Terraria Master mode Mage Build Guide (outdated)

The dark mages guide to magic progression in Terraria inspired by ღ🍁~BesidesLeaf~🌹ღ

May the magicules be in your favour <3

Potions
Always have many potions, You want at least 3/4 stacks of mana potions at anytime as a mana user. They don't take much to brew/buy Make sure you brew potions that buff you such as iron-skin potions, regeneration potions, etc... These are very important to be catered to the boss, they give a significant advantage
The Dummy trick
If you need a fast healing station, you can use the life drain on some placed dummies to heal. For some reason, they will heal you when hit with the life drain
Prefixes
Reforging can be very helpful in tweaking your character.
Want more damage? Focus on the Menacing prefix. Feel like you're too squishy? Go for warding. A balance of these allow you to subtle tweak your character to your play style. You can find a nice balance between prefixes or go all in.
Learning the attack pattern
Most bosses have a set rhyme to them, the more you fight them the more you get a hold on this rhyme. Remember its ok to get hit, just recover and heal up
Day/Night
Its a good idea to keep all your fights in the day, visibility of small projectiles and queue can really be the difference between a loss and a win.
Guides
When reading guides, don't take them at their full word. The way guides are built they depend on the experiences and skill of the player writing them. Use them as a rough estimate to what you should be doing.
Breaks
Remember, the better shape your mind is in, the better you'll do in the fight. If something is frustratingly hard. Take a break, a nice cup of tea or a building session can really calm your mind. When ready, try to focus on the problem from a new perspective.
Life/Mana
The more health you have the more mistakes you can make. Try to get the maximum amount possible by looking for life crystals, life fruits and mana crystals

Equipment:

• Amber Staff/ Diamond Staff/ Ruby Staff
  
• Diamond Robe/ Amber Robe/ Ruby Robe
  
• Wizard Hat
  
• Any Armour piece for legs

Accessories

• Cloud in a Bottle/Sandstorm in a Bottle
  
• Hermes Boots
  
• Aglet
  
• Shackle
  
• Lucky Horseshoe
  

Potions:

• Lesser Healing Potion
  
• Lesser Mana Potion

Strategy

Ok, this is a optional boss. However, being prepared for SK means you'll be ready to do EOC. Movement is really important factor in the fight, be careful from going too far as the boss will shrink and teleport to your location. You should keep moving until he reappears as they'll stop moving for a second. Letting you either clear some of the smaller slimes or get some safe damage in.

In master mode, he hits like a tank with 96 Damage per hit. Moving means he'll not spawn inside of you. Getting stuck inside the boss when they teleport will mean it'll be your end. Not only does the boss hit like a tank, the small spiked slimes he spawns will hit for 42 while summoning spikes to deal a further 54. So its important to deal with them before hand to give you an error margin.

The boots allow you to gain some distance, aim for small mountains. With the high ground, not only are you avoiding the spiked slime's' spikes with the height, you're also decreasing the effective jump height of the boss. This is where the cloud in a bottle will help in a pinch allowing you to jump over the boss. Don't worry about the fall damage, the horse shoe negates it. Training the slime backwards and forwards from to hills will allow you to easily avoid any damage and kill him.

The rest of the accessories are a convenience. Its possible to do this fight without the boots or the horse shoe, either build an arena or keep running in a direction between two points.

Equipment:

• Amber staff/ Diamond staff
  
• Crimson Rod/ Vilethorn
  
• Diamond Robe/Amber Robe
  
• Wizard Hat
  
• Any Armour piece for legs
  
• Slime Saddle

Accessories

• Cloud in a Bottle/Sandstorm in a Bottle
  
• Hermes Boots
  
• Aglet/Band of starpower
  
• Shark Tooth Necklace
  
• Lucky Horseshoe
  
• Band of regeneration

Potions:

• Lesser Healing Potion (binded to H)
  
• Lesser Mana Potion (binded to J)

Strategy

As a mage, soloing the eye is infuriating. You want all the edge you can get. I tend to make an arena of platforms. The platform stretches a screen full and have 5 blocks in between them vertically. This fight can be done with 2 platforms. I tend to recommend 3, just so you have that edge when the eye lingers under you.


It important to remember we are using the slime here as a movement tool, while you can damage the boss by jumping on him, this is only effective for the first phase.Admittedly, it will do similar damage to using a diamond staff. If you're doing this, remember to either use the linger of the vilethorn or the crimson cloud's rain to kill his minions as they will damage you, if you land on the boss while they spawn. Alternatively, instead of jumping on him for damage, you jump on him to position yourself ahead of him. Chaining, "S" then holding "A/D" as he moves to the side of your character, you strafe "D/A" this will do a circle around the boss, positioning him in one of your corners. This also works to allow you to jump on him as he will charge diagonally then upwards.

In the second teeth phase, jumping directly onto his mouth ( he tracks you with his mouth ) will damage you. As he transitions to this phase, multiple minions will spawn. They only have 15 hp, a single shot of the diamond staff will kill them instantly. Hence, its wise to keep the lingering projectile of the vilethorn or the crimson clouds active, thus easing the stress of killing the minons.

Phase 3. Run.
This isn't an official phase of the boss, in master mode, the charge attack he does is exponentially frequent. This means as the fight progresses. The more he will charge. This is the hardest phase.
He will hit you, this is why i recommend maxing out your stars and hearts.
Don't use the slime mount anymore, you will have to rely on the boots and the sandstorm, a flat long arena or long grass lands work well. You will avoid most of the charges, except his diagonal upwards charge. This happens after he charges into the ground. You need to stop running let him charge up, then keep moving. Avoiding damage really gets hard as his health goes down. Killing him as fast as possible is really crucial.

Equipment:

• Demon Scythe
  
• Crimson Rod/ Vilethorn
  
• Jungle set
  
• Slime Saddle

Accessories

• Magic Cuffs
  
• Hermes Boots/Terraspark Boots
  
• Mana Flower
  
• Shark Tooth Necklace
  
• Horseshoe Balloon
  
• Blizzard/sandstorm/Cloud in a bottle

Potions:

• Lesser Healing Potion (binded to H)
  
• Lesser Mana Potion (binded to J)

Strategy

Ok, let me first address the mega gear bump. It is possible, its the easiest way to beat eater. He is extremely op in master mode with the gear we're given as a mage we have to push it to pre-hardmode limit . We are literally pulling all the stops out here. Movement, dps and penetration. I highly suggest a demon scythe, it is possible to find one, farming one is ... Hell



The demon scythe makes the fight really easy, as long as you're keeping track of movement and scythe placement. We build scythe walls when the worm is vertically moving. This prevents the vile hitting us as much as possible.Try minimising damage here, as the more segments you break, the more small worms you'll have to deal with.

When the worm is charging towards us, we spam as many scythes as possible, as his heads explode so does his momentum. We need to keep our distance but still make sure to deal the maximum possible damage. When he does get close we jump up. I suggest an arena like this.


The eater of worlds scarf can be pretty useful.

Equipment:

SAME SETUP AS EATER

• Demon Scythe
  
• Crimson Rod/ Vilethorn
  
• Jungle set
  
• Slime Saddle

Accessories

• Magic Cuffs
  
• Hermes Boots/Terraspark Boots
  
• Mana Flower
  
• Shark Tooth Necklace
  
• Horseshoe Balloon
  
• Blizzard/sandstorm/Cloud in a bottle

Potions:

• Lesser Healing Potion (binded to H)
  
• Lesser Mana Potion (binded to J)

Strategy

This boss is really easy with the scythe, in no time will the creepers die. Have 4 platforms setup like so and jump between them.

The boss plays out quite quickly, due to the boss having less health then EoC.

Equipment:

• Demon Scythe
  
• Space Gun
  
• Meteor set
  
• Slime Saddle

Accessories

• Celestial magic Cuffs
  
• Hermes Boots/Terraspark Boots
  
• Mana Flower
  
• Shield of Cthulhu
  
• Worm Scarf
  
• Horseshoe Balloon

Potions:

• Healing Potion (binded to H)
  
• Mana Potion (binded to J)

Strategy
Let me first introduce the arena. We want a open space, so we can deal constant damage and not let queen bee hide inside blocks. The middle platforms are to allow us to dodge charge attacks. The bottom 2 platforms are there to avoid the stingers.


These phases alternate.

Charge Phase
We want to use the three middle platforms, moving up and down between the top and bottom. we wait for the bee to charge past us, then we stack scythes in her direction, as she charges we either move up or down. We then repeat until she switches phases.

Stinger Phase
She will move toward the top of the arena, if its the stinger phase, this is where we use the space gun. Its projectiles are fast and cost us no mana. While we are doing less damage then using the scythe, the projectiles are skimpily slow and won't hit our mark. We alternate left and right, either jumping and dashing through the gap between the stingers, or we jump above them.

Minon Phase
This is the simplest and fastest phase, bees will spawn from the queen, use the scythe to dispatch them, load 2 scythes at her tail then switch to space gun. This lets us sneak in some damage. Then when the scythes hit the queen repeat if she doesn't move.

Equipment:

• Demon Scythe
  
• Space Gun
  
• Meteor set
  
• Slime Saddle

Accessories

• Celestial magic Cuffs
  
• Hermes Boots/Terraspark Boots
  
• Mana Flower
  
• Shield of Cthulhu
  
• Worm Scarf
  
• Horseshoe Balloon

Potions:

• Healing Potion (binded to H)
  
• Mana Potion (binded to J)

Strategy

High health Phase
Skeletron is a pretty easy fight if we have a good arena setup, you wait for the hands to attack you. They'll then linger, the demon scythe will make quick work of them. If you can't hit them with the scythes use the space gun. Your movement should be in a circular motion in the arena, occasionally dashing inwards with the shield.

Low health Phase
By now, the hands should be destroyed.If not, skeltron gains 25 defence for each hand alive.

All you have left is the head. The head will fire skeleton skulls at you. Its important to keep moving as the heads will kill you if you don't carry on the circular motion.

General tips

• Its good to attack the head while its spinning as it has 10 less defence points.
  
• If stun locked by the spin phase, either use the slime saddle or hook to escape.

Equipment:

• Demon Scythe/Water Bolt
  
• Space Gun/Gray Zapinator
  
• Meteor set
  
• Slime Saddle

Accessories

• Celestial magic Cuffs
  
• Hermes Boots/Terraspark Boots
  
• Mana Flower
  
• Shield of Cthulhu
  
• Worm Scarf
  
• Horseshoe Balloon

Potions:

• Healing Potion (binded to H)
  
• Mana Potion (binded to J)

Strategy

We need a very long arena in hell, more then usually cause of the health boost WOF gets in master mode, we need to stay away from the Hungry. The Space Gun/Gray Zapinator is quite effective against them due to how fast you can shoot the space gun.

Choice between scythe vs Water bolt,
The water bolt is quite effective due its piercing, but the bounce of the beam is the real draw. Its easily done with the scythe too, but its slow casting can make you run out of platform to run on.

The more you damage the WOF, the faster he gets. Try not to miss your shots as each one counts

Equipment:

• Sky Fracture / Sky Fracture
  
• Golden shower
  
• Titanium Mage Set
  
• Slime Saddle

Accessories

• Mana Flower
  
• Terraspark Boots
  
• Sorcerers Emblem
  
• Shield of Cthulhu
  
• Wings
  
• Celestial Cuffs
  
• Mana Cloak

Potions:

• Healing Potion (binded to H)
  
• Mana Potion (binded to J)

Strategy

Phase 1
We want a large arena similar to the one we thought skeletron in, the hardest part of this fight is the minions, their large spread projectile attacks can easily kill you, you should especially keep an eye out for the Crystal Slimes.

Sometimes when she is stationary she'll throw Regal Gel at you, these bounce, its easy to avoid as long as you're under them at the apex of their height.

Phase 2
After half of her half is gone, she grows wings. You'll need to become more mobile, moving more vertically to avoid her. Her slam attack is a good chance to deal some damage.

Equipment:

• Sky Fracture / Meteor Staff
  
• Life drain
  
• Clinger Staff
  
• Titanium Mage Set
  
• Gelatinous Pillion

Accessories

• Mana Flower
  
• Terraspark Boots
  
• Sorcerers Emblem
  
• Shield of Cthulhu
  
• Wings
  
• Celestial Cuffs
  
• Mana Cloak

Potions:

• Greater Healing Potion (binded to H)
  
• Greater Mana Potion (binded to J)

Strategy

Main body:
When making the arena for the fight, make it high up, so the destroyer has to come at you at shallow angles.

We would want to use the meteor staff for our main source of damage. Its wide attack will hit multiple segments and sometimes probes. Its great, as we don't really have to aim it.

The boss will come at you diagonally, if he is moving through a platform, use the Clinger Staff to get some extra damage as you know his entire segment will have to go through the wall of cursed flames.
When dodging: You either want to dash out of the segments way, fly out, or use Gelatinous Pillion as its mobility is great for this fight

Probes:
The probes can become a great problem if not dealt with quickly, the Life drains aoe instant attack is perfect for getting rid of the probes, do bare in mind, the probes won't heal you. You can use the dummy trick for healing purposes.

Equipment:

• Sky Fracture
  
• Life drain
  
• Golden Shower
  
• Hallow Armour
  
• Gelatinous Pillion

Accessories

• Brain of confusion
  
• Terraspark Boots
  
• Sorcerers Emblem
  
• Shield of Cthulhu
  
• Wings
  
• Celestial cuffs
  
• Mana Cloak

Potions:

• Greater Healing Potion (binded to H)
  
• Greater Mana Potion (binded to J)

Strategy
We need a vast sky arena, with quick rest points with either heal statues or dummies. This to to allow us to heal and to continue flying. You shouldn't rest long, only for glimpses.

Spazmatism
Being the easier of the two eyes, he is very similar to the eye of Cthulhu. but with fire. When he is flame throwing you, this is the best time to do damage, use the golden shower to weaken him, then go ham with the sky fracture. Try not to get hit as his cursed flames can really put you out of wack with health regen.

In his charge form, you'll want to be in free fall. As you fall faster then he spews flames. You'll still wanna try quickly kill him. As he does his charge attack you'll want to push your dodging skills, with either the slime or shield/wing combo.

Retinazer
This fight is all about dodging lasers . In his first form, he isn't much trouble, he'll occasionally charge you . He positions himself always to the horizontal of you. So free fall can also avoid all the lasers.

In his second form, he stops charging. His attack rate scales with how low his health is. Zigzagging or free fall are your best options.

Equipment:

• Meteor Staff/Rainbow Rod
  
• Life drain
  
• Golden Shower
  
• Hallow Armour
  
• Gelatinous Pillion

Accessories

• Brain of confusion
  
• Terraspark Boots
  
• Sorcerers Emblem
  
• Shield of Cthulhu
  
• Wings
  
• Celestial cuffs
  
• Mana Cloak

Potions:

• Greater Healing Potion (binded to H)
  
• Greater Mana Potion (binded to J)

Strategy
We have a large arena again, we focus on the limbs. I suggest hitting with the golden shower, decreasing his defence. Then hitting him the rainbow rod, as you'll hit multiple segments. Focus on the vice and laser, as they're got the fastest rate of fire and are hard to keep track of.

You'll want to keep moving horizontally, and occasionally jumping over his limbs as he throws them at you. Wait unit he does his spin attack to move vertically or to jump over & dash him to move to the opposite horizontal direction. You can also jump on his head during his spin with your slime for some extra damage while having momentum to move when he changes phase.

When the limbs are taken care of, go for his head. Use the meteor staff just as its easy to aim and has really high dps.

Equipment:

• Meteor Staff/Rainbow Rod
  
• Life drain
  
• Golden Shower
  
• Hallow Armour
  
• Gelatinous Pillion

Accessories

• Brain of confusion
  
• Terraspark Boots
  
• Sorcerers Emblem
  
• Shield of Cthulhu
  
• Wings
  
• Celestial cuffs
  
• Mana Cloak

Potions:

• Greater Healing Potion (binded to H)
  
• Greater Mana Potion (binded to J)

Strategy
We want to make the whole ocean and arena, as tall as possible without reaching the space boundary. Ending up in space in this fight, is basically suicide.
Phase 1
Charging flurry
He will charge you 5 times, each time directed at you. The secret is to always be perpendicular to him. If he charges horizontally, you move vertically.

Detonating bubbles
These projectiles can be destroyed very easily with the golden shower. He will spray them in a cluster in the first phase. They deal 225 damage in master mode, so they're worth popping. They also inflict the wet debuff for 3-8 seconds. This is purely visual and doesn't do anything.

Sharknado
When you see two bubbles move so the side of fishron, you'll know the spawn location of the sharknado. They can be a major obstacle in your arena. They deal alot of damge and also fling sharkrons at you. They'll go in your general direction in a arc shape. They deal 225 damage, thats also their hp. You can easily kill them before they reach you.

Phase 2
When you reach half of his health, he'll be stationary. His defence rating falls down to 40, you can avoid most of his attacks with the slime mount and moving in a very large circle. Remember to be prepared to move perpendicular to his charges.

Phase 3/ Enraged
Really focus on movement, you won't be able to see him easily, you should switch to fast moving projectiles like the shower or rainbow rod. He will teleport being you.

Equipment:

• Razorblade Typhoon
  
• Golden Shower
  
• Life Drain
  
• Hallow Armour
  
• Gelatinous Pillion

Accessories

• Celestial emblem
  
• Terraspark Boots
  
• Sorcerers Emblem
  
• Shield of Cthulhu
  
• Fishron Wings
  
• Brain of confusion
  
• Mana Cloak

Potions:

• Greater Healing Potion (binded to H)
  
• Greater Mana Potion (binded to J)

Strategy
Clear a large section of the jungle underground, at regular short interval place platforms. We're once again gonna be moving in a circular movement pattern while spamming the typhoon and golden shower.

Use the Life Drain to deal with the biters.

Equipment:

• Razorblade Typhoon
  
• Golden Shower
  
• Life Drain
  
• Hallow Armour
  
• Gelatinous Pillion

Accessories

• Celestial emblem
  
• Terraspark Boots
  
• Sorcerers Emblem
  
• Master ninja Gear
  
• Fishron Wings
  
• Brain of confusion
  
• Mana Cloak

Potions:

• Greater Healing Potion (binded to H)
  
• Greater Mana Potion (binded to J)

Strategy
Welcome to the end game:

Night:
Far the most easiest time of day to fight the boss, just fly around avoiding her attacks. Its that simple, its honestly just a dodging fight. Hold m1 for the Typhoon.

Day: Same as the night fight, but she hits harder. She'll drop a neat summon weapon if you kill her at day.

Equipment:

• Razorblade Typhoon/Everglow
  
• Golden Shower
  
• Life Drain
  
• Hallow Armour
  
• Gelatinous Pillion

Accessories

• Celestial emblem
  
• Terraspark Boots
  
• Sorcerers Emblem
  
• Shield of Cthulhu
  
• Fishron Wings
  
• Brain of confusion
  
• Mana Cloak

Potions:

• Greater Healing Potion (binded to H)
  
• Greater Mana Potion (binded to J)

Strategy
Clear the room, make 2 platforms, then move left and right while spamming the typhoon so that the fists don't hit you, the shower reduces his armour. He really is a push over. Make sure to dodge left and right when he does his jump attack. Keep track of his occasional Laser beams and fireballs. As his health decreases his attack frequency increases.

Equipment:

• Razorblade Typhoon
  
• Golden Shower
  
• Life Drain
  
• Hallow Armour
  
• Gelatinous Pillion

Accessories

• Celestial emblem
  
• Terraspark Boots
  
• Sorcerers Emblem
  
• Shield of Cthulhu
  
• Fishron Wings
  
• Brain of confusion
  
• Mana Cloak

Potions:

• Greater Healing Potion (binded to H)
  
• Greater Mana Potion (binded to J)

Strategy
You should use the skeltron arena for this boss.
First phase

Fireball
He fires four fireballs at the player, move vertically to avoid them.

Ice mist
Move away from the explosion, this allows the shards of ice to spread over, The distance between the icicles increases allowing you to move between them with ease.

Lighting orb
Just keep your distance, they'll shoot fire blots of lighting. Avoiding them is just a case of moving away.

Phase 2
He'll either fire ancient light projectiles or ancient doom projectiles.
Ancient dooms will shoot out projectiles vertically and horizontally, so being diagonally to these will ensure your safety.

Ancient Light: This attack will spread in your direction, you can destroy them or fly under them. Use either the life drain or razor Typhoon.

Decoy:Sometimes he'll spawn 4 decoys of himself, hitting the wrong one will cause a phantasm dragon or ancient vision to spawn. Very tedious enemies to deal with, the decoy and the real boss have a health bar. his eyes also lack a white pixel. The fake also lacks a golden strip on his hood. You can also use a hunter potion.

TBM > ETA? Sometime after the 27th ( School )

Sorry :(

[WARCHIEF99]

cool, no problem,good luck with that, i got out of uni not too long ago

[Teaa]

Yes sorry, started university recently and its put me out of doing anything outside of school :P Ill make sure to finish it soon.

[WARCHIEF99]

out of curiosity, do you plan on finishing this guide?

[jmjm]

also im jealous on how you figured out how to put gifs as you section titles

[jmjm]

its pretty good from past experience

[jmjm]

also the betsy's wrath is meant to be an upgrade to the golden shower

[jmjm]

yeah i understand but the typhoon is better for crowd control while the pine is better for single targets, just keep that in mind :)

[Teaa]

Personal preference my man, Its great for dps, but I tend to prefer the typhoon as it homes letting me focus more on my movement.

[jmjm]

I'm not even mage but i know for a fact with a melee build I can do more dps than any of my melee weapons with a razorpine, but not a razor typhoon

[Teaa]

Yeah The razorpine would be just be under the Typhoon, you can use it, I just recommend going for the Typhoon as its easier to acquire and is more future proof