[EEWorzelle]

Regarding a Magic-Heavy party, I would recommend a Ranger or Gadgeteer in that sixth position rather than a Fighter or Rogue. If you are playing this party according to it's strengths, you will be doing most of your fighting, after the first few levels, at range, and the awesome Melee capability of these characters (Fighter or Rogue) is mostly wasted. You actually can use Melee to defeat opponents with this kind of party, but then you've got a poor Melee-Heavy party, rather than an excellent Magic-Heavy one.

The party is classified by what it does, not by the characters it contains. If you have a party where you don't know if you want to close to Melee Distance or remain at Range, and you end up wasting much of the party's power either way, that would be a questionable party design (exceptions exist). Another example is when part of your party is of Melee or Ranged type that tends to kill opponents one at a time, but another part of your party wants to kill all opponents at once a little bit at a time (i.e. the Magic-Heavy party). These party types conflict with each other and waste each other's talents. A tiny bit of Melee can be useful for cleanup and Bosses, and a tiny bit of Ranged can be useful for balancing Magic Damage and picking off pesky enemy casters.

A Ranger or Gadgeteer are very good, at range, for the "leveling out" role for the damage done to all enemies with your Cone and Area-Effect Spells. This imbalance is often the case where one or two were around a corner or behind a tree, and so in need of individual "attention." Range is good for this, rather than Melee, because it is unlikely that the creatures closest to you will be the ones that need this extra damage. In fact the closer ones will typically take slightly more damage from your Cone Spells. Finally it is nice if that sixth position can cast Spells, too. Many Ranger attack Spells are useful up until just before the Peak (or longer if given Powercast) and some attacking Gadgets work even against the High Resistances seen on the Peak (not as well as a Powercasting caster's Spells, but pretty good).

Also, when choosing Spells, go for those which damage all enemies, a little or a lot rather than those which kill some of them entirely. With this kind of party you want to avoid killing any of them (except, perhaps physically weak, Magically strong casters), while damaging them all at once, as much as possible, until they all go. It's kind of fun to be facing 20 enemies and, with one Spell, to reduce it to like 3 with a few HP left to clean up. Spells which only slow down enemies can have strategic value, but unless you need to do that (which, admittedly is often) are worthless.

During battle, you are only interested in Spells that actually do damage. If enemies are in range of your spells, but are about to surround you, it is nice to cripple several of them, before they come into contact. That way more of them will remain in your forward cone, rather than surrounding the party. That's one cast where the strategic value of a Crippling Spell can be strong. You have to get the timing right, depending on how fast the creatures are, relative to the party, to use it at exactly the right time. I find Web, Hypnotic Lure, Freeze Flesh, Freeze All, and Insanity all very useful, but just strategically. Much more important for this kind of party are Shrill Sound, Fireball, Whipping Rocks, Noxious Fumes, Iceball, Whirlwind, Psionic Fire, Ego Whip, Magic Missles, Fire Bomb, Acid Bomb, and higher level ones, that actually reduce the HP of all enemies at once. Don't neglect your Priest for this either. Whirlwind is very good, Banish is excellent, and Web and Paralyze are strategic while your other casters remain free for other things. Falling Stars is awesome! It's not as powerful as Earthquake and is more expensive but your Priest can cast it at the same time your Alchemist (and Gadgeteer or Ranger) cast Earthquake, when an Earth Realm vulnerability exists.

A lot of conventional game wisdoms go by the wayside when playing this kind of party. Taking on multiple groups of enemies at once is often smart. Your Spells can damage 30 enemies in range, just as well as 3. What you want to avoid is taking on a group, killing them, taking on another group, killing them, etc. That will wear you down and deplete your Magical energies, without clearing the area of monsters well enough to make it safe to take a nap and replenish mana. Later you can Portal out, between battles, but that's a Level 5 Spell. Shadow Hound will protect you from surprise as you sleep but the Mage has so many great Spells in the first four levels that I rarely end up getting it, or even Freeze Flesh, until later in the game.

Standard protection/enhancement Spells continue to be important for this kind of party (Missle Shield, Enchanted Blade, Magic Screen, Armorplate, Chameleon, and X-Ray). Following some suggestions from other players (was it you who suggested that, Sultan?) I now sometimes delay getting Enchanted Blade slightly, but not Missle Shield.

Once engaged, you may not be able to run. Your party cannot out-distance Crusher Crabs or a Bull Picus, for example, once you are fighting toe to toe. If you are not winning... try anyway. Your party may die, but if so just reload. If not... oh, well. I lost one EM IM party to each ot these kinds of creatures, so I know. There is nothing worse than trying to run and getting chopped to ribbons anyway. If you run when you first see the creatures in the distance you can usually run, unless boxed-in.

Some bosses in the game are much more resistant to Magic than their resistance numbers would indicate. Usually there are certain Spells they are still vulnerable to... sometimes only one.

Some used to Melee parties have fallen in love with Spells like Death Cloud, Death Wish, Asphyxiation, Quicksand, etc., that take out some enemies. Mostly these are great for parties are of the Melee/Ranged style of taking enemies out one at a time, because it reduces their numbers. With Magic-Heavy parties, however, these spells are just a waste of time and mana. They just use up precious Spell Points while not reducing the HP of those enemies that remain.

Next to last, developed properly for it from the beginning, your Magic characters will be able to fight pretty good, eventually, which can be useful for enemy partys toward the end with only two or three creatures in them. I know that sort of says that party is a Melee Party at that point, and yes, it is, in those battles. It's just that for most of the game one needs to focus almost exclusively on the main thing the Party does, Melee, Ranged or Magic. Doing that only 90% is only 50% effective. It's that extra 10% that rocks! Toward the end of the game, however, your party can become fair at the other styles, too, and for some enemies groups (depending upon the number of foes) a poor to fair Melee capability can actually be more effective than a superb Magic capability, for example if there are only two foes with lots of hit points.

Finally, whenever Magic-Heavy parties are discussed, someone often brings up Pure-Magic parties, that use no Ranged or Melee at all. That is possible, for expert players, but it an entirely different subject and type of party. Such pure parties are very difficult to play, even for experts, and some cheats or tedious training are usually involved, in order to make it work. That can be cool and fun, but just recognize that such parties are a completely different subject than Magic-Heavy ones, which are balanced within this game. Playing the Magic-Heavy party will present a lot of new and interesting challenges, and is very exciting to play (mistakes are usually fatal), but there is very little frustration, very few reloads, and you don't need to hide or run away, unless you chose to, perhaps to gain a better fighting position for your Cone Spells. It will show you aspects of the game you haven't seen before if you just played Melee-Heavy parties. Have fun!

[ 09-14-2003, 07:01 PM: Message edited by: EEWorzelle ]