The Case for the Spear

[NocturniaUzuki]

@Hyomin Park

I'm interested in why you feel that "there are more useful cards to hold." From my perspective, I've always found the idea of holding Balance a little silly, actually. If you are looking at the game from the common DPS-centric view, I can see where this comes from. As I understand it, DPS-centric players mostly approach the card system in the following manner:

/cast Draw
>if Draw = Balance/Arrow
>>/cast Spread
>else
>>/cast Redraw
>>>if Spread = Balance/Arrow
>>>>if Redraw = Spear/Arrow/Ewer/Spire
>>>>>/cast RR
>>>>if Redraw = Balance/Arrow
>>>>>/cast Spread (Balance/Arrow)
>>>>>/cast Balance/Arrow

This is probably a bit off, but I'm not a traditionally DPS-centric player so I'm just trying to figure out how DPS-centric players approach it.

To me, though, I don't see Spread as particularly valuable for straight DPS increase. The power of Spread is that it allows you to have absolute control over when to use the card that is held. For DPS-centric players, I suppose the idea is that you fish for a Balance or Arrow, hold it, then fish for a RR effect or another Balance/Arrow, then use the card(s). This definitely increases DPS, but I don't think it increases it enough to justify sacrificing most of the potential power of the control aspect of Spread. Instead, I see Spread as the skill I use to hold cards that are highly situational so that I have them available when an applicable situation arises. This resolves the issue that several people have commented on: that Spear is situational, which clashes with the fact that drawing a Spear is RNG. Well, yes, it's RNG. But you can work around that RNG by using Spread to hold it. The cost of doing this is not being able to use Spread. I don't know exactly how this affects the math, but the impression I get is that it doesn't make nearly as much difference as people think. Without access to Spread, the DPS approach would still revolve around fishing for Balance/Arrow. But now, instead of holding it, you simply use it immediately if you get Balance/Arrow. If you don't get Balance/Arrow, you just RR then fish for Balance/Arrow on the next Draw, which is the same as it was before. It's still a process that requires two Draws. The only difference is that now you have to use the Balance/Arrow immediately if you get it, instead of waiting to build the RR effect.

My approach to the game is safety-centric, and I believe in maximizing DPS by preventing disasters (though I only maximize it generally, rather than getting into extremely detailed DPS analyses). I think everyone can agree that if the party wipes, the battle is slowed down significantly more than if you don't use Balance/Arrow. Using Balance/Arrow throughout a fight increases the clear speed by... maybe 10%? If the battle would otherwise take 10 minutes, it will now only take 9, or 1 minute less. On the other hand, if the party wipes at the 6 minute mark, the fight has to be restarted, which increases the fight duration by the duration of the first attempt: 6 minutes. This logic is why I typically hold Spear (and sometimes Ewer or Bole), though I also just dislike the feeling of wiping and will almost never "just wipe" a run because it would be "faster" to restart.

My approach to the card system is very different from DPS-centric players:

/cast Draw
>if Draw = Spear
>>/cast Spread
>else
>>if [card] is needed
>>>/cast [card]
>>if [card] is not needed
>>>/cast RR

In other words, I fish for Spear instead of Balance/Arrow, then hold it until such a time as I need to use it. Then I start judging each card draw on the situation. For example if I draw Bole and I know a dangerous mechanic is coming up, like solo-tank Akh Morn in Royal Menagerie, I'll use it to mitigate the Akh Morn. I'll only use an offensive card if I deem it 100% safe to do so. Once I use Spear though, I will usually start fishing for it again. However, I won't just throw away useful cards to fish for a Spear unless I desperately need to find Spear. If I'm not looking for any particular card and I get Balance/Arrow, I will use Balance/Arrow. I only use offensive cards when I have determined that there is no significant risk in prioritizing DPS at that time.
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Also, I've seen the suggestion about changing Spear to have a weaker effect, but allowing it to affect skills that are on cooldown. I can get behind this idea since it doesn't remove or replace Spear - it just gives it a more direct impact on DPS for the DPS-centric players to get behind. I think this solution would a good compromise to the situation. I would point out, though, that just like how using the current Spear on a player besides oneself requires the player to predict what cooldowns the target player has available at any given time, the new Spear would require the player to know which of a target's spells are on cooldown at any given time. This problem can be somewhat ignored, since it will always have at least some effect on the target, but getting the most out of the card still runs into the same problem.