For those of us who do a bit too much Monstrology, getting a bunch of a single monsters animus in bulk could take upwards of hours. For example, I have been collecting plenty of Lemuria's mobs and have had a blast leveling my lower-level characters with them as minions. However, having farmed 6 hours straight for 140 animus (on normal mobs) does not feel like a great use for my time. I understand that Monstrology should be time-consuming, but I feel some spells or gear to make the process just a tad faster would be a great help!
Spells
Of course, the only real way to have spells impact Monstrology would most likely come from aura effects. A big downside to collecting animus is the damage of course. Not having that +300 enchant can really add up the rounds (and time). Having auras that increase the base damage of Monstrology enchanted spells would be one of the best ways. One example could be: (All Monstology enchanted spells +300 damage for 4 rounds). Of course, the spell would most likely start at a lower number such as +100, scaling as star spells would. I speak more on damage later on, I know the implications of why it's this way, however it just causes more strife in the long run.
Whether it's trained from Burke herself, or crafted using animus, this could be a great addition, and can quickly speed up the animus process. Although I understand the tradeoff for collecting animus is a loss of damage, hours can quickly pass leaving you feeling like you wasted time; especially against bosses. It's best to view this morally from the player's perspective. The fun part of Monstrology is getting your favorite mobs/bosses as your allies, and having them be around your house. Not the hours of farming that went into the work, although I admit, it does bring satisfaction. Yet I am confident that you would gain the same amount of satisfaction having taken less time to hoard up as much animus as you can.
Gear
Gear is a tricky situation. At face value, it would be hard to scale Monstrology gear effectively to be useful compared to the meta gear we use today. However, I feel that you should look at what the players value the most when collecting animus.
Health and Defense to outlast their opponent. Using Monstrology on strong bosses could be a hard situation. For some, you could finally collect their animus but easily faint before your next turn. (Skeletaur I'll get you someday!)
The amount of animus. Potions and the member benefits are great, and usually the main time Monstrology users attempt to farm, for it saves an incredible amount of time. Adding additional animus when attacking an enemy could keep that same feeling, even when a character doesn't have either the potions and member benefit.
The damage. I understand the point of Monstrology not supporting damage. After all, if you kill the monster before you extract all of the animus it could cause trouble. However, this is usually not the case as you collect animus when you kill anyways, and if necessary many wizards will use lower-level spells or gear to not kill the enemy. Many teams refuse to let me and my other animus-collecting friends from using Monstrology enchanted spells for the sole reason of not enchanting with damage. And although the aura could solve this problem, I think it's an important note for gear.
What to do with the gear?
Personally, this is how I would approach Monstrology gear. I will start with the damage. Monstrology needs that extra boost in damage, but how can you make up for the lack of enchants without putting a crazy amount of damage on the gear? Well, you could make the gear's damage be specific to Monstrology enchanted spells. It's a bit hard to explain but I'll try: The gear will of course give some percentage damage (universal would make the most sense). However, it will also have another condition, a bit like the aura: "Monstrology enchanted spells +10% damage." Of course, it would be said with symbols, but I'm limited here. With this, you receive a damage boost when using Monstrology spells. So if your gear gave 10 universal damage, and +10% when using Monstrology enchanted spells, then your Monstrology spells will do 10% more than normal spells (20% in total). Of course this is a smaller example, but using this process could give Monstrology enchanted spells the oomph they need to be useable in a team setting.
Next, I will speak about the amount of animus. Each gear piece should affect the amount of animus you receive in some way. Whether that be small multipliers (i.e 1.1x, 1.3x) or flat numbers (+1 extra animus, +2 etc), any amount would immediately catch the eye of those who farm animus. This is a more simple situation compared to damage thankfully. I will not speak about health/defense because I feel it would be self-explanatory.
Balancing and Getting the Gear
I think it is fair to say this gear can be crafted. Whether it's using animus, or treasure cards created from animus, I feel this is the best situation for balancing. For example, if you want a level 20 version of the gear, it would require Krokotopia animus, whereas level 130 gear would require Empyrea animus. Set bonuses would be a great addition as well, perhaps giving power pip chance or more universal damage. It's a simple concept to understand, but I feel it's the best way to implement it.
Lastly, Pets
I think it's fair to say pet traits having to do with Monstrology would be a great addition. For example, some traits could enhance the amount of animus you collect. Other traits can focus on Monster types, letting you gain even more animus should you collect that specific monster animus. There can be some custom Monstrology pets as well that you can buy from Burke or other sources. These pets can come with Monstrology cards, or give a passive stat like the Dapper Corgi!
Closing Thoughts
Monstrology is a blast, but it can become slow at times. I feel the more support we get for the hobby, the more interested newer wizards would become. Many do not even realize how Monstrology fully works! I would love to see it get some more representation.
This post is coming from the point of view of someone who solos when doing Monstrology (as finding groups interested in Monstrology is tough). Therefore, my problem may be different for others. I would love to hear other wizards perspectives on the subject when it has to do with group settings.
Thank you very much if you've made it through this lengthy post. I would love to hear other's thoughts as well, I'm sure there are better solutions that I didn't think of.
I really shouldn't have written it at 5 am, sorry for any typos! As a comment though, I want to bring up some things. I want to make it clear that I give double animus benefits and animus potions *lots* of attention. However, this post is mainly focusing on the base game without the use of potions and the benefit. Potions are an incredible way to speed up farming. However, I feel any support for Monstrology is for the best. Not everyone will have potions.
I'd like to compare it to energy. You could wait for all your energy to return, you can use elixirs you farmed on grub guardian and the calendar as well. But to get the most out of your energy, you'd always wear your energy gear right? Along with your energy pet, and heck, even jewels. They are optional pieces of gear, yet make the entire energy system flow much better and give less stress to those who take their time (and money) to get these *quality of life* changes. Even fishing gear is a good example, but I've ranted for long enough.
This is my intention with my original post. I wanted to clear that up because I didn't fully structure the post how I wanted. Always triple proofread folks!
