Leveling mine as Wind and I'm plowing through levels. Anyone saying Wind is less effective then Earth/Ice is hilarious.

By the way, i was thinking about the race and stat point of a theurgist.
Main mana use of theurgist is the pet spam.
- Pet spell have a percent cost
- Percent costs are calculated according to the "base pool"
- Total mana pool of the theurgist depends on several other factors

So, in order to minimize the cost of a pet spell, a theurgist have to minimize his base pool.
Because with a lower base pool, bonus like "+ power" (and acuity on SC ?) should be a bigger percent increase of my pool, and should allow me to cast more pet.

I conclude that best race is Briton, and should put 0 point in Intel. Am i right ?

I made a test when it was bugged, this is what I found out on live and I believe it was implemented according to this vid


ok here is test from live:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJmBi3M8KTc

you can see following, I first cast spell with the cost of 12% of power as a reference, after that I cast it with

+50 focus to it's skill
+75 acuity
+75 acuity and +25% power pool (you can no longer get +power items on live just power pool)
augmented acuity 5
ethereal bond 5
red acuity buff from cleric

you can notice that following will REDUCE the cost of the spell (this means it's not part of the base power pool)

+focus
+acuity from items
+power pool
ethereal bond RA

following will not change the cost of spell (this means it is part of the base power pool)

augmented acuity RA
cleric acuity buff

Just wanted to add a little bump comment on this thread as I went Wind @ 20...

Right now, it's 2 yellow kills per full mana bar. Prior to respecing to Wind (from Cold), I could take 4 and sometimes 5 yellows or 3 yellows and an orange on a full mana bar as Cold. Granted, as Wind, I don't have to jockey around and maneuver so my pets don't get their casting interrupted but the Wind pet hits like a wet noodle (less melee damage than that of the Cold pet...but swing faster) and the spec nuke hits hard but takes much more power than the spec nuke in Cold.

For those considering a respec due to boredom of Cold or the annoyances of jockeying the pets around, I suggest you go Earth. If you've got battlegrounds in mind, definitely go Wind just be prepared for your leveling speed to drastically reduce as Wind.

Pros to respecing Wind @ 20: Ready for battlegrounds at the appropriate levels. Hard hitting spec DD nuke, aoe mez for groups without a sorc & no need to jockey pets. Simply fire off a few and nuke until mob is dead.

Cons to respecing Wind @ 20: Poor mana efficiency. Expect to be 20-30% power after 1 yellow/orange that resists a few nukes (I am currently capped +int but not +power).

If I could go back to Cold, I might. I imagine as I outlevel the new pet at 20 and the spec dd nuke at 16 my mana efficiency may improve but right now, it's terrible.

Conclusion: Unless the drudgery of Cold disgusts you or the thought of going to the battlegrounds as Cold is a terrible thought, stay Cold or Earth.

Is there any impact on pet dmg related to your spec line? I know you need to spec high enough to get the highest possible pet. But the pets only con blue to me and I was considering going half earth and half ice or wind. If my pets don't suffer then i would have a tank pet and a casting... Bad idea or...?

miromann wrote:Is there any impact on pet dmg related to your spec line?

At low level, not really. Only higher earth pet are better.
But there's a level limit on low level pet spell. For example, with lvl 12 spell (13 for wind), your pets will be limited to lvl 25. Since 25 is 80% of 32, you'll have to get new pet spell at lvl 32 to still get a pet of 80% of your level.

I hate to necro a thread, but it's relevant to the topic. Is going full ice til 25 still a good idea, then speccing in wind or earth? I'm just a few levels til 20 and want to know if I should even consider not speccing ice all the way til 40...

Thanks for any insight.

This all depends on what you plan to do later - with or without respec stones.

18 ice is enough to get up to lvl 37 ice pets
25 ice is enough to get up to lvl 50 ice pets

More than 25 ice is not necessary concerning ice pets, and only would help to flatten variance with baseline dds a bit.

Also, do you plan to solo a lot or grp all the time?

I wanted to have both possibilities...

So I went up to 25 ice, and put all the rest into earth to get bubble for grp xp. But I also xped solo at 40+ - if you plan to only grp xp with 40+, you could respec to earth at 40 completely.

If you want to solo in bgs, wind would be very recommended for the mezz and stun pets. qc+mezz - get distance - cast some stun pets + earth pets + nuke => dead stealther

Very insightful, thanks. I liked that last option very much since I solo more than anything.

While levelling, is there any use for +spell line bonus for a theurgist? Other than for the DD's? I understand pets aren't affected by it?

Parthos wrote:While levelling, is there any use for +spell line bonus for a theurgist? Other than for the DD's? I understand pets aren't affected by it?

Pets aren't affected. A focus bonus only decreases the mana cost of base line (NOT SPEC!) spells up to the level of the focus bonus.

Fortyseven wrote:

Parthos wrote:While levelling, is there any use for +spell line bonus for a theurgist? Other than for the DD's? I understand pets aren't affected by it?

Pets aren't affected. A focus bonus only decreases the mana cost of base line (NOT SPEC!) spells up to the level of the focus bonus.

Hi, are you sure about that ?

I'm pretty certain, actually. I still have some old "all spell line" focus staves on my characters and while, for example, the power cost of my sorc's single mezz (base line) decreases noticeably while I use the focus staff, the AE mezz (spec line) has no such power cost reduction.

Another factor is that theurgist pets have percentage power costs (as in, 12% - or 15% for the level 1 pets - of your total unmodified power pool).

Fortyseven wrote:I'm pretty certain, actually. I still have some old "all spell line" focus staves on my characters and while, for example, the power cost of my sorc's single mezz (base line) decreases noticeably while I use the focus staff, the AE mezz (spec line) has no such power cost reduction.

Another factor is that theurgist pets have percentage power costs (as in, 12% - or 15% for the level 1 pets - of your total unmodified power pool).

So does it mean that a caster'd rather use a base line DD than the spec one concerning mana issues while pveing/rvring ?

Fortyseven wrote:

Parthos wrote:While levelling, is there any use for +spell line bonus for a theurgist? Other than for the DD's? I understand pets aren't affected by it?

Pets aren't affected. A focus bonus only decreases the mana cost of base line (NOT SPEC!) spells up to the level of the focus bonus.

Thanks for your answer! I did however mean the +spell line bonus as in +cold magic +wind magic, etc .

Right now im 40 and respecced to earth magic for group friendliness... in the end (as PVE theurg) im aiming for 45 earth 25 ice, rest wind.