Two Small Visual Improvements to Magic

[Kaemik]

1. Currently when you charge an attack or cast a spell, you see a white circle charging up. I would propose after charging a spell make a blue circle appear that de-charges as the spell loses its charge. This would be a way more useful visual indicator than a status effect in the top left. The circle would be center screen where you are trying to aim without being anything large and obstructive meaning it's info easily digested mid-fight.

2. Give pretty-much every spell a brief trail that shows where you shot it. Eventually, you could flavor these (a fire trial for a fire spell, lightning bolt for a lighting spell etc.) for now a generic white bar of light works.

The issue is mages are getting way too little visual feedback. Like if you miss a target with a spell, you literally need to look at combat logs to see what happened. A missed spell is about as visually impressive as when I try shooting lightning bolts from my fingertips at people IRL. Having some real-time visual feedback of what is happening as you play would help mages out immensely. Watching your blue charge disappear as trial of light blazes past the enemy's head would definitely do the trick.

 

[Kaemik]

Adding onto this point, making the central circle for aiming light blue while aimed at someone within range of the spell would be quite good. There is no feedback of if you are within target range beyond just spitballing it.

 

[Keurk]

Adding onto this point, making the central circle for aiming light blue while aimed at someone within range of the spell would be quite good. There is no feedback of if you are within target range beyond just spitballing it.

i disagree on this . It is part of knowledge and experience to "judge" by eyes and not have magic indicators telling you its valid or not to shoot the spell.If you good ,or lucky, you enjoy the range, if you not you get penalised by loosing mana and the time used casting (what we call Fizzling ,from MO1 -worded used when you miss the pre cast spell)). I think it is a way better thing

i agree with your first post as i think magic could definitly be a bit more lightning spectacular, and pleasant for visual purpose mainly

 

[Kaemik]

Yeah the more I think about the newer point the more I realize it would actually be a huge buff to mage. Since they need to be targeted and in-range it's essentially a "if the pointer is blue you're clear to fire" mechanic as moving off-target to the side would make it go white.

With the trails it would be easier to get a feel for range. It's just hard to practice so that it feels natural when you have zero indicators of how far short of target your spell was on a miss. This feels particularly pronounced on earthquake that has a very small sweetspot at the edge of it's range you can stand and not get hit.

 

[Necromantic]

I pointed out in the other thread that it would already help to know how far your target is away. That still keeps the skill of having to know spell ranges etc. but give you a better indication that you would also have a feel for in reality. Could also be useful for other things.