Seriously, what is a mage really good for?

[goe2112]

I've been playing IWD for the 1st time and am up to Dorn's Deep. I have a Mage in my party but up untill now, 95% of the time he uses a sling. I rarely have him cast spells. I have two fighters and clerics and one fighter/thief. My mage, to me, is liability. I understand that there are various types of party character configurations, but I don't see any significant reason to have a mage in a party. Perhaps I'm overlooking something vauleable in a mage and if so please inform me.
Thank you for your time

[Kestrel Daystar]

For the magic man!! Have him learn and cast more spells. He can buff up the rest of your party, or cast offensive magicks at enemies. Mages arent useless by a long shot.


--Kestrel--

[Marty4]

Mages are probably the BEST of the characters! Does he know fireball? Magic missle? Other stuff? Have you been teaching him new spells, or is he still using your original spells? You can literally annihilate large groups of enemies in seconds with this guy, especially by Dorn's deep.

[Kaelas]

Mages rock in the right situations. Use web or grease spells on your enemies and then blast them with a fireball or two.
I dispatched most of the cold wights in Dragon's Eye that way. Great fun.

[ 01-22-2005, 01:49 PM: Message edited by: Kaelas ]

[NobleNick]

goe2112,

Most Mages rock. You ~WILL~ understand and appreciate the power of a Mage before you finish the game, becuase there are some nasty ones out there waiting for you.

Is your Mage a General Mage (GM), or did you specialize? You can get into trouble specializing in the wrong school for a single Mage party. Hopefully, if you did specialize, you picked Illusionist.

Are you buying spells for this guy in Kuldahar, and also memorizing from the scrolls you find? Are you saving before you memorize, so that you can retry if memorization fails? Are you filling your slots in the Mage book with spells? Are you sleeping often enough for the Mage to have spells available? Are you filling your slots with the RIGHT KIND of spells? (If you do not ever use a spell, get rid of it and fill the slot with a spell you DO use.)

Assuming you got all the basics correct, it is likely that you have just relied heavily on other members of your solidly built party. In the beginning game, the Mage basically hides in the back and just tries to stay alive; but by the time you start DE, s/he should have a history of contributing significantly. I can't count the number of times my Mage/Thief has saved the party's bacon with her spells. At one point she had racked up almost as many kills as my Fighters; and many of my Fighters' kills were enemies that were all but dead from my Mage's spells.

Here are some specific ideas of how a Mage could have been very useful, in places you've already been:

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~ (Early-to-midgame spoilers)

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1.) Cast Magic Missile at magic users in Orc cave, VoS, ToFG and DE to disrupt enemy magic users. A basic spell that gets more powerful as your Mage levels. Chromatic Orb is another good bread-and-butter spell.

2.) Summon monsters to use as defensive "meat shields" between you and non-ranged attackers, in various fights on virtually every level of DE and SH. My most often used "trick", and one of the first really useful skills that your Mage should master. Especially useful in the final battle of DE.

3.) Defensive Area of Effect spells like Grease and (preferably) Web can slow down enemy units so that your Fighters can handle the flow, and don't get overwhelmed. Other area spells like Stinking Cloud can also weaken or even kill them outright. Many, many oppurtunities for this trick; but the most memorable for me was when rescuing the priestess at the end on the long tunnel in DE2. Also very useful in the first fight of DE3, and later in DE3, when making a stand at the bridge.

4.) Evocation spells like the classic Fireball. Throw this during the first fight of DE3 (after throwing a few Webs) to even the odds a bit. Also excellent later in DE3 and for the first fight in DE4. A great way to get the party off to a warm start in the Lizard King's chamber in DE1. Chain Lightning will bust up a pack of Lizardmen, Orcs, or whatever, quite nicely. Aganazzar's Scorcher is a delight to use.

5.) Skull Trap is an excellent and VERY damaging spell that can kill many enemies outright.

6.) Improved Invisibility can be cast on your Fighters, to get them into strategic positions for a first strike at enemy spellcasters. Even after becoming visible, your Fighters carry a residual (IIRC) 4 point bonus to Armor Class! (And why are we targeting the enemy SPELLCASTERS first? Because they have the ability to screw you royally; just like your Mage has the ability to screw with the enemy. Remember that: When you run into a Mage that throws a spell you just HATE, file that spell name away. Find it. Memorize it. Use it.)

7.) Mirror, Blur and Stoneskin can be cast on your Mage, then walk her out into the enemy and let them beat on her while she smiles as your Fighters bash on THEM. There are a few extremely deadly spells (that you probably haven't found yet) that would make the enemy rue the decision to surround your Mage. Useful tactic in virtually any tough fight, where enemy cannot dispell.

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~ END spoilers

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While a Fighter can get one kill with many hits, a Mage can often get many kills with one spell! There are MANY other spells, techniques and situations we could discuss; but some would be spoilers for places you haven't been, and this post is getting long; so I'll stop here.

If you are really pining away for another Fighter instead of that Mage, I'd suggest getting a carefully rolled Fighter that you could later DC into a Fighter/Mage. Or get an MC Fighter/Mage, or a Bard. Both the F/M and the Bard make respectable spellcasters later in the game.

Hope this helps.

--------------------
What's a party,
without a song?
Bards ROCK!
Party On!!


[ 01-23-2005, 02:29 PM: Message edited by: NobleNick ]

[Aerich]

To me, mages are good for three things:

1) damaging or killing large numbers of enemies with one shot; their biggest advantage over any other class. They have more mass-damaging spells available to them.

2) Single-target killing; a mage is often the key to taking down a tough caster - Acid Arrow, Chromatic Orb, Flame Arrow, Magic Missile, etc. I use MM almost exclusively for pulling down Mirror Image. These spells can quickly disrupt and/or disable a caster, in addition to their damage potential.

3) Combat enhancement; they have spells to buff up your troops, as well as crimp the opposition - two of my favourite spells are Emotion:Courage and Web.

I agree with you in the sense that the game can be completed without mages, and they often seem under-utilized in capable parties, but they can be real killers.

[ister]

Critical uses for mages:

1) Magic missile enemy spell casters before they get their spells off. Or when they have cast mirror image/stone skins. It's extremely fast so you'll always get it off first.
2) Invisibility. Allows thief to remain hidden while checking for traps, allows thief without maxed stealth to backstab, allows severely hurt character to escape, and so on. Incredibly versatile and extremely useful.
3) Haste. Makes hard battles much much simpler. Yes there are other buffs that are very nice, but clerics have decent buffs too. But they cannot cast haste which is my favourite 3rd level.
4) Friends. Allows a 30% discount on EVERYTHING you buy. Meaning any shop items will be acquired that much sooner.
5) Summon x elemental. The elementals are probably the most handy - the summon monster spells aren't that much better than animate dead and you don't need a mage to animate dead.
6) Slow. Yes I know that other area effect spells do better damage, but they take much more planning to use correctly. Slow really helps when you have hordes of mid-level enemies (the high level ones save too often).

It's true that before Dragon's Eye a mage won't help that much. But the game is much much harder without one. (My current game I have a 5 person party with 3 mages. I think the later game is much easier than with a melee heavy party.

edit: Like others I also love grease because it is faster than web. But I don't count that as a big advantage, entangle is a little better and you don't need a mage for that either.

[ 01-24-2005, 09:43 AM: Message edited by: ister ]

[Azred]

I always enjoy using either Animate Dead or Summon Shadow in conjuction with either Stinking Cloud, Cloudkill, or Abi-Dhalzim's Horrid Wilting since undead are immune to all those spells.

As with any class, mages are as effective as you make them. [img]graemlins/petard.gif[/img]

[Serak Moonblade]

well apart from buffing, i find fireball the most useful spell in the game.
other area effect spells can put an entire army out of action - temporarily or permanently! after learning this you must learn ti time your spells and also to place them accurately. a well placed fireball can bring a swarm of goblins to 'nearly dead' and disrupt all the enemy spells exactly as your charging fighters reach the fringe of the area of effect to sweep up the remains.

another indirect gain is that you don't rely on your potions. instead you can sell most of them.

by the time i finished IWD 1, each of my characters had individual potion bags overflowing with potions.

all this takes a wee bit of practice but its not for no reason that it is said that spell casters must be your first targets in a battle.

[Marty4]

A fireball only taking a goblin down to nearly dead? Maybe on HoF...