MSZShadow wrote on 2011-02-12 02:36
Magic Masteries are insanely useful. Mana Use Reduction more so than damage. Bolts are important. Mana is slightly more important than Int, although they're both important.
If you go Magic, be prepared to spend buhttloads of AP on single skills.
Cryosite wrote on 2011-02-13 11:10
If you don't have thunder at rank 1, get it. It's a useful skill to have. With 250 INT already you should see plenty of damage out of it for things like rafting, if nothing else. Rank it along with mana shield, get your INT to around 300, and rank magic mastery to 1, and you should easily tank a lot of things that would otherwise kill you via mana shield.
I wouldn't bother with magic masteries for now. If you primarily kill things with melee, and just occasionally use a bolt to stun or knockback things as part of a combo, you won't get all that much value out of any mastery. If you do plan to occasionally switch to "full mage mode" where you kill things with magic, then certainly rank one of the masteries to match the intermediate magic you'll be using the most (lightning if you follow my advice above).
As said by others, assault slash, blaze, and fireball all add to STR. I can confirm that even if you don't use a combat wand, your INT is below 600, and even with the -25% damage nerf, blaze is still a strong enough skill that you can use it without wasting your time (though at least using a combat wand would be suggested; using it with a lightning wand if you primarily thunder is still feasible though).
Bolt Composer is another way to approach magic with good results. Definately allows for a great deal of flexibilty in choosing how to attack a spawn.