Wizard Class Guide

*For general class information, see Wizard.*
The Wizard is a high-damage, low-defense class. Wizards rely on multiple attack spells, including Meteor Storm, that deal tremendous damage to opponents as long as the Wizard has high enough intelligence (INT) to overcome the opponent's magic defense. The beginning of the game may be relatively frustrating and slow-paced for the Wizard, but after that, the Wizard is relatively easy to play as long as highly-magic-resistant enemies are properly fought or avoided. For example, such monsters can be avoided by using the Potion of Monster Detection. Wizards are also rarely short on gold, since their high-damage play style means that they rarely need to expend healing aids in prolonged combat.

## Key aspects of the Wizard class

### Spellcaster

The Wizard relies on spells for both offense and defense. For the most part, obtaining the spells is easy, since almost everything is available in the Valmorgen library or is automatically learned. Later in the game, you'll have access to obtain additional spells such as Exploding Aura, (permanent) Wind Storm, and Vortex.

* ***Gameplay tip:*** Do not forget to learn the spells from the Valmorgen library, especially the Meteor Storm spell available at level 7!

### Combat strength based on intelligence (INT)

Intelligence (INT) increases the chance of successfully landing an attack spell against the opponent's Magic Resistance (MGR), as well as the damage that the spell inflicts. For more information, see the article on the game's combat system. Since INT affects both the attack resolution and the damage, it is the key stat for the Wizard. As an INT class, your base INT goes up by 1 every even level. Therefore, levels are important to a Wizard.

### Fragility

Wizards have comparatively poor Armor, HP, and Parry/Dodge stats. An important part of "defense" is the use of **Invisibility Gems**. Having multiple invisibility gems readied before combat will allow a Wizard to attack and destroy using spells while preventing most foes from doing any damage. Invisibility gems are particularly suitable for wizards because their high damage output allows them to dispose of foes before expiration of the invisibility, in comparison to low-damage, high-durability classes that rely on prolonged combat.

* ***Gameplay tip:*** Each invisibility gem can only be used once during combat. Therefore, ready the invisibility gems into multiple slots so that they can be used successively. Each slot can carry a maximum of 10 charges, thereby permitting 10 battles before having to re-ready the gems. Having invisibility gems readied in 4 slots will permit the Wizard to stay invisible for a long period of time. In some cases, it is better to have 5 slots of gems readied, and omit healing aids. Boosting Vitality and HP via training, Ring of Fortitude, Shapeshift Tinctures, and Medusa Potions will help survival against round 0 ranged attacks.
* ***Gameplay tip:*** Early in the game, you can also use followers such as Fighters, Oathmen, and/or Skeletons from Krypta. These protect you from the weaker magic resistant foes and absorb damage from melee and missile weapons. After the early game, followers are no longer useful.

### Be careful of monsters with high MGR

Some monsters have unusually high MGR, so it will be necessary to be wary of them. Below is a list of common monsters with high MGR. To beat these monsters, switch to hand-to-hand (by disabling spells, particularly low-level ones, by selecting the "do not ready" option in the spells screen), use Followers, or get higher INT to beat them!

1. **Dryad**: Requires more than **INT 55** to damage using Meteor Storm. Can be defeated by hand-to-hand combat due to their relatively low stats.
2. **Medusae**: The Medusa's 180 MGR requires more than **INT 65** to damage using the Meteor Storm (i.e., **INT 66** will permit a 1% chance to damage using Meteor Storm, so you will practically need a fair amount more than 65 to be able to reliably defeat them).
3. **Thallis Gnome / Monk / Paladin, Greater Wight, Flesh Scavenger**: you'd better kill them fast, with recommended **INT 90**+.
4. **Dark Phantom, Vampire Queen, Specter, Flesh Scavenger Shaman**: all of them know painful spells, so don't even look to their side until you'll have ~**100 INT**.
5. **Thallis Wizard, Shade, Evil Oculus, and Greater Oculus**: **INT 115-120**+ is recommended for smooth combat. The Thallis Wizard is an important gatekeeper to many of the INT-boosting items found at Thallis. Due to the importance of these items, you can attempt to fight them at lower INT levels (around **105-110 INT**) if you have excellent damage by using the Ring of Mighty Devastation.
6. **Phantom Stalker, Liche**: **120 INT** is the recommended minimum. While Phantom Stalkers can be beaten in melee (but are tougher to kill than Medusae), the Liches are powerful mages by themselves and has a company of Shades around, so better prepare your INT against them.
7. **Barbarian Spirit**: any hero should beat a band of them once (in the best case) to achieve the Imp upgrades, and the Wizard is not an exception. Barbarian Spirits have an illusionary hero spell that has a 50% chance of avoiding meteor storm (but not Exploding Aura). They have ~205 MGR, which requires greater than about ~91 INT to hit. However, because of their high durability, **115+ INT**, *together with* the Ring of Mighty Devastation, is recommended.
8. **Abomination and Twisted Abomination** (see in-depth discussion below)
9. **Nomad Champion** (see in-depth discussion below)
10. **Thallis Dwarf**: These guys have the highest MGR in all of Ardania. Based on their estimated 295 MGR, the only way to beat them is to increase INT to **181**+.

***Note***: The exact INT vs MGR formula is here. The INT recommendations above are based on usage of the level 7 spells (Exploding Aura & Meteor Storm).

## Progression

### Early game

At the beginning of the game, you have the advantage of your spells being usable during the first 3 rounds of combat, similar to a ranged character. However, you will be unable to take a single hit without dying. Any fight that involves a ranged attacker (which is common even in the upper sewers) or several monsters (that can survive your 3 attacks) may result in death. As such Wizards should use followers, such as a Fighter or a Krypta temple Skeleton. For general information on the early stages of the game, see the getting started guide.

If your health is too low to absorb damage from ranged attackers, such as Rust Spitters, recruiting additional followers will decrease the chance that you will get hit in combat. The more followers, the less damage that any particular follower will take as well, thereby increasing their longevity in adventuring before having to rest to heal. Note that having additional followers will not substantially affect XP gain, since Wizards almost always out-damage followers by a large margin.

You should be able to level-up and buy your improved spells from the library. As you do, your followers will take less and less damage due to your higher offensive and area effect potential. By level 7, with a reasonable army of upgraded followers, you can take on the Venn's Spire challenge. However, beware of Dryads in Venn's Spire. Have enough potions of monster detection in your inventory in case it is necessary to avoid dryads.

### Midgame

For a wizard, the focus of the mid-game lies in the following areas:

* Fertile Plains
* Hellfire Mountains South
* Dark Forest and its sublocations
* Sunken City

The above locations contain the most important items for a Wizard that could take some time to obtain. In addition, a visit to the Valley of Gur-Mechina for the Mystic Staff, and to the Elven Valley for vitality training are also part of the midgame. Besides these locations, others such as the Goblin Territory, Buried Cathedral and Ratman Battleground can be utilized for supplemental items and/or gold.

One objective after leaving Valmorgen is to level up and gain the items necessary to obtain enough INT to easily defeat Medusae, as they are a common encounter (and baseline MGR monster). Since INT is the most important stat, completing the quests for Merlan's Wizard Tower, which allows the player to obtain the +20 INT Medusa Potion, is generally a priority. +20 INT is equivalent to 40 additional levels. This boost is so significant that it is is worthwhile to use Potions of Monster Detection to stealthily avoid all non-quest monsters in the Dark Forest in order to complete Merlan's questline. Although the Dark Forest has challenging monsters and encounters, the encounters required to complete Merlan's quests are not challenging. To ensure that you win key quest encounters, have some invisibility gems at hand, and ready them for these encounters. After completing Merlan's quests, a trip into the Wild Gardens for the relevant schematics will be needed.

The Bandanna of Thought Stimulation, Ancient Belt of the Godly Mind, Wizards Robe and Ring of Devastation can all be found in different monster locations. This +13 INT can greatly increase the power of starting wizards.

The Belt of Blasting gives a good boost to INT. The additional +2 INT from Holster of the Arcanist can be doubled in the belt and for the accessory. Afterwards, Wizards needs either 90+ INT and good damage for the Sunken City (Dark Band for Ring of Mighty Devastation and Rezzenthells Spellkiller). Wizards will need to obtain a Teevus Wand for the Teevus Staff schematic. This item can be obtained from the Sunken City or from the Dragon Pits in the Hellfire Mountains South.

Although INT is most central to combat, do not forget to account for strength, which determines carrying capacity, and vitality, which determines HP. Strength can be boosted by an assortment of items, including the Potion of Dirgo Strength and the Carved Tooth. Vitality can be trained at the Elven Valley. Therefore, a trip to the Elven Valley is very useful, especially for those with low starting vitality. Vitality can be boosted by the Ring of Fortitude, which is useful prior to obtaining the Ring of Mighty Devastation.

You may come across Medusa Beard Rings. Reserve four of them, two for the Arcane Gloves and two for the Mindband (armband slot), which is obtained later. Due to the rarity of the Medusa Beard Ring, it is inadvisable to use them in any other item in the glove and armband slots.

A good rule-of-thumb milestone for transitioning to the late game is when you have:

* crafted the Ring of Mighty Devastation, **and**
* reached around 110 INT through items and levels.

### Late game

Once approximately 110 INT is reached, the player can enter Thallis for a few more class-specific items worth +8 INT. Wizard-specific Thallis items are obtained from Thallis Wizard guilds, which are defended by Thallis Wizards. The key to defeating Thallis Wizards is to eliminate them before the invisibility from Invisibility Gems expires. High damage and INT is necessary and the Ring of Mighty Devastation is useful to boost damage to sufficiently high levels. Depending on the circumstances, you can either try 1 healing slot + 4 invisibility gem slots, or simply 5 invisibility gem slots. In Thallis, Wizards will be unable to defeat the Dwarves. Use the flee threshold and the healing aid limit to automatically flee from unexpected fights against Dwarves.

At Thallis, you can obtain the Master Wizard Robe, Cloak of the Mage, Mindband, Wizard Boots, and Mind Shield, all of which are optimal items in their respective slots. Once you have obtained these items, you'll have enough INT to defeat the undead forces at the end the Gar-Uta questline that begins with The Temple Raiders.

The Wizard has a relatively easy time in Krolm's Anvil compared to many other classes. Krolm's Anvil provides very high experience gain, as well as items such as the Helm of Displacement and Dwarven Locket. Note that Dark Phantoms have a spell that damages invisible targets. Thus, it is better to use Anti-Magic Gems against them, rather than Invisibility Gems. Against Towering Golems, Wizards with relatively lower INT (less than 130, for example) may consider using 5 invisibility gems and no healing slot, if such a configuration provides just enough invisibility to defeat the golems. Against Ancient Dragons, the amount of max HP threshold is important. A wizard with low HP may get killed at the opening round before invisibility gems even come into play. Moreover, Ancient Dragons have high defense against magic, and if the fight lasts beyond the invisibility gem period, the Wizard will need enough HP to soak up the damage each round.

In order to easily sweep across Krolm's Anvil, a high max HP (450+ HP, preferably 500+ HP) is recommended. The Rune of Healing is a good source for increasing max HP, especially if you have a surplus of Splinters of Health from the Dark Forest or Thallis.

#### Nomad Champion (Nomads' Arena quest)

The Nomad Champion is estimated to have a base MGR of 180, meaning that an INT of ~66+ is theoretically sufficient to damage him on the first round of the Arena. However, the Nomad Champion has FlameShield (which adds +20 MGR to his base MGR during *most* combat rounds), as well as extremely high HP, HP regeneration, and exceptionally high offensive capabilities. Furthermore, you lose 5 INT with every tier. Therefore, at the 10th tier, you will have -45 INT as compared to when you originally started. To complete all 10 rounds of the arena, you will need a combination of defense and offense.

* As to defense, Wizards generally have low parry stats, and it generally won't be worthwhile to try to rely on parry against the Champion. You can, however, rely on the HP. Since the champion does up to about 110-120 damage per hit (and hits twice per round), if you have high enough HP, you can simply soak up the damage using a sufficient amount of Total Restoration Tinctures. The higher the HP the better, but around 500 is probably the target for those trying to barely scrape by. Set a healing threshold of at least 275. This threshold can depend on the likelihood that you will hit yourself using the Ring of Mighty Devastation. If you chose to embed the Ring of Fortitude into a Ring Amulet, the amulet will be extremely useful for this encounter due to the +VIT boost.
* In addition to having a high HP, the **Invisibility Enchantment** that is found by random encounter in Krolm's Anvil is extremely useful. This enchantment costs 30k gold, but provides the powerful invisibility (67) spell. Unlike invisibility gems, this enchantment is cast and recast throughout the entire battle. Each time it is active, it gives you 10 rounds of invisibility, which is extremely useful. Without this enchantment, you will be using a lot of healing aid.
* Temple Enchantments help, but are not essential. The most useful enchantment is likely Illusionary Hero, which will save you a lot of healing aids.
* **INT requirements:** If you have the Ring of Mighty Devastation, and have a relatively high max HP (500-600), a reasonable measure of having just enough INT to beat the Nomad champion is somewhere around **132-135 INT**.
* If you are trying to barely scrape by with the minimum stats needed to defeat the Champion, expect to incur excessive healing aid costs (for example, 50+ Total Restoration Tinctures in the last round).

#### Twisted Abomination (The Desert Artifact Quest)

A Wizard doesn't need the Desert Artifact at all. Even though the Desert Artifact's Apocalyptica spell is a 15th-level spell, it's not affected by the INT and much less effective than the Meteor Storm or even Vortex / Fire Ball spells. Therefore, the Desert Artifact really has no functional purpose for a Wizard. But if you want to finish the quest, you'll need to beat 4 Abominations and then a Twisted Abomination.

The 4 regular abominations have an MGR of 200, which is relatively unremarkable for an endgame encounter. On the other hand, the Twisted Abomination has a very high MGR of 240. Although 240 MGR can be penetrated by 126+ INT, **140 INT** is recommended, combined with the Ring of Mighty Devastation. This is because the Twisted Abomination has 2500 HP, and a regeneration of 4 HP per round. Alternatively, you can fight the Twisted Abomination using melee combat, bolstered by items such as the Belt of Ravaging and temple enchantments if necessary.

## Selection of stat boosts from quests and events

* **Paladin's Keep**: For the Dark Forest Aura from the Paladin's Keep Special Event, Wizards can chose among the Aura of Might for the +4 INT (and +8 STR) boost, the Aura of Health for the vitality boost, or the Aura of Victory to boost Parry.
	+ The preferred choice is generally the **Aura of Might** (+8 Strength, +8 Willpower and +4 Intelligence).
	+ Compared to most other classes, the Aura of Victory is not as useful for a wizard because parry is not necessary if the Invisibility Gem strategy is utilized. Wizards also do not usually benefit from an increase in H2H.
* **Gnome Collector**: The quest The Gnome Collector Part II requires obtaining items from the Fertile Plains, which contain Medusa (see notes above on how to defeat Medusae). The reward is worth the time, and you can find more Medusa BRs (from 13 needed) when harvesting the Fertile Plains.
	+ For the reward, **+2 INT** is likely the best choice for most builds.
	+ +2 VIT can also be considered for its short-term benefits, as the increased HP resulting from the VIT permits the Wizard to utilize more stronger healing aids. However, in the long run, the benefit of +2 VIT is substantially diluted.
* **Thallis stat boosts**
	+ For the Thallis Fairgrounds stat upgrade, Wizards should choose +4 INT as the preferred option for most builds.
	+ For the Thallis library stat boosts, +INT is generally the preferred option for most builds.

## Items Guide

*See also: items usable by Wizard for a complete list of usable items*
### Weapon

* **(No Weapon)** - Wizards do fine without a weapon because they derive their attack power from spells. Weapon damage and weapon enchantments have no effect on the Wizard's spell usage. Therefore, in the beginning of the game, Wizards typically start out with no weapon since there is no need to carry one.
* **Socketed Staff** (Buy an ordinary staff or obtain a Spiked Staff and socket it at the Socket Carver; then, insert Beard Rings using either the "Enchanted Staff" or "Magical Staff" schematic). The staff can be used with beard rings such as the **Goblin**, **Medusa**, **Skull** or **Ratman** types. Early on, the Goblin beard ring is good choice to boost carrying capacity, because they can be easily obtained from the Goblin Territory. Later on, having 3x Medusa Beard Rings permits you to overcome INT thresholds with greater ease. However, it's unlikely that you'll have Medusa beard Rings available early, as they are difficult to obtain in large quantities. Due to the large room for customization, the socketed staff will always remain useful through the late game, especially in specialized situations.
* **Shadow Staff** (*Adds +15 to H2H, Dodge, Parry; is crafted using schematic from the Abandoned Library*) - This staff is typically the preferred weapon for increasing defense. When attempting to craft this item early on you may wish to either bypass the Dark Forest and skip right to the Wild Gardens where the crafting components are located, or harvest the components from the Mimics in the Elven Valley.
* **Teevus Staff** (*Grants the "Vortex" spell; Crafted from Valmorgen Library Schematic*) - This staff grants the Wizard a whole new spell, Vortex. Vortex is not an incredibly power spell like Meteor Storm or Exploding Aura, and crucially suffers from being a level 5 spell rather than a level 7 spell (meaning that 10 more INT is needed to hit something with Vortex than for level 7 spells). However, Vortex still does decent damage. It also means that you will drop Energy Blast (lvl 1 spell) altogether, which is usually a 'wasted' round when fighting most opponents. Depending on the length of the fight, the Teevus Staff increases total damage output by about 5-15% (rough estimate). This item requires hunting through the Hellfire Mountains and other areas to find the ingredients, including the Teevus Wand and the Mystic Staff.
* **Cleansed Teevus Staff** (*Compared to the normal Teevus Staff, this one adds 1 Spell Damage, and removes the -4 VIT penalty; it is upgraded by the Imp in the Desolate Wastelands*) - The +1 damage is negligible, so this particular weapon upgrade is one of the weakest in terms of improving offense capabilities. However, the removal of the VIT penalty is quite significant.

In summary...

* A **Socketed Staff + 3x Medusa Beard Rings** permits you to overcome high-MGR enemies, and is the best option in these types of difficult fights. The main drawback of this option is that Medusa Beard Rings are not readily available in large quantities.
* The **(Cleansed) Teevus Staff** provides a moderate boost to damage against routine enemies. However, because Vortex is only a level 5 spell, it is not useful against high-MGR enemies that you are barely able to harm.
* The **Shadow Staff** provides the greatest boost to defense. However, in the long run, this option is less useful when relying on the Invisibility Gems strategy, since invisibility gems obviate the need to rely on parry.
* A **Socketed Staff + 3x Goblin Beard Rings** is a good choice immediately after getting outside of Valmorgen, because none of the above options are readily available at this point.

### Armor

* **Ironcloth Robe** (*Armor value: 1; purchased at Traveller's Dell Trading post*) - When you're able to leave Valmorgen, make sure you head toward the Traveller's Dell Trading Post to buy an Ironcloth Robe when you have enough money. While the Armor value is negligible, the ability to enchant is very useful, given that each enchantment point is worth more than one point of normal Armor (on average). You can purchase this item early on rather easily by buying a map form Lormidia to go the Traveller's Dell. The important part is having any Armor at all, since Wizards do not have an Armor piece purchasable from the city Blacksmith.
* **Mithrilweave Robe** (*+1 more Armor than the Ironcloth Robe; found in Gur-Mechina, HFM West and HFM East*) - The marginal increase in Armor (worth +1.5 enchantment if going from odd number to even Armor number) makes this robe useful, but because it's not of a particularly high priority, so it's probably not necessary to make a great effort to get this item. Again, the goal is to get some Armor, and the easy-to-get Ironcloth Robe already fulfills that goal.
* **Wizards Robe** (*Armor value: 0, INT +4; Sunken City*) - Instead of 2 points, you get INT. Since INT is currently the most powerful stat in the game, this item is far better than the Mithrilweave Robe.
* **Master Wizard Robe** (*+4 INT, Armor Value: 2; found at Thallis*) - This armored robe combines the attributes of the Mithrilweave Robe and the Wizards Robe, making it the best armor item available to the Wizard class. Unfortunately, it must be found at Thallis, and is thus a late game item.

### Headgear

* **Bandanna of Thought Stimulation** (*Int +4*). Again, increasing INT is good, so this is naturally a good item. This item is available from the Catacombs large tomb, Fertile Plains altar and even the Goblin Territory mound, so obtaining it is rather easy. The item will remain useful until you'll be able to fill the **Dwarven Headband** with 3x Medusa Beard Rings.
* **Circlet of Lycanthropy** / **True Werewolf Circlet**. A very useful item because it gives a pretty good stat boost. The True Werewolf Circlet is the upgrade of the Circlet of Lycanthropy and is available later on. The upgrade is particularly useful because of its MGR boost, which reduces damage to yourself when using the Ring of Mighty Devastation.
* **Helm of Displacement** (*grants the "Wind Storm" Spell*). Available at Krolm's Anvil, which is considered to be the hardest location in the game, this item is useful for the "All-Offense" strategy because it gives you an additional attack spell. When going all-offensive in terms of damage in conjunction with the use of invisibility gems, this item is the optimal headgear.
* **Dwarven Headband** socketed with 3x Skull Beard Rings is useful when you need maximum Magic Resistance.

### Belt

* **Mithril Belt** - Probably the most practical option in the early and early-mid game. Socketing with 3x Goblin Beard Rings provide a huge boost to carrying capacity. Alternatively, use Ratman Beard Rings, if you have an abundance of them. Furthermore, it is useful to keep a Mithril Belt around that has 3x Shield Beard Rings (+5 Willpower Each) for praying at temples.
* **Ancient Belt of the Godly Mind** (*+5 Int, +1 Spell Damage, +5 Willpower; found in Sunken City*) - This is one of two belts that really make sense for this class. The Ancient Belt of Godly Mind does a good job at enhancing spell power (through spell damage, and INT) and for praying.
* **Belt of Blasting** (*+8 Int, +1 Spell damage, socketable; from Abandoned Library schematic (Requires Ancient Belt of Godly Mind, Ring of Devastation, and Dragon or Skull Beard Rings)*) - This belt is a good upgrade of the previous. You get +3 INT and the ability to socket in a holster. Start gathering the components when you are able to handle the Dark Forest encounters. Of course, you'll be required to go to an area like the Sunken City or Gur Mechina to get the required Beard Ring. There are two typical choices for socketing (which requires the "Improved Belt of Blasting" Schematic): Holster of the Arcanist (*+2 INT*), and Holster of Magic (*+1 Spell Damage*), both found in the Dark Forest. Both of these selections offer rather small bonuses. Spell damage only goes up +1 for every four INT, but a higher INT allows you to hit your opponents more easily. In this case, the +2 INT is the better choice, as the INT bonus is more versatile.
* **Belt of Rage** (*Damage +2, Hand-to-hand +10, Strength +16*) It's worth having this in your inventory, for (a) the occasions when you're needing to use hand-to-hand offence against opponents who have very high MGR; and (b) carrying loot when over-encumbered.

### Necklace

* For the early game, the basic necklaces are the Blue Charm (*+10 MGR*) and Green Charm (*+4 Armor, -7 MGR*) purchased from Lormidia. Switch between these two depending on whether the enemy is magic or physical in terms of combat.
* Later on, after the completion of the East Cheswick Quest, the Wizard should replace the Green Charm with the **Ring Amulet** socketted with a Ring of Protection or a Ring of Fortitude.
	+ The Ring of Fortitude option gives a large boost to Vitality and armor. The boost to Vitality is especially useful if you need to utilize the Total Restoration Tincture.
	+ The Ring of Protection option gives a boost to dodge and parry, and a lower boost to armor. However, in comparison to the Ring of Fortitude, this option is likely less optimal because there are fewer opportunities in the endgame where Wizards need to rely on parry.
* The Blue Charm should be replaced by the Rezzenthells Spellkiller (*+25 MGR*) or eventually, the powerful **Dwarven Locket** (*+40 MGR*). The Dwarven Locket is likely the most preferred option for the endgame.
* The Nevryl Amulet can be embedded with 3x Medusa Beard Rings for +6 INT.

### Cloak

* The Protective Cloak (*+5 MGR; Fertile Plains*) is easy to get if you can handle the Fertile Plains and the Medusae that reside there.
* The Forest Cloak, also found in the found in the Fertile Plains. It possesses the Camoflauge Blessing, which acts like a permanent, free invisibility gem. The convenience of Camoflauge (and not having to handle invisibility gems) makes this cloak useful in many situations. However, Camoflauge does not stack with invisibility gems, making this cloak useless if you have multiple invisibility gems readied for combat.
* Finally, the **Cloak of the Mage** (*Int +4, Armor +2*) is found in Thallis, an area typically accessed at the late game stage when your character has high enough INT. Until you get to Thallis, the Forest Cloak is useful against ranged monsters that can hit you in the starting rounds of combat.
* Of course, don't forget the passive Travellers Cloak.

### Ring

* At the early stages of the game, the **Ring of Protection** can be purchased at the beginning of your journey.
* After the early stages of the game, the **Ring of Fortitude** is generally superior to the Ring of Protection. The reason is that the Ring of Fortitude gives a massive +4 boost to Vitality, which is very useful for a low-vitality class such as the wizard. Moreover, since Wizards already have extremely low defense stats, augmenting parry and dodge by using a Ring of Protection will not result in significant gain as compared to augmenting armor by using the Ring of Fortitude.
* Later on, it's necessary to obtain the **Ring of Mighty Devastation** which grants the *Exploding Aura* spell. This spell is very useful because it's a level 7 spell and can hit invisibility enemies. Its overall damage is about the same as that of Meteor Storm. Therefore, the Ring of Mighty Devastation is ***very important*** in the late game. Through the workshop on the Desolate Wastelands it's possible to upgrade the Ring of Mighty Devastation to the Ring of Mightier Devastation which adds +10 MGR. At the endgame, the Ring of Mightier Devastation is the default choice for fighting tougher enemies. However, because this ring will damage yourself, it is preferable to keep a Ring of Fortitude around for situations that do not require extreme damage output.

### Other Gear

* **Shield**: The Mind Shield (+1 Armor, +5 MGR) is found in Thallis and is the only shield available to Wizards. This is unfortunately a late game area item.
* **Gloves, Boots, Armband**: All classes have a set of generic and semi-class-specific schematic items for these categories. For the Wizard, getting the schematic boots (Boots of the Magi) and gloves (Arcane Gloves) are both very important items because they increase INT. It is therefore necessary to stay on the Fertile Plains for a while to gather the necessary ingredients. While doing so, you'll probably come across a variety of Bracers. The best Bracer is probably the Mithril Bracer. All of these items should be socketed with Ratman Beard Rings. Later on, the Wizard has access to the Boots of Lunord and the class-specific Mindband (*+4 INT*, socketable with beard rings). The Mindband should replace all other Bracers, but whether to use the Boots of Lunord or not depends on whether you need the extra defense. For general use, the Boots of the Magi are fine until the Wizard Boots are found in Thallis: these are similar but have slightly higher INT (and no Dodge) and you'll be using these when that extra INT is needed and/or you don't need the defensive attributes of the Boots of Lunord. Here are the stats for these: items
	+ Wizard Boots: Armor: 2, Parry +5, **Intelligence +6**
	+ Boots of Lunord: Armor: 2, **Parry +10**, **Dodge +15**, **Magic Resist +5**, **Damage +1**, Speed +2
	+ Boots of the Magi: Armor: 2, Parry +5, Dodge +5, Intelligence +4

* **Accessory**: Wizards should equip the Black Stone, the Carved Tooth (for purposes of boosting strength), the Holster of Arcanist, or the Holster of Magic. The Accessory slot is not particularly important to this class.

## Endgame equipment set

As noted above, INT is very important. Therefore, items are important, and levels are also important. At very high INT, Wizard can go through many of the toughest areas without needing healing aids to be equipped at all (instead, using 5x Invisibility Gem, or 4x Invisibility Gem + healing aid). Thus, it is important to find all the INT-boosting items you can get.

**Build for high-INT Wizard relying on Invisibility Gems**

* Weapon - Cleansed Teevus Staff **or** Socketed Staff with 3x Medusa BRs
* Armor - Master Wizard Robe
* Cloak - Cloak of the Mage
* Shield - Mind Shield
* Helm - True Werewolf Circlet **or** Helm of Displacement **or** Dwarven Headband with 3x Medusa Beard Rings for maximum INT
* Belt - Belt of Blasting embedded with a Holster of the Arcanist for use against Spellcasters
* Boots - Wizard Boots unless you need better defense, in which case use the Boots of Lunord
* Gloves - Arcane Gloves with 2x Ratman Beard Rings or 2x Medusa Beard Rings (the 2nd one is better, but craft both the sets for variability); War Gauntlets with 2x Goblin BRs for long-ranged weight transfers
* Bracer - Mindband with 2x Medusa Beard Rings
* Necklace - Dwarven Locket **or** Ring Amulet **or** Nevryl Amulet
* Ring - Ring of Mightier Devastation
* Accessory - Holster of Magic **or** Holster of the Arcanist

**Total INT boost**

* + 6 (Weapon - Socketed Staff with 3x Medusa BR)
* + 4 (Armor)
* + 4 (Cloak)
* + 6 (Helm, 3x Medusa BR)
* + 10 (Belt)
* + 6 (boots)
* + 8 (Gloves - 2x Medusa BR)
* + 8 (Bracers - 2x Medusa BR)
* + 6 (Necklace - 3x Medusa BR)
* + 2 (Accessory)
* + 20 (Medusa Potion)
* = **+80 INT** subtotal from items (requires 13x Medusa Beard Rings)
* + 4 (Aura of Might)
* = **+84 INT** total