Any point in playing MAG over NEC?
 

I mean, their DD spells and pets seems only slightly better than necro. And very little better. For example :

Lv 1 : Burst of Flame - 5 damage VS lifetap - 3~5 life drain
LV 24 : Shock of Spikes- 176/1.6 DPM DPM VS Shock of Poison - 1.6 DPM
LV 44 - Shock of Swords - 600 d/2.4 DPM VS Incinerate bones - 500d / 2.38dpm

The strongest DD from MAG deals 1024 damage while NECROs has an freaking lifetap which drains 1100 hp.

The level of pets seems to be merely +1. And the max damage of their pets is not that different. The stronger air elementsl deals 60-68 damage while Emissary of Thule deals 52-61 damage.

And this looking only into Pets and Direct Damage, where MAG are supposed to be the best.

Other huge problem of mage is that they seems to be too restricted into fire with few mag damaging spells and no spells which are harder to resist. And don't get me wrong, I"m not an min maxer, I'm playing as an human necromancer(lv 30 at moment), arguably the worst race for necromancers.

With necromancer there is a lot of pressure to juggle many hats.

The magician’s lack of spells mean you can’t ‘get bullied’ into a more active play style than your comfortable with (assuming you want a fairly hands off experience).

Many magician players in groups seem happy to send pet in at 70% hp. Dump mana into one mob burn and then declare afk. It’s a real struggle to get many of them to even cast their DS.

There is less accountancy too of having to manage your hp / mana / pet hp which necromancers can die from out of combat if absentminded.

If you care about the math and balance and what is stronger in the end.... then the answer is No... play a NEC

Velious timeline is a bad time for MAG, and a pretty good timeline for NEC

My thoughts on MAG (I leveled one to 60, and another to 55 for COTH Bot)

No root or self cast CC on a caster class = Ouch seriously this is the worst..... mage pets are not strong enough to justify this handicap. Sure mages are pretty ez-mode to about level 53 but they start to loose a lot of steam after that... You ever get caught with your pants down and no pet up and get aggro lol just run away or gate all you got! It is so dumb that necromancers get Root and Mages don't lol.

Raid role is required but feels awful (personal opinion) you summon eyes thru walls, or have people anchor for you, summon people, summon pullers back etc, pretty much cast 2 spells COTH and Mod rod is majority of your entire role in raids. I dunno would feel bad to me investing a bunch of gear and stuff into a character just to like.....have the mana to summon a few extra mod rods? 1 or 2 more COTH's? per mana bar.....ugh

No Self-mana = So mages are very mana efficient so long as their pet is doing all the work. Problem is their pets fall off a cliff in 55+ content so their lack of self mana is a real bummer....and when you compare it to NEC (the closest pet class to mage) whos pets are fairly comparable to MAG the lich line just blows MAG out of the water.

Necro twitch is a similar raid role to Mod rods.... So necro raid role if your not pulling and training stuff around, or other strats is similar to MAG you feed clerics mana. But necro twitch is easier in that you just target the cleric directly and cast the spell. MAG rods can be back-loaded with the whole raid keeping rods and dropping them on the ground etc. But ease of use Necro twitch wins in my book.

I am biased cause I usually min/max. But imho you kinda really have to like the class either theme or nostalgia to play a MAG as a MAIN in velious era p99....cause theres armies of MAG bots anyway....

Mage kinda fun in groups, boring class overall. I leveled nine to 60 and basically abandoned it
The necro 1100hp lifetap uses an essence emerald, I have never seen someone cast it outside of pvp

Necros are fun because they offer a wealth of options. Mages are fun because their lack of options let you play (relatively) mindlessly.

Short answer: no

Mages have essentially zero depth.

If you want simple, mage is your answer though. And honestly at 60 if you want to raid competitively at least you can master the art of DA quad kiting in ToV.

What about WIZ? Any point in playing WIZ over NEC? ENC I know that is probably the strongest caster.

No point in playing a wiz unless you want to be a port bitch for a guild.

No point in playing a mage unless you want to wake up one day and realize you wasted one of the ~60 years you have between puberty and dementia.

Getting into different roles and what your personal expectations are...You need to ask yourself what you personally want... If your dead-set on INT casters....

How important to you is.....

Personal power/Solo power?
Theme?
Raid Role?
Solo play (or) Group play?

ENC-Pick this if you are most about Personal power / Solo power. ENC is unquestionably the strongest INT caster in terms of game scaling. However their raid role is often lacking there is some raids they can charm, but may that they just sit around and just buff people and never fight the raid mob at all.

NEC- Pick this if you like personal power, but want a more versatile kit to help other players. CC, Heals, dps, mana feed NEC have a little bit of everything, while still keeping a high level of personal power / solo strength. Although not the absolute min/max that a ENC can be NEC is still a very strong class on its own. NEC is stronger than enchanter when they don't have access to good charms (low level zones, uncharmable mobs etc) NEC can kill things in more varied ways... root rotting, fear kiting, charm, stronger summoned pet) But when charm is available enchanter wins hands down. Has lots of potential raid roles depending on your game knowledge and comfort even entry level just feeding clerics mana is always good

WIZ- Pick this if you want to be lazy and still play at 98% of your potential. Do not pick them if solo power is a big concern of yours. This class is NOTHING in solo strength when compared to NEC or ENC. Their raid role is usually one of two things. DPS or Kite stuff around. As DPS you blow your mana bar until either oom or the NPC is dead and as Kite you spam flux staff and run away to keep adds or other mobs off the raid while they kill the target. Added benefit is you can be anywhere in the game fairly quickly because teleports!

MAG- Pick this if you really like the theme of the class, or your guild really needs more mage bots...Honestly I cannot recommend this class with a straight face unless your just absolutely in love with the idea/theme of this class. Raid role is always needed but so many guilds on p99 have armies of MAG bots because few players want to main a MAG

Maybe not fully up to date with p99 meta but can also consult this class selection guide. Has different rankings for each class for different aspects of the game.

https://wiki.project1999.com/Loraen%...election_Guide

Thanks a lot Foxplay. I will be honest. I made this thread because having powerful spells and powerful servants appeals to me. I created some mags but ended deleting them and playing as an necro(lv 31 at moment), and created this thread only cuz I really wanna to see an good reason to play as an MAG. Like

"IF you conjure the spell A and cast the buff B in the pet, he becomes godlike"

Or "this MAG only item made his spells caster faster, so you can deal a very high DPS"

But considering how my pets die quickly if I don't fear the enemy, +10% survivability from MAG doesn't seems to make a huge difference.