Risen 2nd playthrough as "mage" - need advice

dagoo7

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So wanted to try playing as mage-type character after playing Don-aligned strength/sword build. However, I am clueless as to how this works as by the time I got to monastery I was already aligned with the Don and nobody would speak to me.

From reading other posts I understand that one needs to complete Harbor town quests and get commandant's recommendation in order to get accepted to the mage side of the order. I don't necessarily care whether I technically get admitted as warrior or mage but I do want to focus on crystal magic. So was really wondering what was the best way to do this without wasting points on skills/stats that don't contribute to end build.

I do have a game from earlier in which I finished harbor town with order side quests. However, in order to get through some of the fights in there, I trained staff to 3 and put about 20 pts into strength. I'm assuming that those pts are wasted for a mage build and I should start over. Just don't see a way of getting through harbor town without spending some points in other skills as there appears to be no way to train magic in town.

So anyways, a few specific questions

1. Can you train crystal magic to 10 regardless of whether admitted as warrior or mage?
2. Can you train wisdom in monastery like you do str/dex or is this just limited to the book reading and stone tablet boosts.
3. Do mage builds put any pts into staff and strength or just crystal magic and mana (or wisdom if trainable)?
4. If I want to go directly to training crystal magic without wasting pts, do I realistically need to just get beat up and taken to the monastery?
5. Which of the crystal magics are recommended as primary? I gather fire does the most damage, but not clear on the magic bullet line.

Apologize for the rambling nature of this post, but any input appreciated. Haven't been sucked into a game like this since Gothic 2.
 
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This is my first play-thru and I'm a warrior and have been able to train crystals after I was accepted into the order.

I think training wisdom was mostly just through the book reading...can't recall any other ways at the moment.

As far as crystal magic goes, I have found the frost crystal most useful but the fire crystal does do more damage. Hope this helps you...like I mentioned above, I'm playing a warrior so I don't know the mage side of all this.
 
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2. Yep, you can only get wisdom from books and tablets.

3. You can do a mage build where you use frost magic to freeze them and attack them with your staff. This might be the most fun way to play a mage (see later in post).

4. I was able to do all the town quests with starting strength and swords. It wasn't easy, in fact it was somewhat masochistic playing through the beginning like this. It is really bittersweet saving your points like this, because once you get crystal magic pumped up to a good level (magic or fire) you can take every enemy in the game with ease. It really killed the mage build for me, there was no danger from anything or skill needed to overcome any adversaries. Just chuck magic and quaff potions and things die. I think it was intended that you waste points in the beginning to build more slowly to this crazy overpoweredness, instead of having it at the start of chapter 2. I quit playing my mage build and went to a bandit instead.

5. Fire is area of effect and heavy damage, greater cost. I played magic bullet and it is kind of like having a machine gun at high levels. You can even hold down the button and your guy will continue to fire from his hands. There is a slight knockback effect and it has the cheapest mana cost. The only thing that can trip you up is running out of mana, you need to buy lots of potions. If you have mana you can't be beat, and eventually you get rich enough that potion buying is not a problem. Others may have had a different experience, but it ruined the fun for me. It was too easy.
 
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1. Can you train crystal magic to 10 regardless of whether admitted as warrior or mage?
- Yep

2. Can you train wisdom in monastery like you do str/dex or is this just limited to the book reading and stone tablet boosts.
- Nope. Only books and tablets. Wisdom is only used as a prequisite for Seal ranks (50 for L1, 100 for L2, 150 for L3 and 200 for L4).

3. Do mage builds put any pts into staff and strength or just crystal magic and mana (or wisdom if trainable)?
- I played as a "pure mage" once, and I only put points in Fire, Seals and mana. You can certainly make hybrids though, that rely somewhat on magic, and somewhat on melee. Or a mage with a lot of skills (lockpicking, smithing, etc). It's all viable. Just remember that you should have a L10 crystal magic by the end of the game, or it will be tough to kill the worst enemies.

4. If I want to go directly to training crystal magic without wasting pts, do I realistically need to just get beat up and taken to the monastery?
- You can only train as a Warrior if you come to the Monastery after being beat up. The Mage path is only available as a volunteer. Of course, Warriors can get crystal magic, so that is the fastest route, yes.

5. Which of the crystal magics are recommended as primary? I gather fire does the most damage, but not clear on the magic bullet line.
- Fire as a pure mage. I prefer Frost when I play something of a hybrid (melee), as it's nice to freeze all the enemies, then whack them down one at a time. As I stated, however: For something of a pure caster, Fire is the way to go, simply because it doesn't require the redicilous amount of mana that Projectile does (it costs less per cast, but needs several hits to get the same effect, especially when fighting several enemies).
 
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Thanks that's the info I was looking for. I like the idea of a frost/staff hybrid.

Just have one more question ....
Does wisdom increase spell damage or is it just for the use of seals?
 
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Thanks that's the info I was looking for. I like the idea of a frost/staff hybrid.

Just have one more question ….
Does wisdom increase spell damage or is it just for the use of seals?

Not a 100% certain answer as I don't know the formulas which spell damage is calculated by, however on my mage who had 200 wisdom I noticed no difference on my fireballs on "same" enemies from 150-200. I could be wrong however I'm pretty sure no damage difference was noticeable aside from raising the ranks of the spell and topping at 10.
 
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Wisdom only affects the seal level. You only have access to so many bookstands/tablets at specific points in the game, so it controls your seal level as progress through the game.
 
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Indeed, and forces you to explore a lot if you want the highest Seal level. Otherwise, they would've implemented the good ol' Gothic 1/2 way of doing it, where you get access to higher "ranks" (Circles in Gothic, Seals in Risen) depending on chapter.
 
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A small correction:

1. Absolutely not. If you're not a mage = no crystal magic. Except… You can make an amulet that gives +2 to crystals, and that's max for Order warrior.
 
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Not true Joxer. Warriors of the Order have access to the exact same Crystal Magic. Bandits don't have access, but Warriors certainly do. The only thing a Warrior does not have access to is Seals.

I've completed it twice as a Warrior of the Order and twice as a Mage, I should know.
 
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Not true Joxer. Warriors of the Order have access to the exact same Crystal Magic. Bandits don't have access, but Warriors certainly do. The only thing a Warrior does not have access to is Seals.

I've completed it twice as a Warrior of the Order and twice as a Mage, I should know.

Yep, doesn't crystal magic max out at 5 for Order Warriors though? If not I know what I'm doing for my next play through...
 
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You can max crystals to 10 as warrior or mage
 
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There are two differences:
- Mages have access to Seals.
- Warriors get better armor in Chapter 3 (but they even out again in Chapter 4).

That's it. Those are the differences. No more, no less.
 
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I was under the assumption that mages also had training limitations on things like swords. i.e. they can't max them to 10, along with some other select weapon types. Read that in the forums here, though I haven't tried training a mage in that way before.
 
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Both Warriors and Mages have that restriction (on swords). Not sure about mages and staff training though - perhaps only Warriors can train past rank 7? I've never tried getting rank 10 staff on a Mage.
 
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Trying to play as a pure mage now. Is it not possible to block attacks from animals\monsters with a staff, or am I just doing something wrong?
 
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Parry generally works "decent", but far from as good as blocking. It often works only once, then the staff gets knocked aside and you will get hit. Against certain enemies it works as well as blocking does, but in most cases it doesn't.
 
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Well I have no problem blocking or parrying humanoid opponents, but I don't seem to be able to block animal attacks (with a staff).
 
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Depends the height of the attack I think - you can't block things that attack below the waist!
 
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