I was lucky enough to get the Best in Slot item for Arcane Shell, Robes of White Wylla. How should I build around this for multiplayer? I could buy a second Mindsplinter Staff from Randimar's this week, and have the maximum five Obliterating Spark, but what's the best multiplayer party to go with a lightning wizard? I'm currently over 1500 so it needs to be at least somewhat competitive, but don't have any experience with that kind of character. Any help would be appreciated!
Best direct spell damage builds I've seen used Unholy Wellspring so you might want to look into that. But as a general rule I think that damage dealing wizards are pretty weak in Card Hunter. Control wizards are much more versatile and effective imo.
SLG is right on both counts. If you want to try damage wizards, back them up with a priest loaded up on as much Unholy Wellspring as possible (you'll need Axe Of The Dark Soul to make it worthwhile). However, having played this build quite a bit myself, you'll lose to aggressive warrior builds because they have higher damage output. It only works well on maps with very long line of sight, such as Heart of the Mountain.
Isn't Arcane Shell worse than Arcane Aura? Unless there is some way to break the added damage to non-damaging magic cards, why not play something like Cotton Wizard Robes that adds 2 damage instead of 1? I had the whole spark inductor/arcane aura buff thing going for a while, but wizards are attractive targets and it is likely that you will lose the aura from getting attacked. It's nice for a turn or two but then it gets dropped after it soaks very little damage, plus it takes up a card slot for the 2 you save each turn. It's therefore inferior to buffs that attach to your character like mass frenzy, blind rage, etc. It's nice to deal double digits of damage with a wizard, but I was just underwhelmed the Arcane shells & auras. Unholy Wellspring seems like a better route.
Do you have four copies of Rod Of Winds and one Tempest Robes or Witchy Robes? I wonder whether a build using 9 Whirlwind Enemies, comboed with Unholy Wellspring and Savage Curse priest and a step warrior would work? You could at best deliver 8 damage to all enemies at one hit while throwing them around. You'd need to avoid using the four Whirlwind cards unless it would be OK to hit your own team also. On paper this would be an hit-only-enemies Firestorm build. It would probably not be very reliable to pull off, but maybe it'd make for a nasty surprise for an opponent or a funny novelty build.
I love amplifying wiz damage with Savage Curse but the OP wants to build around Arcane Shell so it won't synergize well, Unholy Wellspring is the best route to go here.
Oh yeah, right, Savage Curse would discard the Arcane Shell. Silly me for not noticing that. Just 4 damage a pop, then, for Whirlwind Enemies and other zero damage cards. Makes the whole deal less attractive. It has some novelty value, I guess. I wonder if two Arcane Shell/Whirlwind Enemies wizards supported by an Unholy Wellspring priest would work well enough to be worth a run. The two Robes Of White Wylla required make it a paper-only build for practically everybody, though, a test server pipe dream.
Thinking about it more, no, the 2x wizard 1x priest wouldn't work, you'd land opponent killers next to your wizards soon enough with the constant tornadoes. It would maybe barely work with only one wizard.
Er... does Arcane Shell really add damage to non-attack spells? (It does say "spells" rather than "attacks", but does that mean it would add damage to, say, healing spells too?) Also, WWE isn't an attack spell, so it won't be affected by Savage Curse or Unholy Wellspring.
oh hey, that's interesting. It's only on mage robes, so it doesn't get to interact with healing spells without battlefield training shenanigans. I'll test some things out next time I get the chance
I would recommend that you fit in at least 2 Flanking Move on your wizard, and if you don't have another wizard to support you, you should also consider running 1 Staff Of Winter instead of a Mindsplinter staff. Arcane items generally don't do much in the damage department (except for Big Zaps) but I would recommend some Locket Of The Gale or Greenstone Pendant for a slot or two and then Blasting Rod or even Copper Zapping Wand for tokenless slots. With those wonderful Arcane Shells I can't help but recommend a Dark Soul priest for maximum card draw and Wellspring. Priest is loaded up with 2X Axe of the Dark Soul, 7th circle charm, charcoal talisman or 2nd circle charm. That will give you 6-7 Wellspring and up to 5 Demonic Power. A Human priest should use Advanced Flexibility; those Leadership are great for discarding short ranged attacks or move cards and loading up on more damaging spells. This priest worked well for me when combined with 2 warriors/wizards. The priest is definitely useless in battle, but if you can load up your wizard with cards and Wellspring, you can do craptons of damage. You might consider some items with more Team Heal/Healing pulse on the priest instead of Demon Charms.
Yes. I used Arcane Shell for a while in SP, e.g. Winds Of War deliver 2 damage with it on the wizard. The full card text is "Add 1 damage to any Magic cards you play." so if a card has the keyword Magic on it, it will now do damage. For example, Minor Heal has the keyword Magic on it. That's a very good point, thanks. Whirlwind Enemies + Arcane Shell is a total no go, then.
Looking at the card texts, it doesn't. Haven't tried it. (Sorry, I'm mixing things up.) I think Arcane Shell should add 1 damage to Whirlwind Enemies as the latter is a Magic card. Haven't tried that specifically.
Wait, I'm confused. Does it or doesn't it? The text of Arcane Shell indicates that it should add damage to anything with the keyword Magic, even though that seems a little bit silly. I've never played with or against it, so I can't say what it actually does. Here's part of its entry in the cards file: Code: DamageAddComponent,attackType=Magic add=1 It looks like you can only add damage to an attack card, so it doesn't affect WWE.
That's not what "attackType=Magic" means. The same file has that phrase also for e.g. Mind Leak, which has the text "Whenever you take damage, you discard your oldest Magic card." We know it discards any Magic card, not just Attacks. Therefore, Arcane Shell adds damage to any Magic card.
Well, guess what? I just tested this in single player. Arcane Shell DID NOT ADD DAMAGE to Whirlwind Enemies. According to the card text it should. Is this a bug in the card function or the card text? Arcane Aura has the text "Add 2 damage to any damaging Magic card you play." Arcane Shell has the text "Add 1 damage to any Magic cards you play." Even though the texts are very different, the cards still behave the same. They add damage to damaging Magic cards, but Arcane Shell does not add it to Whirlwind Enemies even though it should.
