The recent changes blocking multi-clicking in combat have had a rather dramatic impact, especially for mages.
At the outer rim (distance 1100), casting Erupt on opponents, I conducted two tests. The first on Nov. 1, the second just now. I was higher level on the 2nd test, so my Erupt spells were doing more damage. Nonetheless I have the following results:
Nov. 1 Nov. 8 Change
Gold/Hr 3,714,349 1,212,654 -67%
Dragon Pts/hr 6,020 1,963 -67%
Experience/hr 8,127,730 2,520,182 -69%
Attempting to melee fight at this distance with my Attack (10089) and Defense (12185) scores resulted in a "pillow fight" result of me consistently doing 0 damage and taking only 1 pt./round of damage.
I then switched to melee fighting at a distance of 611. In my Oct. 31 test at this distance I had an Attack of 9763 and Defense of 12146.
Oct. 31 Nov. 8 Change
Gold/Hr 1,379,059 937,668 -32%
Dragon Pts/hr 7,103 4,244 -40%
Experience/hr 5,304,044 3,248,502 -39%
Not quite as bad. I think this was because of the 1/2 second delay in waiting for the list of spells to come up. Could that at least be eliminated or reduced?
As it is, the Mage class is now at a clear disadvantage. It is clearly inferior in PvP combat in the arena because of the absence of spells, and now it is slower to grind with because you have to click on Cast and then the spell each round, whereas a Warrior can just attack with one click. Moreover, the Attack stat can be raised an unlimited amount with AP purchases, whereas max damage from spells is tied to a Mage's level.
EDIT: I should also note that in the first comparison I went from using 12 MP potions in 12 minutes down to 6 MP potions. No potions of any sort were used over the course of 12 minutes each run in the 2nd comparison.
Best wishes,
EnderWiggin
Mages were way overpowered in DKV with players being able to one shot monsters way out of their league. I corrected this issue and made mages more like a mage. Strong still in magic, but weak in other areas.
For the Player Arena, mages shouldn't be too disadvantaged unless they put too much AP into MP and didn't worry about attack or defense. 1k MP would suit a mage pretty much throughout the game allowing many, many spells to be cast. Warriors and Paladins can also use spells which requires MP. This lowers the difference between the 3 classes.
Basically, it shouldn't be too much of a difference unless a player applies more AP to MP than necessary.
I removed the 500 millisecond delay on the spell button in fights but there will still be a split second as the animation finishes and brings up the different spells.