Mage build and mod questions.

[DaLagga]

1. I'm trying to build a dedicated mage and I've gone into the Rune magic and Hermit trees but I'm not sure what to take as my 3rd. I've seen a lot of people suggest going Philosopher if for nothing else than for the mana regen, but I don't seem to be having mana problems so I don't know if it's really a good choice for me. I was thinking Engineer as I hate having to drop my bag constantly to roll, plus half stamina costs is nice and traps can be OP for any build. But it doesn't really fit with a mage, so what do you all suggest?

2. Is the mana regen percentage rate you get from food affected by burnt mana? In other words, if half my mana is burnt, is my regen rate halved or is it still based on my maximum mana pool?

3. Is there a mod that simply stops food spoilage in your chest or bag on the floor? I've seen mods that stop spoilage outright, but that seems a tad OP and a bit ridiculous. But at the same time, I hate that food spoils no matter what I do unless I dump it directly on the floor which makes managing recipes annoying and tedious to say the least.

4. Finally, if I install a mod that adds more hotkeys for skills, will I still be able to play online with friends? Obviously any mod that fundamentally alters the game will be incompatible online, but this is more of just a UI/input mod right, so it may work online? Does anyone know for sure? Thanks!

[ArchaicReaper]

1. Hex Mage is pretty strong. Even if you don't use much from the tree, Bloodlust and Lockwell's Revelation will help any magic build. Really any tree that either boosts your specialty or fills a gap you think should be filled.

2. All sources of information I find simply say "max mana" so hard to say. Could always test it; spend mana, drink leyline water, check recovery rate, burn your mana, spend some, drink leyline water, check recovery rate.

3. No idea about mods. There are some backpacks that slow decay times though, like the Alchemist Backpack and the Preservation Backpack.

4. Worst case scenario they need the same mods installed.

[Lyff]

Originally posted by DaLagga:

4. Finally, if I install a mod that adds more hotkeys for skills, will I still be able to play online with friends? Obviously any mod that fundamentally alters the game will be incompatible online, but this is more of just a UI/input mod right, so it may work online? Does anyone know for sure? Thanks!

As said before worst case scenario they'll need the mod installed (if you host). But in most case if the mods only edit things on your own game like UI/input/etc you have no reason to worry about anything, they'll just need to set their game to default-mono.

[Princess Pilfer]

1: It's not actually a big deal. Rune Mage is a *highly* self-sufficent skill tree.
Hex mage is very powerful but risks massively overshadowing your rune-magic in terms of damage output, Philosopher's Chakram skills could help you deal with groups if you're not attached to the idea of using a staff.

3: Keep salt on hand, turn it into travel rations before it goes bad. And/or use an Alchemist Backpack. Food spoilage forcing you to be prepared for trips and the like is like, a core feature of the game, lol.

[Erei]

1/ Magic comes in many ways, and it's kinda up to you to know which one appeal to you the most. I strongly adivse you to pick an element and stick with it. Doesn't mean you can't use anything else, but consider the rest as mostly utility. That way you can make that specific element much stronger by stacking all the sweet damage bonuses.
First, let get this out of the way : Philosopher is intended for spellblade kind of gameplay, not pure mage. The mana regen, quite frankly, is not a big deal (none of my pure mage are philosopher and I never had any issues). You can get a variety of food and drink which does it just the same or better, without wasting a precious skilltree. And you can also make potions.
What may be of interest to you is the sigil of ice from philosopher. If you like ice really much, well, there it is.
Second, remember you can use (and are strongly advised to, at least for some) all the perks and skill before the breakthrough of EVERY class in the game. While some may not be useful to you, it may be enough to get most of what you want without investing in said class. For example, you get all the basic rune mage ability without being rune mage.

As for magic, you have :
-rune mage, your classic mage who can do a variety of things. It's a jack of all trade kind of mage, and I strongly recomend it for most mage build
-hex mage : that one is different. It's essentially, a witch. You get the hex magic, which involves using hexes on your enemy and then detonate those hexes for damage. If that doesn't appeal to you, there is also a way to play with corruption stuff. Corruption gives powerful buff and debuff to you. Eventually, it is really harmful. The hex mage walk the line of corrupted but not dead. You get to use a blood sigil (corrupted sigil) for example, and it's the only skill line with a skill to literally remove most of your corruption.
Hex mage also comes with one of the biggest/best damage buff of the game for magic damage (lockwell's revelation), and a really good sustain ability (bloodlust). If none of its magic appeal to you. Whether you intend to do the corruption thing or not, the cleanse skill is very useful to remove your corruption before it's too annoying (potions are expensive, skill is free). And the rest is also very good, which is why hex mage is usually suggested for anybody who do magic damage.
-Cabal hermit get you the sigil of wind (mosty), which is a lightning based spell making thing. It also gives you conjure, which is mandatory if you want to go "summoner" (with an undead and the hex mage turret).
-honorable mention to the primal ritualist. Consider it some, well, primal magic, it's shaman basically. You drop a drum on the ground and beat it. It will do magic stuff to your opponents. Since it's hexing them, for free, you can also use the hex mage skill to detonate such hexes.


There is a few kind of builds I see for a pure mage.
-The hexer. Either hexes and/or jinx and then detonate them. You may use some weapons and skills to, but that's less pure mage.
-The hexer but tribal. It play really differently despite using the same "root". Put drums, beat them, nuke stuff with hex mage. One good thing is using "nurturing echo" after the fight and literally heal your mana/health/stam up to max (including burned) in one skill. Who cares about regen ? :D
-The archmage, using rune magic, and mostly the magic trap to do damage. Usually can be paired with another one though
-The summoner/lightning mage, (hex mage+rune mage+cabal hermit), which use summon and lightning to destroy its opponent (also a pistol to do a magic "spell", don't ask).

There is also the ice sigil from philosopher, but I never tested ice magic, so I don't know how good it can be.
And remember you can get the fire sigil for "free" no matter your class.

in any case, wiki have all the possible combination for a sigil, if you want to look what's of interest to you.

2/ Mana regen is an odd thing. According to wiki, it's a % for consumable (I assume it's max mana irrelevant of burned mana), but the philosopher passive gives you a flat 0.34/s no matter what.
As suggested, you can fairly easily find other source for mana regen. If you are tired, you get mana regen already (pair well with hex mage passive). Leyline water (the pink-ish water in the conflux mountain and in one palce in sorobor) gives you +0.15%/s. And you can put it in your waterskin (empty it first). It will also quench your thirst just like regular water.
There are other food, which are not that hard to make and quite strong (like cheese cake, one of my mages favorite).


I personally played a tribal hex mage and a "corrupted" summoner/lightning (totally not a Sith) mage. Both had their pro and cons, but were overall quite fun. If those appeals to you, let me know I'll give the rough outline of the builds.

[DaLagga]

Thanks for the responses. I'm leaning toward Hex mage for my final pick but what I'm wondering is, how do you deal with the -30% stamina regen debuff on very tired status? Seems like a rather massive debuff, especially for someone like me who sprints everywhere.

As a side note, I did test the whole mod thing and you can indeed use the hotkeys mod and still play with others who aren't modded.

[Erei]

You do damage with your mana, not stamina. That's the point of a pure mage :D
As for running, I have the bird hat for speed boost, and switch to a "regular" hat when I do combat/enter a dungeon. That helps a lot, and the hat is not really heavy.

You can use food to regen stam. It's a fixed rate per sec (not like mana, which is % base, most of the time, which is very intuitive and not confusing at all), so I don't think tired affect that. And regular water gives another source of stam regen (it stacks with food).
With the best food and water, you are looking at 1.5/s


Also, I personally avoid to be in "very tired" state. If you drop to 0 sleep it's a defeat scenario, and yes it happened to me. You don't have any warning after being "very tired", you just drop "dead". So, now I stay at "tired" and sleep at "very tired", just to be safe.


And don't be scared of the lack of mana regen, astral potion are super easy to do, they don't "rot", and they can be upgraded to great astral potion relatively easy. By mid late game I always carry a few of great astral pot and they are ridiculously powerful (100% mana regen and remove some burn).
On top of all the food and stuff.