QCF Design Community

Hi,

I've heard a lot of good things about Crystal Ball on this forum (supposedly it's one of the best spellcasting items?) and Fire Heart looks really good on paper (just think of how many potions it's equal to) but I have some questions.

When are you supposed to use Crystal Ball? If I use it for leveling I can't afford to use it when I get to the boss (the gold cost is too high) but if I only use it for the boss, I'm passing up on items that could be useful for both leveling and the boss (Dragon Soul, Battlemage Ring, etc). Also, when I'm trying to use it to spike the boss, I can rarely get more than one or two refills from it because once you use it once, it's not worth using again until about another 12 glyph casts (it's rare to get such a big mana spike). Finally, the price for Crystal Ball just seems too high to me? For the same amount of money, I could have bought an item that equally helps my spellcasting, and also a potion on top of that, for instance. On dungeons that aren't generous with gold, that's pretty important.

As for Fire Heart, I can see the point of it more since it doesn't have an innate gold cost. Should I just be using it when it's at 90% or higher whenever possible to spike tougher enemies during leveling? Or is it more worth it to use at only about 40%-50% restoration since that will charge faster?

Crystal Ball is awesome for an elf caster in Naga City (tons of money) https://youtu.be/WJWIfu9xRrY

Actually, even for just 1-2 uses, the Crystal Ball is not that expensive. Of course it's better than the mana potion. Needless to say, a longer dungeons with plenty of money this become even better. And you notice that the item initially comes with 10 mana charged from the shop, right? It helps a lot in some desperate situaions. It's not charged from the start when you prepare it, but on the other side it's arguably one of the best preperation items with dedicated spellcasters. (Piercing Wand or Mage Plate are also fine there) One more thing to consider is that the item not only work with BURNDAYRAZ, but also PISORF. Think about a Wizard with 3 mana PISORF.

Saying about Fire Heart, I think you're playing with it really well.

Yeah, with two mana potions you refill 80% of your mana, while the crystall ball can refill 100% with one use.
If you have an elf spellcaster, mana booster prep and Mystera, you can easily start with 20 mana, cast 4 fireballs,
refill your crystal ball for 4 more fireballs, start converting your glyphs for 2 more fireballs each, use your potions
for 2 more fireball each, which means your crystall ball is now back at 20, and you can get 4 more fireballs.
Overall, you got 28 fireballs, which means 1120 damage at level 10, without the Flame boons or Battlemage ring.

If you think about it, when your fireballs cost 5 thanks to Mystera, the crystall ball saves you 1 mana per cast so now they cost only 4. The dragon soul, on the other hand, gives you 1 chance / 6.66 to get a free cost, meaning it saves you on average 0.75 mana per cast. This is why the dragon soul is small and the crystal ball cost money to activate.

Of course, it's even better if you have the two items.

And in most Hard or Vicious dungeons, after killing the first boss you will get 25 gold, which is quite enough to pay for the crystall ball refill.

Fire heart can be used both ways you're describing depending on the circumstances. Sometimes you want 100% for the boss fight, and sometimes a quick 30% refill is exactly what you need to finish a high level kill. It's also pretty useful for Vampires to regen their mana more easily.