==>Maplestory Leveling Guide List <==
In-Depth Analysis
Okay, I can't help looking through this section of the forums without seeing a zillion threads about "Ice/Lite Mages are better than Fire/Poison", and vice versa. Well, basically, I'm sick of this type of bullshit. Yes, you people ARE total idiots for saying one is better than the other. And, yes, you are total idiots for only looking at ONLY the biggest numbers. I'm going to take the time to clear out some myths and stat some facts about these mages, since most of you people running your mouths don't know what the fuck you're talking about. If you choose to deny these facts, then you're more than welcome to do research yourself on the topic.
Okay, so lets start.
Myth 1: Ice Strike has a bigger range than Explosion.
Well. To get right to the point. That's utter bullshit. Let's look at the facts first of all.
ExplosionLevel 30: MP -50; Basic attack 120, mastery 60%, attack range 200%
Ice StrikeLevel 30: MP -50; Basic attack 90, mastery 60%, attack range 200%
Wow. Look at that. Same range. Like, fucking, wow. I know, some of you say "Oh but Ice Strike is more horizontal, and Explosion is more vertical!" But, it isn't, trust me. They're completely the same. I've had countless Ice Mages compare the range with me, thinking they'd somehow be proven correct each time they tried, but they fail. The range is exactly the same. This can easily be proven through Screen Shots, which I'll eventually get around to. But this isn't the end of things.Alot of people try to still argue such facts, which the statement...
"Look at Poison Mist, it says 200%, yet the range isn't the same as Explosion! There has to be a mistake, see?"
Well, this is where the entire factor of "Ignorance" comes into play. Wizet didn't say it has 200% range for nothing. In fact, in this case, the range is more elevated vertically, compared to Ice Strike / Explosion. The range ISN'T any smaller, it's just positioned differently, due to the fact that Poison Mist is to be used in a COMPLETELY different manner than Explosion / Ice Strike.
Myth 2 : Ice Strike is weaker than Explosion.
I put this as both a Myth and a Fact because it's both true and false. Let's make some comparisons first
With Ice Strike, it instantly makes monsters totally immobile, allowing you to recast Ice Strike without any fear of having monsters walk into you
With Explosion, you need to cast it either from a safe spot, or move all the monsters to one side and explode so they all get knocked back in certain direction in order to minimize damage. This makes Explosion less spammable than Ice Strike, if you plan to somewhat minimize on potion expenses.
The truth is though, people only look at the numbers. They see :
ExplosionLevel 30: MP -50; Basic attack 120, mastery 60%, attack range 200%
Ice StrikeLevel 30: MP -50; Basic attack 90, mastery 60%, attack range 200%
Now, people think, "Okay, Ice Strike has 90 spell damage, and Explosion has 120, which makes Explosion better". It's okay to think this, I did too when I was inexperianced with the entire third job concept, but it doesn't work like that, sorry.
Something that wasn't factored in was this cute little thing called "Casting Speed"
Even though Ice Strike's Base spell damage is only 90, it casts almost 2x faster than Explosion. With a casting experiment carried out with me, Lucia, and NycxWind, we came to the conclusion that.
Within 30 seconds, Ice Strike (with Kage and level 11 booster) was casted 30 times
Within 30 seconds, Explosion (with Kage and level 11 booster) was casted 18 times
**Note, both times, all 3 of us were timing 30 seconds, while counting how many times the skill was casted, also, the designated key for the skill was held down to make sure we it was litterally spammed as much as possible. This test was done 3 times, and each time the results were the same
So now you're saying, "Wow, then Fire mages are pretty fucked, huh." Well, not so fast.
Another experiment was done, which blends in with...
Myth 3: Evil Wings has no effect on casting speed
Attack Speed = Fast
Attack Speed = Slow
So, we continued our experiment to see if this popular and slought-after staff really did do anything special. Then we came across quite an interesting discovery.
Within 30 seconds, Ice Strike (with Evil Wings and level 11 booster) was casted 30 times
Within 30 seconds, Explosion (with Evil Wings and level 11 booster) was casted 21 times
**Note: We tested with a Lama Staff, which is the same as a Magicodar in speed, and Explosion casted APX. 19.5 times.
This got us curious, we proceeded with testing all of our skills with both Evil Wings and Kage.
To make life simple, EVERY skill remained the same with both staves, with the exception of Explosion. The fact is : Only Explosion is affected by a weapon's Attack speed. What exactly does this mean? Well, it means you can either use this advantage to it's fullest, caping your luk exactly for Evil Wings, and possibly the dark Enigmatic shoes/gloves, or you can continue to use Dark Rituals and Kages and eventually a Magicodar and just put up with the slower casting speed. As your level progresses, you'll miss out on alot more damage by casting slower, although at the same time, other IGNORANT players will ridicule you. Also, there's the fact that you'll lose out on avoidability/defence. By capping your luk, you'd be doing the same damage as if you changed weapons, so the choice is honestly up to you. This is where "Personal Preferance" has a role.
Myth 4 : Ice/Lite Mages are superior to Fire/Poison Mages because Thunder Spear is stronger than Magic Composition
Lol.
Why the fuck are you people comparing these two completely different skills?
Let's compare the skills properly, shall we?
As some of you may, or may not know, Magic Composition is based of 50% Fire and 50% Poison. Thunder Spear is a Pure Element. What does this mean exactly? Let's take a look.
Thunder Spear:
A basic elemental skill. Only has 1 element to deal with, 170 spell damage
When facing a neutral monster: 170 spell damage
When facing a monster weak to Lite : 255 spell damage
When facing a monster resistant to Lite : 85 spell damage
Magic Composition:
150 spell damage in total, 75 fire, 75 poison. In addition to base damage, also poisons a monster by chance to do extra damage with a %'s of the monster's hp/ second. Because it's composed of two elements, it does less damage on Fire Weak monsters since it's simply 150 x 1.25. (only 1 element gets the boost)
When facing a neutral monster: 150 spell damage
When facing a monster weak to Fire : 187.5 spell damage
When facing a monster weak to Poison: 187.5 spell damage
When facing a monster weak to both Fire AND Poison : 225 Spell damage
When facing a monster resistant to Fire: 112.5 spell damage
When facing a monster resistant to Poison : 112.5 spell damage
When facing a monster resistant to both Fire AND POISON : 75 spell damage
These two skills have NOTHING in common to compare. You can't simply shove them together and say "oh look, this one has bigger numbers, thus it's better. Boo hoo, Fire sucks because they don't have bigger numbers!". It's blind assumtions with a total lack of respect towards the classes themselves.
But more importantly, Ice/Lite Mages have this skill as well. Both Fire/Poison and Ice/Lite Compositions have the same casting speed. Let's compare these two skills, since they're in the same rank.
Magic CompositionLevel 30: MP -22; Basic attack 140, mastery 60%, freezes enemy for 2 seconds
Magic CompositionLevel 30: MP -22; Basic attack 150, mastery 60%, 70% success rate to put enemy into the state of poison for 40 seconds
In addition to the fact that Fire's composition does not only a higher base spell damage but it does the additional poison damage / section, which gives it more power, I'd have to say Fire's composition has a damage advantage, no?
People often overlook the fact that we're known as fire/POISON mages for a reason. Poison DOES do damage, and it's added on to our base damage. Anyways, let us continue our research.
Thunder Spear vs. Poison Mist
This is where the real comparion is made. Thunder Spear has been know for it's huge damage, making it almost unquestionably power in many KS wars. This is the shining glory of I/L Mages, although not many monsters are weak to lite. At the same time, this goes for Poison Mist on the F/P side. The difference is, Poison Mist can be just as useful in any map, with the exception to monsters who are immune to both Poison's base damange AND Poison effect.
Level 30: MP -24; Basic attack 170, mastery 60%
Attack Style: Pure brute damage. Slower than Magic Composition, but has zero distance traveling time. So whether you're right infront of a monster, or at the complete boundry of Thunder Spear's range, this skill will take the same amount of time to get to the monster from where ever you stand. It can only hit one monster at a time, and it's damage increases as your magic attack increases. This gives it an edge in boss fighting, but may not be always used while training without first sealing / freezing the monster due to it's slowness.
Because of Elemental Amplification, this skill ends up costing 48 MP to cast
Level 30: MP -50; Basic attack 90, mastery 60%, attack range 200%, 70% success rate to put enemy into the state of poison for 40 seconds
Attack Style: The base damage sucks. It's nothing to brag about, although it's the effect which gives it's name. It has virtually zero monster limitation. Any number of monsters can be in the mist, and they will ALL be poisoned. Unlike Thunder Spear, the poison's effect does little damage to each monster that is poisoned, which accumulates into a bigger, overall number. In addition, the Mist itself stays around after it has been casted for 40 seconds, which means you can go elsewhere while the Mist is still in effect. This skill can be recasted, has very little delay, and opens many oppertunities to F/P Mages.
The downside is, every boss is Immune to Poison's effect, making it completely useless against bosses. Also, because this skill has a crap base spell damage, you'll never use the base damage as an actual attack, only the effect. This means that the less HP a monster has, the more useless this skill is. It's damage progresses depending on the monster's HP / amount of spawn in the map.
Because of Elemental Amplification, this skill ends up costing 100 MP to cast.
The conclusion? Whichever attack style appeals to you more will be what factors into your preferances.
Myth 5 : All bosses are immune to Poison damage.
WRONG! WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG! All bosses, with the exceptions of Balrog Jr. and Crimson Balrog, are not immune to poison. They take normal damage from Poison's base attack, but they are immune to poison's HP / second effect. This means that F/P composition will do normal damage to Mushmom, Zakum, Populatus, whoever, whatever, although, these bosses will NOT become poisoned.
Myth 6 :Both Mages suck during Third Job so who cares?
Yes, I know, this isn't exactly on topic, but it's another one of those comparions which contain total ignorance. The truth is, Mages DON'T suck. We are NOT the most useless or "sucky" third job class. Each class is meant for specific advantages, and when it comes to training, mages aren't a class which should be overlooked so quickly. Our damage is more AREA based, and less individually delt out. In other words, we do less damage to more monsters at once.
In conclusion, I hope to have cleared some issues out. I plan to continue this, although right now I'm tired and want to go to sleep. Enjoy.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment