Being a Mage - Part 3

There's more to being a mage than just direct damage. Sure, killing things dead has obvious advantages, but sometimes that's not what you need. Here are a few other tips for general spell use. After all, between the three skills, you have 92 spells to play with.

General Tips

- Use the Field spells. Wall of Stone has a short duration, but works if you're looking for a quick way to break line of sight to heal and/or hide. Energy Field, on the other hand, has a decent duration, and often only one is necessary to completely halt a monster. For melee creatures, this means you're free to blast away without fear (until the field drops). Throwing two more fields to completely box a monster (or monsters) in makes a nice target for Fire Field; Energy Fields won't build where a creature is standing, but Fire and Poison will. Using the terrain and/or Energy Fields to trap casting enemies in a Poison Field is a good way to ensure they only waste their time Curing (so long as they're not immune to 4th). Energy Fields do not break line of sight like Wall of Stone, so casting creatures will teleport over it.


- Summons are a mixed bag. Beyond just the usefulness of the summon is managing your control slots. Blade Spirit is a decent enough spell, but requires as many control slots as an EV, which without question tears open many more new holes in things. The Blade Spirit advantage is that it's a 5th circle spell, so GM mages never fail in casting and it has a long duration. The 8th Circle summons can be useful, but are generally not worth the cast time, especially with less than 120 Magery; there's few things more annoying than fizzling on Summon Daemon three or four times before finally getting it right only to have it dispelled by the first creature it runs across.

Necromancy gives us more interesting summons in the familiars, but they're ultimately not that useful either. The Horde Minion is a nice pack creature, but if it's dispelled then everything it was carrying goes with it. Thanks to it's habit of rushing into a fight, you don't want it carrying anything important outside of town. The Dark Wisp suffers from the same trouble of rushing into combat, which makes it's mana flare useless beyond a mana battery while macroing. The other familiars have their uses, but against the PF Uniques they're not going to make it. Animate Dead is a better summon spell. It takes no control slots and can conjure some okay monsters. It's based off the dead monster's fame, so you'll get the best stuff from the stronger enemies. The target corpse can't be undead, however.

Nature's Fury might be my favorite summon. It's very quick to cast, takes one control slot, and can actually tear some things up when you get a few out. A single Fury isn't a match for an EV, but four or five can do some work. They have a very short duration, so don't expect them to distract anything for too long. At the same time, I've been known to swarm Terragon Roaches with seven or eight of them with good results. Spellweaving also has Summon Fey and Summon Fiend. Summon Fiend will hit your karma, so avoid it if you're trying to stay in the positive. These two spells are somewhat interesting, but I find that Nature's Fury is far better in most/all cases. These two are casters, so if you have an Evo tank they might add a bit to the table, but otherwise stick with something else.

Not directly a summon, but Dryad's Charm allows you to sway Humanoid creatures into your service. They'll take control slots and there aren't many that are highly useful, but it is fun to watch an Arctic Ogre Lord work for you for a change.

- Buffs and debuffs. Bless and Curse are both very nice spells. They should not be underestimated. In the old days, they did a flat magery/10 + 1 bonus or penalty. The new formula depends on Eval instead *and* works as a percent bonus/penalty. This means that GM Eval gives you 11% of your base stat bonus when you bless, or 16 points off a base 150 stat. That's another 1% spell damage outside of item SDI bonuses and 16 mana, as well as 16str/8hp. It also helps offset the *wild* curse penalties some monsters inflict. Curse takes into account the target's resist, but even still you can expect a solid reduction to the target's stats. Even better, cast Evil Omen first.

Necro is almost sheerly debuffs. Blood Oath is very nice if you can actually take a few hits to make use of it. Evil Omen is even better. It has a short duration and only impacts the next spell you cast on a target, but you have three options with it: 25% more damage on your next damage spell, boosting poison one level, or taking advantage of the fact that it sets a target's resist to 50 and landing a good debuff or Pain Spike. Corpse Skin is very helpful against things already weak to Fire or Poison, or even more against things with high resists all around. If you're using Mondain's Staff and don't have the Physical Resist to make up it's penalty, Corpse Skin is also a buff option to cover that for you. Just make sure your Fire and Poison resists are good enough that you don't trade one weakness for two. Mind Rot is the final Necro curse, but outside of PvP it's very little help. The creatures it will work on could more easily just be killed.

Spellweaving has buffs galore, and this is where the real benefit of the skill shows. Arcane Circle, first and foremost; it provides a benefit to all your other Spellweaving spells, depending on the level of the Focus Crystal you create. You'll now need other people to get a crystal, but it makes a big difference and is worth the effort. Gift of Renewal is moderately useful; throw it on your Evo for an HPR boost and possibly saves you from having to cure once. Ethereal Voyage is decent enough for some quick scouting. The time limit is somewhat short and it can't be used with other forms such as the Necro forms or Reaper. It loses most/all of it's usefulness once you GM stealth, but until then it has a place. Gift of Life is the final, and likely most appealing, buff of the skill. For five minutes or so, you're granted a one-time instant resurrection at the spot you died. You're restored with 50% health and cured of any poisons. It can also be applied to bonded pets. This is without a doubt one of the more useful spells in the game, and is only really beaten by Sacrifice res. The higher your skill, the better the duration.

Since the upgrade, we've gained the rest of the Spellweaving spells. Arcane Empowerment does not grant SDI outside the cap, but it does impact healing strength and increase summons' resistance to dispel. If you have a high enough crystal to raise the duration of this one, you have a potent spell to throw on for pet healing or summon bombs. Attunement absorbs melee damage outright; without a focus at all, it blocks 48 damage and up to 90 damage with a level 6 focus. Immolating Weapon adds a very minor bit of damage to your melee attacks, overall underwhelming but if you need a bit of a boost...

- Polymorphs. This is hard choice to make. Lich form still has great regen rate, but it takes you off your mount and offers not much else. I have trouble telling if Wraith form actually lets you mana leech with your spells; if not, it's benefits are pretty small and it also has the penalty of forcing you to dismount. Vampire is where it's really at. Even with 100% LRC the garlic penalty is in play, but immunity (more like free cures, but eh) to poison 4th and lower is a massive benefit. The life drain effect doesn't count for spells, but if you have a melee weapon for mana leech, you may enjoy the free life leech.

The contest comes in with Reaper form. Yes, it is ungodly slow; it's intended to be used in places where you can root down and focus on spewing damage. The benefit is that the SDI bonus it applies is outside the item cap; at base it's 10%, +1% per level of your arcane focus. This sounds small when you're already at 125% item SDI, but it can (literally) mean the difference between one-shotting drakes or having to throw a second spell at them.

I would recommend using Vampire for the majority of the time; you keep your mobility and gain poison resistance. When you have time to root down, by all means take advantage of that free SDI bonus; it's very much worth the trouble.