Better Mage
Mage is my favorite class in Terraria.
I love the versatility, the cool weapons and the idea of having to manage resources for a big reward. However, the accessories are boring or underpowered and mana ends up being of little to no importance past Eye of Cthulhu. Mods do little to fix this, with most making things even worse (e.g. Ethereal Talisman in Calamity does the following: 15% increased magic damage, 5% increased magic critical strike chance, 10% decreased mana usage, +150 max mana, increases pickup range for mana stars, automatically use mana potions when needed if visibility is on) as they simply give mages stat boosts (which does nothing to make the class more interesting and just makes mana more irrelevant) or stack the same boring and useless vanilla effects (e.g. celestial magnets bigger pickup range for mana stars).
However, it would not be right for me to critique the game without providing my own ideas. These ideas have not been tested and they could probably use a bit of tweaking, but I have done my best to rework the mechanics and accessories of the mage class to make it more challenging, entertaining and unique as well as enhancing the sense of progression throughout the game. I have refrained from introducing new accessories and have not touched on armor or weapons in this thread.
Mechanic ChangesHearts/mana stars - Can only be picked up if the player does not have full health/mana. This would likely be a welcome change for all classes, not just the mage
Mana sickness - Is now called 'mana overload' and deals damage to the player and provides a boost to magic damage which both scale with the severity of the debuff in an attempt to maintain the utility of mana potions while providing a more tangible risk-reward scenario for mages
Mana Regeneration - Mana now takes much longer to begin regenerating when depleted and takes a bit longer to regenerate back to full which will hopefully drag mana regeneration potions and accessories into relevancy
Star Cloak & Upgrades - The stars now home onto nearby enemies
Mana flower - The auto use of mana potions can now be toggled on and off
New MechanicsBlocking - This is something that I think should be introduced to the game to reward skilled players while still giving some benefit to less skilled players and make shield accessories more interesting than a flat defensive boost and immunity to knockback. It could be activated with alt fire and reduce the damage of attacks by more the closer Mouse 2 is pressed to the frame that damage is dealt in, with the attack being fully negated when the block is timed perfectly. To stop this from being overpowered blocks should have a short cooldown and maybe make the player have slightly reduced damage for a few seconds to prevent blocks from being spammed and give a minor cost to using them. I will explain how this will work with shields better if I end up writing a thread on making melee better but I'm introducing the idea in this thread as I have included this mechanic in my rework of one of mage's accessories in an attempt to make it more interesting and powerful
Shimmer Transmutations
Putrid Scent and Flesh Knuckles can now be interchanged using the shimmer
Band of Starpower
Acquired: Breaking shadow orbs or crafted in graveyard with mana crystal and band of regen
Stats: +20 max mana, decreased interval until mana begins regening
Band of Mana Regeneration
Acquired: Crafted at a tinker’s workshop with a Band of Starpower and a Band of Regeneration
Stats: +40 max mana, increased mana regen rate, decreased interval until mana begins regening
Arcane Cuffs
Acquired: Crafted at a tinker's workshop with a Band of Mana Regeneration, a Shackle, and 50 bones
Stats: +60 max mana, increased mana regen rate, decreased interval until mana begins regening, allows the user to cast a shield spell (alt fire) reducing the damage of attacks and reflecting projectiles when perfectly timed
Celestial Magnet
Acquired: Found in sky chests or sky crates
Stats: Increases the range at which mana stars can be picked up at to fifty blocks, mana stars are instantly picked up, mana stars have an increased chance to drop from slain enemies
Celestial Emblem
Acquired: Crafted at a tinker's workshop with a Celestial Magnet, Sorcerers Emblem, 5 souls of sight, 5 souls of might, and 5 souls of fright
Stats: Increases the range at which mana stars can be picked up at to fifty blocks, mana stars are instantly picked up, mana stars have an increased chance to drop from slain enemies, increases magic damage by 15%
Celestial Cuffs
Acquired: Crafted at a tinker's workshop with a Celestial Emblem, Arcane Cuffs, and 10 spectre bars
Stats:+80 max mana, increased mana regen rate, decreased interval until mana begins regening, allows the user to cast a shield spell (alt fire) reducing the damage of attacks and reflecting projectiles when perfectly timed, increases magic damage by 15%, increases the range at which mana stars can be picked up at to fifty blocks, mana stars are instantly picked up, mana stars have an increased chance to drop from slain enemies
Nature’s Gift
Acquired: Found in jungle
Stats: 5% reduced mana cost, reduces the damage caused by mana overload by 6.25%
Mana Flower
Acquired: Crafted at a tinker's workshop with a Nature's Gift and a mana potion
Stats: 10% reduced mana cost, reduces the damage caused by mana overload by 12.5%, automatically uses mana potions when out of mana
Mana Cloak
Acquired: Crafted at a tinker's workshop with a Mana Flower, a Star Cloak and a Putrid Scent
Stats: 15% reduced mana cost, reduces the damage caused by mana overload by 25%, automatically uses mana potions when out of mana, homing stars fall from the sky when injured, enemies are less likely to target you, 8% increased magic critical strike chance, damage restores its equivalent in mana
This is the core of the idea of the mage class but at the moment it just ends up taking a back seat role due to insignificance of mana regen and the poor design of mana sickness. I think my suggestions make it much more central to the mage class like it is supposed to be, but I feel as though mana should be more than just a resource pool from which you draw from as you're spamming Mouse 1. I mean I'm playing mage not ranger gosh darn it. I don't just want to kill enemies quickly; I also want fun and exciting effects. I want a bit of flair, a bit of magic. I feel as if mages should get some sort of buff if they keep their mana topped up, just to make things more interesting. I feel that these buffs should be focused on either team support or protection from weaker enemies. I feel that a change such as this would increase mage's versatility and make an interesting choice for the player about whether they should stop casting for a bit to help other players on their team or keep casting to add to the dps. I would also like to see these buffs be viable in single player as well as multiplayer (though I do think they should have more of an impact in multiplayer). I unfortunately don't have any ideas for this at the moment as unlike most of the rest of this post it was an off the top of my head idea. However, I will add to this thread in the future about any ideas I have for this.
