Magus Class review

A Magus of Tzeentch is a devoted follower of the Raven God, and spends his entire lifetime studying pure sorcery with a fevered intensity. Desperate for even a bare glimpse of Tzeentch’s great plan, the Magus has learned through his research that Tzeentch’s daemonic minions are creations and reflection of the Great Changer, and he focuses his search for knowledge obsessively on this fact – for perhaps, by understanding the servant, he may better understand the master.

Class Mechanic

Daemonic Fiends
The Magus can call forth several different types of daemonic fiends, but can only maintain the concentration needed to restrain a single one at a time. A clever Magus therefore makes sure to best fit his summoning to his need: a Pink Horror which flings bolts of fire corruption at distant enemies, a Blue Horror which spews out waves of warping energy around itself, or a Flamer which spits blasts of fire at groups of enemies. All the base daemons are summoned within a circle of binding and are unable to move outside that circle (they don’t move at all.) Daemons can be set to be passive, aggressive, or defensive in nature.

Daemon Abilities
Each of the Magus’ daemons have two abilities that essentially proc at random. The first ability fires at a rate of 90% and the second fires at 10%. At this time it is not possible to micro-manage these daemon abilities. You can toggle one or the other on or off, but it does not affect the proc rates. This is apparently due to balance reasons as the secondary abilities are considerably more impressive than the primary abilities.

Pink Horror
The Pink Horror is a long range, single target daemon. The primary weapon of the Pink Horror is Daemonic Fire (long range DD) and the secondary ability is Daemonic Consumption (long range DOT).

Blue Horror
The Blue Horror is a short range, area of effect daemon. The primary weapon of the Blue Horror is Warping Energy (short range Cone AE) and the secondary ability is Coruscating Energy (short range PBAE + Snare).

Flamer
The Flamer is a medium range, multi-purpose daemon. The primary weapon of the Flamer is Flame of Tzeentch (medium range single target DOT) and the secondary ability is Flames of Change (short range PBAE DOT).

Uncontrolled Pets
An Uncontrolled Horror is summoned as a random proc when killing a victim is killed using Indigo Fire of Change (Path of Change Spec Ability). A Firewyrm of Tzeentch can be summoned using the Path of Daemonology Morale IV abiity.

Magus Masteries

Path of Havoc
This path focuses on long-range attacks, and primarily focuses on destroying a single target at a time. A master of this path will typically call forth a Pink Horror to help him slaughter his enemies from a safe distance.

The Path of Havoc’s primary focus is long range, single target damage. Spending points in Havoc enhances the baseline abilities Summon Pink Horror, Glean Magic, Surging Violet Fire, and Mutating Blue Fire, earns access to the new abilities Warping Blast, Bolt of Change, and Perils of the Warp, new tactics such as Fiery Winds, Changer’s Blessing, and Chaos Unleashed and ultimately the Morale IV ability Soul Leak.

Path of Changing
A specialist in this path understands that change waits for no man, and that Tzeentch demands speed and swiftness in those who serve. The cost of this decision is that his spells dissipate more rapidly into the Winds and therefore are only effective at moderate ranges, but a master of this path is a quick and adaptable sorcerer who uses a summoned Flamer to great effect.

The Path of Changing’s focus is medium range damage but also includes some area of effect damage in trade for the lost range. Spending points in this path enhances the existing abilities Surge of Insanity, Summon Flamer, Rend Winds, Dissolving Mists, and Infernal Blast, grants the new abilities Seed of Chaos, Tzeentch’s Firestorm, and Chaotic Rift, access to the tactics Infernal Pain, Lingering Mist, and Wild Changing and ultimately the Morale IV ability Daemonic Scream.

Path of Daemonology
This path is primarily focused on exploiting the warped and twisted daemonic Disc that the Magus rides, tapping into its power to unleash massive blasts of power at close range. In conjunction with a summoned Blue Horror, a specialist in this path can rend and shatter everything around him, leaving a trail of ruin and destruction in his wake.

The Path of Daemonology is focused around enhancing your daemons and point blank or very short ranged damage. Spending points in Daemonology enhances the existing abilities Summon Blue Horror, Aegis of Orange Fire, Agonizing Torrent, and Swat Aside, grants the new abilities Exchange Vitality, Instability, Indigo Fire of Change, access to the tactics Chaotic Attunement, Daemonic Pact, and Daemonic Contract, and ultimately the Morale IV ability Firewyrm of Tzeentch.

Character Stats
There are eight stats the affect your character as you level and find better gear. In addition there are eight more stats that are defensive in nature. Not all the stats are effective for all the classes so I’ll try to outline what are the important ones to think about for your Magus.

Stats at Character Creation
When you first create your character, you have 50 points in each of the offensive stats. You are not able to allocate them, you just get what you get and start leveling from there.

Stats as You Level
At this time, all of the eight main stats do increase each time you level, though they all appear to increase at a different rate.

How Does Each Stat Impact Your Magus?
Since all of the careers get the same sixteen stats, they all have a varying degree of impact on each of our careers. Since the Magus can be short/moderate/long range damage your choice of stats may vary slightly from one spec to another.

Intelligence: Increases magic damage and reduces the chance that your attacks will be disrupted. Magi earn 4.5 points of Intelligence per level. Willpower: Increases healing and increases the chance that you will disrupt a magic attack. Magi earn 3.5 points of Willpower per level.

Initiative: Increases your chance to evade attacks and reduces your chance to be critically hit. Magi earn 4 points of Initiative per level.
Wounds: Increases hit points. Magi earn 9 points of Wounds per level.
Toughness: Reduces all damage taken. Magi earn 3 points of Toughness per level.
Strength: Increases melee ability damage, melee auto attack damage, and reduces the chance that your melee attacks will be blocked or parried. Strength has no noticeable effect on Magi.
Weapon Skill: Increases your chance to parry an attack. Increases armor penetration. Weapon Skill has no noticeable effect on Magi
Ballistic Skill: Increases your ranged damage and reduces the chances your ranged attacks will be blocked or dodged. Ballistic Skill has no noticeable effect on Magi.

Defensive Stats
Armor: Reduces physical damage.
Corporeal Resistance: Reduces damage from Corporeal school damage.
Spiritual Resistance: Reduces damage from Spiritual school damage.
Elemental Resistance: Reduces damage from Elemental school damage.
Block: Chance to parry melee attacks. Magi have no block ability.
Parry: Chance to parry melee attacks. Magi start with 8.3% chance to parry.
Dodge: Chance to evade attacks. Magi start with 8.3% chance to dodge.
Disrupt: Chance to disrupt magical attacks. Magi start with 8.3% chance to disrupt an attack.

Initial Abilities
Flickering Red Fire: Summons a chaotic bundle of red flame that flies toward your opponent to inflict 46 elemental damage. Range:100 ft. Cast Time: 2s. Cost: 40 AP.
Daemon Lash: An ethereal tentacle swipes the target in front of you for 45 damage. Range: 5 ft. Cast Time: Instant. Cost: 45 AP. Cooldown: 5s.
Flee: You run away from the battle in a mad panic, increasing your run speed by 30 for 10 seconds. You immediately lose all of your action points and your morale will begin to drop, and you will not begin to regain action points until 10 seconds have passed.

Early Life as a Magus
In most cases you can pull mobs from range using Flickering Red Fire and once in melee range and Daemon Lash. You should also be experimenting with your pets (the Pink Horror is earned at level 3) and learn how they are affected by their agro radius.

General Combat Tactics for Magi
Magi aren’t the squishiest of casters, but when it comes down to it, they are casters. Certainly, early in the Magus’ life, the majority of damage will want to be dealt from range just to keep yourself out of danger. Pet’s can be tricky in heavily congested areas so try some solo experimentation before you start dropping pets in a group so that you understand how your pets will interact with the environment around them.

Choosing a Path for Your Magus
The Magus can be specced for short, moderate, or long range damage. Speccing for long range damage limits you to mostly single target damage while speccing for moderate or short ranged damage allows for some area of effect or point blank area of effect damage respectively. The closer you end up to your targets, the more you are going to want to concentrate on Wounds, Toughness, Initiative, and Corporeal Resists since you will likely be in the thick of melee. It also seems that the Path of Changing and Path of Daemonology offer more crowd control options than the Path of Havoc.

Overall, the daemon pets seem a bit on the week side, however when properly geared, specced, and the right traits, the PBAE damage can be pretty impressive and the pets become instant cast so you just drop them when you need them. The Path of Daemonology is likely to be a powerhouse spec at max rank, but is difficult to manage as a leveling spec.

I’m not a big fan of the Havoc tree simply because the cast times are so long that any melee will have closed the distance gap at around 1.5 spells cast and quickly make minced meat of you. I know a lot of people liked this spec, but I couldn’t make it work for me.

The Changing line seems to be a nice sweet spot if you can’t make up your mind. You get ranged AE damage and the most crowd control available to you while only giving up a small portion of your range. I think this will be the most common leveling spec and could be played even without the deamon summoned.

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