Gap between different spells

Vorhs - Lost City

I always played wizard. Since he got no spells that could be stack in succession due to long cooldowns, i always thought that the 1 second delay/gap between spells was normal.

I noticed now, playing veno and cleric, that if you cast continuously the same spell (plume shot for clerics and venomous scarab for venos) there is no more gap between same spell!

I mean, this is what i used to see on wizard while i cast 2 different spells:

- click on gush
- start gush channel bar
- during channel bar i click on pyrogram to put it as next spell
- channeling ends, 1 second of cast time while channel bar is full
- the channel bar disappear, 1 second of wait
- pyrogram channel bar appear and start channeling
- channeling ends and start 1 second of cast time while bar is full
- cast ends and bar disappear.

This is instead what i saw on veno for example:

- click on scarab and keep it pressed
- start scarab channel bar
- channeling ends, 1 second of cast time while channel bar is full
- channeling bar re-start casting scarab without disappearing and without 1 second gap
- cast time during channel bar full
- cast ends and bar disappear

I experienced the same thing on plume shot or ironheart bless of cleric.

Now, what im thinking, is the 1 second delay supposed to be normal? Cause if it isnt, wizards got an incredible handicap versus other magic classes: 1 second is really high as delay, it is like our spells have +1 second handicap on channel time, wich isnt reduced by -%channel gears...

Its like loosing 1 spell each 2 that we cast, we should have 50% more dps

lol im starting to get now why we are so slow in dps even if we hit that hard!

@players: do you experience the same problem?
@gms: is it actually a bug?

Tiageos - Sanctuary

You're comparing apples to oranges. on the wizard you're casting two different spells, on the others you're casting the same spells over and over.

The point of the wizard isn't DPS, it's hitting massive numbers. Who cares about hitting 1k 5 times a second when you can do 150k every 2 seconds?

Also compare the channel/cast/cooldown times on these characters and your current framerate when you are doing it. Compare apples to apples as well, spam gush or pyro on the wizard instead of swapping between two spells.

Dralighte - Harshlands

@players: do you experience the same problem?

Yeah, but It's not a big problem for me... and you are in the wrong section )

Dralighte - Harshlands

Tiageos - Sanctuary wrote: »

You're comparing apples to oranges. on the wizard you're casting two different spells, on the others you're casting the same spells over and over.

The point of the wizard isn't DPS, it's hitting massive numbers. Who cares about hitting 1k 5 times a second when you can do 150k every 2 seconds?

Oooooh nice b:dirty

Tiageos - Sanctuary

Dralighte - Harshlands wrote: »

Oooooh nice b:dirty

Here's a video montage that a wizard I know put together. All numbers are actual. b:victory


Also note, if you want DPS, play a DPS class.... Duh!

WaffleChan - Sanctuary

also, did you take the time to check the cast, and cooldown on each spell too?

gush and pyro have a 3s cooldown, venomous and plume shot have a 1s cooldown. the frames between cast channel and cool are way smaller. theres your answer, theres nothing wrong with anything.

Vorhs - Lost City

WaffleChan - Sanctuary wrote: »

also, did you take the time to check the cast, and cooldown on each spell too?

gush and pyro have a 3s cooldown, venomous and plume shot have a 1s cooldown. the frames between cast channel and cool are way smaller. theres your answer, theres nothing wrong with anything.

did u check that exactly THAT was my point? i didnt say 2 gush in succession, but gush + pyro compared to scarab + scarab..

@Tiageos: no wizards can do 150k in 2 seconds.. that video shows ultis.. wich are at least 5-6 seconds channel/cast and require 2 sparks, a wizard is able to get 2 sparks in around 60 seconds lol
My best hit was 182k with an ulti, wich becomes around 23k on a nirvana boss. nothing really big, compared to the 2k per hit that aps can do on bosses.

aps classes got like 70% of wiz's dph, but 400% of wiz's dps, but this isnt the reason why i posted here, many others already complained about aps overpowerness

Dralighte - Harshlands

Tiageos - Sanctuary wrote: »

Here's a video montage that a wizard I know put together. All numbers are actual. b:victory


Also note, if you want DPS, play a DPS class.... Duh!

sorry, I didnt know nirvana +5 isnt enough b:faint


EDIT: 300k? ^^
Anyway, the only SS I did was with a pataka +3, without a shard and I dealed 97k. I can do better now. But I'm PvPing atm

WaffleChan - Sanctuary

WaffleChan - Sanctuary wrote: »

also, did you take the time to check the cast, and cooldown on each spell too?

gush and pyro have a 3s cooldown, venomous and plume shot have a 1s cooldown. the frames between cast channel and cool are way smaller. theres your answer, theres nothing wrong with anything.

there is a reason your skills have longer cooldowns. look at their potential damage vs venos magic classes -_-; venos ultimate 59 spell isnt even nearly as strong as some of your basic moves... clerics are almost as strong, but cost alot of mp, and they dont have very many of them. wizards > other casters.

Vorhs - Lost City

lol waffle u still dont see my points... im not complaining on cooldowns!

its good and right for wiz to have cooldowns.

im telling that we got a strange 1 second gap between casting gush + pyro while u dont have any gap between scarab + scarab. its not a matter of cooldowns, cause pyro doesnt share cooldown with gush!

Chillum - Dreamweaver

Can't say I generally find large gaps between spamming Pyrogram and Gush.

Generally they cast / start casting right on top of one another.

Perhaps check your ping?

Sometimes when my ping is high, there can be gaps between spells.

Regards.

Kupuntu - Sanctuary

I've seen that when I'm spamming BM skills in PK most of the time there seems to be no gap at all but I guess that's just because I always lag.

Dire_Straits - Raging Tide

Can this be tested ?
Do sutra and cast few 1.0 casting time spells (gush, CoF, DP, pitfall, WotP, frostblade), how many can you cast ? and is it the same with other wizards ? This might prove if its your ping or something else.
Also if none of the wizards are able to cast 4 or more will prove your 1 second delay.
OR it might be that the delay only happens between the spells you mentioned :P

I am assuming you tested your veno and wizard at same ping. Since it would have been same day, few minutes appart b:tired

Vorhs - Lost City

Dire_Straits - Raging Tide wrote: »

Can this be tested ?
Do sutra and cast few 1.0 casting time spells (gush, CoF, DP, pitfall, WotP, frostblade), how many can you cast ? and is it the same with other wizards ? This might prove if its your ping or something else.
Also if none of the wizards are able to cast 4 or more will prove your 1 second delay.
OR it might be that the delay only happens between the spells you mentioned :P

I am assuming you tested your veno and wizard at same ping. Since it would have been same day, few minutes appart b:tired

i can do 4 maximum fast skills with sutra, tried it.
my ingame ping is and always been 400-600ms.
the 1 sec delay happens even between 2 different spells of the veno. it just doesnt happen if u cast 2 of the same kind of skills.

Mahabharatha - Archosaur

Yup, happens on my Mr. wizzy too, cleric and veno are ok. It is really annoying, because he just stands there for one sec, long enough to get hit by the monster, ande after he gets hit does the second spell start QQ

Michael_Dark - Lost City

Zooming Thunder Powder or stack more channeling you baddie. xP

Neodaystar - Sanctuary

Vorhs - Lost City wrote: »

I always played wizard. Since he got no spells that could be stack in succession due to long cooldowns, i always thought that the 1 second delay/gap between spells was normal.

I noticed now, playing veno and cleric, that if you cast continuously the same spell (plume shot for clerics and venomous scarab for venos) there is no more gap between same spell!

I mean, this is what i used to see on wizard while i cast 2 different spells:

- click on gush
- start gush channel bar
- during channel bar i click on pyrogram to put it as next spell
- channeling ends, 1 second of cast time while channel bar is full
- the channel bar disappear, 1 second of wait
- pyrogram channel bar appear and start channeling
- channeling ends and start 1 second of cast time while bar is full
- cast ends and bar disappear.

This is instead what i saw on veno for example:

- click on scarab and keep it pressed
- start scarab channel bar
- channeling ends, 1 second of cast time while channel bar is full
- channeling bar re-start casting scarab without disappearing and without 1 second gap
- cast time during channel bar full
- cast ends and bar disappear

I experienced the same thing on plume shot or ironheart bless of cleric.

Now, what im thinking, is the 1 second delay supposed to be normal? Cause if it isnt, wizards got an incredible handicap versus other magic classes: 1 second is really high as delay, it is like our spells have +1 second handicap on channel time, wich isnt reduced by -%channel gears...

Its like loosing 1 spell each 2 that we cast, we should have 50% more dps

lol im starting to get now why we are so slow in dps even if we hit that hard!

@players: do you experience the same problem?
@gms: is it actually a bug?

I understand what you are referring to. You're right, this has nothing to do with channeling speed, cool down, and cast time of skills. Normally, when you channel a spell or during casting, there is some kind of animation that lets you know it's happening. In the case of casters casting a different spell right after a different one, you experience a second or two idling. It may look as if you are lagging, but it's not lag if you can see others casting spells on you or seeing other things happening.

I am not 100% certain of the reason for this problem, but it might have to do with your computer's processing speed when giving a new command/cast a different spell. It takes an extra second or two to load up a different animation. Which is why when you go computer shopping, people there ask you what you use the computer for...gaming, rendering high resolution images...? I notice this since I play this game both on a 15 year old pc, and a 5 year old one. The older pc seems to process the commands slower even when both receives the same connection speed.

Now, if everyone experiences this problem, then the fault is likely to be the game's algorithm in executing a new skill command and showing a new animation if you are not repeatedly casting the same skill, which is specified in the program's loop asking if the next skill is the same or not - i.e cleric spamming plume shot. It's similarly to how you have a folder for temporary internet files to load the most recently accessed info more quickly.

MrHanky - Harshlands

i never had that problem
i can pyro gush till i go blue in the face with no delay between

Vorhs - Lost City

Neodaystar - Sanctuary wrote: »

I understand what you are referring to. You're right, this has nothing to do with channeling speed, cool down, and cast time of skills. Normally, when you channel a spell or during casting, there is some kind of animation that lets you know it's happening. In the case of casters casting a different spell right after a different one, you experience a second or two idling. It may look as if you are lagging, but it's not lag if you can see others casting spells on you or seeing other things happening.

I am not 100% certain of the reason for this problem, but it might have to do with your computer's processing speed when giving a new command/cast a different spell. It takes an extra second or two to load up a different animation. Which is why when you go computer shopping, people there ask you what you use the computer for...gaming, rendering high resolution images...? I notice this since I play this game both on a 15 year old pc, and a 5 year old one. The older pc seems to process the commands slower even when both receives the same connection speed.

Now, if everyone experiences this problem, then the fault is likely to be the game's algorithm in executing a new skill command and showing a new animation if you are not repeatedly casting the same skill, which is specified in the program's loop asking if the next skill is the same or not - i.e cleric spamming plume shot. It's similarly to how you have a folder for temporary internet files to load the most recently accessed info more quickly.

yea thats what i was thinking too.. it cant be lag, but my computer is more than powerful: i can play crysis with almost all graphics on max lol.. im playing stacraft 2 too in these days and when there are many animations around i dont lag a bit

Azzazin - Dreamweaver

I smell lag.

In my experience, using a macro tends to eliminate gaps between skills, which I have noticed on all characters I have ever played. Sin, barb, cleric, at various times, have all had gaps between skills. Pressing one skill while another skill is still casting helps reduce the problem, but I still see gaps, particularly when the area I'm playing in is crowded with players. (Note: as previously mentioned by someone else, a computer with not-very-good graphics may also be at fault for gaps between skills; though in your case I would doubt this.)

Try making a gush>pyro macro. If you aren't familiar with macros, you go press 'R' when in game; click at the bottom of the window 'new', and a window will pop up. On that window, find the button shaped like a curly arrow with a blue background, and drag it into the first slot. It says 'walk behind', but what it actually means is 'repeat macro'. Then drag pyro and gush over from the skill window into the slots to the right of where you just placed the repeat icon, and then save the macro. Drag the macro icon into your skill toolbar and you are good to go. From my experience with using macros, that 1s delay should, if not entirely vanish, at least be much smaller.

I have somewhat of a theory about this, which may explain the 1s gap you notice. With a cleric's 'ironheart' heal skill, for instance, you say you can hold down the button, and occasionally you will get 2 heals go off without any gap at all between them. This I have noticed. However, this happens MORE when its lagging. Typically, what happens is I hold down ironheart hot key, and then one ironheart goes off. If I let go, no second ironheart goes off. If I hold down for longer, then let go, say, after 3 ironhearts have been cast, often a 4th one will go off, even though I let go of the button during the casting of the 3rd ironheart. My theory is, somehow with skills whose cooldown is faster than the combined channeling & casting, when you hold down the button you send the signal to the server 'ahead of time' to do the skill again. So this goes back to the idea of testing out a macro. To my understanding, a macro is a pre-programmed set of skills you will use. When you click the hot key to a macro, you send the information to the server in advance about what skills you will be using. Thus, if my theory is correct, this would be why the gap between skills should go away. If you press each key individually, the server has to wait for each of your key strokes to reach the server one after the other, before processing that information & making your character use the skills in question.

If you want to test this further, try alternating skills on your cleric or venomancer. I predict that if you, say, press 'cyclone' > 'plume shot' > 'cyclone' back and forth on your cleric, you'll see a gap between skills somewhat similar to your wizard.

Oh, I just had another idea, entirely different; it could be that the cast bar for wizard skills is not long enough. I highly doubt this, but perhaps the casting bar disappears off your screen before the skill is actually done casting. This could result in the false appearance of a gap between skills.

Hope this helps/gives you some things to try out.


Azzazin

Vorhs - Lost City

The gap exists between any 2 different skills, even plume + cyclone or else. In fact in the topic i didnt mention "gap between WIZARD skills"

in fact i dunno why they moved my thread in wizard section while it ISNT a wizard matter only...

btw i use many macros and the gap exists even during macros and it lasts exactly the same 1 second... as i said its not a problem of computer, it must be a problem in programming the skills when they created pwi, or just a very strange problem of high ping, wich i dont think, cause if it really was i should lag even when casting 2 skills of the same kind..

i hope they fix this.. 1 second handicap is really high

Borsuc - Raging Tide

That's right. I can spam morning dew instantly because it has no cooldown (cooldown starts when casting time starts and since it's shorter, well, it cools down before it finishes casting), but when you try 2 different spells it's a different matter. Game fault I guarantee.

WaffleChan - Sanctuary wrote: »

there is a reason your skills have longer cooldowns.

No there isn't.

WaffleChan - Sanctuary wrote: »

look at their potential damage vs venos magic classes -_-;

Assuming both are pure mag, the basic skills have at most just some constant add-on damage difference, hardly a difference endgame when weapon damage is most of your attack.

If not pure mag, well, whose fault is it that a veno doesn't usually go pure mag? You want survivability, don't say you do less damage than a wiz then. b:bye

WaffleChan - Sanctuary wrote: »

venos ultimate 59 spell isnt even nearly as strong as some of your basic moves...

So sandstorm isn't a "basic move" it's more basic than that right? Since Nova is not NEARLY as strong even though it has same weapon % addon and about same add-on damage.

WaffleChan - Sanctuary wrote: »

clerics are almost as strong, but cost alot of mp

????

Plume Shot lvl11 -> 265 mana
Pyrogram lvl11 -> 265 mana

Tempest lvl11 -> 655 mana
BIDS lvl11 -> 655 mana

Where are you pulling this stuff from???

WaffleChan - Sanctuary wrote: »

and they dont have very many of them. wizards > other casters.

Course they don't, that would be epically ridiculous. Considering a cleric's healing skills, buff skills, debuff skills AND control skills.

Adea - Lost City_1363814429

I always thought this delay of casting between spells was normal, but I tried a Venomancer for a few minutes and I see what you mean. b:surrender

MrHanky - Harshlands

ok you people realize there is a thing called CASTING TIME right?
and your skill cooldown BEGINS after channeling the skill
so if your skill takes 1 sec to cast and has a 1 sec CD you can spam
like say the venomous scarab

i really really hope the delay you are talking about isnt the CAST TIME
please say it isnt so

because like i said i can go from pyro -> gush with no delay BUT the 1 sec cast time

MrHanky - Harshlands

take off all channel gear
get a stopwatch
start watch when u cast pyro and hit gush to go
when gush starts channel check time

see if it really is 1 sec or you are miscalculating something like the casting
i dunno cause i go from skill to skill with no problems

Borsuc - Raging Tide

I already said morning dew can be spammed even with 1 sec cooldown because its casting time is longer than that... and from my experience the delay is more like 0.3 seconds or so between different spells. I don't know what it depends on, macros make it worse more like 0.6 or 0.75.

Vorhs - Lost City

MrHanky - Harshlands wrote: »

ok you people realize there is a thing called CASTING TIME right?
and your skill cooldown BEGINS after channeling the skill
so if your skill takes 1 sec to cast and has a 1 sec CD you can spam
like say the venomous scarab

i really really hope the delay you are talking about isnt the CAST TIME
please say it isnt so

because like i said i can go from pyro -> gush with no delay BUT the 1 sec cast time

ok you mrhanky realize there is a thing called ORIGINAL POST right?
and your eyes should go on that post, before posting xD

u'll clearly see im not talking about cast time, im talking about a gap of around 1 second between the END of cast time of first spell and the START of channel of next spell. a gap wich is not existent if you try consecutive same kind of spells, wich could be mornindew-mornindew, plume-plume, scarab-scarab...

with a chronometer:

i take around 3,1 seconds between the start of channeling of gush and the start of channeling of pyro, and i got 12% channel reduction (should be 2 seconds - 12% of 1 second)
i take instead around 5,3 seconds between morning dew and next morning dew. (should be 5,7 seconds -12% of 4,5 seconds)

Azzazin - Dreamweaver

@ OP: I made a wizard to test what you've been saying. The 1-second gap you describe between skills is non-existent for me; I do, however, see about the same amount of gap that I see when on cleric or veno or barb or assassin when skill spamming. And I don't know whats up with your connection, but macros are nice & fast for me. If I had to measure the gap between skills, I'd have to put it at 0.2s.

Once again, I blame your connection speed/lag.

Azzazin

BLOODMYSTIC - Archosaur

Chillum - Dreamweaver wrote: »

Can't say I generally find large gaps between spamming Pyrogram and Gush.

Generally they cast / start casting right on top of one another.

Perhaps check your ping?

Sometimes when my ping is high, there can be gaps between spells.

Regards.

It took 11 posts for someone to actually answer the question instead of debate it. Gotta love the forums.

Borsuc - Raging Tide wrote: »

I don't know what it depends on, macros make it worse more like 0.6 or 0.75.

I have heard this as well, to the point that you can even get 5 skills off in sutra if you do it manually, but only 4 skills off in sutra if you do it with a macro.

fulgida

I was not able to comprehend the original poster's question.

However, I offer you a timeline for the sequence: gush, pyrogram, gush, pyrogram for a wizard wearing no channelling gear.

0 seconds: gush starts channelling and will probably slow its target
1 seconds: gush goes off and damages its target, gush's casting and cooldown times start
2 seconds: gush's casting time has ended, pyrogram starts channelling
3.5 seconds: pyrogram flys off and starts its casting and cooldown times
(somewhere near 4 seconds: pyrogram hits its target)
4.3 seconds: gush starts channelling...
5.3 seconds: gush goes off...
6.3 seconds: gush's casting time has ended PROBLEM HERE

The problem, of course, 6.3-3.5 = 2.8 seconds and pyrogram has a three second cooldown. When you cast manually, this might be no big deal because you just need another fifth of a second before you can cast your pyrogram. But this will break macros if you do not do something about it. And casting sandstorm between gush and pyrogram is usually not a good way of fixing the problem.

And when you compare wizard spell casting to venos with plume shot or clerics with venomous scarab (or did I get that backwards? *lol*) I have to imagine that this is the issue you are getting at.

And of course if a wizard tries to chain together a sequences of gushes, that extra second between each cast will hurt.

Borsuc - Raging Tide

Most of the time macros work with Gush->Pyro combo indefinitely proving that there's some sort of delay (at least on my end). b:surrender