Why Elvish Sorceress can't heal?

[vvb]

Yes. I know. Balance and so on. But it's seem quite strange. Elvish shaman can heal, but is he forgot this skill after upgrade? How it could be "in real life"? Should the upgrade of units lead to just improve characteristics?

[Ken_Oh]

For the same reason that Pikemen have no ranged attack, Swordsmen have no piercing attack or firststrike, White Mages don't do fire damage, Drake Gladiators don't have firststrike, and Liches don't do impact damage.

Losing abilities is OK, as long as there is at least one advancement that doesn't lose any.

[Aethaeryn]

It's conceivable that the sorceresses know how to heal, just don't have the right herbs, etc., on them as they focus entirely on a new specialty. Not everyone who's a doctor is a doctor for their entire life even though they might not entirely forget their training.

In addition, balance and gameplay trump realism.

Even if you could come up with a coherent argument that makes total sense, you have to remember we're talking about nonexistent creatures (elves) doing nonexistent activities (magic). Realism simply doesn't cut it.

[Cloud]

All of the above condensed into one acronym: WINR .

(Yes that's a blod period/full stop).

[ParadiseCity]

Yes. I know. Balance and so on. But it's seem quite strange. Elvish shaman can heal, but is he forgot this skill after upgrade? How it could be "in real life"? Should the upgrade of units lead to just improve characteristics?

1. People forget stuff. Im guessing that every race would too.

2. They may be focusing soley on combat so even if they do remember they just let the druids do a better job.

3. Because they don't.

[AzuSkyLigh]

It's rather simple if you wish for a lore-related explanation.

Elvish sorceresses, unique to their own unit line and contrasting to the elvish druids, solely focus their training into the honing of their dominance over faerie fire, an essence which is so arcane and wonderfully mysterious in Wesnoth that even the general populace of elves would know little about it in general, most likely. The sorceresses, concentrated in the difficult task of mastering their ability to harness faerie fire as an offensive tool, purposely neglect to train in the art of healing magic. As their mastery of faerie fire grows, their unused healing capabilities decay through time until they have become mere dust, cast into the winds.

Thus, as an elvish shaman deigns to the arts of sorcery to become a sorceress, she will intentionally forgo her knowledge and skill of healing in order to become proficient in an art that is utterly shrouded by enigma: faerie fire. Late into their training, the elvish sorceresses-to-be will no longer be able to reliably mend the wounds of other comrades, though their offensive powers will have increased tremendously.

Why can't she just train in both healing and faerie fire, one may ask? Simply because faerie fire is such a profound mystery in the world that a shaman absolutely cannot fit both realms of magick into her head.

Edit: And of course, just because of gameplay reasons. But then again, I would rather offer someone a rational explanation, rather than just "lolgameplay."

[Skrim]

There are possible fluff reasons:

- The Sorceresses don't keep the requisite herbs & stuff.

- The Sorceresses have lost/neglected their healing skill through the course of their training in the use of offensive Faerie magic(the Sorceress' offensive capabilities are much greater than the Shaman's).

- Both of the above.


Note that the Saurian Oracle does not lose it's healing abilities because it's learning curve is significantly less jarring than that of the Sorceress, and of course, it doesn't learn anything new but just improves it's old Curse spell. The Oracle's more of a support caster than the out-&-out offensive Sorceress.

For the same reason that Pikemen have no ranged attack, Swordsmen have no piercing attack or firststrike, White Mages don't do fire damage, Drake Gladiators don't have firststrike, and Liches don't do impact damage.

Losing abilities is OK, as long as there is at least one advancement that doesn't lose any.

Note that all those units lose their old abilities but gain new ones. Pikemen get a Blade attack at level 3, Swordsmen get a 4-strike Blade attack, White Mages get advanced healing and an Arcane attack, Drake Thrashers get an Impact attack, and Liches get a Draining Arcane melee attack. It's just a trade-off.

Similarly the Sorceress trades off healing for Faerie Fire.

[Crunchy]

Sorceresses would be way too powerful if they healed and had their magic attacks. And as for the other...this game has nothing to do with real life

[Zachron]

It wouldn't be as overpowered to have a healing sorceress as a regenerating sorceress. lol.

Anyway. I like the preparation explanation better. The combat casting component is more the focus of the sorceress and her healing arts are simply neglected. In Invasion from the Unknown, there is a sorceress character who is so ancient that she relearned her healing arts and figured out how to balance both offensive magic an healing... but that is not for mainline.

[Araja]

I much prefer the gameplay reasons rather than 5 people repeating what the person said in the first sentence of his first post...

Nice explanations on the magic focus idea.

[vvb]

Well... may be sorceress just give ability to CURE?

[Yeran]

Its not too far off, that you forget old stuff when you move on with some kind of specialisation. For example, do you still remember every mathematical formula you leared at school? Most likely in many cases you have a rough idea how it was like and would be able to look it up in the right book to get it back in your mind. Then again on the battlefield that is not a favorable thing to do.

Additionally healing is a very sensitive area, as mistakes can easily render things even worse. So why would you call an elf that is much more interested in other areas of magic instead of a dedicated and easy avaiable healer which shamans are in elfish culture? The sorceress knows there are enough shamans around and as her healing ability would be rarely be needed she can freely forget it.
Shamanism was just a needed step approaching her true goals.

[Aethaeryn]

Well... may be sorceress just give ability to CURE?

I don't think anything in the Default multiplayer era is going to change at all without good reason. Arbitrarily giving a unit an ability for flavor reasons won't happen. The devs are just good at doing things for balance reasons that look like flavor things (feeding on necrophage, unique traits on goblins).

The problem with a balanced era is that there isn't much more you can do to it.

[thespaceinvader]

I think the following should be part of the FPI, or the explanation of WINR, or something: you don't make balancing changes to fit flavour at this stage of the game, you make flavour changes to fit balance.

If you see something you don't understand about a unit (Elvish Sorceresses can't heal, for instance) don't suggest it be changed, cos it won't be. Suggest an explanation for why it appears unrealistic and, if there isn't already an explanation, and yours makes sense, it might make it into the game.

[Ninereeds]

they focus on a different specialty. an elvish druid can cure and heal +8 but has a sucky attack.