[X] My Assistant

That's not his ability screen he is only level 50....

Quite right. I believe that was Hito's from when he was 120 or such.

I should also add that whacking stuff over the head with my staff happens quite often. When I get up to Hard, things tend to have a few dozen HP left after I blast them. Beating up low-level monsters to trigger Ether Steal is also greatly useful in grindfest.

This post has been edited by Panuru: Oct 18 2009, 08:12

What use, if any, does putting Ability Points into Overcharge Power have for a dedicated, 'pure' Mage who plans to never resort to physical attacks (except where absolutely necessary)??

Physical attacks are always necessary. You won't last very long if you use magic to kill everything, unless you can afford both an unlimited supply of Mana Elixirs and extra slots to put them in. Having said that, Overcharge Boost is a long way down my list of priorities, and I certainly don't plan to put any points in it in the foreseeable future.

-14.75 Elemental
-2.25 Divine
+0 Forbidden
-17.91 Deprecating
-25.49 Supportive
-30.83 Curative

Physical attacks are always necessary. You won't last very long if you use magic to kill everything, unless you can afford both an unlimited supply of Mana Elixirs and extra slots to put them in. Having said that, Overcharge Boost is a long way down my list of priorities, and I certainly don't plan to put any points in it in the foreseeable future.

So do I understand you to say that you have absolutely no A-Points in Overcharge at all??

What about simply having them in Spirit Points?? Have you any extra points in that area??

Physical attacks are always necessary. You won't last very long if you use magic to kill everything, unless you can afford both an unlimited supply of Mana Elixirs and extra slots to put them in. Having said that, Overcharge Boost is a long way down my list of priorities, and I certainly don't plan to put any points in it in the foreseeable future.

If you are going to Power Mage your way through, you do not have a use for Overcharge. It takes several physical attacks for Overcharge to really have a positive effect on your physical attacks.

However, cakefesting with a Staff and heavy armor and just using the Staff to Attack, instead of magic attacks, to build up Staff Proficiency will help power-up your rare, desperate Staff whacks. The Staff's Ether Theft will help to pay MP costs of Cure (and optionally Shield), and will boost your Curative (and Supportive?) Prof as well as your Staff Attack.

As a former longtime Power Mage, while it kicks ass to do a Normal Random Encounter in 3-5 turns, you will not be able to last long in GrindFest or the middle Arenas, much less the Higher Arenas and you have no hope of ever winning a Ring of Blood Arena battle or becoming Ascended.

I have switched to Plate Tank, although I do Staff Plate grind, too, for the Staff/Curative prof.

So do I understand you to say that you have absolutely no A-Points in Overcharge at all??

What about simply having them in Spirit Points?? Have you any extra points in that area??

None. Admittedly, for various reasons you probably have less Spirit than me, so your priorities may differ. Also, it depends on how many AP you have to spend, and whether you think you can afford to waste them on "luxuries" like a stronger Spirit Attack. If you really are intending to re-invent yourself as a mage, reset your points, acquire all the spells you think you'll need, and then see how few points are left over...

On a different take, I'm a spellsword and have +70% (56ap) invested in overcharge. Cause sometime ya just have to stab the little fuckers. But that's why I'm a spellsword, not a mage.

As some of the other Posters have informed us in the last few postings, the "Archaeologist" Perk doesn't really do all that much in terms of helping you get those rare items -it only doubles the extremely small chance of getting an Artifact in the first place so that a 1-in-10000 of getting one becomes.......a 2-in-10000 chance.

Does anybody know if the "Quartermaster" Perk works in exactly the same way, and if you have gone far in it, has it paid off??

Works the same. It only pays off if you rely on found rather than bought items for yourself. You wont be making money selling the additional equipment after subtracting the costs of QM, at least for a very long time.

As a former longtime Power Mage, while it kicks ass to do a Normal Random Encounter in 3-5 turns, you will not be able to last long in GrindFest or the middle Arenas, much less the Higher Arenas and you have no hope of ever winning a Ring of Blood Arena battle or becoming Ascended.

That's a depressing thought for me, and it seems to indicate an imbalance in the game. What's the sticking point? Too little mana? Taking too much damage?

mana is the biggest reason, I dualwield in mainly cloth so dmg isn't much of an issue. Although I do suppose you take more damage with a staff since you lose parry.

That's a depressing thought for me, and it seems to indicate an imbalance in the game. What's the sticking point? Too little mana? Taking too much damage?

Mana usage. Mana Mana Mana. Ether theft can mitigate this a lot, especially if you've got a really good staff with multi-turn high-chance ether theft, and you can further mitigate it with careful offensive spell casting (ie. with coalesced mana), but still, mana usage.

Using offensive spells drains your mana faster than ether theft can keep up, and when you're not casting spells your damage is... bad. Killing slower means taking more damage, means having to heal more as well. You just get overwhelmed as you go and your mana can't keep up without burning more many potions than a straight melee character would need, if you can even complete it at all.

I've done the early Ring of Blood boss battles playing as a pure mage, it's just not as quick or even as efficient as using a good bleed or PA weapon. Doing legendares is entirely out of the question.

Mana usage. Mana Mana Mana. Ether theft can mitigate this a lot, especially if you've got a really good staff with multi-turn high-chance ether theft, and you can further mitigate it with careful offensive spell casting (ie. with coalesced mana), but still, mana usage.

That's what I figured. Mana cost for spells increases with level, too, so it's not like you can get too far ahead of that curve. That always struck me as the crippling thing for magic vs. melee; the cost of spells increases as you get more powerful, but physical attacks don't have a greater cost in, say, speed.

That's what I figured. Mana cost for spells increases with level, too, so it's not like you can get too far ahead of that curve. That always struck me as the crippling thing for magic vs. melee; the cost of spells increases as you get more powerful, but physical attacks don't have a greater cost in, say, speed.

Actually, if anything physical attacks get better due to x-attack, which increases your attack speed dramatically.

Yes, it's damn near impossible to get ahead of the mana curve with magic, as even if you get every point of tank, potions only heal based on your base mana. Once you burn through your first bar and have to rely on potions a character with 0 mana tanks has the same mana remaining as someone who maxed them. And ether theft is based on enemy mana so you get no advantage there either. Spells will take a pretty much fixed percentage of your mana, and you will get the same number of casts in the end as a melee character, give or take a handful from tanks and a handful more off theft, regardless of how hard you try to be a pure mage.

Without addressing the lack of x-magic, I've done a little number crunching. Excluding mana tanks, I would need to raise INT and WIS twice per level in order to be able to cast the same number of spells as I level up. The math and a solution are posted here.

That's a depressing thought for me, and it seems to indicate an imbalance in the game. What's the sticking point? Too little mana? Taking too much damage?

Yes, mana and weak armor aren't a problem in an Hourly or Round 1 but, when you burn through all of your MP and Mana Potions, you're suddenly a guy in street clothes attacking the mobs with a stick, with a very short life expectancy.

Well hey, if anybody wants to check my math or second my suggestion on the suggestions thread, feel free.

Well hey, if anybody wants to check my math or second my suggestion on the suggestions thread, feel free.

Going up +2 INT and +2 WIS every level could lead to there being more EXP needed to do it than EXP needed to Level-Up. Plus, the other Attributes would start to lag badly, especially the very important for a mage AGI.

Well hey, if anybody wants to check my math or second my suggestion on the suggestions thread, feel free.

You've neglected a few things.

The rounding up of spell costs has a much bigger impact at lower levels. In your example, suppose the spell had a base cost of 15 rather than 10. At level 10, it costs 2MP (rounded up from 1.5), and you can cast it 15 times. At level 50, it costs 8MP, and you can cast it 13 times. Not such a big difference.

The base 10 in the MP calculation has less effect as you level up. It makes much more difference between level 10 and level 50 than it does between 50 and 90. You should probably think of it as a boost to low level players, to cancel out their proportionately higher costs due to all that rounding up.

You get access to more powerful spells as you level up... although I couldn't tell you if Flare does more damage per MP than Fireball, so this point may not be relevant.

Also as you level up, you have the option of putting more points into Magic Tank. Although this won't help much in a longer battle, it does allow you to fight short battles at higher difficulty without using mana items.

Summary: I don't think things are quite as bad as all that.