Worried about my wizard's viability

[Talon_Moonshadow]

If you maxed Int, you'll be fine.

If you almost maxed Int you'll be ok, but always regret not maxing it.

If you have barely enough Int to cast your spells.....Buff a lot and people will probably not notice most of the time......at least not if things are going well for the group.

And if things go bad, they are more likely to blame the cleric anyway.

[squirrl811]

I am at level 19 on my evocation focused archmage and find it to be very fun and still very capable. I will admit that in the very late levels the SLAs start to lose some punch compared to the foes you face, but is still capable of doing the job with some patience or creativity with your other spell choices.

I usually hold a scepter that gives me +9% force critical chance and wear the sora kell set for the big damage boosts to spells. I also took all of the enhancements for the force line for max damage, critical hit chance, and critical hit damage. I also leave maximize and empower on full time which does affect your magic missiles and chain missiles without the big extra SP cost.

I tend to cycle SLA's for almost non-stop cheap damage output. Start with arcane blast, then chain missiles, followed by arcane bolt, magic missiles, and arcane bolt again. The cooldowns are such that you can run this chain nearly non-stop with maybe 1 second left to wait to start at arcane blast again.

I have fun with this build, although I also tend to have a more patient playstyle and don't mind if there are other builds that might flatten the mobs more quickly. I do both solos and PUGs pretty regularly and have never had any complaints. One area this really shines is with beholders... all those SLAs are unaffected by the anti-magic field!

So I guess my point is that an evocation archmage that puts enough focus into the force lines can still be effective and a "blast" to play. (Silly pun intended.) I've not done epics so I don't know how well it will perform there, but the rest of the game works just fine. Most important is to just have fun and be creative in how you get past obstacles in quests.

[Maelodic]

I am at level 19 on my evocation focused archmage and find it to be very fun and still very capable. I will admit that in the very late levels the SLAs start to lose some punch compared to the foes you face, but is still capable of doing the job with some patience or creativity with your other spell choices.

I usually hold a scepter that gives me +9% force critical chance and wear the sora kell set for the big damage boosts to spells. I also took all of the enhancements for the force line for max damage, critical hit chance, and critical hit damage. I also leave maximize and empower on full time which does affect your magic missiles and chain missiles without the big extra SP cost.

I tend to cycle SLA's for almost non-stop cheap damage output. Start with arcane blast, then chain missiles, followed by arcane bolt, magic missiles, and arcane bolt again. The cooldowns are such that you can run this chain nearly non-stop with maybe 1 second left to wait to start at arcane blast again.

I have fun with this build, although I also tend to have a more patient playstyle and don't mind if there are other builds that might flatten the mobs more quickly. I do both solos and PUGs pretty regularly and have never had any complaints. One area this really shines is with beholders... all those SLAs are unaffected by the anti-magic field!

So I guess my point is that an evocation archmage that puts enough focus into the force lines can still be effective and a "blast" to play. (Silly pun intended.) I've not done epics so I don't know how well it will perform there, but the rest of the game works just fine. Most important is to just have fun and be creative in how you get past obstacles in quests.

Once you hit 20, send me a private message and tell me how it does in epics and such, I'm curious. Even though I sold out and switched to PM for the raw power of it, I'd still like to know.

[xtchizobr]

And if things go bad, they are more likely to blame the cleric anyway.

it's true.

this one time, at band camp, i was in a Necromancer's Thrall (normal) run recently, with yet-another-half-elf-bard who died instantly from one Lightning Bolt at the boss. s/he was level 7... and i know from how much i had been healing him/her throughout the dungeon (i took less damage even though i was a 14 AC elf cleric running around meleeing mobs to death with a mace) that s/he had no more than 50 or 60 HP because one Cure Mod would hit him/her for about half his/her health...

so when s/he got one-shot at the boss and then ranted about me not healing at all, nevermind that it was his/her only death even after many close calls with traps.... i suddenly remembered why i hate playing healers, MMOs and just humanity in general.