How to do pure caster playthrough?

[Chicken]

This cavemen only play str/dex but he want to do some pure caster run.
What advice, tips and tricks can you give me? I also have some question to ask

- Can you really go through the game by casting spell without touching a melee weapon?
- How do I fight a fast enemy without having a partner to take aggro? (Ex.Lion Guardian)
- Apart from Comet Azur which spell I should try to get?

[Lumina]

Right after starting as Astrologer get Torrent, then ride to Caelid and pick up the Meteorite Staff and the spell Rock Sling.
That should be enough to beat the Lion.
Also beat the Pumpkin Head in Waypoint Ruins to get access to Sellen.
The most stuff for sorcerers you'll find in Liurnia.
I'm doing a pure spell caster run right now, never used any melee weapon. On RL6 in mid game. So it's very duable. ( I don't expext to beat the game this way, I may level up later)

Pure faith caster with incantations only is fun as well, then you need to start as Prophet.

[Magic A. I.]

Originally posted by Chicken:

This cavemen only play str/dex but he want to do some pure caster run.
What advice, tips and tricks can you give me?

I personally prefer melee and incantations, so I can't really advice you on that, but I can answer some questions.

Originally posted by Chicken:

- Can you really go through the game by casting spell without touching a melee weapon?

Yes, but it requires a lot of FP management and hardly worth it outside of a challenge run. Also, it helps to touch some weapons, but not actually use them, because when they are active, they restore a little FP on kills. There are also talismans that do that.

Originally posted by Chicken:

- How do I fight a fast enemy without having a partner to take aggro? (Ex.Lion Guardian)

Light roll. A lot of it.

Originally posted by Chicken:

- Apart from Comet Azur which spell I should try to get?

Can't help you there. I would totally advice you to get Mirror Image and Time Stop, but they are not in the game.

[Honk1]

If you are open to using melee-ranged spells: Carian Slicer hits hard and is very fast, one of the strongest spells in the game.

[Aertes]

Keep a short selection of spells, two main attack ones, short and long range, some buffing one and little mroe, so you can swap between them easily. If you use spells as support you can have a wider variety, since you will rely more on normal combat, but when I start a pure sorcerer (and I will) I plan to start like that

[Lumina]

Originally posted by Honk1:

If you are open to using melee-ranged spells: Carian Slicer hits hard and is very fast, one of the strongest spells in the game.

[Shrek]

Just use carian slicer, this is the most powerful spell in the game

When it comes to staff either use Azur Glinstone Staff, Carian Glistone Staff, or Lusat Glinstone staff.
Don't use Carian Regal Scepter, it's a noob magnet.
Don't worry aobut FP management if you are going to use lusat in the game, carian slicer barely cost anything in FP.

[Rhudda]

Originally posted by Chicken:

- How do I fight a fast enemy without having a partner to take aggro? (Ex.Lion Guardian)

You could use spirit ashes. I'm only as far as Liurnia, so take my advice with a grain of salt, but Banished Knight Engvall works well for me so far. As a caster, you'll be putting quite a few points into mind anyway, and since you probably won't get hit as often, you can bring more cerulean than crimson tears.

[♱ Remilia Scarlet 🦇]

Can you really go through the game by casting spell without touching a melee weapon?

Yes, magic is very powerful and viable in this game, both in PvE and PvP, I have around 600 hours in this game and I almost exclusively play magic !

How do I fight a fast enemy without having a partner to take aggro? (Ex.Lion Guardian)

Level up vigor and have good armor, or light roll if you're good at dodging.

Apart from Comet Azur which spell I should try to get?

It honestly depends what do you want, there is a lot of variety, and also a lot of school of sorceries, but I'd say Carian Slicer is a mandatory spell, you can get it pretty early by giving the Royal House Scroll to Sellen. Later in the game you will be able to get Comet/Night Comet which are also good spells for high DPS, Shard Spiral and Star Shower are also really useful spells, you can decimate giant enemies and bosses with shard spiral, and you can deal easily with very annoying enemies like bats or birds with star shower. Carian Piercer is another really powerful spell, you can charge it, it knocks enemies over, comes out pretty quickly and do really good damage, Canon of Haima and Adula's Moonblade are excellent spells for crowd control, and there is much more ! :)

[ZTL-Altima]

It's possible but game is not intended for pure casting. Consider pure cast as a challenge run.

[Tomos]

I recommend Elden Ring Reforged for a pure caster run. Later one you struggle dealing enough damage before running out of FP. The mod allows for FP generator spells (for example, Glintstone Pebble recovers about 1.5x its cost on hit) so you can keep casting despite severe FP limits.

[⛧Kairos⛧]

I did my first playthrough as pure caster, but even with pure caster your going to want a melee weapon and to hold your staff in your left hand. Theres plenty of weapons that scale of int and have great skills on them to compliment your casting. I would recomend metorite staff and rock sling for the early game and looking towards the sellens quest to get the primordial mage armors also look into getting terra magika spell.

[赤い花]

Originally posted by ⛧Kairos⛧:

I did my first playthrough as pure caster, but even with pure caster your going to want a melee weapon and to hold your staff in your left hand. Theres plenty of weapons that scale of int and have great skills on them to compliment your casting. I would recomend metorite staff and rock sling for the early game and looking towards the sellens quest to get the primordial mage armors also look into getting terra magika spell.

Use Carian Slicer with Carian Glinstone staff off-hand to boost magic damage by 15%, no need for a weapon, carian slicer is better than most melee weapons..

[赤い花]

Originally posted by Parsify:

It's possible but game is not intended for pure casting. Consider pure cast as a challenge run.

That is not true, not true for sorcery.

[Honk1]

Some additional advice: Consider looking up Seluvis quest because it is one of the rare cases where you can lock yourself out of an item if you proceed too far with another quest. The item you lose out on can be good on a pure caster in pve.

[fmalfeas]

One of the best spells early on for mage soloing is Magic Glintblade.

It summons a flying spectral sword that shoots itself at the enemy after a short delay. This means they're unlikely to dodge it, and since they're aggroed on you, you cast a bunch of them, then circle so that the enemy has turned their back to the swarm of swords. Laugh as their HP goes *POOF*.