My poor narcoleptic mage...

donbaloo · Post by **donbaloo** » January 20th, 2008, 9:59 pm

Hi folks. Just purchased the game and have put a number of hours into thus far and am having a pretty good time with it. Congrats to Basilisk for putting together a very nice old school crpg. Oh how I remember Ultima II on my Atari 800XL...

Anyway, so yeah, I'm pretty sure my poor mage has contracted narcolepsy. All the classic signs are there. I mean, the lazy lay about sleeps about 15 hours per day, and on his bad days he'll put in a good 22 hours of sleep!! I'm about 5th level right now and I've thus far played him pretty straight up mage I think, focusing on Elementalism, Alchemy and some Meditation (but I have to admit I'm addicted to Cartography as well, what a very neat addition to the game!)

He's up to casting 5th level Fire Dart now which is nice, but pretty taxing on the mana reserves. So I'm constantly finding, and have found since the very beginning of the game, I typically head out and kill 2 or 3 baddies and then run away so that my mage can fall asleep again to get those mana reserves back up. Fight, run, camp, repeat. I tried buying some potions to keep on hand but that's just not gonna be economically feasible. I'm finding gold to be a very rare commodity for my poor narcoleptic spell slinger, even though I sell every piece of equipment I find. Buying spells is a coffer draining exchange!!

So am I totally missing some strategy? At this point in the game I'm running into those bees in teh forest and I literally run out, kill 3, and go sleep the rest of the day. Heaven forbid I get jumped by thugs in the middle of the night (or day, he's not opposed to sleeping the afternoon away) after an exhausting hour or two of beebopping.

So, should I be looking for a different approach or should I just concede, strap a mattress to his back, and let him continue his slothful ritual?

Dragonlady · Post by **Dragonlady** » January 20th, 2008, 10:20 pm

You say you have some alchemy? Potions are you friend, close to being your best friend if your a mage type. Both mana and healing. Hope you find a brewmaster ring, better to get 2 and raise your skill level to 9 (with the rings your level willbe 15). That way you can make level 3 mana potions and stay awake to enjoy the sunrise or sunset

of course you have to find/buy the ingredients and have empty bottles...

Jude · Post by **Jude** » January 20th, 2008, 10:27 pm

How many points do you have in Perception?

Jude

sultanoswing · Post by **sultanoswing** » January 20th, 2008, 11:24 pm

...you only need Alchemy at level 10 to create level 3 mana and heal potions, but 15 is nice to imbue equipment to +3.

...and yes, you need perception! At 35 (or is it 38?) - you get the maximum mana regen rate of 1/3 rounds (or is it 1/4), without the need for any meditation. Then, depending on how purist you are, you can start edging up them fight'n skills, which are wonderfully augmented by buffs (bless, ogre strength, nimbleness, chameleon, haste). Some of these things are a little above your current level, but are things to be worked towards!

ps i know what you mean about cartography - a nice addition, IMHO, although I've decided to go the magical 'Reveal Map' route for now to save those valuable skill points for other things!

Daemian Lucifer · Post by **Daemian Lucifer** » January 21st, 2008, 2:47 am

My mage sleeps once in 3,4 days when in open,or once or twice in the dungeons.How?Well first of,perception is the key.Second,you should have some melee fighting skills(I preffer unarmed since it allows me to break things with nothing to loose but some time).So what I do is pummel creatures to 10%,20% of health with spells and then kill them in melee.Of course,some are better to finish of ranged,but most can be let near you.Especially if its dark and you buff yourself.

Second,like said,alchemy beats buying potions,and hard.Most of the ingredients youll find lying arround(willow sap+sulfur for healing and mandrake root+acid for mana).

Furthermore,for outdoors,being a druid is an excelent start since your mana will run up quite quickly.

donbaloo · Post by **donbaloo** » January 21st, 2008, 8:17 am

Thanks for the responses folks.

I just pulled the game up so I could check my stats and be certain of what they were:

Level-7 Druidic
Str-11 Dex-13 End-13 Sp-14 Int-24 Wis-19 Perc-24 Conc-12
Alchemy-6 Divination-2 Elementalism-10 Cartography-7 Lore-1 Meditation-4 Spot Hidden-3 Survival-5 (only through items) Cleaving Weapons-4 (only through items)

So that's my numbers. I'm thinking that maybe I need more physical combat prowess to back up my magic, even though I really wanted to get it done through magic alone. Just happened to find a book on Cleaving weapons while simultaneously finding an item for +3 cleaving. So it was sort of nice at the end of last session being able to get a few decent melee strikes in on the baddy.

As you can see, I am indeed Druidic which is very nice when outdoors. I fear I would literally be sleeping entire days away otherwise.

I figured Alchemy would be a big benefit and thought I'd be able to make mana potions to keep me going. However, as a 7th level character, I've only found enough ingredients to make 2 mana potions thus far. I know I could buy the ingredients, but that's still too expensive, as it costs me 110 gold just to buy the ingredients. Its actually cheaper to just buy the potions if I'm not mistaken, and that's not even cheap.

So you see my numbers, have I just chosen so poorly that I'm doomed to a near perpetual state of sleep?

Jude · Post by **Jude** » January 21st, 2008, 5:57 pm

After a while, the priest at Aridell's price for healing goes way down, but I never used it, so I don't know exactly how it works, whether he heals health only or mana, too. (I suspect that the plot line changes things, also, although I haven't quite gotten there, yet. )

Jude

Maelstrom · Post by **Maelstrom** » January 24th, 2008, 7:36 pm

There's always the inn/tavern in Aridell that restores both mana and health for a mere 15 per night.

Randomizer · Post by **Randomizer** » January 25th, 2008, 1:09 am

Increase perception for a few levels to increase the rate of mana return and make it easier to detect traps. You will need it later on when you really burn through spells anyway.