Research:Spellburst

A place for people to put their Spellburst research. Please do not put ;burst_calc discussion details in the main article beyond "it can be tracked using the script" as it is not applicable to the overall system. For additional history of this page, see here, saves prior to 21 December 2017 apply.

Tracking Spell Burst Wearable Mana Beyond 1/2 of Level

Preface

I'm having my first experience with spell burst in Nelemar with my capped paladin so I figured I'd post my observations on here. I will train skills to incrementally increase wearable mana and track my ability to avoid spell burst while adding spells. Any discrepancies in wearable mana totals is caused by the value of skill bonus enhancives changing as the underlying skill increases in rank.

Using the Gib's wiki calculation I currently have wearable mana of 66.44. My current burst-free set is 406, 414, 506, 508, 509, 601 and 202. Referring to Gib's modifiers I count each elemental spell as costing an additional 0.5 mana, each spell of level nine or over as costing an additional 0.5 mana and each spell identified by Gib as causing unique problems as costing an additional 0.5 mana. Using those modifiers I calculate values of 6.5, 15, 6.5, 8.5, 10.5, 1 and 2 for each spell in my burst-free set totaling 50 mana.

Addendum - In light of my switch to ;burst_calc mana tracking (see Intermission, below) I should note that at the time I commenced my wiki formula testing my ;burst_calc limit mana was 57 and my ;burst_calc current mana was 47. I could not add any current mana without bursting until I reached limit mana 61, which was really more like 62 when you factor in that I was one rank of lore shy of 61.5 and I wear enhancives equivalent to slightly more than 0.5 limit mana.

Baseline

406, 414, 506, 508, 509, 601, 202 = 50 mana.

66.44 wearable mana total.

Replacing 601 with 401 does not result in spell burst. (+0.5 mana)

Replacing 202 and 601 with 503 does not result in spell burst. (+0.5 mana)

Replacing 406 with 507 results in spell burst. (+1 mana)

Replacing 506 with 507 results in spell burst. (+1 mana)

Adding 401 results in spell burst. (+1.5 mana)

Replacing 202 with 503 results in spell burst. (+1.5 mana)

Testing - Wiki Formula

I added skills such that I increased wearable mana in 1.1 mana increments. There was no change through 76 wearable mana.

77.11 wearable mana

Replacing 506 with 507 does not result in spell burst. (+1 mana)

Replacing 406 with 507 does not result in spell burst. (+1 mana)

Adding 401 does not result in spell burst. (+1.5 mana ???)

Replacing 202 with 503 does not result in spell burst. (+1.5 mana ???)

Adding 401 and replacing 202 with 402 does not result in spell burst. (+2 mana ???)

Replacing 601 with 503 does not result in spell burst. (+2.5 mana ???)

Replacing 601 with 503 and replacing 202 with 402 does not result in spell burst. (+3 mana ???)

Adding 503 does not result in spell burst (+3.5 mana ???)

Adding 503 and replacing 202 with 402 does not result in spell burst. (+4 mana ???)

Adding 503 and replacing 506 with 507 does not result in spell burst. (+4.5 mana ???)

Adding 503 and 401 does not result in spell burst. (+5 mana ???)

Adding 905 does not result in spell burst. (+5.5 mana ???)

Adding 503 and 401 and replacing 202 with 402 does not result in spell burst. (+5.5 mana ???)

Adding 503 and 401 and replacing 506 with 507 does not result in spell burst. (+6 mana ???)

Adding 905 and replacing 506 with 507 does not result in spell burst. (+6.5 mana ???)

...

Adding 905 and 401 and 507 does not result in spell burst. (+14.5 mana ???)

Adding 401 and 503 and 905 and 911 does not result in spell burst. (+23 mana !!!)

Intermission

In light of my review of ;burst_calc and Gib's PC thread dealing with it, I am switching to tracking ;burst_calc current mana against ;burst_calc limit mana. To get a more precise measurement I decided to add ranks of lore until I added 0.5 limit mana which conveniently only took one rank. In so doing I happened to notice that ;burst_calc does not factor in enhancive bonuses. Adding one rank of lore with my enhancives on took me to 61.5 but removing an enhancive that gave two ranks had no effect. I assume, however, that spell burst factors in enhancive bonuses and the issue with ;burst_calc is some coding problem. For your reference I am wearing enhancives that add slightly more than 0.5 limit mana.

In the interests of making this a bit easier to read, let us now assume that my base spell set is:

202, 401, 406, 414, 506, 507, 508, 509, 601, 905 and 911 totaling 69.5 current mana. This set does not burst with 61.5 limit mana. It didn't burst with 61 limit mana either, but given my enhancives I would say the real break point is probably closer to 62 limit mana.

Testing - ;burst_calc

61.5 limit mana

Replacing 911 with 712 results in spell burst. (70.5 current mana)

I added skills such that I increased limit mana in 0.5 mana increments. There was no change through 75.5 limit mana.

76 limit mana

Replacing 911 with 712 and adding 211 and adding 503 does not result in spell burst. (85 current mana)

Adding 211 and adding 503 and adding 402 results in spellburst. (86 current mana)

Summary and Conclusion

For what follows I will only deal with ;burst_calc mana. My initial attempts using the wiki formula were needlessly confusing and I assume that anyone trying to use my research as a guide will rely on ;burst_calc instead of manual calculations anyway. When I refer to "limit" mana and "current" mana I am referring to the two sections of the ;burst_calc readout by the same names. Because I wear a few enhancives that impact the spell burst calculation my advice is to add 0.5 limit mana to each of the thresholds described below. While I was able to increase my limit mana in 0.5 mana increments, because of the limited number of spells that have +0.5 current mana added to their actual mana cost in the ;burst_calc formula, I decided to add outside spells in 1 current mana increments.

When I began my testing I had 57 limit mana, however I was only able to wear outside spells totaling 47 current mana without bursting. I added skills such that I increased my limit mana in 0.5 mana increments until I reached 61.5 limit mana. I was unable to wear any additional outside spells until I reached 61.5 limit mana. Once I reached 61.5 limit mana I was able to wear additional outside spells totaling 69.5 current mana without bursting. I added skills such that I increased my limit mana in 0.5 mana increments until I reached 76 limit mana. I was unable to wear any additional outside spells until I reached 76 limit mana. Once I reached 76 limit mana I was able to wear additional outside up to 85 current mana without bursting. In all cases, adding even a single additional current mana resulted in spell burst.

Based on the foregoing, I believe that spell burst wearable mana beyond 1/2 of level is explained as a series of discrete thresholds. At no time in my research did I observe any gradual increase in wearable mana.

I found three thresholds:

47 current mana - presumably the result of the linear increase in wearable mana described by Gib in his original research

69.5 current mana - unlocked upon reaching 61.5 limit mana

85 current mana - unlocked upon reaching 76 limit mana

Since my research was conducted using a 7.7M EXP half-elf paladin I am not in a position to search for the next threshold, but I feel comfortable concluding that there are more thresholds. I take no position on the accuracy of ;burst_calc or Gib's research more broadly. If nothing else, ;burst_calc is an adequate tool to measure spell burst thresholds and, barring some unforeseen racial or professional component, can be used by anyone to implement my research.

MICHN18 (talk) 12:46, 8 January 2016 (CST)

An update from Goat

I did some testing a while back, and I was unable to find a +0.5 mana effect as described above. I did find that burst_calc relies on incorrect mana costs for non-native casts of some spells, mostly spells with variable costs based on spells known or the like. I forwarded spell-list.xml corrections for the following:

102 507 618 905 913 1010 1019 1610 409 1613

With those changes, I think burst_calc numbers produce more consistent results based on spell base mana cost alone.