Mages: barrier and elemental kept for combat

Out of combat, frost mages kept recasting their Ice Barrier and Water Elemental. The mana spent sent them back to sit and drink, without fighting. Both spells are now cast in combat only, which was checked on the test server with copies of the same mages.

The problem

The break summary had shown mages stuck resting. The 30 October batch fixed resting itself, but a second flaw remained. After each rest, the mage cast two spells meant for combat while out of combat:

Ice Barrier, about once a minute, for 21% of its base mana;
Water Elemental, as soon as its cooldown ended, for 16%. It only lives 45 seconds and almost always vanished before the next fight.

Mana dropped straight back below the resting threshold, and the mage sat down to drink again without having fought. On the test server, on 30 October, three mages of level 66 to 79 cast 41 barriers and 26 elementals in 30 minutes, without killing a single monster.

The fix

Ice Barrier is now cast in combat only.
Water Elemental is summoned at the start of a fight, when the target still has at least half of its health or against two attackers. It is never summoned out of combat any more. With the Glyph of Eternal Water, the permanent elemental then stays.
Other pets (demons, ghoul) do not change.

Checked on the test server

Same mages (levels 37 to 79), copied from the same state, 30 minutes of normal play:

before: 41 Ice Barriers and 26 Water Elementals, all out of combat; 28 rests; no monster killed;
after: 5 barriers and 3 elementals, all in combat; 15 rests; 9 monsters killed.

This trial revealed one last waste. Two high-level mages, passing through starting zones on their way to their trainer, cast these spells against level 5 to 7 wolves. A spell kept for combat is no longer cast against a single monster that no longer gives experience. The same rule applies to the other spells kept for combat: the warrior's Shield Block, the paladin's Holy Shield and the rogue's Hunger for Blood.

With this final version, in a new 30-minute trial, the level 79 mage met those wolves again without casting either the barrier or the elemental. Only one elemental and one barrier were cast, in combat against a monster that still gives experience. No deaths during this trial.

On the combat bench, against real level 55 and 60 monsters, alone or in pairs, the mages won 96 fights out of 96, with no deaths. All 40 elementals were summoned in combat.

Deployment

The new module version is installed on the server. The autonomous players stay stopped: this fix will be in place for the restart.