Originally Posted by Dr Strangelove

It's not as cool as it sounds. Most PBAoE spells have a painful aftercast, so it ends up being more of a "teleport in, cast spell, stand still for 1.5s, cast another spell, stand sti---die" The only spell worth mentioning for this strategy is starburst, which saw some play as a spiky HA gimmick. However, to make it work you need to take 2 shadow step skills. Those 3 slots are generally better used on something else.

Originally Posted by Celestial Beaver

4. Rune Choices

Anyone who's made it this far should have noticed that the attributes for Fire Magic are given as "12 + Headpiece + minor/major/sup Rune". It is customary to attach a Fire Magic rune to your headpiece, to further increase the damage dealt by spells, amongst other things. The choices open to you are:

• A Minor Rune of Fire Magic. This rune gives you +1 in Fire Magic with no downside.
• A Major Rune of Fire Magic. This rune gives you a +2 in Fire Magic at the cost of 35 HP
• A Superior Rune of Fire Magic. This rune gives you a +3 in Fire Magic at the cost of 75 HP

It is advised, particularly for newer players, to avoid the Superior Runes, as the 75 health loss is a lot of health to lose, for what really is a small amount of damage gained. Let's take an example: Fireball deals 112 Fire Damage at 15 Fire Magic, and 119 Fire Damage at 16 Fire Magic. You as a player need to consider yourself whether it is worth losing the additional 40 health (from Major to Superior) for the increase of 7 Fire Damage. Usually the conclusion is this is not worth it.

As ever, there is always an exception to the rule. This exception is Mind Blast. Mind Blast Returns 8 energy at 14 Fire Magic, 9 energy at 15 Fire Magic and 10 energy at 16 Fire Magic. The increase in Energy Gain here makes upgrading to a Superior Rune more worthwhile than with most other builds, moreso when you consider that 18 Fire Magic (given by 16 + 2 from Glyph of Elemental Power) gives you 11 Energy back. In Mind Blast builds, where Mind Blast is the primary energy management device (meaning, it's more important than Fire Attunement), it is important to use Mind Blast to it's fullest, thus making a Superior Rune perfectly viable here, though not a necessity.

Originally Posted by Proff

Energy gain is now the same at 14 as at 16.

Great guide btw.