User talk:Patrick2011b/FoVM^Ru
Various Thoughts / Advice
I'd figure, since you've posted the diary, I might as well comment on it.
Skill Training: Slight optimization would be to train Air Magic a tiny bit. The first few levels are really cheap; before aptitudes, going from 0 -> 2 Air is less than half the cost of 4 -> 5 Poison. Even with Fo aptitudes, getting 1 Air on D:1 is worth it. Later on for Meph Cloud you could get 2-3 levels.
I'm not super sure about rushing OTR. PVapours is your main "killdudes" spell, and OTR is mainly crowd control. In the mean time you could get small investments into stuff like Air/Conj (for Meph Cloud, which lets you fight early uniques), Stealth. [The wiki] might say stuff about getting OTR early but I disagree.
On 1.0 Delay Weapons: With attacks of opportunity in play, I don't really think having >1.0 delay matters much in the early game. If, as a mage, your best choice is to fight in melee, something probably went wrong. Therefore, you'll need all the power you can get. The better combat performance from, e.g. a spear, outweighs the downside of double-turn. (This holds true until you get consumables worth using.)
God Choice: IMO not taking Hep immediately was a mistake. Hep ancestor does a lot for you:
- It lets you kite indefinitely. If poison is "too slow", then the god of letting you walk away helps with poison.
- It breaks attacks of opportunity.
- It lets you kill monsters resistant to poison. That's really helpful for VM, you don't have to run the moment you see a wight or ice beast anymore.
Also from a hyper-optimal winstreak perspective, there's always the chance that you get shafted from D:4 to D:7 before you find another altar.
Poison Magic as a whole: The combo of PVapours + OTR + Ignite Poison is a great "side option" for most of a 3-rune. In the latest game I played (KoEE), I was using PV + Ignite to take out Vaults guys, storm/quicksilver dragons, and other lone monsters w/o rPois. Note that it's on Kobold - one of PV's main benefits, its full LOS range, is unimportant due to Ko's reduced sight. (I agree VM is on the weaker end, though.)
