Vampires or Casters?

"scoed;c-17247400" wrote:

"OEII1001;c-17247248" wrote:

"Hermitgirl;c-17247228" wrote:

I understand what you mean with it takes longer to make vamps powerful... but for me gameplay is playing all aspects of the game and I don't plan on limiting my witches to just being all powerful witches and done.

In fairness, it is possible to simply have your sim research vampires on the computer to level them up in about 36 sim hours as well, so it is more how you play it. While not doing that will take a very long time for a vampire to level, playing your spellcaster without dueling for knowledge or just having them practice magic and going to make yourself a sandwich will produce similar results as far as the time to mastery.

But you can't complete all the aspirations in that time as well, you can with casters. I have went from a non-caster to a supermax caster with everything, both aspirations, all spells learned, all potions learned, and all perks earned in just under 60 sim hours, taking care of every need along the way and maxing relationships with all the sages. No bloodline trait, no cheats. Sad thing is I know faster min/maxing is possible as I spent some time gathering ingredients and exploring the worlds as it was my first play through and mistakes were made. I will be honest though my sim was a "super starter sim" meaning I raised her up well as a kid and did all the childhood aspirations, earned the parenthood traits, earned top notch toddler, and the scouting aptitude trait as well. This may have contributed to faster XP gain or maybe not. Testing is needed to see if any of that mattered.

Are the aspirations really that important to vampires? After all, once you've only got thirst and vampire energy motives to manage and you've got a +10 Fine moodlet at all times then the rest no longer really matters.

"Hermitgirl;c-17247228" wrote:
Your post doesn't ring true for me either @scoed. For me I'm given the tools to play the way I want to play. Yes the need potion is there but I don't need to use it.. do I want to? Sometimes and sometimes frequently on certain characters. Or I might use it to get out of a bind on others... or I might give it (and in the future sell it) to other sims to use when they need.
I know some players can't seem to restrict themselves and although that might sound disrespectful it isn't... I think for some if it's there you have to use it. I don't have that problem. I have made an all powerful spellcaster (they know all branches) mostly to see what's there. I still haven't had the time to use every spell and see both good and bad effects though.
When you make a caster you can decide to learn only one school if you want. You can practice it all on your own without the help of a sage.. you don't even have to go to the realm. You do have to make them a caster in CAS though or have them born of casters or have another caster who has the right of ascension make them a caster. You can decide to never practice the other branches at all... It's your choice as a player of the game. I started playing a witch last night that I had another sim use the ascension spell on. I don't think I'll ever send her to the realm. She has a cauldron and she's the stereotypical cackling green hag of a witch. I'm also going to have her practice mischief magic. I plan on limiting her myself.
I actually can't wait to see if challenges crop out from this and how people will navigate what rules people will have to follow. I've mused on a number of scenarios myself :).
I understand what you mean with it takes longer to make vamps powerful... but for me gameplay is playing all aspects of the game and I don't plan on limiting my witches to just being all powerful witches and done.
They will have failings some will want to be normal people who want to fit in. Some will use their gifts in secret.. Some will use them to become rich and powerful but undetected.. and I could go on and on. To me giving them so many options just gives me more possibilities not less.

I do have an issue as I tend to min/max my sims. I can impose limits to create challenges, but even if I ban most of the "cheaty" aspects of casters, gaining the non-banned aspects is not a challenge. Easier than most skills in fact. The one area casters can shine is storytelling. Some stories can only be told with casters.

Sadly EA limited some stories without a reason regarding this aspect of play. I wanted to make an elf and play as a displaced elf mage struggling to overcome urban life hiding who he is and the magic he was born with. But casters don't have assess to vamp and alien cas items like pointed elf ears. I know mods exist for this but with mads I can be a werewolf or fairy as well, or well a caster pre ROM. And worse no real RPG cas clothing. No story book wizard wear. No witches pointed hats unless you own the spooky stuff stuff pack. Why?, just why? Yes I found all this as CC, but a caster pack minus folklore caster type garb seems like a huge missed opportunity for the one area casters excel in. storytelling. It is why despite the utter lack of challenge in them I still love them.

But Vamps have just as many storytelling possibilities out of the pack, as do aliens, ghosts and mermaids for that matter. I just love all the occults. I love fantasy stories. They make them possible in my sims games. I love casters for that reason. I just feel they lack any form of challenge, thus limiting them to building god sims, and storytelling. I would have preferred them had the curses been harder to remove or even permanent like Vamp weaknesses. Restrictions breed gameplay in my mind at least.

Good luck seeing the backfires on all the spells as they happen very rarely. in fact I super maxed three casters, zero curses, zero failed spells, zero accidental overloads, and only one failed potion and it only lowered my needs in green to half filled and a second potion fixed that. If having non-bug related issues happened more often wen being a caster I would love casters more. Magic would be more fun if more random stuff happened when casting. More risk would do tons to fix the lifestate in my opinion.

While I love vampires and that pack still remains one of my faves, I feel spellcasters have more freedom as they don't have to worry about plasma or dying in the sun. But spellcasters fit most of my sims overall.

"scoed;c-17247509" wrote:

"Hermitgirl;c-17247228" wrote:
Your post doesn't ring true for me either @scoed. For me I'm given the tools to play the way I want to play. Yes the need potion is there but I don't need to use it.. do I want to? Sometimes and sometimes frequently on certain characters. Or I might use it to get out of a bind on others... or I might give it (and in the future sell it) to other sims to use when they need.
I know some players can't seem to restrict themselves and although that might sound disrespectful it isn't... I think for some if it's there you have to use it. I don't have that problem. I have made an all powerful spellcaster (they know all branches) mostly to see what's there. I still haven't had the time to use every spell and see both good and bad effects though.
When you make a caster you can decide to learn only one school if you want. You can practice it all on your own without the help of a sage.. you don't even have to go to the realm. You do have to make them a caster in CAS though or have them born of casters or have another caster who has the right of ascension make them a caster. You can decide to never practice the other branches at all... It's your choice as a player of the game. I started playing a witch last night that I had another sim use the ascension spell on. I don't think I'll ever send her to the realm. She has a cauldron and she's the stereotypical cackling green hag of a witch. I'm also going to have her practice mischief magic. I plan on limiting her myself.
I actually can't wait to see if challenges crop out from this and how people will navigate what rules people will have to follow. I've mused on a number of scenarios myself :).
I understand what you mean with it takes longer to make vamps powerful... but for me gameplay is playing all aspects of the game and I don't plan on limiting my witches to just being all powerful witches and done.
They will have failings some will want to be normal people who want to fit in. Some will use their gifts in secret.. Some will use them to become rich and powerful but undetected.. and I could go on and on. To me giving them so many options just gives me more possibilities not less.

I do have an issue as I tend to min/max my sims. I can impose limits to create challenges, but even if I ban most of the "cheaty" aspects of casters, gaining the non-banned aspects is not a challenge. Easier than most skills in fact. The one area casters can shine is storytelling. Some stories can only be told with casters.

Sadly EA limited some stories without a reason regarding this aspect of play. I wanted to make an elf and play as a displaced elf mage struggling to overcome urban life hiding who he is and the magic he was born with. But casters don't have assess to vamp and alien cas items like pointed elf ears. I know mods exist for this but with mads I can be a werewolf or fairy as well, or well a caster pre ROM. And worse no real RPG cas clothing. No story book wizard wear. No witches pointed hats unless you own the spooky stuff stuff pack. Why?, just why? Yes I found all this as CC, but a caster pack minus folklore caster type garb seems like a huge missed opportunity for the one area casters excel in. storytelling. It is why despite the utter lack of challenge in them I still love them.

But Vamps have just as many storytelling possibilities out of the pack, as do aliens, ghosts and mermaids for that matter. I just love all the occults. I love fantasy stories. They make them possible in my sims games. I love casters for that reason. I just feel they lack any form of challenge, thus limiting them to building god sims, and storytelling. I would have preferred them had the curses been harder to remove or even permanent like Vamp weaknesses. Restrictions breed gameplay in my mind at least.

Good luck seeing the backfires on all the spells as they happen very rarely. in fact I super maxed three casters, zero curses, zero failed spells, zero accidental overloads, and only one failed potion and it only lowered my needs in green to half filled and a second potion fixed that. If having non-bug related issues happened more often wen being a caster I would love casters more. Magic would be more fun if more random stuff happened when casting. More risk would do tons to fix the lifestate in my opinion.

I don't need luck. I've seen a number of backfires and basically know in what situations they are likely to happen in at this point .. at least percentage wise. If I want a clumsier witch she gets less good perks.. can't say I'll always want this but my Aunt Clara might not be so well rounded as her niece Samantha... and Endora might trump them all.
I've got a bunch of hexed potions that I need to go through. I've had a few fires, been cursed 3 times, got dirty twice and my needs fell once. I'm not a chaos player for the most part... I don't mind it now and then but mostly I want to know what I have to work with and how it works and then I'm good. I know now it's going to be really hard for the caster I'm playing to die or overcharge because of the perks I've chosen to give her... so next time I'll play differently.
Your first argument was that casters have less gameplay .. and I can see for you that is true. For me it's the opposite. More less restrictive choices equals more ways to play for me.
If I want to play out a scene where two witches that normally make potions want to raise someone from the dead themselves privately... they can learn that spell even though it's in another school of magic. I can try to limit them by getting them powerful in the schools I want them in... then having them buy the book of the spell they need to learn. Or having a sim that collects all the tomes for others to read.. which I'm pretty close to having ready without cheats.
I don't deny that all the supernaturals have many story telling possibilities but I'm not attracted to telling those stories because of what I have to work with in comparison so the point is moot for me personally.

Vampires are a significantly more powerful lifestate, I have compared a Fully-Perked Virtuoso Spellcaster with every Spell Learned to a Fully-Perked and Optimized Grandmaster Vampire and here is what I have discovered.

- A fully-perked/optimized Vampire is immune to up to 11 Death Types which include Drowning, Starvation, Freezing, Overheating, Pufferfish, Steam and Old Age, even emotional Death's if they take the perk which grants them Deadened Emotions, they can become immune to Sunlight MEANWHILE a Fully-Perked Spellcaster is immune to only 1 Death Type which is Old Age, when Seasons are installed it becomes quite obvious how vulnerable their lifestate is compared to that a of a Vampire given they will Freeze and Overheat as easily as any normal Sim, they can "Cheat Death" with the Potion of Prompt Resurrection however it only lasts for 2 days, from what I can tell the Spellcaster has the inferior form of Immortality, the Potion of Immortality only stops them from dying of old-age, it does not actually give them eternal youth, you need the Potion of Rejuvenation for that and from what I hear it only resets your current age so if you do not want to age up you need to keep taking it.

- A fully-perked/optimized Vampire only has 2 needs which are Thirst and Vampire Energy, the former can be ignored with the Tamed Thirst perk as lack of thirst will not kill them, Vampire Energy is just their magic meter and is nothing like regular Energy, a Vampire with no Vampire Energy will not pass-out, they will just act all sluggish but they can restore it very quickly by performing Dark Meditation MEANWHILE a Spellcaster still retains their regular Human needs, they still need to Bathe, they still need to use the toilet, they still need to socialize or have Fun.

- Power-Wise their power-sets are very Similar, both have a few powers the other can not do but ultimately what is more useful? Move as a Bat or Fly on a Broom? from what my experience has told me the Witch will always go outside before using the Broom where as the Vampire will become a Bat wherever, this means their method of traveling is much quicker, the animation may also be shorter which means Bat Form is superior to Flying on a Broom, as for Mistform and the Spellcaster's Teleportation, spell they are mostly equal, it has also come to my attention the Vampire power-set has the capability of actually killing other-sims as their ability to bend emotions exceeds that of what the Spell-caster has available, remember the Grandmaster ability that gives all surrounding Sims an 8+ emotional debuff? other powers like Morphiate may be fun to use but ultimately they have no real purpose, making a Sim soil their pants however...

> @WolfNate said:
> (Quote)
>
> Um... I can drink an immortality potion bub don't say that only vampires can become immortal without turning aging off

You do realize the potion of immortality only stops you from dying from the old age death type, it does not give you eternal youth though, your sim will still age into an Elder despite having consumed it, you need to keep taking Potion's of Rejuvenation to maintain your current age.

> @paradiseplanet said:
> Honestly, being a spellcaster has made things become way too easy. As if the game wasn't already pretty easy to begin with, a high-rank spellcaster with no consequences to their actions makes them eventually boring to play in the end. Once they reach the highest of the high, it's over and done for me. Yet here I am still playing vampires after 2 years of its release, and while I've overdone the occult a bit too many times, I still return to them in the end.

> @paradiseplanet said:
> Honestly, being a spellcaster has made things become way too easy. As if the game wasn't already pretty easy to begin with, a high-rank spellcaster with no consequences to their actions makes them eventually boring to play in the end. Once they reach the highest of the high, it's over and done for me. Yet here I am still playing vampires after 2 years of its release, and while I've overdone the occult a bit too many times, I still return to them in the end.

If you think playing as a Spellcaster is easier, you should try a max-perked Vampire, I have played both, trust me when I tell me making potions to instantly restore needs is not as OP as simply not having those needs.

I've been thinking of giving one of my Vamps the Spellcaster traits & full perks. I love making mixed race & hybrids.

I gotta go with spellcasters myself!

On a sidenote, Spellcasters can become Plantsims.