Magery v. Priest-ery

[Drew]

Drakefyre in another topic commented that he never buys mage spells. Though I don't play regularly, I've noticed that I seem to get a lot more combat use out of my priest character than my mage - repel spirit, for example, sees heavy use, and the priest seems to run out of spell points much more slowly than my mage character. Priest spells, I believe, also aren't affected by armor. Given this, is there really a reason to use mage spells outside of haste, open locks, and light? How do y'all feel about the two different schools o' magic?

[*i]

Arcane summon and Simulacrum can by VERY useful in tough situations.

[Drew]

I suppose that's true... the demon-things I summoned (I'm pretty sure they were demons) in my third battle with Vakhos(sp?) made the fight pretty simple.

 

EDIT: Is there a character building F.A.Q. anywhere? I find I get a little confused when trying to decide what to put points into. Normally, I just stick with boosting main stats - it seems you get the most benefit for that - though I have boosted priest spells and mage spells for each of those characters up to level 20. Was that too far?

[Donald Hebb]

It primarily depends upon the scenario. Unfortunately, there's an extreme surplus of undead/demon scenarios, so that means that priests at this point are far more valuable. In Canopy, however, they become considerably less so.

[Ephesos]

Let's see... I don't think there's anything more satisfying than using Fireblast to roast 8 targets for 200 damage. Also, Simulacrum is definitely a good last-resort tactic.

 

Oddly enough, I'm getting a lot of use out of Create Illusions (level 10) now ever since I got it in somebody's scenario (probably Canopy).

 

Still, I think my priest runs out of SP much faster, if only because she's so busy casting multiple radiant shields per turn, and my mage has higher Magical Efficiency.

 

In the end I think that both are necessary, because forgoing either is expensive and heavy.

[Fyora Toast With Roamer Butter]

You can start with a character that can use both effectively. Hedge Wizard does this as a choice of character. Buying natural mage on a hedge wizard eliminates the armor problem-- and gives your starting character with both mage and priest spells.

 

Dispel Barrier, Open Locks, Light, Far sight are all good spells. Arcane Shield at high levels gives you invulnerability. Fire Blast and Arcane Blow allow you to target multiple enemies. Slow is useful against tough monsters. Acid resistance is the least common resistance so Spray Acid has its uses. I haven't used simulacrum at all.

 

Priest spells which are useful are War Blessing Level 4-- possibly the best spell in the game, Move Mountains, Radiant Shield, Dispel Spirit, and others. War blessing Lvl 4 and Radiant Shield Lvl 3 in combination make parties very tough.

 

To effectively finish most high level dungeons-- it is often necessary to use Move Mountains, Open Locks, and Dispel Barrier to move through the dungeons. It is good to have both priest and mage spells available.

[Lilith]

May as well use this as another excuse to plug my preferred party design. As I've mentioned before, my party consists of one fighter, two archer-priests (using slings, so I don't have to worry about ammunition), and a mage-priest.

 

My fighter's job is to not die; sure, he dishes out a couple of hits every round, but what really justifies his existence is his ability to take a beating every round and survive. My archer-priests' job is to heal the fighter when he needs it and shoot at stuff when he doesn't. My mage-priest is used for healing, hasting, and occasional situations where having a mage is useful (e.g. against melee-immune monsters). When I'm up against monsters my fighter can't sanely take on in melee, my mage-priest uses Create Illusions to take some of the heat off.

[Evil_Penguin]

In my most successful party, I had two almost pure magic users, both of which started with 6 mage, 5 priest, with one getting high level priest and the other getting high level mage. Since they both boost spell points, its not really a waste, even if you don't use most of the spells. But you will use some all the time. Practically all the tough fights I was in, they both hasted themselves first. Next turn, they would almost certainly go first, and so that's four spells I can cast a turn, starting probably with hasting, blessing, and radiant shielding my fighter and archer. And, you know, not everything is undead or demonic (even if it might seem that way sometimes), and its good to have attack spells that actually work.

[The Yeoman Cheesemonger]

I find that Mages may seem weak at the beginnig, but later on, while the most damaging Priest spell is two Cloud of Blades, while both of my mages are pumping off 8 Fireblasts.

I find Priests valuable for their healing/Curing And my Mages valuable for their damage spells.

I never summon/charm, and only just before big fights (Vahkos, Nolagh-Kar, etc.) do I use hasting/Blessing/Shielding.

[Drakefyre]

See, I tend to use War Blessing a lot and charge at the enemies, occasionally casting Divine Fire or Cloud of Blades. I play with a singleton warrior-priest.

[Enkephalin]

That's the most survivable combo for a singleton, and makes a strong party leader, too. I do that if I'm going to start solo and pick up chars on the way.

 

In my most effective parties, everyone trains at least 3 in mage and priest. Everyone can bless, haste, heal and cure themselves early on. Four chars casting repel spirit each round can melt through undead and demons with ease. If I do develop any specialist spellcasters, this takes a lot of pressure off them, since the mana and AP costs are spread around.

[Fyora Toast With Roamer Butter]

It is very easy to completely imbalance the game with an all spellcaster party. For example a party with four characters with cloud of blades pretty much autokills anything out there. The same effect happens versus undead -- 4 casters with dispel spirit at high level wipes out undead.

Even 3 casters can do this.

 

I try not to overdo it with spellcasters. Just to make things interesting... I keep one of my melee fighter at intelligence level 2 and give him no spells.

 

Also large groups of monsters with spell immunities can tear up an all spellcaster party.

[The Yeoman Cheesemonger]

I Like Pure fighters who keep to their own abilities:

A warrior/theif

A Mage

A Mage

A Priest/Alchemist

This setup is really bad for weak partys, But later on, The mages mow the enemys down, the warrior is just a meat shield, and the priest heals, and occasionally blesses.

[Randomizer]

*bump* To preserve material