Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (
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the wharf rat wrote:
> What's the tradeoff between mana pool and flowing thought,
> IOW suppose I need to give up 50 mana to get 2 points FT. Is that
> a good or bad trade? What if it's 100 mana for 2 FT?
How much of your mana pool does 100 mana represent, 1%? 10%? 50%?
Now ask yourself, how often do you go from FM to OOM in very short
order, and end up having to run or die?
Then ask yourself how often you find yourself waiting for mana to
regenerate, or how often you forbear doing something that might speed up
kills per hour, because you can't afford the mana.
The first is a mana pool issue; mana regen takes time, in the short run
you really only have the mana in your pool, if your pool is so small you
are regularly emptying it out, then your pool is too small. If, on the
other hand, you've never run out of mana in the pool in a single pull,
then your pool is larger than you've ever needed.
The second, the question of mana over time, is a regeneration issue;
whenever you have to wait for mana or skip doing something because it
will use mana up, then your regeneration is slow; only if you can always
cast whatever you want, any time you want, are you at a point where more
mana regen won't help. If you are asking these questions I'd bet you
aren't at that point, although believe it or not it is attainable; its
quite possible to get to a point where you can't cast spells any faster
than your mana regenerates without getting aggro you don't want, at
least for some classes.
Slightly off topic, Focus Effects are also very important here, because
many of them mean spending less mana to do a job, one way or another.
Spend less mana on a spell, and its like getting both FT and pool at the
same time; if your spell only costs you 90% of what it "should" (say 90
mana instead of 100) then its as though your pool is 10% deeper, AND
your mana regenerates 10% faster. Focus effects tend to be far easier
to get than FT.
Back to your original question, I'd say a rough rule of thumb is that
FT1 is worth about 5% of your mana pool, if not more; if your pool is
deep its worth 10%, even 15%. If your pool is very shallow, though, it
may not be worth much at all; if you can't cast enough spells in short
order to get thru a mob, then your mana regen rate won't matter at all,
because you'll be dead. Oddly, the lower your level the more the FT is
worth, because your spells cost much less, so regenerating the mana
spent takes a lot less time, Plus, you're only eligible for relatively
small mana regen spells. With KEI or better, plus BAOR, beastlord buff,
some MC and so on, you won't even notice FT1. But when you're running
Breeze, that FT will add half again to your standing mana regen!
Lance
Bergh Brelltender, 65 Cleric, retired
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