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Im confused... wat shud i choose 4 my 2nd tier classes? im a member of the sisterhood, mage guild, and celestial order, and soon 2 be a member of the eastern houses. any1 have some gud suggestions? my 1st 2 are mage and adept. plz help!

It sounds like you want to be a spellcaster, so I'd suggest you pick Enchantress, Sorcerer, and Wizard.

SWC

swcarter wrote:It sounds like you want to be a spellcaster, so I'd suggest you pick Enchantress, Sorcerer, and Wizard.

SWC

yup, that with a high intelligence (enabling high arcane and spellfire skills), is *the* offensive powerhouse class combination in the game.

a less offensive but much better defensive character would be:

Battlemage, Enchantress, War Witch. That provides just as many learning bonuses to the arcane skill as above and trades spellfire for drainlife. Overall its the best class combination in the game.

2nd Tier Classes

Im interested in being an enchantress, bc of the arcane and celestial learning bonuses, but im interested in nether magic and healing, so shud i chuz celestial for my 2nd tier 2 class? and im also interested in the shugenja class.
id really like 2 have scribe and or channel, iron will, and drainlife.

..you can't have iron will AND drain life. Its one or the other. Of the 2, Drain Life is FAR more powerful (..IF your primary attack is magical).

IMO the 3rd tier Kenjasai is also an excellent class - but more for someone well versed in the game. The 2nd tier Shugenja is really more of a stepping stone class to get to the Kenjasai. Note that you could not do a War Witch/Shungenja if you wanted to because one of the requirements to even obtain the War Witch class is that you have a certain skill level in Heavy Armor (which neither the Shugenja nor the Enchantress have). The same is also true of a War Witch/Sorcerer. The solution to this problem is to use the Valkyrie class instead of the Enchantress.. BUT then you wouldn't get another learning bonus in Arcane - and at least spell power-wise it IS a big deal.

Try the Kenjasai class progression for your next game instead (or your 3rd or 4th game).

As to Celestial magic..

Most of the game is oriented toward combat - consider that Celestial magic only has 2 working offensive spells: Solar Ray and Lightening.

Arcane however is nothing but offensive spells, and also has the most powerful offensive spells.

Practically speaking this means that Celestial magic is simply a "support", both for magic characters and melee characters. Because of this 2 learning bonuses is really more than enough (..and with the War Witch combination I mentioned you would have 3). You can of course go to a max of 4, but there isn't a huge benefit to doing so (like there is with Arcane).

Now Nether is a really "mixed bag" - there are a lot of spells that either don't work, OR spells that do work - but unfortunately cause the game to have problems.

There is one very powerful Nether spell that you can still get a lot of benefit from even with NO learning bonuses, AND with one learning bonus (given to the War Witch) - it can become more powerful. That spell is Poison Cloud, BUT that spell is again more of a support type spell thats well suited to magic characters, BUT even better suited to melee characters. In this respect I'd recommend waiting on a strongly Nether based class (..and note that it could encompass a Kenjasai based character).

With respect to Scribe and Channel..

Both skills have been "butchered" in the game. Even at the highest possible in-game levels they don't replenish spells quickly enough to have significant use. The typical solution is just purchasing more spells to compensate. In any event the War Witch has a learning bonus in BOTH skills (..which is the best you can do in the game).

drainlife

so should i go with warwitch, coz its the only magic related class that i kno of that gets it? and i shud wait on the nethermagic classes?

Queen_Articuno wrote:so should i go with warwitch, coz its the only magic related class that i kno of that gets it? and i shud wait on the nethermagic classes?

If you want a more defensive character then yes.

Note that you could choose a Warlock/Enchantress.. but it is a poor substitute for the War Witch/Enchantress/Battlemage.

Remember though that you can crank up your Nether skill to at least 5 without any learning bonuses.

Poison Cloud is particularly useful against the elder ghosts (like the Elven Banshee) in the Elven Trials.:mischief: So make sure you have mixed up about 100 Poison Clouds before entering the trials, AND that you have a skill level 5 in Nether magic. Also make sure you have plenty of Whirlwinds.

Also - quest for and receive BOTH of your 2nd Tier classes before you begin the Way of the Tiger quest.

Second Tier 2 class

Ok, I have Enchantress for my first Tier 2 class, but what should I choose for the second class? I'm a member of the Eastern Houses, The Sisterhood, The Celestial Order, and the Mages' Guild. ne help appreciated. Thnx!

Options:

1. Battlemage>War Witch

2. Sorcerer>Wizard

Tier 2 classes

Scottg wrote:Options:

1. Battlemage>War Witch

2. Sorcerer>Wizard

Why Battlemage?

Queen_Articuno wrote:Why Battlemage?

1. it has a learning bonus in arcane,

2. it has the required access to heavy armor, heavy weapons, and heavy shields needed to quest for the War Witch (which the enchantress does not have).

Spellfire VS Drainlife

Which of these skills is better in your opinion? Coz I really want to have the Warwitch as my final tier class, but SF is so tempting. How does SF work, exactly?

Queen_Articuno wrote:Which of these skills is better in your opinion? Coz I really want to have the Warwitch as my final tier class, but SF is so tempting. How does SF work, exactly?

Drainlife works pretty much as advertised.. Of course the more opponents you affect, the more your character is healed. For this reason Blast Nova *rocks* with Drainlife against multiple opponents. Because of its persistent nature, Whirlwind is also excellent (as is Poison Cloud).

Spellfire is a bit "tricky".

I was doing some informal testing of it vs. the power difference with learning bonuses to arcane. The results were interesting.

1st off at the higher in-game levels of about 12-13 in spell fire typically "netted" about an 18-20% power increase for any spell - ASSUMING THAT THE SKILL LEVEL OF THE MAGIC SKILL WAS MAXED IN GAME. The strange thing is that the power increase was not linear in comparison to an additional learning bonus and resulting additional skill levels.

For instance, say your character has 20 in arcane and 10 in spellfire.

For high level spells like Cataclysm or Fire Nova, increasing your arcane skill level substantially (say to 32) resulted in more power for those spells vs. that 10 in spellfire. Conversely lower level spells like Blast Nova improved more with the 10 in spellfire (vs. the "jump" to arcane 32).

Neither Drainlife nor Spellfire worked very well without at least 7 points, and worked a LOT better with 9 points. Note that BOTH of these skills work with ALL spells (not just arcane).

IMO the better skill is Drainlife as long as you have those 4 learning bonuses in Arcane, and as long as you get your arcane skill up as high as possible. Once you have done that - a 20% increase just doesn't match-up to the defensive potency of Drainlife. (..unless of course you have tons of Cataclysm and use only that spell - in which case the game becomes boring.)

Drainlife & Status Effects

Does DL still work if you use spells that cause status effects, like frozen or burning? Bc, burning does continual damage over a short period of time. So does the burn damage also heal you as well as the normal damage?

Queen_Articuno wrote:Does DL still work if you use spells that cause status effects, like frozen or burning? Bc, burning does continual damage over a short period of time. So does the burn damage also heal you as well as the normal damage?

If the spell works in-game, then both Spellfire and Drainlife will work.

HOWEVER, Drainlife requires damage to your opponent to heal you - so something like the Nether spell Soften, won't heal you.

I believe that damage such as the after burn of a fireball or fire nova spell will not result in delayed health given to you (..I haven't tried "burning".) Instead (If I remember correctly), the health is all given at once to you.

On the other hand Whirlwind and Poison Cloud do give you health over an extended period.

The answer then is, it depends on the spell.