Category:Mages

The mysterious arcane knowledge that these persons wield is often frightening. At the outset, these people may not seem to present a challenge for a good sword or a stout club, but as their studies grow, they have been found to be formidable opponents. They can be limited by their power level, but more than one mage has been known to inflict great fear in others and when they were seemingly defeated, disappear. Not dead of course, but preparing to return and finish the job they started. The prime requisite of Mages is INTelligence, allowing them to learn powerful spells.

Abbreviation: Mag.

Prime Requisite: Intelligence.

Mages in General

Mages specialize in casting offensive spells. They can generally do more damage than characters of many other classes as long as they do not become depleted of their mana; this dependence upon their mana supply may be their greatest weakness. Mages, with their in-class transportation spells and surging ability and such, can obtain and enchant gear more easily than characters of most other classes, which makes them rather handy either for equipping their alternate characters or for earning money by selling enchanted gear to other players. Their ability to solo more easily than characters of most other classes may make mages especially appealing to players whose circumstances do not always allow them to conveniently fight in groups. Mages, sadly, tend to die more frequently over time than characters of other classes for a variety of reasons, including their having lower hit-points and their tending to wear less-protective gear during combat, particularly mana gear. For this reason, it can be argued that tank gear is more important to mages than any other set of gear, accompanied by an ability to change into it rapidly (using effective gear-changing aliases) at moments of mortal danger.

Mage Creation

Characters of any race may be mages but some races are far better suited for magery than others. Characters of races with relatively-high intelligence, such as centaurs, draconians, drow, and elves, tend to make excellent mages. Likewise, characters of races with relatively-low intelligence, such as gargoyles, giants, goblins, and troglodytes, tend to be poor mages with either low mana and/or high rates of spellcasting failure, although some people still choose to play mages of such races because they enjoy their novelty or difficulty.

See also Wiseman's Avatar race comparison chart and/or Another Avatar MUD Site's Race-Class Comparer for some excellent comparative data to aid you in choosing your new mage's race.

Mages at Lowmort Tier

Training

As with any new character, a new mage's first priority should be to train wisdom, either as much as is possible or enough that it may be maximized using level gear, so as to gain as many practice-points per level as possible.

Mages should next train both their intelligence, which will (1) give them larger average mana gains and (2) increase their spell damage and (3) allow them to become adept at skills using fewer practice points, and their constitution, which will increase their average hit-point gains per level.

Mages should then consider training both their dexterity, which may help them avoid combat damage, and their strength, which will increase both their carrying capacity and their melee damage, although training these two statistics is less urgent and may be postponed if desired.

See Statistics for more detail about each of these five statistics and their effects.

Practicing

After maximizing their wisdom, intelligence, and constitution, mages may consider practicing skills.

Mages may practice skills only with trainers; see both Trainers and, more specifically, Mage Trainers for more information on these trainer mobs and on where they may be found.

Mages should generally keep their intelligence as high as possible (usually three more than their maximum trainable amount) while practicing skills so as to avoid needlessly wasting practice points; see Intelligence for more detail about skill-practicing costs. Lowmort mages may practice their skills up to 95%.

See Mage Lowmort Skills and Spells for more detail about what skills mages may practice at lowmort tier, at what level these skills may be practiced, and how useful they are.

Worshipping

Mages, as with all classes, may choose to worship a god or goddess at level 10 or beyond. Some deities, though, are better suited for mages to worship than others, particularly Bhyss, Shizaga, and Quixoltan.

Bhyss versus Shizaga: Bhyss and Shizaga are most popular among Avatar MUD's mages. Both of these deities increase their worshippers' spell damage, which is very beneficial to mages because they do most of their damage via their spells. Bhyss increases spell damage more than Shizaga does. Bhyss also increases melee damage, while Shizaga decreases it. These two facts make Bhyss ideal for mages wishing to maximize their overall combat damage. Both of these deities also reduce the mana cost of spells, but Bhyss provides a greater spell cost reduction than Shizaga.

Bhyss, however, reduces gains in both hit-points and practice-points over time, making his worshippers easier to kill and slightly slower to develop skills. For these reasons, mages wanting to worship Bhyss may defer doing so until either hero or lord tier. Shizaga, on the other hand, does not negatively impact hit-point gains. She also causes you to gain more mana than you would otherwise. For these reasons, Shizaga is a better choice for mages who want good hit-points and mana at Lord, although if maximum Lord stats are your only goal, you should consider worshipping Quixoltan instead.

Bhyss also hurts with enchanting, whereas Shizaga helps with it, making Shizaga ideal for mages wishing to maximize their effectiveness at enchanting gear. Another nice benefit of Shizaga is that she reduces the amount of lag that you experience when casting spells. This allows you to cast spells slightly more frequently than you would be able to otherwise. Bhyss does not affect spell lag either positively or negatively.

In summary, Bhyss is best suited for mages who care most about how much damage they deal, and aren't overly troubled by having lower stats (hp & mana) than they might have had otherwise. Shizaga provides a better balance for mages who are attracted to the damage & spell cost benefits of Bhyss, but also desire good hit-point & mana gains. She is also an ideal choice for mages who wish to obtain and enchant gear--tasks for which mages are well-suited.

See Worship for more detail regarding worship options and their effects.

Fighting

As with characters of other classes, most lowmort mages should have little trouble soloing from level 1 to level 11 very quickly. Afterward, gaining experience alone will grow increasingly difficult and mages should seriously consider grouping with other characters. Once mages practice surge at level 25, they will find soloing somewhat easier once again.

Soloing: Mages may find soloing easier than characters of most other classes once they have practiced surge. Some find mage soloing to be rather tedious, overly repetitive, and/or lonesome, and may do so only if groups are not available. Because mage soloing requires long periods of mana regeneration between kills, mage soloers may opt to engage in additional real-life activities while their characters are sleeping.

Tanking: Mages hardly ever serve as tanks at lowmort tier, although there are rare exceptions. Mages become much better able to tank groups during hero tier after practicing certain hero-tier skills (see below).

Hitting: Mages usually serve as hitters in lowmort groups. Mage hitters should normally wear mana gear to maximize their available mana, upon which they are highly dependent for doing damage. Mages who run low on mana during runs may attempt to alleviate this problem somewhat by "catching tics." Mage hitters typically fight by waiting for their tank to start fighting a mob, immediately using their kill command targetted at this same mob, and then casting a single-target attack spell (usually via an alias) repeatedly without specifying any target until this mob is dead. Whenever their tank is fighting more than a few mobs simultaneously, mage hitters may consider casting an area-effect attack spell instead of a single-target attack spell. Mage hitters should practice chaos channel as soon as possible, as it will rougly halve their mana costs for all of their attack spells while they are grouped.

Healing: Although clerics and their like are usually preferred as healers, they are not always available. Lowmort mages may substitute for characters of such classes by practicing arcane knowledge, by collecting certain brandishes (such as shards of durrite, limestone staves, fingerbones of Senex, gold dragon orbs, and white marble crosses) and by both holding and brandishing these as needed during runs.

Mage Prestige Options

Level-50 mages may choose to become either stormlords or wizards instead. As stormlords, they will gain more hit points but less mana, will not be able to surge as high, and will cast sustained spells; see Stormlords for more information about this prestige class. As wizards, they will gain less hit points but more mana and they will forfeit their ability to learn certain useful spells & skills (particularly psionic spells) but will gain other unique abilities instead; see Wizards for more information about this prestige class.

Mages at Hero Tier

Training

Mages at hero tier will be able to train their intelligence five higher than at lowmort tier and to train their other statistics two higher than at lowmort tier. They will continue to be able to raise each of their statistics up to three more than they can train them to (respectively), unless they devote themselves to a deity, in which case these amounts may be modified slightly. See Devoting below for more information about this subject.

Practicing

Mages should continue to practice skills with mage trainers and should usually keep their intelligence as high as possible while doing so, just as at lowmort tier. Hero mages may continue to practice their skills up to 95%. See Mage Hero Skills and Spells for more detail about what skills mages may practice at hero tier, at what level these skills may be practiced, and how useful they are.

Devoting

Mages, as with all classes, may choose to devote themselves to whichever deity they have chosen to worship (if any) at hero sublevel 1 or beyond.

Bhyss: Mages who devote themselves to Bhyss will experience both benefits and detriments; on one hand, they will have one greater maximum intelligence, which may or may not enable them to become adept at skills more quickly and which will increase their spell damage slightly; however, on the other hand, they will also have both one less maxium constitution and one less maximum dexterity, which will reduce both their hit-point gains and their ability to avoid damage and will thus make them a bit more "splatty" than they already are. In summary, if and when Bhyss worshippers devote themselves, they will dish out damage even better but take it even worse.

Shizaga: Mages who devote themselves to Shizaga will have one less maximum wisdom, which may--or may not--reduce their practice-point gains at hero tier; thus, mages worshipping Shizaga who are eager to learn all of their hero skills as quickly as possible may wish to postpone devotion until later in hero tier. If and when they devote themselves to Shizaga, they may benefit slightly from having one more maximum dexterity if and when they are attacked.

See Devote for more detail about devotion and its effects.

Fighting

Mages at hero tier may have more trouble finding groups than characters of many other classes. This is especially true at lower hero sublevels, where mages tend to die more readily and tend to run short of mana during runs.

Soloing: Mages will almost always solo for their levels unless they choose the tanking path. Mages will find it best to regenerate in mana gear, then to change into either tank gear or hit gear in order to fight, using a surged disintegrate spell to kill mobs. Popular mobs for low-hero mages to kill solo for experience include:

• Shashwat Nisha's "yaks" and cobblynau (although they assist at hero),
• Sir Michael's Stronghold's wandering peasants and such, and
• Shadow Keep's rotting corpses and hound dogs.

Popular mobs for higher hero mages to kill solo are:

• Tortuga Cay's tortugas.

Other good areas for hero mages to kill solo are:

Necromancer's Tower (pp cool cor but have movehidden and invis up) and the top of Greed's

Tanking: Mage tanks at hero tier are fairly common due to the difficulty they experience in finding groups to hit for. In fact, after practicing certain hero-tier skills, particularly dodge, parry, shield block, and charge shield, mages can become formidable tanks, wearing full tank gear for protection and using disintegrate, acid rain, and charged shields to deal damage.

Hitting: Mages will rarely serve as hitters in hero groups. Many, though hardly all, hero tanks expect their low-hero mage hitters to carry both mana gear and hit gear during runs, to wear their mana gear until they reach their base mana, and to change into their hit gear afterward. High-hero mages with greater base mana may opt to wear only hit gear. Mages who run low on mana during runs may attempt to alleviate this problem somewhat by "catching tics." Mage hitters typically fight by waiting for their tank to start fighting a mob, immediately using their kill command targetted at this same mob, and then casting disintegrate (usually via an alias) repeatedly without specifying any target until this mob is dead. Whenever their tank is fighting more than a few mobs simultaneously, mage hitters may consider casting acid rain instead of disintegrate. Even when not tanking, mage hitters may still wish to carry a set of tank gear with them that they can quickly change into in emergencies.

Healing: Mages occasionally serve as healers in hero groups, possibly when no clerics, druids, or priests are available. A few hero tanks may even prefer to group mages who heal with brandishes over clerics who heal with spells. Mages who maintain a stockpile of healing brandishes, such as gold dragon orbs, emerald sceptres of light, black staffs of Typhus, and white marble crosses, may thus be able to find groups slightly more often than mages who do not. Brandishes are best collected well before they are needed, as they tend to be consumed on runs faster than they can be easily replenished. Mage healers usually wear hit gear for runs, though mana gear may sometimes be useful or even tank gear in emergencies.

Mages at Lord Tier

Mages are always welcome in groups at lord tier because they excel at dealing damage and there are only a few runs where they are useless. Unlike hero tier mages are almost a requirement for most Lord running. They are also considerably larger and more robust than Wizards and Sorcerers (bested only by Mindbenders and Stormlords hp-wise), permitting them to serve as tank on smaller runs if their gear allows it. This physical advantage over the more powerful remort and prestige classes is moderated by their reduced usefulness in terms of available mana for damage purposes. They may also practice a spell that enables them to rename objects.
Side note: Mages are the least of a liability when they run in AC gear. Despite their status as "hitters," they should probably not run in DR gear, as it will do little for their damage and make them a liability. In addition, while it can be wise to regen in HP or Mana gear, if nothing else than for an extra oomph to clear the shift, it is advised against running in these kinds of gear, as again, they can make the Mage an instant splat, instead of someone who has a chance to survive.

Mage Remort Options

Mages at lord tier may remort into sorcerers, either human ones at sublevel 100 or ones of their current race at sublevel 200. See Sorcerers for more information about this remort class.

Creatable races that are well-suited for this class include Centaurs, Elves, Drow, Half-Elves, Gnomes and Deep Gnomes. Remort races that are well-suited for magery include dragons, high elves, tuataurs, and sprites. Despite their relatively-high intelligence, griffons are ill-suited for spellcasting and thus tend to be poor mages. See Remort Races for information on the requirements for each of these races.