Question about Spell Mastery

[Baldurs_Gate_2]

I read something about "black necormancy master". What does that mean? Are there trainers for spells or do i just have to learn all spells of one school?

[Muro]

Originally posted by Wall Street:

Are there trainers for spells

Pretty much. Evetually in the game the player can take one spell mastery trial. Completion of it results in receiving spell mastery, which translates into having the cost of all spells from that one college of his choice halved.

[Baldurs_Gate_2]

Hmm, i can find a list of trainers for skills but not for magic. Do you know one?

[Muro]

There is a list, but I'm not sure you'll need one considering all of the masters can be found within one location, namely the mage city of Tulla. If you'll want it anyway, check here: http://www.gamebanshee.com/arcanum/walkthrough/tullainterior.php

[Baldurs_Gate_2]

It's a bit odd. I did the black necro trial, but i use still 5 fatigue for every harm spell.

[Muro]

Did you return to the black necromancy master to finalise the trial and training?

[Baldurs_Gate_2]

Yes ofc. I got a necklace. But it does not matter if i wear it or not, i still use 5 fatigue every harm spell.

btw: What does a "Mage's Staff" do? It has 50 mana, but it seems it does not affect my fatigue loss for spells.

[Mullersmutt]

Figured I'd throw my hat in the ring as well to say that I also am not getting half mana cost for my black necromancy spells after completing and finalizing the mastery quest. Really bummed out, because half fatigue for harm would be amazing endgame.

[Salutations]

Ewe, why black necromancy? Force is way better. Half cost Disintigrate (along with completing Ancient Gods quest) is unstobbale.

Also items that have any number of mana 'add' to your mana pool; any spells that you cast, the mana cost is used from the item first then yourself.

[Weierstrass]

I also tried the quest, using only necromantic black spells but no no avail. What has to be done exactly. Must I prevent my followers from killing anything ?

[Weierstrass]

I just did that plus finding a dialog option telling that I had completed the quest...
It seems to work

[EolSunder]

See if you get half from the other black spells. maybe a patch or something nixed the 1/2 from harm since it's already a super fast and powerful spell. I havent tried it myself i always go with the 1/2 force tree, but check every necro spell see if it doesn't work for them all, or just for harm. If it's just harm, someone coded it that way since harm is super powerful already.

[shug]

I don't know what version you're using on Steam; I'm playing on GOG with hotfix 1.0.7.4. I don't know what the differences are, but you guys seem to really be clutching at straws here. You oughtta google harder, because there's a lot of old forums out there as far back as 2001 with amazing information. Sometimes it's needed since it can be really easy to break quests in this game.

You don't have to use any spells from the school you're trying to master during the challenge. Your followers can kill whatever. You don't need to wear the mastery amulet to get the half fatigue benefit.

You won't get the half fatigue benefit of becoming a master unless you actually learn all 5 spells in whatever school you're trying to get mastery -- BEFORE you do the mastery challenge. I think the masters might even hint at this in dialogue, but I'm not sure. You can see this benefit immediately after completing the mastery challenge in your character sheet under whatever school you mastered -- all fatigue costs will be halved, naturally.

As for the guy who said Force is better, I think you get more XP if you use Harm versus Disintegrate, since you get more XP based on hits rather than kills. Not to mention you'll always get loot that way. Also, Harm is beautiful since it has zero cast time. The only time I can't spam the ♥♥♥♥ out of Harm is when I have a magical shield up of some sort, seems to lag the game and reduce how fast I can click someone to death with Harm.

If you wanna be OP, get Summon Demon from the Summoning school, then cast Reflective Shield from Meta, then unsummon your demon and remove the shield. He'll stay as a follower indefinitely, you can make a horde of demons and just wipe everything. Do this somewhere you can rest 1 hour in-between to save fatigue potions. Pair this with Tempus Fugit from the Temporal school, and the entire game is EZ mode. They have a huge health pool, run really fast, and hit hard.

NPC's don't react well to you having demons, so you can use Disperse Magick from Meta to unsummon them.

[EolSunder]

Disintegrate is better than harm vs any strong foe that doesn't carry loot. You don't have to spam Disintegrate, 1 shot, boom dead. 2nd fire elemental 1 shot, dead. Alot quicker and easier than throwing a hundred harms at a tough foe. I can run into a room with 5 fire elementals.. 5 blasts.. all dead.. keep going through dungeon. Don't need to spam harm on anything. Harm is great for most foes, Disintegrate is great vs any tough foe that doesn't carry loot that you want.

[shug]

Sure, unless you want more XP for the extra hits. Honestly, the cast animation / duration of Disintegrate isn't much different to me than the amount of time I'd spend spamming Harm. Also, there's the Fatigue cost -- how many times do you need to cast Harm 10 times for a kill, and is it worth spending the extra character points just to blow 50 Fatigue? I prefer to just spam Harm and save myself the character points. I honestly don't see how you'd throw 5 blasts at 5 elementals -- you wouldn't have 250 Fatigue unless you did the entire ancient gods quest, or unless you did Force Mastery in Tulla, and then you'd only spend 125 Fatigue. Unless your build is all CON and WIS with only 5 points in Force, I could see that.

As far as kill spells go though, Disintegrate is wayyy better than Quench Life.

I honestly haven't used any damage-dealing spells other than Harm for this entire playthrough and haven't had any problems. However, I'm also running a fairly large party (4 followers plus Dog, plus familiar), not to mention it's not hard to make summons of Demons and keep them around indefinitely with Reflective Shield.

But, to counter my own argument, I'd say that mastering the Force college is the best 5 points you could spend in magic if you weren't going for a full mage build.

[Scrubwave]

Virgin spellcasters vs melee chads.