Antimagic...

[Hunter]

I've decided to really and seriously devote myself to an antimagic build. I went with a Yeek berserker (considered wyrmic, but I also decided to devote myself to a serious melee build as well.) I never had much success with antimagic characters before, and found the tree itself extremely underwhelming (even doing all that damage with Mana Clash never seemed to be particularly helpful toward the endgame, when I'd have a half-dozen or more powerful spellcasters and rares attacking at once) and the lower-level resistance/protection powers always struck me as almost useless when (once again) I'd have multiple damage types, often for hundreds of points, hitting me all at once. My conclusion was that I must be playing it all wrong, since others have obviously had great success with the field. Can anyone 1) give some advice? (I'm at level 25, need to clear Dreadfall, and just starting to develop the tree) and 2) give me some idea of antimagic's effects over and above the specific talents available in the tree? Thanks.

[laru]

The key to success with antimagic lies in the second skill tree you get from zigur: the fungus tree (you did beat Urkis and talked to protector Mysil afterwards, did you?); more specifically, the 3rd skill in antimagic tree and the 1st and 3rd skill in fungus tree have an amazing synergy together, in my opinion even better than Aegis tree (shields can be dispelled).

How it actually works: Antimagic Shield eats away on the elemental damage you receive, but rises your equilibrium, which at some point makes the shield fail. Now, the 3rd skill of fungus (whatsitsname?) makes regeneration effects lower your equi while making the use of regeneration infusions (almost) instant, and the 1st one lenghtens the duration of your regens. So you put 2 good regen infusions to autocast, and have practically constant regen + equi lowering while having antimagic shield up. Everything else AM is just icing on the cake.

Note that wyrmics have the fungus tree from start and high mindpower - but on the over hand, they do a lot of other stuff that rises equi, so pure warriors investing in willpower often get better mileage from their antimagic shield.

Second note: if you're going that road - warrior with high willpower - take a good look at the Superpower and Spell Feedback -prodigies.

[AIAndy]

The Antimagic Shield also works well in combination with a Mindslayer which has some other shields that eat up a part of each elemental attack and it all adds up (although you really lack generic points when you go that way as Mindslayer).

[Hunter]

Thanks for the insight. I, well, died horribly from a rare horror...twice, because I was just too stubborn to abandon the fight...but I'll be trying again soon and working with this advice. Better that way anyhow, since I hadn't planned ahead for allocating points in Fungus with my berserker. Considering going antimagic with a solipsist that's been sitting around unplayed for a few days, but we'll see.

Just to be clear, what is the effect of having antimagic itself? I recall something about how having multiple antimagic items stacked, which implies that just possessing antimagic has an effect on gameplay, but I'm not clear on the mechanics.

[bricks]

Antimagic-powered items have a chance of interrupting any spells you cast, including runes. There isn't a specific bonus for using said items after completing the antimagic quest, but there isn't any downside, either.

[Hunter]

So it doesn't affect anybody else's spells, just your own?

[AIAndy]

Antimagic-powered items have a chance of interrupting any spells you cast, including runes. There isn't a specific bonus for using said items after completing the antimagic quest, but there isn't any downside, either.

There are several arcane-disrupting artifacts that get stronger when you have antimagic.

[greycat]

The whole "arcane disrupting gear" thing is quite horribly under-documented right now. If anyone knows which artifacts are affected, in what ways, please speak up.

[AIAndy]

The whole "arcane disrupting gear" thing is quite horribly under-documented right now. If anyone knows which artifacts are affected, in what ways, please speak up.

They usually mention in the flavor text that they are stronger for antimagic. But similar to the items that have more or less value for certain races (e.g. the halfling foot thingy that increases luck for all but reduces luck for halflings) you only see the true value when you equip it.

[supermini]

The whole "arcane disrupting gear" thing is quite horribly under-documented right now. If anyone knows which artifacts are affected, in what ways, please speak up.

Out of the ones I encountered:

Gaping Maw, t5 2h weapon.

Witch Bane, t5 1h weapon.

Breath of Eyal, t5 light armour.

Guidance, t5 light source.

Blightstopper, t5 shield.

As for the actual effects, you'd have to dig through the code, as I can't list it off the top of my head.

[Robsoie]

So the antimagic improvement can only happen to a very few artifacts ?
Disapointing as i hoped that there was at least some boost for non artifact antmagic powered items.

[supermini]

So the antimagic improvement can only happen to a very few artifacts ?
Disapointing as i hoped that there was at least some boost for non artifact antmagic powered items.

The effects are very nice on all those artifacts.

I think witch bane gets mana clash on hit, gaping maw does even more damage, breath of eyal gets resist all bonus...

[PureQuestion]

Blightstopper only has its bonuses next version:

+15% arcane res, +5% blight res, +50% poison immunity, +15% disease immunity.

[Hunter]

The key to success with antimagic lies in the second skill tree you get from zigur: the fungus tree (you did beat Urkis and talked to protector Mysil afterwards, did you?); more specifically, the 3rd skill in antimagic tree and the 1st and 3rd skill in fungus tree have an amazing synergy together, in my opinion even better than Aegis tree (shields can be dispelled).

How it actually works: Antimagic Shield eats away on the elemental damage you receive, but rises your equilibrium, which at some point makes the shield fail. Now, the 3rd skill of fungus (whatsitsname?) makes regeneration effects lower your equi while making the use of regeneration infusions (almost) instant, and the 1st one lenghtens the duration of your regens. So you put 2 good regen infusions to autocast, and have practically constant regen + equi lowering while having antimagic shield up. Everything else AM is just icing on the cake.

Note that wyrmics have the fungus tree from start and high mindpower - but on the over hand, they do a lot of other stuff that rises equi, so pure warriors investing in willpower often get better mileage from their antimagic shield.

Second note: if you're going that road - warrior with high willpower - take a good look at the Superpower and Spell Feedback -prodigies.

Okay, I'm now running a wyrmic and putting a couple pretty good regen runes on autocast with heavy investment in the fungal tree, and, yeah, that's pretty awesome. I just blew through Daikara without so much as a moment of nervousness. I spent most of my time just leaning on the directional keys with a relatively mediocre weapon until I found Drake's Bane on level 4. I'd heard about the usefulness of the tree before but never fully appreciated it until now (mainly because I rarely use autocast because it's led to some sticky situations on previous characters.) I haven't gotten antimagic yet (and haven't decided for certain that I will) but I can definitely see the point of getting antimagic with a class that doesn't get fungus from the start. Thanks again for the help.

[Sirrocco]

I'm not certain, but I believe that at one point wearing even generic antimagic gear could cause spell failure in your foes, if you were AM. I could have sworn I'd seen that occur a time or two.