DGB246

Join Date 04/2006

Fire magic - an overview

Right 2 more to go, here's fire magic:

Fire Tier 1:

Burning hands - 10 mana tactical (2 turns cooldown) - does 8 fire damage (+4 per fire shard) to an adjacent enemy - damage halved if resisted

Candlecloak - 30 mana tactical (also requires fleshbound tome) - all friendly units gain a flamecloak and enemies attacking them take 3 fire damage from the cloak

Protection from fire - 30 mana tactical (also requires book of flames) - all friendly units gain 50% fire resist

Fire Tier 2:

Burning blade - 10 mana champion enchantment - champ/sov gains fire attack bonus (+2 fire damage and +2 per fire shard)

Flame dart - 24 mana tactical - target enemy takes fire damage which is double casters level +4 per fire shard - damage halved if resisted

Pillar of fire - 48 mana strategic - target enemy army in controlled territory takes 8 fire damage (+4 per fire shard) to each unit

Fire Tier 3:

Feedback - 24 mana tactical - disrupts enemy spell and deals 6 fire damage (+6 per fire shard) to enemy caster unless they resist

Fireball - 50 mana tactical (1 turn casting time) - deals 18 fire damage (+6 per fire shard) to all units in 3x3 square - damage halved if resisted

Focus - 4 mana tactical - damage doubled for caster's next action

Fire Tier 4:

Mantle of fire - 25 mana unit enchantment - unit is protected by a flamecloak that deals 6 fire damage to anyone that attacks them

Summon fire elemental - 30 mana summon (tactical and strategic) - summons a level 5 (+1 per fire shard) fire elemental

Fire Tier 5:

Firestorm - 200 mana strategic - target army takes 10 fire damage (+10 per fire shard) to each unit - leaves a firestorm hazard on the tile for 10 turns

Wall of fire - 20 mana city enchantment - protects city with a fire wall - enemy units that attack city take 10 fire damage (+5 per fire shard) each

(EDIT) Heart of fire - 200 mana city enchantment - trained units gain +1 fire attack per essence and per fire shard

Combo spells:

Glyph of life - 30 mana city enchantment (Life2Fire2) - all defenders gain regeneration

Soulburning - 32 mana tactical (1 turn casting time) (Death2Fire2) - damages enemy - 12 damage plus 6 per fire/death shard - leaves a fire hazard on tile

Sunder - 15 mana tactical (Air2Fire2) - enemy elemental takes 5 damage per caster's level

Cloak of thorns - 30 mana enchantment - 25% damage is reflected from target to caster

So, thoughts on fire magic?

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Fire Tier 1:

Burning hands - use a lot

Candlecloak - never

Protection from fire - sometimes

Fire Tier 2:

Burning blade - sometimes

Flame dart - a lot

Pillar of fire - a lot

Fire Tier 3:

Feedback - never

Fireball - a lot

Focus - a lot

Fire Tier 4:

Mantle of fire - never

Summon fire elemental - tried this last night and the elemental could not hit... is his accuracy too low or what?

Fire Tier 5:

Firestorm - never

Wall of fire - never

Combo spells:

Glyph of life - never

Soulburning - a lot

Sunder - a lot

Cloak of thorns - never

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Burning Hands and Flame Dart are probably the two most common I use. Like most Fire based magic in other games, it is the most direct damage options. Played as Magnar, by the end of the game Flame Dart was pretty much a one shot kill on anything. Granted I had 5 or 6 fire shards, and I was level 20 or something.

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Fire Tier 1:

Burning hands - good early game
Candlecloak - quite useless

Protection from fire - useless

Fire Tier 2:

Burning blade - decente but need a buff

Flame dart - after lvl 4 this is teh spell, slightly op end game but if we get a good balance pass this is ok

Pillar of fire - not so good considering the cost but if you swim in mana its strong

Fire Tier 3:

Feedback - decent

Fireball - ok aoe

Focus - very good

Fire Tier 4:

Mantle of fire - decent but not really needed

Summon fire elemental - not much needed tbh

Fire Tier 5:

Firestorm - not good imo

Wall of fire -there are better enchantments

Combo spells:

Glyph of life - not bad but there is better stuff
Soulburning - nice nuke
Sunder - situationally good

Cloak of thorns - might be good

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The tier 5 spells suck. Tier 4 is below average. Mantle of Fire is okay cast on a melee champion. The summon fire elemental spell isn't very useful by the time you get it. Focus + Flame Dart is useful the entire game. Fireball is also pretty useful.

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No compelling reason to take fire past rank 3.

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Fire Tier 1:

Burning hands: Works well against enemies that are especially susceptible to fire. Early in the game, this can be useful, but later on, Burning Blade on a good, strong weapon with a decent crit is better.

Candlecloak: I've never used this.

Protection from fire: Good, serviceable spell when cast very early in a battle.

Fire Tier 2:

Burning blade: I always put this on my foremost melee champion, and leave it there. Extra damage never hurts.

Flame dart: One of the best things in the fire tree, because it is even does half damage to those annoying ophidians, who are notoriously magic resistant.

Pillar of fire: Best spell for pest eradication at a distance on the strategic map. Now, if only we can get a bug fix that removes units when they've been killed by this spell, instead of leaving them to regain HPs from 0, next turn...

Fire Tier 3:

Feedback: Simple counter is cheaper. But if you've got the mana to waste, fine.

Fireball: Yield of damage in a localized area seems low for the mana involved, and the turn you wait.

Focus: Nice spell, requires strategic handling to get it right.

Fire Tier 4:

Mantle of fire: I've not used this.

Summon fire elemental: Good spell, and certainly far better than the disappointing Water Elemental, much less the nonexistent Air Elemental.

Fire Tier 5:

Firestorm: Far too high a mana cost for the damage it does.

Wall of fire: Good spell. Cast in a timely matter, it offers the kind of damage that occurs again, and again.

Combo spells:

Glyph of life: It's either too much, when I've only got one unit in battle, or too little, when I've got several units in battle and they need more regen, much quicker. Wellspring (Life4) is the way to go, though it's immediate healing rather than bad regen.

Soulburning: Never use this.

Sunder: Never use this.

Cloak of thorns: To be honest, I'd rather get an enemy before it does enough damage to one of my units to make that 25% reflection really matter.

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I think fire is good if you opt to specialise in it with a mage/warlock build, Magnar is clearly good with fire. I tend to skip over fire unless I'm specialising in it.

Tier 1:

Fire only gets one tier one spell as the other two have requirements. This feels a bit off to me and I think fire should get another level 1 spell, I've got a few ideas but I'm sure Derek has plenty.

Tier 2:

Burning blade gives a nice little bonus and it also scales up through the game, not bad at all and can be used by any champ.

Flamedart is very good for high level mage casters and can dish out huge damage in the late game - I know I put this on my crappy spells list but I've had a change of heart on this one, it's very good with a Magnar type character.

Pillar of fire is also good with damage multipliers on it, again its one for a specialist.

Tier 3:

Feedback is excellent and I think this will become more important when the AI gets better at spellcasting - even now, all 3 of the counterspells are very useful against things like shrill lords etc.

Fireball is still pretty good even if the AI gets the casting time to spread out - at 50 mana it seems expensive relative to water's blizzard, though it's still quite usable.

Focus is excellent for any sovereign, not just mage builds.

Overall Fire gets some excellent stuff at tier 3.

Tier 4:

I like mantle of fire as the damage is multiplied for mages/warlocks so it can dish out alot of damage - it is especially good for a battlemage with the defences to get up close

Summon fire elemental is also nice to have for a while although he doesnt scale well - this is more to do with monsters levelling up though as opposed to the elemental itself

Tier 5:

Firestorm feels overpriced especially when compared to Vetrar's howl (water) or Tornado (air) - OK tornado doesnt outright kill an army but it's very cheap and it scatters a tough army into managable chunks. If they dropped the mana cost by a hefty chunk I'd like this spell, as is I tend to stick to pillar of fire - with a warlock this spell tends to get the job done for a quarter of the cost.

Wall of flame has seen a big drop in price which is most welcome, I now think this is very usable although it's reliant on your cities having essence to cast it on - on the harder settings your cities will get attacked and this will be fantastic in those situations. Next time I use Magnar I will prob level him to Fire5 thanks to this spell's cheaper price.

Overall I think fire magic is pretty solid really.

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Fire magic is pretty solid. The difference is it has a better focused design. It is for offense and it does it splendidly. Some might think it is overpowered, but I like the idea that each element is powerful, but does different things. A very significant look at the spells was very much needed. Looking at them all in order really shows how most books only have two or three really useful spells. Nice to see I am not alone in thinking there needs to be some balance and retooling of a great many spells.

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Needs more summons as all magic types do. Pretty solid when it comes to doin damage at any rank of fire magic.

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