Thinking of trying a challenge game - Bard Archmage

[Booster]

Since going non-scumming I've completed a ULE and a UCG, so I was thinking about trying my luck at making an archmage. Is this still feasible on p14 or is it mainly a thing of the past? Since I'm going for a non-wizard, ideally I'd need the max PP possible which would make my play choice a Mist Elf (hard to play with but FUN!). I never played a bard before, but will try and focus strongly on magic - do they find a good amount of spellbooks during play? Just got a Mist Elf wizard to lvl 16 (died to a lightning vortex in ToHK.. big surprise! :)) and she found tons of spellbooks; since I'll be physically weak I was thinking of going spear + shield with a strong emphasis on bows. A few questions:

Is it worth it to focus on pets? Seems like more of a hassle to me (I've never bothered with pets/familiars before)
SLB - with the slight nerf is it worth going for the heir gift or using my talents elsewhere?
The Bard innate ability that finds more treasure - is this noticeable?
As a physical weakling, are there any 'must have' skills? As a mist Elf I have Concentration, Dodge, Literacy, and Alertness as guaranteed. I was thinking Find Weakness, Athletics, Healing/Herbalism.
Do Bards in general receive a good amount of PP per level? I will need a lot in order to try for the archmage - is it worth playing with anything other than a wizard when attempting an archmage?
Weird Tome - has anyone tried reading it recently? I remember 100 music and high Le being a pre-requisite; I'd like to try reading it and see for myself

[Silfir]

Any class can be turned into an Archmage if you have the patience to grind it out. Yes, beastfighters and mindcrafters, too. The main challenge is to stay sane while you accumulate the prerequisites. I know I can't do it. Good luck!

[Booster]

Yes, that was a concern of mine as well from what I've read - I was hoping with a naturally high PP it might lessen the time needed to pump up PP.

[grobblewobble]

Since going non-scumming I've completed a ULE and a UCG, so I was thinking about trying my luck at making an archmage. Is this still feasible on p14 or is it mainly a thing of the past? Since I'm going for a non-wizard, ideally I'd need the max PP possible which would make my play choice a Mist Elf (hard to play with but FUN!). I never played a bard before, but will try and focus strongly on magic - do they find a good amount of spellbooks during play? Just got a Mist Elf wizard to lvl 16 (died to a lightning vortex in ToHK.. big surprise! :)) and she found tons of spellbooks; since I'll be physically weak I was thinking of going spear + shield with a strong emphasis on bows. A few questions:

Is it worth it to focus on pets? Seems like more of a hassle to me (I've never bothered with pets/familiars before)
SLB - with the slight nerf is it worth going for the heir gift or using my talents elsewhere?
The Bard innate ability that finds more treasure - is this noticeable?
As a physical weakling, are there any 'must have' skills? As a mist Elf I have Concentration, Dodge, Literacy, and Alertness as guaranteed. I was thinking Find Weakness, Athletics, Healing/Herbalism.
Do Bards in general receive a good amount of PP per level? I will need a lot in order to try for the archmage - is it worth playing with anything other than a wizard when attempting an archmage?
Weird Tome - has anyone tried reading it recently? I remember 100 music and high Le being a pre-requisite; I'd like to try reading it and see for myself

1. The main use of pets is as tools. If you want to kill a beggar without alignment hit, kill a cat, kill a vortex.. they have their uses.
2. Yes, SLB are still worth it.
3. I don't know.
4. I advise against Mist Elf (unless you just like the challenge), but skills aren't critically important in any case. The mana advantage relative to gnomes or other elves isn't big enough to torture yourself with this race.
5. Bards have good enough PP I think.
6. Get really, really high willpower before you try this.

Now about your main question, archmaging. I'm not an expert on this, but the main change in p14 that matters is hp casting. Still, I'm pretty sure you can work around that. Finding the book in the first place will be the biggest problem I think. Remember that the orb of mana can be used to increase your power points and mana very quickly. Once you have enough mana to bookcast wish on Silvernight, wishing for scrolls of chaos removal and using the orb starts a positive feedback loop. Wishing for speed at the start of Silvernight is good, too. You should probably get the ToTRR for the mana boost to get started.

[Grey]

One of the biggest reasons to use wizards is the guaranteed Wish book in the library.

Seconded on the mist elf advice - gnomes are much better in so many areas.

[Booster]

Thanks for the replies.

A Gnomish wizard might be a better bet than Mist Elf since they innately have Concentration and Literacy, but Gnomish Bards don't have a great base skillset - I'd rather not have to re-roll too many times to get the basics. I enjoyed playing as a wizard so might just stick with that, but I tend to enjoy the challenge of Mist Elves. Usually by the time I make it to lvl 16/17 it's much easier to survive as I've acquired -shock or found arrows of constuct slaying. For me the biggest adjustment is using a lot of spells as opposed to melee/missile which is why I thought a bard might be a good mix.

I'm curious about natural PP of races - is there a comparison of lvl 50's of the same class/base stats so we can see the HP/PP multiplier for each race? I imagine Humans would be the benchmark, but if I can get a few hundred more base PP as a mist elf I'd prefer to go that way even if the early game is more difficult

[Drifted]

I'm curious about natural PP of races - is there a comparison of lvl 50's of the same class/base stats so we can see the HP/PP multiplier for each race? I imagine Humans would be the benchmark, but if I can get a few hundred more base PP as a mist elf I'd prefer to go that way even if the early game is more difficult

I don't think race affects PP. I think character level, mana attribute and class are those that affect it. Not 100% sure thou.

[Stingray1]

Is spellbook of Wish wishable?

[JellySlayer]

Nope. You can't wish for any item that produces wishes. You get a book of calm monster instead IIRC.

[Grey]

Race effects PP on a very minor level. 100 Concentration is the main driver of PP regeneration and overwhelms all other sources.

[asdf]

Since going non-scumming I've completed a ULE and a UCG, so I was thinking about trying my luck at making an archmage. Is this still feasible on p14 or is it mainly a thing of the past?
Still possible, but takes a lot longer for non-wizards. Would not recommend to try non-wizard Archmage without rings/books shop to start severely nerfed (but still possible) ring wish engine/eventually buy Spellbook of Wish.

[JellySlayer]

Race effects PP on a very minor level. 100 Concentration is the main driver of PP regeneration and overwhelms all other sources.

Race does have a fairly significant effect on your total PP though.

[Carter]

Now about your main question, archmaging. I'm not an expert on this, but the main change in p14 that matters is hp casting. Still, I'm pretty sure you can work around that. Finding the book in the first place will be the biggest problem I think. Remember that the orb of mana can be used to increase your power points and mana very quickly. Once you have enough mana to bookcast wish on Silvernight, wishing for scrolls of chaos removal and using the orb starts a positive feedback loop. Wishing for speed at the start of Silvernight is good, too. You should probably get the ToTRR for the mana boost to get started.

i'd reckon the HP casting nerf will be an issue depending on how it is implemented. At the moment you lost 1-2 TO just from HP casting once, wonder what would happen if you cast something that is 500+ of hp.

would definately avoid a mist elf because you need the HP to book cast, as its worth 2 of every SP. Mist elfs have crap HP.

iirc the only non wizard "book casting" archmage i've seen was an elementalist who actually got the book by wishing for 1000s of books via the "ring archmage" method.

[JellySlayer]

i'd reckon the HP casting nerf will be an issue depending on how it is implemented. At the moment you lost 1-2 TO just from HP casting once, wonder what would happen if you cast something that is 500+ of hp.

It would be the same. HPcasting just abuses To and Wi, but no matter how much you abuse a stat, you never get more than 1 decrease per set of abuses, if my understanding is correct. If you HPcast once and think you will get a decrease, you may as well just HPcast constantly until you see the decrease, then stop immediately.

[Carter]

you sure about the 1 decrease per abuses? I would imagine it works like increases - you can stack them up.

but your right - you would just HPcast as quickly as possible, and once you start casting your TO will drop to 1 anyway eventually. would make it more difficult.

Obviously bards don't have the same spell cost advantages, so you'd need approximately 25% more SP than a wizard on top of it, so you would need to abuse mana sink significantly (probably to the tune of 500+ wands) and clothes of power etc.

then again it is probably possible with enough effort - the original archmage didn't have book caster talents which make it significantly easier.

[grobblewobble]

i'd reckon the HP casting nerf will be an issue depending on how it is implemented. At the moment you lost 1-2 TO just from HP casting once, wonder what would happen if you cast something that is 500+ of hp.
I don't know if this is going to make a big difference, casting wishes reduces your toughness to 1 pretty quickly in any case. But I think HP casting became less efficient, too? In terms of how many HP you lose.


iirc the only non wizard "book casting" archmage i've seen was an elementalist who actually got the book by wishing for 1000s of books via the "ring archmage" method.
There have been many non-wizard (bookcasting) archmages in 1.1. Someone recently had an arch farmer on the server (he got the book from Barnabas).

[Carter]

There have been many non-wizard (bookcasting) archmages in 1.1. Someone recently had an arch farmer on the server (he got the book from Barnabas).

would love to know the story behind that - thought only bard/wizard/elementalist/necro/druid could even read a book of wish even with boosted stats.

[Silfir]

Simple enough; they don't learn Wish from the book. You don't need to pass a reading check to bookcast.

Eventually, a wand of wonder or a potion of wonder will get you basic knowledge in Wish. Even more eventually, it will get you enough basic knowledge that the PP penalty for having below 100 becomes bearable. And then you're good to go, even if you're playing a beastfighter. The only limiting factor is patience.

[Carter]

and presumably corruption?

[asdf]

would love to know the story behind that - thought only bard/wizard/elementalist/necro/druid could even read a book of wish even with boosted stats.
Even fighter characters, except trolls (~50% chance), mindcrafters/barbarians (never) - could learn Wish reliably at level 50 with 99 Le, Concentration, Literacy and blessed book.

[Booster]

Well, one decent candidate just got petrified by a Gorgon. Lvl 17 Mist Elf Wizard, had many spells (no ball spells though), tons of herbs, 20 PV, precrowned with Executor at lvl 12. I still somehow resorted to meleeing quite a bit (even before executor) as that's what I'm used to. Shame too, had a small ring shop in PC so slight possibilty for wish engine to get me going towards archmage.