How Heavy Spell Can Be Implemented In Wynncraft

Part I: What is Heavy Spell?

Heavy spell (often abbreviated to hspell) is a playstyle probably easiest explained through an analogy to heavy melee, although there are some differences. The general principle heavy spell is based upon is higher damage, higher cost; where a spellspam build might have the mana and costs to cast 2 spells every second, leading to X dps, an hspell build would perhaps have the mana and costs to cast a spell every 2 seconds, ideally landing near the same X dps.

Part II: The Purpose of this Thread

Before I describe the theory work and item construction/testing that I and others have done, I want to make clear the aims of this project. I don’t expect to see any of this implemented in game, nor do I expect my ideas to be taken as fact. What I hope is that IMs/CT who are interested in implementing heavy spell but do not have time to devote to theorycrafting and testing it can use this is thread as inspiration and learn from the conversations I’ve had and mistakes I’ve made in order to have a smoother and easier time when it’s their turn.

Finally, I want to clear up some misconceptions:

1. “Heavy spell exists already! There is Ambivalence!”

I am, ironically, ambivalent on the item Ambivalence. On the one hand, it shows to me that heavy spell is something that is wanted in the game. Ambivalence seems to be an attempt at that and I have respect for that. On the other hand, it is conceptually flawed to the point where ‘heavy spell’ is actually better without Ambivalence, and by no fault of the IMs. What Ambi tries to do is impossible—there is no way for a single item or even several items, let alone accessories, to successfully execute heavy spell within the game as it is now. More on this later.

2. “Won't hspell just still be worse than spellspam?”

I have two responses to this. First, I want to say, no it isn’t necessarily worse than spellspam. I think this line of thinking comes naturally from how much of a meme it is presently, but with proper support it can certainly be a meta-viable playstyle. Second, I think that build diversity is one of the biggest things Wynn has going for that, and part of it is acknowledging that not everyone likes to play the meta. I truly believe that spellspam will always have the highest theoretical dps and most versatility and most players, but that doesn’t mean players will not want to branch out elsewhere, like they do now.

3. “How do you know hspell is unsupported? Have you tried it?”

Yep. I have played heavy spell in 1.20 (as have @hppeng and @Ingo) and used it for all sort of endgame content. It’s bad.

4. “This is a waste of time. None of this will ever make it in game or be useful.”





Part III: The Theory.

Here comes the bulk of the thread; how do you take an archetype that is fully unsupported and turn it into a meta-viable concept? The next step is to consider game-wide changes that would be needed for hspell to function, and as far as I know there is only one: the Spell Cost Formula (:doom:). Currently in game, spell cost is calculated as follows:



(Here is a nice thread by @Saya)

The problem with this formula with regards to heavy spell is that both high %costs and high raw costs can be easily cancelled out. If an item (like Ambi) has very high %cost, but you are able to use intelligence and -raw cost to reduce the cost to 0 or below before %cost applies, the resulting spell will cost 1 mana. Conversely, if you have an item with very high raw cost, you just need -100% cost after that (say, slayer + dtide), and the resulting spell costs 1 mana.

Therefore, and I want to make this clear, any concerted attempt at hspell implementation requires a change in the spell cost formula: Raw after %. This is not a new idea; @Bart (MC) brought it up a long time ago and it’s been discussed frequently. Here is what that formula looks like:



Within this formula (unlike what is currently in game), % cost reduction caps at -100%. This is incredibly incredibly important to having heavy spell function. Without this caveat, players can use items like panic zealot and slayer to have effectively -8 or -9 cost before raw applies, rather than 0, which it should be.

I also think it's important to note that this formula does not change all that many builds used right now. It will require some rethinking and rebalancing, but I think it could be implemented without changing over a dozen items and could be done relatively quickly.

Oh, and also, given that raw costs are what is being used to make something heavy, Lower will need a rework. I think that’s rather self-explanatory. From the testing we did, other high -raw cost items (ex: olily, the evolved) were not problematic, but other implementations may vary in this regard.

Now, to the main theory.


3.1: What is Heavy Spell? But with Details

I realize that my opening description was vague, and purposefully so. Unlike melee is right now, heavy spell aims to not just be viable at the extremes. This means that builds won’t just aim for 19-cost spells (which, by the way, you can go past at which point spells are uncastable), but will instead shoot for a wide range of costs, balancing casting speed and mana with damage to the user’s preference. From my experience in game, ideally even ‘heavy’ spells won’t exceed 10 mana—being able to cast them twice allows for much more flexibility—but again that is in some respect personal preference.

I, alongside others, have aimed to design sample items with the idea of making costs in the 6-9 range (for damage spells) reasonably accessible in any archetype. I see this as the ‘sweet spot’ for heavy spell. I want to make it a point to not needlessly penalize movement spell cost—that destroys the utility and QoL of builds for no good reason.

In terms of mana, mixed mana is far and away the best option for hspell builds. Not only does it let you exceed 20 net mana on a build (which is definitely helpful), but it spreads your mana reliance into two sources, meaning either a ms or mr tick can allow you to cast 1-3 more spells.

As a last note: theming. @Gigavern made the point that, from a Wynncraft elemental theming standpoint, heavy spell seems like a natural extension of earth spell, much like thunder spell thematically leads to spellsteal as a playstyle. I expanded on this a bit; EF is (imo) the thematically ‘heaviest’ archetype, and from a balance perspective could seriously use some more offensive support. Because of this, most of how I see heavy spell rests on an EF axis—TWA can all be used, but the items would favor EF for the reasons discussed above.

3.2: The Centerpiece Model

Through numerous flawed attempts at coming up with a way to implement heavy spell (including just spamming items mindlessly and major IDs), I’ve settled on a centerpiece model as the best way to allow heavy spell to function in a manner that is both viable and not abusable. The gist of it is that, rather than distributing +costs and high damages across items in a build, they would be consolidated on one armor piece (the centerpiece), and the other items in the build provide mana/cost/utility support around it. This method is much less abusable than others I’ve tried, and comes with much less to consider.

This model also relies on support pieces to put around the centerpiece; fortunately, we already have plenty of those in game. Items like Brainwash, Anxiolytic, Aquarius, Resurgence, and Ration are good examples—providing a lot of mana, often with damage or cost penalties allows heavy spell builds to maintain consistent spell casting and dps.

3.3: Class Playstyles

Again, most of this is just theory. To my knowledge, no one has seriously attempted heavy spell on Assassin, Archer, or Shaman at endgame. But, as I will be providing dps calculations with sample builds later on, it’s important to know how I got there.

Mage:

Mage is easily the most synergistic class with heavy spell. The amazing melee beam allows for consistent mana steal usage, and the naturally slow meteor casting is not particularly hampered by higher costs. Mage hspell dps calculations are relatively simple, focusing on how often meteor can be casted with the mana available.


Warrior:

While not as clean as Mage, Warrior is also relatively easy to calculate in heavy spell. The days of upper-bashing are over, though, in favor of a new cycle: upper-charge. As charge costs will be much lower than bash costs in hspell builds, upper-charge cycles can be cast much faster without sacrificing too much raw damage, leading to higher dps. Like mage, dps is calculated through the rate at which upper-charge cycles can be cast with the mana available.


Archer:

Archer too, as best as I can tell, won’t be too far off from its current style. Storm and bomb can both be cast relatively often with high damage and arrow shield can be optionally kept up if the damage is worth the cost. To calculate Archer dps, I generally followed the warrior method but treated storm-bomb as the relevant cycle.


Shaman:

HAUL AS A DAMAGE SPELL! Shaman is… weird man. The thing about Shaman hspell is that its often optimal to allow aura to cast twice, which takes 3 seconds, so Shaman’s dps cycle is 3 seconds long. The idea is to fit as many hauls as you can within those 3 seconds for damage, and for dps calcs I used both aura hits, 2 haul hits, and 3 totem hits over 3 seconds for dps.


Assassin:

Here is easily the biggest deviation from the norm—spin becomes the least casted spell. Besides cherry bomb Assassin, the cycle I use to calculate dps is a five second cycle of smoke + as many vanished multis I can fit with the mana on the build.


3.4: Sample Item and Builds

So what does a centerpiece look like? The first item I made, which I then refined with others is this:

Spoiler: Stronghold

https://hppeng-wynn.github.io/custo...+020NS100201a110231G140201a1B01051F01061H0104

I initially planned on having a handful of centerpieces and several custom support items (many of which myself and others have already made), but realized that for a thread meant as inspiration, having just one solid item is far and away the most valuable.


Stronghold is an EF centerpiece item that provides a net of 1500 raw spell damage, 235% spell damage, and 1/5s mr at the cost of +5/0/6/4 raw spell costs. Here are some sample builds that use our adjusted spell cost formula. If you want to test the formula for yourself, you can use this version of wynnbuilder (thanks @hppeng):

Spoiler: Wynnbuilder Link

https://hppeng-wynn.github.io/builder2.html

Sample builds:

Spoiler: Sample Builds

https://hppeng-wynn.github.io/build...061H01040qo0qo0TN0og0Jz1616-E28001g000011Z6CO
WynnBuilder build:
> Brainwash
> Insulated Plate Mail
> Cinderchain
> Stronghold
> Unspeakable
> Unspeakable
> Dragon's Eye Bracelet
> Tenuto
> Infused Hive Relik [f6f6f6f6f6]

https://hppeng-wynn.github.io/build...061H01040qo0qo0TN0Ji00b161B-E1v001g00001036CO
WynnBuilder build:
> Brainwash
> Insulated Plate Mail
> Stalactite
> Stronghold
> Unspeakable
> Unspeakable
> Dragon's Eye Bracelet
> Contrast
> Bonder [f6f6f6f6]

https://hppeng-wynn.github.io/build...061H01040qo0qo0TN0Ji00Y1J1B-E1L-i1g00001006C6
WynnBuilder build:
> Brainwash
> Cardiac Arrest
> Stalactite
> Stronghold
> Unspeakable
> Unspeakable
> Dragon's Eye Bracelet
> Contrast
> Braker [e6f6f6]

https://hppeng-wynn.github.io/build...061H01040qo0qo02d0Ji00a160e-O1q0F1g00001006CO
WynnBuilder build:
> Brainwash
> Insulated Plate Mail
> Demon Tide
> Stronghold
> Unspeakable
> Unspeakable
> Atlas
> Contrast
> Slider [f6f6f6]

https://hppeng-wynn.github.io/build...061H01040TQ0qo0FN0Ji09f160t141f+T1g0000100sC6
WynnBuilder build:
> Guillotine
> Soulflare
> Greaves of the Veneer
> Stronghold
> Draoi Fair
> Unspeakable
> Enmity
> Contrast
> Plague [e6f6f6e6]
(courtesy of hpp)

These builds all use non-mythic weapons on purpose, but mythic weapons have been tested too. I will cover potential areas for worry in the next section, but the point of this is to demonstrate that heavy spell is accessible to the general player base and isn’t reliant on mythic weapons. The dps of each of these builds is calculated before powder specials apply, and generally seems competitive with spellspam counterparts.


Part IV: Extra IM Notes


Here are some other things not yet included that I have learned through this work:

• Ideally, unboosted heavy spell dps should look relatively high, specifically because powder specials are less potent in heavy spell (due to the additive nature of curse/courage)
  
  
• While a heavy spell / heavy melee hybrid is the most natural hybrid extension of hspell (for mana reasons), fast melee hybrids are perfectly reasonable as well. This is most true for Assassin and Shaman, as their spell cycles are timelocked regardless by the 3s aura/5s smoke bomb timers.
  
  
• Time Rift can be dangerous. In testing this was especially true with Lament (lol) as its 10ms battery and heal/dmg% support lets it neutralize time rift’s mana and meet the mana demands of heavy spell. Rewind and Nirvana deserve some consideration too, but were less potent due to the low base on Rewind and awkward fit/lack of support for hspell Nirvana. With that being said, I think that any water centerpieces should be either restricted to the chestplate slot or done very carefully—time rift building is a minefield that can destroy all your best concepts in one blow.
  
  
• Due to the limitations of .3 to 1.3 roll range for ‘positive’ IDs, centerpiece items have to be static. Otherwise, they would be so roll dependent that for all purposes they would be unusable. Ideally, they can be snuck into current merchants (like the dungeon ones) as well as future merchants/other rewards.

• Stronghold (and other hspell items) are much further from the "typical" (loosely) 10 raw = 1% ratio. We found this ratio was overtuned on mage in particular, which led to such a hard percent skew. There are other ways to accomplish the balance I'm sure, but I think that throwing out the typical raw/% balance is an easy one.

• 2nd spell cost is something worth considering; with no 2nd cost penalties, int builds will naturally have more utility than most 0-int builds (excluding ones with 2nd cost reduction). I think its probably best treated on a case-by-case basis—needlessly punishing 2nd spell might drive players away for QoL reasons, but never punishing 2nd spell favors some classes on 0-int hspell more than others.

Part V: Closing


TL;DR? Well, this thread is already sort of a TL;DR of all the work myself and many others have put in over the past few weeks. Thanks for reading, and if you have any questions or comments I’ll do my best to keep up with everything!


Credits:
@Gigavern (theorycrafting)
@hppeng (item making, testing, theorycrafting, dev support, emotional support)
@ferricles (dev support)
@Deco113 (item making, testing, theorycrafting)
@9o62 (item making, testing)
@LegionGlory (item making, testing, theorycrafting)
@Bart (MC) (not killing me on sight, theorycrafting)
@H07oh (item making, testing)
@Chrysitis (emotional destabilization)
@euouae (item making, asuna)
@oinuk (item making)
@d3keract (item making, testing)
@Altakar (please reverse mountain’s heart nerf, not killing me on sight)
@iTechnically (theorycrafting)
@Highmore (mocking people’s cps)

 

Wheres my credit for being wxhlf >:(

And emotional support

 

This is a waste of time. None of this will ever make it in game or be useful

 

Can't wait for Air Centerpieces to be added so combat warp is viable

But being serious this was a very fun project and I had a lot of fun testing it and glad to see it being posted on the forums as inspiration

 

me and the boys contributing absolutely nothing

 

I have a great wand suggestion for heavy spell.

Spoiler: Epic wand

yes
This was definitely thought out and it’s definitely balanced, especially with Pandemonium

 

I know this is memeing (could you put the image in a spoiler so it doesn't take up a whole page), but you would never be able to cast a spell with that, the cost is higher than 20

edit oh lol misread the 3rd cost..... but still please no please no lmfao

 

: pensive :
: pogfish :

 

Stronghold our beloved

justice for Overflow

 

I've been following the hspell discussion in the Atlas inc discord for a while, and im super happy to see a thread like this. Its incredibly interesting, and I really hope this gets added in some way.

 

You should have posted the entire doc of like 30 items just to give every item maker a heart attack and stroke while hyperventilating and then proceed to ask alta for two dozen h-spell ingredients

 

We do have a spreadsheet of heavy spell item concepts. Originally we were going to propose both centerpieces and supports, but decided against it as supports already exist in some capacity in game already. Additionally it's tough to balance a large number of items, so eventually Stronghold was just decided as the poster child for the purposes of this thread.

except Overflow is still coolant bring back Overflow I wanna see people :flurshed: over its mana stats

 

So do items like stronghold account for the use of int or -spellcost items? It would be easier to hit 6-9 cos spell by not tampering with them but that’s unrealistic to expect of players

Also as you mentioned haul spell, haul spell is actually really good with something like oly. If you can sit in your totem in an enclosed space, you can tick damage super fast. I use this to war towers without aura since I just sit under the lip of the tower and spam haul it get better dps that aura

 

Strhold does account for the use of int, also I didn't test it in ETFA a lot but I'm pretty confident it has by others and hasn't been shown to be broken there (I'd be surprised if it wasn't tested a decent amount), also I did test nerfed Stronghold and it was decent in ETFA (Stronghold was balanced around if raw came after %, which it isn't right now but that might change in the future)

 

9o62 said most of it, but yeah, items like Stronghold do account for cost reduction within a build. I've found through building with it that in both int and 0-int contexts it tends to fall in that 6-9 cost range with enough mana. Stronghold perhaps favors 0-int a bit but its definitely viable in EWF especially paired with things like olily or adrenaline.

Edit: myself and others made a few other concept centerpieces, but as of now they are much less thoroughly conceived than stronghold, so I didn't include them

 

https://hppeng-wynn.github.io/build...061H01040qo0qo02d0UB0CB16110A1Y0e1g00001006CO
WynnBuilder build:
> Sparkweaver
> Insulated Plate Mail
> Demon Tide
> Stronghold
> Unspeakable
> Unspeakable
> Atlas
> Renda Langit
> The Exploited [f6f6f6]
I love heavy spell, but fr, please make it raw + %, to make it harder to cancel

 

Going by the assassin dps calc method I have in the post, this build falls short of 30k vanished dps, which is not all that high for assassin; am I missing something here? It is quite tanky, but, idk.

Edit: raw damage numbers can be misleading -- its not a cherry bombs build. Those smoke bombs are only contributing 12k dps when vanished and the mana on the build is on the low end, with no melee dps support.

 

hauka when

cool stuff

I can't see a spellcycle that lets this hit 30k dps (smoke alone gives 12k which is neat but not close to enough to be competitive)

oops touhoku replied

 

cool beans my guy, ya finally finished it, i know you worked hard on it, very proud
(i'll add some comments later but i am become sleepy, the goer to bed)

 

Bart the cool IM because he didn't call Wintery Aspect dagger heavy spell kappa