I will go over my opinion of the pro's and the con's of playing a "Mage."

Pro's:

-Mage is the highest Damage dealing class because of the large amounts of aoe they can spam.

-You can run much faster then the other classes because you wear cloth. This in turn makes you an excellent kiter.

-You have 3 schools of magic available to you plus some divine spells from the fighter trainer and poison spells from the ranger trainer that are really usefull. Having access to 5 schools of magic can make you quite a versitile killing machine.

-You have an amazing mana pool because of high benefit from int.

-You have alot of +dmg to spells because of your int.

-You can solo trash quite quickly.

Con's:

-You take alot of damage beause of lack of defense.

-You can't cast any spell while moving

-You don't have much endurance and when you do put points into endurance you do not get that much of a benefit.

-Mages tend to have alot more difficulty on boss fights then the other 2 place holder classes.





My personal advice and solutions:

-Get some nice cloth, mainly focusing on 2 of the 3 basic schools of magic. In my opinion Shadow is a really strong school (mainly because of "Shadow Lightning" and "Shadow Bolt") that will go nicely with either fire or frost.

-Pick up the "Righteous Stomp" spell from the fighter trainer, this is amazingly usefull to a mage. If you notice that you are getting surrounded and begin to take lots of damage, you can pop it and run away. It also has alot of synergy with some of your other spells.

-Go to the ranger trainer and pick up "Gaseous Blast" and "Spirit of the Hare." "Gaseous Blast" is an amazing form of aoe because because it affects EVERY unit with in 3 meters of you unlike the linmited number of units you can hit with "Ring Of Fire" and "Shadow Lightning." "Spirit of the Hare" is great for kiting and running past mobs in instances.

-Learn to kite mobs that hit you hard instead of AOE tanking them. "Shadow Lightning" is a great kiting tool despite its short range and 1.5 sec cool down. The reason why is beacuse when you kite the mobs will most likely be in a single line and the lightning will just jump from one mob to the next. And what is great is that after you cast it, it goes on a 1.5 sec cool down which will not affect you beause you need to moe anyway, and when it is cool you just cast it again. "Shadow Lightning" is in my left click slot of my hot bar and is quite possibly my favorite spell in the game.

-If you do need to aoe tank, an amazing casting rotation to use is "Gaseous Blast" first, then "Ring of Fire" second, then cast a "Righteous Stomp" to get them away from you. At this time I like to spam "Shadow Lightning" on the mobs that survived the poison and firey explosion.

-Wear Plate on bosses wear you take alot of pysical dmg. OR Lightning Kite the adds on this fight.

-Stack INT, it gives you more mana to play with and increases the damage of your spells. You do not get alot of bang for your buck for stacking endurance asa mage. I like 1 end, 4 int attribute distributon. Then again, I like to as much damage as possible so it is just me. Popular attribute distribution for a mage is 2 END, 3 INT.

-As for bolt spells, I love fire folt and shadow bolt. Fire bolt is really fast and has a decent range, and shadow bolt seeks targets.

Hope fully this helps alot of new mages and enlightens some of the more veteran mages out there. I hope to post more as new spells come out.

This is an excellent summary, thanks Mephfisto.

I'm going to add two small other suggestions that I really find effective. First, I prefer ice bolt because it has the highest minimum damage per attack along with a slow/ice debuff. Ibalaki will probably disagree with me

Second I really love Acidic Blight from the "ranger" group of spells. It is a percentage defense rating debuff over time. It really helps take down the high dr/high hp melee mobs. I use it first, then gaseous blast, then ring of fire, then run away and nail them with shadow lightning. That combo takes down large groups in seconds.

I used Retribution early on (20-50) but now I have damage reflect gear instead. I've never been a fan of Stomp but I'm not sure why. Stephen, who plays a mage by the way, loves Stomp. So that's a good recomendation right there.

Oops, on edit one more thing.

If you are dying a lot and under level 20 then take a couple of attribute points in Endurance, otherwise always take 5 attribute points of Intellect. You will need the firepower later on. If you can get away with taking no Endurance points in your attributes then do so, it will be tough early but easier later on.



Edited by Mama_Anarchia (04/04/07 10:16 PM)

Great information from both of you, thanks!

Something I've heard other mages do, and intend to try myself, is to use Fear of Gosh instead of Righteous Stomp. The cooldown is shorter and it still disperses mobs.

Well about accidic blast I didn't find the utility for the moment
Ice bolt is a good spell (better than fire bolt) with good damage and a slowdown. But I prefer Ice shard (best Dmg in low range), I use Ice shard against Boss like Shadow queen because she takes the 3 shots.
Now I am using Shadow Bolt because I have a + shadow gear and the Damage are really good.
Retribution is good at high level because of the duration. With my rainbow shield (18% block 87% melee dmg reflection) I have 197% melee dmg reflection.
At High level Unnerving shout is the best spell against melee monster since ice bolt has been nerfed.

Excellent thread, all.

That's what I like about this community. Lots of people willing to share their expertise with the rest of us.