Conjuror FAQ
All credit for the Conjuror guide goes to Xalmat of the Conjuror Forums. You can see the original posting of this guide here.
MUCH credit goes out to El Chupacabras for making his wonderful Necromancer FAQ, thus inspiring this FAQ. Words can't describe how useful his FAQ has been to the Necromancer community, and I only hope my Conjuror one is just as useful. In fact, a lot of the questions and answers are taken ver batim from his FAQ and used here, because his FAQ is that good.
In an effort to cut down on the number of repeated threads popping up on the boards, I've put together this frequently asked questions list. I certainly don't know everything about the class, so if you disagree with me, be sure to let me know!
Conjuror General Questions.
Q. Where can I get an accurate spell list?
Q. What's the difference between our pets?
A. Probably the most asked question of them all by new Conjurors. We have four different pets we can cast: Earth (Fighter) pets, Fire (Mage) pets, Air (Scout) pets, and Water (Healer) pets.
Our Earth pets, beginning with Tellurian Recruit at our first level, make up the bread and butter of our solo ability. This pet has, by far, the most hit points out of all of our pets, and is the only pet with Taunt abilities in its arsenal, making it the best overall pet for soloing. Unfortunately it also has the lowest damage potential of all of our regular pets, making it quite ill-suited for groups. Also, it's ability to soak up damage and hold aggro are less suited for larger groups of 4 or more; a player-tank is preferred in such situations.
The Fire pets, starting with Igneous Apprentice at our twentieth level, are very similar in nature to player Mages, specifically Sorcerers. Their whole ability to deal damage is by heat-based spells, both single target and area-of-effect in nature. The flip side: this pet has even less hit points than you do! Therefore, it is not meant to do any sort of tanking. It is also quite prone to dying to area-of-effect attacks that monsters do, so try to position this pet in the rear of the monster, or work on achievement lines geared for survivability. The ideal time to use this pet is when you aren't soloing, you have a tank capable of holding aggro against multiple mobs at once, and you are fighting multiple mobs at once.
The Air pets, with Aery Outrider being the first one at the thirty-second level, are scoutish in nature. While the Igneous pets deal damage by spells, the Aery pets dish out the damage with high-damage melee attacks and high-damage auto-attack. It's hit points fall somewhere between that of Fire and Earth pets. While it is a good pet to use when soloing, it is an even better pet when in a group! Ideally you'd use this pet when it's not tanking, and when you are fighting mostly single monsters at once (mostly ^^^ heroics or a pair of ^^ heroics). Like the Igneous pet, it tends to suffer heavy damage to monster area-of-effect attacks. Position this pet to the rear of the monster to avoid these attacks, and to avoid nasty (and damaging) parries and ripostes that monsters do.
The Water pet, Hydromancer, is only obtainable with spending achievement points. It basically acts like a super weak healer, with a couple nifty effects that help the rest of the group. Unfortunately, it's so weak you're basically better getting a healer to take your place.
Q. What changed for Conjurors since the last time I played?
A. If you have to ask, you're pretty far out of the loop. I would advise logging back in, open your spell book, and sort by level (reverse). Most of the spells you use will be within the last 10-15 levels of you.
Q. What are our "fun" spells and where can I get them?
A. Our fun spells are: Illusion Fire Elemental (lvl 20), Illusion Water Elemental (lvl 30), Illusion Air Elemental (lvl 35), Illusion Earth Elemental (lvl 40), Group Illusion Air (lvl 45), and Group Illusion Earth (lvl 50). You can find them all on the Conjuror spell merchant in the South Qeynos Mage Tower.
Q. Where does our armor quest (AQ) start?
A. The Armor Quest for Mages starts in Eldaar Grove, southeast of the monk dojo in a ruined building. It's given by Gildas Cedartree, with a required level of 20 to start. In my opinion, I wouldn't obsess over these quests because they are a royal pain in the butt, and cannot be soloed until the late 20s or early 30s. The gear is fairly good overall, but not as good as Legendary monster drops, and definitely a lot weaker than master crafted gear.
Q. What makes the conjuror special compared to other mages?
A. Mastery of pets, and high / steady damage output.
Conjurors are, by far, the most pet-oriented class in the game, even more-so than Necromancers. A majority of our spells are to aide our pets in some way or another, be it a debuff ability that procs for your pet, a massive pet-based damage spell, or the ability to protect our pet from death itself. All of our targetable buffs can be cast on our pets, turning them into, essentially, a second group member.
Conjurors are also effective damage dealers, usually ranking pretty high on the damage scale. Because our damage is split with our pet, we tend to have much better aggro management than the heavy hitting classes. However, if our pet dies, it also cripples our damage output.
Because we lack the heavy hits of other classes, we're pretty much the "steady damage output" class. Once we get going on a mob, our damage tends to stay very consistent throughout the fight, without having to rely on long-recast spells. We excel at long fights, but can suffer on extremely short fights.
We are also pretty potent at dealing AE damage. Between our fire pets and our abilities, we rank fairly high in this regard.
Q. What's the difference between a Conjuror and Necromancer?
A. There a few major differences between Conjurors and Necromancers.
First, Conjurors are vastly better at dealing AoE damage than Necromancers. While a Necromancer is more adept at taking down monsters one at a time, Conjurors are well known for charging head-first (with their pet of course) into a group of monsters and decimating them all at once. It truly is a sight to behold.
Second, Conjurors get more group-oriented buffs than Necromancers. We have the ability to grant group members a heat-based proc, damage-shield a group member, and sacrifice our pets to heal the group. Necromancers instead get health transfers, a resurrection spell (though not until late in the game), and several other utility and crowd control spells that we lack.
Third, Conjurers deal magic and elemental damage (fire mostly), while Necromancers are noxious based (Disease specifically). This isn't always important, though it is helpful when grouping with a sorcerer. Wizards are elemental based like Conjurors, so the two classes compliment each other quite well; likewise Warlocks are noxious based, which compliments Necromancers quite well.
Fourth, Conjurors are much more pet oriented than Necromancers. A majority of your abilities as a Conjuror center around your pet, whereas a Necromancer relies less on their pet.
Q. Whenever I cast the spell Aqueous Stalker or Roaring Flames, they all get killed before they do much damage... how can I maximize their effectiveness?
A. The fish and fiery pets can take very little damage. sometimes when a mob uses an ability that effects everything in front of it or around it, the pets get killed. The best way to cast this spell is go behind the mob and cast, the pets will stay in back and not take as much if any damage from the mob, leaving your tank to take the damage, you and the pets to do damage. The limited pets won't take damage from frontal AEs, but all-direction AEs will still eat it. The best way to use them is to time their casts between AEs going off, if you can.
Q. Are Conjurors mostly a solo class?
A. No. Forget any ideas about the class from certain other games. A conjuror with pet does not make him a solo only class. This is not to say we aren't a good solo class, we are probably one of the most efficient solo classes in the game, but those solo abilities are what translate into a fantastic groupmate as well. It's not like "certain other games" where the long duration DoT's of necromancers made them a detriment to a groups damage. Here, we have some of the fastest cast times and most consistant damage with outstanding group support... this makes us pretty close to ideal in all playstyles.
Q. Are Conjurors a fun class to play?
A. I've always enjoyed the class, and since the combat revamp I've come to enjoy it even more. There's no way of really telling how much you'll enjoy it; pet classes in this game are quite a bit different than that "other" game so give it a try. You'll know by level 16 or so if a pet class is right for you. Just remember that Conjurors aren't big nukers like the Sorcerers; we cast lots of fast DoT's and use lots of dumbfire pets and spend an inordinate amount of time micromanaging everything. See what you think, it's a great class that has only gotten better the more the game's matured.
Q. Can I become a Conjuror in Freeport, Neriak, or Gorowyn?
A. Nope, Conjuror is only available to the good cities, Qeynos and Kelethin. You will be killed on site with Freeport and Neriak (unless you are in the process of betraying), but Gorowyn residents are mostly indifferent so will tolerate your presence.
Q. What should I be spending most of my money on? Spells, equipment or a combination?
A. Spend every penny you can on upgrading your spells, especially the ones you use the most. For Conjurors (and any mage really) our effectiveness is completely tied to our spells (especially pets, pet buffs and swarm spells). If you have to decide between upgrading your boots or upgrading a spell, the spell wins every time. I'm not saying save all your money for spells only... if you find a jeweler grinding out rings and things, pick them up; just don't concern yourself with keeping all your equipment "new". Don't be afraid to let your equipment /con grey, our AC gains really don't mean alot anyways... our spell power > all.
Q. What stats should I be looking for in my armor upgrades?
A. This can be subjective... my belief is that the desireability order is intelligence > power > stamina > health > resists. If you find an item that is very grey to you but has unbeatable int, use that item instead of the item with high AC but no int or power on it.
Recent updates have made this a very tricky thing to answer.
First you have to realize that in a group, you are a damage dealing class. So therefore your priority should be on dealing damage.
Stat wise, INT is king. The more INT you have, the more damage you deal, and the bigger your power pool. Once you start getting very high in INT (roughly 60% of your level's cap, which is roughly 9 times your level), you get a significant reduction in any INT benefit. But as far as a "stat" goes it's pretty important.
+Spell Damage is a quick and easy way to up your damage output. The cap is 50% of the spell's base damage, after factoring in INT, any +base spell damage effects you wear. Crits and debuffs also increase the cap of Spell Damage. Be warned though, as Conjurors cap our spell damage extremely low compared to all other casters, so as soon as the majority of your spells stop gaining benefits, stop concentrating hard on spell damage and work on other things.
+Critical Spell Rate is another effective way of increasing your damage output. When you crit it's a flat 30% increase to your base damage, and it increases your +spell damage cap (for a crit) as well. So the more you crit, the higher your effective +spell damage cap becomes too.
Other things to watch for are your Power, HP, Resists, Stamina, and any other useful effects.
Q. What race makes the best Conjuror?
A. Erudites, Dark Elves, Gnomes, High Elves, Fae, Arasai, Ratonga make the best Conjurors. Erudites definitely make the best, but other races are a very, very close second. Reason being is that these races have a high starting INT and have the best conjuror-oriented racial traditions.
However, don't make a conjuror's race based on what is "best", because at the end of the day pretty much all deficiencies can be fixed by gear and/or achievement choices.
Q. Aren't Sorcerers better at damage then us? Why should I choose a second-rate DPS'er?
A. Sometimes, the term "best DPS" gets thrown around with little basis in fact. Sorcerers (and predators) can out damage us sometimes, not all the time. In fights lasting longer then 30 seconds, Conjurors start pulling ahead of the pack in regards to top damage output; every second after 30 pushes us further up the DPS chain since most classes cannot keep up with our overall damage and power regen capabilities. This leads us to the difference between burst and sustained damage.
Q. What's the difference between burst and sustained DPS classes?
A. Conjurors (and necromancers/rogues) are a sustained DPS class, Sorcerers and predators are burst damage classes. Burst damage attacks are high damage long recast attacks, those big booms that wizards get. Sustained damage is steady, reliable damage that just keeps adding up the longer you go. A good example of sustained damage is the DoT, a whole bunch of DoT's stacked together and allowed to run their full course are perfect examples of why Conjurors are great in the long fight: our damage is sustained with very little variation and why you will generally see your DPS as always around the same number.
A really nice thing about our style of damage is we aren't horribly effected by resists to our spells: if one of them is resisted, not that big a deal since we've got other stuff running on the mob and we generally have short recast timers (the swarm pets line being the exception). A burst class misses their big hit and they have to wait a while before they can try to do that damage again, meanwhile our slow steady damage has been ticking the whole time.
I'd recommend to anyone to download one of the various combat parsers (I recommend EQCompanion) to see how to maximize your damage output and to prove that we are a high damage DPS class. You don't see the big booms with a Conjuror but the proof is in the pudding at the end of a play session. In a short fight we can't even touch a sorcerer or predator, give us 30 seconds and we move quickly to the top of the heap.
A Conjuror will do alot more damage without drawing the agro than most classes but if any of those pets dies we are in deep poop.
Conjuror Specific Spell Questions
Q. I just came over from EQLive after playing the Mage class, and ...
I know exactly what you're going to say, and I'm stopping you right there.
Repeat after me.
"This is not EQLive."
It's true, Conjurors of EQ2 and Magicians of EQ1 have a lot of similarities. But both classes, and indeed both games, are so radically different from each other that a comparison is impossible. And to say that one class is gimped over the other because "X" spell is missing doesn't hold water either.
Trust me, with this attitude, you'll be a lot happier.
Q. Why can't I stack my concentration buffs?
A. Concentration buffs (just like pet buffs) are meant to be used 'til upgrade, with the old one taken off the spell bar. We aren't meant to stack up our buffs for +100 intelligence or anything like that, you get one buff of each line at a time, and that's it.
Q. I just hit level 51 and didn't get my spell! What the heck is going on?
A. Spells level 51+ are no longer granted automatically, they have to be purchased either from your friendly sage, received as an adept1/master1 spell drop or purchased in Maj'Dul.
Q. What are these special spells level 52/55/58/65 I'm hearing about? I can't find an apprentice spell for these either on the broker or in Maj'Dul.
A. The four spells, Call of the Hero (lvl 52), Frigid Winds (lvl 55), Elemental Vestment (lvl 58), and Plane Shift (lvl 65) cannot be made into apprentice spells nor do any merchants carry the app II. If you want these spells (and you really should want them) you'll either have to find a dropped adept spell or find the adept III recipe and have a sage make it. These just don't come in an apprentice variety, but Elemental Vestment is probably one of the best spells in T6 to upgrade to adept III.
Q. What's the difference between Call of the Hero Adept I, Adept III, and Master I?
A. The difference is that Adept I and Master I are available as monster drops, whereas Adept III is available from a Sage. Functionally there is no difference whatsoever; if you have Call of the Hero Adept I, you don't need Adept III or Master I; besides, that rare would probably be better suited for something else than Call of the Hero. (Since Call of the Hero is not labeled with rank anymore, this question is now relatively moot.)
Q. Where do I find softly glowing pearls?
A. You can find them just about anywhere in town. The cheapest price for them is 1g 20sp each (a stack of 50 softly glowing pearls costs 60g).
Q. What is Swarm of Bats, and where do I get it?
A. Swarm of Bats is a DoT spell from the Bloodline Chronicles, an Adventure pack that came out in February 2005. You can get the Apprentice II spell by completing the quests (starting in Nektulos Forest, at the waterfall), or you can hire a Sage to make the Apprentice IV or Adept III spell scrolls for you. I highly recommend you get the Adept III, since you will be using it even at level 60.
As for details on the spell itself, it's just an ordinary level 35 DoT with a really cool looking graphic associated to it. It is not a swarm pet, as the spell suggests, but rather a DoT, like Static Pulse or Flaming Agony. To date, no spells are considered upgrades to it, so there should be no stacking issues with this spell at all.
There are also upgrades at 53 and 71.
Q. I just harvested a rare, what spell should I upgrade?
This is quite a subjective question. Generally, your priorities should be this order:
Primary pets and Swarm pets
Pet stances
Damage spells
Buffs
Anything else
Q. I just hit level (14/24/34/44/54/64/75), what should I take for a master spell?
A. Generally, you want to pick a spell that will give you the biggest bang for your buck, and last the longest. Compare your spell choices with upcoming upgrades, and the general improvement you will get by picking that Master II over the other choices.
Q. What about other character development choices?
INT, Power Regen, and whichever one of your resists are the lowest.
Q. What's the deal with Achievements?
A. See this thread for a basic primer.
Conjuror Specific Pet Questions
Q. What type of pets do conjurors get?
Conjurors get four pets and two primary pets.
Earth pets are tank pets. They soak up the damage, and hold aggro while you deal the majority of the damage.
Air pets are scout pets. They deal high melee damage to single targets, but little to no AE damage to multiple targets.
Fire pets are mage pets. They deal medium-high damage to single targets, and lots of AE damage to multiple targets.
Water pet is the Hydromancer, a pet you get from achievements. It's a healer pet, dealing almost no damage and doing low-medium healing to the group.
The Aqueous Swarm pets are three water-based swarm pets that deal damage to a single target.
The Pyrotechnic pet is a fire-based pet that deals AE damage to the target encounter.
Q. Which pet should I be using in a group?
A. In general:
The Mage pet works best in longer fights, and against multi-mob encounters. Like us it needs a good amount of time to get its damage ramped up.
The Scout pet works best in quick fights, and against mostly single-target encounters. In fights that last less than 10-15 seconds, the scout pet will vastly out-damage the Mage pet.
Q. What types of damage do my pets do?
A. Pets have four total damage types, sometimes these need to be considered when choosing a pet to use as some mobs are resistant or immune to certain damage types.
* The Tellurian line does crushing autoattack damage and magic special damage
* The Aqueous line does crushing damage
* The Fiery line does crushing damage with heat AoE
* The Igneous line does heat damage
* The Aery line does piercing damage with cold special damage
Q. How do I pull with my pet?
A. Send your pet at a target, let him hit, press backoff. Once the mob is fairly close to you (close enough not to hit you but close enough that your "pull" was successful) hit "pet attack" on that same mob. It used to be much harder then this and why it was in the FAQ, now, it's quite simple.
You can also send your pet, wait for the mob to get aggro on the pet, then cast Call Servant to summon the pet back to you. The mob will usually be angry enough with the pet to continue chasing.
Q. Why won't my pet attack? The mob is right in front of him!
A. One of the more villified changes to pet targeting is the change that keeps pets from attacking anything that you wouldn't be able to attack. What this change did is keep pets from attacking stuff stuck in walls and floors as well as making it so we couldn't pet-pull something a long ways off or obstructed by geography. The change in theory was ok but now if anything is in your pets line of sight (LoS from now on) your pet will give a can't attack message. LoS isn't just walls, it's chairs, rocks, hills... it can be pretty much anything that would either be in the way of your pet running directly to the target or not seeing the target. This can be a real pain in certain zones, but there are workarounds!
1. Pet stay: Park your pet somewhere a little ways off that has clear LoS to where you're pulling to and tell him to stay, works most of the time though it's only good for groups that are camping a location.
2. Tank training: I know, I say it all the time... doesn't make it any less true though. Have your tanks pull mobs right onto your pet and have them jump over the mob to turn it. Doing that will give you and the pet the mobs back while maximizing your damage potential. This is the best option when group dungeon crawling since it works 100% of the time.
3. Run around like a goof trying to get your pet a LoS: Probably the worst option since the pet has such a long follow radius, you have to do alot of running to get him a LoS, possibly bringing adds. Only do this combined with 1 if solo
If your tank won't help you in groups by doing #2 where there is horrid geography, don't give the group the benefit of your pet damage. There are too many risks involved in positioning a pet in a dungeon crawl using method #3; lower DPS is better than a dead group.
Q. Can I name my pet?
A. You betcha! Just right-click your pet, select Pet Options, and in the window set your pet's name.
Q. Can I name all my pets different things?
A. Yes. Each pet can have a different name, and the name will persist even if you switch pets.
Q. Why don't enchanters like Conjuror pets?
A. Our pets have minds of their own, if something hits them, they will hit back. Sometimes when an enchanter is mezzing (mesmorizing a mob, essentially making it as dangerous as a rock) and a pet hits the enchanters target, the mez will be broken adding the previously mezzed mob back to the fight. Pets, however, don't just go willy-nilly, breaking mezzes... they have to be hit to change targets from the one you send them to. Sometimes a pet will break the mez on a target... just how it goes. Generally, it'll just be one target that breaks and you can usually get him to stop once the tank gets that mobs attention so it stops attacking the pet. This is no longer the case, however, a pet set to its default behaviors of protect itself and master will act this way. When grouped with an enchanter or in a raid, your best bet is to set your pet to passive (pet back off) and follow. Pets and enchanters should no longer have the aforementioned problems as long as the pets defaults are turned off (you need to do this every time you zone or summon a new pet).