Time for round #4, the beloved Magician.
The previous guide can be found HERE


The goal is to make a fundamentally sound, concise and accurate guide. The Magician is the most powerful casting class until Warlock. How do you like to build your Magician?

Do you add vitality?
Do you have a target goal for maximum intelligence?
Do you prefer staffs or daggers?
Do you like to melee 1-xx before casting?
What other modifier considerations do you like? (Max Mana, Mana Per Kill, Mana Per Attack, Mana Skin, Mana Syphon, Heal Mastery, Intelligence, Mind Numb, Mana Consumption, Experience gain, Magic Luck, Block, Physical/Magical damage reduce, Dexterity, Mana Regeneration...)
Weller mage considerations?

Put your ideas and thoughts out here and we'll go from there

Pure Offensive Magician - SOFTCORE

1. Add a lot of vitality (10-15) if your heal charms are not over 80ee. I usually do the first 5 into vitality and the remaining 5+ into intelligence
2. Afterwards, the rest of your stat points will be pumped into Intelligence
3. If you can get low level gear that has max mana and mana per kill on it then you can cast from 1 - 71, however, if not, melee from 1 to 15.
4. Mods that help a lot later on in your climb are mind numb, max mana, MAX LIFE, heal mastery, and of course, intelligence.
5. While daggers are cheaper to cast with, they arent usable by warlocks later on.


Weller mage:

100+ ee charm (for lower ee charms, stick to ice or earth, as you dont have room to hit for 100 or 200 with light or wind)
35+ intelligence weapon and robe.
90+ ee heal charm

The more EE and INTEL you have, the easier it to fight well monsters.

Edit: Remember to use your hot keys when switching back and forth between heal and attack when welling (or in general). It will save precious time.
Edit: When the monster has a sliver of life left, hoykey over to your melee weapon and bonk him on the head. Don't waste your mana, its precious too.

This:



This post was edited by rtcw14 on Aug 23 2009 07:51am

Do you add vitality? On HC, 50 is a must! On SC, no I don't as I like the larger Mana Pool rather than more Life, but for newer players with a tight FG budget, I'd say go 10 into Vita. For intermediate players put 5 Vita/5 Intel.
Do you have a target goal for maximum intelligence? 200-210+ with MQ gear on.
Do you prefer staffs or daggers? Staffs since you can use them on your future Warlock as well.
Do you like to melee 1-xx before casting? Yes, as you don't have to worry about running out of Mana or Regen'ing, unless of course you have nice Mana Per Kill gear modifications, where casting on all levels is easier than going melee.
What other modifier considerations do you like? (Max Mana, Mana Per Kill, Mana Per Attack, Mana Skin, Mana Syphon, Heal Mastery, Intelligence, Mind Numb, Mana Consumption, Experience gain, Magic Luck, Block, Physical/Magical damage reduce, Dexterity, Mana Regeneration...) Heal Mastery, Intelligence, Mana Skin, Magic Luck, Dex, etc, all these mods work. Intelligence however is mandatory for a caster, while Heal Mastery is mandatory for a Healer.
Weller mage considerations?

MQ Gear:

100+ EE Lv 55 Charm

80+ EE Lv 55 Heal/Focused Charm

30+ Int Weapon

30+ Int Armor

Side Tips:

Well at Lv 15+. Any white item you find, drop it into the well, never know if you're going to get a nice secondary drop.

This post was edited by UsmanSimjee on Aug 23 2009 07:47am

As I only play Hardcore Vitality is a Must for me.

I build my HC mage: 65 Vit, rest into Int

I cast 0-71. With Max Mana/Int/MPK gear until ~25.

As far as the modifier considerations:

Max Mana, Very usefull for the lower levels upto 25
Mana Per Kill, -->If you have the gear and can stack it 100+ it works really nicely upto 30-35 after that it becomes an add
Mana Per Attack, -->Lowerlevel ~5-10 usefull after that it becomes an add
Mana Skin, -->Hate it
Mana Syphon, -->15%+ it becomes awfully overpowered, beautifull
Heal Mastery, -->Nice add
Intelligence, -->Your Main Stat
Mind Numb,
Mana Consumption, -->havent been able to notice any real difference from this
Experience gain, -->unneeded on a feeder class
Magic Luck, -->nice add if you have it on int/ml gear, but still luck is luck
Block, -->an add
Physical/Magical damage reduce, -->an add
Dexterity, -->if you can get about +40 - 50 ish a nice add for the levels 65+ whilst welling
Mana Regeneration ?

Proficiencies is what make a mage stand out from the rest

as for gear:

levels 0-15

Mythical elm staff
Damage: 11 to 29

+13 Intelligence
+270 Max Life
+65 Max Mana
+2% Experience Gained
+2% Physical Damage Reduction

Godly ironwood staff
Level Req: 10
Damage: 18 to 49

+15 Intelligence
+83 Max Life
+5 Magic Luck
+1 Extra Item Slots
+1 to 28 Mana per Kill
+15% Heal Mastery
+1% Glancing Blow
+1 Jubilance

Mythical woolen robe
Defense: 0 to 4

+180 Max Life
+253 Max Mana
+1% Life Steal
+2% Damage Return
+1% Armor Pierce

Mystical brocade robe
Level Req: 10
Defense: 0 to 8

+20 Intelligence
+1 to 31 Mana per Kill
+4% Heal Mastery

Mythical earth III
Spell Damage: 41 to 73
Mana Cost: 25

+52% Enhanced Effect
+290 Max Mana
+2 Life Regen
+1% Damage Return
+3% Armor Pierce

Mythical wind IV
Level Req: 5
Spell Damage: 29 to 130
Mana Cost: 35

+58% Enhanced Effect (+ a decent prof)
+268 Max Mana
+2% Experience Gained
+3% Damage Return
+1% Armor Pierce

Mystical wind V
Level Req: 10
Spell Damage: 45 to 202
Mana Cost: 45

+96% Enhanced Effect
+1 Mana Regen
+1% Glancing Blow

and 15 to 20/25ish, max mana here boosts your chains a bunch

Mythical heartwood staff
Level Req: 15
Damage: 22 to 59

+14 Strength
+25 Intelligence
+181 Max Mana
+1 Extra Item Slots
+1% Heal Mastery

Angelic silk robe
Level Req: 15
Defense: 0 to 9

+24 Intelligence
+264 Max Mana
+2 Critical Strike
+6% Heal Mastery

Legendary wind VI
Level Req: 15
Spell Damage: 53 to 239
Mana Cost: 55

+93% Enhanced Effect
+43 Max Life
+113 Max Mana
+1 to 29 Mana per Kill
+4% Damage Return
+5% Physical Damage Reduction
+4% Mana Syphon

This post was edited by benell on Aug 23 2009 07:54am

My build was:


Starting Stats:
Strength: 20
Dexterity: 50
Intelligence: 60
Vitality: 20

+10 vita base points. Rest (if 10 fails :P) on int.
Rest points always i put in int.

From 1-10: ee staff/dagger 1-30 lpk armor (+other stats if you have - like life/str), charm 10+ str lpk life.
Very fast grind without any problems (with good lpk and ee gear - you can go melee with full chains to lv 10)
High dex on start rly help with that.

After lv 10 to lv 20:
20 int weapon
20 int armor
ee charms (~70ee + is cheap and rly usefull).

After lv 20:
25 int weapon
25 int armor
ee charms (~70-80ee - still good and cheap)

After lv 30:
30-35 int weapon
30-35 int armor
ee charms (~80-90ee - still good and cheap)

after lv 40:
weapon and armor can be the same as lv 30
ee charms ~90 ee is the must
heal charm: around 60-70ee

after lv 50:
40+ int weapon
40+ int armor
ee charms: 140ee + is the must for solo play (easy and funny)
heal charm: around 100ee is rly good.


I have played with this items few times, and always was very easy to climb + well. Great char for solo play.

You need after lv 55 buy some mana regen gear couse less drops. From lv 10-50 i always use shrines. I am not no life, but with this setup you will grind your mage solo in 2 days max - with rest etc/sleep. The best thing is that you don't need team, all drops are yours etc. Solo climbing after 55 with 140ee+ charm is rly easy and funny. When i had 156ee fire and 90ee wild heal i made about 10 chains, than fast regen + shrines and again. 10 chains is about ~26% exp.

This is my build.


Sorry for english


edit: you should change dmg charms on each 5lv. Few days ago i bought 80ee light lv 40 for 2 fg. Common, this is rly cheap.

This post was edited by LukaSss on Aug 23 2009 08:46am

drop the first 10 points into vitality to increase your life pool. drop all points after that into intelligence (goal being 200+ intelligence at lvl 55). for levels 1-15, use a weapon with enhanced effect as the mana pool is too small for any sustained killing chains therefore slowing the climb. At lvl 20 change to a weapon with intelligence on it, as much as you can afford. Your armor with be robes only, padded preferred, with intelligence, as much as you can afford. The weapon can be dagger or staff, let cost be the determining factor.

for arena (solo), damage charm with enhanced effect in main slot, and heal charm with enhanced effect in accessory slot (75% effectiveness). for catacomb healers switch charms. use heal charm in main slot (100% effectiveness). when not healing in catacombs, hotkey to weapon. hits will be low but count towards experience. don't use damage charm in catacombs, it just wastes mana.

if you're attempting to build a mage weller, these are your guidelines:

weapon +/- 30 intel
armor +/- 30 intel
damage charm 120 ee or better ice/earth
140 ee or better light,fire,wind

heal charm 100 ee or better focused heal
120 ee or better heal
140 ee or better wild heal

these are my opinion ofc. lvl 55 on charms.
will get you 90% or better success rate after lvl 65, and prolly close to 100% success lvl 55-65

0-10points on vita rest into int
with this setup you will have no problem doing catas without people whining and welling lvl 55 items with high % of success rate.
when doing catacombs you should get a Staff/Dagger+Charm+Rob with Healmastery for nice boost of healing. (charm goes on main charm slot & healing charm on 2'nd)
(2-3 different level setups should work fine (just like the robes,daggers and staffs)

mabye have lvl 0-15 staff/daggers with EE% on it depending on if you like arena or catas in the start.

Daggers/Staffs
level 0 with 10-15int
level 5-20 with 20-30int
level 25-55 with 35int+

Robes
level 0 with 10-15int
level 5-20 with 20-30int
level 25-55 with 35+

Elemental Charms
level 0 with 58-60%ee
level 5 with 70%ee
level 15 with 80%ee
level 25 with 95%ee
level 35 with 110% ee
level 45 with 115%ee
level 55 with 120%ee

Heal Charms
level 0 with 58-60%ee
level 5 with 70%ee
level 15 with 80%ee
level 25 with 95%ee
level 35 with 110% ee
level 45 with 115%ee
level 55 with 120%ee

It is better for a catacomb healer to keep the heal charm in the accessory slot and swap your damage charm for a heal mastery charm. It will be much more efficient on a heal to mana cost ratio, and with enough hm you end up with better heals as well.

Do you add vitality?

Anywhere from 0-10.
10 is a must for a weller
I've done 0 for climbing mages, trying 5 on my next climb, as being 2 shotted is very common with 0.


Do you have a target goal for maximum intelligence?

No....just as much as possible.


Do you prefer staffs or daggers?

Staff if you plan on progressing, and playing Warlock at some point.


Do you like to melee 1-xx before casting?

No, get Max mana and mana per kill gear at low levels, Int is just an extra mod at low levels.


What other modifier considerations do you like? (Max Mana, Mana Per Kill, Mana Per Attack, Mana Skin, Mana Syphon, Heal Mastery, Intelligence, Mind Numb, Mana Consumption, Experience gain, Magic Luck, Block, Physical/Magical damage reduce, Dexterity, Mana Regeneration...)

Low Levels: Max Mana > Mana Per Kill > Intelligence (Mana Per Kill can be better than Max Mana once a certain chain length is reached)
High Levels: Intelligence...anything else is a small bonus.


Weller mage considerations?

10 Vitality. Heal or Focused, wild sucks for wellers...

Focused heals are the best charms for mages as you can control whether you waste mana or not, where if you have a wild or regular you can heal for much more than needed...and then heal for much less than you want, thus wasting mana.