Mana regeneration

Feedback and Suggestions
21

i unfortunately have to go raid in WoW for the next 4 hours but i agree with alot of the stuff you are saying and some how even some of the stuff heavy said as well :wink:

i think increasing the mana you got back from the resolve node in the dark quiver tree would be my next best solution. Do you think 2 mana back per point per arrow is a good spot for it or could increasing it be an option? in my mind and after playing my cinder strike build i dont think even doubling the mana on that node would break the class but i cant be for sure.

22

The co.mmunity doesnā€™t hate it when you have suggestions. ā€œThe communityā€ isnā€™t even monolithic enough to entirely disagree, some people will agree with you that mana as a constraint feels bad & thatā€™s fair enough as a viewpoint. Itā€™s just not one the devs (& some of the community share).

Itā€™s not obvious. We have no idea how many you have.

Not explicitly, no, but that kinda is how most of your posts come across (& mine too probably).

Especially as a Rogue & especially especially as a Marksmanā€¦

Thatā€™s not true, that sounds like youā€™re comparing a very mana expensive build (requiring the generator/spender playstyle) to builds that donā€™t use big spenders which is a foolā€™s errand.

Then PM the devs directly. If you donā€™t want to have a conversation, donā€™t post in public.

He probably does, heā€™s just not having the conversation that you think heā€™s having. Heavy tries (given heā€™s not a native speaker but his English is generally pretty decent) to understand why you are saying what you are saying to get to your fundamental premises then discuss those.

My issue with that is that suffixes are almost always defensive while mana regen is most definitely an offensive stat so from that point of view it belongs as a prefix (& IMO, thatā€™s reasonable).

And i believe thatā€™s the point, we know the devs donā€™t mana cost to be trivialised as it is in some other games.

But Iā€™m glad the conversation has moved on to a more constructive one.

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23

I really appreciate this about LE. In many ARPGs by endgame you donā€™t even think about mana, itā€™s just spam, position and watch health. I like placing my bets on spending big skills at the right time.

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24

I am surprised OP complains from Rogue, which has one of the better ways to generate mana across all the classes. Not as good as Sentinel, which restores all mana with a press of a button, but still pretty good.

Try Sorcerer. The premium mana stacking class has to sit on one spot and channel in a game where every boss loads instakill circles under his ass.

25

Donā€™t have time to read the entire thread so I will throw my two cents instead:

  • Is a mostly useless stat you may want a bit of it, with cooldown abilities.
  • If you want to maintain any large mana cost ability to the point to spam it, no amount of extra mana + mana efficiency + mana regeneration will solve the trick.
  • Sometimes the skill itself have huge mana changes so you can go that route.
  • Sometimes you must look in another skill that is able to restore your mana, to do a restore-spend combo.
    So we have three affixes for mana that are mostly either niche and could be bait.

I donā€™t know if thatā€™s intended, I guess so, would be cool to enable certain playstyles using these three affixes but all they do is alleviate or adjust, not fix or enable.

26

I do think this is probably a problem with a very particular build. Mana cost loading on Cinder Strike sounds like a really cool idea though that Iā€™d love to see supported. Iā€™d really love to see OP start a new feedback thread on exactly what theyā€™re trying to do with that build and why it isnā€™t working with some suggestions on how to make it work through some balance changes.

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27

I think is a design problem, or a design outcome because possibly is intended this way:

  • T6 and T7 mana regen are crap, usually a T7 is worth two T5, but not here.

  • Mana percent, and mana efficiency, another ones with crappy values and very limited gear slots (usually chest/head and maybe some idols for some skills).

  • Flat mana as affix is everywhere, just as a dead affix for most classes and builds, and again, not great values, but in isolation is the only one who scales adequately (I guess for that 300 mana goal for sorcs).

  • Flat mana from attunement is a joke.

If you had also flat mana regen, say, 3 points at T5, up to 6 at T7, mana efficiency and mana percent where options in more gear slots, and in bigger magnitudes, and 3-4 flat points from attunement, then you could think in ways to play with mana affixes to enable certain builds, but is not the case.

Is the same as cooldown reduction efficiency: extremely low value in head as default, something you cannot play with, some skills have their cooldown reduction for class specific, so anything cooldown reduction is extremely tight and controlled on EHG desires, not a thing you can play with.

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28

I donā€™t like, that there are so few ways to restore mana. Mana regeneration stats are too weak and require to sacrifice prefixes. Relying on a another skill to restore mana as its sole purpose is kinda strange too. Sentinel doesnā€™t even have such skill, have to gently touch enemies in melee to throw some javelins.
Also mana costs are often disproportional to skill power. Some skills like meteor deserve their high mana cost, but for example ballista costs 44 mana, so pure ballista build is impossible without shooting some zero damage toothpicks into enemies just to restore mana. While other more damaging skills cost 0 mana or even restore it.
I like warpath but never play it, cause everytime I try to make a build, mana makes it either weak or clunky. RIP my forge weapon bee vine paladin, it required 12 skill points to just solve mana, but the rest were not enough to make it work. Also a bug prevented mana from restoring via Dark Nexus, reported with no reply.
I wish there were more ways to reduce mana costs or completely ignore them, even with a downside, like Devouring Diadem or lifetap in POE.

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29

I donā€™t agree that thereā€™s a problem here that needs to be solved by substantially increasing the mana regen stat on gear. Very few builds would come on line from it that donā€™t already work by other means, and the ones that do would likely be super broken (i.e. Self Cast Infinite Proc 6 Meteor with Harbinger of Stars). The vast majority of builds have solutions to the mana problem, and the few that donā€™t probably need a balance adjustment on either mana cost, better mana regen sources in their skills/passives toolkit, or damage to bring them more in line with the rest.

In other ARPGs mana as a resource often becomes trivialized at endgame. This creates substantially fewer reasons to be creative with builds and in LE would invalidate the mana decisions that players currently need to make with their skills, including skill tree nodes and using generators. I donā€™t want to see almost every build just scaling mana gen or something like mana leech just so they can spam the highest mana version of their skill, and I think thatā€™s what would happen if mana regen as a stat was buffed enough to build for it exclusively in builds like the one mentioned here, or something like mana leech was introduced. There might be minor adjustments they could make but Iā€™d much rather they just address the particular skills that struggle instead of make a universal adjustment that could massively affect the core gameplay loop.

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30

Then apparently youā€™re doing wrong, youā€™re supposed to take the node that restores mana instantly but with a cooldown (Null Profusion).

Volatile Reversal plus the likes of Smite, Vengeance, Rive and Multistrike with the Time and Faith passive.

31

You can make mana a non issue on every build with ease you just need to say good bye to the big spenders and skill accordingly. You canā€™t simply have the best of both worlds aka free skills with the biggest numers and thatā€™s a good thing. Sooner or later all people get it and might find the sweetspot for each build they are playing.

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32

I know, that there is a solution, I just donā€™t like it :laughing:
Without taking a node, that disables mana restoration, Volatile reversal has about 6 to 7 seconds cooldown. Iā€™ve tried to use it to cast sigils of hope, got tired of tracking remaining buff length and doing the combo every 20 seconds. Also it can not only restore mana, but also take it back, if you donā€™t constantly keep in mind the exact amount of mana you had 6.66 seconds ago. It also restores a position, reducing clearspeed. Also it is hard to catch exact timing, if high mana cost skill was used after movement skill - you can either donā€™t restore mana or return too far. Thatā€™s too much chunkiness for me to handle constantly. I will give it one more try, only if a new node is added to prevent position messing. For now I see it only as a buff/debuff.
As for the other skills, Vengeance/Rive/Multistrike require a melee hit, ranged builds become melee and lose clearspeed. And I want to use Smite as a 0 mana cost 4.44 seconds cooldown screen-wide obstacle-ignoring teleport and buff instead (increases clearspeed, DPS and enjoyment).
Mana starved forging hammer throw is my favorite build, just because it ignores all of the problems caused by mana starvation :hammer:

33

Imho, this is just a problem in general with mana as a system as a whole.

We see to some degree even in a game like league of legends. mana is either a problem on the character where they need to recall frequently to deal with it because there is simply no mana options that will restore how fast they spend it, or they have ā€œmana costsā€ but they dont matter because in normal item choices they just never run out of mana anyways.

Heck id argue while LE has a better solution to it then many games, having an ability like mana strike that you can spec to give you 50 mana on a swing on a non mana stacker build basically means that skill is how you ignore mana.

like lets say you have 100 max mana, and your ability costs 15 mana a cast, and you cast twice a second, you have baseline mana regen. you lose 30 mana second, but get back 8, meaning you spend 22 a second total, for simplicity sake lets say due to inconsistency, after 5 seconds you are oom, well then you just hit mana strike twice in one second, and are now full mana.

While yes, you have to make a choice to use a mana restoring move, for the most part if you dont mind hitting that button twice in a combo, mana is basically meaningless. you can restore it almost instantly. You never have to think about spending your mana, because you can so easily get it back.

I think LE still has a situation where mana is trivialized, its just a more active approach to making it solved vs a passive one.

I think its especially odd since this game also has cooldown gates on some abilities. Why does VC cost 15 mana when it also has a CD limit? the mana either does not matter on a VC focused build 99% of the time, because you have to wait for its cooldown anyways. And if the mana cost becomes too high, now your required to get cooldown rate, mana recovery AND not slack on other offensive stats.

Sorry for the ramble, I just really think mana is a hold over from an era where there was health and mana potions. And cooldowns exist as a better gate to control how people engage in combat. or you need to have three types of abilities, low to no cost ā€œfillerā€ skills that might even restore mana. Big mana spenders that have no cooldown, allowing you to spam them if you want but increases how often you need to get mana back, or cooldown abilities that have little or no other cost, and are gated instead by cooldown.

And most games simply dont hit the proper balance of mana, cooldown, and filler. And it would be easier to just remove mana from the equation.

34

Exactly. One canā€™t have their cake and eat it.

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35

You mean, like how LE does it?

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36

Blackhole says hi, an ability that can be specced to cost a billion mana, and has a massively restrictive cooldown?

Meaning not only do you get punished by its cooldown, its most competitive damage spec also makes it eat your mana.

Its probably why blackhole is basically never used. Imagine if you removed its cooldown when it dropped space rocks, suddenly you could make a blackhole build in exchange for needing to solve mana.

And if you choose to leave it with a cooldown, then it simply exists as a utility piece.

This is the problem, there isnt that proper balance yet. It cant fufill the role of a spender skill that is gated by mana but gets damage in exchange. instead it can be specced as a burst damage option, or a utility.

But burst damage is actually not a useful mechanic for a game like this because there isnt as much strict dps windows like say an mmo.

its why stuff like smite, and lightning blast always have way higher and better damage uptime then stuff like meteor or blackhole. There is not enough balance for the manaless skills or low mana skills in terms of reduced damage. So it ends up being optimal to spam low cost spells most of the time.

I think it would be way more interesting if there was a way to play a rotational based character that was at the mercy of cooldowns and had an excess of action time.

Cause we didnt even get into action time. if the mana fillers are not strong enough, and the mana cost of mana spenders it too high, instead you just spec a low cost skill and scale speed to the moon, without cooldown gating, and instead mana gating you run into an action limit.

there is almost never a world where you run fireball, meteor, and lightning blast all converted to lightning, you drop meteors then go to a manaless skill to fill the gaps, but both lightning blast and fireball do that. you are at an action limit. A third cooldown skill that costed no mana would be ideal, too bad most of them can eat lots of mana for almost zero reason.

I dunno, I just feel like its so much easier to balance two axis of gating (cast speed vs cooldown, if you remove mana) then it is to try and balance 3 by adding mana into the mix.

Every game ive ever played in recent years feel like mana only exists because its a stereotypical design for rpgs.

But these are all the grumblings from an armchair so take with a grain of salt.

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37

This reads to me as a different definition of ā€˜trivializedā€™. I would define your version of trivialized as ā€˜solvable through active gameplayā€™. I donā€™t see that as trivialized, even if it is often easy to accomplish. Trivialized to me is more akin to ā€˜I take this node here or wear this item and I never think about mana againā€™.

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38

D3 committed full on to the ā€œgenerator vs spenderā€ mana model and it worked pretty well. Game had problems but the combat flow and ability rotations were not bad.

LE is obviously sorta aiming for this model, itā€™s just a bit half-baked in the implementation. In short expensive spenders tend to be underpowered relative to their cost and inconvenience, while some of the cheaper skills and generators are too easy to build into a 1-stop damage solution. Thatā€™s a balance problem rather than a deep systemic issue, so I think thereā€™s high hopes it will steadily improve in the future.

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39

I am Largrly in agreement that the mana cost of many high mana cost skills just donā€™t match up with the damage they put out. Most of the time it feels like 5x the effort for 80% of the effect of a brain dead let me use 3 buff skills and movement skill and just spam damage.

Most recently I played a Bleed Forge strike use Javelin as a pre=dmg generator. I actually had too much attack speed that I couldnā€™t consistently javelin before using FS. The exact same setup was infinitely simpler and more damage if i just used multistrike for bleed. It seems like its a problem that can be solved with changing numbers, I donā€™t think even doubling mana regen would change it. The bottom line is mana is expensive and 0 mana cost if infinitely less than even 1 mana cost.

The only node Ive seen do mana cost right is Judgementā€™s Pious Offering node (2% more dmg per 1% mana cost). To use MTG terminology, this should be the ā€œShockā€ of LE. The measuring stick by which all other power is compared. If i make a skill cost 10 additional mana it should give me the utility or power of 20% more damage. To be clear it shouldnā€™t just read +10 mana cost 20% more dmg, there should be more to it than that.

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40

Null Profusion has many many many problems. its very risky.

  1. When you go low on mana you risk not having enough to TP/Shield in critical moment. RIP
  2. Next you need to be in deep negative. If you are only close to 0 its entirely possible to regen to above 0 in the window between using Focus, which absolutely sucks and basically kills any function on your character for 10+ secs
  3. As conclusion to pt2 you need big mana spenders. But all big mana spenders on sorc areā€¦ not good enough. You are left in a loop where you trade offensive affixes for mana affixes.
  4. Even null profusion is not good enough if you use mana heavy skills. You need to channel for A LOT to fill your huge mana pool. And channeling in LE is suicide.

I am sorry. You canā€™t defend Focus. Whoever designed this skill should be ashamed. It combines every bad property in an RPG into a mandatory skill. And it completely fails thematically compared to Volatile Reversal or Rebuke. If you want to play a wizard type of character you either play Lich or Sentinel.

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