The Earth Mage

[muun]

Well, I've done the earth/fire mage game. Meh. The 17 pts in earth seemed enough, though somewhat diluted; but I never really found utility for the fire, except for the wardens at end game. Overall, this game sucked. Possibly, that was because of the rest of my build, as I "stole" a skill book from an FRR to buff the mage early. At any rate, it wasn't a good eperience and I won't do earth/fire again. Will do earth again, though, as I think it rocks, and might do a single-school fire. No synergies in the earth/fire build, though, in my opinion.

[Hissssa]

Earth is by far the weakest element as there are several early and a few late enemies immune to poison. Not to mention poison/disease quickly becomes non threatening once you get to level 6 or 7 for your characters.

Meanwhile fire, ice and lightning really really hurt when they hit you.

Fire does the most damage due to an item

Ice and air both do good damage and offer good utility (freeze/invisibility)

Earth is just kinda gimped by comparison as it is the worst party resist buff (only really useful against the mages who seem to very rarely shoot poison).

[Empyrean]

All accounts I've heard report that poison cloud does good damage if you can keep your enemies in it. I don't really go for the stationary combat style, but I could see that being really useful in a few tough fights where your mobility is restricted, or you have a door to trap enemies behind.

[Hissssa]

All accounts I've heard report that poison cloud does good damage if you can keep your enemies in it.

And where would you be doing that for most of the game? As soon as you make a poison cloud you're making the 2x2 step a lot more complicated and dangerous.

The point of having magic is for long range high damage.... so that you can cast 2 spells and damage most enemies to 20% health. Why take earth and slowly whittle an enemy to death when you can take fire and quickly end an enemy? There are several puzzles with group fights and front loaded DPS is far better than damage over time.

Even with a staff increasing earth damage it's still the worst element. And let's not forget there is a fire boosting staff and a book to increase fire magic.

[Dhauntyr]

I may be completely wrong, but the Earth magic path always seemed a bit "less powerful" than the others. Can someone demonstrate that's a false pretense?