Pale Master SLAs

[Hipparan]

It has been a long time since I've played a Pale Master. The main reason I haven't is that I absolutely loved the SLAs (especially Necrotic Blast) but for a long time they didn't do very good damage and were mostly a waste of AP. I know that now things have changed and they no longer use HP and now scale with 100% spellpower and can use metamagics.

How are they now? Do Pale Masters nowadays bother using those abilities? I'm currently using an Abyss Warlock to have fun with undead stuff, but it's not that great as you can imagine from others' feedback.

[Discpsycho]

Even at 30 I still use Necrotic Blast, which is comparable to Energy Burst (thanks to spellpower differences) but doesn't require close range. There's a chance I'll remove it from the bar when my DCs are no-fail in most endgame content, but that's a long way off

[MsE]

An item found in the Feywild within Feytwisted chests called the Pendant of Bottled Moonlight adds an effect called Overwhelming Despair. Almost everything you hit with a Necromancy spell including your SLA's will be affected by Crushing Despair with no save. This equals a -2 penalty on attack rolls, saving throws, skill checks, and weapon damage rolls and all targets within the area of effect now suffer -5 to will for 15 seconds .

[Carpone]

The power level of PM SLAs are great. The lack of necrotic damage immunity bypass (except for undead) really sucks.

[MsE]

Try the tier 4 Pale Master enhancement called Unholy Avatar.

You are cloaked in the darkness itself, and can reach out with your Negative Energy Spells to taint the Undead with mortality. When you strike an Undead with a damage-dealing Negative Energy Spell, it leaves a lingering weakness to Negative Energy that bypasses an Undead's natural resistance to Negative Energy for 20 seconds. Only works while in a Shroud form.

Your first Necrotic Blast will heal undead, thereafter necro spells will do damage to undead. Note that it doesn't work on ALL undead, which should be bug reported but I haven't bothered.

[Torkzed]

Try the tier 4 Pale Master enhancement called Unholy Avatar.

You are cloaked in the darkness itself, and can reach out with your Negative Energy Spells to taint the Undead with mortality. When you strike an Undead with a damage-dealing Negative Energy Spell, it leaves a lingering weakness to Negative Energy that bypasses an Undead's natural resistance to Negative Energy for 20 seconds. Only works while in a Shroud form.

Your first Necrotic Blast will heal undead, thereafter necro spells will do damage to undead. Note that it doesn't work on ALL undead, which should be bug reported but I haven't bothered.

It also doesn't help with non-undead creatures that are immune. Some constructs, for example.

I am playing a PM for the first time in over 5 years, and while I am happy with the damage of the SLAs against most targets, I have to agree that the lack of immunity bypass makes for a somewhat more aggravating play experience than with sorc or alchemist.

That said, PM have a LOT of spells at their disposal, and I never run out of options. I just have to work harder and I am constantly juggling what spells/abilities are located in the prime areas of my hotbars.

I don't know how long I will stay a PM before I go back to sorc or alchemist, but it is fun change of pace.

[Discpsycho]

It also doesn't help with non-undead creatures that are immune. Some constructs, for example.

It also doesn't negate Death Ward, which I always fail to check for :P

[KoobTheProud]

The SLA's are ok in most situations. Necrotic Ray is still the OG killer when you need to take one target down on one cast and don't know if Deathward is there.

[Seph1roth5]

their SLAs are awesome, something to do in between meteor swarm or when you're low on SP. Hell I have necrotic ray un-meta'd and it does a ton of damage too lol. Easy to get a ton of necrotic spellpower.

[Carpone]

Try the tier 4 Pale Master enhancement called Unholy Avatar.

It needs to be bumped to T5 and bypass immunity for all creature types. It's lame you can't rely on it for constructs and other immune creature types, after investing all that AP and gear to make the SLAs worthwhile to use.

[mr420247]

So lame but then you could then make a viable necromancer without an am pass then how would they sell alchs oh right

The slas are ok but not enough of them or spells to make it really work 2 slas 1 single spell and no spell ed aoes

Trying to max necro and elemental with no tree that works def isn't ez and then force and untyped impossible

[zybert]

It has been a long time since I've played a Pale Master. The main reason I haven't is that I absolutely loved the SLAs (especially Necrotic Blast) but for a long time they didn't do very good damage and were mostly a waste of AP. I know that now things have changed and they no longer use HP and now scale with 100% spellpower and can use metamagics.

How are they now? Do Pale Masters nowadays bother using those abilities? I'm currently using an Abyss Warlock to have fun with undead stuff, but it's not that great as you can imagine from others' feedback.

the pale masters SLA's are nerfed by 50% now and the do damage but they are not that great. at level 14 i can do about 300 damage with necro blast without crits. on the other hand necro ray i can do almost 2k at the same level standard of about 500 damage. ive seen cleric of all classes clear rooms at the same level. so in conclusion a caster wizard is ok compared to the other caster classes, if doing wizard i recommend EK mixed with palemaster for the necro healing

[Peter_Principle]

the pale masters SLA's are nerfed by 50% now and the do damage but they are not that great. at level 14 i can do about 300 damage with necro blast without crits. on the other hand necro ray i can do almost 2k at the same level standard of about 500 damage. ive seen cleric of all classes clear rooms at the same level. so in conclusion a caster wizard is ok compared to the other caster classes, if doing wizard i recommend EK mixed with palemaster for the necro healing

Surely it's not 50%. We lost about 200 sp from the foolish belt nerf, but that's not cutting damage by half. I went from about 1150 necro spell power to 950. That's not a 50% loss of damage, is it?

[Xgya]

The singular change that made me the happiest was to Cloak of Shadows.

Gives me a very good excuse to max out tumble just so I can fool enemies by staying invisible while I'm blasting.
The game's sole source of stable, at-will Improved Invisibility that doesn't stop when you do an action.


As for dealing with Constructs, no much to do but throw other damage spells at them, or hope for some good luck on Prismatic Sprays.