Spells: Charisma and you

[Pringles]

So while screwing around trying to make ancient software work I had an idea. I looked into this idea and found some merit for it. Now whenever p99 branched off from eqemu there was code in there giving Necro's a bonus for lower charisma which never sat quite right. Well I did find a bunch of quotes from Geoffrey Z. a dev for classic EQ. This was slightly amusing as I had finally figured out how to read the old EQ spdat.eff and in huge font one of the spells data was this Geoffrey guy asking why I am reading this file. Anyways the links here were dead but most you can find on the archive. Thankfully this poster had a little foresight copying the text.

https://forums.daybreakgames.com/eq/.../#post-3678554

So I've seen a lot of guesswork and posts about Charisma's effect on various (mostly chanter) spells.

I've gathered a lot (most?) of the classic-era posts/tests around this issue, in the hopes that it helps get us a little closer to classic. Apologies in advance for the formatting and various broken links from long ago...


1 - The following post-classic-era thread links to several classic-era discussions (although those classic sub-links no longer work :/). It gives a very good summary (with comments from Verant itself!) of what impact CHA had on charms, mezzes, and lulls...

http://www.brellrants.net/brell/view...3c072341d4df83
Charisma has impact on...

1. Lull Resists (helps determine if you aggro or not)
http://eq.crgaming.com/viewarticle.asp?Article=4882
Quote:

Is the effect resisted?

If the effect is resisted, will the NPC get angry and tell its friends that it's time for a BardSnack(tm), or will it ignore what just happened?

Charisma is the sole determinant in the second check. It doesn't affect (resists).



2. Charm
http://eq.crgaming.com/archives.asp?...60&Action=View
Quote:

I checked with GZ this morning regardng the effect Charisma has in charming. The answer is that its effect is twofold.
Firstly it effects the chance at resisting the initial charm cast. Secondly, and more importantly, it makes it harder for the charmed NPC's save to successfully roll. This basically means it does effect duration.



3. Mez and Blur
http://eq.crgaming.com/archives.asp?...31&Action=View
Quote:

Spoke with GZ this morning regarding Charisma and its effect in relation to resists.

In summary Charisma effects the resists of Charms, Mesmerises and Blur-Type Spells across all classes.



Boston Fanfaire
http://eq.crgaming.com/viewarticle.asp?Article=4451
Quote:

Is Charisma actually taken into account on mesmerizations and charms?

Yes it is. It varies on a number of spells to its actual usefulness but it does have a use. There are different levels of charisma for different classes. The system does take into account that an Enchanter should have a higher charisma than say a Necromancer. It�s unfair to expect masters of the undead to be entirely charismatic.



GZ ON CHARISMA (SOFT) CAP
http://eq.crgaming.com/archives.asp?...75&Action=View
Quote:

GZ confirmed that the soft cap on Charisma is 200

For those unfamiliar with how a soft cap works, once a stat goes over 200 the actual real benefit diminishes. In practical terms this means an increase of a stat from 190 to 200 gives greater benefit than increasing it from 200 to 210.


GZ = Geoffrey Zatkin


2 - http://www.therunes.net/startingguide.htm (Date: 2000-2002)
Cha- This not only gets you the best prices from vendors, it directly effects things such as Charm, Mezz and Lull. I know there is a lot of debate on the effect of Cha for enchanters, however it was finally confirmed by that company.


-=Webarchive link EQCR=-

October 8, 1999

CHARISMA - THE NATURE OF CHARM
I checked with GZ this morning regardng the effect Charisma has in charming. The answer is that its effect is twofold.

Firstly it effects the chance at resisting the initial charm cast. Secondly, and more importantly, it makes it harder for the charmed NPC's save to successfully roll. This basically means it does effect duration.

Also charm does have a maximum duration. The higher level charm spell you use the longer the maximum duration can be. So there is a good reason to use that Allure spell even though its more mana.

Submitted by Baelish, 6:25 PM


November 10, 1999

WHY DO I NEED CHARISMA?
Spoke with GZ this morning regarding Charisma and its effect in relation to resists.

In summary Charisma effects the resists of Charms, Mesmerises and Blur-Type Spells across all classes.

Charisma will not lower resist rates of debuff spells, slow spells, direct damage spells, or DoT's.

Submitted by Baelish, 3:26 AM


NOVEMBER 5, 2002

CHARISMA & LULLS
Source: The Concert Hall.


3 - http://www.therunes.net/rguidehighlevel2.htm
EQ has always been mysterious in the mechanics department. It took a year before it was even acknowledged that Charisma played a role in Mez and Charm resists. Here are some facts that have been discovered (thanks goes out to Nanyea for this info) on the role that Charisma takes:

"Charm does an initial check that consists of a level of caster vs level of mob modified by MR.
Charisma affects this by adding a modifier to the MR approx 10 percent of your total charisma.. so a 300 chr enchanter gets a bonus neg 30 check. After the initial charm land..theres a per tick check based off the server clock.. ie the clock checks every 6 seconds according to the server and say your charm lands on second 4 of that 6... the mob gets a chance to break again in 2 seconds.. that's how you get instant or early breaks that don't last a full tick."


4 - Also, for the following *limited* test, which was unfortunately PoP-ERA :/, the data indicates the following...

With a 305 cha, and then, a 130 cha - and everything else that is relevant unchanged...

1 - Charm lasts ~10% longer with a 305 cha vs. 130 cha.
2 - Charm cast is completely RESISTED, MUCH more often with a lower cha (this surprised me).
3 - The guy's conclusion that #1 above corresponds to "almost no effect" is bogus imo. 10% is huge over time.

http://www.therunes.net/forums/viewt...735fa34e9b4a0f

https://forums.daybreakgames.com/eq/.../#post-3678593

Dev responds with current cha effects ill just label the SPA for readability

CHA currently affects:
how much merchants will charge you
bard fizzle chance
Chance of an NPC aggro'ing you when you cast pacify
Chance for SPA 63(memblur) to successfully blur your target
Chance for DI spells to heal for their full amount
Chance for SPA 22(charm), 31(enthrall/mez), 34(confuse), 63(mem blur) to be resisted, you hit this cap at 200 CHA
Note SPA 3(snare??? maybe typo and meant 31 aka mez), 20(blind), 22(charm), 99(root) have a minimum 5% chance of breaking every tick regardless of how much CHA you have. (only 22 gets a CHA bonus)
Edit: If you have 342 or greater CHA you have capped your bonus chance to all of the above.

[Pringles]

tl;dr

Charisma affects all classes' charming which really doesn't surprise me I mean if they wanted to treat charms different they could have added a Beguileanimal SPA or something. Some classes have this effect on charisma capped lower than others. However no matter your class cha should affect the resisting and saving throw of charm and just the resistance of mez while memblur gets a greater chance of success.
Crit resist on lulls should only make a saving roll versus the PC's CHA while
So it would only be useful for enchanter/necro/bard's to surpass as the soft caps GZ referred to were somewhat misleading as most of the things that CHA affects stop getting a bonus at 200 but it is still useful to max if you are lulling/blurring. I'd also expect DI to not be capped at 200 Enchanter probably had its cha effectiveness cap at 200 being the charming class and perhaps bards to. The caps on necro/druid charms must have been low enough that base stats could cap out the effect. Although I'd put necro's higher than druid's as necro gear has lots of negative charisma on it.

Also that 5% chance for charm to break being the floor would account for much shorter charm duration in classic not to mention druid/necro's lack of access to MR debuffs. Although just after the quotes from GZ Kunark dropped and gave druids their pet tash probably to balance them out with necro charm efficacy.

Lot to go through in there tbh and Im not sure what is implemented although I believe some of it is while some was removed. Druid's not being charismatic charmers here since 2011 is I'm sure infuriating.

[Pringles]

nvm on the druid/necro charm thing seems kanras fixed that long ago. I imagine it's some system where there is a cap that ench reach with less cha than Dru/Necro. You just need 200+ or more cha on those two classes to see it in action.

I think.