[crossfire] [IDEA] Reagents for cast magic

[Brendan Lally]

On 10/19/05, Anton Oussik <
     antonoussik at gmail.com
     > wrote:
>
      IMO this would make spellcasting less useful, as it would be easier to
     >
      take a dragon and claw through armies of monsters, picking up reagents
     >
      as you go. You can then sell the reagents to the poor spellcasters
     >
      struggling to get enough for a zombie-killing cast.
     
You make an assumption that it can't be balanced in game.

This assumption is not valid, a spell that would only be capable of
killing zombies would likely be extremely cheap.

>
      It does seems like an interesting idea though. It is sort of like
     >
      alchemy but the kind you take around with you and needs less
     >
      ingredients. If we are heading this way, why not just change the
     >
      alchemy ingredients so they are easier to make? This seems to be the
     >
      main reason it is not used too widely - ingredients are rare enough
     >
      not to bother with it and look for ready-made things in shops instead.
     
I disagree, IMHO the reasons it isn't used so much are
1) the recipes are hard to find
2) without recipes it is dangerous
3) there aren't enough useful products that can be created at low levels.
4) the golden unicorn horn/restoration is overpowered.

having a few easier useful things (philosophical * aren't useful on
their own) would make it possible to use alchemy to level, rather than
leveling to use alchemy.

Rare ingredients for powerful items is a good thing. - though possibly
those same potions/balms/dusts could become less common in treasure
lists.

>
      Maybe decrease the weight of potions too so you can carry many around
     >
      with you and be a pure alchemy-based damage dealer.
     
That should be closer to what an alchemist does. They are a seperate
class to the magic classes. A couple of interface changes would be
needed first (something like diablo's potion belt maybe?)