Wizard Builds for FTP Newbie

[Enderoc]

OK I am going to get real for a moment...
If you want to be a pure living wizard you are going to have to follow this plan...

Suck it up and play as undead until you can self heal then reset enhancements. This means start off with good charisma and max UMD INCLUDING taking a SKILL FOCUS feat for UMD (USE MAGIC DEVICE) Always look for UMD and insightful UMD ITEMS in the AUCTIION HOUSE as well as ANYTHING that boosts Charisma.

UMD is the only thing that will save your face in grouping. Every Vet here knows it is THE MOST IMPORTANT skill to have for those who can't turn SP (or ki) into HP.

If you can at least get cure serious wounds wands and scrolls to 80 percent you can start taking off the shroud. But don't stop there the goal is heal and restoration scrolls. Keep reaching for higher UMD.

Palemaster is made especially for newb wizards...you can't keep your skelly forever...Archmage is where the power is. So start off PM and in the morning you will be AM and it will be another day....if you make it as a ftp fleshy you deserve respect.

Normally people don't do wizards until a few past lives and tomes....unless they been here awhile and want a challenge.

[KoobTheProud]

UMD is the only thing that will save your face in grouping. Every Vet here knows it is THE MOST IMPORTANT skill to have for those who can't turn SP into HP.

UMD is not at all easy to get to the necessary levels if you are a newer player playing a class that does not stack Charisma and/or have built-in buffs to UMD.

If OP is really set on playing a non-PM Wizard the obvious choice is to go Warforged, secure in the knowledge that you can self-heal and immune to many of the things (death effects, level drain, various CC that annoy the bejeezus out of fleshies, etc.) that will make them miserable otherwise.

[Enderoc]

UMD is not at all easy to get to the necessary levels if you are a newer player playing a class that does not stack Charisma and/or have built-in buffs to UMD.

If OP is really set on playing a non-PM Wizard the obvious choice is to go Warforged, secure in the knowledge that you can self-heal and immune to many of the things (death effects, level drain, various CC that annoy the bejeezus out of fleshies, etc.) that will make them miserable otherwise.

Actually its not as hard as you think. I picked up a helm with both UMD and insightful UMD the other day...its easier now than it has ever been to get high UMD and the boost on stats on equipment jumped as well. Warforged is ideal for a new player but if its not available and you want an Eldritch Knight Arch Mage... UMD is THE MOST IMPORTANT thing to focus on not involving your class.

[Careall]

In my opinion, Pale Master is too strong and should be nerved. There - I said it ! - But it would very surely evoke a storm.

No storm from me. I agree PMs are OP and need to be nerfed or otherwise balanced. Light spells used to be insta-death from many champ casters, but it seems the light spells were "fixed" and now my PMs remain cautious, but are far less afraid of light damage. Another change, which allowed PMs to be healed by Positive energy, might have been "needed," but was all benefit. Also, PM's now have an unconscious range instead of instantly dying when at zero HP. With those changes, the scales were tipped considerably with very little to counterbalance. PMs were strong before those changes.

[Varr]

As a PM for years, why I argued so long and hard on the forums about the Positive healing changes.

Reguardless.........This will not make alot of sense to the OP, but if I was your buddy, I'd instead suggest you play a Druid.

[bookmarked]

As a PM for years, why I argued so long and hard on the forums about the Positive healing changes.

Reguardless.........This will not make alot of sense to the OP, but if I was your buddy, I'd instead suggest you play a Druid.

Actually, I'd like to try a druid, but that's more $$$ I don't really have. Maybe they'll go on sale next month.

[Peter_Principle]

Actually, I think you could get away with playing a first life no-prior-gear free-to-play Archmage Evoker dps caster wizard, as long as you manage your expectations. The game has 14 difficulty levels: Casual, Normal, Hard, Elite, R1-R10. If you have average video game competence (i.e. you don't need to have fighter pilot reflexes, and assuming you're not a complete klutz at video games) you can probably complete at least half of all the DDO quests as a first lifer on Normal difficulty. If you find yourself getting killed in a particular quest, you start over on Casual difficulty. If you still can't finish on Casual, skip it. You only need to earn 1.9 million xp to get to level 20. The levels are going to zoom in.

Your 28 point build for this would be:

Human race

Max int

16 Con

Rest of your points into Charisma for UMD (wands and scrolls for backup self healing)

Have a hireling cleric tag along as your primary healing source

20 wizard

Concentrate your enhancement points in Archwizard. You will especially want everything that gives an SLA damaging spell. The cores gives you magic missile at 1, chain missile at 6 and Cyclonic Blast at 18. Tier 3 gives you Arcane Bolt around level 3 and Arcane Blast around level 12. These 5 SLAs go in action slots 1-5. When you run into an enemy, these are going to be your go-to attacks. You just move down the row pressing keys 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. If an enemy dies, Tab to the next one and repeat.

Feats

You get 1 bonus feat as a human and a bonus feat at level 1 as a wizard. Everyone gets 1 feat at level 1. Human wizards get 3.

At level 1 you should take:

1: Empower, Maximize (wizard bonus), Quicken (human bonus)

These three Metamagic feats are going to give your SLAs a lot of power. Empower and Maximize will make them do a lot more damage. Quicken will make them cast faster. Your Core 1 Magic Missile is going to ruin the day of many kobolds and orcs.

Remember that Metamagics are free on SLAs. I spent a lot of time when I started DDO not knowing this. Learning it was a game-changer. Turning on metamagics for regular spells will up their cost prohibitively. But the cost stays the same with all SLAs turned on. You turn on/off metamagics for particular spells by right clicking on them. You can also turn them on/off universally by dragging your metamagic to a hotbar and clicking on it.

3: Mental Toughness

5 (wizard bonus): Improved Mental Toughness

These feats are going to give you bonus spell points. You'll need them. Spell points are a resource you're going to have to learn to manage. It's easy to run out. NB --> This is also why you want to have a cleric hireling. Some of them have a a nifty enhancement called Divine Vitality. Focus the "cursor" on yourself and click their Divine Vitality button and your cleric buddy will restore some of your spell points. Shrine in a can!

6: Insightful Reflexes

Instead of using Dexterity bonus for reflex saves, you use Intelligence bonus. Traps are going to be an issue. This fixes that.

9: Enlarge.

This increases the range of your spells. It can be an issue in some quests and in wilderness areas.

10 (wizard bonus): Spell Focus: Evocation

12: Greater Spell Focus: Evocation

All your evocation spells will have higher DCs from Spell Focus, which makes it harder for monsters to save against them.

12 (wizard bonus): Heighten

This also increases the DCs of your spells. It's a metamagic, so it costs spell points if you turn it on for a spell. It changes the spell level of the spell to whatever spell level is currently the highest spell level you can cast. Increasing the spell level of the spell increases spell DC on a 1-for-1 basis. E.g. if you're a level 11 Wizard, highest spells you can cast are 6th level. Color spray is a 1st level spell. Let's say your standing base DC for this spell is, idk, 20. Turn on Heighten, and now the DC is 25. It makes Color Spray think it's a 6th level spell for purposes of determining DC. When you hit level 13, Color Spray will convert a 7th level spell for DC calcuation, and your DC in this example will go up to 26. When you hit level 17 and can cast 9th level spells, it bumps 1st level spells up by +8 DC. Quite a jump. It does nothing for 9th level spells, of course.

15 (wizard bonus): Spell Focus Enchantment

15: Greater Spell Focus Enchantment

Increases your crowd control spell saves.

18: Augment Summons

Helps with your hirelings. At this point, you've taken all the useful feats for a caster.

20: Extend.

Makes spells with a duration last longer.

Skills

In order of importance, take Spellcraft, Concentration, Use Magic Device, Search, Spot, Balance, Tumble, Heal, Perform and that will surely max out your available skills until you hit 20.

Items

Spellpower and spell critical for Force spells, definitely. It probably doesn't hurt to have spell power and/or crit when you can find it for one or two more of Fire, Lightning, Ice and maybe Acid, if you can fit it in somewhere. You can typically find spell power and crit on rando scepters, orbs and rings. Check the auction house regularly. Thaumaturgy on items is an especially nice prefix to find, since it adds two spell powers and a Potency (which adds to all your spell powers, at a lower level). You can also find spellpower on armor.

Other magic properties on rando items to look for: + Int, +Con, Deathblock, Fortification, Speed (especially on boots), Saves, False Life/Vitality.

Happy to answer other questions you might have.

[Peter_Principle]

So I just played that build I suggested above. I started at level 7. The only twinking I did was to buy about 40,000 plat worth of gear off of the auction house, and use one of the horses in my stable. The gear I had would probably be somewhere below what you would eventually acquire playing the game legitimately up to level 7. I had a +3 int item, a +4 con item, 107 force spell power, every other spell power less than that, a Deathblock item and a Sheltering item.

I ran it through a level 2 quest (Missing in Action), two level 4 quests (Stand Your Ground, Dirty Laundry) and then part of a level 7 (Temple of Elemental Evil Part 1). All on Normal.

So the 2 and 4s were a face roll. TOEE is probably one of the most difficult quests to run at level.

This build was able to kill mobs with ease. Hit groups with Chain Missile sla, then pick off the survivors with Magic Missile and Arcane Bolt sla. Your bane is the mobs who cast the shield spell. But shield doesn't protect against Arcane Bolt (and all your other damaging spells). I couldn't finish TOEE of course, I don't think anyone would expect you to. But it's noteworthy that the monster that sent me packing was Kirmundy the Bleak. He's a lich, and he's immune to any spell 4th level and below. Kinda ******** to put him in a base level 7 quest, but there ya go.

If you want to run an Archmage, I think you'll be fine if you stick to Normal.

[bookmarked]

Actually, I think you could get away with playing a first life no-prior-gear free-to-play Archmage Evoker dps caster wizard, as long as you manage your expectations. The game has 14 difficulty levels: Casual, Normal, Hard, Elite, R1-R10. If you have average video game competence (i.e. you don't need to have fighter pilot reflexes, and assuming you're not a complete klutz at video games) you can probably complete at least half of all the DDO quests as a first lifer on Normal difficulty. If you find yourself getting killed in a particular quest, you start over on Casual difficulty. If you still can't finish on Casual, skip it. You only need to earn 1.9 million xp to get to level 20. The levels are going to zoom in.

Your 28 point build for this would be:

Human race

Max int

16 Con

Rest of your points into Charisma for UMD (wands and scrolls for backup self healing)

Have a hireling cleric tag along as your primary healing source

20 wizard

Concentrate your enhancement points in Archwizard. You will especially want everything that gives an SLA damaging spell. The cores gives you magic missile at 1, chain missile at 6 and Cyclonic Blast at 18. Tier 3 gives you Arcane Bolt around level 3 and Arcane Blast around level 12. These 5 SLAs go in action slots 1-5. When you run into an enemy, these are going to be your go-to attacks. You just move down the row pressing keys 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. If an enemy dies, Tab to the next one and repeat.

Feats

You get 1 bonus feat as a human and a bonus feat at level 1 as a wizard. Everyone gets 1 feat at level 1. Human wizards get 3.

At level 1 you should take:

1: Empower, Maximize (wizard bonus), Quicken (human bonus)

These three Metamagic feats are going to give your SLAs a lot of power. Empower and Maximize will make them do a lot more damage. Quicken will make them cast faster. Your Core 1 Magic Missile is going to ruin the day of many kobolds and orcs.

Remember that Metamagics are free on SLAs. I spent a lot of time when I started DDO not knowing this. Learning it was a game-changer. Turning on metamagics for regular spells will up their cost prohibitively. But the cost stays the same with all SLAs turned on. You turn on/off metamagics for particular spells by right clicking on them. You can also turn them on/off universally by dragging your metamagic to a hotbar and clicking on it.

3: Mental Toughness

5 (wizard bonus): Improved Mental Toughness

These feats are going to give you bonus spell points. You'll need them. Spell points are a resource you're going to have to learn to manage. It's easy to run out. NB --> This is also why you want to have a cleric hireling. Some of them have a a nifty enhancement called Divine Vitality. Focus the "cursor" on yourself and click their Divine Vitality button and your cleric buddy will restore some of your spell points. Shrine in a can!

6: Insightful Reflexes

Instead of using Dexterity bonus for reflex saves, you use Intelligence bonus. Traps are going to be an issue. This fixes that.

9: Enlarge.

This increases the range of your spells. It can be an issue in some quests and in wilderness areas.

10 (wizard bonus): Spell Focus: Evocation

12: Greater Spell Focus: Evocation

All your evocation spells will have higher DCs from Spell Focus, which makes it harder for monsters to save against them.

12 (wizard bonus): Heighten

This also increases the DCs of your spells. It's a metamagic, so it costs spell points if you turn it on for a spell. It changes the spell level of the spell to whatever spell level is currently the highest spell level you can cast. Increasing the spell level of the spell increases spell DC on a 1-for-1 basis. E.g. if you're a level 11 Wizard, highest spells you can cast are 6th level. Color spray is a 1st level spell. Let's say your standing base DC for this spell is, idk, 20. Turn on Heighten, and now the DC is 25. It makes Color Spray think it's a 6th level spell for purposes of determining DC. When you hit level 13, Color Spray will convert a 7th level spell for DC calcuation, and your DC in this example will go up to 26. When you hit level 17 and can cast 9th level spells, it bumps 1st level spells up by +8 DC. Quite a jump. It does nothing for 9th level spells, of course.

15 (wizard bonus): Spell Focus Enchantment

15: Greater Spell Focus Enchantment

Increases your crowd control spell saves.

18: Augment Summons

Helps with your hirelings. At this point, you've taken all the useful feats for a caster.

20: Extend.

Makes spells with a duration last longer.

Skills

In order of importance, take Spellcraft, Concentration, Use Magic Device, Search, Spot, Balance, Tumble, Heal, Perform and that will surely max out your available skills until you hit 20.

Items

Spellpower and spell critical for Force spells, definitely. It probably doesn't hurt to have spell power and/or crit when you can find it for one or two more of Fire, Lightning, Ice and maybe Acid, if you can fit it in somewhere. You can typically find spell power and crit on rando scepters, orbs and rings. Check the auction house regularly. Thaumaturgy on items is an especially nice prefix to find, since it adds two spell powers and a Potency (which adds to all your spell powers, at a lower level). You can also find spellpower on armor.

Other magic properties on rando items to look for: + Int, +Con, Deathblock, Fortification, Speed (especially on boots), Saves, False Life/Vitality.

Happy to answer other questions you might have.

Cool! Thanks, I look forward to giving it a try! And even if I can't make it work as well as someone more experienced, as long as I'm having fun and learning more about the game, it's all good.

[slarden]

what I'd like to see is 1) a first life 28 point FTP Eldritch Knight build - pure or multiclass (with some melee class?), and 2) a first life 28 point FTP wizard - multi-class is fine - that doesn't focus on melee like the ED. Both of them need to be able to solo much of the time and I don't want to do any of the undead Pale Master stuff. T

The bottom line is you shouldn't do this at all and should go in a different direction with the constraints you provided.

If you want to solo on a new ftp character there are 2 options for wizard - Pale Master or Warforged. You won't have enough charisma/UMD to scroll heal as a 28 point wizard build with no tomes. You don't have warforged and you excluded pale master as a constraint.

Without harper tree you can't go int-based so as a 28 point build this is going to spread you very thinly.

Casting is in a terrible place compared to martial builds, but can be overcome with alot of past lifes and other power such as tomes.

If you want to solo on a 28 point build with full free-to-play limitations you should look at a class with easy-button healing or a class that provides UMD as a class skill and go with scroll healing if you are willing to learn a harder way to heal that works - but will provide you more build options moving forward once you mastered it. Cleric war domain melee or ranged will work well if you want to some casting. Paladin is also really good if you are willing to consider a non-caster melee and there are several starter builds on the class forum page. Paladin, Cleric melee, pale master eld knight melee are all good 28 point ftp builds for soloing.

I would stay away from pure casting on a 28-point build with free-to-play limitations regardless of class - especially for solo play.

[bookmarked]

Actually, I think you could get away with playing a first life no-prior-gear free-to-play Archmage Evoker dps caster wizard, as long as you manage your expectations. The game has 14 difficulty levels: Casual, Normal, Hard, Elite, R1-R10. If you have average video game competence (i.e. you don't need to have fighter pilot reflexes, and assuming you're not a complete klutz at video games) you can probably complete at least half of all the DDO quests as a first lifer on Normal difficulty. If you find yourself getting killed in a particular quest, you start over on Casual difficulty. If you still can't finish on Casual, skip it. You only need to earn 1.9 million xp to get to level 20. The levels are going to zoom in.

Your 28 point build for this would be:

Human race

Max int

16 Con

Rest of your points into Charisma for UMD (wands and scrolls for backup self healing)

Have a hireling cleric tag along as your primary healing source

20 wizard

Concentrate your enhancement points in Archwizard. You will especially want everything that gives an SLA damaging spell. The cores gives you magic missile at 1, chain missile at 6 and Cyclonic Blast at 18. Tier 3 gives you Arcane Bolt around level 3 and Arcane Blast around level 12. These 5 SLAs go in action slots 1-5. When you run into an enemy, these are going to be your go-to attacks. You just move down the row pressing keys 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. If an enemy dies, Tab to the next one and repeat.

Feats

You get 1 bonus feat as a human and a bonus feat at level 1 as a wizard. Everyone gets 1 feat at level 1. Human wizards get 3.

At level 1 you should take:

1: Empower, Maximize (wizard bonus), Quicken (human bonus)

These three Metamagic feats are going to give your SLAs a lot of power. Empower and Maximize will make them do a lot more damage. Quicken will make them cast faster. Your Core 1 Magic Missile is going to ruin the day of many kobolds and orcs.

Remember that Metamagics are free on SLAs. I spent a lot of time when I started DDO not knowing this. Learning it was a game-changer. Turning on metamagics for regular spells will up their cost prohibitively. But the cost stays the same with all SLAs turned on. You turn on/off metamagics for particular spells by right clicking on them. You can also turn them on/off universally by dragging your metamagic to a hotbar and clicking on it.

3: Mental Toughness

5 (wizard bonus): Improved Mental Toughness

These feats are going to give you bonus spell points. You'll need them. Spell points are a resource you're going to have to learn to manage. It's easy to run out. NB --> This is also why you want to have a cleric hireling. Some of them have a a nifty enhancement called Divine Vitality. Focus the "cursor" on yourself and click their Divine Vitality button and your cleric buddy will restore some of your spell points. Shrine in a can!

6: Insightful Reflexes

Instead of using Dexterity bonus for reflex saves, you use Intelligence bonus. Traps are going to be an issue. This fixes that.

9: Enlarge.

This increases the range of your spells. It can be an issue in some quests and in wilderness areas.

10 (wizard bonus): Spell Focus: Evocation

12: Greater Spell Focus: Evocation

All your evocation spells will have higher DCs from Spell Focus, which makes it harder for monsters to save against them.

12 (wizard bonus): Heighten

This also increases the DCs of your spells. It's a metamagic, so it costs spell points if you turn it on for a spell. It changes the spell level of the spell to whatever spell level is currently the highest spell level you can cast. Increasing the spell level of the spell increases spell DC on a 1-for-1 basis. E.g. if you're a level 11 Wizard, highest spells you can cast are 6th level. Color spray is a 1st level spell. Let's say your standing base DC for this spell is, idk, 20. Turn on Heighten, and now the DC is 25. It makes Color Spray think it's a 6th level spell for purposes of determining DC. When you hit level 13, Color Spray will convert a 7th level spell for DC calcuation, and your DC in this example will go up to 26. When you hit level 17 and can cast 9th level spells, it bumps 1st level spells up by +8 DC. Quite a jump. It does nothing for 9th level spells, of course.

15 (wizard bonus): Spell Focus Enchantment

15: Greater Spell Focus Enchantment

Increases your crowd control spell saves.

18: Augment Summons

Helps with your hirelings. At this point, you've taken all the useful feats for a caster.

20: Extend.

Makes spells with a duration last longer.

Skills

In order of importance, take Spellcraft, Concentration, Use Magic Device, Search, Spot, Balance, Tumble, Heal, Perform and that will surely max out your available skills until you hit 20.

Items

Spellpower and spell critical for Force spells, definitely. It probably doesn't hurt to have spell power and/or crit when you can find it for one or two more of Fire, Lightning, Ice and maybe Acid, if you can fit it in somewhere. You can typically find spell power and crit on rando scepters, orbs and rings. Check the auction house regularly. Thaumaturgy on items is an especially nice prefix to find, since it adds two spell powers and a Potency (which adds to all your spell powers, at a lower level). You can also find spellpower on armor.

Other magic properties on rando items to look for: + Int, +Con, Deathblock, Fortification, Speed (especially on boots), Saves, False Life/Vitality.

Happy to answer other questions you might have.

@Peter_Principle - I'm finally putting this build in Character Builder Lite and I've run into a couple of questions.

First, it looks like you added an extra bonus feat at L12. You've got both Greater Spell Focus: Evocation and "(wizard bonus): Heighten" at that level. Unless I missed something somewhere you only get wizard bonus feats at L1/5/10/15/20. So, do I drop one of those two or bump something later to keep them both?

Here's what I see:

Feats

.1. . . . : Empower Spell
.1 Human. : Quicken Spell
.1 Wizard : Maximize Spell
.3. . . . : Mental Toughness
.5 Wizard : Improved Mental Toughness
.6. . . . : Insightful Reflexes
.9. . . . : Enlarge Spell
10 Wizard : Spell Focus: Evocation
12. . . . : Greater Spell Focus: Evocation
15. . . . : Greater Spell Focus: Enchantment
15 Wizard : Spell Focus: Enchantment
18. . . . : Augment Summoning
20 Wizard : Extend Spell
21 Epic . : 
24 Epic . : 
26 Destiny: 
27 Epic . : 
28 Destiny: 
29 Destiny: 
30 Epic . : 
30 Legend : 

Also, I could some help with the enhancements. I've included the 5 SLAs you mentioned plus the Gust of Wind and Fire Shield SLAs because I wasn't sure what else to put points in. You did not mention anything from the Human or other trees (Eldritch Knight ???). Can you share what you used when you tested this build?

Here's what I have as a start:

Enhancements (Spent: 44+0r +0u / Max: 80+0r +0u AP)

Archmage (44 AP)
Magic Missile, Gust of Wind, Chain Missile, Fire Shield, Cyclonic Blast, Master of Magic
Energy of the Scholar III, Spell Critical
Efficient Maximize III, Efficient Empower III, Spell Critical
Arcane Bolt III, Spell Critical
School Mastery: Evocation, Spell Critical
Arcane Blast III, Arcane Supremacy, School Mastery: Evocation




.

Thanks!

[Torkzed]

Looking through the wizard builds, everything seems like it's Pale this or Necro that. Bah I say! Undead should be destroyed, not made into pets!

There've been a few other newbies who've also asked for non-Pale Master FTP wizards, but they've all seem to have asked for "pure" builds. Honestly, if the Archmage tree wasn't so weak/outdated then that's probably what I'd want to try, but I'll skip that until they update it. Inquisitive, which is also often recommended for wizards, is also out since I need it FTP. Shiradi is out, too.

Considering how things are right now, what I'd like to see is 1) a first life 28 point FTP Eldritch Knight build - pure or multiclass (with some melee class?), and 2) a first life 28 point FTP wizard - multi-class is fine - that doesn't focus on melee like the ED. Both of them need to be able to solo much of the time and I don't want to do any of the undead Pale Master stuff. There are a few enhancements on the Pale Master tree that don't appear to depend on Pale Shroud and the other undead enhancements so anything like that is fine. I've no idea if I'll ever make it to the Epic/reincarnation/end game stuff.

Can anyone point me to builds like this?

If advantageous, I do have the Dragonborn race since I bought the Starter Bundle, but I'd probably go with one of the free races unless it makes a real difference.

Thanks!

I think there have been enough responses that explain your options. I won't repeat them.

I just wanted to tell you that I feel your pain. For flavor reasons, I never wanted to play a palemaster, but wizard is the class that I am most drawn to.

I tried to generate interest in this topic several years ago and got told the same thing you have been told. Basically the answer is "Too bad, but if you want an even mildly effective and survivable DC based wizard...you must play pale master. If you are okay with being a bad wizard doing no higher than hard difficulty, then you can also be warforged." I was a bit surprised that many just don't understand how objectionable it is to have to play an undead (or in undead form, if you want to get pedantic), but whatever...that is the culture that we live in. I find it beyond ironic that SSG is okay with denying evil alignment choices to players, but then making an undead form the only viable choice for an iconic character class (well, the DC based variant) at the top end of the game. Its kind of funny that some of the examples from modern fantasy literature that should be the epitome of the wizard class (think Gandalf or Dumbledore) would be sub-par in DDO.

Of course, if you play the game for a decade and pile up all the necessary past lives, and also jump through some hoops to get to higher levels, then you can be sort of decent without pale master. But you will always be gimped relative to those that play DC wizard as a pale master.

I think that SSG does not see this as a priority. There are enough other things to work on and they likely don't see a sufficient market demand for folks who find pale master distasteful but want to play a good DC wizard.

I finally caved in...the last time I played wizard, I played as a deep gnome pale master. DC casting is a fun (but demanding) playstyle so I just tried to ignore the fact that I was in Lich form the whole time.

Maybe someday someone at SSG will read posts like these and do something to help DC wizards who object to having to be in undead form, but I would not hold my breath.

[slarden]

I think there have been enough responses that explain your options. I won't repeat them.

I just wanted to tell you that I feel your pain. For flavor reasons, I never wanted to play a palemaster, but wizard is the class that I am most drawn to.

I tried to generate interest in this topic several years ago and got told the same thing you have been told. Basically the answer is "Too bad, but if you want an even mildly effective and survivable DC based wizard...you must play pale master. If you are okay with being a bad wizard doing no higher than hard difficulty, then you can also be warforged." I was a bit surprised that many just don't understand how objectionable it is to have to play an undead (or in undead form, if you want to get pedantic), but whatever...that is the culture that we live in. I find it beyond ironic that SSG is okay with denying evil alignment choices to players, but then making an undead form the only viable choice for an iconic character class (well, the DC based variant) at the top end of the game. Its kind of funny that some of the examples from modern fantasy literature that should be the epitome of the wizard class (think Gandalf or Dumbledore) would be sub-par in DDO.

Of course, if you play the game for a decade and pile up all the necessary past lives, and also jump through some hoops to get to higher levels, then you can be sort of decent without pale master. But you will always be gimped relative to those that play DC wizard as a pale master.

I think that SSG does not see this as a priority. There are enough other things to work on and they likely don't see a sufficient market demand for folks who find pale master distasteful but want to play a good DC wizard.

I finally caved in...the last time I played wizard, I played as a deep gnome pale master. DC casting is a fun (but demanding) playstyle so I just tried to ignore the fact that I was in Lich form the whole time.

Maybe someday someone at SSG will read posts like these and do something to help DC wizards who object to having to be in undead form, but I would not hold my breath.

A few things on this. First with the constraints listed the OP shouldn't play a caster period. What PM offers is unique self-healing - its certainly not the only viable build and as you advance skulls in reaper the benefits of PM diminish and even become a negative self-healing declines and it reduces healing you get from others. In general casters are in a horrible place and those problems are very pronounced on a first-lifer with no tomes. Stick with melee or ranged, but THF melee is the way to go for sure. If you want to solo self-healing makes is much better and there are MANY options available.

I don't think SSG needs to do anything about PM because there isn't a problem with it. Archmage could use a boost. There are ways to self-healing as a wizards, but those options aren't available to the OP right now and scroll healing while perfectly viable is going to be challenging for a first-lifer with no tomes. Stick to easy-button healing as a first-lifer.

[C-Dog]

...I've no idea if I'll ever make it to the Epic/reincarnation/end game stuff.

With all the limits you're putting on yourself, it's not looking good.

Looking through the wizard builds, everything seems like it's Pale this or Necro that. Bah I say!...
...
... I don't want to do any of the undead Pale Master stuff...

What you're looking for is a "flavor build", i.e. a build that is far from optimal in the game but fits some story-inspired model from your own readings/imagination.

Unfortunately, altho' moderately flexible, DDO, does not cover all archetypes of characters, or at least not well. And a classic Gandalf blast-em wizard is one that's noticeably sub-optimal.

My first character, back in the day when I first started*, I wanted a Cleric Trapper - and back then, that just wasn't possible (it's more possible now). Many veterans and build-gurus (Unbongwah memorably among them!) advised gently but repeatedly against it, listing the problems - and I ignored them, and built what I wanted to run! And it was fun for about 5 levels, and then, as they all predicted, it failed miserably and utterly by about Level 8, and languished as a gimped mule for years until I re-rolled** it into a mule that could actually run a quest.

(* pre U19 Enhancement re-work!)
(** As my first character, I could not bring myself to delete him. I'm a sentimentalist. <shrug>)

Now, what I did next was to find something that gave me the "feel" and "fun" of that concept, even if it did not conform to my inexperienced expectations of Class. So my first build to 20 was a Drow Paladin Mechanic/Trapper - and that worked just fine for me, approximating a "Cleric Trapper" enough that I forgot any disappointment.


So... I am not posting this to tell you how to have "fun" - that's 100% up to you. BUT, if part of your "fun" is to be able to run a quest on Elite and gain full Favor, and not die every combat and actually... (what is that word?... oh, yeah!)... and actually "contribute" to a party... then you're going to have to accept that "Ya can't get there from here, at least not that way", and adjust your expectations.

Either way, GL, and haff fun stomin da cassul!
o/

[Peter_Principle]

First, it looks like you added an extra bonus feat at L12.

Oops, so I did. Sorry about that.

You've got both Greater Spell Focus: Evocation and "(wizard bonus): Heighten" at that level. Unless I missed something somewhere you only get wizard bonus feats at L1/5/10/15/20. So, do I drop one of those two or bump something later to keep them both?

I had you take feats in (what I judged to be) order of importance. So if I were you I would eliminate the feat you take at 20 and just slide all the other feats down a notch. The 20 feat I had was Extend, and all it really does is increase the duration of spells cast, which only affects Crowd Control spells and buffs. I think it's easy enough to recast a spell as needed if additional duration is required.

Also, I could some help with the enhancements. I've included the 5 SLAs you mentioned plus the Gust of Wind and Fire Shield SLAs because I wasn't sure what else to put points in. You did not mention anything from the Human or other trees (Eldritch Knight ???). Can you share what you used when you tested this build?

Here's what I have as a start:
[CODE]Enhancements (Spent: 44+0r +0u / Max: 80+0r +0u AP)

Archmage (44 AP)

• Magic Missile, Gust of Wind, Chain Missile, Fire Shield, Cyclonic Blast, Master of Magic
  1. Energy of the Scholar III, Spell Critical
  2. Efficient Maximize III, Efficient Empower III, Spell Critical
  3. Arcane Bolt III, Spell Critical
  4. School Mastery: Evocation, Spell Critical
  5. Arcane Blast III, Arcane Supremacy, School Mastery: Evocation

When I tested the build (at level 7) I only put points into Archmage tree.

I think for the most part you will want to put your points into the Archmage tree, then as a secondary choice - i.e., when there isn't anything useful in Archmage to spend on at level - put points into Eldritch Knight for the defense (Radiant Shield, MRR) and the Mage Armor/Shield SLAs. Mage Armor gives you a bonus AC, always a good thing, and Shield SLA in EK gives you the shield spell as well as PRR, which are also rather important. You also get a fair boost to your spell power from the EK cores. Lastly, I'd put points into the human tree to get one more point of Int and healing amp.

The abilities in the Archmage tree I would skip are all the things that discount the cost of Metamagics. Sure, it would be nice to have them, but Enhancement points are a limited resource. I don't think metamagics are a cost effective way to spend spell points on damage spells, since you can easily go more than 2x the spell point cost but you don't get double the damage. I think it's easier to just cast a spell twice. (The one exception to efficent metamagics is to buy down the cost of Quicken, since you're a wizard and it takes forever to cast a spell; and you can get the cost of that pretty low with the Efficient Quicken Enhancement, capstone and a Magical Efficency item like a Pansophic Circlet.)

Unforunately right now I can't really give you exact info on when and where to put points, I just kinda have to go from memory and looking at the wiki page. I might be able to be more specific when I get home and can mess around with my HC S3 toon who is at level 20. It's easier for me to think about where to put points when the game is keeping track of what points I have available. heh

Thanks!

No problem, let me know if you have any more questions.

[Peter_Principle]

One other suggestion.

If you have Feydark Illusionist tree, you might be better off putting 4 points there to get 100 spell points (Core 1 plus 3x Study the Arcane), rather than 6 points into Energy of the Scholar. IDK, it might be a wash (because you get spell power and spell points from putting points into Archmage), and you'd have to somehow buy Feydark tree.

If you do have Feydark, T2 has another force SLA...but that would mean fewer points into your other trees.