I no longer recommend using slow on the enemy mob, as you will rarely hold a pet that can survive two fights in a row, and losing your pet can often mean zoning because you don't have the mana to nuke finish a mob. Successful charm soloing usually involves a pair of mobs spawning together, rooting one, charming the other and letting them battle it out, doing your best to make sure your pet barely wins, allowing you to break charm and have a fleeing mob left to finish off with nukes. You may even consider hasting your pet, to make for a reliable kill time. If you choose this route, then I suggest slowing the enemy, and going for a two mob kill before charm breaks. A strong haste is often enough to pull this off, but you can go from full health with Rune V up to very dead in seconds in this situation.'

So, here we have:

1) He could kill 2 L50 mobs reasonably frequently with charm if he hasted the pet. A L48-50 Sarnak Myrmidon has ~10K hp. I remember parsing it once, and it did about 100 dps with DW and haste, so probably 50 base dps and 75 with haste. 2 of them would be 20K hps @ 75 dps or 250 seconds plus 10-20 seconds to find mob #2. This would require a 4.5 minute charm. Without haste, it would require 400 seconds or 6.5 minutes.

2) He could kill 2 L40-45 mobs reasonably frequently with charm without haste at L50. A L44 Lava Duct Crawler has ~4.5K hp and does maybe 40dps without haste. That gives us 225 seconds, or just under 4 minutes of fighting time.

3) He claims the 'average charm' is 2.5 minutes. I assume this is counting all the breaks. I don't trust this as much as the calculations since we humans are very bad at averaging this kind of stuff in our heads.

So what I get from the guide is that at 50+, on mobs 5-10 levels below the enchanter, with tash but without malo, charm should last 4-5 minutes fairly frequently, break early some of the time (maybe 20-25% of the time), and generally break before 5-7 minutes.

If you believe in Xornn's memory over raw calculations, you get a 3-4 minute charm fairly frequently, with some early breaks, and the occasional 5-6 minute charm, which works out to an average of 2.5 minutes.

This is somewhat less duration than charm before patch, but clearly more than we are getting now. Kind of amazingly, I actually agree with Verant's balancing there. Keep in mind that the risk of charm soloing with a hasted L49 pet is really, really high. As he says, 1 bash = dead enchanter.

P.S.

With all that said, I had a great time in Sebilis last night with TMO (their reputation on this board seems totally undeserved) doing stuns and slows. So I am still enjoying my enchanter, even without my froggy pets. And if you guys can find better evidence that the current charm is classic, I'm not going to ragequit.

[nalkin]

lol enchanters till qqing... nice. The glory days are over my friends. Hold onto your butts cause ezmode is over. Remember, it never hurts to put that /lfg tag on.

[Blingx]

Here is a thread from 2003 on FoH Forums. (http://www.fohguild.org/forums/mmorpg-general-discussion/8059-best-worst-classes-each-expansion.html) On the first few pages they discuss a rather recent (LoY maybe) nerf to charm. That obviously won't happen here for 2 reasons.

1. We will never see Ykesha.

2. My ability to research has gotten worse(-1).

FTFY

February 25, 2003 - LoY
December 4, 2001 - SOL

[Blingx]

Saw this post (http://www.project1999.org/forums/showthread.php?t=35049)under the server patch and believe it belonged here.

On the same page under solo tactics for charm...
You will have horrible charm durations. You will be chased to zone or die horribly. You will get a train on you that you can't do anything about.

That's the only secret to charm solo, really...

1. Gain control.
2. Regain control.
3. Regain control...

Best case scenario break, the pet rushes you and the other mob is rooted.

[Splorf22]

Obviously charm will break. The question is how often. I just posted evidence that charm soloing was a viable technique in classic. For it to be a viable technique, it has to have a certain minimum duration based on how long mobs take to kill each other, and it has to hit that minimum duration reasonably often (say at least 60-80% of the time). It's just obvious that current charm durations aren't classic; it's equally obvious that prepatch they were too high.

[Throb]

I can't find the post now, but recall a dev posting the reason for the nerf was to make sure charm breaks randomly. The problem with that reasoning is that it already did before the nerf. Sure sometimes it lasted max duration with tash/malo, but I can distinctly remember some insta breaks and random 1-2 min breaks, even with properly debuffed mobs and 235+ charisma. So you guys have fixed a problem that didn't exist, and in effect you have rendered an entire spell line nearly useless.

[Haynar]

I can't find the post now, but recall a dev posting the reason for the nerf was to make sure charm breaks randomly. The problem with that reasoning is that it already did before the nerf. Sure sometimes it lasted max duration with tash/malo, but I can distinctly remember some insta breaks and random 1-2 min breaks, even with properly debuffed mobs and 235+ charisma. So you guys have fixed a problem that didn't exist, and in effect you have rendered an entire spell line nearly useless.
I have not looked at the changes. But that is how it was intended before. If the mob was tashed, malo'd, charm would often last the duration. The big issues, were the consequences when charm would break.

Charm should cause wipes on raids if used. Charm should be useable to solo. Charm should be dangerous in groups, but useable if you keep the mob snared, tashed, and malo'd.

I don't know how to fix the issue, with charm being a primary dps method on raids.

Maybe charmed mobs should run off randomly in wrong directions and bring back trains, if their master is not close enough?

There are so many things that could be explored.

[Taryth]

I have not looked at the changes. But that is how it was intended before. If the mob was tashed, malo'd, charm would often last the duration. The big issues, were the consequences when charm would break.

Charm should cause wipes on raids if used. Charm should be useable to solo. Charm should be dangerous in groups, but useable if you keep the mob snared, tashed, and malo'd.

I don't know how to fix the issue, with charm being a primary dps method on raids.

Maybe charmed mobs should run off randomly in wrong directions and bring back trains, if their master is not close enough?

There are so many things that could be explored.

Why change anything at all from how it was during classic? I know a lot of the recent posts on the matter have supplied anecdotal evidence, which should never be taken as a trustworthy fact, but they are compelling. If Enchs were a bit OP on Live, why is that being changed here? There are other things that nobody agrees with which are implemented, and the reason given is that it's how it was in classic.
What's with the divergence from the stated plan?


BTW, I'm not complaining; I'm genuinely curious. I know the devs are free to do whateverthefuck they wish with the server, it just doesn't fit in with a lot of the nerfs/unpopular changes that are allowed because that's how X was in classic.

[chr0nix]

It seems the Devs knew charm was way OP compared to how it was on Live, with all the non charming classes putting in complaints about Necros, druids, enchanters running camps, (Especially in CoM) so they basically nerfed it into oblivion to make it worthless to give them time to tweak it out to make it usable but unreliable. Hopefully we see it changed to be more in line with how it should be. 3-4min avg with some breaking within a min and some lasting upwards to the max duration, 5-7min. I'll take that over the current 5 breaks within a minute every minute.

[Beauregard]

I have not looked at the changes. But that is how it was intended before. If the mob was tashed, malo'd, charm would often last the duration. The big issues, were the consequences when charm would break.

Charm should cause wipes on raids if used. Charm should be useable to solo. Charm should be dangerous in groups, but useable if you keep the mob snared, tashed, and malo'd.

I don't know how to fix the issue, with charm being a primary dps method on raids.

Maybe charmed mobs should run off randomly in wrong directions and bring back trains, if their master is not close enough?

There are so many things that could be explored.

I'm not a young doctor but what I got out of this post is;

"We fuckered solo charm ability to oblivion because TR is/was using mass amounts of charmed mobs to kill Trakanon/dragons and we don't like it because that's not how these mobs were killed on classic live."

[moklianne]

I have not looked at the changes. But that is how it was intended before. If the mob was tashed, malo'd, charm would often last the duration. The big issues, were the consequences when charm would break.

Charm should cause wipes on raids if used. Charm should be useable to solo. Charm should be dangerous in groups, but useable if you keep the mob snared, tashed, and malo'd.

I don't know how to fix the issue, with charm being a primary dps method on raids.

Maybe charmed mobs should run off randomly in wrong directions and bring back trains, if their master is not close enough?

There are so many things that could be explored.

What about not allowing charm to stick in raid areas. Or, if a raid mob see charmed pets, he targets them first and annuls the charm?

[Haynar]

Why change anything at all from how it was during classic?
In classic, everyone did not know that cha was vital to charm, along with tash and malo on the mob.

So if you can come up with a way to make everyone stupid, and not know that info, let me know how to implement it.

H

[Taryth]

That makes sense.
Thanks, and sorry if you or one of the other devs has already said this somewhere.

[kanras]

http://wiki.project1999.org/index.php/Xornn%27s_Enchanter_Spell_Guideand
http://wiki.project1999.org/index.php/Xornns_Enchanter_Guide

These were stolen from a Tripod page. It looks like Xornn started in late kunark (he had breeze), hit 50 around Velious, and took a break until Luclin at 56.

Some quotes:

Under charm soloing he says 'honestly I usually get 2 fights in easy using attack slow as the edge'.

'That's all there is to it, really. Charm sometimes holds for 5 minutes. Other times it holds for 5 seconds.' [note: that was about the L12 spell even!]

'Charm soloing is very dangerous now, and if you do choose to fight this way, it's important to consider this factor--if the average charm is 2.5 minutes (reasonable with my experience), can your pet finish the fight with your pull in that time? At one point in charm soloing, about 40 to 50, mobs you charmed could kill two other mobs before charm broke. You will find with the colossal increases in total hit points of the mobs, even the heavy hitting charmed pets have trouble finishing a fight in under three minutes. Dealing with a charm break is practically expected at this point, unless you are able to locate a set of low hit point mobs that will carve each other up quickly. I no longer recommend using slow on the enemy mob, as you will rarely hold a pet that can survive two fights in a row, and losing your pet can often mean zoning because you don't have the mana to nuke finish a mob. Successful charm soloing usually involves a pair of mobs spawning together, rooting one, charming the other and letting them battle it out, doing your best to make sure your pet barely wins, allowing you to break charm and have a fleeing mob left to finish off with nukes. You may even consider hasting your pet, to make for a reliable kill time. If you choose this route, then I suggest slowing the enemy, and going for a two mob kill before charm breaks. A strong haste is often enough to pull this off, but you can go from full health with Rune V up to very dead in seconds in this situation.'

So, here we have:

1) He could kill 2 L50 mobs reasonably frequently with charm if he hasted the pet. A L48-50 Sarnak Myrmidon has ~10K hp. I remember parsing it once, and it did about 100 dps with DW and haste, so probably 50 base dps and 75 with haste. 2 of them would be 20K hps @ 75 dps or 250 seconds plus 10-20 seconds to find mob #2. This would require a 4.5 minute charm. Without haste, it would require 400 seconds or 6.5 minutes.

2) He could kill 2 L40-45 mobs reasonably frequently with charm without haste at L50. A L44 Lava Duct Crawler has ~4.5K hp and does maybe 40dps without haste. That gives us 225 seconds, or just under 4 minutes of fighting time.

3) He claims the 'average charm' is 2.5 minutes. I assume this is counting all the breaks. I don't trust this as much as the calculations since we humans are very bad at averaging this kind of stuff in our heads.

So what I get from the guide is that at 50+, on mobs 5-10 levels below the enchanter, with tash but without malo, charm should last 4-5 minutes fairly frequently, break early some of the time (maybe 20-25% of the time), and generally break before 5-7 minutes.

If you believe in Xornn's memory over raw calculations, you get a 3-4 minute charm fairly frequently, with some early breaks, and the occasional 5-6 minute charm, which works out to an average of 2.5 minutes.


I'm not sure how you derived 1) and 2) from those quotes. I'm guessing it was this:

At one point in charm soloing, about 40 to 50, mobs you charmed could kill two other mobs before charm broke. You will find with the colossal increases in total hit points of the mobs, even the heavy hitting charmed pets have trouble finishing a fight in under three minutes.

When I read that, I interpret it as:
"When charm soloing as an enchanter between levels 40 and 50, mobs you charmed could kill two other mobs before charm broke."

Which would be much more reasonable regarding his 2.5 - 3 minute standard charm duration if he's soloing low-mid dark blues.

[kanras]

Few other things:


Could we keep the evidence in this thread, please? Makes it much easier for all parties, I would think.
There is no "devs", "you guys", with regards to this issue. Other devs knew generally what I was doing, but the change was entirely mine. If you have animosity you want to release, you can send me a PM.
Try to keep this thread constructive.
If there's a specific situation that you think is getting unwarranted charm breaks, be sure to post details. For example, "I charmed a light blue mob and it was averaging 2 minute durations over 20 attempts." or "As a level 55 enchanter, a fully tash/malo'd level 45 mob is averaging 30 second durations over 15 attempts". Be sure to pastebin your logs.
I have read the evidence posted in this thread a couple of times. So just because I don't respond, don't think that it's falling on deaf ears.

[Koota]

At the end of the day, Enchanters now no longer have a need to raise their CHA. That certainly wasn't classic, was it? CHA should be the underlying foundation to their character, and now it does absolutely nothing. Oh, I can get a stack of Water Flasks for 1 silver cheaper. But Calm resist aggro checks aren't affected by it, and now charm is quite literally -useless-.

I agree that Whirl Till You Hurl and even Charm required a nerf, but I really feel like it was taken from one end of the spectrum (OP) and seriously thrown to the bottom of the opposite side of it. They aren't even worth memorizing, much less casting. -Ever-. There really needs to be some middle ground.

I am beyond disenchanted with enchanters right now (no pun intended). The aspect of having to wrangle a hasted pet that could break at any time, CCing, and stun locking kept me doing something in a group at all times. And kept me ENTERTAINED. Now I am nothing short of a half ass'd shaman. With solo pulls I do nothing. Haste and clarity. Nukes generate too much aggro from a warrior who can't taunt off me. Stuns do the same. I literally can not do anything to contribute in a group, other than haste and clarity. Not even trying to QQ, but I feel input on me considering trading my account for another, just because im not enjoying it anymore is warranted to consider 'hey, maybe we did over do it a tad'. My two cents

[ziahh]

I'm not sure how you derived 1) and 2) from those quotes. I'm guessing it was this:



When I read that, I interpret it as:
"When charm soloing as an enchanter between levels 40 and 50, mobs you charmed could kill two other mobs before charm broke."

Which would be much more reasonable regarding his 2.5 - 3 minute standard charm duration if he's soloing low-mid dark blues.

Remember 1 thing : First charming at low lv is more dangerous and thus charm breaking will occure more often due to the fact the a blue mob will be within the range of 1 to 6 level below you.

At higher lv charm is holding more steady due to the fact that a blue mob range from 1- 12 lv below you. a good exemple of that is sebilis.A lv 55 enchanter charming a dar knight wich is lv 44-49 make the duration of the spell more realible. That is why it is often goes up to the full duration.
http://eqbeastiary.allakhazam.com/search.html?id=5013

When i tested charm in beta i was soloing in sebilis with a lv 50 enchanter and i couldnt solo at all because charm was breaking too often. Yes i could kill a few mob but the risk was too great to make solo viable.

It eventually became more realible around lv 52 and higher.

[ziahh]

Few other things:


I have read the evidence posted in this thread a couple of times. So just because I don't respond, don't think that it's falling on deaf ears.
[/list]

Thx you :)

[Splorf22]

Few other things:


Could we keep the evidence in this thread, please? Makes it much easier for all parties, I would think.
There is no "devs", "you guys", with regards to this issue. Other devs knew generally what I was doing, but the change was entirely mine. If you have animosity you want to release, you can send me a PM.
Try to keep this thread constructive.
If there's a specific situation that you think is getting unwarranted charm breaks, be sure to post details. For example, "I charmed a light blue mob and it was averaging 2 minute durations over 20 attempts." or "As a level 55 enchanter, a fully tash/malo'd level 45 mob is averaging 30 second durations over 15 attempts". Be sure to pastebin your logs.
I have read the evidence posted in this thread a couple of times. So just because I don't respond, don't think that it's falling on deaf ears.


Thanks for the response Kanras. I was pretty irritated when it was changed, but this is just a game. No need to go crazy and ragequit, and besides I can't complain too much about a free server. Besides, my toon is plenty effective as is, although it took me a bit to get used to it. I can still go /lfg and get asked to sebilis within 15 minutes (suck it Nalkin!).

If I had to guess, I would say average charm durations on a 50 pet at L55 are about 0.5-1 minute, when they should be 4-5 to be classic, and on a 45 pet maybe 2 minutes when they should be 7-8. But that's just waving my hands and I could be totally wrong, what we need is for someone to make a log of 10-20 charms on a known level mob for a some reasonable data. It's late for me but I'll do it tomorrow night if no one else steps up to the plate (here's looking at you Poule!).

[Splorf22]

I have not looked at the changes. But that is how it was intended before. If the mob was tashed, malo'd, charm would often last the duration. The big issues, were the consequences when charm would break.

Charm should cause wipes on raids if used. Charm should be useable to solo. Charm should be dangerous in groups, but useable if you keep the mob snared, tashed, and malo'd.

I don't know how to fix the issue, with charm being a primary dps method on raids.

Maybe charmed mobs should run off randomly in wrong directions and bring back trains, if their master is not close enough?

There are so many things that could be explored.

I think the simplest fix is to just change the max duration. I saw a quote from Castersrealm somewhere that the max duration of allure was 8 minutes, not 20.

[Splorf22]

I'm not sure how you derived 1) and 2) from those quotes. I'm guessing it was this:



When I read that, I interpret it as:
"When charm soloing as an enchanter between levels 40 and 50, mobs you charmed could kill two other mobs before charm broke."

Which would be much more reasonable regarding his 2.5 - 3 minute standard charm duration if he's soloing low-mid dark blues.

Well I guessed a bit higher in level because a) from 45-50 is when mob HPs start to take off. A L45 mob only has 4k HP, a L50 mob has 10k, while the damage they do does not increase proportionally. So its right around then that charmed pets would have a hard time finishing fights. Second, even a hasted L45 mob is just not that damaging to an L55 enchanter, especially when its not dual wielding.

But we can argue the details. I just wanted to get the ball rolling with actual evidence rather than whining from enchanters and hating from the haters. It's a simple method of calculating charm durations rather than 'oh I remember this'. I like mathematics a lot more than vague memories.

[Uaellaen]

At the end of the day, Enchanters now no longer have a need to raise their CHA. That certainly wasn't classic, was it? CHA should be the underlying foundation to their character, and now it does absolutely nothing. Oh, I can get a stack of Water Flasks for 1 silver cheaper. But Calm resist aggro checks aren't affected by it, and now charm is quite literally -useless-.

I agree that Whirl Till You Hurl and even Charm required a nerf, but I really feel like it was taken from one end of the spectrum (OP) and seriously thrown to the bottom of the opposite side of it. They aren't even worth memorizing, much less casting. -Ever-. There really needs to be some middle ground.

well as far as i remember classic, enchanters didnt go for 200+ cha gear because charm sucked in classic, and whirl till you hurl was more used as a "mez" type since it breaks on damage ...

with velious or luclin our enchanters started to charm for real ... before that it was always a gamble ...

[Koota]

well as far as i remember classic, enchanters didnt go for 200+ cha gear because charm sucked in classic, and whirl till you hurl was more used as a "mez" type since it breaks on damage ...

with velious or luclin our enchanters started to charm for real ... before that it was always a gamble ...


Enchanters I knew on classic went for 200+ CHA gear. And they were also charming imps to do the Efreeti, as well. True, it wasn't reliable all the time, but it was at least usable beyond a minute long duration. And again, I know this is a free server, and because of that reason my irritation with these changes aren't valid or whatever. But, it is what it is.

[ziahh]

Enchanters I knew on classic went for 200+ CHA gear. And they were also charming imps to do the Efreeti, as well. True, it wasn't reliable all the time, but it was at least usable beyond a minute long duration. And again, I know this is a free server, and because of that reason my irritation with these changes aren't valid or whatever. But, it is what it is.

The reason being that a lv 50 enchanter charming a imp lv 46-48 make the grip on your pet very weak, just like before the nerf.
http://eqbeastiary.allakhazam.com/search.html?id=3275

i really beleive it was working as intended pre nerf . try to charm a krup knight at 53 with boltran agacerie and have a nice grip on your pet with spell file no 7,it was only holding betwin 1-3min max. wasnt even worth the effort solo. could help with exp with heal and a group.

[Brain]

In classic, everyone did not know that cha was vital to charm, along with tash and malo on the mob.

So if you can come up with a way to make everyone stupid, and not know that info, let me know how to implement it.


That's not the point, why not just go create a new game? This isn't classic, this is 2011.

Kanras - as we've stated many times: happenings on this server will not mock classic experiences, it's impossible.

-We know what stat(s) to stack this time around
-Raid leaders / Guilds know the MOST EFFECTIVE strategy for raid mobs (if that involves charming, then so be it)
-Because of all this established knowledge, our experiences on this server should be EASIER, FASTER and PREDICTABLE. Why in the world is anyone trying to change that? It's not a hard concept...

You shouldn't nerf a classes core ability because it was being used to down raid mobs, especially making it obsolete. This isn't classic, this is 2011. Hell yes charm is going to last longer than everyone remembers in classic, especially with 255 CHA......

[ziahh]

Originally Posted by Rilen

To harp on a bit of what Throb said. I think most people are misleading themselves in thinking that charm is as it was on live. How many ench did you know with 255 charisma that constantly ran malo/tash on their pets? How many did you know that kept -MR items bagged specifically to give to pets to lower their break chances?

Like many things here, they seem OP'd because everyone knows the name of the game already. On live MANY things simply were not done the way they are here because of a lack of general knowledge of such things. I distinctly remember enchanters doing duo/trio work in Kunark, and I remember when my group of friends first got started in Velious charming giants in the arena. My little collective of friends would have been incapable of doing anything were it not for the ench holding a lieutenant in the arena as a pet.

The reason I remember for charm and pets in general not being as prevalent in the experience scene is that pets ALWAYS took a percentage of exp; even if you did 5 damage or whatever. Also, like Throb said, people had a stigma about people not controlling their pets, or a paranoia about pet pathing that over-rode whatever assistance they might have given on raids.

And to reiterate some of what I said, even after the charm nerfs on live I ran a PLing service for 60+ characters using druid charm as my primary method of xp. This was on a DRUID with approximately 200 charisma, no dire charm. I had no problem keeping pets for 10 minutes to kill 3-5 mobs before the charm broke and then I'd DD/DoT and kill the pet.

As it stands now, between not being able to retrieve items from pets, and the charms seeming to be entirely level based, the charm line for all classes involved is nearly useless. This isn't the way it should be for a character with 255 charisma, malo, and 5-10 levels on the mob being charmed.

It needs to be recognized that while people may not have their own anecdotal evidence of charm being powerful (or any "overused" ability here), 90% of that reason is because this server has MANY players with MUCH higher skill than any of our live servers had. The worst guilds on this server are still 10x better, and more knowledgeable than most of the population of any live server. Most people here flat out play at a higher skill level than what was seen normally on live. We don't all deserve to suffer, or be forced into some niche of mediocrity simply because we know what we're doing or understand how to play the game.

[Blingx]

Originally Posted by Rilen

To harp on a bit of what Throb said. I think most people are misleading themselves in thinking that charm is as it was on live. How many ench did you know with 255 charisma that constantly ran malo/tash on their pets? How many did you know that kept -MR items bagged specifically to give to pets to lower their break chances?

Like many things here, they seem OP'd because everyone knows the name of the game already. On live MANY things simply were not done the way they are here because of a lack of general knowledge of such things. I distinctly remember enchanters doing duo/trio work in Kunark, and I remember when my group of friends first got started in Velious charming giants in the arena. My little collective of friends would have been incapable of doing anything were it not for the ench holding a lieutenant in the arena as a pet.

The reason I remember for charm and pets in general not being as prevalent in the experience scene is that pets ALWAYS took a percentage of exp; even if you did 5 damage or whatever. Also, like Throb said, people had a stigma about people not controlling their pets, or a paranoia about pet pathing that over-rode whatever assistance they might have given on raids.

And to reiterate some of what I said, even after the charm nerfs on live I ran a PLing service for 60+ characters using druid charm as my primary method of xp. This was on a DRUID with approximately 200 charisma, no dire charm. I had no problem keeping pets for 10 minutes to kill 3-5 mobs before the charm broke and then I'd DD/DoT and kill the pet.

As it stands now, between not being able to retrieve items from pets, and the charms seeming to be entirely level based, the charm line for all classes involved is nearly useless. This isn't the way it should be for a character with 255 charisma, malo, and 5-10 levels on the mob being charmed.

It needs to be recognized that while people may not have their own anecdotal evidence of charm being powerful (or any "overused" ability here), 90% of that reason is because this server has MANY players with MUCH higher skill than any of our live servers had. The worst guilds on this server are still 10x better, and more knowledgeable than most of the population of any live server. Most people here flat out play at a higher skill level than what was seen normally on live. We don't all deserve to suffer, or be forced into some niche of mediocrity simply because we know what we're doing or understand how to play the game.

1. No cha, yes tash, yes malo if avail. Don't know of anyone on live or on P99 to carry -MR items for pets.
2. solo?
3. Something that should be implemented on P99?
4. Druids need cha?

[Brain]

Lots of people (enchanters/necros) carry -MR items for pets, or USED to. (adamantite rings...)

Sorry to veer off subject, but why can't we loot non-nodrop items given to NPCs now? I remember live being able to loot the items again...

[Splorf22]

Channeling the spirit of a thousand great scientists before me, I
went forth to charm. I started LFG in Sebilis, where I charmed a
bok shaman and killed a jin wizard (1 recharm necessary) and then
kept him charmed for a bit to experiment. The bok hit for 144;
I believe that makes him L47. I am L55 with 206 charisma in all
these experiments (sadly 5 hours of playing time is not nearly
enough to level up on these ridiculous kunark levels).

[Sun May 01 01:27:03 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 54 seconds (Froglok bok shaman)
[Sun May 01 01:28:02 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 01:28:25 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 147 seconds (Froglok bok shaman)
[Sun May 01 01:30:57 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 01:31:20 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 32 seconds (Froglok bok shaman)
[Sun May 01 01:31:57 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 01:32:11 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 198 seconds (Froglok bok shaman)
[Sun May 01 01:35:34 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 01:35:53 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 294 seconds (Froglok bok shaman)
[Sun May 01 01:40:52 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 02:42:48 2011] You begin casting Allure.

I went to Chardok and did the tunnel. My golem was very weak (hit for
135, so I guess L43-44 or so). We had a mage this time so all of
these were with malo.

Charm duration: 247 seconds (A chardoki golem)
[Sun May 01 02:47:00 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 02:47:16 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 364 seconds (A chardoki golem)
[Sun May 01 02:53:25 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 02:53:54 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 255 seconds (A chardoki golem)
[Sun May 01 02:58:14 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 02:58:29 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 341 seconds (A chardoki golem)
[Sun May 01 03:04:15 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 03:04:46 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 54 seconds (A chardoki golem)
[Sun May 01 03:05:45 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 03:05:59 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 300 seconds (A chardoki golem)
[Sun May 01 03:11:04 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 03:11:20 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 45 seconds (A chardoki golem)
[Sun May 01 03:12:10 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 03:12:28 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 458 seconds (A chardoki golem)
[Sun May 01 03:20:11 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 03:20:28 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 152 seconds (A chardoki golem)
[Sun May 01 03:23:05 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 03:23:26 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 257 seconds (A chardoki golem)
[Sun May 01 03:27:48 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 03:28:04 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 184 seconds (A chardoki golem)
[Sun May 01 03:31:13 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 03:31:28 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 623 seconds (A chardoki golem)
[Sun May 01 03:41:56 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 04:02:29 2011] You begin casting Allure.

We had a little confusion and my faithful golem was killed. So I
played with a myrmidon. I think he was L48.

Charm duration: 289 seconds (A sarnak myrmidon)
[Sun May 01 04:07:23 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 04:07:47 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 278 seconds (A sarnak myrmidon)
[Sun May 01 04:12:30 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 04:40:46 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 13 seconds (A sarnak myrmidon)
[Sun May 01 04:41:04 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 04:41:20 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 284 seconds (A sarnak myrmidon)
[Sun May 01 04:46:09 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 04:46:33 2011] You begin casting Allure.

We almost wiped in a nasty train but our wizard evac'ed us just
in time (except for poor Goragu, who was flattened). After we
recovered the corpse of our SK, I charmed a L51 myrmidon (he
summoned me when it broke) for 2 minutes (no malo). Its
interesting to note that the Janissary he was fighting was only
half dead when charm broke.

Charm duration: 123 seconds (A sarnak myrmidon)
[Sun May 01 04:48:41 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 05:13:49 2011] You begin casting Allure.

I ended up charm duoing the zone in/out with a mage which after
we got the hang of it I have to admit was easy mode. So all of
these durations were with malo. I had some bad luck with the
golem at the end but most of the time I ended up breaking charm
with invisibility. Nalkin can take heart: the mage's earth pet
would out-taunt and out-damage mine (it was hasted with daggers,
and I didn't feel confident enough to haste my charmed pets
without any healer at all).

Charm duration: 143 seconds (A sarnak janissary)
[Sun May 01 05:16:17 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 05:26:18 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 297 seconds (A sarnak templar)
[Sun May 01 05:31:20 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 05:31:20 2011] You vanish.
[Sun May 01 05:34:06 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 301 seconds (A sarnak aruspex)
[Sun May 01 05:39:12 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 05:39:12 2011] You vanish.
[Sun May 01 05:41:27 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 431 seconds (A sarnak janissary)
[Sun May 01 05:48:43 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 05:48:43 2011] You vanish.
[Sun May 01 05:51:30 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 58 seconds (a sarnak templar)
[Sun May 01 05:52:33 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 05:53:17 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 60 seconds (A sarnak templar)
[Sun May 01 05:54:22 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 05:54:22 2011] You vanish.
[Sun May 01 06:01:19 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 506 seconds (a sarnak janissary)
[Sun May 01 06:09:50 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 06:09:50 2011] You vanish.
[Sun May 01 06:11:25 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 16 seconds (A chardoki golem)
[Sun May 01 06:11:46 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 06:11:57 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 39 seconds (A chardoki golem)
[Sun May 01 06:12:41 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 06:13:01 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 41 seconds (A chardoki golem)
[Sun May 01 06:13:47 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.

Unfortunately I didn't really test what I wanted to test (charm sans
malo) that well since for some crazy reason I was always grouping with
magicians.

Once I looked at the data it became obvious what's happening: now
charm breaks much more frequently in the first minute. I had 2/6
(33%) charms break early without malo, 7/26 (30%) charms break
early with malo. People notice this and get irritated,
especially when they get 3-4 instant breaks in a row, because it
sticks in their memory - its why we used to dance to make it
rain. This happens even with malo (see my little experience with
the chardoki golem at the end). It's also what makes charming
much more dangerous now, because you never know when you might
have to blow 1000 mana on 3 recharms in a minute. What's
interesting is there is not a single charm break at 60-120
seconds. That second minute is just ironclad control.

Verdict: Charm is way better currently than I thought it was, but
I find it hard to believe that it broke 1/3 of the time in the
first minute on classic for an enchanter with 200+ charisma,
tash, and malo. I'd be very curious to see how you changed the
code to create this effect, and whether that was your intent or
not.

The 'no-pet-dw' fix is already a huge nerf towards charm soloing,
and some people may be confusing this with a charm nerf. It takes
a solid 4 minutes for a L45+ sarnak to kill one of his brothers
in arms now without haste. So if charm soloing at this level was
practical on live (and it was, at least according to Xornn) then
charm would have to last 4-5 minutes fairly consistently; that
happened on only 1 out of 6 charms.

If I was wishing, I would ask for about 25% increased duration
and breaks in the first minute 1/5 times rather than 1/3 times.
But overall though the situation is not nearly as bad as I
thought it was. The people that are saying charm (that would be
me, sigh) is useless now are just wrong.

[ziahh]

i got 3-4 post with data like urs in this tread. I would had like you to solo with only tash and not both malo+tash.thx for the info.

my last test :

[Thu Apr 21 00:45:06 2011] You begin casting Allure.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:03 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
57 sec
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:08 2011] You begin casting Allure.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:21 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
13sec
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:31 2011] You begin casting Allure.
[Thu Apr 21 00:46:39 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
8sec
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:09 2011] You begin casting Allure.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:34 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
25sec
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:41 2011] Insufficient Mana to cast this spell!
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:42 2011] You begin casting Gate.
[Thu Apr 21 00:47:48 2011] LOADING, PLEASE WAIT...
[Thu Apr 21 00:48:04 2011] You have entered Trakanon's Teeth.

Note that all test i made were done with spell file 8. havent played since 21 of april.

non edited fight on page 11 and more on earlier pages.

[nalkin]

...
If I was wishing, I would ask for about 25% increased duration
and breaks in the first minute 1/5 times rather than 1/3 times.
But overall though the situation is not nearly as bad as I
thought it was. The people that are saying charm (that would be
me, sigh) is useless now are just wrong.

Great post. After seeing that I think that the average duration of charm should be increased by a little bit and 1/5 seems reasonable for breaks in the first minute.

Still definitely not unusable and great in a duo like you did.

[Splorf22]

Ziahh I think you were just a bit unlucky. I was getting about 1/3 early breaks without malo and only slightly less with it. So there is a 1/80 chance of getting 4 in a row - which you will hit if you charm all day. You can see right at the end I got 3 early breaks on the golem within one minute. But on the whole charm lasts more like 2 minutes without malo and 4-5 with it.

IMO that's still too harsh, but its not unusable like I thought it was before I made the test. I think the big change that people have forgotten is charmed pets no longer automatically DW! This makes fights longer and more dangerous. Anyway, you can always make your own log - I'd be curious to see more data, and its not that hard, just a little tedious at times.

[Treats]

Went to Chardok to see if I could still solo with charm. Level 60 Enchanter with 255 CHA. There was no noticeable difference to me from when I solo'd there from 58-60. Here's my log:

Level 45 sarnak aruspex

[Sun May 01 15:20:25 2011] Logging to 'eqlog.txt' is now *ON*.
[Sun May 01 15:20:36 2011] You begin casting Calm.
[Sun May 01 15:20:39 2011] A sarnak aruspex looks less aggressive.
[Sun May 01 15:20:45 2011] You begin casting Calm.
[Sun May 01 15:20:47 2011] Your Mesmerize spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 15:20:48 2011] A sarnak templar looks less aggressive.
[Sun May 01 15:20:53 2011] a sarnak aruspex tells you, 'Attacking a sarnak janissary Master.'
[Sun May 01 15:22:23 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.

Level 45 sarnak aruspex

[Sun May 01 15:22:35 2011] You begin casting Allure.
[Sun May 01 15:24:03 2011] You begin casting Invisibility.
[Sun May 01 15:24:03 2011] A sarnak aruspex hits a sarnak janissary for 82 points of damage.
[Sun May 01 15:24:05 2011] Taunting Attacker Master
[Sun May 01 15:24:05 2011] A sarnak aruspex hits a sarnak janissary for 135 points of damage.
[Sun May 01 15:24:08 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 15:24:08 2011] You vanish.

Level 46 sarnak templar

[Sun May 01 15:24:44 2011] You begin casting Allure.
[Sun May 01 15:30:15 2011] You begin casting Invisibility.
[Sun May 01 15:30:18 2011] You haven't recovered yet...
[Sun May 01 15:30:19 2011] You haven't recovered yet...
[Sun May 01 15:30:19 2011] You haven't recovered yet...
[Sun May 01 15:30:20 2011] You haven't recovered yet...
[Sun May 01 15:30:20 2011] You haven't recovered yet...
[Sun May 01 15:30:20 2011] You haven't recovered yet...
[Sun May 01 15:30:21 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 15:30:21 2011] You vanish.

Level 49 sarnak aruspex

[Sun May 01 15:31:18 2011] You begin casting Allure.
[Sun May 01 15:35:27 2011] You begin casting Invisibility.
[Sun May 01 15:35:32 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Sun May 01 15:35:32 2011] You vanish.

Level 45 sarnak templar

[Sun May 01 15:35:53 2011] You begin casting Allure.
[Sun May 01 15:39:13 2011] a sarnak templar says 'Sorry, Master..calming down.'
[Sun May 01 15:39:14 2011] a sarnak templar says 'Sorry, Master..calming down.'
[Sun May 01 15:39:14 2011] a sarnak templar begins to cast a spell.
[Sun May 01 15:39:14 2011] a sarnak templar says 'Sorry, Master..calming down.'
[Sun May 01 15:39:14 2011] a sarnak templar says 'Sorry, Master..calming down.'
[Sun May 01 15:39:15 2011] a sarnak templar says 'Sorry, Master..calming down.'
[Sun May 01 15:39:16 2011] a sarnak templar says 'Sorry, Master..calming down.'
[Sun May 01 15:39:16 2011] a sarnak templar says 'Sorry, Master..calming down.'

One random charm break (the first one) and that was after it was charmed for almost 2 minutes. All other breaks were done by invis. Last one pet died.

[Splorf22]

I decided to make another log without malo.

[Tue May 03 03:24:47 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 46 seconds (a sarnak templar L48)
[Tue May 03 03:25:38 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Tue May 03 03:26:14 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 31 seconds (a sarnak templar L48)
[Tue May 03 03:26:50 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Tue May 03 03:27:07 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 153 seconds (A sarnak templar L48)
[Tue May 03 03:29:45 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Tue May 03 03:30:23 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 175 seconds (A sarnak janissary L48)
[Tue May 03 03:33:23 2011] Part of your image fades away.
[Tue May 03 03:33:23 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Tue May 03 03:34:44 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 99 seconds (A sarnak templar L48)
[Tue May 03 03:36:28 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Tue May 03 03:36:43 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 263 seconds (a sarnak templar L48)
[Tue May 03 03:41:11 2011] Part of your image fades away.
[Tue May 03 03:41:11 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Tue May 03 03:41:53 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 217 seconds (A sarnak janissary L45)
[Tue May 03 03:45:35 2011] Part of your image fades away.
[Tue May 03 03:45:35 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Tue May 03 03:45:59 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 116 seconds (A chardoki golem L48)
[Tue May 03 03:48:00 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Tue May 03 03:48:17 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 26 seconds (A chardoki golem L48)
[Tue May 03 03:48:48 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Tue May 03 03:49:14 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 90 seconds (A sarnak janissary L46)
[Tue May 03 03:50:49 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Tue May 03 03:51:09 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 47 seconds (A sarnak janissary L46)
[Tue May 03 03:52:01 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Tue May 03 05:40:57 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 37 seconds (A sarnak janissary L46)
[Tue May 03 05:41:39 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Tue May 03 05:41:53 2011] You begin casting Allure.
Charm duration: 191 seconds (a sarnak janissary L46)
[Tue May 03 05:45:09 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.
[Tue May 03 05:49:13 2011] You begin casting Allure.
[Tue May 03 05:49:40 2011] A sarnak janissary's feet adhere to the ground.
[Tue May 03 05:53:43 2011] a sarnak janissary has been slain by a sarnak myrmidon!
Charm duration: 276 seconds (A sarnak myrmidon L49)
[Tue May 03 05:53:54 2011] Your Allure spell has worn off.

Charms 0-1 minute: 5
1-2 minutes: 3
2-3 minutes: 2
3-4 minutes: 2
4-5 minutes: 2
Average: 110 seconds.

So after this I am a bit more convinced that current charm is
underpowered. I had an average duration 1:50, which is well below
Xornn's memory of 2:30 and even further below my calculated times. The
last fight is a great example of how long it takes to kill stuff at
this level. My Myrmidon was 2-3 levels higher than the Janissary it
was fighting and it still took over 4 minutes to kill it. With an
average duration of 110 seconds, this means 1 charm break per fight.

Other notes: I died in the name of science. A templar stacked
envenomed bolt and plague on me and I went down in 20 seconds tops.
Fortunately Daliant was on hand to rez me (thanks man). Since the
penalty for death at 55+ is so extreme, my net XP here was about -1
blue sans rez.

I was looking forward to using my new Goblin Gazughi ring but as you
can see I only used it 3 times because charm was wearing off just fine
on its own.

[Slave]

Why is this not being mentioned?!

--When you charm something, all other detrimental spells on the mob are dispelled--

Evidence: all root, mez, and snares wear off as soon as charm hits, and the mob trots over to the charm caster with its tail wagging.

Therefore, Tash and Malo DO NOT MATTER except for the initial resist chance of landing charm. If the developers would change charm to not erase all the detrimental effects on the mob, tash and malo would hold and the mob would stay charmed much, much longer. Right?

[Treats]

Why is this not being mentioned?!

--When you charm something, all other detrimental spells on the mob are dispelled--

Evidence: all root, mez, and snares wear off as soon as charm hits, and the mob trots over to the charm caster with its tail wagging.

Therefore, Tash and Malo DO NOT MATTER except for the initial resist chance of landing charm. If the developers would change charm to not erase all the detrimental effects on the mob, tash and malo would hold and the mob would stay charmed much, much longer. Right?

Have you ever charmed anything???

[Kender]

Have you ever charmed anything???

lol that's what i was thinking

[thefloydian]

Pro~. Well that would explain why I thought it was so long. Though still, if it was not difficult to re-charm then that still seems a bit OP to me. I also think Glitch may be right with what he said below this post about how people know more about what they are doing. It probably wasn't as OP as it used to be because people were still figuring things out, and now with all the pros on here it changes things.

5 min avg I am fine with that and think that is fair. Like I said though, when whirl was pre-nerf watching an enchanter play made me sick to my stomach at how easy it was. So I am still smacking my lips from the bitterness...

Chaining pets is pretty annoying as well.

:D

[Dalien]

--When you charm something, all other detrimental spells on the mob are dispelled--

Evidence: all root, mez, and snares wear off as soon as charm hits, and the mob trots over to the charm caster with its tail wagging.

This is not true at all, detrimental effects absolutely stay on the mob during charm. Just snared a wolf to test, charmed it, broke charm with invis, it's still snared. I can't speak for charm duration but detri effects staying on the mob is def classic, used to duo with an enchanter on my druid and keep the pet snared all the time, etc.

[guineapig]

Why is this not being mentioned?!

--When you charm something, all other detrimental spells on the mob are dispelled--

Evidence: all root, mez, and snares wear off as soon as charm hits, and the mob trots over to the charm caster with its tail wagging.

Therefore, Tash and Malo DO NOT MATTER except for the initial resist chance of landing charm. If the developers would change charm to not erase all the detrimental effects on the mob, tash and malo would hold and the mob would stay charmed much, much longer. Right?

Lol, don't I wish. My root always seems to last the longest possible duration when I charm a mob. It's the most annoying thing in the world.

[Malrubius]

Why change anything at all from how it was during classic?
In classic, everyone did not know that cha was vital to charm, along with tash and malo on the mob.

So if you can come up with a way to make everyone stupid, and not know that info, let me know how to implement it.

H

Sorry to necro rez this thread.

The above surprised me, and I may just be reading too much into it. So...does that mean that you guys are not trying to make the game mechanics purely classic anymore, but just using that as a starting point? And then tweaking the classic mechanics so that the game is more difficult? (to compensate for the fact that we have all played the game before)

Not trying to be snarky, I'm just genuinely curious.

I'd also point out that CHA was never "vital" to Charm in the classic era. It was slightly noticable, but far less important than MR. See #4 in the OP here: http://www.project1999.org/forums/showthread.php?t=6733.

[redghosthunter]

This issue has been beat to death.

I'm as hateful as the next ENC about the changes made, but 99% of what goes on is here excellent. Yes I'm sure there are a select few... (as mentioned in the threads ya posted,) but you going to find that everywhere in everything ya do in life.

[guineapig]

I had charm lasting close to full duration last night multiple times in Seb at guard/necro.
Malo and Tash was used.

Was lot's of fun.

Oh also, I was not wearing my full charisma gear either. Decided to add some cold resist for the wizzies and charisma was at around 218 instead of 255.

I have no idea what people are complaining about. My guess is they don't understand the word "random". I had a very unlucky day with 255 charisma earlier this week and last night I had a very lucky day. It's that simple.

[Malrubius]

I hear ya, and to make it clear, I wasn't complaining at all. I have no idea if charm is currently overpowered or underpowered (or neither) vs. classic.

It was just a general question about whether or not the design (of stuff) is sometimes intentionally changed to compensate for the fact that we are (mostly) intimately familiar with the game.


I also wanted to make it clear that CHA was far from "vital" in classic. It was helpful, but that's about it. A very likely-sounding formula is even in those classic era posts!

Anyway, based on your results gp, it sounds like it might be about right. I'm looking forward to spinning up an Enchanter again.

[xxzertox]

Thank you very much.

[Sunderfury]

Moving to resolved, future tweaks to duration can be posted anew to link evidence as this thread has gotten a bit sporadic.