The Arena: Prologue (Chain-Stunning)

One of the most loathsome playstyles that may discourage or turn a player away from the Arena is "Chain-stunning."  What happens is the "chain-stunning team" will load their decks with a few specific cards that complement one another to produce the effect of permanently immobilizing their opponents; this was easier to perform in 4v4.  These cards include Choke (from Fire) and/or Blinding Light (Myth), both of which incapacitate all members of the opposite team, for a mere two (2) pips, and Earthquake (Myth), which deals AOE damage and previously removed all wards and charms (positive and negative) from enemies.

The "first generation" chain-stun was comprised more of the use of two or more of the inexpensive AOE-Stuns:  Choke and/or Blinding Light.  

Originally, whenever a stun affects someone, a single ward (Stun Shield) appears on the victim, to prevent yet another disable from landing on him/her.  To remove this shield to open the person for another Stun, a ward removal spell (such as Steal Ward [Ice] or Pierce [Myth]) or a Stun must be played.  This was a highly effective defensive mechanic for 1v1.

But, when a team of wizards (two or more) was utilized, a loophole was created: one wizard would immobilize with Choke or Blinding Light, and then a second would cast either of those spells in the same turn, to remove each Stun Shield.  Or, if the opposing team managed to put up any Stun Shields (assuming they have first turn), the double cast could still produce the same result: one AOE-stun to remove the Stun Shields, and a second to paralyze the now-vulnerable players.

Hence, the other side was disabled and unprotected from a second wave of stun.  Because of the low pip-cost, there was a requirement of a minimum of one turn and a Power Pip generated for each "chain-stunner" in order to repeat this tactic.  With a high rate of Power Pip chance, "chain-stunners" could virtually create an infinite loop.  True, while decks at the time could hold up to seven (7) copies for certain schools, there was still the sideboard to hold Enchanted (per Accuracy boosts) stun cards.  Thus, a flaw such as not having a stun in hand was easily avoided.

By forcing the other team to pass each and every turn, other members (mainly attackers) could efficiently set up for mountains of damage, usually in AOE form.  Damage reduction shields and charms would not be a factor against a "chain-stun" team, if their enemies are prohibited from casting anything.

Nothing was more demoralizing or offending than entering a battle with a wisely created deck and strategy, only to find your wizard unable to act offensively or defensively every single turn of the battle.  Crowns Players suffered the most from a loss (pretty self-explanatory there) due to "chain-stunning."  The only true counter to this at the time was to have First Turn and your own "chain-stun" team; this was a type of fire that even water could not put out.

Luckily, an update in June of this year somewhat corrected this loophole, but "chain-stunning" was still possible, and along came the "second generation" tactic.


KingsIsle modified the secondary effect of stuns to not produce just one Stun Shield, but four (4).  This counteractive update successfully trumped the ability to spam AOE-Stun after AOE-Stun.  Even if the "chain-stunning" team all used a disable-all spell, their opponents would have at least one turn to act since there was now a shield for every potential stunner.  So, along came the use of the spell that has the ability to remove all wards:  Earthquake.

With a more concentrated and synchronized team (at least three Myth Wizards, especially) one could still chain-disable opponents.  I'm not going to go into lengthy details on the procedure, but if enough people are interested in this expired method, I'd be happy to update this post.  (I still remember that annoying battle against four Myths, just the day before Celestia arrived).

The arrival of today's update has added further countermeasures against the act of "chain-stunning."


Without the ability to remove all Stun Shields and disable all opponents in two or more consecutive turns, there is a largely improved balance in Player vs. Player.  Crowns Players will get their money's worth whether they pay a fee per match or a time-interval pass, as their wizard(s) will have at least a chance to fight or cast back.  As of now, players are free to test themselves offensively and defensively in any match.  Go forth, fair duelers; it's a new dawn.

November 8 Updates

Major and minor updates to talk about! The following updates have been made to the game:

Pets

All pet hatching prices have been reduced by 25%

Pets with Talents that cast Blades or Traps will now cast those Blades and Traps.

Celestia

The Lunar Chest will no longer disappear if a friend Teleports to you in the Moon Room.

Teleports have been added to the Crustacean Empire area.

Combat

Boys should sound like boys when they take damage, and girls should once again sound like girls.

Earthquake will no longer remove Stun Shields.

Quests

Players will no longer be required to complete a series of side quests to enter the Dojo for the Obsidian Chest Quest called Wizard Tours.

Other

We have decreased the side to side movement of the shark mount.

Spritely Mechanics

Ever seen a pet interrupt battle to do this?

For the hundredth time, I am NOT the Green Lantern!

This Pet Talent, Spritely, has recently spiked in its reception and popularity among intermediate and advanced players, and is slowly making its way to fascinate and interest beginners.  In response, I think it's time we explored this nifty skill a little more.

In game, when a player mouses over this talent,

they will see a description box saying "May Cast Life Spell."  Basically, the pet will cast an enhanced Sprite on its owner.  The total amount of heal received from this ability is more than the actual Sprite card itself.

As you can see, the regular card does an initial 30 Heal, and 90 Heal per Tick for 3 rounds.  Spritely does an initial base of 50 Heal, and 100 Heal per Tick for 3 rounds.  And if that's not enough whip cream on your banana split, Spritely doesn't have a Pip Cost...it's free!

"Is there a method to [this] madness?"  Certainly!  While it is uncontrollable, there are actually ways to play to increase your chances of seeing this ability trigger:

Basically, when you see an effect or some number floating and rising, that's a potential for Spritely to go off.

It may trigger when a Charm or Ward (negative or positive), Damage, Healing, Control (Stun, Beguile, etc.), Lifesteal, Star aura, Global Aura (Bubble), etc. is casted.

Following this mechanic/rule, we can then expect Spritely to have a chance to appear up to FOUR times for every AOE (Area of effect; hit-all/heal-all), for one Spritely-Pet.  

Let's say I use Blizzard against four monsters, and I am alone with a Spritely-Pet.  For every chunk of ice that hurts those creatures, I get a "lottery ticket" with a random number.  

Now let's assume there's a rule that only even-numbered "lottery tickets" will generate a Spritely.  This creates a range (-4, -2, 0, 2, 4, 6, ... 100, 102, 104, ... etc.) that my "tickets" have to fall in.

So, if I hit four targets, there's a chance I may see Spritely casted once, twice, thrice, or four times on me, depending on how many "tickets" were even numbers.  With the odds, however, it's technically a smaller range (perhaps the rule is numbers with 0 as the last digit, or with 9 as one of the digits, etc.)

Thus, if all wizards on one team had a Spritely-Pet, Spritely may trigger up to 16 times for every AOE before a turn ends (very, very, very, very tiny chance of happening).  Furthermore, if all of those wizards used an AOE, that would mean 64 times.  (I'd count this as extremely improbable, since the average I've seen is 4 before a turn ends on an AOE team).

The same mechanic applies to repeat-hit spells, such as Minotaur, Orthrus, and Hydra.  

Minotaur and Orthrus both hit a target twice (two floating numbers), and therefore have a chance to trigger Spritely twice on any wizard with a Spritely-Pet.  Intuitively, Hydra will produce three chances per Spritely-Pet.

Also, Damage Over Time can, too, increase Spritely chances.

We noticed that when we were stunned by Blinding Light and hit by a Dragon, Spritely would go off even when our wizards were forced to pass turns.  That's why I originally thought that "passing" could spark the Sprite, but I didn't consider that the Ticks were a factor.  But, after much observation, "passing" was "doing nothing," while the Ticks created an effect.

*~*~* (the information below this separator line is going further into the mechanics, but it's not vital to understand them; skip the text between the pink separators if you'd like)

Now that we've covered how often Spritely can show itself, let's take a look on a deeper process:  when does a wizard get their successful Spritely when more than one wizard has a Spritely-Pet?

Let's say that Missy, Ronan, Fallon, and Cassandra are in the battle circle in this order, so the farthest right (Cassandra) has first turn, and the farthest left (Missy) plays her card last.  Imagine that they get hit by...I don't know...a Rebirth (just to be nice :P); Cassandra casts the spell.  Now let's separate the spell into four components:  Heal on C, Heal on F, Heal on R, Heal on M.  That's the order they are healed under Rebirth, naturally.

Assume Spritely goes off only on even "tickets."  Diving further into scenario-crafting:

• All four wizards receive an even "ticket" on Heal on C
• Only Fallon gets an even "ticket" on Heal on F
• Ronan and Cassandra gets an even "ticket" on Heal on R
• No wizards have an even ticket from Heal on M.

Spritely triggers in reverse order per effect.  Thus, for Heal on C, Spritely will trigger on M first, then R, then F, then C.  For the Heal on R, Spritely will trigger on R first, then C.

Thus, after Rebirth is casted in the above scenario, this is the entire order that Spritely will trigger in, before Fallon's turn is given:

M, R, F, C, F, R, C.

That is why you see the triangle sometimes zig-zagging between players, such as "last turn" then "first turn" then "third turn" and once again for "last turn" for Spritely.  So, in PVP, when I see an interrupt and the triangle points towards the last person, it's good news...really, really great news, actually.  When the triangle first points to the "first turn" wizard, I'm still excited, but there's a lower chance that more than one teammate gets a Spritely before the next wizard's turn.

~*~*~

Well, it took many weeks to understand and dissect, but I'm glad we've gotten this far!  Hopefully this answers JessTheTheurge's question.

A little off topic, but I'm pretty satisfied that my hundredth blog post is about my favorite Pet Talent.  Cheers!



*Special thanks to Perfect Catch for their support, enthusiasm, passion, and efforts in working as a team!

BUN: Adventures in Celestia (Tales and Tips)

The past few days have been such a blast with all the new spells, equipment, monsters, quests, income rate, challenges, pets, and strategies that have flooded into the Spiral on the Live Realm.  As with our characters, we were submerged into a whole new world called Celestia, and my PVP team "Perfect Catch" and I were ready and anticipated surprises or twists along the way.  True, some of us were able to touch on the new features in Test Realm (TR), but a few changes, such as the removal of the spells Simplify and Elucidate and the adjustments made to Level 55 weapons, meant our experience was going to be much different.  Similar to how we explored the new world in TR, we split up and played "individually" instead of as a group.  Different schedules called for varying progression rates.

Normally, I am a solo-type gamer, meaning I usually dislike playing with others.  However, the aspects of Wizard101 have undeniably shown that this game was developed with a lot of hindsight to the negative factors of multiplayer interaction.  Instead of a "Greed or Need" system, everyone has the same chance for the same loot, regardless of party size or damage dealt.  Without competition amongst companions, more focus can be placed on similar (if not the same) goals.  If one of the ingredients is a great friendship, then you've got a recipe for success as a team.  With the amazing people I often play with, there was not an excuse for me to jump back into being a hermit.  So, I took on Celestia with mainly Missy, and tripled up with Ronan Dawn towards the end.

Armed with some experience from the TR, Missy and I set straight off to picking up some core, utility spells:  Conviction (Star) for PVP which increases the chance to avoid Critical Hits and Stuns, Fortify (Star) for increased resistance, and Strong (Sun) for increased damage on applicable cards.  I took on the Damage Tier of Sun School since I could rely on a Pet for Accuracy if necessary.  +100 damage to a Blizzard is adding nearly half its minimum value to the spell.  At the highest rank, Gargantuan does +225, which is a 90% boost to my Rank 4 AOE's minimum.  I think farming as a group in Kensington by killing on the first turn is more than possible now!  Seraph, here I come!

On my first day and first fight against Cuthalla in the Grotto, this dropped for me:

I still haven't trained it, surprisingly, but it's most likely because I'm currently working on a new PVP/PVE-based pet.  Surprise, surprise.

I love the new Spritely animation, by the way.  It's somewhat comical, because I don't think any of the other healing spells create this visual:

Looks like a cool effect to use for a new Mistblood logo, huh?  Hmmm...anyway...

What was notably different about the Base Camp Astral trainers on the Live realm was that some spells were relocated to "secret trainers," while others were discontinued/removed.  (On TR, you could see the entire "Tier" or "skill tree" of the Sun enchantments, all of the "basic" Polymorphs, and all Star auras that weren't PVP-based.  Empowerment, Vengeance, and accuracy/damage boosts above Keen Eyes/Strong were viewable in Celestia's "Commons" trainers.)  Also, the Pip Reduction spells of the Sun School (Simplify and Elucidate) were removed.

Thus, my Astral build changed slightly, leaving me with 3 free Training Points after picking up all the new spells that I needed.  I've maxed out on Sun School's Damage tier (Gargantuan), picked up the Fortify and Empowerment auras from Star, and naturally adopted the Gobbler Polymorph from Moon.  Through these combined powers, I became Captain Tank-It!  With Empowerment, I'm getting a faster Pip generation; whenever a Rank 4 (or above) spell is casted on me, be it damage or a heal, I get 1 Pip!  The only catch to this spell is that X-based cards do not trigger the special effect; if Judge, Dryad, Heckhound, or some Boss's natural attack that uses all of its pips is targeted at me, my aura does nothing.  Neat balance!

Before I forget, if you're wondering where you can find additional Astral spells, keep in mind that two trainers are inside their respective instances:  Stellarium from the District of Stars has the Star Trainer, while Lunarium (entered from "Using the Moon Portal") has the Moon Trainer.  There are multiple posts in each of these instances to pick up the spells from; you just need to do a little exploration!  As for the Sun Trainer, you have to go outside for a little tan on the beach to find that kind of magic.  What better place to do that at than the Floating Island?  Just walk up the ramp next to Pierce and past the Teleporter posts to find it.

Speaking of the Floating Island and Pierce...

Mmm, I love Kelp!

With a higher rank in Crafting, I managed to keep my promise of obtaining this:

With the Iceblade Vial, I can stack two Rank 0 blades for +40% and +45%, more than doubling my damage!  Adding Gargantuan onto that, and I'm more effective than a chill pill.  

On the subject of Amulets, Jewel of the Feint dropped for me after fighting Ptolemos, the Moon Boss of the Trial of Spheres.  I think there are some other places where it drops, too (Solar instance, according to new friend Lauren Ironbane), so keep an eye out and cross your fingers!

So, with the mention of making it to the Trial of Spheres and doing every side quest along the way, Ronan, Missy, and I became Spiral Geographers and Legendary Sorcerer, Diviner, and Thaumaturge together, on Friday.  In my next post, I'll elaborate on our reasons for advancing through the world so quickly, but keep in mind, we're not yet through with this new world!  The content is still fresh and fascinating; beating Celestia once or twice or seven times still would not be enough to quench my curiosity on every story on the game (well done, KingsIsle!)  It may be purely coincidence, but I still can't get over the similarities between the nature of Astral Magic and the general nature of magic in my fan fiction comic Mistblood:

"Mind, body, and soul" used in Astral Magic and Mistblood

But that will be another post for another day...

Before we part from this transaction of communication, here are a few helpful Tweets I've made that just can't be elaborated on further:

Star Auras

Every Turn Counts

New Snacks Are Better

In Regards to the Crafting Quest

Critical on a Hydra/Orthrus vs. Block *confirmed*

Repetition is Sometimes Good

False Experience Displayed

Why Celestian Fashion Fails

How to Gain Training Points (part 1) *must read*

How to Gain Training Points (part 2) *must read*

New Endgame Badge *unconfirmed*

Two Sets of Level 58 Armor

Post a comment if you have any questions or thoughts....thanks for reading!

The Sea Cucumber

@DragonBrightWiz made this for me :)

If you haven't seen it yet, check Friendly's post here.

That's why.

Plus, Celestia's coming up on Wednesday of this week.  I think I'm ready....