I don't know about 'magic', so much as it represents ability beyond the mundane. I'm sure there are plenty of people in the world far more nimble, cognizant in stress situations, and however many other traits that result in them being harder to ping with a snowball than I am.

But seeing as we're trying to put a realistic face on the game actions, by which I mean mostly the semblance of internal consistency, I would hazard the guess if that an acrobat can dodge invisible psionic attacks (and they can) then dodging bolts of visible energy wouldn't be as much of a problem, assuming all other factors are similar.

Both of these attacks leave the character more or less at a hindrance with regards to guessing their source. I would imagine psionic attacks are as likely to be 'fast' in the same manner that Coven attacks might be assumed to be fast.

Presumably, the mind is dancing around as well, dodging on its own

But Xenthos is incorrect about moon bursts always comming at the same time every time. Its not automatic that the moonbursts come right away, and you can't really code for that either.

I wish there were more discussions like this. I enjoy exploring the metamechanics and metaphysics of a game setting. I'd like to see more internal consistency in the game, though as was indicated before, skills balance must supercede realism.

Me, I always found it odd that acrobats can dodge psionic attacks. More so even than Coven, psi attacks would seem less easily avoided. While I'm sure there's a transference of energy there somewhere, I don't picture it as a bolt or packet or such passing physical distance between the attacker and defender.

You never saw the whole "We're going to copy/paste trigger lines into this clan, and force our combatants to use this trigger line to trigger Rage Coven bursts" thing? I sure did! I felt it, too.

I already accounted for the "can't code for that" bit, however. I've said the change is fine for balance reasons, and it would be far more effort than it's worth to try and do case-by-case checks. I'm just disputing the logic presented, which I don't agree with. Disputing that, however, won't change the fact that it was apparently changed for balance reasons (and, as such, isn't likely going to change again). Nor should it, in this case.

If you actually put in some effort, you could come up with other ways to avoid such situations. I came up with a bard one that you could definately do just by reading all of this. I'm fairly sure few bards actually have even though of using this idea. More simpler ones are things like burrow below. indoors and quick disappearance all at once. Though you'd have to check to see if the bug in the past where moonburst hit burrowed people was fixed. It was back when Moondancers were much more popular so it might have been fixed, might have not.

Lolserpent. Trade in your mask and trans lowmagic!

Trade in your prism and gem while you're at it. Relearn lowmagic 4-5 times just so you have serpent -really thoroughly.-

Sometimes people don't have triggers ready. Sometimes people are new. Sometimes there is lag and the trigger doesn't run. sometimes people dissobey orders and don't make the triggers.

Its not a certainty. And if it was, and they knew that someone could dodge it, I'm sure then they would space them out with random #wait commands, so not even they knew when the next attack was going to come.

And yet, even with this, there's more indication that something is coming than with a psionic attack (as was rightly pointed out). Even then, you know it's coming in the next few fractions of a second (if people are using wait triggers to wait for long periods of time, they're not actually going to kill anybody), so... nope.

You might think another one is coming, but you'll never know for sure until it hits you. It could be none, could be one, could be many. If it's many, simultaneously, then maybe the person infact gets confused about how to dodge them all and flusters, dodging none! Tricky tricky.

Xenthos is grasping at straws... and coming up short.

Take a look at the psionics message, and try to say that with a straight face. All you get is "You feel a dull throbbing in your head." Not even a sign that they're attacking. And yet, it can be dodged!


It could be-- but it could also be that you dodge all of them. If you're moving and dodging, and they're aiming at where you were... odds are that they'll miss. If you're moving and they are firing at intervals as you move, there would likely be more of a some-hit some-miss pattern, but even then... they wouldn't all be hitting.

I can still say it with a straight face because your argument is based on the fact that people can dodge psionics and so they should be able to dodge moonburst from afar. I understand the principle there, but I'm much more inclined to think the other way and say that psionics should not be dodged.

Actually, I'm not so sure of that.

Mob psionic attacks absolutely can. PvP psionic attacks, I'm not so sure.

But since we're talking realism and not balance, the argument still applies.

I'm going based on the quote from Eldanien, "But seeing as we're trying to put a realistic face on the game actions, by which I mean mostly the semblance of internal consistency, I would hazard the guess if that an acrobat can dodge invisible psionic attacks (and they can) then dodging bolts of visible energy wouldn't be as much of a problem, assuming all other factors are similar."

It could be incorrect, but as he is an Acrobat with access to dodge, I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt.

Either way: If you know where something is coming from, and roughly when it's coming, you can move out of the way if you're quick enough. That's what Acrobatics is based on. Tripleflash is spending 10power to speed your reflexes up to such an insane rate that you can dodge 500000 swords all swinging at you at the same time. And still fight back. Dodging a few moonbursts when you know where they are coming from and when isn't anywhere near to being an impossible thing.

Was Acrobat. Transed, twice. Now Eldanien is Trans Psymet for the second time.

I have a bad habit of that. But I felt like I needed to explore Psymet more, and it's good to have someone strongly familiar with both.

Triple Flash can dodge Judgement from Sacraments. That means bards can dodge an arbitrarily wide column of light coming at them from the sky at 300,000 km/s. OP!

How do you know Light travels at 300,000km/s in Lusternia? Nothing in the tales of the Elder Wars suggests it doesn't travel instantly across the luminiferous aether -- which we do, in fact, have in Lusternia. Then again, it might travel as a particle and if so at any speed you like, even varying speeds.

Yes, this argument has reached the point where we have to consider which 18th century model of physics best applies to a game where the moon rises at sunset every day and still has phases. Isn't it wonderful?

I said there was something that he specifically can already do, having a general idea of what his skills are. lol kind of funny now that I realize I didn't even think of serpent.