Wizard101 Level 97 Spell Analysis (Globals)

Wizard101's release of Khrysalis Part 2 brought with it three sets of new spells. The first was a set of Moon Shift spells (HERE), and the second is a set of new global spells! Let's give these a look.

What are Globals and Where do I Get Them?

Global spells, as you likely know, affect the entire arena. You get the bonus and your opponents get the bonus. Existing globals, oftentimes called "bubbles," started out costing four pips, but were later reduced, and now cost two or three depending on the spell. Original globals were trained from trainers, but these new ones come from Amelia StarDust after completing her quest "A Dream of Avalon" in Radiance Reborn. You only get your school's spell for free, but you can use training points to train others.

Bubble Wars Heat Up

I'm going to take a little bit different approach to analyzing these spells and talk about them largely as a whole, but I'll touch on some individually. First and foremost, I can say that PvP is going to change. "Bubble wars," as they are called, occur in a match where one person uses a global (or "bubble") spell, and another uses their own to replace the previous one. And it goes back and forth, with both parties trying to control the field. Previously, each class was restricted to one or two bubbles and they now all have options - with shiny new effects to go along with them. With some of the abilities given by these new global spells, controlling the global in a PvP match will be more important than ever.

Old vs. New

Most schools had damage increases for their bubbles. Storm, Myth, and Fire had a 25% damage boost. Ice had a 35% damage boost. These all cost two pips each, which means that for the most part, they could be thrown up every round if necessary during a bubble war. These damage boosts were definitely something, but for the pip cost versus the percent, were really only useful if you intended to attack more than once or just needed an extra boost in addition to all of your other power-ups. And for some people, that might be quite often, but I'm gotten into the habit of pulling one-hit kills, at least in PvE. In PvP, not only does this boost your own damage over the long term (and you will definitely be hitting multiple times), but it also prevents your opponent from getting his or her own boost from their global spell, and that's always a plus.

These new versions add 20% armor piercing for that school (minus Ice, which gets 25%), and varying amounts of critical. Now this might not seem like a lot, but it's concentrated critical, not spread out across gear pieces. You could have four gear pieces with 30 critical each (totaling 120) and only have 12% critical chance. Whereas having 100 critical (20 less than before) on only one piece of gear would give you 19% critical rating. And that's the power of the auras. In addition to the armor piercing, you get and extra 14 to 23% chance of criticals. That's pretty significant, really, and could mean a majority of your hits go critical.

Life, Death, and Balance were a little bit different. Life got a 3-pip +50% to all heals global. This is okay for PvE, but it's not very sensible to spend the pips giving your opponent this same advantage in PvP, unless you believe you're just loaded up on heals beyond their ability.

Life did have a damage bubble aura, but it was only available through pet cards, which you don't get as many of and can't be placed in side decks or necessarily be reliable. This new global should increase Life's ability to do some damage, though they are on the lower end of the critical scale, getting only a 90 rating boost as opposed to the average 100.

Death had a -65% heal global, which might seem like another situation where you may be hurting your opponent, but also yourself. And for my play style, it is. This definitely isn't a PvE global. It's meant for you to make use of your steal spells for health, which are not affected by the global, while preventing enemy healing. With some of the new tools available to Death, and especially if Shift Sugar Glider is made to cost only four pips, this may become an outdated global, as stacking Infections leaves the opponent with less opportunity to heal than an easily replaceable bubble. There is currently no spell that removes all negative wards.

Death, too, has a damage bubble option, but again only through pet cards. This new bubble may allow them to get some easy extra damage while being able to maintain their heal-reducing powers through Infections.

Balance had one of the worst globals around. It grants an additional 35% pip chance... to everyone. And it also costs four pips. Not only do you end up having close to 100% power pip chance later in the game, but you also don't want to be giving that kind of advantage to anyone - even PvE enemies. Balance didn't have any other options that I recall. This new global is going to give them something they can actually use.

At four pips, these won't be as easy to replace during bubble wars, and may offer better opportunities for a series of attacks while they're up. Like all globals, these will, of course, be more and more useful the longer they last, and also won't be used against PvP (and possibly PvE) enemies of the same school.

Offense is the New Defense

Why all critical and armor piercing? My first guess is that it's a response to the complaints of too much resistance. Instead of treating the root causes, however, the solutions seem to be over-correction. We had "Jadezillas," and that birthed "Crit Monsters" which are now just as bad. The solution was to tweak gear and stats so that the resistance wasn't so high. Over-correction is okay for solving a problem, but these are very permanent spells, and I worry that curving a trend is simply setting a new one.

That being said, this will definitely lead to a new PvP dynamic and involve more quick-paced matches and fewer "who can last the longest" battles. This is definitely something I'll have to adept to, as I am a very casual PvPer, and these updates seem to be pushing things to either extreme.

Will you be using your new global spell?

Thanks for reading and see you in the Spiral! Credits: Big thanks to Johnny for the global spell card. Published with his permission.