Afid's Beginner Magician Leveling Guide (1-34) (2024)

New to the Magician class or just rusty in general? For all of you Gnomish heartthrobs out there, this is the place to start. This guide is written for the untwinked beginner mage that just wants to level up quickly. You can get to level 20 in less than 24 hours if you are lucky with the mobs, with the longest level taking up to 2 hours to get. You will not make a ton of cash following this guide. The money will be just enough to get you by with your spells and some spending money.

Helpful Programs

Orzeszek Timer is a Windows application that pops a timer window on your screen. If you are playing full screen then this might be more trouble than keeping a stopwatch handy, but you can have multiple instances up and keep track of various spell durations.

Intro. To Pets

Let's cover some basic pet information first.

Earth pet

• Highest HP and roots target.

Water pet

• 2nd highest HP and nukes target.

Air pet

• 3rd highest HP and stuns target.

Fire pet

• Lowest HP, nukes target, and has a damage shield.

Choosing a Pet

Since you want mobs to run (so your pet can kill them without taking any damage towards the end), the earth pet is out of the running. You also want the pet's special ability to do damage, so the air pet is also eliminated. This leaves the water and fire pets. Every guide and post I've found here says fire is better for soloing. I've tried both fire and water pets in the low levels, and my verdict is that fire is a horrible pet. It gets killed quickly and the damage shield doesn't make up for its lack of power. The water pet on the other hand nukes as hard as the fire pet, has way more HP, kicks and bashes really hard at early levels, and with your damage shield makes up for the lack of an innate one.

This guide uses the water pet for now, so modify your tactics if you want to use a different pet.

Summoning a Pet

When you summon a pet it will be a random level within a given range. That means the pet could be weaker than you wanted. When you summon a pet, see what it cons to you. Also check the chart to see what the max level pet for your spell is.

If you are level 4 and you summon a yellow pet, it could be 5 or 6. The chart says the max level is 6, so you need to take the pet on a test run. You can look to see how hard it hits. If you never see your pet hitting for the damage listed under the Max Hit column then it is a lower level than the pet you want. With the water pet, its nuke will do an amount of damage equal to its level + 1. So until higher levels, you can see how hard it hits with its nuke. If you want a level 6 pet, then its nuke should hit for 7 damage.

But summoning all those pets until you get the right one takes a lot of mana. That is where the spell Reclaim Energy comes in handy. When you cast Reclaim Energy, it will give the mana back it took to summon the pet. The mana you get back is based on the% of HP your pet has left. So if you summon a pet and immediately Reclaim Energy on it at 100% HP, you get 100% of your summoning mana back. This way you can summon as many as you want and not run out of mana (except for the 5 mana cost of reclaiming the pet). The only problem is that it still takes 1 Malachite per summon, which is why you want a bunch of Malachite. If you are going to be grinding, you want the best pet for damage, HP, taunting, and hitting.

Controlling a Pet

When you summon a pet you will see a pet window pop up on your screen. Aside from making /pet <command> hot buttons, you can click the buttons on the window to command you pet.

The commands used in this guide are below.

Pet Attack

• Commands pet to attack your current target. If your pet is fighting a different target, it will "remember" and execute your command after it is done with its current target. If the target is too far away, it will act like nothing happened.

Pet Back Off

• Whatever the pet is doing it will stop and run back to you. This basically clears its aggro list in a way.

Pet Sit

• Pet sits down and regenerates HP faster. It will stand up automatically if issued a active command.

Pet Follow Me

• Default pet action. If you told your pet to sit, then telling it to follow you will make it stand up and...follow you.

Pet Go Away

• Kills your pet instantly. Usually not a good idea in the context of this guide.

Handling Multiple Mobs

Let’s say you tell your pet to attack a rat. During your fight a skeleton comes up from behind you and attacks. So the rat is fighting your pet about 20 feet away and a skeleton is beating on you. How do you get your pet to switch targets to the skeleton so it can be fighting both at the same time instead of letting you off-tank?

Well, giving the Pet Attack command will just "queue" it up from when the rat is dead. And if you wait that long the pet will attack the skeleton anyway since it hit you. What you need to do is get your pet closer to the skeleton. You can either run to your pet, or have your pet run to you. Click Pet Back Off as fast as you can until your pet is next to you with the rat in tow. Why click Pet Back Off so many times? Because when you issue the order once, it starts coming back to you. But the rat is still attacking your pet.

How would you like it if you were walking down the road and a pixie bops you upside the head? You would probably turn around and unleash Gnomish fury upon that trickster! Now imagine a voice made you forget all about that. You are on the road, there is a pixie behind you, but you don't know why. Well, back to walking down the road! Hey, this pixie just hit you on the head! Back to going Gnome-Lee on it! But wait, the voice is back and you just forgot all about being hit again.

That is what happens when you tell your pet to back off during combat. You give it short-term memory loss.

So every time your pet gets hit on its way back to you, it should be told to back off again. Instead of watching and timing the clicks, it usually is faster to just click-spam your Pet Back Off button as quickly as possible until your pet is next to you.

Now for the fun part, how to get the pet to attack the skeleton. You need to wipe the pet's memory and tell it to attack the skeleton before the rat reminds it why it was fighting in the first place. So quickly click Pet Back Off and Pet Attack and hope that:

• The rat doesn't hit the pet between the two commands.
• The pet hits the skeleton before the rat hits it.

The goal is to get the pet to land a hit on the skeleton before the rat can land a hit on your pet. If you are successful, the pet is now on the skeleton. If not, back to clicking those two commands. You can make it easier by making hotkeys with the /pet attack and /pet back off commands and bind them to numbers like 1 and 2. So all you would need to do then is press 121212121212 really fast to get the pet to switch targets.

Aggro

If your pet is fighting something and you stand within range of the mob, it WILL turn and attack you. It doesn't matter if your pet has aggro before you went in, the mere act of standing next to a mob your pet is fighting enrages the mob so much it will turn to hit you. But when you step away it will forget all about you.

The lesson? Don't stand within melee range of a mob your pet is tanking. That is, unless you want to. One reason is when your pet has 5% HP and the next attack will kill it. But the mob needs a few more hits to die. You don't have enough time to nuke, and not enough time to heal. So run right up to the mob and take a few hits!

The mob will completely forget your pet is there for the duration you stand next to it. That gives you time to heal your pet or nuke the mob.

Level 1

Spells To Get

• Reclaim Energy (Can wait until level 4)
• Summon Dagger (Can wait until level 8)

Leveling

Head out into the wild and go to the Druid rings (southwest). You will see a bunch of mobs walking in the valley below you. Your primary targets will be skeletons. If you see one with a cracked staff, make sure to kill it. That sells for 1 plat and will fund your level 4 spells. Other than that, it is just grinding.

If you can, take on white or yellow mobs to level faster. Watch out for adds down there too. If you want to you can pull the mobs to the red zone and kill them safely there. Make sure to melee the mobs with your dagger, and don't cast your nuke on the mob if they are running away; finish off fleeing mobs with your dagger to their back to save mana.

When fighting mobs, wait until they attack you before casting your nuke. At this level your channeling skill is low so you don't want to be hit when casting. You can squeeze a nuke in between every other of their attacks.

Keep your shield and your chin up until level 4. Sell to the merchant at the Druid rings when you get full.

Level 4

Spells To Get

• Burn
• Elementalkin: Water
• Gate

Leveling

Make sure to put a point into Meditate!

You finally get a pet! The next 4 levels will go extremely fast. You should buy around 20 Malachite if you can. It should come out to about 1 plat. Either use the merchant in the zone (purple dot on map) or go back to Ak'anon to get them.

Head a little north of the druid rings where you have been fighting and you will see 3 kobold camps. These contain kobold scouts and an oracle. Basically you will run around and kill all of them. You don't really need to pull them anywhere since there are no wandering mobs.

If you are too afraid to break up the 3 kobold group, just skip them and walk around the tents on the outskirts of the camps. The individual kobolds will pop out of the tents and attack you. You will be doing a circle around all three camps and that should keep you occupied for up to level 8. At level 7 you will be getting around 1% XP per kill, but killing 100 kobolds goes a lot faster than it seems.

If your inventory gets full then sell to the merchant at the Druid rings. You have a ton of spells to buy at 8, so loot those rusty weapons!

Level 8

Spells To Get

• Dimensional Pocket (Can wait until level 12)
• Elementaling: Water
• Flame Bolt
• Invisibility (Can wait until level 12)
• Lesser Shielding (Can wait until level 12)
• Renew Elements
• Shield of Fire

Leveling

Now you can move up to the northeast area and fight with your new pet. Keep summoning until you get a level 9 pet (hits for max of 16 and nukes for 10). Carefully work your way into one of the red zones. The clockwork spiders will aggro you, along with the skeletons, diseased rats, wolves, and earth elementals. Keep your spirits up though! There is money to be made here.

The drakes and earth elementals drop gems and other items that sell for 8 gold to 8 plat each. Whenever you see one try to go and kill it. Make sure to give your pet a magical weapon (Summon Dagger) so it can hit the earth elementals!

Pull to the red zone if you are uncomfortable fighting multiple mobs. Make sure to keep your pet healed, and always have the damage shield (Shield of Fire) on your pet at all times. You can use Orzeszek Timer to keep the shield up, or you can just wait until you don't see the mob being burned every time it hits your pet.

You will get a bunch of adds if you fight in the blue area, and green wolves will attack you when you sit. Always go after even or yellow cons, never reds. When everything is blue, just remember the earth elementals and harpies are higher level than the rest.

You should make around 40 plat doing 4 levels in this place, so this should fund your spells for the next level.

Survival Tips

• Watch out for wandering mobs. They will sneak up on you and it isn't fun getting swarmed.
• Do not nuke the mobs unless you are certain you will not get aggro. At this level it is not much of a threat, but if you get adds it can kill you.
• The earth elementals will root whoever has aggro. So make sure never to get aggro. There is a good chance you will die if you are rooted next to it for 16 seconds and you can't move away so it changes and attacks your pet.
• Keep that damage shield up on your pet!

Level 12

Spells To Get

• Bind Affinity
• Burnout
• Elemental: Water

Leveling

This level pet still takes Malachite, so make sure to restock before you leave.

Run through Lesser Faydark and into Greater Faydark. Bind yourself right outside of Felwithe or somewhere in Kelethin. I prefer Felwithe because during the next 4 levels you might get asked to bind someone at the Lesser Faydark zone line (like I did 3 times) and make some nice cash in the process. Also the levers are a little too high up for a gnome to reach comfortably at the Kelethin lifts.

Head to Crushbone and zone in. Summon up your pet. Keep summoning and casting Reclaim Energy on your pet until you get the level 13 pet. The pet should nuke for 14 damage and hit for 16 max. Once you hit level 15 the pets will all be blue so you will need to test it out on some low level orcs until you get the level 13 pet again.

The green path on the map is the killing route, or your Trail of Murder. Depending on how crowded the zone is, you can add the blue path to your route. The blue path adds Slavers and the Taskmaster, but it also more dangerous.

To start, work your way through the east side of the zone (towards the wall and Taskmaster area). The reason for this is the pet completely freaks out if you go the other way (towards the cabin) and starts pathing all the way around the zone and ends up pulling a train or getting itself killed.

Once you are at the Taskmaster, you will be able to see the purple dot, or the Emissary. If not, continue on my wayward gnome. Otherwise, clear out the corner of mobs and pull the Emissary to you.

Once you can safely walk past that area you can finally start the green path. The red dots are possible Legos. Sometimes they are pawns and centurions, so kill them anyway. Inside the huts you might get a Lego and an add, but generally it won't be life-threatening. If the Slavers aren't camped, then you can run into the caves and get the two in there, then run into the cabin and get that one. Make sure to collect the keys and turn them in for nice xp.

Back on the green path you have the 3 orcs in the little tunnel. Kill them and then you can rest at the orange circle if you want. Trains should pass you by and nothing paths in the corner.

Keep going up and down the route and you should hit 16 in no time. Do not try to nuke with your level 8 spell Flame Bolt until they are at least 75% HP or less. Try to make sure you also have a straight path for the projectile to travel, since this area is often jagged in the geometry.

Even up to level 17 you will be getting around 2% of your level per Lego kill. The average level should be every 1 hour and 40 minutes to 2 hours. If you want to stay here until 17 or 18 since everything will be super easy (almost no healing needed) then come back with your new pet and tear it up.

Survival Tips

• Don't try to kill the Warlord. If you get him on you, it would probably be best to zone out.
• Leave the Oracle alone also.
• If you get two orcs at the same time (like the Slavers), do NOT sit down. When the first Slaver gets low enough, start nuking him so he dies faster. Between heals of your pet, the cooldown of the spell allows you to sneak a nuke in. When the first Slaver is dead, the other one should be low health because of the damage shield on the pet. Make sure to do at least 1 damage to the mob.
• You finally get Burnout at level 12. It should be on a 15 minute timer, so set Orzeszek for 15 minutes so you know when it wears off.
• If you find yourself lacking on room or become encumbered, summon as many Dimensional Pockets as you can. The last thing you want is to have to zone out and sell (and summoning your pet 8 times) or being encumbered when you need to run.

Level 16

Spells To Get

• Minor Summoning: Water
• See Invisible
• Shielding
• Shock of Flame

Leveling

You need Lapis Lazuli for this pet again, so stock up on some before leaving.

Get a port to North Karana (Druid) or West Karana (Wizard) and make the run to East Karana. Bind yourself at the bridge (orange circle) on the East Karana side (or better yet the North Karana side) since if you die the run is very short. Summon the strongest water pet and get ready to kill.

Get familiar with the red zone. It is a safe area where you can pull to and sit down without worrying about adds. The green line is the pathing for 2 "a dark stalker" that you will want to kill. Otherwise you might run into them when pulling (plus it is good XP). Every now and then some sort of gnoll reaver will wander by on the purple line. Kill it before it kills you unexpectedly.

The blue area is where most of the mobs will be. This includes "a gorge hound" and "a griffawn". Make sure to pull them to the red zone and kill. If your pet needs HP, tell it to sit at your fighting spot while you pull. Pull with a weak nuke like the level 1 nuke Burst of Flame and then sick the pet on it when it reaches the red zone. Heal the pet and sit down. Heal and sit. Rinse and repeat.

The griffawns drop anywhere from 1 to 5 gold per kill, and the mobs drop research pages/runes that sell for about the same. Experience is about a level every 2 hours. Occasionally an evil eye will stare at your from across the path, but it is just trying to see why you are leveling up so quickly. Don't talk to it.

Survival Tips

• Don't get hit. The mobs can do over 70 damage to you per round. You will die very fast if you try to tank and it gets lucky with the damage.
• Don't try 2 at a time. Your pet will go down faster than you can heal, and you will get aggro. None of those are very good.
• If you want to use your big nuke to kill a mob faster, wait until it is at 50% HP. Otherwise you risk getting aggro.
• Don't curse at the bard who is pulling 15 gorge hounds and 4 griffawns behind him. Yes, he is taking virtually all the mobs in the area that you want, but you are also next to the zone line and would like to know if a train is coming.
• Stay away from Squire Wimbley. He will help you attack the mobs, but will AoE and hit your pet, who in turn hits him, who then gets on his aggro list, who will then kill you. He stuns, roots, nukes, and will kill you. Zone ASAP if he attacks your pet.

Level 20

Spells To Get

• Bolt of Flame
• Lesser Summoning: Water (In the Ocean of Tears)
• Renew Summoning
• Shield of Flame

Leveling

Head to the Oasis of Marr for your next levels. Leveling here will be simple. Kill anything with scales that is at least dark blue to you.

Just go along the coast and kill any loose gators. The "deepwater" series are higher level and will be your primary targets. The crocs are also slightly higher level than the others. One thing to note is the sand giant that rests near the docks. He is the blue dot on the map. You can rest at the docks since mobs don't path to the edge and the giant is too far away.

It is generally safe to rest along the shoreline. Even though the gators scowl at you, they do not attack on sight and are not social. You have to watch out for the pumas when you sit, but they are green. Crypt mummies are also a pain, but should be dark blue and good experience too.

If you didn't want to do the journey to East Karana at level 16, you could also kill the lower level gators and stay here for the next 8 levels. I like to go to a different zone every spell set because of boredom. You should be getting about 2% per kill up to 23, where it would be slowing down to around 1% depending on what you kill. The time to level is still under 2 hours per level though, so still considered good experience.

You will get little to no money for your levels here, so try to save up and loot those research items to sell!

Survival Tips

• Stay away from sand giants.
• Do not sit down when 4 pumas are walking by.
• Make sure to look in the water. There are a bunch of swimming experience points underwater.

Level 24

Spells To Get

• Major Shielding
• Shock of Spikes
• Summoning: Earth

Leveling

Unfortunately, the water pet is a research-only spell this level. The earth pet will have to suffice for the next 5 levels.

This is the time to make your money! If you are lucky you should come out of these levels 1,000 plat richer. Bring 4 bags with as many slots as possible, and summon 4 of your Dimensional Pocket. You want to stay in the XP area for as long as possible and don't want to be encumbered.

To start, take the raft that frequents the Oasis docks to the Timorous Deep. From there, get off on the island it drops you on and run to the other side where the docks are. Wait for the large boat to come and take you to The Overthere. Jump off the boat before it docks (it drops you off at an evil outpost) and swim to shore. Make your way to Warsliks Woods and follow the path to the giant fort.

Before entering the fort (and maybe before running across The Overthere) you should cast invisibility on yourself. If you follow the trail in Warsliks Woods you will cross a small bridge before entering the fort. Two giants guard it, so it is safer to sneak past them while invisible. As soon as you enter take a right along the wall. You will come up to a hill with a flat triangular shaped top. Sit there, this is where you will pull giants to. This is marked by the red dot on the map.

Once you are propped up safely on the hilltop in the northwest corner of the fort, summon your earth elemental. It will always be blue to you, so now every summon you will need to test it out against a giant to see what level it is. The pet should hit for a max of 26. If it doesn't, summon a new one. Remember to always give it two weapons so it can dual wield.

Don't try to take on red mobs when testing your pet for its level. If you end up getting the weakest possible pet against the strongest possible giant, I hope you have full mana and Gate memorized.

When you finally get your high level pet, remember to give it a damage shield. The earth pet does not nuke and does not have any innate damage shield, so it needs all the help it can get. Every giant in the fort is fair game for your pet; it can kill all the giants with your healing. Just watch out for "a forest giant". He lives inside a building not too far away and when he dies an Iksar pops out that has crazy regeneration and makes for a long fight.

All the giants have a possibility to drop a Forest Loop among other items. The loop can sell for 500pp to other players, or 300pp to a merchant. Loot everything that you can! Put the lightweight research items and gems in your backpacks, and the heavy weapons that sell for upward of 40pp each into your summoned bags.

Do not try to split the two giants at the entrance. Sure, it can be done without having to lull or harmony, but if you screw up and aggro both it is not worth the trouble of gating and running back. Otherwise, tell your pet to sit at the hill crest and pull with your level 1 nuke back to the pet.

Right off the bat you should notice the "evergreen" series of giants are harder to kill than the "greenwood" giants. When you are fighting a red or yellow giant, just get your weakest nuke in so you get XP and then concentrate on healing the pet. With the blue giants feel free to nuke once or twice at 50% HP.

You will need to take breaks every 3 or 4 giants to get your pet's HP and your mana back up. Always have your pet sit so it regenerates its life faster. It should be about 2% per kill and under 2 hours per level still. If you even get 1 Forest Loop then you will not have to worry about buying spells for a long time.

When you finally do get full and decide to sell, invis up and run back to The Overthere. Around the small pond at location 1900, -2900 is a merchant that you can sell to.

Survival Tips

• Always pull up to your hilltop before fighting. There are 2 pathing giants that can join in if you fight lower.
• Don't go into a fight without the ability to heal at least 3 times. Better be safe than sorry.
• If you do get multiple giants on you at the same time, cast Gate! The death is not worth it.
• Play nice with other people there. Usually there are enough giants to go around.

Level 29

Spells To Get

• Burnout II
• Greater Summoning: Fire
• Inferno Shield
• Phantom Chain

Leveling

Make your way to Highkeep and bind yourself at the bank. There is a gem merchant upstairs and everything you need inside the zone. Buy a stack of Cat's Eye Agate for your Phantom Chain spell and stock up on Malachite if you need to. Keep your Major Shielding and Phantom Chain on yourself at all times. The Phantom line of spells gives you a small bit of HP regeneration as well as AC.

You finally get to try the fire pet if you haven't been already. The water pet is still a research-only spell this level. An easy way to see what level the fire pet is at is to let it get hit once. If the damage shield it has does not report back 28 damage, then chuck the pet and keep trying. It should also hit for 28 damage max and nuke for 27.

Go to the basem*nt and check to see if a group is there. You will not be touching the warrior or raider rooms, just the top room. If there is a group, you have a choice. Join it or come back later. Your experience will go a lot slower in a group, even with them pulling the whole basem*nt. If you are in a group then you don't really need to read this part as it pertains to soloing.

So you finally have the room to yourself. Get your highest level pet out and start clearing. Use your weak nuke and drag the goblins to the edge of the stairs to kill. The pet should not have a problem killing them, but always keep an eye on the pet's health. The fire pet has the lowest HP and can go down half health in an instant. If the goblins start to cast an ice spell, start healing your pet if it is at 50% HP or lower.

Nuke once at 50% HP, don't let them run and get adds, and keep your pet healed. That takes care of the 4 single pulls in the main room. The side room is a double pull however. Make sure your pet is at full HP and you have a good amount of mana. Then sick the pet on one (a caster if they are different) and nuke it down ASAP. Toss a heal to your pet if it gets low. You can tank one for the duration of the fight if needed. Just cast Inferno Shield on yourself and with the Phantom armor buff you should regenerate your health afterwards quicker.

The goblins respawn every 12 minutes and 30 seconds. You should be able to do your rounds with 8 minutes left on the spawn timer. That gives you enough time to med up to full before the next cycle starts. You will get around 10% XP each spawn cycle, so it takes about 2 hours per level.

Survival Tips

• If you get more goblins than you want, run to the guards! They will help you.
• Loot all the bronze and sell it to the merchants upstairs.
• Keep the ears the goblins drop. Either sell them to players or turn them in to Captain Bosec for experience.