Mage gear....may I ask advice? :)

[Istaria]

Hi again,

Tis me, the newb of a thousand silly questions!

I've been really enjoying myself this week, working on getting skills up (had an alacrity token). I have magery, eval, focus and necro to 120 now, and am working on Myst and SW. Hoping to hit 100 Myst today, and complete the SW quest to get started.

I'm not 100% sure yet what direction this whole thing is going, but it's fun

The thing is, I am getting somewhat pwnt.

My current gear is the starter suit from the new players pack (the sov store item), giving me 100% LRC, 40 LMC, 70 all resists, and a number of other nice little bits like stat bonuses and regen. It's a nice suit

I paired this with a Crystalline Ring and Ornament of the Magician, and managed to get a very basic Scrapper's Compendium.

This leaves me very little room for SDI, and I don't hit the FC or FCR comfortable points. So time to ditch the nublet gear and get going with proper evening wear. And...

...I';m absolutely bewildered.

It occurred to me that a place to start might be clothing....I don't have any equipped right now (Britannia is disgusted), so that's some gaps filled there maybe...

On the other hand, would I be better off just planning out a decent suit? Artifacts, I dunno. I don't have a crafter and I appear to be too stupid to understand crafting. I know people will help me out (awesome community!), but some key pieces to focus on first would be amazing.

I would deeply appreciate the community's advice

EDIT: Oh, and if I can somehow be a plate wearing mage, that would be awesome

Aes.

 

[MalagAste]

Often you can put a really nice suit together from drops you get on mobs... If you go to the EM Events on your shard loot the bosses after they go public... you might find some really decent gear there... Otherwise there is some on the new Khal Ankur in Khaldun which is pretty decent better than the gear from the token... However find a full suit first since the gear from that Token requires you to wear the full set to get the full benefit.

You can be a plate wearing mage if you find good plate drop gear or someone who will imbue you a set and you can pay a lot to have Mage property added to it... forget what NPC that is but there is one... I would never since it often requires a LOT of str to wear and I'd rather put most my stats into int... but it's up to you.

 

[Basara]

My mage has a suit that is a mix of event, dungeon artifact, and crafted items, that is around 50% SDI before book (up to 98% with an event mage book, before the city bonus), +37 INT, +24 Mana, MR 28-30 (depending on book used), 110 LRC, extremely overcapped on LMC (somewhere between 55-60%, with a cap of 40%), FC2/FCR4, all 70s even with Protection cast, 430 luck. Oh, and the neck slot item has ZERO resists (Pendant of the Magi).

This is on a Weaver/Mystic/Mage.

Head/Neck/jewelry
Dr Spector's Lenses
Pendant of the Magi
Ornament of the Magician
Katalkotl's Ring (set to Mysticism - my SW & magery are 120 natural)
Earrings (currently using nightsight jewelry)

Clothing
Conjurer's Garb
Tangle
Lieutenant of the RBG Sash
Minax's Sandals
Ranger Cloak of Augmentation (for lack of anything better)

Armor
Protector of the Battle Mage (tunic) (I could probably find better as loot if I looked hard enough)
Crafted Sleeves, Arms, Leggings (either runic or reforged, enhanced with Barbed)
A looted shield MR 3, SC -1, 100 luck, DCI 13%, that was powdered, imbued, and enhanced with gold to raise to 140 luck.
Note that NONE of the body armor pieces are over 450 intensity (3 of them are in the 320-400 range) according to Pinco's, other than the shield (which is over 450 after enhancing - but is mis-calculated in Pinco's). Theoretically it should be easy to reforge or loot items much better, but getting the resists and properties to line up are the hard part.

 

[Acid Rain]

With casting being your main focus, you need to hit the 2FC/6FCR caps. Its a must for mages.

The starter suit is nice but its just that - a starter suit. At GM casting skills your char may no longer be a "starter" even if u feel ur starting, heh.

Vendor search in game & use key words "platemail" w/ "mage armor" added in the gump. Make sure to add "2 MR" (at least 2 per piece/ good suits have +4).
I'd also add at least 4 LMC in a search, more is better (to hit 40% cap). Often good pieces can be found in decent price ranges.
When building suits I search multiple times a day as u never know whats gonna pop up. It may take some time but consider a
few hours searching over a week for a suit you'll use for months (until u can upgrade) isn't that bad. Search on weekends esp.

Platemail needs lower requirements for heavy pieces on mages, sometimes hard to find but yea... plate on mages looks beastly

Avoid cursed/antique pieces (antique can be viable w/ jewls only). The Orny can be a viable piece but very hard to pair w/ crystalline ring
when hitting casting caps. I'd go w/ one or the other but not the pair (unless u can make it work).

What shard are you on? I make hundreds of scrappers at a time when crafting. I can hook u up w/ a scrappers that has casting speed bonuses.
May even have some invasion books w/ casting speed bonuses but I'd have to look.
Clothing is covered in @Basara 's post. Garb, Tangle, & Lt Sash are key for mages but can be pricey. Minax sandals r awesome but very pricey.
Clothing is KEY for mages as it makes up for gaps in armor/jewls. Jumu's Sacred Hide can help hit casting speeds also.

I posted some new players advice on suit building, some may disagree but I still think its pretty solid starting help & still relevant even tho its alil old.

Determining valuable armor or weapons vs trash?

Hope this helps & if your on Atlantic I should b around this weekend so shout out in Help Chat - "ROMP"
Watch out for impersonators tho lol. There's a d-bag that likes to fake other players to troll on Atlantic sometimes !
If your not on Atlantic, I can prob xfer something that may help if your having trouble finding on ur home shard.

Good luck & welcome back to UO, we missed ya