Pure Mage

[Smartress]

To be honest, after respec to mage, with 2 pieces of Thoth Cloth, plus the thoth staff, I still find it is too WEAK.

As you probably put a lot of stats into Int, the rest into Dex, with mere 200 health, a lot of bosses can still one shot you if you don't have the mana shield up.

While I enjoyed playing Paladin, in honesty, it is not PURE mage. Mage should have tremendous burst of damage. But damage wise seems to be most affected by dex, and Int only helps little bit.

With full thoth gear, mana is never a problem, this makes Paladin a lot more powerful than a mage.

Mage should be focused on spells rather than melee, but it has the same cooldowns as a Paladin or Bowchantress, so while the spells on cool down, you staff melee is slow as hell. This is another disincentive to play a mage. What you do while your damage spells on cool down, I tend to click rebuff or heal?!

Welcome your comments, I am thinking switch back to Paladin.

[Smartress]

To be honest, the only way I can think of to fix PURE mage issue, is allow Int spec mage/healer to have a shorter cool down or increased damage, otherwise Paladin will beat Mage any time and any where.

[bmc85uk]

Stat based skill progression should help some, but I still think that characters should never be one hit killed in pvp, mana shield or not. If an int mage could survive some hits with manashield down, it then becomes a tool for tactical play rather than a necessity.

But I think if hp/mp per level or some kind of substitute health system is added this will change for the better.

[Inching]

I hv respec'ed back from pally to pure Mage and I mean pure ie 100% of points into INT. I have full Thoth gear and also the Thoth staff lvl 45 and guess what, I die like 3-4 time in plasma map. Sigh.

I have recently stopped usin the Thoth staff and using the dark matter staff of mastery, at least now I also have health regen and also started using a Dreamers helm which also gives me some health Gen but honestly, all this getting killed often is starting to get me thnking of respec back to pally.

I hope the update will change my mind.

[Violentsaint]

I hv respec'ed back from pally to pure Mage and I mean pure ie 100% of points into INT. I have full Thoth gear and also the Thoth staff lvl 45 and guess what, I die like 3-4 time in plasma map. Sigh.

I have recently stopped usin the Thoth staff and using the dark matter staff of mastery, at least now I also have health regen and also started using a Dreamers helm which also gives me some health Gen but honestly, all this getting killed often is starting to get me thnking of respec back to pally.

I hope the update will change my mind.

hey inching apparently isis cloth gives 6h/s so u could always wear that

[Away]

In the upcoming update, wouldn't it benefit INT mages?

[Rebel]

In the upcoming update, wouldn't it benefit INT mages?

Yes, but the question is: will it benefit them enough to keep playing intellect.

[jonboy]

Ok I'm currently running as below geared (bear in mind I haven't got geared to 45 yet (made it last night) -unbuffed.

Stats

STR:1
DEX:87
INT:156
Hit%:131
Crit 22
Dodge:20
Health:200
Regen:18
Mana:378
Regen:7
Damage:100-116
DPS:49
Armor:83

Skills
Heal:5
Lightning:5
Ressurect:1
Firestorm:5
Icestorm:5
Weakness:3
Nightmare:5
Magic Shield:5
Blessing of Vitality:5
Blessing of Might:5

Gear:
Dreamer's Khafra Helm(39): 7Int, 3H/s, 2M/s, 8 Armor
Dreamer's Dark Wand(35): 68-84 Damage 2.2Speed, 7Int, 3H/s, 2M/s
Khafra Cloth of Isis(40): 8Dodge, 6H/s, 51Armor
Imhotep Eye of Isis(40): 8Dodge, 6H/s, 19 Armor:

not used atm: Set Lightning Staff of Thoth(45):101-117Damage, 2.3Speed, 8Int, 3%Crit, 8M/s 3Armor

is it worth taking the armor hit for the M/s gain not to mention halving my H/s and losing Dodge for more crit and int.


Constructive criticism please.

[Theremin]

I agree completely about the pure INT based enchantress being more about high BURST damage. Mages are always going to be "glass cannons." I can't wait to see some of that in PL. There isn't much you can do about the enchantress' low chances of survival, but the damage output isn't up to par with the other damage dealing classes in the game currently. I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Not everyone wants to be a healer. It seems like that's what the DEVs had in mind with the enchantress class because we do less than noteworthy damage, and even in high end gear, we still do half the DPS of other classes.

I'd also like to see more STR and dodge on enchantress loots. If we're supposed to be allocating the majority of our points into INT, we're not going to live through a boss encounter where the boss does any type of AOE damage which has the RNG possibility of critting for 200+. It would also be nice to have some avoidance to have a better chance at mitigating incoming damage from hostile targets.

Currently I'm experimenting with crit gear, but I've recently respecced and added more points to INT. I gained 1 DPS, and lost 1 crit with my current build. I'm wearing fulll Horus gear, as well. It's a shame enchantress gear isn't better itemized for doing "damage," and being able to boost regeneration stats for health and mana, since we have such a small HP pool to work with in the first place as INT based casters.

Off to the side here, does anyone know if our heal has the possibility of critically healing a friendly target? :D

Thanks in advance.

[FluffNStuff]

I agree completely about the pure INT based enchantress being more about high BURST damage. Mages are always going to be "glass cannons." I can't wait to see some of that in PL. There isn't much you can do about the enchantress' low chances of survival, but the damage output isn't up to par with the other damage dealing classes in the game currently. I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Not everyone wants to be a healer.

Thanks for mentioning the Glass Cannon. This is always how I see a mage. They need to be careful because a mage should be able to be killed quick if they make a misstep. But at the same time, they should be able to deal a ton of damage at high levels. The biggest issue I have seen with the way the mage was designed in this game is the progression and placement of skills. The lightning skill should be the second to last skill you pick up and firestorm should be the last skill. Having them so early they need to be weak and with only 5 skill points you can not really push them to a high enough damage for later boards. Now a way they could fix this is by having the intelligence exponentially increase (small at first then increasingly larger) the damage and area of these spells. But it really needs to be exponential for there to be a reason to play the pure mage over the palladin. Example of exponential damage if you are unfamiliar:
10 Pts = 100 Damage
20 Pts = 400 Damage
50 Pts = 2,500 Damage
100 Pts = 10,000 Damage

Now to be clear, I am not saying it should be 10,000 damage, I am just saying that it needs to be a system where 100 points does Way MORE then 10x Damage of 10 points. If it is just linear, I would see no compelling reason to not just put points in STR and a few in INT.

[Relis]

I started a thread a week or two ago about how hp should be raised across the board because of being 1 shorted in pvp. What's the point of being able to heal if you can't even take 1 hit before dying. I agree there needs to be big changes to our class. So I'm interested in what changes will occur before I respec to a pure int Mage.

[Theremin]

I don't think that is currently unreasonable.

@FluffNStuff, Thanks for your hypothetical breakdown of how INT based enchantress damage should "theoretically" scale. I had previously mentioned in one of these threads that it just sort of seemed like enchantress spells and damage just aren't scaling as well as some the other two classes since they've increased the level cap a few times now. I'm sure they'll get around to adjusting it, but it is an interesting topic of conversation, nonetheless.

I wish I could remember if I felt like my damage was adequate way back when. I seem to remember feeling as though enchantresses were capable damage dealers, and healers, and at that time I was geared and specced to be a primary healer. I got frustrated with Xanthia's healing build, because I PUG quite a bit, and I don't really understand the mechanics of threat, healing aggro and straight-up logic behind OMGWTFBBQ AGGRO in this game very well, apparently, yet.

@Relis, I agree with you on the HP factor. Now that players characters are actually capable of hitting for 200 Damage with increasing regularity, this probably will become an issue worth investigating further. As you have probably seen, I suggested that maybe items for INT based enchantresses start including some sort of STR stat as well. I think that is a doable solution, but I'm not sure if that would make enchantresses overpowered or not. As a spell-casting class, your durability is probably going to be low, but the damage, "crowd control," buffing, and healing you do while you're alive is what makes your character an asset in a PvE group, as well as in PvP settings.

While I'm here, I know I've done a lot of complaining about the amount of damage INT based enchantresses do recently. But, I'd like to add that I have recently experienced a major increase in DPS, which makes me very happy as an INT based enchantress. I am now currently rocking 71 DPS, unbuffed, and wut?

Yes, that's right: The Dark Matter Staff of Mastery, that's WUT. This good-a** staff does 108-126 Damage, 2.0 speed, 7 INT, 2 H/s, 2 M/s, and 5 armor. And, in the right group (which is one where people know their roles and someone actually tanks stuff), the Galzyx Dark Matter Staff is a bada** mofo as well. It does 104-122 Damage, 2.0 speed, 9 INT, 3 H/s, 9 M/s, and has 5 armor. I do believe that puts me at 69 DPS, which isn't too shabby either. So yeah... WOWIE, these staves are great!!!

I believe they're the fastest I've seen in game thus far!

TY DEVS! :D

[Smartress]

I have moved back to Paladin, still using lvl 40 full thoth gear, you get 6x4=24 m/s plus 1 from the item stats, i.e. 25m/s, without putting a single point into Int.

Compared to mage, 6x2 (2pieces thoth) + 8 = 20, 166 (142+24) Int points give you 4 m/s, i.e. That's only 24m/s, if you have Galyzx Staff, that's 25m/s, i.e. you need 142 Int + most epic staff in the game to get 25m/s.

Wand drop is rare, to drop a thoth wand is extremely rare, I only know one person has one in the game, which is only a lvl 41 wand. To get a lvl 45 Thoth Wand, plus the eye of thoth, you can get 29m/s. I don't know anyone in the game has 29m/s.

Yes, I know there is a lvl 35 wand (from Swamp) can give you 5m/s, seriously would you use lvl 35 weapon at lvl 45?!

To be honest, 25m/s is more than enough for a mage.

[bmc85uk]

I see no real advantage in staves, they offer less to stats than bracer/wand combo and slightly more damage, not to mention the loss of armour.

For staves to work they need to offer some kind of extra damage/proc as 2handers usually do.

Currently my int Mage is geared with full Thoth except wand which is a dreamers lvl 39.

In regards to int mages in pvp, I think their only means of survival except for manashield would be debuffs to debilitate the opponents dmg/hit enough to endure while manashield/blessing is down.

[roguedubb]

The DPS listed on the Avatar sheet isn't always as important to an Enchantress as to an Archer or Bear. With AoE damage ~200norm/~400crit and a crit rate from 30-70 a wand or staff is only used to mop up the remainders of a pack (or selectively pre-target and auto attack any bow-mobs which can be troublesome).

On a boss fight the listed DPS becomes more important, but on a boss fight there is arguably more important stuff to worry about (rotating debuffs with shield to ensure you don't get gibbed, healing and reviving).

[Theremin]

I don't want to seem misleading here. When I was complaining about DPS, I was complaining that as an enchantress geared and specced mostly for healing, if I had aggro off a random mob in an AOE pack, I could barely kill the thing and survive. This is the reason I didn't gain many kills when I originally started advancing through the levels as an endgame enchantress.

@Roguedubb I don't think DPS is terribly important for "trash" mobs, but for boss encounters, it's definitely crucial. And, I'm not sure I'm understanding what you're saying when you say:


With AoE damage ~200norm/~400crit and a crit rate from 30-70 a wand or staff is only used to mop up the remainders of a pack (or selectively pre-target and auto attack any bow-mobs which can be troublesome).

It almost seems like you're saying that the weapon has absolutely no equip benefits, which is what I'm actually after. I want the base damage of the weapon, if that scales with my spell casting abilities. I actually "want" that attack speed, crit, mana regen, armor, and any other item enchantment which can directly benefit the execution of spell casting for my character. I realize that clean-up single target DPS is not a good basis for judging the damage-dealing ability of our class, because we have so many AOE abilities, but I'm operating on the premise that those stats do, somehow, scale into damage output of some sort.

@Bmc85uk, in my experience, it's not so much a matter of staves "not working," as it is the equip stats, base damage, and attack speed of the item.

Also, I want to believe that there are procs for these staves. The attack/casting animation for the Dark Matter staves when the ball of "dark matter" actually hits the target shows some filmy purple stuff, which appears to explode into iridescent spheres (and occasionally there's a filmy cloud of black or pink haze) upon impact. I really hope that's a proc of some sort. I'm guessing that the animation is either a "Nightmare" or "Weakness" proc. When I zoom in, the animations appear to be similar.

Furthermore, I read somewhere either here in the Enchantress Class forums that the Dark Wands had Nightmare procs, and that the Fire Staves had a sort of fire blast AOE proc, and that the frost staves had a frost blast proc. At that time, lightning weapons were not too common, but I have a theory that the lightning weapons may also have a proc; presumably, it's armor reduction. I can't actually prove any of this, but it's been a topic of discussion on the forums here, and if anyone has an in with a DEV to ask this question and get a point blank answer, that would be good information to have.

Beyond that, I challenge you to zoom in and watch your character's casting animations and see for yourself if the animations resemble any of the spells your character casts. :D You can read more about the discussion here: Enchantress Weapons with AOE? (http://www.spacetimestudios.com/showthread.php?2928-Enchantress-weapons-with-AoE&highlight=weapon+proc)

[Addihul]

Thing is, we're not single damage mages. We do however provide a good amount of AoE spike. The Paladin right now beats an INT mage hands down in every aspect. However, since I leveled my bear to 45, I find no use for the Paladin build anymore. I'm specing back to INT, awaiting the changes. It's crap that you 'have' to be a Paladin in order to maximize your chanters use at high levels.