Forums » General Pantheon Discussion

Out of combat vs in combat abilities

    • 219 posts
    February 24, 2017 7:57 PM PST

    I may have misunderstood this, but I think I read we'll only have access to 8-10 of our abilities at a time.  Like we can only set up actionbars for so many at a time.  I'm curious if this is in combat or out of combat as well.

    As an example, lets say a Ranger has an ability to make a campfire or forage for berries, whatever.  These are abilities designed for non-combat uses.  You're not going to be foraging a boss for his berries or anything like that (one can hope not, anyway...)

    So I'm kind of wondering of non-combat related abilities will be castable from our spell/ability books directly or if they HAVE to be on our active bars.  Because I could see it getting REALLY annoying if the Summoner or whatever has to respec his active ability bar every few fights in order to conjure a few flasks of water for the party to drink between pulls, only to swap his spec right back as soon as the "Summoning of the Flasks" is complete.

    I also like the idea of some non-combat abilities being usable in combat, but just with difficult provisions.  For example, a Gate/Teleport/Portal spell being castable in combat, but having a 60 second cast and fizziling if the caster takes a hit before it completes.  Mostly, though, I'll admit, this is because I have in my mind this epic image of a party trying to keep the hate off of the Wizzard as he EVER so slowly summons a portal so they can all jump into it to escape a dire situation.  Waves and waves of enemies, an unending train, but a spark of hope if ONLY that portal will open in time...!

    "Hurry up, Wizard!  We can't keep this up forever!"

    • 633 posts
    February 24, 2017 8:02 PM PST

    I believe that, in general, you'll be able to swap out abilities as long as you're not in combat, although it may take a short period of time to do so (like memorizing a spell or something).

    Or if it's anything like EQ.  You'll have to sit and rest to do it, which would draw extra agro if you're in combat.


    This post was edited by kelenin at February 24, 2017 8:02 PM PST
    • 1 posts
    February 24, 2017 8:11 PM PST

    kelenin said:

    I believe that, in general, you'll be able to swap out abilities as long as you're not in combat, although it may take a short period of time to do so (like memorizing a spell or something).

    Or if it's anything like EQ.  You'll have to sit and rest to do it, which would draw extra agro if you're in combat.

     

    Being forced what you have on your bar can make or break an encounter. Really makes you think about what you need instead of having 30 abilities bound to 30 different keys.

    • 1618 posts
    February 25, 2017 6:49 AM PST

    From the FAQ:

    2.2 Will there be a limitation to the number of abilities we can use at a given time?
    You may be limited to a subset of your abilities for the next encounter, causing you to have to intelligently plan ahead and memorize the spells most effective against the upcoming enemy. Likewise, you'll want to memorize spells that counter the upcoming mob’s abilities. Lastly, you may have some abilities that work synergistically with others in your group. But the key point here is that these tactical decisions can be made right before the actual encounter. Then, say you move on deeper into the dungeon and are about to confront a different boss with different abilities and a different disposition, it may make tactical sense to prep different abilities. So yes, you are limited to that extent (you cannot simply use any of your 80+ abilities whenever you wish) because planning for the battle ahead and doing so effectively is key to Pantheon. The exact number of spells, abilities, feats and actions one can prep is TBD and won’t likely be finalized until Beta. What’s depicted in screenshots showing the UI is not final.

    • 187 posts
    February 25, 2017 7:12 AM PST

    If it's like EQ, you can only have 8 spells memorized at one time. Then there are other abilities that you can turn into hotkeys.

    So, you have 8 combat like abilities, but then you have tracking, forage, sense heading, even fishing.

    You can do any of your other abilities at any time, they are "on their own table" so to speak.

    At any time, even during combat, you can risk sitting down to change your spells (you can only change them while sitting and with your spellbook open). Unfortunately, sitting down is HUGE aggro, so you better be prepared for the consequences if you choose to do it--especially right after you already cast something nasty or healed someone on the hate list.

    I like this method and I hope they use it. You're limited to 8 in-combat spells... but you can change them out ONLY at great risk to yourself and the group. You have other abilities that don't do anything to help battle, and can be used anytime.

    Except fishing. You gotta be at water to use that one. ;p

    • 1618 posts
    February 25, 2017 7:42 AM PST

    I believe that is the build concept. In the streams, you see two bars, bottom and right. IIRC, Kilsin mentioned in a different thread that one bar was for your abilities/spells and the other bar was for your other items, like macros and non-spell/ability actions.

    • 483 posts
    February 25, 2017 8:12 AM PST

    It would be nice if VR separated the utility spells ( Things like gates and conjured food, mostly non combat related) from the rest of the combat spells. This would make those abilites less annoying to use.

     


    This post was edited by jpedrote at February 25, 2017 8:12 AM PST
    • 1618 posts
    February 25, 2017 8:17 AM PST

    jpedrote said:

    It would be nice if VR separated the utility spells ( Things like gates and conjured food, mostly non combat related) from the rest of the combat spells. This would make those abilites less annoying to use.

    Agreed. But, you might be able to cast directly from your spell book as well, in addition to the hotbars. Out of combat, this would not be a big deal, just an extra step of bringing up the spell book. But, in combat, you probably would not want to look through the spellbook, with the interface blocking your view to cast a combat spell.

    • 187 posts
    February 25, 2017 8:29 AM PST

    jpedrote said:

    It would be nice if VR separated the utility spells ( Things like gates and conjured food, mostly non combat related) from the rest of the combat spells. This would make those abilites less annoying to use.

     

    This is another area where I'd like tabs--and personally editable tabs would make me positively giddy. :p

     

    Banking, inventory, spellbook, abilities.... I would like tabbing on all of these, and again, the ability to self-label tabbing would just be beyond fabulous.

    • 1618 posts
    February 25, 2017 8:32 AM PST

    +1 for customizable labels for everything. I am a fan of organization and I rarely organize things the same as others. Customizable options are great as long as they do not harm balance.