Currently a battlemage can blind people using flashfire, color spray or sear. All for a very similar result, a long duration blind that can be cured by gyvel/red potions or cure blindness.
I propose we change Color spray to be more unique and to give it more of a use, as well as to fit the "warrior mage" theme.
My idea would be the following:
Change blind duration to 0 - 1 hours
Change success rate to be more similar to other 0 - 1 hour blind skills
Change blind type to be incurable akin to fireblind. (This can potentially be ditched, resulting in something more similar to secret arts rather than dirt kick)
Essentially this would be a spell version of dirt kick.
The only problem with having a blind like that is that battlemage can dispel magic. Now, if you make it a two round spell like dirt kick, I'd be fine with that because it has significant damage as well. No dispelling someone and blinding them while their own dirt kick lag is wearing off. Otherwise, it would be a nice addition to battlemage.
@Archbishop Monk
Fair point, raising the lag to 2 rounds would be warranted. Only issue would be losing their only single round magical nuke.
Perhaps a variant: Being able to cast the current version of colour spray as is or toggle for the 2 round dirt kick version?
Why not change it to something else entirely? Instead of blinding a person, have it give a small chance to change the way they see things. Similar to misdirection they may see exits wrong or have a chance to blind for much shorter duration. I don't see people at 50 using it, so giving it a chance to do either or may be interesting enough for it to be used at 50 more often, and have it start causing the misdirection at later levels similar to lifedrain paralyzing from time to time after level 45.
I actually really like turning it into a castable dirt kick. I'm not really behind it being a 2 tick blind, but a normal dirt is a fantastic idea. Lower its damage values, and make it dirt kick. Maybe have a saving throw? If you make the save its 0 hour effect, if you fail its a 1 hour effect?
I'm fine with it being like a castable dirt kick as long as it takes two rounds so that you could not dispel and blind someone while their dirt kick lag wore off. If they tried to bash, you could punish them with this with a well timed dispel and 'colourspray blind. Though, battlemages could use some help in the versatility, so this would be a good addition.
Colour spray is the only useful damage tool BMG's have prior to L31.
It's mostly used for Ranking and for casting non-physical damage on Ogres/Vampires at pinnacle.
The current mechanics of the spell make it:
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Deal 34-138 (@L50) light damage, using an uniform distribution (equal chance distribution) which explains it's randomness.
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Save half damage at current level.
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If the damage wasn't saved, try to cast at Level/2 the spell blindness.
The corollary of this is that color spray IS JUST a light damage type spell. It never has a chance to blind over 5% on anything that matters due to casting at L50 as a L25.
I think it causing blind is perfectly in line with the spell RP and class RP. BUT, I think blindness code should be changed to provide more discrimination.
We should have the basic shaman/necro blindness. But we should have a secondary blind that is called by other spells as an secondary effect and that allows more fine tuning. Things like passing the duration of the blind, independent of level, the affect level (which determined how easy is to cure it) and the level it saves against.
In the case of color spray it would allow for example to set the blind duration to 3 hours, the level it saves against as L50, and the affect level as L45.
The reason I imagine color spray is being cast as L50/2 is because L50 is very long lasting and hard to cure, even trough you need to fail 2 saves to get blind.
Any feedback from staff? Is it possible for something like this to be considered?
I think its a good idea.
Sear blind is a bitch tough.
Someone put all the ideas into one concise post and throw it in prayer. Bmages have been needing a little overhaul for a while imo.
I don't think they need an overhaul. They are a very unique class.
They just need some twerking of some stuff.
If folks want to DM me (here or on Discord) ALL of their ideas for BMGs, I will volunteer to collate the good, the bad, and the ugly into a unified post that can be made for review/consideration.
