30 day check in - Gnome Wizard

[Stumplicker]

I'm not quite at my 30 days yet. In fact, I'm still a good 2 and a half weeks out, but I want to give myself ample time to make decisions. I expect to end my 30 days at level 21, so this is what I'm looking at for stats/skills resting at 21, and I'll do my best to explain why I went that way. My hope is that you all will tell me how very wrong I am, and why, so I can get this nailed down before I can't fixstats. Thankya much.

Name: Nunya Race: Burghal Gnome Profession: Wizard (not shown)
Gender: Male Age: 180 Expr: 204416 Level: 21
Normal (Bonus) ... Enhanced (Bonus)
Strength (STR): 96 (8) ... 96 (8)
Constitution (CON): 86 (28) ... 86 (28)
Dexterity (DEX): 68 (19) ... 68 (19)
Agility (AGI): 76 (23) ... 76 (23)
Discipline (DIS): 83 (11) ... 83 (11)
Aura (AUR): 87 (23) ... 87 (23)
Logic (LOG): 91 (30) ... 91 (30)
Intuition (INT): 42 (1) ... 42 (1)
Wisdom (WIS): 80 (15) ... 80 (15)
Influence (INF): 44 (-8) ... 44 (-8)
Mana: 95 Silver: 0


Level 0 Stats for Nunya, Burghal Gnome Wizard

Strength (STR): 94
Constitution (CON): 82
Dexterity (DEX): 58
Agility (AGI): 70
Discipline (DIS): 78
Aura (AUR): 77
Logic (LOG): 80
Intuition (INT): 21
Wisdom (WIS): 73
Influence (INF): 27



Nunya (at level 21), your current skill bonuses and ranks (including all modifiers) are:
Skill Name | Current Current
| Bonus Ranks
Armor Use..........................| 20 4
Physical Fitness...................| 93 21
Climbing...........................| 50 10
Swimming...........................| 25 5
Perception.........................| 45 9
Arcane Symbols.....................| 96 22
Magic Item Use.....................| 96 22
Spell Aiming.......................| 144 44
Harness Power......................| 144 44
Elemental Mana Control.............| 96 22
Elemental Lore - Air...............| 96 22


Spell Lists
Major Elemental....................| 19

Spell Lists
Minor Elemental....................| 19

Spell Lists
Wizard.............................| 13


Statwise, I set things leaning towards maximization but also focusing on TPs overall. I couldn't bring myself to lower my logic any further than it is. The physical stats are set pretty much for maximization, with the exception of agility, which is a little under.

Skill-wise, the idea is to utilize 903 and 901/910. I'm aiming for 50 air lore ranks and then 60 water lore as soon as possible in order to soak and increase damage factors of the primary spells I'm using.

I'm 100% positive I'm missing something here that's going to leave me horribly gimped down the line. I'd appreciate any and all constructive input.

[Tgo01]

Personal preference but I always leave harness power at 1x and only work on it further after cap.

I look at it like this; you spend twice as many training points for every rank past your level but only gain 1/3 of the benefit. I always put those extra points into something else, although overall your skills don't look like they're really lacking.

I think 1x perception is nice and I always like to at least 1x in first aid or survival (whichever is cheaper) because silvers is silvers. Although since all of my characters tend to hang out in Icemule I tend to go for 1x in survival no matter what over first aid because it helps with ice patches.

[Stumplicker]

Thankya. Once I hit 100 mana, I'm planning on dropping Harness power down to 1x. I just like the extra boost early on while the pool is really low. I forgot to mention that. That should allow me to get back up to 1x in perception.

[bluecenterlight]

I am *certain* I will be corrected for this, but it's worth mentioning for discussion since there have been improvements to lores since I was anywhere near that level. However, I was under the impression that's it's statistically better to shoot for more spells than lores to boost 513/425. Now I realize you don't have 425 at the moment, but it's coming soon since levels at that stage in the game move quickly.

My consideration/question/ponderable would be to focus more on increasing AS vs the DF from lores until the TPs aren't as tight. Since tripling in spells will boost AS (sooner than later) you'd get higher endrolls and offset the DF increase from the lores.

Like I said though, I'm not sure where the min/max cutoff would be, and as always if it's in your RP to have the lores then go for it mayne.

[Whirlin]

I agree with the heavy Harness power approach on the short term... While it is TP expensive for +1 mana... +1 mana is a lot more beneficial when your mana pool is 30 compared to when your mana pool is 300. Only caveat/recommendation is once you stop training in Harness Power and let it recede back down to 1x, ensure that your mana is on an EVEN amount (and you'll gain +2 per level as it transitions down to 1x)... It'll help maximize rounding benefits.

Lore training are the only things that stick out... You have a couple options available, which maybe you've weighed out, but just wanted to point out:
For a wizard that doesn't have all 'key' spells unlocked, I wouldn't go above 20 ranks in air lore. Unlocking Tonis Bolt as the single target opener is really the emphasis of that training. As a gnome, i can understand hitting 24 ranks for the extra disk space... But the emphasis should really be on getting 430, 535/540, and 925 unlocked.

Dreaven already pointed out perception, which you addressed... Only other thing I would point out is that you're actually still undertrained for level 21. 1x at Level 21 would be 22 ranks, working on the 23rd rank as you proceed to level 22, due to level 0 training. Typically, the first thing that's done the second you level is to max out things like spell aiming, which should be at 46 ranks. Very minimal, and maybe you just have extra TP you're sitting on, but that drives me crazy!

[Whirlin]

I am *certain* I will be corrected for this, but it's worth mentioning for discussion since there have been improvements to lores since I was anywhere near that level. However, I was under the impression that's it's statistically better to shoot for more spells than lores to boost 513/425. Now I realize you don't have 425 at the moment, but it's coming soon since levels at that stage in the game move quickly.

My consideration/question/ponderable would be to focus more on increasing AS vs the DF from lores until the TPs aren't as tight. Since tripling in spells will boost AS (sooner than later) you'd get higher endrolls and offset the DF increase from the lores.

Like I said though, I'm not sure where the min/max cutoff would be, and as always if it's in your RP to have the lores then go for it mayne.
You're completely right... the only caveat is that the transition between 901/903/904/906 for use as your primary bolt is rough on your mana pool at those lower levels, so having 20 ranks of a lore to grant a transitional spell unlock becomes fairly valuable. It's subjective whether you want to go for Tonis Bolt (505, 20 ranks air, imo; best single-target opener available to a wizard) or Minor Steam (903+ 20 ranks fire, best DF against some armor classes, but not great critical death tables).

I really wouldn't go beyond one spell unlock though in lores, exactly for the same reasons. Currently, the OP is at ~2.3 ranks of spell research per level. At current pace, if he keeps WIZ at 13 ranks, he can get both MjE and MnE up to level around level 30, while unlocking 425 at level 25. So, 1 rank isn't really hindering the time that the spells is unlocked.

[Stumplicker]

Thank you guys. That's exactly the sort of info I was looking for. I hadn't been thinking at all about disk space or unlocking tonis bolt. The reason for my air lore was solely to increase chances of stun shock with the idea of making 903 soak 100% of the time down the line. I should have a good idea now of where I'm going skill-wise thanks to you.

Stat-wise, is there anything you can see that's horrendously deficient? Am I foolish for maxing out the physical stats since their GI's are so poor, or should I use one of them as a dump stat instead of dumping things like INT and INF? The only one possible I could see to use as a dump stat is Agility, since CON/STR are pretty much the only thing keeping my gnome from being encumbered while naked, and Dex because wizarding.

[Whirlin]

I don't touch stats when it comes to recommendations... I trust you did your research, placed them to grow to an appropriate level, and evaluated alternative recommendations. Some people like placing stats to max out at 100, some like placing them to max out around 50s, some people like having the TP because they don't think they'll ever cap... It's all incredibly subjective... And too much math. I mean geeze, who does math in their free time?

[Stumplicker]

Ha. I didn't mean crunch numbers for me. I've crunched and am fine crunching the numbers myself. What I mean is stat-wise, are any of the stats I've used as dump stats going to come back and bite me super hard when I go to try to enchant, or cast certain spells, or various other things along the way. The only one I'm really worried about is INT

[Nosh]

Been following this thread thinking I might roll a Wizard... Does look like Intuition will impact enchanting, but there are a ton of other bonuses that do as well. Wisdom, Aura, and logic.

My assumption would be that given how high level you're going to need to be to enchant well anyway, the stat will have probably grown out of its hole by the time you're ready to use it. And since there are so many other stats that impact enchanting you'd probably have to take a hit in one of those to raise INT anyway. I don't really see lowering STR or CON any significant amount as viable on a gnome becasue they grow so absurdly slow.