Problematic Skills in Solomon Game
It has been so long since we got the last update about SKUME and I am very tired of waiting so I decided to go over all the skills in the game and see which are problematic. So here are the list of problematic skills and my humble and generic opinion on how to fix them:
1. Smart Missile: This one is a bit similar to chill wind. It is very important to learn it but it does not feel necessary to level it up. The main reason why players feel that way is because the shot speed is a bit negligible and useless while the re-target enemies feel powerful. This skill should be reworked to make it worth putting more than just one skill point.
2. Boulder: Boulder is a fun primary spell to play with but is very difficult due to its stupidly slow attack speed. It has low dps and cannot deal with spread out enemies. I feel like all it need is to increase basic charge speed while decreasing base damage would be suffice. Also, boulder needs some method to deal with spiders other than secondary spells.
3. Health Up: Let's be honest, only fools get health up. The main reason why this skill is worthless is because increasing health does not really increase survivability of a mage thanks to the stupidly powerful poison and the existence of magic shield. Unless there are any sort of skill or item that synergize with health up, this skill must be reworked or removed.
4. Mana Up, Channel Mana, Battle Mage: Of all mana related skills, mana up has been the weakest skill and here are the reasons: First, battle mage is op. Second, Channel Mana is far better than mana up. Third, increasing max mana is generally weak compared to mana reduction and mana regen in any game unless mana reduction and regen skills and items are weak. Personally, I do not like this current meta of going for stupidly high mana cost reduction(like 90%) because it sort of defeats the purpose of mana. IMO, the best way to balance this mana issue is to increase the base max mana(the mana you start with at the beginning of the game) drastically and also buff mana up while decreasing the maximum amount of mana cost reduction you can get. This will allow players to deal with the early mana issue if RNG screws them and not give a single battle mage or channel mana while making mana up more viable option for players in late game.
5. Meditation: The main problem with meditation is that you need to stand still and do nothing to make it proc, which is pretty much a suicide. In order for meditation to be viable, it should be just like what the concentrated version of meditation in Solomon Dark.
6. Rush: This one is a bit... complicated. It is necessary to deal with monoculous but the speed increase is very difficult to even notice. There are several ways to make it better: First, just buff the number. Second, make it look like player is moving faster like change in walking motion. Third, make something that synergizes with it.
7. Magic Circle: I always felt magic circle is too weak and unnecessary because the crowd control part is weaker than flash freeze, regen bonuses are negligible, and slowing projectile does not help when there are too many projectiles to dodge. The best way to buff this is just give damage reduction buff to player within the circle just like Mr. Raptis said before. That will not only make this more viable in late game but also make it a good support skill in co-op games.
8. Resist Poison: This thing is pretty much the worst skill you can ever have because it barely reduce poison damage and does not work well with poison resist item for some reason. The best way to make this work is to make it work like how deflect works with poison damage in Solomon Dark( I know dodging poison damage sounds stupid but that is how it works in Solomon Dark and it is far better than having poison resist). If you are not going to do that, then I recommend to just remove this skill because you can just get poison resist from items anyway (and it is far better than the skill version).
9. Disintegrate: Sure, the instant kill part looks sweet but the problem with this is that it has 5% chance and only applies to enemies with 20% health or lower. If you buff the number, however, then this thing will become op so you can't do that. In many cases, instant kill skills are either too op or too trashy. Therefore, I recommend to just scarp this stupid thing and make a new elemental flourish that actually make some sort of gameplay difference (I will suggest an alternative on later discussion)
10. Ember to Imps: The only problem I have with this is that it is way to similar to immolate. I believe it should be changed with something that actually make some difference in gameplay.
11. Rock Surge: I like the idea but relying on rng... I just don't think it is appropriate for this skill. This does not give any sort of strategic depth and just make players to pray for rngesus. I was having real hard time thinking about the solution for reworking this skill but I sort of got the idea of that. I will post it on the later discussion but keep in mind that this elemental flourish needs some fix.
12. Grounded Bolt, Ethereal Boulder: These are very unimaginative and boring weld skill and need a rework that makes it more unique and fun. I already posted suggestions about that so I will not put it on here.\
13. Meteor Swarm: Beside the stuipd mana cost bug, this thing is the most useless primary spell in the entire game. The accuracy of this thing is dreadful, it cant hit enemies close to player, attack timing is weird... there is just too many problem that you might just want to make a new spell instead of keeping this one.
14. Steam jet: Just make it deflect arrows and it will be fine.
15. Call Leviathan: The only problem I have for this is that it needs some sort of upgrade that makes it viable in late game like magic storm do. Just make an upgrade for it or a synergy skill like prismatic shock for magic storm.
16. Burn: The damage is a bit insignificant. It might require some buff or change.
17. Firewalker: This skill is very underwhelming because of its wierd attack mechanism and lack of incentive to use this. The duration of fire should be buffed and it should also increase movement speed.