Ok, I was on my mighty meditation chair (the toilet if you must know) and I reached a new stage of enlightenment. I think the reason we were given the staff of temperate flux is the same as why mages have their focus items, to help do our main job more effectivly. I've read posts from wizards who want the staff to reduce resists by more than 7 and also inclue magic resists. I've also read people asking for larger nukes and lower aggro. So here's my solution
Instead of a right-clickable effect that lowers fire and cold resists, change the staff to have a constant effect on the spells of the wizard weilding it (much like mage focus items). That effect would be that when you hold the staff and cast a DD or AoE spell, the formula calculating damage delt and chances of resisting would be changed. The change would be that instead of considering your current lvl in the equation, it would consider (current lvl + 2). This way, not only would spells do a little more damage, they would be resisted as if you were 2 levels higher. Nuke reds as if they were yellow, yellows as if they were even con, evens as if blue, etc. The downside of this effect would be that you would sacrifice a hand slot to hold the staff. I dunno about you, but I would gladly give my right arm for more damage and fewer resists
Just my daily gnomish pondering, go ahead and tell me how bad of an idea it probably is...
The staff is one of the best items wizards get. I don't want to see any changes to it at all.
The debuffing aspect is minor, but it has a ton of other uses. As Arilou said, it's great for speeding up casting time. It is also great for pulling, taunting, and kiting. It's one of the best items I have, even though the debuff portion is worthless.
OK now for the rest of Wizard kind, here's a thought:
A quest that involves turning in your staff and some other things (non kill quest preferably) to get an upgraded one that does a bigger effect or makes the power innate. That way you can keep your tickle stick and everyone who wants an actual item that DOES something can get one.
I'm in with Gherad. It doesn't deliver that much in the area of debuffing, but all the other goodies that you can do with it makes it worth the while (even though I'm sure it was unintentional on Verant's part); among my favorite use for it is the pulling. You can pull faster then anybody else with that thing...gotta love it.
I just find it so amusing that no one uses the staff for what VI made it for, but instead addapted it to what it's good at. They could make it -1 fire/cold and people would still use it.
Grimstaff, you surprise me. You've been playing a wizard long enough that you should know how to use the staff. It is a very useful item.
Try expanding your role as a wizard sometime. Need to burn something fast, clicking the staff to remove spell delay drastically increases how quickly you can chain nuke (although jboots will do the same thing). Yes, normally chain nuking is bad, but when trying to hit a gating or chealing mob with draught of jiva it is invaluable. Need to pull with a low aggro, instant casting spell that doesn't force you to stop running - click your staff. I fight in HS a lot with no enchanter and my lower level friends. As the highest level character there, I am the only one who can pull singles, and the staff is the way to do it. Once you get 50 and start doing your epic you'll want to learn to fight Phingel. I do the same thing there - a clickable aggro is great for underwater pulling when you can't stop to cast a spell. No enchanter in your group and you need to root park an add? Nuking isn't enough to aggro things sometimes - but 10 clicks of your staff will pull any mob on you in a few seconds and you can safely root it away (and it won't summon you because you did no damage). I commonly use this to park adds in Sebilis or HS or Chardok. If you ever feel the urge to quad kite something (which I did for a few levels) you'll quickly learn that there is no better way to pull than with the staff. You get the idea.
Would I prefer that it lowered all resists by 20 points? Of course, but you might as well ask that it gives you permanent clarity too. It isn't going to happen. It is silly to call for changes on an item that is actually very useful at present - even if for other reasons than Verant intended.
Ok, thanks fer pointing out where my idea is wrong, I figured that was comming But still, if the staff is intended to help us be resisted less, I would definatly trade the ability to aggro things onto myself for the ability to more quicky and efficiently kill things. I know that not everyone agrees with me on this, but personally, I'd rather kill a critter than root park it out of the way. That's what I thought a wizard was when I started. I said, "Hey, cool, I can be the guy that smacks things down in a few quick spells." I didn't just think, "Wow! I can lure creatures away from the people who are doing real damage and then root them so they can't harm the important group members! Woohoo!" If there was a way to trade my current staff for one that lets me nuke higher lvl creatures with far less resists (like the way I was describing would work) then I'd trade my aggro-stick in as soon as the patch was over. Keep yours if you want, but I'd rather deal damage. (not that something would ever be created to let wizards nuke better anyhow, but I like to hope)
*grits his teeth and cringes in preperation for some bashing on how wrong he is*
If the staff actually reduced the resistances on creatures by a useful amount it would be functional in its intended role. It was designed to help Wizards do their job better, to help with resistances. The fact we have figured ways to use this piece of crap despite its nearly worthless function is because we are Wizards and have had to do that with all our spells since day one. If it worked properly it would do all that other stuff AND be valuable in its intended job.
Expecting a debuff from an item that you quest for at level 25 to be useful at level 50+ is a bit much. I outgrew the debuff a long time ago, but as a "tickle stick", my staff is invaluable. (wow... tell me THAT didn't sound like a bad pick-up line.)
I can turbo-nuke draughts so much faster than wizzies without it, it's not even funny... of course you can do the same with jboots, eye of inny, or any other click item.
The debuff was great and noticable when I got it, but I really didn't even expect -6 CR and FR to make that big a difference when I got much higher in level.
Then again, I believe it does stack, and SoTF along with malo is pretty nice.
Your idea is fine. I am all for wizards getting items that they can wear or hold that actually make their spells more powerful. We've been asking for those for a long, long time and so far we haven't gotten any. But even if I was lord of Verant I wouldn't change the flux staff to be the way you suggest - I'd rather have it be an entirely new item. That is mostly due to my level though - at my level adding one or two additional levels to my spells wouldn't do me an ounce of good. Even blue stuff resists spells fairly often - and for red stuff I have to use lures, and would still have to use lures even with that staff. The flux staff is extremely useful. And I for one enjoy playing crowd control and pulling sometimes - sitting on my butt tossing off a couple nukes every minute isn't exactly thrilling.
Grim,
Like I said, I'd love Malo on a stick, but it isn't going to happen. Verant is very careful about giving any casters something for free. The only people who get useful buffs or debuffs for free are melee/priests. Any item they give int casters will either have a pitifully small effect or will have such an obscene casting delay as to make it worthless. Just check out the effects on our Velious quest armor or on the other casters Velious quest armor. Half the effects are worthless. The other half have 30 second cast times. Heck, even enchanters and their clarity pants have such a long delay that they can easily med up more mana than they save casting it (and of course at that level they don't cast clarity anyway).
A right clickable staff with Malo or even Malaise would be an enormous benefit to us. And there is no way they would ever make such a powerful item the reward for a quest we can do at level 25. Heck, god drops aren't even that powerful.
It doesn't have to be to those extremes. Listen, Malaise is castable at level 19 and lowers resistances on Cold, Fire, Poison, and Magic by 20 EACH. Tashan, level 4 Enchanter spell lowers Magic resistance by 15 points.
We get this stick at level 30 or so (you can't really feasibly get it at level 25 unless someone does the kills for you) and it lowers resistances by SIX. That's not something you outgrew, its crap at level ONE.
For this stick to be useful it would have to at least lower by 10 points. That's less than Malise, its not a lot, but it would probably be slightly noticable, and yes, it does stack with Mal and Tash line (but not scent line... why exactly did necros get a resistance reduction again? Maybe you can remind me....)
Incidentally, God drops ARE that powerful... for melee classes.
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