Over the last week, I’ve been playing around with the various crafters not named Eveline (/hears much disapproving grumbling from the community) and Xione decided to RNG-bless me with an Epic copy of Insect Plague. The spell does an absolutely silly amount of damage when equipped on a Shaman, especially for the 50 mana cost and extreme ease of refilling the spell for additional casts, even at level 1.
So, this got me thinking… why are Epic weapons weak at level 1, while Epic spells are so powerful at level 1?
Although Epic weapons have access to Attributes and Abilities at level 1, they are still dependent on that weapon’s Power rating to achieve maximum effect. The Power growth curve is fairly linear, as well.
On the other hand, Epic spells do not have Attributes and Abilities. Instead, the vast majority of a spell’s power is baked into the base spell effect/damage, with minimal growth with leveling. For spells, the effectiveness of a spell is often not in its Power, but the bonus or alternate/supplemental effect granted by the spell’s Rarity (additional gem creation, better chances of a secondary effect processing, and so on). These Rarity bonuses are available at level 1, and are often far more powerful than the Power growth curve from 1-50 for many spells.
With that in mind, what are everyone’s thoughts on the following from the perspective of the health of the game,
Would it be more beneficial for the health of the game if weapons/spells that dropped at rarities over Common be limited to the effects of the rarity tier at a weapon’s/spell’s current level?
In other words, weapons would not gain their +1 attributes until being leveled to 15, +2 at 25, +4 at 35, and so on. Spells would be similarly limited in the bonuses granted to the secondary effect until reaching rarity keystone levels.
Functionally, I do not know how hard this would be to code. Would it be easier to make these weapons and spells get a “free pass” when reaching the evolution keystone levels that the Rarity of these things already exceed (example: an Epic spell gets a free pass at the level 5, 15, and 25 evolution keystone levels)?