Teach me how to use mages!

[KissBlade]

NickW said:
I think the bottom line that a lot of new dom players don't get is that outside of a few very specific strategies there isn't much of a place for mages on the battlefield. Just tacking a mage onto an army without a plan is basically worthless, which is counterintuitive for people who are used to mages being badasses in other fantasy games.

Mages are generally only useful if you have a battle plan built around a specific spell or two, and a good supply of gems for the commander.

I've had this experience myself actually heh. The best way to learn how to use more mages is to play more people. You'll learn how scripting works and also magic strategy quite effectively from this.

[Nerfix]

It also helps to check what type of damage the spell does. Type as in whether it is normal, armor piercing (good) or armor negating (priceless). Bladewind does normal damage and thus can be blocked by armor. Fire spells do armor piercing damage (generaly speaking) and are more effective against armor, but armor still effects the damage it does. Some spells like Astral Fires and Mind Burn do armor negating damage that ignores armor.

Checking if the spell can be resisted by magic resistance is also useful. Don't try to use Astral Fire, Mind Burn or other Mr-resistable spells against high-MR units.

Having the mage cast path and/or precision boosters can be VERY beneficial. Especially Summon Earthpower, which gives reinvigoration. Aim and Eagle Eyes can make the mages substantially more accurate with spells.

To put it shortly, know what tools you have been given and how to use them best.

[Shovah32]

As said, placing is very important. Here are a few good spells from each path:

Fire:
Fire Darts can make a high (f9-10) fire pretender into a nice early game artillery mage (number of shots scales with level)
Fireball, its good range, damage, has AoE(1 square but still) and ap.
Falling Fires is nice, decent range, nice damage and a fairly big AoE
Pillar of Fire is a monster, huge range, massive (AoE 1) damage and can set alot of units on fire

Water:
Falling Frost has good AoE, nice damage and can freeze, need i say more?
Frozen heart has great range and precision and does some very nice damage

Air:
Orb lightning does lots of damage and has alot of shots, its very close ranged though
Lightning bolt has good damage, range and precision. good all round spell
Thunder Strike has nice range, AoE and great damage. Quite high fatigue though.

Earth:
Bladewind, the king of EA. Any mage with some sort of precision (a bladewinder who can cast eagle eyes is godly) can decimate almost any EA army with this spell. Try a marveni communion with this (4-8 slaves, 2-3 druid masters with earthpower and eagle eyes can rain bladed death)
Petrify, the holy grail of SC destruction. If the target fails a mr test they are gone and thats that, even if they pass they get paralyzed so you get another shot.

Astral:
Mind burn, great range, precision and nice damage. MR negateable though.
Soul slay, an instant death spell if they fail a mr test, whats not to like.
Paralyze is like soul slays little brother. it wont kill the enemy on its own but can give you plenty of time to finish them
Nether Darts is another beast, it has alot of shots all with good AN damage and a chance to feeblemind the enemy

Death:
Raise skeletons, this spell is another very powerful (and over used) spell. Fairly easy to cast, a couple of death mages can raise an army in a few turns and, with a few relief casters can keep it up for the whole battle
Plague, nothing says i love you like a single spell dooming the enemy army to a terrible plague.
Cloud of death, does nice damage, has AoE and lasts for a few turns
Desintigrate, read soul slay
Dust to dust, the ultimate (sort of) anti undead spell

Blood:
Agony is great for routing conventional armies
Bloodletting, a few castings of this can decimate entire armies, with each casting hitting the whole battlefield
Life for a life, 1 slave lets you hit a single target for 40+AN unresistable damage

These are all just battle spells, not including any buffs or spells requiring gems (although the blood spells need slaves) and is nowhere near a list of all good spells, just those that came to my mind.

[Nerfix]

As for Death, Shadow Bolt is a nice spell and Shadow Blast is good even if the gem cost means microing.

Nether Bolt/Darts are superb Death/Astral spells. MA Ermor and LA Jotunheim as well as Early/Late Tien have an acces to it.

Banefire is a terrifying Fire/Death spell. Only Late C'tis has an easy acces to it though, from what I remember.

Gifts from Heaven won't hit the dead center of an Ermorian horde unless you cast a precision booster but does amazing damage. There's really nothing in the game that won't escape a hit from GfH unharmed. Earth/Astral was very rare, but now it's quite the fad. Marverni and Patala excel at GfH casting since they can also easily boost their accuracy.

Magma Bolts is nice and Magma Eruption is superb, but can be shrugged off with armor. The Earth/Fire mix is pleasantly common.

Acid Bolt is a potent spell and Acid Rain is the acid equivalent of Falling Fires/Frost but earlier on research tree and the added bonus of armor destruction. Fire/Water mix is very easily accessable to Early Atlantis and somewhat easy for EA/MA Tien.

[KissBlade]

You guys are starting to talk about Dom II with some of these replies. For example, MA TC has no access to acid spells at all. (heck if they did, they wouldn't be so crummy) And there's no point in having multiple relief casters since it's now a battle enchantment that costs gems. I find Mind Burn actually a very poor spell btw.

[Nerfix]

I thought they could get the Water/Fire combo? O_o

[dirtywick]

KissBlade said:
You guys are starting to talk about Dom II with some of these replies. For example, MA TC has no access to acid spells at all. (heck if they did, they wouldn't be so crummy) And there's no point in having multiple relief casters since it's now a battle enchantment that costs gems. I find Mind Burn actually a very poor spell btw.

Eh, it's not a bad spell. It hits almost every time and usually kills human sized units and smaller when it does. Plus, there's really no too much for an S2 mage to cast that early in research, I'd take it over Star Fires. I usually go to Thaum 2 for site searching spells anyway, and that comes as an added bonus.

[Cainehill]

KissBlade said:
I've had this experience myself actually heh. The best way to learn how to use more mages is to play more people. You'll learn how scripting works and also magic strategy quite effectively from this.

But that mostly only works in blitzes done via IRC, where you can get immediate chat answers (sometimes). Just playing more people doesn't help much - for instance, the most _basic_ stumbling block is that you can't leave them (mages, commanders, or troops) to their default retarded position / orders. Somewhat counterintuitive to most games where units act like they have at least a 50 IQ.

(Example why I'm so harsh : Bad *** one-eyed pretender who starts with great strength and protection. Without orders, he _casts spells_ instead of attacking, even if his magic ability and precision sucks, and he really should be going melee.)

[UninspiredName]

Heh, I've had situations where my priests actually ignore the script I set for them, and cast bless despite the fact there are no holies on the battlefield.

[Endoperez]

Besides themselves, of course. Generally mages only ignore their script if they CAN'T cast the scripted spells, most often because there are no legitimate units in range.