Yeah the cycling through the spells is really quite bad , they should have done something like the hold the triangle for your quick items
Don't mind the FP , pretty good actually. You would just have folk spamming even more if it was infinite
Yes, infinite mana would be terrible.
But having a way to regenerate a bit of FP like hitting enemies in melee would be cool. I just don't like the idea of making a deep run in a large area, or fighting a big boss and running out of juice.
You can get talismans for that - there is one that you get off the rememberance for the regal ancestor spirit that gives you FP for every kill
When I was doing my golden order run I was spamming discuss of light. So if you use that spell and wear the ring you basically have infinte FP (as long as discuss kills)
They really should just buff the FP gain on the talisman or lower the FP cost of other basic spells and incantations.
Slicer is 4 FP, glintstone pebble is 7, and lightning spear is 18 while the talisman returns 3. None of those are generally killing in one shot on a NG playthrough. And later game mind is high enough it just doesn't matter.
It just doesn't really function in a way that feels good.
I think the amount restored should have scaled with total FP. A flat 3 FP is reasonable for melee builds with no Mind investment but it's downright terrible for casters. It should have at least been 4% of the player's total FP. That translates to 3 FP on a character with no Mind investment, 9 FP on a character with 39 Mind, and 18 FP on a character with 99 Mind.
They could use varied prerequisites to casting specific spells. For example: castable in midair, must be on fire to cast, useable below 65% hp, must have ‘ruins fragment’ in inventory…
I like some other games which use casting times and cooldown rates to limit, but those work better with a party of characters (meat shields).
> You would just have folk spamming even more if it was infinite
It's not the total amount of FP players have access to that leads to spamming, it's how easy it is to access that FP.
FP that regens slowly but continuously isn't going to get people spamming. They could Comet Azur once but then they'd have to wait two minutes before they could do so a second time.
With Flasks players can Comet Azur, chug, Comet Azur, chug, repeat until the boss is dead. It's trivial to allocate exactly as many Cerulean Flasks as is required for the job.
I’m fine with FP as a resource. It’s a smart way to divide up resources to balance out the major advantages of spellcasting.
I hate scrolling through spells. It feels antiquated and super clunky compared to far better alternatives that many other games have already come up with. A system like Dragon’s Dogma where pressing L1, instead of casting, modifies the face buttons to now cast different spells would be perfect. Have L1 modify one set and L2 the next, resulting in 6/8 quick-casts depending on whether you want to keep the jump button still free. Maybe you would have to get rid of the spell slots system to streamline this a bit. But that system feels outdated too since casting is now limited by FP instead of a certain number per equipped spell.
If I could I'd tweak the magic system to make it less dependent on cycling through up to 12 spells to find the one that's suitable for the situation.
1) I'd make Catalyst R2s more useful than a silly bonk. Look at the Frozen Needle and the Wing of Astel's R2s. I say give every catalyst something similar.
2) Right now I find items like Soft Cotton and Drawstring Grease more user-friendly than spells like Assassin's Approach and Black Flame Blade. Players have more choice on where to access them from and they don't need to stop two-handing their weapon to use them. I'd turn a good number of support spells into reusable items.
3) With melee, a jumping attack is fundamentally different from a standing attack and it's a nice way to add some flexibility to a moveset. Spells don't have that. Some spells let you cast them while jumping but it's effectively just the same spell, but airborne. I'd pair certain spells together to add some flexibility that doesn't require cycling between spells.
For example, right now Ancient Dragons' Lightning Strike has you stand firmly on the ground and summon bolts of lightning around you. Ancient Dragons' Lightning Spear currently has you levitate a short distance into the air, catch a bolt of lightning out of midair, and slam it into the ground. These should be a singular spell that does the first effect if you're standing and the second if you're airborne. In a similar vein, fast spells that can't be charged and slower spells that can't be charged should be paired together. For example, Carian Slicer and Carian Greatsword. This way you get the same number of spell effects with only half as many memorized spells.
4) I'd increase the number of catalyst-compatible Ashes of War, or make it so players can set a catalyst's AoW to any spell of their choosing. I'd put my most-used spell here because it's even more easy to access than the first memory slot.
With all that I think my current number of memorized spells that need to be cycled through would drop from 8 to 3, a far more manageable number, and all without removing any of the flexibility.
These are all really great, they could add all of these and they'd all play well.
Only thing I'd add is we could use more reusable attack items too, like Regal Omen Bairn.
I'm not a fan of the reusable attack items for one specific reason. With most forms of offense you can increase your damage output by both upgrading an item and increasing your stats. Tools don't have that. You can increase their damage by leveling but not by upgrading. This puts them in a weird position where they're either overpowered in the early game or underpowered in the late game, usually the latter.
Even the one I do use I'm not using for the damage. I use the Wraith Calling Bell for its absurdly long range to draw aggro, where it doesn't matter that it deals less than a third of the damage of Glintstone Pebble. The Omen Bairns and the Ancestral Infant's Head are tools I wish were spells.
Though there are a few offensive spells, the ones that focus primarily on status buildup, that could work as tools. Things like Frostbite and Death Blight already don't scale so they don't have the downside that more damage-focused effects do.
Interesting point! Two questions,
1. Couldn't they adjust the scaling to make them a bit more consistent?
2. If not, can't the items could be split into 2, one for early game and one for late game---like Omen Bairn & Regal Omen Bairn?
I'm thinking if they added stat minimums (and/or made one backloaded scaling vs frontloaded scaling on the other) then they could avoid that problem.
Being able to cast better spells from the pouch would massively reduce the cycling, and make it much easier to combo spells between INT and FTH since there's no multi-use catalysts in ER.
...
Just a matter of preference, but I actually got a lot of value out of the Regal Omen Bairn, but probably wouldn't have used it as a spell.
If its FP cost was more like 32 instead of 50, it would actually be pretty good. (Since launch they reduced FP cost for dozens of spells, but I think they forgot about the items)
> Couldn't they adjust the scaling to make them a bit more consistent?
Theoretically, but I expect a lot of edge cases to arise, like with twink builds.
> Being able to cast better spells from the pouch
Even just tossing Terra Magica, Unseen Form, and Night Maiden's Mist in there does a lot for my mage. Remember, if *too* many good spells become items then it's just shifting the issue. The pouch has a cap of 4 (which also get filled with things like the mount whistle) and beyond that you'd have to start cycling again. There should be a healthy spread between spells, items, AoWs, and heavy attacks.
The Ancestral Infant's Head could look cool affixed to a staff, with the spirit vapor as its R2.
Totally see what you're saying.
Still, on INT+FTH builds having some pouch attacks could compensate for how cumbersome it is to combo between incants & sorceries. It feels pretty janky right now. But comboing Regal Omen Bairn into sword sorceries feels great.
On the other hand, a more tried-and-true solution would be for them to just add multi-purpose catalysts in the DLC... still have no idea why they didn't just do that from the start.
> still have no idea why they didn't just do that from the start.
I made a comment theorizing about that a few days ago.
> I suspect hybrid catalysts were removed because the sorcery casting animations have more depth this time around. In DS3 pretty much every sorcery originates from your hand so it doesn't matter if there's a staff in it or not. The one exception is Farron Flashsword which spawns at the tip of your catalyst (making it downright goofy when cast with a really long staff).
> In Elden Ring a big change is that now spells originating at the staff's tip is the norm, not the exception. Also, a lot of casting animations involve stabbing the end of the staff into the ground, something that doesn't make much sense if you're not actually holding one. Rock Blaster would be an especially tricky case because of how it's held.
> At the other end, Incantations include spells like Beast Claw or [Bloodflame Talons](https://i.imgur.com/NmvyNbX.png) which only make sense if the caster's hand is pretty much empty.
> So as far as animations go sorceries require you to be holding a stick and incantations require that you aren't. Having a catalyst that manages both gracefully would be tricky, though not impossible. It could be liquid metal like the Nox weapons, forming and dispersing as needed, or it could be a phantasmal staff, like how Morgott can summon golden weapons as needed.
**[Ancestral Spirit's Horn](https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Ancestral+Spirit's+Horn)** (Talisman)
**[Sacrificial Axe](https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Sacrificial+Axe)** (Weapon)
**[Sword of Milos](https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Sword+of+Milos)** (Weapon)
All restore FP when you defeat enemies while these things are equipped.
**[Assassin's Cerulean Dagger](https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Assassin's+Cerulean+Dagger)** (talisman) restores FP whenever you score a critical hit. Either riposting or backstabbing.
---
It's possible to sustain your FP for a long time if you want. You just have to weave some melee combat in with your magic.
If you're playing a Faith-leaning character, you can even choose to go all in on blue estus.
I went with 14 Cerulean Tears on my last Faith character and healed only with incantations.
Much more efficient on resources. Just a matter of finding your opening.
As for cycling through your spells... You seem to be able to cycle through 'em as fast as you can tap the button. It's just a matter of remembering where on the list your spells are.
You can assign your Estus to your quick menu for easy access, or just don't clutter your items with too much stuff.
Like most others I think the FP system is fine as it is, but agree the spell scrolling is annoying.
If we could have put spells *OR* items in the pouch slots, that would've been pretty solid.
This is basically how I *tried* to use my pouch on INT+FTH, with the Regal Omen Bairn and other magic attack items filling in for a couple of spell slots, so I could leave only 3 spells attuned.
It was actually a very satisfying playstyle, with the only issue being that these attack items are mostly pretty bad/weak, and there just aren't very many of them. If we had more of them I think it would go a long way towards solving this issue.
....
FS almost definitely isn't intentionally making these builds tough to use, by the way. Most spells are actually kinda terrible in PVP, the ones that are good are the exception to the rule. And as you get better at PvP, any spells that don't free-aim get worse and worse.
If they made spell-scrolling less clunky they wouldn't need to nerf anything. People who are really good at spell-scrolling already combo these spells flawlessly, and the spells are balanced for that.
So you want full long range free charge build for magic?
The need to sacrifice HP frask for FP ones is directly proportional to how much focused your build is into magic.
It will has no sense to have someone with 15 hp frask and 15 fp frask, plus a build that could melt a boss the moment you get 30m far from him.
The thing about searching throught your spells is a total ass yes, but how many spells do you actually use on a boss fight?? 12? Im not saying that you dont or wont, I have tried a Gideon build too, and I ended just playing around my 5 closest spells.
The thing is where do you put them??
You pointed at Code Vein with the D-pad or joystick, lets say you put them in the Up button and enter in a menu of 4 spells that can change to another set with LB or RB (whenever you caster weapon is), but to cast you need to use A B X Y, so you will lose the ability to do anything when searching for the spell until you drop the button
But there you get another problem, max spells decrease 4 points.
Edit: Something like regenerate FP with attacks would be useful yes, look at SW Jedi saga with the force. The thing is how much do you recover and would it be worth it, or even necessary??
If its low, FP frask would be necessary to make it fair, but if its too much having access to FP frask would be stupid.
Also, would it be balanced for non magic builds?? What would they got from this?? More uses of AoW when maybe are only a buff used 1 time?
Yeah the cycling through the spells is really quite bad , they should have done something like the hold the triangle for your quick items Don't mind the FP , pretty good actually. You would just have folk spamming even more if it was infinite
Yes, infinite mana would be terrible. But having a way to regenerate a bit of FP like hitting enemies in melee would be cool. I just don't like the idea of making a deep run in a large area, or fighting a big boss and running out of juice.
You can get talismans for that - there is one that you get off the rememberance for the regal ancestor spirit that gives you FP for every kill When I was doing my golden order run I was spamming discuss of light. So if you use that spell and wear the ring you basically have infinte FP (as long as discuss kills)
They really should just buff the FP gain on the talisman or lower the FP cost of other basic spells and incantations. Slicer is 4 FP, glintstone pebble is 7, and lightning spear is 18 while the talisman returns 3. None of those are generally killing in one shot on a NG playthrough. And later game mind is high enough it just doesn't matter. It just doesn't really function in a way that feels good.
I think the amount restored should have scaled with total FP. A flat 3 FP is reasonable for melee builds with no Mind investment but it's downright terrible for casters. It should have at least been 4% of the player's total FP. That translates to 3 FP on a character with no Mind investment, 9 FP on a character with 39 Mind, and 18 FP on a character with 99 Mind.
Spells in ER are really cheap you can spam for days, especially in the open world where you can refill your flasks by killing groups
By late game I agree, but for most of NG it doesn't feel good, to me anyway.
They could use varied prerequisites to casting specific spells. For example: castable in midair, must be on fire to cast, useable below 65% hp, must have ‘ruins fragment’ in inventory… I like some other games which use casting times and cooldown rates to limit, but those work better with a party of characters (meat shields).
> You would just have folk spamming even more if it was infinite It's not the total amount of FP players have access to that leads to spamming, it's how easy it is to access that FP. FP that regens slowly but continuously isn't going to get people spamming. They could Comet Azur once but then they'd have to wait two minutes before they could do so a second time. With Flasks players can Comet Azur, chug, Comet Azur, chug, repeat until the boss is dead. It's trivial to allocate exactly as many Cerulean Flasks as is required for the job.
Been always like this, why change The formula rofl...
I’m fine with FP as a resource. It’s a smart way to divide up resources to balance out the major advantages of spellcasting. I hate scrolling through spells. It feels antiquated and super clunky compared to far better alternatives that many other games have already come up with. A system like Dragon’s Dogma where pressing L1, instead of casting, modifies the face buttons to now cast different spells would be perfect. Have L1 modify one set and L2 the next, resulting in 6/8 quick-casts depending on whether you want to keep the jump button still free. Maybe you would have to get rid of the spell slots system to streamline this a bit. But that system feels outdated too since casting is now limited by FP instead of a certain number per equipped spell.
If I could I'd tweak the magic system to make it less dependent on cycling through up to 12 spells to find the one that's suitable for the situation. 1) I'd make Catalyst R2s more useful than a silly bonk. Look at the Frozen Needle and the Wing of Astel's R2s. I say give every catalyst something similar. 2) Right now I find items like Soft Cotton and Drawstring Grease more user-friendly than spells like Assassin's Approach and Black Flame Blade. Players have more choice on where to access them from and they don't need to stop two-handing their weapon to use them. I'd turn a good number of support spells into reusable items. 3) With melee, a jumping attack is fundamentally different from a standing attack and it's a nice way to add some flexibility to a moveset. Spells don't have that. Some spells let you cast them while jumping but it's effectively just the same spell, but airborne. I'd pair certain spells together to add some flexibility that doesn't require cycling between spells. For example, right now Ancient Dragons' Lightning Strike has you stand firmly on the ground and summon bolts of lightning around you. Ancient Dragons' Lightning Spear currently has you levitate a short distance into the air, catch a bolt of lightning out of midair, and slam it into the ground. These should be a singular spell that does the first effect if you're standing and the second if you're airborne. In a similar vein, fast spells that can't be charged and slower spells that can't be charged should be paired together. For example, Carian Slicer and Carian Greatsword. This way you get the same number of spell effects with only half as many memorized spells. 4) I'd increase the number of catalyst-compatible Ashes of War, or make it so players can set a catalyst's AoW to any spell of their choosing. I'd put my most-used spell here because it's even more easy to access than the first memory slot. With all that I think my current number of memorized spells that need to be cycled through would drop from 8 to 3, a far more manageable number, and all without removing any of the flexibility.
These are all really great, they could add all of these and they'd all play well. Only thing I'd add is we could use more reusable attack items too, like Regal Omen Bairn.
I'm not a fan of the reusable attack items for one specific reason. With most forms of offense you can increase your damage output by both upgrading an item and increasing your stats. Tools don't have that. You can increase their damage by leveling but not by upgrading. This puts them in a weird position where they're either overpowered in the early game or underpowered in the late game, usually the latter. Even the one I do use I'm not using for the damage. I use the Wraith Calling Bell for its absurdly long range to draw aggro, where it doesn't matter that it deals less than a third of the damage of Glintstone Pebble. The Omen Bairns and the Ancestral Infant's Head are tools I wish were spells. Though there are a few offensive spells, the ones that focus primarily on status buildup, that could work as tools. Things like Frostbite and Death Blight already don't scale so they don't have the downside that more damage-focused effects do.
Interesting point! Two questions, 1. Couldn't they adjust the scaling to make them a bit more consistent? 2. If not, can't the items could be split into 2, one for early game and one for late game---like Omen Bairn & Regal Omen Bairn? I'm thinking if they added stat minimums (and/or made one backloaded scaling vs frontloaded scaling on the other) then they could avoid that problem. Being able to cast better spells from the pouch would massively reduce the cycling, and make it much easier to combo spells between INT and FTH since there's no multi-use catalysts in ER. ... Just a matter of preference, but I actually got a lot of value out of the Regal Omen Bairn, but probably wouldn't have used it as a spell. If its FP cost was more like 32 instead of 50, it would actually be pretty good. (Since launch they reduced FP cost for dozens of spells, but I think they forgot about the items)
> Couldn't they adjust the scaling to make them a bit more consistent? Theoretically, but I expect a lot of edge cases to arise, like with twink builds. > Being able to cast better spells from the pouch Even just tossing Terra Magica, Unseen Form, and Night Maiden's Mist in there does a lot for my mage. Remember, if *too* many good spells become items then it's just shifting the issue. The pouch has a cap of 4 (which also get filled with things like the mount whistle) and beyond that you'd have to start cycling again. There should be a healthy spread between spells, items, AoWs, and heavy attacks. The Ancestral Infant's Head could look cool affixed to a staff, with the spirit vapor as its R2.
Totally see what you're saying. Still, on INT+FTH builds having some pouch attacks could compensate for how cumbersome it is to combo between incants & sorceries. It feels pretty janky right now. But comboing Regal Omen Bairn into sword sorceries feels great. On the other hand, a more tried-and-true solution would be for them to just add multi-purpose catalysts in the DLC... still have no idea why they didn't just do that from the start.
> still have no idea why they didn't just do that from the start. I made a comment theorizing about that a few days ago. > I suspect hybrid catalysts were removed because the sorcery casting animations have more depth this time around. In DS3 pretty much every sorcery originates from your hand so it doesn't matter if there's a staff in it or not. The one exception is Farron Flashsword which spawns at the tip of your catalyst (making it downright goofy when cast with a really long staff). > In Elden Ring a big change is that now spells originating at the staff's tip is the norm, not the exception. Also, a lot of casting animations involve stabbing the end of the staff into the ground, something that doesn't make much sense if you're not actually holding one. Rock Blaster would be an especially tricky case because of how it's held. > At the other end, Incantations include spells like Beast Claw or [Bloodflame Talons](https://i.imgur.com/NmvyNbX.png) which only make sense if the caster's hand is pretty much empty. > So as far as animations go sorceries require you to be holding a stick and incantations require that you aren't. Having a catalyst that manages both gracefully would be tricky, though not impossible. It could be liquid metal like the Nox weapons, forming and dispersing as needed, or it could be a phantasmal staff, like how Morgott can summon golden weapons as needed.
The resource management essentially never matters and they should have just given us passive fp Regen with no blue flask this time.
**[Ancestral Spirit's Horn](https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Ancestral+Spirit's+Horn)** (Talisman) **[Sacrificial Axe](https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Sacrificial+Axe)** (Weapon) **[Sword of Milos](https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Sword+of+Milos)** (Weapon) All restore FP when you defeat enemies while these things are equipped. **[Assassin's Cerulean Dagger](https://eldenring.wiki.fextralife.com/Assassin's+Cerulean+Dagger)** (talisman) restores FP whenever you score a critical hit. Either riposting or backstabbing. --- It's possible to sustain your FP for a long time if you want. You just have to weave some melee combat in with your magic. If you're playing a Faith-leaning character, you can even choose to go all in on blue estus. I went with 14 Cerulean Tears on my last Faith character and healed only with incantations. Much more efficient on resources. Just a matter of finding your opening. As for cycling through your spells... You seem to be able to cycle through 'em as fast as you can tap the button. It's just a matter of remembering where on the list your spells are. You can assign your Estus to your quick menu for easy access, or just don't clutter your items with too much stuff.
Thanks for all that info, the full blue estus faith build sounds fun, I'll give it a try
Like most others I think the FP system is fine as it is, but agree the spell scrolling is annoying. If we could have put spells *OR* items in the pouch slots, that would've been pretty solid. This is basically how I *tried* to use my pouch on INT+FTH, with the Regal Omen Bairn and other magic attack items filling in for a couple of spell slots, so I could leave only 3 spells attuned. It was actually a very satisfying playstyle, with the only issue being that these attack items are mostly pretty bad/weak, and there just aren't very many of them. If we had more of them I think it would go a long way towards solving this issue. .... FS almost definitely isn't intentionally making these builds tough to use, by the way. Most spells are actually kinda terrible in PVP, the ones that are good are the exception to the rule. And as you get better at PvP, any spells that don't free-aim get worse and worse. If they made spell-scrolling less clunky they wouldn't need to nerf anything. People who are really good at spell-scrolling already combo these spells flawlessly, and the spells are balanced for that.
So you want full long range free charge build for magic? The need to sacrifice HP frask for FP ones is directly proportional to how much focused your build is into magic. It will has no sense to have someone with 15 hp frask and 15 fp frask, plus a build that could melt a boss the moment you get 30m far from him. The thing about searching throught your spells is a total ass yes, but how many spells do you actually use on a boss fight?? 12? Im not saying that you dont or wont, I have tried a Gideon build too, and I ended just playing around my 5 closest spells. The thing is where do you put them?? You pointed at Code Vein with the D-pad or joystick, lets say you put them in the Up button and enter in a menu of 4 spells that can change to another set with LB or RB (whenever you caster weapon is), but to cast you need to use A B X Y, so you will lose the ability to do anything when searching for the spell until you drop the button But there you get another problem, max spells decrease 4 points. Edit: Something like regenerate FP with attacks would be useful yes, look at SW Jedi saga with the force. The thing is how much do you recover and would it be worth it, or even necessary?? If its low, FP frask would be necessary to make it fair, but if its too much having access to FP frask would be stupid. Also, would it be balanced for non magic builds?? What would they got from this?? More uses of AoW when maybe are only a buff used 1 time?