Ice Mastery/Fire Mastery vs Earth Mastery

[Rustbane]

Other than a single point to have a specific elemental damage soak, does anyone pursue Ice or Fire mastery over Earth?

It seems to me that if Earth mastery is going to provide you with a great tank, the others should be at least somewhat usable. I was quite disappointed to discover that fire wasn't ranged as it pretty much charges in and dies reducing its "increased" dps to 0. Earth just seems superior in all aspects.

Any mages find use (beyond the niche damage soak) for the other mastery types?

 

[VDX_360]

In general, Earth Elementals and Iron Golems are viewed as being more versatile and better living shields, which tends to make them better suited as go-to summons for mages. But they come with a higher summon mana cost. In contrast, Fire and Ice Elementals tend to be a more specialized and will require a more durable wizard to be viable.

If you look at the stats for the various elemental, you'll see that the Earth Elementals are more defensive in nature, with decent armor, high resistance (except against poison), decent hit-points and the lowest DPS of the three basic Elemental Types. This makes Earth Elementals more suited for taking the damage while a wizard safely attacks from afar. Iron Golems have a higher DPS than Earth Elementals and are almost immune to everything except ice but serve a similar purpose.

Ice Elementals can take a beating while doing decent damage which can make them a little more useful in attack, but a little less useful as a living shield.

Fire Elementals have the highest DPS of the three elemental types and can really knock out damage. Just don't use them as a living shield as they tend to die too quickly. But if your party has another person to take the damage, i.e. a tanked out Companion, or a really tough mage build, Fire Elementals can add a nice offensive element to a party.

Fire Elementals are obviously the go-to choice when fighting trolls.


Fire Mastery
http://www.exiledkingdoms.com/wiki/inde ... re_Mastery

Ice Mastery
http://www.exiledkingdoms.com/wiki/inde ... ce_Mastery

Easth Mastery
http://www.exiledkingdoms.com/wiki/inde ... th_Mastery

 

[Lolerescut]

Each elemental has its own superior ground for example fire elementals are the most tanky summon in elemental plain in soh and when facing ice enemies like the area near icemist or the ice key area in termedan tower ice elemental are superior but the earth/iron golem tend to be superior everywere because simple everywhere is earth except few place i personally tried having all together which works just fine since sometimes iron golem is useless and dies too fast and u need a tank as fast as possible so other golems take place

 

[Dark Mage Ascended]

In my opinion, the reason Earth Mastery is more useful is because of its versatility. When picking out your skills for your build, you need to ask yourself: "Which of these abilities will be useful in most situations". The reason I max out Lighting while picking no fireball is simple: some monster are vulnerable to shock, others are resistant to it, but virtually no monster heals from shock damage. In fact, the only monster I know of that heals with shock is the Sparkling. Plus, Loghting makes the Ark a walk in the park.
Same thing goes for summoned creatures. Sure, the Fire Elemental will decimate trolls and yetis, but once you find yourself facing Fire Dragons, you suddenly don't have a reliable summon to help you out. Meanwhile, the Earth Elemental is a solid opponent against everything except poison, and from experience, poison is the enemy you'll have to face in the least amount of situations (except shock). Plus, Iron Golems are immune to shock, making the Ark even less challenging.

 

[Argarath]

The problem with Mage is, you have to choose what fit best for most situations, because you can not just reset every time you enter a different environment. That is why Staff/Summoner build with Iron Golem is good, it is straight forward, you can just change staff like a Warrior change weapon. You cannot afford to pick all 3 Golems skills, you have got to choose 1, and the 1 that fitted for most situation

 

[DavidBVal]

You're all looking at it from the perspective of the player that knows it all and picks among skills freely. For the vast majority of players, the Icemist skills are not available until the mid-late game.

But yes, some skills are, overall, better than others. Picking a good development path is part of the game, and that's how I understand how RPGs should be. However the "worse" skills can situationally become very powerful as well; a fire elemental can be truly nice to have in some places.

 

[VDX_360]

For the vast majority of players, the Icemist skills are not available until the mid-late game.

That's a valid point. A mage has to get to Icemist first before having the chance to learn Earth Mastery, which rather pushes it to be a stronger skill.

The NPCs that teache Fire Mastery and ICE Mastery even say they teach "Nothing as fancy as what you can learn at Icemist but still useful." In that train or thought, Ice and Fire are comparable as equals with Earth being a step up. That seems to be the more natural progression.

 

[Shane Ross]

In my opinion, the reason Earth Mastery is more useful is because of its versatility. When picking out your skills for your build, you need to ask yourself: "Which of these abilities will be useful in most situations". The reason I max out Lighting while picking no fireball is simple: some monster are vulnerable to shock, others are resistant to it, but virtually no monster heals from shock damage. In fact, the only monster I know of that heals with shock is the Sparkling. Plus, Loghting makes the Ark a walk in the park.
Same thing goes for summoned creatures. Sure, the Fire Elemental will decimate trolls and yetis, but once you find yourself facing Fire Dragons, you suddenly don't have a reliable summon to help you out. Meanwhile, the Earth Elemental is a solid opponent against everything except poison, and from experience, poison is the enemy you'll have to face in the least amount of situations (except shock). Plus, Iron Golems are immune to shock, making the Ark even less challenging.

Actually， fire elemental are the best meat shield against fire dragons.though their attack heals the dragon, so does dragons attack heal them. FE can stay longer than IG,even the golem is to lv superior to the fire element.
thats why I learned all three summoning skills.
another trick is that when facing enemies like the void lord, any of the three high level elements can stay alive long enough, but I can instantly summoning another one when one is killed.

 

[Lolerescut]

In my opinion, the reason Earth Mastery is more useful is because of its versatility. When picking out your skills for your build, you need to ask yourself: "Which of these abilities will be useful in most situations". The reason I max out Lighting while picking no fireball is simple: some monster are vulnerable to shock, others are resistant to it, but virtually no monster heals from shock damage. In fact, the only monster I know of that heals with shock is the Sparkling. Plus, Loghting makes the Ark a walk in the park.
Same thing goes for summoned creatures. Sure, the Fire Elemental will decimate trolls and yetis, but once you find yourself facing Fire Dragons, you suddenly don't have a reliable summon to help you out. Meanwhile, the Earth Elemental is a solid opponent against everything except poison, and from experience, poison is the enemy you'll have to face in the least amount of situations (except shock). Plus, Iron Golems are immune to shock, making the Ark even less challenging.

Actually， fire elemental are the best meat shield against fire dragons.though their attack heals the dragon, so does dragons attack heal them. FE can stay longer than IG,even the golem is to lv superior to the fire element.
thats why I learned all three summoning skills.
another trick is that when facing enemies like the void lord, any of the three high level elements can stay alive long enough, but I can instantly summoning another one when one is killed.

You stole my precious words of wisdom :cry:

 

[VDX_360]

Summoning several creatures in a row is a tactic in the tougher fights.