Magic Returning Strats

[vastin]

I'm trying to figure out some strategies for dealing with magic returning elites as a non-celestial/demon caster.

Elemental Lord is the only class that offers any respite, but you have to devote a huge number of AP to piercing to give you a modest chance of surviving your own spell return and the benefit comes too late to be of any use to the caster who needs some kind of effective return/immune attack strategy by level 2. Right now the correct answer seems to be to keep your speed high, and stay near stairways.

Fighter by comparison can buy a return defeating ability at lvl 1, and any branded weapon allows them to deal with physical immune enemies reasonably until they can pick up Elemental Strike, which deals with that problem more or less permanently.

Life blast is the only other spell effect that seems like it might deal with magic returners, mainly because it's guaranteed not to one-shot you and you can try to heal in-between salvos.

Then of course, there's the magic immune/physical returner, but those don't show up until at least lvl 25 or so, by which time the caster has more options. They are also a rare combination, so if you have to flee the level when one shows up it's not that big a deal.

My final strategy as a caster dealing with returners would just be to jam up my alchemy to 40 (plus a few leveled items to boost it to 50 or so) and then max out a resist ASAP so I could safely blast away in that category. Still that's 8 level worth of alchemy, and you need to keep your other skills up, so that's not going to happen till at least 20th or so.

[Variaz]

One strategy would be to ressort to summoning monsters. That's perhaps the best option. Keep some backup items that boosts charisma and leadership a bit, and when you meet the magic returner, wear them, then summon a couple of monsters and let them do the job. You could also use damaging fields if you found the books, though they don't appear until later.

If you have alchemy, making a gear of resistance against one element is another option. If you have Alchemy 100 for example, you could make about 5 items with 20% resistance to a specific element, thus making you immune to it.

Alteration has "Magic Resistance" spell. Creating a 100% resistance spell for, let's say, 2 turns, will cost 1100 mana at Alteration 100(a bit less if you also have School Focus: Alteration). This is more for a specialized, Int-based Alteration mage though, but it will work.

[vastin]

Summoning is pretty worthless right now - ESPECIALLY against returners. A summoned monster that is hit by its own returned attack seems to register that as a hit from YOU, and turns on you immediately. Needless to say, its also far far too expensive to use at low level, unless you rely entirely on the bugged Jindar Guards, which is basically an exploit.

Everything else you're talking about isn't available until well into the mid-levels. You'll have died dozens of times by then, as magic returners are a dime a dozen. Life Blast sounds like the only really viable option so far, and it is a very slow way to kill something for builds that normally depend on overwhelming offense for their survival. I'll give that a shot tho - at least it is available immediately.

[Gando]

Run like hell and be prepared to die constantly is my only good advice...Everything else is flawed as you said...but thats the nature of Port.

[Variaz]

Magic Returners were meant to give magic users trouble. And they do that pretty well. ;D I guess at low levels, there's not many alternatives, so it's better to run.

But really, summoned monsters aren't that bad, as least not the melee ones. For me, I never had the problems you guys mentions where they turn against you. Besides, it's not like it's going to be your main offensive method if you're an elemental mage. It's just used in case of magic returning.