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Ah, so you're interested in the Wizard, are you not? It's certainly an excellent choice for a Tier 3 class, as almost anything is available to them. A Wizard can be a master craftsman and enchanter, infuser, stronghold clearer, or just general support. In fact, about the only thing a Wizard would be bad in is physical combat... oh wait, they can do that well too, if you build right.

A Wizard can be a very capable fighter or general support. The Wizard can be an almighty terror... while she's awake and ready. Asleep or unprepared, she's incredibly vulnerable. A Wizard has none of the defenses that the fighting classes has, but all of her strength comes from her magic and just how versatile it can be.

Are you ready? Are you prepared? Good, let us walk the path of the purest magics.

Contents 1 The Wizard, in summary. 2 Growing up: the Wizard as a Mortal 2.1 Combat Skills 2.2 Sense Skills 2.3 Utilty Skills 3 The Adolescent Years: Life as a Sorcerer 3.1 Cast Spell 3.1.1 Offensive Spells 3.1.1.1 Area of Effect Spells 3.1.1.2 Autohit Spells 3.1.1.3 Ranged Spells 3.1.1.4 Touch Spells 3.1.2 Buffing Spells 3.1.3 Warding Spells 3.1.4 Utility Spells 3.2 Sorcerer Skills 4 Ultimate Power: On Becoming a Wizard 4.1 Wizard Skills 4.1.1 Power Skills 4.1.2 Magic Skills 4.1.3 Enchanting Skills 4.1.4 Utility Skills 4.1.5 Staff Skills 5 Sample Wizard Builds 6 In Closing

[edit] The Wizard, in summary.

In the end, the Wizard is an extremely capable character who can be whatever it wants to be.

[edit] Growing up: the Wizard as a Mortal

Any good build starts at the Mortal levels, and Wizard is certainly no exception. Because the Wizard is capable of many things, there is no particular "must have" trees; in the true human fashion, you can pick and choose what you need. But let's get into the Mortal skills, shall we?

[edit] Combat Skills

Now, the combat trees can be summed up in my Guide to Combat Trees, but this is a summary.

• Dodge- The Wizard has ZERO natural defenses. Period. While Dodge is limited to Hand to Hand and Melee attacks, it can help your Wizard stay alive long enough to get away.

• Hand to Hand Combat is fairly reliable and requires little work. As well, there is a group of spells that use Hand to Hand Combat to determine spell accuracy. It is an excellent combat tree choice for Wizards who plan to be factionless, however.

• Melee Combat is an extremely niche tree for wizards. There are no attack spells that use this tree (Although the Wizard is capable of buffing this tree with spells). Some Wizards take this further for either wardbashing or as an MP-less attack.

• Ranged Combat as a skill, is generally the tree of choice for Wizards, as it is the first skill that boosts ranged spells and Area of Effect spells. Taking this tree further is basically along the lines of Melee Combat: for niche Wizards interested in wardbashing or packing MP-less attacks.

[edit] Sense Skills

Determining the attributes of your opponent is important when deciding if you should fight or not.

• First Aid isn't particularly high priority, unless the Wizard plans to heal a fair bit as well. However, the usefulness of being able to see another's HP cannot be denied.

• Sense Magic is "must get". Period. Especially if you plan on working as an enchanter. This will allow you to discern potions as well as any enchanted gear you have. No sense giving a hopeful factionmate a plain old sword by accident, after all!

• Sense Morality is useful, but usually a step toward getting Psychometry, which is far more useful to Wizards than Sense Morality, with Infuse, Greater Infusion, and (especially) Tap Ley Line.

[edit] Utilty Skills

There are, of course, other skills out there that can be of varying use to the Wizard.

• Engineering isn't a particularly crucial skill, unless the Wizard wants to improve their Morality or gain experience by repairing doors and the power grid... and really, there's much better alternatives out there. Still, it can be useful for door and power badges. Structural Engineering is even of less interest, unless you're interested in creating or maintaining a heavily barricaded area, such as Foghaven.

• First Aid is useful as a detection skill to detect HP, and is also fairly useful to help your friends (or random people with). It's also useful for a Wizard with Sorcerer's Might who doesn't have swift access to healing: One First Aid Kit with the Surgery Skill means 15 more MP for you! Not only that, the First Aid tree can be very good experience if you have easy access to First Aid Kits, a Surgeon's Kit, or Stygian Bone Leeches.

• Hide is useful if you're a soloing Wizard. Honestly though, Wizards are better off hiding behind a good, sturdy factional ward. It's also useful for weapon-toting Wizards, as they have no other real way to enchance weapon damage. Either way, you'll probably want Advanced Hide as well.

• Lockpicking is a rather difficult XP gathering tool, but useful if you don't have Wisp Form or want to spend time and MO busting down doors.

• Planar Protection can be very useful to Wizards, since as a neutral class, they do not have protection from the power of Paradise or Stygia. Any Wizards residing off-plane will want this.

• Repair Item and the crafting trees are very reliable experience, and highly advised for any Wizard who wishes to be a professional enchanter.

• Search is very important for any Wizard who searches for crafting or alchemy components. Research is even less impressive, unless the Wizard wants to level quickly via reading, and once the Wizard maxes, it becomes worthless.

• Strength useful for an enchanter and alchemist as it means they can carry more components and items to enchant. Stamina isn't so much a survival skill for Wizards (it basically only means more XP for those out to kill you), but it DOES mean that a Wizard can use Sorcerer's Might more before running out of MP. It's like having a spare 12 MP for 20 CP (and 2 AP)!

• Swim is generally not considered. You have potions of Flying and Water Breathing, Way of the Porpoise and Wisp Form. Why bother with Swim?

[edit] The Adolescent Years: Life as a Sorcerer

Tier 2 tends to be described as the hardest levels in the game, and it's not hard to see why: the once numerous Tier 1s to prey upon are now worthless (if it's not outright frowned upon to attack) as experience, yet you don't quite have the firepower to take on Tier 3. You're soft enough for Mortals to eye you hungrily, and yet still worth experience to the godlike Tier 3s. Basically, you're a meaty godsend to any T1, T2, or T3 who doesn't inflict a lot of damage.

Like the teenage years in real life, this is a very hard time where everything pretty much changes all too quickly.

Still, at this point, you may consider the value of alternate sources for XP, such as crafting. However, if you're already a crafter, you shouldn't have too much trouble here. It's the fighting wizards who may run into snags.

[edit] Cast Spell

Because of what this skill is capable of, it deserves it's own section. We'll get into the other Sorcerer skills shortly.

Now that you are a Sorcerer, you gain the Cast Spell skill, for "free". The reason "free" is in quotes is because spells themselves are not free to learn. Each spell has a specific CP cost attached to it. As well, some spells can only be learned and used once you become a Tier 3 character.

There are several types of spells to choose from for the discerning spellcaster:

[edit] Offensive Spells

Offensive Spells are the bread and butter of the combat spellcaster. With it, almost any damage type is possible, and the Sorcerer can tailor his attacks to strike at the chinks in a foe's armor. However, the more exotic damage types (which are less likely to be easily soaked or impossible to gain an immunity to) require more CP to learn. Offensive spells, however, cannot target constructs such as wards and barricades: the Wizard will need alternate attacks to tear them down.

[edit] Area of Effect Spells

Area of Effect (AoE) Spells are the spells that are capable of clearing strongholds. They're also the most costly spells, CP-wise. AoE spells are divided into two "grades": Grade 10 AoE spells can inflict up to 10 damage per target to a total of 100 (actually, 109 with AoE mechanics). Grade 20 inflict up to 20 damage per target to a total or 200 (actually, 219 with AoE mechanics). Area of Effect Spells use the Ranged Magic accuracy.

• Grade 10 AoEs are: Fire Storm, Ice Storm, Smother, Caustic Storm, Thunder Storm, and Magic Storm.
• Grade 20 AoEs are: Dragonfire, Hail Assault, Death Cloud, Corrosive Fog, Static Rumble, and Aether Wave.

[edit] Autohit Spells

Autohit spells are exactly what they say. They automatically hit whatever you use it on. They're cheap to learn and cast, but the damage is extremely low. Still, they can be reliable spells for the fighting wizard. They are considered ranged spells, so they do not run afoul of aura defenses. Autohit spells are perfect for taking enemies with a very low soak to a particular damage type.

• Autohit spells are: Fire Dart, Steel Dart, Death Dart, Acid Dart, Shocking Dart, Magic Dart, The Crushing, and Thunder Bolt.
• Tier 3 Autohit spells are: Fire Arrow, Ice Arrow, Death Arrow, Lightning Arrow, Caustic Blight, and Arrow of the Magus.

[edit] Ranged Spells

Ranged Spells tend to be have the highest CP cost overall (individually as well as proper skill tree) of all of the single-target offensive spells. However, they are very accurate and highly damaging. They also go into mundane damage, giving them a broader damage type range.

• Ranged spells are: The Thousand Razors, Quillfire, Immolation, Arctic Wind, Death Wings, Ash Choke, Acid Vapor, and Blood Boil.
• Tier 3 Ranged spells are: Earth Wail, Burning Air, Snowblind, Reaper Storm, Acid Rain, Kiss of the Clouds, and Eyes of Doom.

[edit] Touch Spells

Touch spells tend to be cheaper than ranged spells MP and CP wise (using a Mortal combat tree and individually), but run afoul of Hand to Hand/Melee defenses. They also have considerably lower damage than ranged spells. Useful for Liches, but Wizards can certainly put them to excellent use too!

• Touch spells are: Burning Touch, Chilling Touch, Gravefingers, Corrosive Grasp, Electrical Touch, Blood Touch.
• Tier 3 Touch spells are: Fist of Burning Rage, Heartstopper, The Heartless Fist, Skinmelt, Fist of the Eel, and The Tick's Mouth.

[edit] Buffing Spells

Buff spells are primarily used to raise a character's capabilities in some specific way. All buff spells are personally targeted, so you cannot cast say, Tiger Claw on a Pariah. You COULD, however, create a spell scroll that a Void Walker with the Cast Spell skill could use. Buff spell durations stack duration, but not effect. Two Tiger Claw spells mean the buff lasts 40 AP (actually, 39 due to 1 AP being used for casting the second spell). It does not mean that Hand to Hand accuracy is raise by 40%.

The spells that a Wizard will probably be most interested in is Turtle Shell, Visual Prestidigitation, and either Tiger Claw or Eagle Eye (at Tier 3) depending on what type of spell the Wizard uses.

• Bear's Strength: Raises Hand to Hand (but not spell) damage by 2. Duration is 10 AP.
• Eagle Eye: Raises Ranged accuracy (including ranged spells) by 15%. Duration is 15 AP. Tier-3 Restricted.
• Shade of the Dervish: Raises Melee accuracy by 20%. Duration is 10 AP.
• Tiger Claw: Raises Hand to Hand accuracy by 20%. Duration is 20 AP.
• Turtle Shell: Raises soak by 4 points to all damage types. Duration is 2 hours.
• Visual Prestidigitation: Raises defense to all attacks by 5%. Duration is 2 hours.
• Way of the Porpoise: Grants the Swim skill. Duration is 15 minutes.

[edit] Warding Spells

Warding Spells cover Wards themselves, as well as the spells that destroy them. Wards prevent access (but not egress) according to the Ward's power and and alignment type: Minor wards stop Mortals, Major Wards stop Tier 2 and Mortals, and Greater Wards stop all characters, as long as they are the appropriate alignment. As well, stronger wards have more hit points and require stronger Dispel Ward spells to remove it. However, stronger wards require more CP to learn and more MP to cast.

Normal wards last for 2 1/2 hours, and Extended wards last for 8 hours. Ward durations do stack, so casting an Extended ward on top of a normal ward only extends the duration by 8 hours. Extended wards, naturally, cost more to learn and cast.

Dispel Ward spells come in three types, much like Wards themselves: Minor, Major, and Greater. Dispel Minor Ward can only destroy Minor wards. Dispel Major Ward can destroy Minor or Major wards. Dispel Greater Ward can dispel all wards. The morality restriction (or duration) of the ward does is not a factor.

[edit] Utility Spells

Utility spells cover various miscellaneous spells that can be functional, but do not quite fit in with the other spells.

• Aspect Shift changes the caster's aspect to another random aspect.
• Destroy Door immediately destroys the door of a building. Useful for farming Door badges.
• Open Door immediately opens the door of a building.
• Open Lock immediately unlocks one lock on the door of a building. If a door is locked AND padlocked, two castings are required.
• Reveal immediately reveals any hidden characters in a location (only to you, however). It also dispels any invisibility present, turning all invisible characters visible. Extraordinarily useful for hunting as well as raiding situations, as Sorcerers do not get Enhanced Senses.
• Shadow Wrap immediately hides the character, if hiding at the current location is possible. Expensive, but useful for survival if you don't want to waste AP trying to hide.

[edit] Sorcerer Skills

Now we get into the Sorcerer skills. The Sorcerer skills are focused around utility, however, the Ranged Magic tree can be learned here as well.

• Alchemy allows a Sorcerer to create potions. This is the second method a Sorcerer has to buff herself, and allows the Sorcerer to buff others, regardless of the ability to cast spells. It is also necessary for a professional enchanter, unless the Wizard can obtain potions reliably from someone else.
• Transcribe Spell is a child skill of Cast Spell (although it is not free). This allows the Sorcerer to create a scroll of a spell for double the MP cost and 5 AP. However, the spell scrolls can be given to others to learn or cast from, and any spell cast from a scroll the Sorcerer herself transcribed costs only 1 MP to cast.
• Heal Self is generally not a very useful skill. However, it may be of interest to the soloing Wizard, and it can cure the Poison debuff.
• Infuse is only worthwhile if the Wizard is in a faction, and even then it is overshadowed by the far more MP-efficient Greater Infusion. However, Tap Ley Line can be very valuable to a Wizard: when combined with Greater Infusion, practically creates a limitless source of MP for the Wizard to use. A wizard who is not interested in the Cosmic Tree or Transcribe Spell is very likely to take these skills.
  • Flag Warden can a useful skill if the Wizard is lucky enough to stumble in on a raid on their faction and wants to defend while remaining invisible or trying to appear to be asleep. However, it is only useful if the raiders are attacking the flag shield and if the Wizard is awake, so the Wizard may not find much use for this skill.
• Sorcerer's Might is the other MP replenishment skill of the Sorcerer, and someone with this skill tends to be VERY welcome in factions with a lot of healers. Combined with Transcribe Spell, it can provide the Wizard with an almost limitless spellcasting ability. With Straylight, Sorcerer's Might tends to be a less wise idea while raiding or in combat as you cannot be healed for five minutes.
• Spell Combat and Battle Magic make up the Ranged Magic tree, and when combined with Ranged Combat it can provide a Wizard with 65% accuracy with ranged and Area of Effect spells. It is, however, fairly expensive as opposed to touch spells.

[edit] Ultimate Power: On Becoming a Wizard

After all the work, tinkering with potions, crafting weapons, or just obliterating your foes with your magical might... you've done it. You've reached the apex of your spellcasting abilities. Or, so you think...

By now, you will have probably planned out, in meticulous detail, what spells and skills you want your Wizard to learn. However, if you haven't, this is probably where you'll want to do some studying, to decide what will work for you.

The Wizard's skills work around either Enchanting objects to make them more powerful, making more efficient use of her limited Magic Points (or giving her even more!), to making her spells far more powerful than anyone else's, or even giving the Wizard a unique swiss army knife capable of flight or levelling a few buildings.

[edit] Wizard Skills

The Wizard Skills, like spells, can basically be summed up in specific types: Staff, Power, Magic, Enchanting, and Utility.

[edit] Power Skills

These skills basically deal with enhancing a Wizard's spellcasting power. Currently, the only skill in this category is Nexus Empowerment. There may be others, however.

• Nexus Empowerment: 30 CP, raises damage inflicted by all Offensive spells by 25%, rounded up, before bonuses.

Nexus Empowerment is a VERY valuable skill for ANY combat spellcaster, as the bonus applies to any and all Offensive Spells. Eyes of Doom will inflict 20 damage instead of 16, The Heartless Fist will inflict 15 instead of 12, and any Grade 20 AoE will inflict 25 damage per target up to 250 (274, really).

[edit] Magic Skills

These skills basically deal with enhancing a Wizard's ability to use Magic Points, by either granting more, or making more efficient use of them.

• Nexus Affinity: 30 CP, lowers MP used by 25%, rounded up.
• Cosmic Affinity: 30 CP, raises maximum MP by 15.
  • Cosmic Mastery: 60 CP, raises maximum MP by a further 15.
    • Cosmic Oneness: 90 CP, raises maximum MP by a further 15 and raises MP regeneration to 2 MP/15 minutes.

Nexus Affinity is a VERY valuable asset to any Wizard, as it reduces any MP costs paid by the Wizard by 25%. ANY costs: spellcasting, transcribing, alchemy, enchanting, even travelling through portals.

The Cosmic Tree is of less use to a factioned wizard (who can easily replenish MP vial Greater Infuse/Tap Ley Line or through Sorcerer's Might and timely healing. To the solo wizard, or the enchanter who doesn't want to mess with their faction's infusions, however, the Cosmic Tree is an incredible (if somewhat underpowered) asset.

[edit] Enchanting Skills

The Enchanting skills are the skills that create powerful enchanted items for use by the Wizard and others. Enchanted Weapons can inflict more damage, a different damage type, or be more accurate, and enchanted armor and jewelry can bestow a bonus to defense, hide, or even provide better damage soak.

These skills are also (along with buffing spells) what can make a weapon-based Wizard viable.

Enchanting help can be found here.

• Enchant Weapon: 30 CP, allows enchanting of weapons. Enchanting a weapon costs (15+(10*Current Enchantments) MP (15 for the first, 25 for the second, and so on).
• Enchant Armor: 30 CP, allows enchanting of armor. Enchanting an armor costs (15+(5*Current Enchantments) MP (15 for the first, 20 for the second, and so on).
• Enchant Item: 30 CP, allows enchanting of jewelry and clothing. Enchanting an item costs (15+(10*Current Enchantments) MP (15 for the first, 25 for the second, and so on).

Most any factions will welcome an enchanter, as any character can appreciate the bonuses enchanted gear can provide. Enchanted weapons are obvious: who doesn't want to have a more accurate and damaging weapon that strikes the weak points in enemy armors? Armor used to be rather unpopular, but with the introduction of the new paperdoll inventory system (that is, a character has "slots" that can only be filled by one item) and armor gaining 10 enchantments, it can be very useful. To those who want the bonuses from Enchant Armor, but have spare slots and a lack of inventory space, a +10% defense accessory can be an incredible boon. If you're a solo Wizard, it gets a bit harder, due to a lack of a safe place to enchant, and lack of safety overall (which contributes to enchantment degradation).

It's generally considered wise to take the proper crafting trees (Smithing, Gunsmithing, Bowyer, or Armorsmithing) if you enchant, as a successful enchantment degrades the item, and enchantments become more likely to fail the lower an object's condition gets.

[edit] Utility Skills

Utility Skills are the Wizard Skills that do not directly contribute to the Wizard's magical abilities, but provide valuable functions nonetheless.

• Greater Infusion: 30 CP, allows the Wizard to infuse for 2 points per MP/AP spent instead of 1.
• Wisp Form: 30 CP, 1 AP/4 MP activation, 1 MP/minute maintenance, 1 MP action cost, immunity to nonmagical attacks and weapons, lesser flight (1 AP per square moved).

Greater Infusion is the core of the Infuse/Tap Ley Line combination. With it and 5 AP, the Wizard can gain 1 more MP than they spent (4 Greater Infusions to place 8 points of infusion, and 1 Tap Ley Line to drain 7 points of infusion for 5 MP). This does not seem very efficient, however a Wizard can go over his normal MP maximum with Tap Ley Line, and can in fact gather obscene amounts of MP over time. Even if the Wizard doesn't plan to use Tap Ley Line, it is much better than Infusion for helping your faction claim territory. It is also a particularly potent raiding weapon, if the Wizard happens to catch a faction before they reinforce their stronghold infusion.

Wisp Form is the "travel" skill of the Wizard, however, it only provides lesser flight. Thus, a Wizard will need a Potion of Flying to have normal flight. It DOES, however, provide immunity to mundane attacks, so it can allow a Wizard to AoE-bomb safe from pet attacks, as well as unenchanted weapons and uncharged attacks.

[edit] Staff Skills

These skills create and expand a special "staff" that is capable of several uses by the Wizard. However, it is a very expensive tree, especially if you plan on completely mastering it.

Once the Wizard has a Staff (by learning Staff of Power), the staff is capable of:

• Recharging (1 charge for 5 MP)
• Melee attack (Magical damage, uses Melee tree) that expends one charge.
• Ranged attack (Magical damage, uses Ranged Magic tree) that expends one charge.

However, there are other capabilities that may be obtained by learning specific branches of this skill tree.

• Staff of Power: 30 CP, Staff has 30 charges. 6 Ranged, 5 Melee.
  • Staff of Might: 60 CP, Staff has 50 charges. 8 Ranged, 7 Melee. Regenerates 5 charges a day.
    • Staff of Wizardry: 90 CP, Staff has 100 charges. 10 Ranged, 9 Melee. Regenerates 10 charges a day.
  • Sphere of Destruction: 60 CP, Staff is capable of an Electrical AoE that scales with level (20-30/200-300 damage) at a base of 70% to hit and does not strike factionmates. Requires 15 charges and 1 AP.
    • Sphere of Annihilation: 90 CP, Staff is capable of a Magical AoE that scales with level (25-37/240-360 damage) at a base of 70% to hit and does not strike factionmates. Requires 20 charges and 1 AP.
  • The Drawing of Power: 60 CP, allows the Wizard to recover 15 MP at a cost of 4 charges and 5 AP.
  • Wings of the Magus: 60 CP, allows the Wizard to expend one charge for greater flight (at 2 squares per 1 AP moved). Lasts 10 minutes and requires 1 MP per minute in flight.

The Staff of Power/Might/Wizardry is the base skill set of the Staff Skills, and is primarily concerned with expanding the base capability of the staff. The extra charges and charge regeneration bestowed by Staff of Might can be useful, but I am of the opinion that the staff attacks really aren't worth the effort unless you really hate transcribing or using Magic Points.

The Sphere skills grant the staff a potent but costly Area of Effect attack. With the Staff of Wizardry, the Wizard is capable of no more than six Spheres of Destruction or 5 Spheres of Annihilation. However, it's costs and abilities make it an excellent defensive weapon or compliment to traditional Area of Effect attacks.

The Drawing of Power and Wings of the Magus are, in and of themselves, not particularly good reasons to get a staff (90 CP for proper flight or highly inefficent MP generation ability), but to the Wizard set on getting a staff anyways, they can prove useful.

[edit] Sample Wizard Builds

Here, you can find some sample builds for the Wizard. Mine (StarStorm) is just one build, but it's not the ONLY way to play a Wizard. If you have a fun build, feel free to add yours. Just make sure to add your comments.

Personal comments are bolded.

Note: I don't quite remember (or have a copy) of my Wizard's build, and I'll be redoing her anyways. Maybe someone could give some examples?

[edit] In Closing

Wizards are an excellent class for someone who wants to fight, or just help others. It would also be tougher going about as a solo Wizard, although possibly rewarding (not that there aren't enough factions who would JUST love another Wizard!)

In any case, if the complete versatility and ability of the Wizard doesn't appeal to you, that's quite alright. There's certainly other classes you can have fun with. But if you want to follow the path of the purest magics, hopefully this guide will prove to be very helpful to you.

Good luck, and make spellcasters proud! Any discussion and useful edits are, of course, welcome.

StarStorm 02:27, 17 August 2007 (CDT)