Need Advice !

Fehd

Hi fellas , after spending the last 3-4 years in MMO's with PvP and RvR I need to take break from any pvp sort so a friend who used to play Istaria told me to try it since it has no open world pvp .

I will likely start humen as f2p to see whats the game about before rolling again with momthly sub , I want to play as mage/caster class so am looking for any tips/advice for the class and any info that would make the game more fun to hook me up .

Thanks .

Lithuanian

Well, I have not tried a real caster class - just a bit of Druid (up to lvl.20) and now Shaman (some lvl.60).  However, everything depends on your preferable strategy.

For pure caster you may go to be Mage. I played it, although it was not my favourite class. Mages may differ into Fire, ice, Spirit disciples. Once again: fire works well against ice, so fry up those froze beetles! Ice kills fire - so just cool down some Lava golem to his death.

You won't be depending on mana in Istaria, since we have no such thing:instead, each spell has some cool-down period (from seconds to hours).

And for fighting...well, it is hard for me to advice. I took Warrior, to use heavy armor and weapons; took Cleric to have superior heals and resurrects. When I finished those - I just took some schools to become Shaman. As Shaman/Mage, I cannot use heavy armor of Warrior and weapons like sword (however, can use warhammers as Shaman).

Maybe you could start with Warrior to be able to wear heavy armor. Then switch to Cleric to know basic healing spells. And then - your favourite school.

You should also take some schools in crafting. In fact, you may need every crafting school: once again, it's up to you, what are your preferences. For quality metalworking you may need Miner and Blacksmith (you may take related schools like Weaponsmith, Armorer). For work with organic materials you may need Gatherer and Carpenter/Fletcher.

Since you are going to be spellcasters - I think, joining Spellcrafter school is a must. You will be able to make spells yourself.

And if you would like to help others with plots (as f2p you can't have plot, but still can help others in building) - you will need all building schools: Carpenter, Fitter, Mason,Enchanter, Weaver.

Combat levelling may be fun.  Town marshalls may ask you to kill some monsters for reward. So, when you kill something, after returning with victory you will be rewarded. Main thing is: always look for quests, they will give you experience, coins, technologies and would help in exploration. There are many quests, you just have to look for them. Beginners usually start making one mistake (I made it too): they do depend on Trophy hunter quests. Trophy hunter would give good xp and money for each 5 trophies. After you turned those 5 times, reward is twice less, no matter if it is 6th or 6000th time. I made this mistake - hunted for same things, turned in trophies...and lost many quests and much fun.  As a multi-classing character, at some point (let us say, finishing 3rd or 4th combat school) you would have to live on quests or trophies: before that, try to avoid depending on them.

Fighting may be fun, you just need to take care of too social creatures and some deadlands' dwellers. Also, some monsters are eventually tougher than their ranking is. Some are social (skulks, wolves...), some are non-social (golems, spiders). Some are spellcasters, some even may heal themselves (treants). It is with fighting  only that you will get some formulas and crystals.  It is possible to ask some players to help you to grow: they would take you to some safe place and kill relatively easy enemies so that you will gain xp. If I do so, I always expect such player to try to heal me.

Crafting may be fun and fast, if you know how to combine. Example: chop tree as Fletcher, make boards as Fletcher. Then switch to Carpenter, make tools from boards, deconstruct....and voila, both Fletcher and Carpenter gain xp. You could also level your building schools by just helping people with their structures. Spellcrafter may be done quite easily if your stoneworking/quarrying skills are high enough: just mine some, say, slate, make slabs, make spellshards and repeat.

Getting coins is not too hard: when you kill monster, he will drop something, like "Insect chitin". The higher molnsters tier - the more drops are worth. Some stuff are Dragon-only, so it may be sold to pawnbroker...or donated to Dragons. In many cases other players may craft your stuff either for free or for materials required. Sometimes I use to come to New Trismus and ask new players if they need any help, be it tool, weapon or just healing. Community is mostly friendly anf helpfull.

Fehd

So If I roll as worrier to learn heavy armor then I will still be able to use it when I later switch to mage ? The reason I wont stay as worrier is am not big fan of close melee fighting style , I am more of range dps/heal play style .

Lithuanian

About armor: both yes and no. Explaining: to wear any armor, you should have appropriate armor use level. To use heaviest armor, you must have armor lvl.910 - i.e. be lvl.91 in any school. The problem is type of armor. Warriors, Clerics (and can't remember who else) can wear heavy metal armor. Ranged types (especially spellcasters), as far as I know, cannot wear this heavy armor - only lighter ones.

In Istaria, you could use certain abilities in many schools. As a warrior, I had melee flurry. I could use it almost as any class. I have multistrike - and almost any class could use it. Some abilities are class-related (Cloak of Thorns is druids-only).

Solution may be grindy: make any combat school to lvl.91 to have armor used level 910. Then you may search for some high-levelled Armorer to make you Ironsilk armor. It's lighter than those heavy, but it  is universal: any class can wear it.  I personally have this armor for my Druid or Shaman schools (especially bearing in mind that I am multiclassed and have abilities from Warrior and Cleric). Just to warn: in order to have top-level ironsilk armor, you need top-level components which are hard to hunt asnd seldom to buy. So either prepare to pay...or do hope someone would have spare parts.

Although I do not have direct experience, some people told me Elemental Archer may be cool ranged school. It's archer, as the name implies, but it can use some "magic arrows" type abilities. This you should ask in the game chatt/forum to more experienced players.

You should also consider your own ranged attack strategy: do you want to rain down a storm of arrows or just weaken enemy, take away dexterity, corrode his armor or even summon arcane powers to transfer some life from him to you? First option is some Mage school (and then aby sub-school); second is my favourite avenging Shaman (although it is more melee).

For healing you have two options: Cleric or Healer. Both have fast advancement in healing/resurrection spells, just healer has superior resurrect (resurrection without death points; very long to cool down). In any fighting group any of this class would be wellcome.

Fehd

Yeah I started playin and I understand how this multi class ability idea now , I guess I will take time to figure which combo abilities would work for me best .

 

Thanks Lithuanian , u have been very informative and I learned a lot from yr replies , maybe I get the chance to see u online .