Which skill should I rank next?

• Serathx wrote on 2010-07-06 16:33
  I know for sure once I'm getting the AP I'm ranking Defense to 1,
  but after that I'm not sure what I should do.
  I currently have ranking Blaze, and Thunder in my mind, but I'm not sure if there's any
  skills I've overlooked. I am a Melee/Magic user.
  Also, should I maybe try using alchemy skills? Thanks in advance for the advice.
• JustNoOne wrote on 2010-07-06 16:47
  I would say Thunder since you can use that for Rafting.
• Spartaaaaa wrote on 2010-07-06 16:59
  If you don't already have r1 windmill, I suggest you get that before defense. Maybe ranking magic mastery/meditation before ranking blaze and thunder so you have more MP would also be a good idea.
• Serathx wrote on 2010-07-06 17:09
  Hrm, ranking Meditation sounds good. As for Magic Mastery, I already got that capped. XP
  I am also now going to rank WM to 1 since I finally got -CP gears.
  So, current list of skills now is:
  WM / Defense / Meditation / TH / Blaze, I guess.
• Chillax wrote on 2010-07-06 19:12
  Maybe it would be better if you listed your current skills first. It might be in your better interest to rank all bolts and +int life skills to their caps before ranking Blaze, so you get more oomph with your attacks.
• Serathx wrote on 2010-07-06 19:20
  owo Okay then, here's my highest ranked skills:
  R1 Smash, CM, DK / R2 Defense, Firebolt / R3 WM, Crit Hit / R4 LB / R5 IB / R6 MM
  Nearly all of my Alchemy skills are Rank F, rofl
  Most of my life skills are either Rank F or Rank C
  As for life skilling I've barely bothered with it, except for Refine.
• wolfram wrote on 2010-07-06 21:01
  Get your WM to rank 1. Your already past the hardest rank (Rank 4), the rest is a breeze.
• Justified wrote on 2010-07-06 22:19
  If your Int is at least 350, Blaze can already do decent damage.
  Meditation barely helps at all. I don't even bother using it half the time and mine is capped. (Plus if you're using Blaze or fighting Hybrid style, the stam regen is probably more helpful).
  
  Fireball and Ice Spear will give a nice boost to Int (Ice Spear also gives a small bit of Mana, along with the Blaze combo domination) so if you think you can afford the AP drainage I'd go with one of those. Fireball currently gives the most Int out of all skills, while being the advance magic with the lowest AP cost.
• Serathx wrote on 2010-07-06 23:09
  INT is 300, but I suppose that's pretty okay.
  As for Fireball and IS, I've been trying to get those,
  it's just that I have no motivation to do page hunting whatsoever. D:
• bebepanales wrote on 2010-07-07 02:44
  im magic/melee as well, but def 1 is really not necessary. im currently rank 5 and i do fine in hard sm's and hm dungeons. the only real boogers that wound me a lot are the hard archers in sm's. i'd say put that off so you can rank other things. also, what is your dex?? dex is kind of important too, for the melee part of your fighting style. you should wm 1, refine 1, then raise your dex some more. for magic i'd vote for blaze, since your int is kinda high.
• Taliya wrote on 2010-07-07 02:59

  Quote from Justified;83927:

  If your Int is at least 350, Blaze can already do decent damage.
  Meditation barely helps at all. I don't even bother using it half the time and mine is capped. (Plus if you're using Blaze or fighting Hybrid style, the stam regen is probably more helpful).

  
  
  Any skill that gives MP is highly recommended for a mage. That and Mana regen takes priority over stamina regen in almost any situation I can think of mostly because stamina potions can be purchased.
• Justified wrote on 2010-07-07 03:59

  Quote from Taliya;84068:

  Any skill that gives MP is highly recommended for a mage. That and Mana regen takes priority over stamina regen in almost any situation I can think of mostly because stamina potions can be purchased.

  
  
  Melee/Range skills use less stamina. Stamina regens faster.
  Magic uses very high amounts of mana. Mana regens slow with or without Meditation.
  
  Using Meditation results in needing high amounts of both Mana and Stamina potions. Leaving Meditation off will cut your stamina potion usage by a good amount, without really affecting your mana potion usage very much.
  
  MaxMP is also a pretty moot stat. It's mostly only good for Mana Shield and rafting. (The former increases your survivability while the latter can be replenished often at a mana tunnel).
  For normal dungeoning, missions, etc where Mana Shield isn't used and Mana Tunnels aren't around, all MaxMP will do is delay how long you can go before you use the first potion. It doesn't help a mage much at all, as long as they have around 250 to be able to drink an MP100 on Friday without dipping too low or overpotting (A mage with 500 mana and one with 200 mana will deal the same damage and drink the same amount of pots). Anything past that is a luxury.
• Taliya wrote on 2010-07-07 04:11

  Quote from Justified;84097:

  Melee/Range skills use less stamina. Stamina regens faster.

  
  Melee and range use less stamina then magic? what!? O.o
  
  

  Magic uses very high amounts of mana. Mana regens slow with or without Meditation.

  
  Every bit helps.
  
  

  Using Meditation results in needing high amounts of both Mana and Stamina potions. Leaving Meditation off will cut your stamina potion usage by a good amount, without really affecting your mana potion usage very much.

  
  The point is that stamina can be store bought. Anything that helps preserve mana should be taken advantage of.
  
  

  MaxMP is also a pretty moot stat. It's mostly only good for Mana Shield and rafting. (The former increases your survivability while the latter can be replenished often at a mana tunnel).
  For normal dungeoning, missions, etc where Mana Shield isn't used and Mana Tunnels aren't around, all MaxMP will do is delay how long you can go before you use the first potion. It doesn't help a mage much at all, as long as they have around 250 to be able to drink an MP100 on Friday without dipping too low or overpotting (A mage with 500 mana and one with 200 mana will deal the same damage and drink the same amount of pots). Anything past that is a luxury.

  
  
  I was obviously pointing towards Mana Shield so why are you talking about beginner dungeons? Outside that it makes a difference due to possible situations. An example being leveling up. Boom full MP. Also when you transform. BOOM more mana refilled.
• Justified wrote on 2010-07-08 18:12

  Quote from Taliya;84102:

  Melee and range use less stamina then magic? what!? O.o

  
  Magic skills use more mana than combat skills use stamina, and mana regenerates slower than stamina. Because of this, it's better to let stamina regenerate than to kill your stamina regen for a small mana regen boost. It's possible to fight as a Mage/Melee Hybrid (mainly magic attacks) and not need to use many stamina potions. Turning Meditation on kills this and makes you use a lot.
  
  

  Quote from Taliya;84102:

  The point is that stamina can be store bought. Anything that helps preserve mana should be taken advantage of.

  
  Not necessarily. You need to weight the benefits with the costs. Sure, stamina potions can be bought at NPCs, but mana potions can be player bought - people sell mana herbs all the time, it's just a matter of making them with 99% monday rates every week.
  If I run around with capped meditation on, I end up using maybe 3-4x as many stamina potions, without a noticeable difference in mana potion usage. Is it good to use up an extra 3-5k gold on stamina potions just to save about 1k gold on a mana potion? Maybe to you, but not to me.
  
  

  Quote from Taliya;84102:

  I was obviously pointing towards Mana Shield so why are you talking about beginner dungeons? Outside that it makes a difference due to possible situations. An example being leveling up. Boom full MP. Also when you transform. BOOM more mana refilled.

  
  
  Excuse me, but where were you obviously pointing to mana shield? Because you didn't mention it even once.
  Also, where did I mention beginner dungeons? If you mean where I said "normal dungeons" - then I meant dungeons opposed to rafting, and not "easy dungeons."
  
  Leveling up doesn't happen often enough to justify raising MaxMP. As for transformation...
  
  50/100 --> Trans --> 550/600
  250/300 --> Trans --> 750/800
  In both cases, you'd get +500/500 mana. You don't magically gain more mana for having a bigger MaxMP, you gain a set amount.
  
  I see lots of mages putting a priority on MaxMP because they see it as an indicator of how good a mage they are, for whatever reason. Yes, it's always nice to have more (no real drawbacks to it), but as I said - it doesn't save you potion usage (beyond like...1), increase mana efficiency, damage, or speed, so it's not a priority as long as you have around 200-350.
• Serathx wrote on 2010-07-08 18:57
  Hokay, so I should rank Refine to 1 as well?
  So many skills, so little AP~
  And as for getting more mana does that mean I should rank up the Elemental Shields or something?