AcornStory -- Playing a Post-Ascension Magician

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Welcome to AcornStory, our ongoing feature helping players get started in Maple World everything from choosing a class to finding friends to understanding combat to tips for participating in an online community. MapleStory is easy to learn, but once you learn the basic game mechanics, where do you go and what do you do? Read on to find out!


Playing a Magician -- Post Ascension!

In two previous editions of AcornStory, we discussed choosing an Explorer or choosing a Cygnus Knight. Later, we had an in-depth discussion about the advanced Explorer Magician classes and most recently, we talked about the changes to the Bowman. Even in Maple World, though, time doesnt stand still. Ascension has arrived and things have changed again. In this AcornStory, well discuss whats happening with Explorer and Cygnus Knight Magician types.

Magicians and Blaze Wizards share the same basic designs. Both are classic glass cannon classes, a tongue-in-cheek reference to a class that has the potential to do enormous amounts of damage with the trade-off of being incredibly fragile. Indeed, MapleStorys magician types wear even lighter armors than Bowmen and most can take very few hits before dying. That much has not changed. Any kind of party function you fulfilled as a Magician pre-Ascension, you should be able to do so post-Ascension.

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Changes for Magicians

The greatest change for post-Ascension Magicians is that they will finally live up to their billing. One of the key problems the team found when evaluating this class was that at lower levels, they simply did not have enough damage-dealing power relative to monsters on their own level. This often made leveling a magician an exercise in frustration. As such, the team found that not many skills actually had to be removed. Instead, existing Magician skills were amplified in power or their level requirements were lowered. The new skills that Magicians now possess are mostly designed to remove monster defenses and make it possible for more damage to actually get through.

The net result of these changes will be to open up more of the world to effective exploitation by Magician classes. Rather than heading to those few areas where they were guaranteed easy kills, Magician players will find the character more solo friendly at all levels and in many more regions.



Basic Explorer Magician Skills

Changed Skills

Energy Bolt: The damage inflicted has been increased.

Magic Claw: The maximum number of targets has been increased.

Job Advancement

Once a Magician reaches level 30, they have the opportunity to begin to specialize in their chosen class. This is called a "job advancement." For Magicians, that means they can choose to follow the path of the Fire/Poison Wizard, the Ice/Lightning Wizard, or the Cleric. The Fire/Poison Wizards abilities revolve around the ability to inflict massive damage via fire spells or do damage over time using poison.

As might be expected, the Fire/Poison Wizard is one of the most powerful damage dealers in the game. The Ice/Lightning Wizard can also deal out great damage, but their greatest contribution is their ability to stun and freeze creatures as well as attack large groups. Clerics, on the other hand, have a comparatively low damage output, but have spells that can heal and buff their companions. Blaze Wizards are similar to their Fire/Poison counterparts, though theyre even more specialized as damage dealers.






Fire/Poison Wizard (Explorer)

The path of the Fire/Poison Wizard is one of destruction. You exist to blast enemies into oblivion, either quickly through the liberal application of flame, or over time through the use of poisons. After Ascension, Fire/Poison Wizards will find that all of their damage dealing spells have become more powerful, particularly their poison skills. Moreover, various skills now help the Fire/Poison Wizard bypass monsters defenses, making more of the world a potential hunting ground.


Post-Ascension Fire/Poison Wizard Skills

High Wisdom (2nd Job): Permanently raises the Fire/Poison Wizards INT by up to 40.

Burning Magic (3rd Job): Increases the duration of all damage-over-time attacks. Also increases the damage dealt when one of your spells strikes a monster that has already been stunned, frozen, affected by a damage-over-time attack, hit by a darkness effect, or paralyzed.

Mist Eruption (3rd Job): A passive effect that increases the amount of damage done by Poison Mist. Can also be used as an active effect to cause Poison Mists on the playfield to explode.

Arcane Aim (4th Job): Causes other spells cast by that wizard to ignore 20% of a monster's defense.



Ice/Lightning Wizard (Explorer)


The Ice/Lightning Wizard also uses lightning effects to deal out significant amounts of damage, though nowhere near as much as their Fire/Poison brethren. The Ice/Lightning Wizards primary function though, is crowd co