Tag Archives: Balance

Waterworks Guide

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Most of us have done this dungeon, whether you were farming for mastery amulets, mega snacks, or your level 60 Legendary gear, Waterworks is your friend for all of that. In this article, I will explain how to beat Waterworks, what you’ll encounter, and what to expect. Without further ado, let’s get started.

Entrance

When you first enter the dungeon, you’ll be underwater. No enemies are present here. Pull the lever and go on to the first room. Stop at the entrance to plan out your strategy for the fights that follow.

Room 1

In this room, you will encounter four enemies. Two Fintooth Warlocks (Death, 2,560 health) and two Slithering Eels (Storm, 2025 health). They do not cheat, but they do have considerable resist toward their same school. The best strategy for this first fight is to have your team prepare blades for a hard-hitting hit all spell. They’re easy mobs that you can kill in 2 to 3 turns, max.

The next fight is a little harder, but it’s doable. Here, you will face two Hydromatic Drones (Ice, 2,735 health) and two Rivershell Guards (Storm, 2,095 health each). The Hydromatic Drones love to spam Frost Giant and Tower Shield to make your life a little more difficult. The best thing to do is to blade up as usual and use hit all spells. After you’re done with this battle, this concludes the first area. Pull the lever and you’ll be ready to move on to the next area.

Room 2

Puzzle: Here, you’ll be met with a puzzle. It’s fairly easy, but you must move fast. You will need to open all the blue clams to advance to the next floor. Avoid the yellow clams at all costs or you’ll summon four enemies, and while they aren’t hard, you will waste valuable health and time. After solving the puzzle, you will be granted health wisps, which are very handy for the boss ahead.

Boss Fight: After the blue clams have been opened, you’ll encounter the first boss in Waterworks, Luska CharmBeak. He is a balance squid with 21,150 health, but he has some pretty massive fire and death cheats. He drops the Waterworks Hat and occasionally, mastery amulets. How this boss works is pretty simple.

You can’t put any traps Luska or he will remove them and follow up with a massive Power Link or Skeletal Dragon that does 1100 per turn for 3 turns. AOE Traps such as Windstorm are fine, and pet traps will not trigger this cheat either. Multi traps like Fuel are not allowed by Luska. Only the first trap gets removed but it will still trigger the Skeletal Dragon.

You can only attack Luska if you have been “inked.” The wizard who is inked can hit Luska with any type of spell, but if you’re not inked, you can only attack with hit all spells. The wizard occupying the first spot will immediately be inked and as Luska’s health drops lower, he will ink the second wizard and soon enough, the third wizard. The fourth wizard will never get inked, so your best idea will be to put a support wizard last since they don’t need to hit. He can be an easy, straightforward boss if you have a hitter in the first spot and avoid traps. After defeating Luska, pull the lever and move on to the third area.

Room 3

Fight 1: Here, you will face two Fintooth Marauders (Death, 2,715 health) and two Wingfin Slicers (Fire, 2,190 health). They do not cheat. Blade up, use a hit all spell, and the mobs should be dead. After they’re dead, you’ll proceed to the next battle.

Fight 2: Here, you will face two Stormtide Elementals (Ice, 2,705 health) and two Rivershell Shamans (Balance, 2,430 health). Just as before, they are an easy mob battle. Blade up and use a hit all spell to eliminate them, then pull the lever and head into area four.

Room 4

Puzzle: In this room, before you battle anything, you’ll be met with a puzzle. It’s a simple puzzle to solve. When you read the instructions they will tell you “Start here to play follow the leader.” An eel will appear and will start touching various levers. Follow the eel and pull the levers in the same order. If you fail at the puzzle, you will face 4 Slithering Eel enemies, they are storm with 2,025 health each. After this puzzle is done, proceed to the next phase of Waterworks.

Fight 1: Here, you’ll face your last set of mobs. You will face two Riverclaws (Ice, 2,690 health) and two Celestian Constructs (Moon, 2,670 health). There’s nothing special to it, blade yourselves and use a hit all spell, but do remember that the Ice Riverclaws can use Frost Giant and Tower Shield. After defeating this set of mobs, pull the lever and head back to the main room to drain the valve.

Main Room

Final Fight: Pull the lever and you’ll be greeted by three bosses. Sylster Glowstorm (Star, 24,980 health), Water-Wing (Fire, 8,190 health) and the Spellhammer Sorcerer (Death, 6,560 health). The enemies might look easy enough at first, but they have some nasty cheats that you must consider.

Sylster Glowstorm: Sylster drops the Waterworks Robe and Boots, as well as mastery amulets. When the battle begins, Sylster will put up a Doom and Gloom bubble and say, “Traps go undetected in the Light”. This means you can’t hit Sylster (or any of his allies) unless there’s a trap on them. It’s important to note that the trap doesn’t have to match the school of attack you’re using. For example, I won’t trigger Sylster’s Ra cheat if there’s a Myth Trap on him, but I choose to hit him with Leviathan instead. Any trap will prevent the cheat.

After four turns pass, Sylster will change the bubble and say, “The blade goes unseen in the dark.” Just like the trap cheat in the previous cycle, you can’t hit Sylster (or any of his allies) unless you have a blade on. If you fail to abide by Sylster’s rules and use a trap or blade in the correct cycle, he will hit you with a powerful Ra at 2,000 plus damage. The Water-Wing uses a weak Rebirth that doesn’t give absorb, and the Spellhammer Sorcerer uses a weak Scarecrow, so their cheats are less of a threat. I recommend counting the rounds so you know when to use Blades or Traps. Hit all spells will not trigger Sylster or any of his allies’ cheats during either cycle, so if you lose track you can safely cast that.

Spellhammer Sorcerer: He will take over Sylster’s Doom and Gloom cheat cycle if you kill Sylster first. He uses a weak Scarecrow if you fail to hit him with a Trap or a Blade.

Water-Wing: He will take over Sylster’s Doom and Gloom cheat cycle should both his allies be defeated. His cheat is a weak Rebirth if you fail to hit with a Trap or a Blade.

Bonus Glitch

Are you tired of running Waterworks, again and again, hoping to get your gear?

In Waterworks there is a glitch to make Sylster re-spawn without running the entire dungeon again. In order to do this, the entire team must remain in the dungeon together. All you have to do is have three of your teammates wait in the room where the battle just completed while the fourth goes into another room inside Waterworks. When the fourth Wizard returns to the team, Sylster will return for another battle. If done correctly, you can have infinite attempts at Sylster’s drops without having to run the dungeon each time.

Final Thoughts: Overall, Waterworks is a fairly simple dungeon with a decent drop rate. Most get their Waterworks gear within a day of farming, which is good because Waterworks gear is crucial to have. That said, I wish everyone the best of luck in farming Waterworks and getting their Legendary gear!

 Written by Ross Shadparvar

Catacombs Farming Guide

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Welcome!

Hello everyone! Discord community member Hannah here, or Emmaline GhostSong as you may know me in-game. Chances are, you’ve heard that Dragoon Gear is the over-all best for any max-level Wizard. But what is it, and how do you get it? If you have these questions, this is the guide for you.

To craft your Dragoon gear you’ll need to be a Visionary Crafter first. Then, you can gather the reagents and recipe. The reagents you’ll need come from two bosses. Today I have two different strategies for Prince Viggor and King Detritus. These bosses drop the Alchemical Extracts, Salts, and Crystals you will need.

 

These bosses are essential for farming level 130-140 gear for most offensive builds. Each piece of the Dragoon set requires 300 Alchemical Extract, 50 Alchemical Salts, 5 Alchemical Crystals, and a piece of Vanguard gear. Any school’s Vanguard gear will work to create your preferred Dragoon set.

You can also craft the Vanguard gear if you’re not getting them as drops. Each requires 180 Alchemical Extracts, 30 Alchemical Salts, and 3 Alchemical Crystals. That number can sound intimidating for the new Visionary Wizard.

 
Gathering all those reagents can seem like an impossible task. But don’t stress – it’s easier than it sounds! This guide is here to teach you some of the best strategies to farm these materials. Let’s get started!

Abandoned House Strategies

King Detritus is the first boss of the Wizard City Drains after completing Empyrea Part One. He is the Abandoned House dungeon’s final boss, which is an excellent spot for Alchemical reagents. Each run drops ten Alchemical Extracts – one from the first mob fight and nine from the boss. King Detritus also drops other Alchemical reagents, Vanguard Hats, and much more. During the Double Reagents member event, you can get up to seventeen extracts per run!
 
Suppose you do not have this dungeon unlocked. No worries! The Abandoned House is a free-to-play dungeon that any Wizard can teleport inside. I have seen many Wizards start farming King Detritus for extracts as early as level 120. So, the Abandoned House is a very frequented area for high-level free-to-play Wizards.

Mob Battles

There are two mob fights before the boss. The first fight will drop one Alchemical Extract, and the second doesn’t drop anything of note. The mobs range in health, depending on which type spawn. Have one or two Wizards pack a first-round AOE hit, plus a blade or Mass Feint depending on your teammates. This setup should defeat all enemies in one round.

Fighting the Trash King

The most common strategies for farming the Abandoned House are the two round and four round strategies. The two-round approach is usually best when you have a consistent four-person team. Meanwhile, the four-round is better when using the Team Up Kiosk. If you are new to farming King Detritus, you may want to try both to see which one works best for your play style.

2-Round Strategy

This strategy requires a hitter, a Storm Wizard with around 160+ damage. You’ll also need three support Wizards. Your hitter must be in the last position (4th), and everyone needs to join in the first round. Your team should coordinate three different types of Feints; some examples are Mass Feint, regular Feint, regular Potent Feint, TC Feint, pet-card Feint, etc. For the second round, you need any three types of blades that stack. Again, these can be any blades depending on your team, but they must be stackable.
 
Remember, never put more than seven cards in your deck for this strategy to work. You must get all three Feints down on the first round. Casting Feints after the first round will result in the minions removing all of the Feints that have been cast. Without the three Feints, it is challenging to defeat the boss in the second round. One of your support Wizards should pack a Cleanse Charm, as sometimes the minions cast Virulent Plague. If needed, this can go in place of their second-turn blade but never in place of their first-turn Feint.

First Round

1st: Feint

2nd: Feint

3rd: Feint

4th: Blade or Frenzy

Second Round

1st: Blade

2nd: Blade

3rd: Blade

4th: Epic Storm Lord (or Epic Glowbug Squall, if they have a shadow pip)

I personally find this strategy to be the most reliable and easiest way to farm for Alchemical Extracts. Your team will fall into a rhythm after a few runs. Each run will take about ten minutes and yield ten Alchemical Extracts.

4-Round Strategy

If you only want to do a few runs, can’t find a team, or prefer more laid-back farming, you may want to try the four-round strategy. This strategy is best when using the Team-Up sigil for Abandoned House. It is adjustable for up to five rounds if necessary and works with various school attackers.
 
The way this strategy works is by sending in only one player for the first round. This Wizard will cast a Potent Feint. Once the first round has started, the remaining Wizards will join. This ensures that only one minion spawns.
 
On the second and third rounds, blade the hitter. On the third round, the one and only minion will sacrifice itself. So when the 4th round starts, the only enemy left is King Detritus. Because there is no minion, your team can cast their Feints now. The hitter will traditionally cast their school’s King Artorius spell in the fourth round. But any good seven to eight pip attack spell will do the job.
 
While the 4-round King Detritus strategy is a bit longer, it can be less stressful when using Team-Up.

Prince Viggor Strategies

Prince Viggor, located in Viggor’s Tomb, is part of the Catacombs questline. Many Wizards farm Prince Viggor, as he always drops three Alchemical Salts per fight. He also has a chance to drop other Alchemical reagents, Daybreaker and Nightbringer Spellements, and Vanguard boots. There are two main strategies for Prince Viggor; this guide outlines both strategies.

The first strategy takes two rounds but is challenging to pull off and requires two or three Fire Wizards. The second strategy takes three or four rounds but is much more flexible. If you do not have this dungeon unlocked, any Wizard can teleport to their friend inside. But you must have a membership or purchase the Catacombs with Crowns for access.

Mob Battle

This dungeon has one mob fight before the boss. Rydall’s Plague is a group of four Death mobs with 3,590 Health each. Have two players pack an all-one-enemy spell that they can use on the first round, such as Meteor Strike or Tempest. One of your support Wizards should carry TC Cleanse Charm; if Rydall’s Plague goes first, they always cast Virulent Plague. Your other support Wizard should pack a blade or Mass Feint if they have it.

2-Round Strategy

Your Team

For this strategy, you’re going to need the following:

  • One Wizard of any school. They can be a support Wizard with high resistance. This slot is the only flexible part of your team for this strategy.
  • One Fire support. This Wizard will cast Backdraft.
  • One Fire attacker. Their damage should be 160 or higher. They need to have 100% Power Pip and Accuracy.
  • A Wizard with a Dalia’s Smoldering Hairdo hat from the Professor’s Hoard Pack. This must be a level 40+ version that gives the Incindiate card. A Pyromancer or another Wizard with a Fire Mastery Amulet will do the job. They should also have a 100% Power Pip chance & good Accuracy.

Fighting Prince Viggor

All players need to go into the battle in the first round, in the correct order, without being late. That is quite tricky but do-able. Your hitter must be in the third position, and your player with the Dalia hat must be in the fourth position. The players in the first and second positions are interchangeable.

Each player should have no more than seven cards in their deck, and everyone will need a different stackable blade. Your support Wizard should have a Feint as well as Indemnity enchantment on hand. The Indemnity prevents Prince Viggor from removing the Feint with a cheat.

Viggor and his Ice Minion also like to cast a -55 Tower Shield. So one support Wizard should have TC Shatters or Pierce on hand. They will cast Shatter or Pierce in the second round rather than blading. You’ll still kill without the extra blade, but you won’t have a chance without removing the Tower Shields.

First round:

1st: Indemnity Feint

2nd: Blade

3rd: Blade or Frenzy

4th: Blade

Second round:

1st: Blade or Shatter/Pierce

2nd: Indemnity Backdraft

3rd: Epic Scald

4th: Incindiate

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When this strategy works according to plan, you can expect to do around 80,000 damage to Prince Viggor. One of your Wizards may sometimes need to do a backup Meteor Strike on the third round, but most often, you can 2-round!

Traditional Strategy

Speed is the most significant advantage of using the two-round strategy. Yet, it requires excellent coordination and is easy to mess up. If your team can’t execute the two-round strategy, you might try the traditional method. You will find this strategy is more flexible and has room for error. I usually do four rounds with my team. You may find three to five rounds will work for you. This strategy is adjustable.

Your Team

You’ll need the following for this strategy:

  • One tank or support Wizard. They will ideally have high resistance to tank some extra hits. They need to be able to cast Indemnity enchanted Feint.
  • Two other support Wizards. One of them may want to have their hitting gear on for the mobs or a potential backup hit.
  • One attacker. This can be any school, except for Myth or Death as Prince Viggor has a high resistance to those schools and may remove prisms. Storm and Fire are ideal schools to hit in this battle.

Your Decks

Your tank Wizard must pack Feint plus an Indemnity enchant.
 
All three of your support Wizards should coordinate to pack several stackable blades for your hitter. You could use elemental blades, dark pacts, school blades, pet blades, an so on. At least one support player should also pack TC Shatters and cleanse charm. You may pack traps. Yet, all traps must have an Indemnity on them. Do not cast them if Prince Viggor summons a Storm or Myth minion – so this should be a last resort only.
 
Your hitter needs a good attack all spell. When I hit on my storm, I use Storm Lord – as well as Frenzy or another aura, and usually one or two blades for themselves.

Fighting Prince Viggor

For the first round, have only your tank Wizard go in and cast Indemnity Feint. This tactic minimizes the amount of minion hits your team gets. Once the first round has started, the rest of your team can go in with your hitter in the fourth position.
 
Next, spend one to two rounds blading up your hitter. It may take a couple of tries for your team to see exactly how many rounds you need. I hit on the fourth round, but I find it is possible to kill on the third for some Wizards.
 
On the round you hit, use Shatter on Prince Viggor. The only time I don’t do this is if our team goes first and he doesn’t already have a shield on. If he doesn’t have a shield, but the opposing team goes first, cast Shatter anyway.
 
With the Feint, a couple of rounds’ worth of blades, and the Shatter, your hit should take Viggor and his minions out in one go. If, by some chance, you have a straggler, have your backup hitter cast a quick AOE. This strategy is a reliable way to farm Alchemical Salts – and if you’re lucky, Vanguard boots!

After Farming

Now that you know the strategies, you’re well on your way to crafting Dragoon gear. Pick up the recipes from Zasha Emberforge and get crafting! I recommend spending most of your time at King Detritus for Alchemical Extracts. Once you get most of your extracts, pop over to Viggor for a few runs to catch up on salts.
 
The meta PVE set for level 130-140 in most cases asks for the Dragoon Hat, Boots, and Amulet. Dragoon gear gives a lot of Health, and the robe and athame are staples in high HP builds for Ice Wizards. The stats of all Dragoon pieces are below but don’t forget about the set bonus! With three pieces, you get extra damage, which is a big part of what makes this gear so powerful. 
 
Also, some pieces come with great spells. The hats come with a zero-pip mass trap, the boots with an item card Sharpened Blade and Potent Trap, and the amulet with an overpowered four-pip AOE spell. Take a look!

The Stitch and the Recipe

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The Gear Stats

Fire

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Storm

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Ice

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Death

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Myth

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Life

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Balance

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Thanks for Reading!

Thank you for reading my guide on Dragoon Gear farming. I hope you’ve enjoyed this guide and that you have a better understanding of how to get this popular level 130+ gear. If you have any questions, leave them in the comments, or find me around the Spiral or Discord. I wish you the best of luck on your Catacombs adventures!
~Hannah/Emmaline Ghostsong

Spring Update Highlights

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Greetings, Wizards of the Spiral. As we prepare for the Summer here at Ravenwood Academy, we’d like to highlight some of our favorite changes from the Spring 2021 Test Realm. Without further delay, let’s begin!

New Skeleton Key Bosses

Two new Skeleton key bosses have arrived in Grizzleheim and Karamelle. The first boss, King Borr, resides in Savarstaad Pass. Meanwhile, the Stay-Puffed Marshfellow dwells in the Nibbleheim Mines.

The Stay-Puffed Marshfellow requires a Gold Skeleton key. At the same time, King Borr has variants for all three keys. The Nibbleheim Key Boss drops new unique Marshmallow Wands. Meanwhile, King Borr drops Spellements for the Grizzleheim Lore Spells. Life Wizards rejoice as there’s now another method to get Ratatoskr’s Spin!

New Social Feature

Recently added in the Spring Update was the new Social feature. Clicking the icon beneath your Friend’s List will bring up a list of all nearby Wizards. This list will show you all the Wizards currently in your same zone and their current quest.

Friendly Wizards are okay with other people joining them in combat. You can also chat and teleport to any nearby Wizard who has marked themselves as Friendly.

Finding a questing buddy is now easier than ever! Even better, we no longer must sacrifice those on our Friends List to make room. Finally, we can see if a player is fine with another person joining their PVE duel. No more awkward conversations when you enter a fight that was almost over.

Team up VolUnteering

The Join a Team Kiosk has received an update in the form of Volunteering! Volunteering allows you to help other players without having to stay put. You can select the world and types of instances you want to volunteer for at the Kiosk outside the Bazaar. Here you can choose from any world you’ve unlocked to volunteer. From there, you can choose to volunteer to assist with farming or longer dungeons.

The teams who’ve been waiting the longest time for help will receive volunteers first. After you’ve helped your team complete the instance, your Health and Mana are replenished. From there, you’ll return to your previous location. This system allows players to help other players without selecting a new team to help each time. Excellent for any Wizard seeking to get the illustrious Team Champion Badge.

New Spell Animations

Many AOE animations were updated to hit all enemies, making them faster. Below is the list of AOE’s whose animations were updated. You can also check out the video below to see the changes made to them.

Fire: Meteor Strike, Fire Dragon, Rain of Fire

Ice: Blizzard, Frost Giant

Storm: Tempest, Storm Lord, Sirens

Myth: Humungofrog, Orthrus, Mystic Colossus

Life: Forest Lord, Rebirth

Death: Deer Knight, Scarecrow

Balance: Sandstorm, Ra

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New Spells

It’s time to visit your professors because sixteen new spells have arrived in the game! There are two new spells for every school. But Life and Death received an extra, each in the form of damage boosting Globals. All these spells are available from the respective trainers in Ravenwood. You must be level forty-two to learn these spells. You’ll also need the prerequisites in your Spellbook.

Many of these spells were once popular treasure cards used in PVP. Their popularity has brought them to be permanent additions to our Professors’ curriculum. Don’t worry non PVP players; the Developers kept PVE in mind too for these spells. You might find them helpful outside the arena.

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New Quest

“Old is New Again” is a new quest available in the Arcanum for Wizards who have completed “Everything and Nothing.” For those who don’t want any spoilers look away now. For those who don’t mind spoilers, the video below covers the entire quest.

Spoilers Ahead!

To summarize the quest. We receive a message from the Old One, who is seeking to recover a memory of a world called Lemuria. Scholar Zander helps us discover Lemuria is little more than a fairytale.
The Old One insists the world exists, and so we venture to Mirage to find proof. After some snakey-shenanigans, we realize we are the only ones who can see the Old One. From there, we recover a piece of a mosaic depicting the Lemurians kneeling beneath him.

The Old One reveals himself as an aspect of the Nothing. Exhausted, the he tells us we must find Lemuria before vanishing. Finally, we return to Bartleby for more information. The Grandfather Tree gazes back through history only to inform us that Lemuria disappeared centuries ago. 

We’re too late.

Food for Thought

The quest takes us to Mirage, which houses the Sands of Time. According to Librarian Fitzhume on the Message Boards, we know time within the Spiral is governed by the flow of magic. Meaning time within the Spiral is flexible and subject to manipulation. We’ve seen it in Dragonspyre, the Five BOXES event, and Mirage. Does our return to Mirage hint at us going back in time to stop Lemuria’s disappearance?

We also know worlds can become disconnected from the Spiral and reconnected to it. We’re told about this in the level twenty quest “Grizzleheim.” Merle Ambrose tells us, “The Grizzleheim world-tree was once linked to the rest of the Spiral, but the contact was lost…. we thought it was destroyed. Bartelby now informs me that the portal to Grizzlehiem is now active, and travel there is possible.” This begs the question of how does a world lose its connection to the Spiral? How does it regain contact? Going a step further, how many worlds are floating undiscovered within the Void?

Regarding the Void

Which brings us to another question what exactly is the Void? In the Storytime posts from 2013 and 2014, King Artorius spoke about the “Outer Void.” The most we can glean from his responses is that the Outer Void fills the space between the Spiral’s worlds. It’s a dangerous, inhospitable place, and little is known about it. In Pirate101, when we sail from one world to another, one could claim we are traversing the Void, albeit not as empty as the name implies. Artorius does use the words “Outer Void” when he mentions it; this means, to me at least, that the Void has depth. 

Could it be what we see in Pirate101 and the Arcanum is partly a product of being so close to the Spiral? Are other fragments of the First World being pulled closer to the Spiral by the same magic used to create it? Who is to say the Void doesn’t grow darker and quieter the farther out you go? But to our knowledge, no one has ever traveled so far and returned to talk about it.

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Again, according to Librarian Fitzhume in the 2016 Storytime on the Wizard101 Message Boards, it doesn’t appear that the Void is the end. According to Fitzhume’s responses, there is still something beyond the Spiral. Whatever it might be is beyond our understanding. It is worth noting there is no mention of the Outer Void here. 

Meaning the theoretical ‘something’ excludes the Void. Based upon this information, I’d like to think of the Void as a kind of padding. It surrounds and guards the Spiral, somehow part of the Spiral, and apart from it, like armor or a shell. It is keeping things that don’t belong in it out while also containing everything within. A fascinating subject, to be sure. I am interested in seeing how it develops going forward.

Thanks for Reading!

With that, I will draw this to a close. Thank you all so much for reading this article; I hope you enjoyed it. Feel free to browse the other guides and pieces here. Leave a comment below on what you think will happen as the Fourth Arc continues.

If you want to stay up to date on our most recent releases, you can follow us on social media. Ravenwood Academy has started creating YouTube videos for the Community. Check it out!

Until we meet again, I hope to see you in the Spiral!

-Morgan Shade

Critical Changes Explained

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The New Critcal System Explained

Hello Wizards, Nathan Shadowbringer, and Scot Moonshade here! We’re going to explain the recent changes to Critical and Block. Today’s article will revisit the previous age’s Critical and delve into the new system. We will examine the formulas to calculate your Critical Chance and damage multiplier. Critical has undergone a lot of change in recent years, and this update brings a new era of Critical! Critical and Block were once a percentage-point based system. Now it’s changed to a dynamic framework involving both Critical and Block.

Disclaimer!

Before we begin, we need to make a quick disclaimer. According to Ratbeard’s Karamelle PvP Update #2, Critical in PvP is not calculated the same as in PvE. The formulas we used do not work for calculating Critical or Block in PVP. All the information below applies to PVE only. With that said, let’s get started!

Old Versus New

Before the 2020 Fall Update, Critical was well… more critical. There was a chance to critical and a chance to block—the Critical stat based itself on how high your rating was in the respective category. Landing a Critical would ensure that your attack would do twice the damage (or 1.33 times damage in PvP). The problem with the old system was that achieving a high Critical Rating was easier than Block. It was making Block obsolete compared to Critical. With the new changes, it’s more balanced.

The following variables represent the corresponding data sets:

c = Critical rating

b = Block rating

l = Level / 100, where l ≤ 1.

The changes to Critical involve two new formulas. Both equations depend on the attacker’s Critical and the defender’s Block. The first formula determines your Critical chance. Note that Critical chance and Block chance must always add to 100%. For example, if you have a Critical chance of 90%, your opponent would still have a 10% chance to Block. 

If your attack doesn’t Critical, or if the enemy blocks, the calculation ends there. In this scenario, the second formula isn’t necessary. But, if you do land a Critical hit, then the second equation runs. This determines the Critical Multiplier. This formula relies on the attacker’s Critical and the defender’s Block. Further examples are available in KI Developer Ratbeard’s Dev Diary.

Critical heals also use the Critical Chance formula. But they’re based on your Critical Rating and the Block of the person you are healing. The only difference is, they cannot Block a heal but instead can “resist.” The higher your Block, the less you’ll get from a critical heal. Fortunately, the schools that have more Block also tend to lean towards a tank-type playstyle. Tank builds have more Health and Resistance, so they can afford to lose some of that incoming healing from the Critical. Regardless, the amount of extra healing uses the same critical multiplier formula. Remember, it’s still impossible to block a critical heal!

Spell Alterations

Another important note to these changes is the way Vengeance and Conviction work. Vengeance is an Astral spell that increases your Critical chance by 20% for four rounds. This bonus only affects your chance to Critical. It doesn’t affect the enemy’s Block or your damage multiplier. Conviction increases your stun resistance by 90% and Block chance by 20% for four rounds. This 20% increase only affects the possibility to block a Critical. It doesn’t affect the enemy’s chance to critical, nor does it lower the multiplier.

Charts and Calculations

There are a few basic formulas that can roughly estimate Critical and Block ratings. These formulas are interchangeable, and most involve moving numbers and variables around. The following equation presented removes the need for complex fractions. Here are two general procedures for determining Critical chance:

Much like the Critical percentage formula, the damage ratio also follows a function. In this case, the damage multiplier is equal to 2 – 3 * Block / (Critical + 3 * Block). See the formula below.

Here is an estimate of your Critical Chance against mobs with ninety block (blue) and two hundred-forty block (red). The green line at the top represents the Critical Chance soft cap at ninety-five percent.

Using these formulas, you can now find optimal Critical numbers for mobs and bosses. Karamelle mobs have around 90 Block while Karamelle bosses have at most 240 Block. Except for the final boss, it would seem.

This is the approximate damage multiplier against a mob with 90 Block.
Here is the approximate damage multiplier against a mob with 240 block.

What Does this Mean?

It’s important to remember that everything we’ve shown you is subject to change. Critical and Block in PvP are calculated differently than PvE.

Using these numbers, you can find your optimal amount of Critical; 570 Critical will get you up to 95% Critical against most mobs. Using the formula for Critical Multiplier, we suggest 630 Critical as a good general goal. This way, against monsters with 90 Block, you’ll Critical 95% of the time and get a 1.7 multiplier against them.

As we enter the “Third-Age” of Critical, there’s potential for more diverse character builds. An example of this could be full-damage pets as opposed to pets that have Critical and damage. These changes also give new life to the may-cast Vengeance talent. This update creates better balance and a more dynamic flow between Critical and Block, allowing players to customize stats to their unique play-style. Thanks for reading; we hope this helps you understand the changes and how they affect your Wizard. If you have questions, you can always find us around the community. That’s all for now, until next time, we’ll see you in the Spiral.

-Nathan Shadowbringer & Scot Moonshade

Pip Wizardry 2020

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Pip Wizardry 2020!

Hello Wizards, this is Nathan Shadowbringer here to help you calculate the actual damage of spells per pip!
 
This article will be updated if spell changes happen down the line. Eventually, I plan for this list to include even Loremaster and crafted spells.
 
We will start with the highest Pip spells, and works our way down to the lowest ones. You will notice some of the spells are not a whole number. Why is that, you ask? Currently, Shadow-enhanced spells that use Shadow and standard Pips – have been changing. In the summer 2020 Test Realm, KI has confirmed that one Shadow Pip now equals 3.6 pips. This number is subject to change. 
 
Before the 2020 Summer Update, Shadow enhanced spells had severe damage compared to non-shadow-enhanced spells. These spells went through changes to balance them. Shadow Pips previously never had an absolute value, but now they do thanks to the new spell changes! They are still powerful, but now within reason to normal spells of a similar rank.
 

Calculating Damage Per Pip

First, if the spell has a damage range, we must find the average damage. For example, let’s take the spell Storm Owl. Storm Owl is a ten Pip spell, that can do anywhere between 1330 – 1470 damage. Which, on average, is about 1400. I would divide 1400 by 10 to get the spell’s loss per Pip or DPP. Storm Owl would come out to be 140 DPP.
 

This can be represented by the formula: (damage)/(x-y). 

Here you would take the spell’s average damage (based upon the values on the card), and divide it by the difference of its Pip cost (represented by the letter x) and its utility Pip cost (represented by the letter y) which we’ll get to in a moment.

So the math for Storm Owl would look like this:

(damage)/(x-y)

(1400)/(10-0) 

1400/10

= 140 

It seems simple, right? Not always. To get a spell’s true DPP, we have to factor in Pip reductions, and damage multipliers.

What Are Pip Reductions?

A Pip reduction is something factored into a spell’s DPP calculation. These reductions happen when a spell has an added effect or utility attached to it. When calculating DPP, some Pips may get subtracted. 

For example, one type of Pip reduction is the scion condition. Scion spells cost 11 pips, and do x2 damage if a particular condition is met depending on the spell. Because Scion spells can do x2 damage, reducing their initial damage. Their base damage is around the damage of a ten Pip spell. See where I’m going with this? 

The Scion Condition results in -1 Pip when calculating damage per pip. Yet, the Scion condition is not the only Pip reduction. There are, in fact, many more. 

Types of Pip Reduction

The following list contains the types of Pip reductions along with how many Pips they reduce.

  • Special: 10% Pierce blade: -0 Pips
  • Rusulka’s Wrath blade/weakness: -0.5 Pips
  • 800 Absorb: -1 Pip
  • Disarm: -1 Pip
  • Guiding Light: -1 Pip
  • Infection: -1 Pip
  • Pierce: -1 Pip
  • Remove 2 pips: -1 Pip
  • Scion Condition: -1 Pip
  • Steal 1 pip: -1 Pip
  • Stun: -1 Pip
  • Summon minion: -1 Pip
  • Trap: -1 Pip
  • Tower shield: -1 Pip
  • Bubble change: -2 Pips
  • Double Disarm: -2 Pips
  • Double stun: -2 Pips
  • Gain 1 pip: -2 Pips
  • Plague: -2 Pips
  • Pierce before hit: -2 Pips
  • Smokescreen (40% accuracy debuff to all enemies): -2 Pips
  • Spirit Shield + Elemental Shield: -2 Pips
  • Stun all: -2 Pips
  • 45% Weakness: -2 Pips
  • AOE 45% Weakness -3 Pips

What This Means

These Pip reductions may NOT all be accurate, because determining the number of Pips a utility takes away is tricky. KI developer Mattnetic has said some utilities may cost less and others more. The issue is finding out which ones. Most pip reductions appear to be -1 one Pip, with AOE utilities such as Plague counting as -2. One for the utility, and one for the AOE effect. However, that still leave some loose ends, so allow me to to tie those up right now.

Because all King Artorius spells to get a 10% Pierce charm, the Pierce charm is not counted as a utility. Thus, every King Artorius spell gets it for free.

Rusalka’s Wrath gives either a 30% storm blade or a 30% Storm Weakness to the caster. Considering it has a chance to positively and negatively affect the caster, it was given 0.5 pips instead of 1.

Because the typical bubble would cost two pips, the Pip reduction is counted as two Pips.

Calculating the Pip reduction for an 800 Absorb was difficult. The actual Absorb spell is three pips for a 400 Absorb; therefore, wouldn’t it be counted as six Pips for an 800 Absorb? If so, then the DPP of Hungry Caterpillar would be extremely high. But that wouldn’t be, right? Would it? These things can be quite challenging. 

What Are Damage Multipliers?

You factor in a damage multiplier after you calculate a Pip reduction. For example, a standard damage multiplier is an AOE, or area of effect. An AOE spell is when a spell hits all enemies. Let’s take the spell, Glowbug Squall. This spell is an AOE, and it does 940 damage to all enemies. It costs five regular Pips and one shadow Pip. A Shadow Pip currently equals 3.6 Pips; therefore, Glowbug Squall would be 8.6 Pips in total.

AOE spells have their damage multiplied by 0.75, or 3/4. To account for this spell being an AOE, we get the inverse of 3/4 and multiply by 4/3. Instead of dividing 940 by 8.6, we would multiply 940 by 4/3 first to get 1253.3. Now, we divide by 8.6. Finally, this makes the DPP of the spell Glowbug Squall 145.7.

 

Calculating Drain DPP

Calculating the damage multiplier for drains was difficult. Thanks to the new spell, Ship of Fools, we can now figure it. Ship of Fools has two routes you can go and upgrade using spellements. One is damage, and the other is a drain.
 
We can now accurately compare drain damage to typical damage. For example, the final tier of Ship of Fools. We found drains to suffer a 0.88% damage dropoff compared to pure damage. The final drain tier for Ship of Fools deals 330 damage. The final pure damage tier for ship of fools deals 375 damage. 330/375 is 22/25, 0.88, or 88%. 
 
This rate stays consistent for each upgrade of Ship of Fools. Therefore, before we calculate a drain spell’s DPP, we have to multiply its damage by the inverse of 22/25, which would be 25/22, to find the true DPP.
 

Calculating DOT DPP

One more type of damage multiplier is “damage over time” or DOT. These spells have initial damage, and then the damage dealt over three rounds. Because this damage takes longer to deal, the damage is 25% higher than the average spell—DOT’s damage multiplies by 1.25. So, to find DPP of spells with DOT’s divide by 1.25 to get the final DPP value. 

X rank spells like Tempest and Snowball Barrage are not affected by the AOE multiplier. Because they already have their damage per Pip value listed on the card.

What do the Devs say?

The first chart here is from Ratbeard’s Dev Dairy, it shows the individual base DPP for each school of magic. In addition to the new and old DPP for each school’s Shadow-enhanced spells. 

With the damage per pip chart below, you will start to notice things with some spells above rank 7. The damage per pip curve caps off at eight Pips. It does not increase further. To account for this, rank eight spells and above get utility for cheaper then what a rank seven or lower would. They get these utilities at a 50% discount, compared to a rank seven or below spell. 

There is one utility that does not get this discount, the Scion Condition, which remains at -1 Pip, not -0.5. The discounted utilities are bolded on the chart.

Another thing to note is rank seven spells DO NOT get penalized for being an AOE. They are purposefully over the damage curve. None of the things mentioned above apply to Shadow enhanced spells.

Formulas: (x = number of Pips and y = utility Pip cost)

AOE: [(damage)(4/3)] / (x – y)

DOT: [(damage)(0.8)] / (x – y)

Drain: [(damage)(25/22)] / (x – y)

If you’re interested in learning more about DPP you can check out Ratbeard’s Dev Dairy on the subject with this link! https://www.wizard101.com/game/dev-diary/spell-balance-audit

Final Notes

Moving forward the it’s important to keep this information in mind:

  • One Shadow Pip equals 3.6 pips
  • Storm base DPP is 125
  • Fire base DPP is 100
  • Myth base DPP is 90
  • Death and Balance base DPP is 85
  • Life and Ice base DPP is 83
  • DOTs have a damage multiplier of 1.25
  • Rank 7 spells are intentionally above the curve in DPP (no x4/3 AOE multiplier when calculating DPP)
  • DPP scales slowly as spells start to cost more Pips
  • Shadow enhanced spells have a higher DPP compared to regular spells.

We hope this article helps you to understand the logic behind the recent changes to the game and how they will help balance things going forward. Personally, I am excited to see what new spells will be possible now.

Thanks For Reading!

Special thanks to Shawn Fire and Dustin from the Ravenwood Community Discord for assisting me in the many calculations throughout this article. I would also like to thank KI developer Ratbeard for responding to my questions about DPP so quickly, he was extremely helpful! And, thank all of you for reading. I hope you enjoyed this article as much as I did writing it. If you did, please check out the other guides and information Ravenwood Academy has to offer. Let us know what you think and what your calculations find in the comments below, or at the Ravenwood Community!! 
 

Balance 100% Critical Guide

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Ah the school of Balance! Arguably one of the hardest schools to beat in PVP. In addition, they can also achieve max critical and high damage. With this setup you can get around 130% damage and 839 critical.

Benefits of the Balance School

The Balance school is really amazing. They’re one of the most feared schools in PVP. Loremaster, Mana Burn and Supernova can all be deadly spells when used correctly. I usually always lose to Balance in PVP, so I hate going up against them.
 
Their wide variety of spells can prove to be very useful in certain situations. Yet, one disadvantage they have that isn’t shared with the other schools is a prism card. This forces them to fight Balance bosses without the option of a hit conversion spell. This can be very annoying in PVE. You’re forced to ask for help, which is not always possible since some dungeons are solo.

disadvantages of this build

 
 Of course when you boost certain stats, you run the risk of decreasing the others. In this case, pierce and power pip chance and resist might be reduced. You don’t really see many Balances running around with 100% critical these days. This is solely because they don’t really like sacrificing other valuable stats. However, it’s always nice to critical every hit you use.
 
For this build I would use the Morganthe’s Shadow of Amber amulet because of the extra blades. You can swap it out for the Darkmoor alternative if you’d like. It would increase your critical by 5 and increase your pierce a little.
 
Personally, I would adjust the pet slightly to allow for more damage. This would decrease your critical, but it would still be high enough to achieve regular critical hits. That’s the beauty about customizing your load out to your own specifications. You can adjust the damage and critical to suit you, as long as you don’t decrease one of them too much.
 
Another disadvantage is that the Balance school doesn’t have the 3% damage Ghulture mount. Unlike the other Ghulture mounts, it caps it at 2% which is unfortunate. This is because the Balance Ghulture gives universal damage, not school specific damage.
 
 

What You’ll Need

Robe: Virtuous Light Brigade Armor

Hat: Balanced Paradox Conical

Boots: Balanced Paradox Boots

Wand: Jack Hallows Guitar

Pet: Quad damage, double critical pet.

Athame: Athame of the Chosen one (with two (2) +18 critical Citrine jewels)

Ring: Balanced Paradox Ring (With one (1) +18 critical Citrine jewel)

Amulet: Travelling Dead’s Charm

Mount: Balance Ghulture

Deck: Balanced Paradox Deck

Total Damage: 129% (Rounded to 130%)

Total Critical: 839 (100%)

Gear Setup

Calculations

We hope you find this guide helpful in your journey as a Balance Wizard. What is your favorite way to use your Balance 100% critical set? Let us know in the comments below!

Check out the rest of our Gear Guides, we have a guide for every school at Ravenwood Academy!

More Guides!

Petmaking 101

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Where to Start

The first step of the hatching process is to determine what your end goal is. If you don’t have specific talents in mind, it will be hard to know when you have finally trained your dream pet. If this is your first pet, I recommend going for what is known as a triple/double. The talents for this type of pet will be 2 universal resist talents, 1 universal damage talent and 2 school specific damage talents.

I like to start with this type of pet for a few reasons: First, it’s the most versatile pet. It helps you while questing at any level and can also be used in PvP. Second, it causes you to build base pets along the way that can be useful for creating other pets later on. Here are examples of a myth triple/double and an ice triple/double, the type of pet the talents are on doesn’t matter, as long as it has these talents, it is a triple/double.

The Pet Tab

If you view a pet on the pet tab, there are few different sections to look at. I’ll try to break down the important parts to look at and what they mean.

When you first open your pet tab, I recommend clicking the Full Talent View at the bottom to show you all of your pet’s talents as opposed to just the manifested talents.

This tab shows you everything you need to know about your pet. You can click on “Talents” and “Derby” to change back and forth between combat talents and pet derby talents.

Pedigree – the pedigree is the rarity of all of your pet’s talents, normal and derby combined, + 1 per talent. Unfortunately, it doesn’t tell you much about the pet, because a higher rarity talent isn’t necessarily a better one.

Manifested pedigree – this is like regular pedigree, but its only for your manifested talents. Also like regular pedigree, its not very useful except that this is how the hatching kiosk organizes pets. More on this later.

Stats – stats are determined when the pet is hatched. Each stat influences the final value each different talent can give you. For instance, damage talents such as pain-giver are calculated using this formula (2*strength + 2*will + power) * 2/400. Each talent has its own formula, but certain types of talents are always calculated using the same stats. Selfish talents are talents that increase the maximum value of your pet’s stat(s). The maximum stat values without a selfish talent are 255 strength, 250 intellect, 260 agility, 260 will and 250 power. Pets with these max stats are known as 2.0 pets.

The Hatchmaking Kiosk

The first place you should go to look for a pet to hatch with is the hatchmaking kiosk located outside of the hatchery. This kiosk allows people to put their pets inside for others to hatch with in return for hatching peppers. It’s unlikely to find the perfect pet you’re looking for in the kiosk, but it’s a great place to start. It still costs the same amount of gold for you to hatch through the kiosk and it functions identically to hatching with another player directly. The easiest way to find the pet you’re looking for is to enter the kiosk, go to “Browse Pets”, and find the type of pet you’re looking for. In this example I selected a clockwork paladin, so the kiosk will display all of the clockwork paladins it has at this time.

The kiosk organizes the pets in descending order by their manifested pedigree. Things worth looking at are the item cards the pet gives, the stats the pet has and the talents in the pool both manifested and unmanifested. Some pets give cards innately, these are known as item cards and function identically to cards given by other pieces of gear. Some pets give their cards at baby while others require you to level up the pet to unlock the cards. These cards are tied to the type of pet. So, all clockwork paladins, for instance, will give the clockwork minion spell. Certain pets can be put in the kiosk but will require crowns to hatch with unless you already own that pet. Some other pets aren’t available for hatch making at all, these pets will have a corresponding tag on them. I recommend avoiding crowns pets if you can or just hatching with these pets directly through a player.

Hatching Your Own Pet

So at this point, you should have an idea what kind of pet you actually want. Assuming you do, now it’s time to start looking to hatch. Look through your pets to see if you have any that have one or more of the talents you are looking for manifested already. If you do, look for either the pet with the most ideal talents manifested or the pet with the highest stats. If not, I recommend starting with a Wizard City first generation pet. First generation pets are pets obtained in the world that have never been hatched. These pets will always have the same talent pool and stats but do not always manifest the same talents. These are nice for a few reasons. For starters, you know exactly what talents are in its pool and where they are located which makes them easy to track. In addition, most of these talents are much easier to replace because very few pets you’ll be hatching with have them already in the talent pool.

Hatching The Other Pet

The best-case scenario would be to find the exact pet you’re looking to get to hatch with. However, that’s not always available when you aren’t lucky enough to have a helpful friend. So, the next best thing you can do is find a pet that has at least some of the talents you’re looking for. The tricky part is, you also want to make sure it has none of the talents you don’t want. Otherwise, those talents will be more likely to manifest in future generations. So, for example, if you wanted to make the triple/double from before you could look for a pet that has pain-giver and spell-proof to start. Once those talents manifest you could then look for a pet that has some of the other talents you are looking for. Continue doing that until your pet has all the ideal talents within its pool.

Pets in the hatchmaking kiosk go on cooldown for one hour when hatched with and are completely removed from the kiosk after they’ve been hatched with 10 times. Players whose pets are hatched with through the kiosk receive one hatching pepper reagent each time someone hatches with one of their pets.

Base Pets

Now while it might be tempting to hatch with the pet you want and train it straight to mega that’s a risky plan of attack. There is a “strategy” for creating pets known as base pets which make excellent checkpoints along the way. A base pet is a pet that has some of the talents your ideal pet wants with no bad talents manifested. This allows you to always have a pet to hatch with without introducing bad talents to the pool. If you were to train your base pet further, and it manifested a talent you didn’t want, you wouldn’t be able to hatch with it without risking the newly manifested talent showing up in the offspring.

If on your journey to creating a triple-double, you train a pet to ancient and it manifests three talents you want, it would be wise to not train that pet any further. Instead hatch with it again as an ancient base pet. Then, if that offspring makes it to epic with four ideal talents, you could either hatch again or train it to mega. If the newest hatch fails, you can go back to the ancient base pet and hatch again.

This could seem like a waste of resources at first because there’s a chance that ancient pet could have just been perfect had you trained it to mega. Let’s look at energy cost to show why I recommend this method.

To train a pet it costs:
baby to teen
2 energy per game and 125xp
to adult
4 energy per game and 250xp
to ancient
6 energy per game and 500xp
to epic
8 energy per game and 1000xp
to mega
10 energy per game and 2000xp
to ultra
10 energy per game and 2000 xp

As you can see, not only does the energy cost go up, but the amount of xp you need goes up too. This means training a pet from epic to mega is significantly more expensive than training a pet from adult to ancient. This is why I recommend having at least an ancient base pet before pushing to mega, some people like to be extra safe and use an epic base instead.

Becoming Self Sufficient

While the hatchmaking kiosk I mentioned earlier can be a great way to get started on your perfect pet, I wouldn’t suggest relying on it entirely. Since pets go on cooldown every time they’re hatched with and get removed after 10 hatches, you’re banking on the fact that you’ll get all the hatches you need to complete the project. Because of this, your goal should be to become self-sufficient as soon as possible.

This means getting all of your ideal talents manifested on two base pets. Ideally both ancient, the older the better. Once you do this, you can self hatch instead of using the kiosk. This way you are no longer at the mercy of the owner of the pet you desire, so you can hatch anytime. Another benefit is that your pets will have very similar pools. This makes preserving both stats and talents much easier and reduces the risk of accidentally introducing new talents to your pool.

The safest way to use this method would be to have two epic bases. They should both have three of the same talents you want, then each should have one of the last two talents you want. For example, if you were making the myth triple-double from before, one epic base might have spell-proof, spell-defying, myth-giver and myth-dealer. The other base might have spell-proof, spell-defying, myth-giver and pain-giver. As you can see, ¾ of the talents overlap between the pets, making them likely to manifest in the offspring which reduces the risk of a bad talent manifesting.

Pet Jewels

Once your pet reaches ancient, it unlocks a jewel slot. Pet jewels, or star jewels, in most cases just function as a sixth talent. While the jewel slot unlocks at ancient, different jewels require your pet to be different ages to socket them. For example, a Wisp Bonus Opal only requires ancient+ while a Spell-proof Opal requires ultra+. You will not be able to socket a jewel if your pet already has the same talent manifested.

Most Wizards don’t socket an ultra jewel, because training a pet to ultra does not grant you an additional talent, it only allows ultra jewels to be used. If you socket a jewel and then the pet manifests the same talent, the jewel will remain on the pet but you will not get the effect it provides. When this happens you have to shatter the jewel to place a useable jewel in the socket. There are many places to get jewels, but most school specific jewels can be crafted using the crafting recipes from Lowe Springfield in the Pet Pavilion. Opals, special jewels that give universal talents, are dropped from enemies or gathered from Jewel Blossoms. Kroger jewels have unique talents and give two talents per jewel, but can only be obtained by a select few Wizards.

Clean Pools

The bare minimum you would want to do before training a pet to mega is getting 5 ideal talents in the pool. There is something called a “clean pool.”  A clean pool means introducing talents that would allow you to make a different pet accidentally. For example, in your triple double pet’s pool, you may want to include pain-bringer, mighty or piercing talents. While manifesting those talents wouldn’t necessarily give you the pet you want, you could accidentally make a quad/proof or a piercing pet. Going for clean pools usually takes a lot more time and effort but a single clean pool can allow you to create a handful of pets using the same base.

Clean pools will not make it easier for you to obtain a specific pet. The purpose of a clean pool is to give your fails a chance of being useful. If you are just trying to make one specific pet, clean pools will not help you. 

Snacks

Each snack gives a variety of stats and counts as experience towards your pet’s next level. The snack rank gives you a general idea of how much xp the snack gives. Snacks rank 8+ are “mega snacks” and give 25+ experience.

Each snack also has a school and type associated with it. The types are fruits, vegetables, meats, munchies, candies, desserts and cereals. If the snack school matches your pet’s school, your pet will like the snack and will gain +1 extra experience. Each pet also has a specific snack type, if the snack you feed them matches that, they will also like it and gain +1 experience. If both the snack type and the snack school match your pet’s, your pet will love it and gain +2 experience.

With pet snacks It’s usually best to focus on the xp gained and not the stats themselves. This is what makes mega snacks so appealing. Here are a few ways to obtain mega snacks:

  • Arena Tickets – you can purchase rank 8 mega snacks from Broc Connery in the pet pavilion for 50 arena tickets each, which can be useful in a pinch.

  • House Gauntlets – Winterbane and Pagoda are both decent ways to get some rank 8 mega snacks. It requires combat so you need to be a decent level or bring a friend who is.

  • Mirror Lake – the final dungeon of Zafaria, Mirror Lake gives two rank 8 mega snacks when you complete it. The dungeon also offers other loot and the snacks drop every time.

  • Gardening – by far the best method for obtaining mega snacks, but also requiring the most prep. I recommend setting up a full garden from the start so you don’t spend more time gardening than pet training. Couch Potatoes and Evil Magma Peas both give rank 9 snacks at elder which are some of the best snacks in the game.

 

Fake Stats

You may notice some stats show one thing on your character sheet but do not give the full effect in combat. This is due to “fake stats.” These occur because the character sheet adds common values and then rounds values greater than 0.5 up, but the combat calculator adds common values and then does not round.

Piercing talents are the one exception and they actually round down to the nearest whole number for combat. For example, the formula for calculating the value of armor-breaker is (2*strength + 2*agility + power) * (5/2000). Which for this pet calculates to 3.5 and shows as 4%. The formula for calculating armor piercer is (2*strength + 2*agility + power) * (3/2000).

For this pet that calculates to 2.1 and shows as 2%. However, the combat calculator adds these two values together and does not round them. So 3.5 + 2.1 = 5.6 which means in combat I only get 5% effective pierce.

For all talents other than pierce, the individual rounded talents are displayed on the pet, the rounded sum on the character sheet, and the exact decimal value is used in combat. This means the difference between 9% damage and 10% damage is often smaller than it looks. 

FAQ

  • What is pedigree and should I care about it?
    • Pedigree just tells you the rarity of the talents in the pet’s pool. However, a higher rarity talent is not necessarily better, so in most cases you can just ignore it.
  • What kind of pet should I make?
    • The most standard pet you could make is a triple/double. For pvp ward pets are popular and for pve critical pets are popular.
  • What pet should I put my talents on?
    • The safest bet is either an enchanted armament or a pet with a blade as they will always be useful.
  • How long does it take to make a pet?
    • It varies a lot depending on what your starting pet is, what the pet you’re trying to make, how much energy and snacks you have and of course luck.
  • How are stats determined?
    • When two pets are hatched, the offspring rolls each stat individually. Each stat has a 25% chance to be equal to parent A’s; 25% chance to be equal to parent B’s; and a 50% chance to be the average of both parents.
      This means the only way to get a max stat is by hatching with a pet that has a max stat and that if both parents both have max stats, the offspring will always have max stats as well.
  • How does someone’s pet have an 11% damage talent or 11% resist talent?
    • The only way to get stats that high is to have a selfish talent. If a selfish talent is manifested instead of socketed as a jewel it won’t appear but will still affect the pet.
  • Why is a max stat pet called 2.0?
    • The original max stats a pet could have were 250 across the board and that was known as 1.0. However, since then higher stats have been introduced, and the new max stat values are now referred to as 2.0.
  • What are these weird names for pets?
    • Triple/double = three damage talents and two universal resist talents
    • Quad/proof = four damage talents and one universal resist talent
    • Ward pet = any pet with ward talents, usually also paired with universal resist talents
    • Quint damage = five damage talents
    • Quint resist = two universal resist talents and three resist talents of the same school
    • Utility pet = pet that provides non-combat benefits, such as fishing and gardening talents
    • Universal pet = pet with all universal talents

The Masteries of Wizard101

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Greetings fellow wizards! In this article I will discuss the different type of masteries, where they are dropped and their usage in PvP/PvE.

What are Masteries?

Masteries are a subgroup of amulets that allow a wizard to use Power Pips with spells that are not of their own school.

This is what a mastery looks like.
This one is the Life School Amulet.

Where to Find Them

Any Level

Dropped from either Waterworks, located in Crab Alley, Wizard City, or from The Tower of The Helephant, located in Pegasus Place, Wysteria.  Both are avaliable to wizards at level 60 or higher.
It can also be bought from the Crowns shop for 9995 crowns

Level 90

 

 

Dropped by all 3 secret bosses in Aquila.
Mount Olympus – Gladiator Dimachaerus
Atlantea – Sand Squid Tentacle
Tartarus – Cronus

Level 100

 

 

Dropped by the hidden chest in the first part of Darkmoor. A gold key is required to gain access to the boss. Castle Darkmoor becomes available to wizards who reach level 100

Level 110

 

 

 

Dropped by Omen Stribog in the River of Frozen Tears in Polaris. A gold key is required.

Level 130

 

 

 

Can either be crafted from a recipe bought in Nimbus Recipe vendor Romar sells the recipe for 50,000 gold

Usage in PVE and PVP

Life: Mainly used because of the amount of healing spells it offers. Regenerate and Satyr are the most popular to save you which in battle either in PvP or PvE. 

Death: Mainly used with damage, life steal and healing spells. But its more commonly used to spam the enemies with plagues.

Myth: Mainly used to stun, using earthquake to remove all the enemies blades and shields or the use of shatter. 

Balance: Mainly used to spam Loremaster and Mana Burn in PvP, but also used when the wizard wants to be a support focused player.

Fire: Mainly used for damage over time hits (DOTs) which include Fire Elf and Burning Rampage. Also good for the Eirikur Axebreaker spell that comes from the ColdFire Dragon pet.

Ice: Mainly used for the shields that ice has to keep their damage low and you can use it to stun your enemies.

Storm: Use if you want to land high damage hits on your enemy or cast dispels.

What else are Masteries good for?


Masteries are not just used for PvP and PvE, they can also be used as part of a stitch. For example,  if you’re trying to make yourself look like a life wizard it looks cool to have the orbs flying around your wizard’s head.

To the right is an example of the Mastery Amulet stitched to a matching look.

You can use a mastery from another school to take care of some of the weaknesses that your main school has. For example, Storm wizards have low health so some Storm wizards might use a Life Mastery to get themselves out of any sticky situations. 

If you buy or farm for a Mastery Amulet, I hope this guide helps you to use it to your best advantage in game!

A Game Changing Deck Strategy

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Have you been spending your training points on a secondary school thinking it’s the best option to help on your questing journey?

Well, I have a little game changer for you! Personally, this helped me so much in my journey through the spiral. I am a life wizard and everyone knows us life wizards don’t hit hard in the beginning. It’s a struggle until we get Forest Lord. So, I thought learning the spells of the strongest school in the game would help me out a lot. I was wrong. I struggled through all the worlds until I got to Celestia, which is main world no.6! I spent all my training points on the wrong cards.

It wasn’t until I found a useful set up that saved me more times than I can remember that life in the Spiral got a bit easier.

Let’s elaborate shall we?

ICE - Tower Shield

Tower shield is a necessary spell in case you are facing an enemy you don’t have a shield for or didn’t pack a treasure card for. It reduces 50% damage from any school. I don’t take this spell out of my deck unless I have a shield to match the school of the enemy I’m facing in battle. You have to be level 16 to learn it. All spells require 1 training point but you will have to learn Frost Beetle, Snow Serpent, Volcanic Shield, and Evil Snowman before getting access to train the spell. You will need a total of 5 training points.

Tower Shield is also available as a Treasure Card which gives an additional 5% shield. It can be bought from the Bazaar in Wizard City Olde Town.

DEATH - Feint

Feint is one of my favorite spells from the death school. It’s a trap that adds 70% damage with a small catch of also casting a 30% trap on you. It is not linked to another school, so can be used on any enemy to add more damage. You will have to be level 26 to be able to get this spell. You will have to learn Dark Sprite, Ghoul, Dream Shield, Banshee, Vampire, and Skeletal Pirate before getting it. You will need a total of 7 training points.

Feint is also available as a Treasure Card too! Instead of a 30% trap on your self it reduces to 20%. Also can be bought from the Bazaar.

BALANCE - Reshuffle

Reshuffle, a spell I had no idea was actually trainable in Wizard City itself! This spell is another favorite of mine and never leaves my deck. It is a massive help when you’re fighting a boss, or even a mob battle and haven’t packed enough attack spells or heals. Reshuffle does exactly what it’s called, reshuffles all your cards back into your deck. This spell is located in Colossus Boulevard in Wizard City. Mildred Farseer has the spell for you to train along with a few others. You will have to be level 20 to be able to train it and will only be 1 training point. You do not need to learn all the spells that she offers in order to train one. 

Reshuffle can be bought from the Bazaar. If you haven’t trained the spell and see it in the Bazaar, buy it quick as it is fast to go. You can also buy Reshuffle from the Library in the commons of Wizard City.

Below is a picture of Mildred Farseer and a map of where she is located in Colossus Boulevard. 

BALANCE - Spirit and Elemental Blades/Traps

These 4 spells are great for setting up a boss or mob to increase your damage. The blades adding 35% and traps adding 25% damage. They are not only great for yourself but if you are working with a team of other wizards, you can also help out by trapping the enemy they are aiming to hit or casting the blades on them. So these are a multi-useful spell. I would only get the cards that match your school.

Niles, the Balance tree has these spells. He is at the entrance of the Krokosphinx in Krokotopia, which is the second main world in the Spiral.  You will have to be level 15-25 to get these spells and you also must complete all the Wizard City main quests to gain the Krokotopia Spiral Key. Each of these spells needs 1 training point. 

Below is a picture of Niles and where he is located.

Training Points

To learn all the spells above, you will need a total of 15 training points. Don’t panic! Every four levels, you gain 1 training point and your school spells don’t cost anything! Also, doing Prospector Zeke’s quests in every world, which involve you exploring the world you are in to find whatever item he has requested, will help you gain another training point in each world.

A picture of Prospector Zeke along with 2 of his quests are below.

I hope this guide helps you the way it did for me! 

Shields101

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Shields are a type of ward and are the exact opposite of traps. While traps add damage to a spell, shields detract damage. Charms and blades trigger first, and wards go second. So any shielding you do will affect the spell with the charm buffs.
 
There are three different types of shields: Absorbs, Universal Shields, and School-Specific Shields.
 

ABSORBS

Some absorbs absorb a set amount of damage.
Life gets absorb 400 damage at level 16
 
Other absorbs take damage based on the number of pips the wizard has when it was cast.
If the wizard had 3 non-power pips, the absorb would absorb 375 points of damage. Ice learns this spell at level 18
 

It’s important to note that any damage will be absorbed by this shield, making all absorbs also universal shields. If there is a boss that takes universal shields, they will take absorbs that are individually cast. (Rebirth users, rejoice! Some bosses won’t take your absorb, but some will. Depends on the boss)

UNIVERSAL SHIELDS

These are the shields the Ice school is known for. You guessed it; the tower shield. The other, slightly less common one is the legion shield. A universal shield takes a certain percentage off of any school-type damage before it hits you. A tower shield, specifically, halves the damage. A spell that does a 100 damage will only do 50. The legion shield takes off 30% damage.

SCHOOL SPECIFIC SHIELDS

These are the most numerous. There are school shields for every school except balance. There are different amounts of damage they take off as well. Everyone, starting at level 10, can get a -80% shield of their school for no training point cost. Others can be trained for one point each if you wish. Sabrina Greenstar, in the Commons, by Hilda Brewer, trains these spells

Each school, except for Balance, gets a spell with two -70% shields of the other members of its trio. The elemental trio (Storm, Fire, and Ice) can get the Glacial (Fire), Thermic (Storm), or Volcanic (Ice) shield. The spirit trio (Life, Death, and Myth) can get the Legend (Life), Dream (Death), or Ether (Myth) shield.

As you can see, the Volcanic shield gives the user two shields; one-70% storm, and one -70% fire.

Just because Balance isn’t a part of a trio, doesn’t mean it gets left out. Balance wizards get two different spells. One spell has the spirit trio shields, all at -50%. The other spell is the elemental shield.

NOTE: Damage over time’s (DOTs) do count as incoming damage, meaning that any shield placed will be used by the DOT. This is either helpful or just a nuisance.

Be careful, and pay attention.

LAYERING SHIELDS

Just like traps and blades, shields can also be layered. However, two shields of the same kind will not stack. Three of the same type of tower shields won’t work better than one tower shield. However, it is worth noting that different types of shields can be stacked. For instance, a trained tower shield can be stacked on top of a treasure card tower shield to increase its protection.
The rule of layering: First thing on, last thing off!
 
When it comes to layering shields, you should watch carefully. A tower shield placed before an absorb will only trigger after the absorb has been broken. A tower shield placed after an absorb will trigger as soon as you take damage, halving the damage the absorb takes. If you’re in charge of shielding think about whether you want an absorb as the last line of defense, or if you want standard shields last.
 
Consider this scenario, you place a Spirit Armor (400 absorb) on a teammate. The teammate suffers no damage, and next round you place a -80% Storm on top of it. The enemy casts a Storm Lord (690 base damage) and ends up doing a total of 0 damage. This is because the -80% storm shield lowered the damage to 138. The absorb had enough to take the damage, lowering the amount left to 262.
 
Now, consider the reverse, with the storm shield on first, and the absorb on second. The opponent hits. The absorb takes 400 damage, leaving 290. The -80% shield pops, damaging the wizard with 58 points.
 
These two scenarios are basic, but, as you can see, layering shields so you can get the best advantage out of them is important. Keep track of the shields going off and on.


GETTING RID OF SHIELDS

Ice has this handy little spell called Steal Ward. It takes a shield off of the chosen target and places it on you. However, this only works for the most recently cast shield. If a wizard places a tower shield followed by a -80% Myth shield, the spell will take the -80% shield off.
 
Myth’s infamous Earthquake will take every ward off including any traps. If there are important traps that need to stay in place, Shatter can be used instead on a single target for 3 pips. After reaching level 100, Mystic Colossus will do a mass shatter, taking all unused shields and leaving behind any unused traps. Myth can also use Pierce to remove the last shield cast in much the same way as Ice’s Steal.
 
Another way of taking shields off is with small spells. Wand charges, for example, will take a tower shield off, or a school-specific shield. A decent DOT will be enough to take off most absorbs. Having a teammate hit before you will also be semi-helpful if they can pull the absorbs and universal shields.


CONCLUSION

Shields are just as important as blades and traps. When soloing in attack gear shields can save you. They can give you enough time to save pips for that one-shot. When shielding others, keep in mind their health and resist. Don’t just shield one person, pay attention to every Wizard. Properly used, shields can make all the difference in your quest for victory.