Planning to roll an Archmage... advise is welcome!

[krogyy]

so, here comes U9 with all its savantness and i'm thinking to play a wizard. my reasons are twofold: firstly i never played an arcane past level 8 so i want to get a taste of all the spells out there to see what i really like. secondly it is always good to have a wiz PL in case i decide i'd like to try a sorc.

so my dilemma now is choosing what scools to specialize in. my top three preferences are Conjuration, Transmutation and Evocation that could combine in different ways. for example:

Primary Conj, Secondary Evo: cheap webs, sustainable damage. probably the best for soloing. downside is i will lose a lot of SP to get all evocation SLA.

Primary Trans, Secondary Conj: big, long range disintegrates sonds awfully fun. on top of that you get an effective helpless source in the form of FTS and, well, cheap webs.

both would be primarly force specced. would such combos be effective at all?

another issue is AOE spells. there is cyclonic blast that looks like decent damage but the description says it wipes clouds, WF and other lingering spells. does this include web or ice storm also?

otherwise AOE damage could come from horrid wilting if it remains a no-save spell or from a secondary line.
what do you advise as a backup?

[bryanmeerkat]

Planning to roll an Archmage... advise is welcome!

Dont !

There was only one decent Archmage line and that is getting hit with the bat of nerf shortly.
Along with the AM SLA abilities are being doubled in cost .

And if you havent got Warforged really dont .

Pale master is looking a lot better at the moment .

[krogyy]

Dont !

There was only one decent Archmage line and that is getting hit with the bat of nerf shortly.
Along with the AM SLA abilities are being doubled in cost .

And if you havent got Warforged really dont .

Pale master is looking a lot better at the moment .

i'm aware that evocation SLA will get longer cooldowns/higher costs but, for example, this wouldn't affect a transmutation/conjuration AM.

care to elaborate why the above combos are not effective?

besides, i do have wf of course.

[bryanmeerkat]

i'm aware that evocation SLA will get longer cooldowns/higher costs but, for example, this wouldn't affect a transmutation/conjuration AM.

care to elaborate why the above combos are not effective?

besides, i do have wf of course.

As well as the evocation they have done the same to the archmage bolt and blast.

(to be fair I am being overly negative the increases prob wont make a lot of difference I seldom ran out of mana on most quests I had loads left )

[krogyy]

As well as the evocation they have done the same to the archmage bolt and blast.

(to be fair I am being overly negative the increases prob wont make a lot of difference I seldom ran out of mana on most quests I had loads left )

true. and i was planning to skip arcane bolt/blast because of this . magic/chain missile + cyclonic blast should be a nice sustainable source of damage(around 200 dps maybe).

the only issue is if cyclonic blast wipes webs or ice storms away...

[Bodic]

in order to rebalance SORC, Archmage wizards is getting nerfed into a buffbot pale master is a good choice the highest necro DC's

[Beethoven]

There will always be people who insist anything but their choice is gimp. It's true Palemaster got a huge buff and a lot of perks that puts them even or above Archmages in a lot of ways. However, that doesn't mean Archmages have no longer anything going for them.

Now, where I do agree is that all the stuff coming with Palemaster makes a non-warforged Archmage hard to justify. So, I'll continue with the assumption of a warforged archmage.

Currently (on live) the probably most powerful specialization for epics is Enchantment/Conjuration. Generally Palemaster will have a similar Enchantment DC if they spec for it (ie: purchase Spell Focus and Greater Spell Focus Enchantment) and I consider it likely most concerned with Epics will. There is really little reason for them to not go that route since it gives them one high DC school for nuking/killing (Necromancy) and a high DC for the most potent CC (Enchantment).

Enchantment/Necro specialized Archmages are going to fall behind some here with similar Enchantment DC and likely a lower Necro DC; if warforged the Archmage will have higher burst healing potential but that's pretty much it.

Transmutation: currently the primary point for Transmutation is Flesh-to-Stone due to mob immunities against insta-death (Necro) spells. Flesh-to-Stone targets the Fort save, which is the low save for caster types. However, come U9 the immunities go away and you might as well use insta-Death spells against them. There are significantly less cases where Flesh-to-Stone is the superior choice. It's going to be mostly limited to cases where mobs actually cast Deathward (and here you could try take out the cleric with Power Word: Kill before it gets the spell off) and cases where you don't want them dead (ie: cases where casters respawn after they are killed).

Conjuration: to me this remains an extremely attractive choice. You likely end up with higher Conjuration DC's than a Palemaster (since I simply cannot see why they would specialize in Conjuration /instead/ of Enchantment or manage to free up enough feats to fit in 6 feats for Spell Focus/Greater Spell Focus). Conjuration will give you high DC webs for CC and access to Web as SLA.

My suggestion would be to go warforged and take Enchantment as primary and Conjuration as secondary Spell Mastery school. You get Hypno as 1 SP SLA and Web as 3 SP SLA; if things get tight you have an easier time firing off combinations such as Web (to trap them), Hypno (to debuff) and Mass Hold. All in all it'd give you an instantenous CC to round them up, +3 DC (due to the debuff) for Mass Hold and only costs you 4 SP more. It requires more button mashing and adds a couple seconds of casting. Also, Web as SLA gives you nigh unlimited CC for cases where SP become an issue (particularly long quests like eCoF). Other Conjuration spells of note are several Acid spells, Incendiary Cloud and Trap the Soul.

In other words, you'd get some more versatility in crowd control and free debuffs as Archmage, which - in combination - should put the Archmage ahead in pure CC capability. Palemaster will shine by being superior in combining CC with nuking ability.

[Kriogen]

Go Evoc AM from lvl 1 to 12 (now or U9). Then switch to Pale Master. Do this even if you are Warforged.

Why Evoc: that cheap MM can on-shot-kill most trash mobs at low levels. Why bother with CC if you can just kill them. Plus just because you are speced for force damage, you don't lose your regular spells. You can still "web" even if you nuker. Lowbie mobs are lowbie, no need to have super high spell DC. You need high spell DC when you enter Vale/Amrath/etc, high level areas.

Why switch: at higher levels, end game, Evoc AM is kinda pale even now. And it got a nerf (longer cooldowns). PM gives you best overall spell DC and is not far behind AM in any specific spell school. Maybe a point or 2. So good in any situation and also gets a couple of nice perks.

[stille_nacht]

well if you want to stick with archmage my advice goes like this:

Main focus Ench.- mass hold is getting less powerful, true. However, mobs taht take 1.5x damage from everything and cant move still die fast. mass hold is still going to be the most important dc spell IMO.
Secondary focus Necro or Conj.- really depends whether you really want heap cc (web), or a better insta kill dc. either is fine, though i prefer necro because webs dont cost much in the first place

unless taking conj. i wouldnt bother with SLAs.
if you want to make an Evo archmage, then youll want all the SLAs, and bolt/missile. if you cycle enough spells, cooldown becomes less important.


but i should note that PM does seem directly better than archmage with the next update. form of the vampire allows pm to reach the same ench. dc as archmage, and more easily (they take no effective loss of Fort. from the yugoloth potion). In addition, they have more hp, self heal, and possibly spell pen.

[krogyy]

elf palemaster it is then XD

it is a pity though. transmutation/conjuration was growing on me...
something a bit unique and spamming disintegrates around sounded lots of fun!

[MindCake]

i will lose a lot of SP to get all evocation SLA.

Here's a secret: AMs _can_ get SLAs.
They don't _have_ to.

You can take just the first 3 tiers. That's a popular setup I think.
Then decide if Cyclonic Blast is good enough to be worth the permanent 300 SP cost (75 evoc spec II, 100 fire shield, 125 cyclonic blast).

BTW, maybe it's just me, but with U9, Evocation sounds like a poor choice to specialize in. Not even talking about rampant nerfing.

The main thing Evoc AM has for it is nearly-free DPS.
With Spell Pass, spell costs are being lowered to give reasonably-priced DPS spell options. So take, say, MM and Scorching Ray as spells. Not quite as SP efficient, but comparable if not better DPS (shorter cooldowns), and it saves you: feat, AP and permanent SP.

[krogyy]

Here's a secret: AMs _can_ get SLAs.
They don't _have_ to.

i know but there is no other point other than the SLAs about an Evocation Archmage.

You can take just the first 3 tiers. That's a popular setup I think.
Then decide if Cyclonic Blast is good enough to be worth the permanent 300 SP cost (75 evoc spec II, 100 fire shield, 125 cyclonic blast).

yeah, it's a steep cost indeed. i was reasoning i could get cyclonic blast instead of arcane bolt/blast.

while cyclonic has the same damage of the arcanes, it gets heightened, maximised and empowered for free so it should do significantly more dps and higher burst damage for 100sp more.

BTW, maybe it's just me, but with U9, Evocation sounds like a poor choice to specialize in. Not even talking about rampant nerfing.

The main thing Evoc AM has for it is nearly-free DPS.
With Spell Pass, spell costs are being lowered to give reasonably-priced DPS spell options. So take, say, MM and Scorching Ray as spells. Not quite as SP efficient, but comparable if not better DPS (shorter cooldowns), and it saves you: feat, AP and permanent SP.

this may be true. i will need some experimenting and maybe some feat swaps along the way.

[Majere_Aumar]

I've been testing Evocation AM on the test server and its been buffed quite a bit.

Cyclonic Blast from evocation 5 has been fixed so force enhancements apply. I've seen normal damage of around 300-450 with crits up around 1000. This is untyped damage with no resists possible.

Combined with its knockdown, this has become a great spell. Evoker AM can deal quite a lot of damage now. Not even close to the new sorcs, but great for a wizzie.

[krogyy]

I've been testing Evocation AM on the test server and its been buffed quite a bit.

Cyclonic Blast from evocation 5 has been fixed so force enhancements apply. I've seen normal damage of around 300-450 with crits up around 1000. This is untyped damage with no resists possible.

Combined with its knockdown, this has become a great spell. Evoker AM can deal quite a lot of damage now. Not even close to the new sorcs, but great for a wizzie.

cyclonic blas is capping at 20d6 now also.

i think i'll try to roll an evocation/conjuration archmage and see how it goes.

on a side note. did you notice if cyclonic blast wipes webs?