Best all around mage/exploration build?!

[magickmynd]

So I've played through the game a couple of times and there were a few things bugging me about the character builds. I wanted to try and build something as multi-purpose as possible while still being able to take on the various threats in the game. I ended up doing a lot of math and comparing various faction bonuses, and I think I have come up with a general all purpose magic build that takes care of a lot of various issues with very few concessions while still allowing the player a lot of room for tweaks and, most important, storage space! See the TL/DR for the build summary!

So let's go over a few things.

Exploration:

My primary concern with a lot of the character builds was exploration. Most of the time you are stuck either carrying multiple armor sets to take care of various things like weather, enemy types or function, such as movement speed. If you really want to move around quickly and easily and carry a lot of things your only real option is the pearl bird mask with the master trader's set. And then when you actually get into combat you would need to switch over to another armor set before the fight starts.

This bugged me because it takes extra inventory space to have to carry around armor for various situations, and you need that space for loot! So I wanted to find a way to make a class that would allow me to move more quickly than normal, but to also not have to change armor sets and still have a decent amount of protection in fights. Not having to carry multiple sets of armor, or even 1 additional set, helps to clear up some storage space.

There is also the concern of movement speed. Using any heavy armor set or even a medium armor set usually comes with movement speed debuffs, which defeats the purpose of only keeping 1 kind of armor because then your speed of exploration suffers. And in a game with no fast travel options that will heavily impact the amount of time it takes you to move from location to location.

Storage:

As I already mentioned storage space was also a concern. You want a character build that will allow you to carry the minimum amount of "essential" gear necessary so that you have lots of extra backpack space for all that sweet dungeon loot!

Protection/resistances:

Also a big concern. Wearing big/heavy armor gives you a lot of physical protection, but lowers movement speed and increases stamina usage in most cases. But if your armor is too light then you tend to aim more for elemental resistances and movement speed, but not much in the way of physical protection, so you end up getting 1-2 shot in a lot of cases with the stronger enemies in the game.

Flexibility:

Another target was how viable the build was for every situation without having to change gear. I wanted something that had decent elemental resist/physical protection/movement speed and was light on stamina usage. I wanted a build that was decent at everything rather than focusing too much on one aspect. There were a couple of concessions needed, such as not having 100% mana reduction or 100% stamina cost reduction, more like 60-85% of either one, but even that is better than most builds can ask for without having to use a bunch of consumable items that will take up storage space and require a lot of resources to keep going.

I really like the idea of going into a dungeon with all of your resistances/damage proection/storage space intact so that you can explore and gather everything you want without having to make multiple trips back to town, unless you just REALLY REALLY want to grab everything that isn't nailed down and make hundreds and hundreds of silver with every dungeon crawl.

The setup:

Ok, so let's get into everything that is needed. First, this is a magic based class since magic offers the greatest flexibility of all of the other class types. In this case, we are specifically targeting ruinic magic. Rune mages have access to spells that offer attack magic at both long and close range, defensive magic for both physical and elemental damage reduction, light sources, utility and even summoned weapons! With the right game choices you can even add elemental damage to regular weapons!

The second aspect is the choice of factions. I looked over all of the faction bonuses you get for completing the main quest line, and the one that offers the most utility, flexibility, and overall just the best rewards is, in my opinion, the Holy Mission. You get weather resistance to help with giving you the flexibility of choosing any armor set you want, although we will be going with a specific one. This way you won't have to worry about carrying torches or weather defense potions. Gotta save space!

You also get a physical protection bonus, again to help with your armor choice since we will be wearing light armor, and you even get a stamina and mana cost reduction! Always useful. You will also get a spell to augment any weapon you want with lightning element damage, which very few of the enemies in the game have a resistance to, not to mention you can make any weapon able to deal damage to ethereal enemies, essential against ghost types. You also get some free decay resistance, which is cool.

The next major decision is your choice of secondary classes. Given the fact that our concern is flexibility and exploration, along with combat strategy, our secondary classes will be the Mercenary and Shaman. Mercenary for the armor stamina cost reduction/movement speed and running stamina boost, and Shaman for the weather resistance and increased effectiveness of boons. This is important because mages have access to a lot of various Boon spells for elemental resistance. I've taken direct hits from pistol shrimp lightning blasts and barely taken any visible damage other than knockback effects.

And last is our choice of equipment. Since we are a mage class we want to really focus on mana cost reduction. We won't get 100% like some other builds, more like 85% at the top-most end of the build, but that is still a LOT of reduction. Enough that you can fight for a pretty long time if you have at least 100 mana and you only need to carry around a few mana potions to keep you going. Most of the time you will never need to replenish your mana during any normal fight, and rarely during boss fights if the boss has a TON of health. By the time you use all of your mana, they should be dead honestly.

But keep in mind that is only if you are going bare bones with only your passives and your equipment with nothing in your backpack! Secondary equipment like tents and potions can push you over the 100% mark! With a Mage and/or Luxury tent and Stamina potions you can have infinite mana and stamina!

The build:

Ok, let’s get into the actual build details! As I mentioned before, you want to join the Holy Mission faction and unlock your mage abilities at the Conflux Mountain. This will give you the main setup for the class as far as just passives and your first active abilities go. At the mountain I suggest getting 100 mana to start with and getting the Reveal spell along with Flamethrower. I would also pick up the Cool Boon from one of the mages in the lower area. This will come in handy later for exploring the dessert biome.

The next order of business is to start unlocking our class abilities. The classes you want to aim for are the Rune Mage, the Mercenary and the Shaman. Rune mage will be your primary damage dealing and utility setup, while the Mercenary and Shaman are mostly for the secondary passive bonuses like movement speed, weather resistance, increasing Boon effects, rest bonuses and reduction in stamina use for armor and running. You can also get the summoning ability if you really want it from the Shaman tree, but personally I don’t feel it’s super useful. It will take up extra quick slots that are better used for other things and the actual summoned minion isn’t all that powerful. In some situations it can be useful for drawing aggro, but it doesn’t stay alive long enough in any fight that matters for it to be worth it.

By going Rune mage you have access to healing, physical and elemental protection, a light source without a lantern, long range attacks, AoE attacks, trap setups and a weapon any time you need one, if you don’t have any in-game weapon you want to use over the summoned ones. The summoned ones are actually quite powerful and they act as their own light source if you want to use it, which you can get rid of at any time rather than having to have the magical lantern stick around and give you away if you want to sneak. Instead you can just un-equip the summoned weapon and the light goes away. Nice bit of utility there. Not to mention you don't have to worry about weapon durability.

Now let’s talk gear. Since we already have our faction and class abilities decided, let’s get some awesome armor and weapons! The armor set that really brings everything together is the Gold Lich armor set. Its mana cost reduction bonuses are higher than any other set in the game. The problem with that though, is that it doesn’t have much in the way of physical protection or even a lot of elemental resistance. But we will fix that though, so don’t worry.

We will also want the Pearl Bird mask, the Light Mender’s Lexicon, The Light Mender’s backpack, and any Jade weapon you prefer. I really like the Jade mace, but your pick based on preference. I like the mace because it has mana cost reduction, decay damage and does a lot of impact damage to help stagger enemies. And if necessary you can use your Blessed boon and the Light Infusion spell to give it additional lightning damage. But we won’t be doing a lot of melee fighting with this build, so you will mostly be doing it for the mana reduction.

With this equipment and your class/faction choices you should have over 30% increased movement speed and 85% mana cost reduction. With your Rune Mage abilities and the increased Boon effectiveness you will also have a ton of elemental resistance. If you take the Rune Mage ability to increase Rune Magic effectiveness you will also have a lot of physical protection and increased resistances, the same as if you were wearing most Plate armors. And with your physical protection bonus from the Holy Mission you will actually have better physical protection than most of the armor sets in the game, without the stamina and movement speed debuffs.

However, it’s true that this setup will take quite a while to completely obtain. You have to defeat the Gold Lich to get the majority of your mana cost reduction, and the Light Mender’s backpack is one of the harder packs in the game to actually get since it requires a lot of running around the swamps to get, as well as solving a lever puzzle in one of the abandoned ziggurats to unlock one of the islands that has a grave on it that you need to get to. And the Light Mender’s Lexicon requires you to complete another lever puzzle in an area with a lot of high level lightning based mobs. But trust me, the benefits to getting everything together is completely worth it!!

TL;DR

You get: All elemental resistances, over 30% increased movement speed, 85-100+% mana cost reduction, nearly unlimited stamina for running/exploration (especially if you use stamina potions), lot’s of freed up storage space, access to highly flexible abilities and utility spells as well as great DPS and you can choose the way you play! You can be a trap setter and lure enemies in, buff yourself and go in for Melee, or cast spells from a distance! Great single target or AoE damage and even DoT! And no worrying about weather!

Classes:

Rune Mage, Mercenary, Shaman (Make sure to choose to make your Rune Mage spells more powerful rather than not having to use a Lexicon. You need it to make your physical protection spell more powerful).

Faction:

Holy Mission (you get mana/stamina cost reduction, physical protection bonus, ability to infuse your weapon with lightning damage and decay resistance.)

Equipment:

Pearl Bird Mask, Gold Lich armor and boots, any Jade class single hand weapon (for the mana cost reduction, I recommend the mace), Light Mender’s Lexicon, Light Mender’s Backpack (again for mana cost reduction).

Secondary tools:

Luxury tent (for the stamina cost reduction for extended exploration) or Mage Tent (to get over 100% mana cost reduction for boss fights. You will actually GAIN mana when you cast spells!). Another option if you want the extra resistances and unlimited fuel for the flamethrower spell if you really like it is the Lantern of Souls, although you will have to constantly switch between the Lantern and the Lexicon.

The flamethrower spell can be a great fight opener for burning DoT, and then switch to the Lexicon for the rest of your damage spells. But this will require 2 play throughs since you can only get the lantern through a Blue Chamber Collective faction quest. It can be nifty, but it’s optional, you don’t really need it.