Making other classes end-gameables

[vaudeville]

My 7 cents:

1) I'm down with AR bonuses in general.

2) Yeah I sort of mentioned that bit about having 2 shadow masters. My suggestion was that that should be another scroll like Valkyries, Golems, and Spirits.

3) Bowzons are great once you get Frostfire and the Cow Queen set (although keep in mind, Game gave hints that set will be nerfed), but any other Amazon build without pretty much the most optimum gear (and I do mean optimum) is nowhere near as great a killing machine in my opinion. Personally the only thing the lightning javelin or physical javelin or spear amazon needs is either a slight synergy boost for certain skills or have their main weapon(s) buffed a bit.

4) Regarding the cold elemental druid, I'm not exactly sure that many extra tornadoes should be added. It would be nice to see at least 2 to 4 of such, but more than that sounds pretty crazy. Right now, I just think the whole elemental tree needs buffing in terms of damage. I don't think life steal needs to be added to that build since you ought to have enough points to put at least 1 on murder of crows, though I am sympathetic about the other suggestions mentioned.

5) ...skeletons will always be a joke. That's just the way it is. Perhaps if we wanted to see them improved they ought to be treated more like ravens. I.e. their life is based on a few hits provided. Add to that that skeletons with cqc weapons can do some % of crushing blow, open wounds, or prevent monster heal (ravens do 2 of those if I'm not mistaken). Mages probably should be replaced with archers in truth to do much of the above. It's either that or the following complicated and possibly op result should be made. That would be something like this:

a) Poison mages have a chance to inject acid and/or have some kind of aura (pestilence?);
b) Fire mages can grant warmth and/or meditation or some other kind of aura (lower fire resistance?);
c) lightning mages have a chance to do static and/or have some kind of aura (lower lightning resistance?);
d) Cold mages have a holy freeze aura and can slow targets if not freeze them and/some kind of aura (perhaps holy freeze or lower cold resistances);

I'd probably also recommend the above have their lives dependent on a few hits as well. In general, perhaps skeletons should be treated sort of like ravens. They're annoyances but add some decent traits to the game.

6) As for norak suggestions regarding 1 skill tree... that would really unsettle things you know that? Every item which say gives +2 to curses would all have to be re-worked to give either + X to a character class skills or + X to some master skill tree or so that's the impression I get from what I read. That would be a step in the wrong direction.

A) A bow and staff mastery? Did I read that correctly as well? I get the bow part if you would like to do a physical bowzon build, but the staff part? Why? For who?

B) I don't think elemental poison mastery is needed. The poison necromancer is pretty powerful as is, and even if they weren't, a simple tweak to their gear or skills would make fix that. A magic mastery skill, however, would be interesting for a hammerdin, bone necromancer, or even a berserk barbarian, but again, it might not be necessary. You could just add scrolls with extra magic damage which I have not seen (I know there are jewels that do that, but they are very rare).

7) Not discussed in the above, but if we're going to talk about re-balancing then we should include the sorceresses as well. In particular, I would like to see that physical damage conversion modifiers removed especially if what I mentioned in my questions/concerns about that are true (i.e. essentially you can't rely on -enemy fire or lightning resistance modifiers since now you're supposed to be doing physical damage). Even if somehow, the above wasn't a problem which is not my experience, I don't even understand the thought process/motivation of wanting to have the Sorceress even do physical damage in the first place. If you want a physical sorceress that also does magic damage, then make an enchantress (something I may try out eventually). There's already a weapon for her to try that out. The only concern I would have for that kind of build is probably AR (haven't test it so I have to get back to you all on that). The funny/ironic thing is that that isn't done for the cold sorceress (i.e. there is no item that converts ice to physical damage), and people now prefer that build over the other two which should tell you what people think of that modifier (at the very least, it should be something optional by having a scroll that does that).