March 11, 2024
Arc 2 Spellement Teasers
On Friday, March 8th, the Kingsisle Developers hosted a Spring Update Spell Teasers Livestream to show a couple of brand-new Path B spellement paths for the Spring 2024 Update to Wizard101!
It’s important to note the developers have teased that alongside these new spellement paths, all of these spells will be available for training off-school at their respective Ravenwood professors!
A Brand-New Mechanic
Along side the Arc 2 spellements is a rework of AOEs for Advance Combat only. In other words, any AoE spells’ Path B spellements function as a “select targets” spell according to the developers. While the spell type icon shows as just a single target damaging spell, the new icon for the aforementioned new spell type is not yet implemented into the developer build. This spell will function similarly to how Mirage spells split their damage, except they will not divide exactly the same way. Instead, the dropoff is about 75% per target from the base number, so they end up performing better than the first iteration of divide spells.
The utility effects will apply fully on each enemy, so it’s only the damage that splits.
For those interested in the math, I’ve created an equation to model the damage per enemy as a function of selected targets. The developers have since confirmed its validity!
Time to Take a Look
They randomized their reveals by spinning wheels for each school, but fortunately for us they accidentally leaked a couple extra ones as well! Let’s take a look while they’re still hot off the press:
Storm Spells
The Storm spell that was shown is Storm Owl! It is important to note that the developer build version for the spell was incorrect when they showed it. Cam, one of the developers, has since confirmed in a tweet that the teased Storm Owl Path B variants will actually give 3 white pips instead of 1 power pip per hot, and the maximum amount of times the condition can activate is 4 instead of 3. The correct version of Tier 2B is shown to the right.
That aside, you’ll notice a pattern with the Rank 10 spells that they all seem to have a gambit (or in this case, conditional because it’s an overtime) to gain pips from an effect! This allows for amazing combo potential, and also means that hanging effects can be more threatening than just a gambit now that these spells have another use for a lot of a particular hanging effect.
Fire Spells
Fire’s rank 9 spell, Rain of Fire, was selected to be teased! This is a bit of a shocker… it has the potential to apply up to 6 DoT’s on the enemy. An important thing to note is that alongside this update, the developers are removing DoT protections in favor of splitting the damage among more DoT’s. This Path B effectively splits the 1350~1425 damage among 3x 6-round damage overtime effects, and on top of that will apply another, but smaller, 6-round DoT per Heal Overtime you have on yourself, up to 3. That is some absolutely insane DoT application! Scary!!
And, of course, as an AoE spell it will have the new select mechanic on its Path B. Make sure to read up on that above if you have not already!
Ice Spells
Lucky Ice wizards got two spell teasers – one Arc 2 teaser and one event spellement Path B teaser. Take a look!
Just like Rain of Fire, the newly teased Frost Giant has the same “select targets” mechanic. Make sure to go take a look at that page if you want to read up on how that works.
The spell itself is quite interesting – it clears a whopping five blades from each enemy you select it to target, and exchanges those blades for a trap! What you’re looking at is a beefed up Ice Wyvern, which also feeds on the blade-to-trap interaction presented by Oni’s Destruction. This can and will be a devastating move to use against a bladestacker!
Here is the Path B for Thieving Dragon – now removing auras! Yes, that’s right, auras will be integrated into the rhoshambo wheel this update! If auras will be a property of Storm, it only makes sense for Ice to be able to counter them. According to the developers, the shield is chromatic, so look forward to a very strong and accessible aura counter!
Balance Spells
Yes, yes, another pip utility. But Balance, being the school of everything and pips, gets it on their rank 7 Power Nova! Obviously as a former traditional AoE, the Path B has the new mechanic. The craziest part about Power Nova, however, is the amount of pips you can get from it! Each shield that remains on the enemy following the hit will mean another pip in your pocket.
And if you’re following along with the details on the new mechanic, yes that does mean it’s technically possible for this spell to try and give you 24 pips in one turn if against 4 opponents that have a plethora of shields. Don’t get your hopes up though – we all know there’s no way of holding that many at once!
Life Spells
You didn’t think the new mechanic was exclusive to AoE damage spells, did you? Well, if you did, think again! Rebirth utilizes the new mechanic on its massive heal. Just like how DoT protection is being removed from the game in favor of splitting a hit into more DoT’s, the HoT protections are also being removed in favor of splitting a heal into more HoT’s. The utility will indeed clone on each ally you select, so no need to worry about that splitting with your heal.
If you’re paying attention, this is indeed a slightly different version of Centaur due to its pretty solid utility. While it doesn’t seem nearly as crazy as the others, it makes for a great support spell or even just an excellent alternative for regenerate.
Myth Spells
King Artorius, the most obvious example of a myth spell that went from zero to hero to zero. And now…. it’s back to hero? Well, we’ll see. Either way, the utility is pretty amazing. Similar to Stone Colossus, it clears weaknesses before a hit. But instead of just 3, it’s 5. Instead of converting them to deferred DoT’s, it’s a massive 50% chromatic trap each. And instead of a consolidated hit, you’ll get a hit split among two five-round deferred DoT’s.
If you’re asking yourself why it’s two DoT’s, please take a read at the Fire spell teaser in the tab above for specifics. The new standard will be multiple DoT’s instead of protected DoT’s, and that seemingly applies to deferred ones as well!
Death Spells
Just like Storm Owl, this rank 10 spell has a similar pip-granting mechanic. The only difference is that the pips are from a weakness gambit instead of a HoT conditional. It has great potential for follow-up hits, and serves as a sort of alternative for Rigor Mortis. It gambits up to 4 weaknesses on enemy each for 3 pips as opposed to just doubling your damage. The base damage is a little lower to compensate.
Accidental Teasers!
While showing off the developer build, KingsIsle accidentally gave us a peep of two other school King Artorius spells! Apologies for the poor image quality, they only accidentally had them on-screen for a brief moment. Here’s Life and Storm:
Both of these spells function as great overtime counters, and help generate good HoT value. The King Artorius spells feel a little more like what we’re used to, as opposed to the new mechanic and new pip-granting spells.
Conclusions
Personally, I would say these will be a great addition to add some more strategy and unique gameplay. Especially the pip-granting spells provide some room for amazing combos. They’re an interesting alternative to a basic 2x damage gambit! While they seem very strong initially, Rigor Mortis can end up doing 18 pips worth of damage if successfully gambited. Avenging Fossil does less but provides the potential for 12 pips, which is roughly equivalent in value. We’ve wanted options, and options we now have!
As for the other changes, my main concern is time. With so many clears, DoT’s, and HoT’s on this new wave of spells, animation time could be a big problem. I hope the devs can look into developing tools to speed up hanging effect animations. I don’t know about y’all, but I’m not excited to wait for my 24 Rain of Fire DoT’s to tick…
Overall, I love the amount of utility we’re getting on these spells. If you think about it, each spell is representative of a Rhoshambo “ramp”, since one usually corresponds to the Path B utility effects. The amount of doors these hit-and-ramps, as I call them, open is quite significant when it comes to creating unique playstyles and strategies. I’m excited to see what comes of them!
