Birth to Badassery - A Conjuror's Guide

[Banditman]

Introduction

This is a guide to life as a Conjuror. How to get to the upper end of the game where things happen and how to survive once you get there. If you are thinking of rolling as a Conjuror, read this first. It will help you decide if this is the class and style you will enjoy.

First things first, you need to understand what a Conjuror is and is not. A Conjuror is a DPS class. This means you are going to be competing with Predators, Rogues, Sorcerers and other high DPS classes for a place in the end game content. It doesn't really matter "what" your end game might be - Heroic or Raid - people expect Conjurors to provide high damage first and foremost. While Conjurors do have some utility, you will not be brought to a group for that utility.

So, that's what you want, right? If you are looking for a primary utility class, this is not the class for you. You want to be a DPS class that can compete with the big guns, and also bring some decent utility to your group at times, right? Right?!?! Ok, good. Keep reading.

Editors note: I am assuming for the length of this guide that the player has all expansions, including the somewhat dubious AoD "expansion". I am not personally a fan of that "expansion", but for the new player / character, it offers some things that make life a lot easier.


Starting the Journey

Alright, roll your character. Conjurors are one of the few classes that are still considered "Good only", thus your options are somewhat more limited. You'll have to start out in either Greater Faydark (Kelethin) or Frostfang Sea (New Halas). I personally find New Halas to be the better starting experience among the choices available.

Race is largely irrelevant but one thing you might want to do is choose a race with the Track ability. Those races aren't always the best "natural" Mages, however, having that ability is unbelievably helpful during the process of leveling up. Whatever tiny amount of effectiveness you might sacrifice will be paid over a hundredfold when you can track down exactly what you are looking for with ease.

Let me go ahead and make one quick plug for the Kerran race. It gives you not only Track, but also Safe Fall, a physical mitigation racial tradition and an INT racial tradition. Kerrans aren't the perfect Mage, but they are pretty close. A Kerran Conjuror would have a lot of versatility that the more traditional race such as Erudite may not.


As you go . . .

While leveling, you will periodically gain access to various traits and options on your Character Development page. Keep careful track of when these become available. Make sure you are taking full advantage of them as they open up.

Of note, some "less than obvious" advice here.

Whenever you get an attribute (STR/STA/AGI/INT/WIS) choice, you'll want to take STAMINA. I know. Intelligence is available, and it helps your damage. During the course of leveling, the extra HP will serve you far better than the Intelligence will. At end game, if your end game is raiding, the extra HP will be non negotiable. Take the Stamina. Really.

You'll also get options for different resistances as you level. Don't be tempted to seek out something you feel is weak on your character. Take Physical Mitigation at every single opportunity. Don't even debate it. Take the mitigation and be thankful.

There is also a section consisting of four choices at various levels: Health Regen, Max Health, Power Regen, Max Power. Take Max Health at every single opportunity.

There are racial traditions available on this page as well, and since I have no idea what race you'll choose, I can only give you general guidance here. If there is an opportunity to take Physical Mitigation, take it. If there is an opportunity to take Max Health, take it. After that, it's really hard to say what might work out best.

One final note here. As a Conjuror, at L14 you will have the opportunity to choose a Grandmaster spell. It is terribly important to you that this choice be Defensive Haven. Don't be tempted by anything else at this level. Take Defensive Haven. The reasons will become more clear at a far later time, but, it will help you considerably now, and in the end as well.


Let's get to it

For the first 19 levels, I highly recommend that you do not aquire a mercenary. Especially for a new player, you need to spend this time getting familiar with your character and your pet. Learning how to make your pet do what you want it to do, when you want it to do it, is a huge part of being an effective Conjuror. Believe me when I tell you, many Conjurors don't get it. Don't be that player.

We'll start with some basic things.

Get your pet window up and learn to pay attention to it. The first time you summon your pet, the window should appear automatically. If it doesn't, by default, ALT-P will bring it up. Position that window so you can track it and use it.

Now, right click on your pet and select "Pet Options". You'll see various different buttons there, and you'll want to turn most of them off. The one you want to be SURE remains ON is the "Follow" button. Just mouse over them. Pet Protect Self and Pet Protect Master need to be turned OFF.

Yes, it seems counter intuitive, but believe me, your pet is wayyyyyyy too dumb to make those sorts of decisions on it's own. Once you've made those changes to default behaviors, cancel your pet and resummon it to make sure that the changes take effect from that point forward.

Now, from the pet window, drag the Red "Pet Attack" button to a convenient place on your hotbar, and likewise, drag the Green "Pet Back Off" button to the hotbar as well. Speaking of hotbars, you'll probably want to go ahead and open at least four of them total. That will likely be enough as you level, though you may need more in the end game.


Your first AA's

You should start getting these at L10, and initially, they'll come really fast. I recommend, for your first 5 AA's, choosing: Possess Minion, Transference, Shadow Step, Animated Dagger and Shockwave - in that order.

Possess Minion is not really useful, but is required to go further. Transference gives you a way to heal yourself or an ally by transferring health from your pet. It's on a long'ish recast, but, having a heal available can save a life - usually yours. Shadow Step gives you a way to be absolutely sure your pet gets on top the enemy quickly. Animated Dagger gives you another damage spell at a time when you don't have very many available, and Shockwave gives your pet the ability to collect aggro on a bunch of enemies all at once. Read each of them and understand what they do, these are going to be important abilities to you early on.

Next, swap over to your Conjuror page, and drop 5 points each into Enhance: Crystal Blast, Enhance: Fiery Annihilation and Enhance: Heal Servant. All told, these 20 AA points will give you really good bang for your buck at this early stage.

Leveling Slowly versus Burning

I am still a big proponent of level slowly and aquiring the AA as you go. I've done it both ways, and there are definitely advantages and disadvantages to each. I am convinced that you learn a lot more about your character by leveling slowly and earning your AA's as you level up. Veteran players may not need this period of growth, especially if their understanding of game mechanics is high. New players absolutely need this time to come to terms with "how things work".

For the new player, I recommend setting the AA slider to 80% XP goes into AA. It definitely slows down your raw leveling speed, but, you are a FAR more powerful character at every stage. This allows you to make mistakes and learn without spending a lot of time working off XP debt.


Questing versus Grinding
This is another conversation that is not "one size fits all". For players with fewer than 5 characters at level cap, you're going to be better off questing your way upwards. This is to say, when you go to a zone, find and complete every quest you possibly can. I *highly* recommend going to eq2i.com and searching for "Solo Timeline". It's an invaluable resource for locating and completing quests appropriate for your level.

As you have more characters at the level cap, there will come a point where simply slaughtering mobs will get you to the higher levels faster. The number of characters varies depending on the character you are currently playing. If you are leveling a character that kills slowly, that number will be higher, say around 5 to 7 capped characters. For a fast killing character, say a Berserker or Shadowknight, that number is probably lower, say 4 or 5 characters at cap.

If you are reading this guide, chances are you are a newer player, and you're probably going to be better off using that Solo Timeline and working your way up via the quests available.


Mercenaries

Mercenaries are NPC's that you can hire to come along with you and help you do "things". They come in many shapes, sizes and functions. It would seem that the common wisdom is that you grab a healer mercenary to keep you alive. Common wisdom is pretty fail.

Meet your new best friend, Jennis Proudhilt. Jennis is a L90 Paladin who will happily mentor down to your level and help you out. We like Jennis. He can be found in Qeynos Harbor outside the inn. Just ask one of the helpful guards where to find Jennis.

When you hire Jennis, he will pop up another window that looks remarkably like your pet window. Despite the fact that Jennis creates a group with you, he acts very much like a second pet. As with your pet, I recommend putting his "Attack" and "Back Off" buttons on a convenient hotbar and using them liberally. Jennis was not blessed with much in the way of brains. Poor thing.

As I said earlier, I recommend you wait until Level 20 before you hire Jennis. You really, really need to get a good handle on your pet before you try juggling what amounts to two pets.

Additionally, level 20 is also where you get your first true DPS oriented pet, Fiery Magician. This is where you really start to see the Conjuror turn into a DPS class. While this pet definitely puts out more damage than your Earthen Avatar, he is squishier than an overripe tomato. Thus, at L20, you pick up Jennis, who is NOT squishy and let him to all the tanking while you and your pet do all the killing. It's a win / win situation.

Because Jennis is mentored, he will probably NEVER need heals in the course of doing solo con mobs. He's just awesome that way. However, if you are doing Heroic content, having Transference can sometimes be super helpful. One good heal is usually enough to get Jennis through all but the worst of pulls.


Mid-game leveling

From level 20 to level 49, you're going to find the going pretty easy, especially if you've followed my advice and set your slider to 80%.

It's here that I'd like to call your attention to a few spells in that level range which are noteable for either their usefulness, or uselessness. I am only hitting high points here, I strongly encourage you to carefully read each spell as you aquire it and understand what it does for you.

Flameshield is aquired at L20. This spell should be cast on whichever member of your group is supposed to be taking damage from enemies. If you have Jennis as a tank, the spell should go on him. If your pet is tanking, your pet should have the spell. I will laugh at you if I see you with the spell on yourself. Read the spells. Please.

Aqueous Swarm is a limited summoning spell aquired at L24. Delete this spell and all subsequent upgrades from your hotbars as soon as they appear. The mechanics of the game have marginalized and forgotten these pets, and your time is far better spent casting other spells.

Aery Hunter is a pet summoning spell aquired at Level 32. Delete this spell and all subsequent upgrades from your hotbars as soon as they appear. There was a time when Aery Hunter was useful. It was a long time ago.

Roaring Flames is a limited summoning spell aquired at L35. Delete this spell and all subsequent upgrades from your hotbars as soon as they appear. The mechanics of the game have marginalized and forgotten these pets, and your time is far better spent casting other spells.

Sacrifice is a spell that will soon have an opportunity to be useful in the very end game. To you, the leveling Conjuror, this spell is not useful. Stick it on an out of the way hotbar just so you don't forget it exists. You won't use it until end game, and then not until after LU63 brings us the new Prestige AA's.

Stoneskin is a get out of jail free card for yourself. It lowers your hate with enemies around you and gives you three "free" hits that will do no damage to you. It can be upgraded with AA points in the Conjuror tree to give those same free triggers to your pet. Good choice.

Vehement Skin is similar, but for your pet only, but more importantly, VS *only* works against *physical* attacks. Thus, if an enemy casts a heat based spell at your pet, it will *not* be blocked by Vehement Skin.

Masters Intervention is aquired at L48. This short duration buff goes on your pet when cast. If, while the buff is on them, your pet happens to die, the pet is instead healed and the buff removed. It's basically a death prevent for your pet. Learn to love it.


Power Shift

At Level 50, there is a significant range of 15 levels where the strength of the Conjuror grows at a prodigious rate due to some unique abilities we aquire therein. I'll run these down real fast, and you watch for them to pop on your bar as you level up and then use them accordingly.

The difference in power between a L49 Conjuror and a L65 Conjuror is amazing.


Blazing Avatar (L50) - This spell should be cast every single time it's up, as soon as it's up. Whether your pet is hitting something or taking hits, Blazing Avatar makes him much more deadly. Each hit he takes, or each hit he makes (spell or melee) triggers a large reactive damage proc on the enemy. This is, by a long shot, one of the Conjurors most effective spell lines, and L50 is where it starts.

Winds of Velious (L55) - This spell is, ostensibly, a DoT (Damage over Time) spell. One of the more important aspects however is it's effect on the movement speed of your target. As in, once this spell lands, your target can barely move at all. What's better, the snare effect is not breakable. Once snared, your target is stuck for the duration barely able to move.

Elemental Unity (L58) - This spell is another of the more effective spell lines available to a Conjuror. Even against a single target, the damage results of this spell are better than most of our other spells. Against a group of mobs, this spell can really bring the serious pain. Elemental Unity is a work of cooperation between you and your pet. With Elemental Unity running, every time you cast a spell, a buff is put on your pet. With this buff on your pet, the next time your pet attacks, damage is done to every member of the target encounter. Every time the pet attacks, the buff is dispelled, thus, you have to continually cast spells to keep putting the buff back on your pet as he uses it for the duration of Elemental Unity.

Plane Shift (L65) - This spell turns your pet into a wtfpwnbbqmobile. It's on a huge recast timer, so is best saved for really difficult encounters, but seriously, at level, your pet will become a freaking monster. The best way to see it is just to cast it and watch. This spell loses some of it's "Oomph" as you get higher and higher in levels, but even at the end game, you'll still be casting this periodically to elevate the value of some other abilities.

[Banditman]

Some AA noteables and AA leveling targets

Editors note: Keep in mind that these targets and specs are specifically for the process of leveling up. End game specs and abilities are covered later.
These targets will help you decide whether you need to alter your AA slider from the 80% you started out with. You *did* slide it right? If you have too few AA's, you'll probably want to push the slider up to 90+. If you have more, perhaps drop it back to 75%.


L50, 100 AA's. Click here to see a sample AA configuration. You've got the Summoner INT line to help your pet produce more DPS through faster casting, and the STR line to allow you and your pet to occasionally critically hit a mob. On the Conjuror tree, you have most of what used to be the Evocations line, as well as the Stoneskins Expertise ability to give you even more ways to prevent damage on your group. You've also begun investment in the Shadows tree, but aren't really getting a lot out yet, just filling some pre-requisites for future use. Shadows tree unlocks at 50, so you'll basically be sitting on 10 unused AA's at L49 waiting for the ding.

L65, 140 AA's. Click here to see a sample AA configuration. By this point we've gotten into Shadows pretty good. Noteably, we now have Dimensional Storage. This ability is a toggle. You cast it while you have a pet, and the pet disappears. You then cast another pet for use. If that pet dies during combat, you simply click Dimensional Storage again, and the pet you stored earlier pops up ready to go. We're still limited in the first two trees, but we've built a good base.

L70, 170 AA's. Click here to see a sample AA configuration. Level 70 gives us a lot more flexibility in the first two trees, unlocking an additional 20 points in each. That allows us to grab the rather valuable Reanimate. This spell is a buff for your pet that lasts until your pet dies. When your pet dies, Reanimate triggers and instantly brings it back to life. Very useful. We also grabbed a sizeable chunk of Minion's Attention. This ability helps your Mage pet stay low on the hate list, or helps your Fighter stay high on the hate list. Good stuff. We also dropped more points into our heal spell now. The hits are getting bigger, so we need bigger heals to compensate. In the Conjuror tree we added some upgrades for Plane Shift and Elemental Unity.

L80, 226 AA's. Click here to see a sample AA configuration. This is another one of those watershed moments in the life of a Conjuror. In Elemental Toxicity, you gain the most important group DPS buff in your arsenal. It's freaking amazing against groups of mobs. As good as Elemental Unity is, Elemental Toxicity works for the whole group. Those two abilities in combination against a large group of mobs is just devastating . . . for the mobs. You also get what will become your largest source of damage in longer fights, Elemental Blast. This ability must be used with caution. Hate from it is attributed to your pet, and will often make him public enemy #1. Thus, one of the reasons we went ahead and worked on Minion's Attention earlier. In addition to those two huge abilities, you also picked up two spells for your pet: Blazing Conjuration and Elemental Fury. These will be two of his biggest sources of damage going forward. Finally, you also picked up the under appreciated Runes of Geomancy. This is a buff that gives any member of your group who is being attacked in melee combat a chance to proc a stoneskin on himself. It works very much like Percussion of Stone from a Dirge (and incidentally, does NOT stack with Dirge) or Unyielding Benediction from a Templar (which it DOES stack with).

L90, 280 AA's. Click here to see a sample AA configuration. This is basically your "I just hit L90 spec." Most of this step went into the newly opened heroic tree. Most of your points went toward the second line, where Potency, Crit Bonus and Reuse live. Since these stats are shared, we are improving our own character and our pet at the same time. We also picked up another 20 crit bonus for our pet in the third line, as well as some Ability Modifier for both Master and pet in the first. Soulburn, our end ability, is now in our arsenal. Learning to use this ability well goes a long way toward making your mark as a Conjuror. Soulburn turns all of the HP the pet currently has into a damage spell, leaving him with 1 HP. This can be bad. Cast Soulburn, follow it immediately with Crystal Blast, and follow Crystal Blast immediately with Heal Servant. Your pet will spend only a fraction of a second with 1 HP using that sequence. Minor note: We also swapped our points out of Minion's Critical Strike over to the Conjuror tree, Strength of the Elements.

L90, 320 AA's. Click here to see a sample AA configuration. This is your standard DPS AA configuration. The biggest point of contention between Conjurors at the end game is on the Summoner page, specifically the choice between the AGI (Teamwork) line and the INT (Reanimate) line. AGI is your biggest potential for DPS. There is no arguement. INT is probably better until you and your companions are more experienced. The logic goes like this: The biggest decrease to yor damage dealing capability is losing your pet. When your group / raid is inexperienced / learning / underequipped, pet deaths happen more often, thus, Reanimate serves to mitigate that. As you gain experience, your pet dies less often, and thus Teamwork provides you more DPS. See what works best for you.


Prestige AA's

This section reserved. I'll update when the LU is in final form. It's on test right now, and the finalized version is expected in the next 30 days or so.

Tricks of the Trade

I mentioned very early on in this article how important the L14 Grandmaster version of Defensive Haven would be to you. Here it is. When we talked about Soulburn, you'll note that the damage of Soulburn is based on the Hit Points of your pet. The more HP your pet has, the more damage Soulburn does. Hello L14 Defensive Haven. This spell increases the HP of your pet, while also increasing it's hate gain. Higher levels of the spell do provide more hate gain, which is beneficial to your tank pet. However it is very bad for your Mage pet. On the other hand, the L14 version provides exactly the same HP bonus as the highest level version in your book. Thus, you get the benefit you want, more HP, while minimizing the disincentive, the hate gain. You should be running Defensive Haven L14 Grandmaster 24/7.

We talked earlier about how Plane Shift would slowly deteriorate in value as you got higher in levels, and here is where that happens. One important caveat of Soulburn is that you cannot Soulburn a Plane Shifted pet. Since Soulburn can be cast every 30 seconds, and Plane Shift lasts one minute, you are actually losing DPS by allowing Plane Shift to run it's full course. Enter the macro. You'll need to create a macro for casting Soulburn that consists of two lines. The first line needs to be the command /cancel_maintained%Plane%Shift:%Fire. The percentage signs are single spaces. The second line is an ability, Soulburn.

[Banditman]

Reserved (jic!)

[Orz]

Finally someones decided the old conjy guides were "outdated".

Amazing.

Nuff said

Also want to ask you if the teamwork buff is still bugged (gains agro)

[Banditman]

There definitely seems to be something really funny with Teamwork.  It's really only observable right at the start of combat when there isn't much hate on a mob.  Mobs really, really, really like to go after the pet that has Teamwork.

It's been brought up to the developers, but like many other issues, received absolutely no acknowledgement or known investigation.

[leannel]

Excellent summary!  Thanks for taking the time to do this, it's going to be very helpful to a lot of players.

[Babin]

Allow me to add my thanks as well Banditman, your efforts are very much appreciated.

[KempThinker]

Thank you very much. However, the "As you go..." section seems to be copied from an earlier version. At least I personally haven't been given the option of "adding points to an attribute" Stamina or otherwise. Does this come after 50 or something. I'm new to this game.

ClydeKemp on Permafrost.

[wullailhuit]

KempThinker wrote:

Thank you very much. However, the "As you go..." section seems to be copied from an earlier version. At least I personally haven't been given the option of "adding points to an attribute" Stamina or otherwise. Does this come after 50 or something. I'm new to this game.

ClydeKemp on Permafrost.

At certain levels you 'invisibly' get the option to add a choice to your character develpment tab , you don't get told you have been given the option of a  choice , you have to keep checking that tab.

[Banditman]

Wullailduo@Splitpaw wrote:

KempThinker wrote:

Thank you very much. However, the "As you go..." section seems to be copied from an earlier version. At least I personally haven't been given the option of "adding points to an attribute" Stamina or otherwise. Does this come after 50 or something. I'm new to this game.

ClydeKemp on Permafrost.

At certain levels you 'invisibly' get the option to add a choice to your character develpment tab , you don't get told you have been given the option of a  choice , you have to keep checking that tab.

What Wullailduo said.  And just for clarification, there was no 'earlier' version of this guide.  I wrote it completely from scratch.

[KempThinker]

"One final note here. As a Conjuror, at L14 you will have the opportunity to choose a Grandmaster spell. It is terribly important to you that this choice be Defensive Haven. Don't be tempted by anything else at this level. Take Defensive Haven. The reasons will become more clear at a far later time, but, it will help you considerably now, and in the end as well. "

At Lvl 14 I was given the Defensive Haven spell at the Apprentice level. There was no choice to be made. Is this a setting I have as a newbie or what?

Clydekemp - Permafrost

[Orz]

KempThinker wrote:

"One final note here. As a Conjuror, at L14 you will have the opportunity to choose a Grandmaster spell. It is terribly important to you that this choice be Defensive Haven. Don't be tempted by anything else at this level. Take Defensive Haven. The reasons will become more clear at a far later time, but, it will help you considerably now, and in the end as well. "

At Lvl 14 I was given the Defensive Haven spell at the Apprentice level. There was no choice to be made. Is this a setting I have as a newbie or what?

Clydekemp - Permafrost

Press 'L' and scroll down your character development thingy and you should be able to choose the m2 version of dh.

[KempThinker]

Thank you all very much. A manual would be nice. Some of us really ARE new to this game and not just returning after 5-8 years LOL

Clydekemp - Permafrost

[wullailhuit]

KempThinker wrote:

"One final note here. As a Conjuror, at L14 you will have the opportunity to choose a Grandmaster spell. It is terribly important to you that this choice be Defensive Haven. Don't be tempted by anything else at this level. Take Defensive Haven. The reasons will become more clear at a far later time, but, it will help you considerably now, and in the end as well. "

At Lvl 14 I was given the Defensive Haven spell at the Apprentice level. There was no choice to be made. Is this a setting I have as a newbie or what?

Clydekemp - Permafrost

You get given apprentice spells automatically as a reminder that you have gained a new spell and you can then upgrade it , thats the only reason it appears  , previously it never happened and some people never realised they were missing some spells from their hotbar , so they toggled that on again.

[akin99]

Thank you for this guide I found it very useful.

[wjss]

Nice work on the guide. However, unless I missed it somewhere, you left out summon minion (is that the right name? not at my gaming machine). I use it all the time for pet positioning because, as you say, they're too dumb to be left to make such decisions for themselves.

[GnomeRome]

Dear Moderator........sticky this now.

[Imokles]

Thanks for the guide Banditman. Helped a lot when I dusted off my conjy I hadn't played for quite some time for GU63.

This deserves a sticky, please!

[Solarax]

hey trinity nice way to cover the abilities . are you going to have a pre cast , inc and during fight sample rotations and all that?

what a lot of the newer guys need help with is distinguishing when certain things are appropriate.

different dps rotations for mobs that die at different speeds and such. sorry my wording sucks, but i think you get what im trying to say

[ssor02]

THANK YOU so much for this guide!  Am two weeks into EQ2 and have a level 22 Erudite Conjuror in Greater Faydark.  However, after reading your guide about the benefits of Kerrans and tracking and beginning in New Halas, I'm going to create a new Conjuror, following your suggestions and see how it goes.  I also appreciate the AA advice!  Very helpful!  Thanks again!

[ssor02]

nt

[ssor02]

nt

[ssor02]

Banditman wrote:

Some AA noteables and AA leveling targetsEditors note:  Keep in mind that these targets and specs are specifically for the process of leveling up.  End game specs and abilities are covered later.These targets will help you decide whether you need to alter your AA slider from the 80% you started out with.  You *did* slide it right?  If you have too few AA's, you'll probably want to push the slider up to 90+.  If you have more, perhaps drop it back to 75%.L50, 100 AA's.  Click here to see a sample AA configuration.  You've got the Summoner INT line to help your pet produce more DPS through faster casting, and the STR line to allow you and your pet to occasionally critically hit a mob.  On the Conjuror tree, you have most of what used to be the Evocations line, as well as the Stoneskins Expertise ability to give you even more ways to prevent damage on your group.  You've also begun investment in the Shadows tree, but aren't really getting a lot out yet, just filling some pre-requisites for future use.  Shadows tree unlocks at 50, so you'll basically be sitting on 10 unused AA's at L49 waiting for the ding.L65, 140 AA's.  Click here to see a sample AA configuration.  By this point we've gotten into Shadows pretty good.  Noteably, we now have Dimensional Storage.  This ability is a toggle.  You cast it while you have a pet, and the pet disappears.  You then cast another pet for use.  If that pet dies during combat, you simply click Dimensional Storage again, and the pet you stored earlier pops up ready to go.  We're still limited in the first two trees, but we've built a good base.L70, 170 AA's.  Click here to see a sample AA configuration.  Level 70 gives us a lot more flexibility in the first two trees, unlocking an additional 20 points in each.  That allows us to grab the rather valuable Reanimate.  This spell is a buff for your pet that lasts until your pet dies.  When your pet dies, Reanimate triggers and instantly brings it back to life.  Very useful.  We also grabbed a sizeable chunk of Minion's Attention.  This ability helps your Mage pet stay low on the hate list, or helps your Fighter stay high on the hate list.  Good stuff.  We also dropped more points into our heal spell now.  The hits are getting bigger, so we need bigger heals to compensate.  In the Conjuror tree we added some upgrades for Plane Shift and Elemental Unity.L80, 226 AA's.  Click here to see a sample AA configuration.  This is another one of those watershed moments in the life of a Conjuror.  In Elemental Toxicity, you gain the most important group DPS buff in your arsenal.  It's freaking amazing against groups of mobs.  As good as Elemental Unity is, Elemental Toxicity works for the whole group.  Those two abilities in combination against a large group of mobs is just devastating . . . for the mobs.  You also get what will become your largest source of damage in longer fights, Elemental Blast.  This ability must be used with caution.  Hate from it is attributed to your pet, and will often make him public enemy #1.  Thus, one of the reasons we went ahead and worked on Minion's Attention earlier.  In addition to those two huge abilities, you also picked up two spells for your pet:  Blazing Conjuration and Elemental Fury.  These will be two of his biggest sources of damage going forward.  Finally, you also picked up the under appreciated Runes of Geomancy.  This is a buff that gives any member of your group who is being attacked in melee combat a chance to proc a stoneskin on himself.  It works very much like Percussion of Stone from a Dirge (and incidentally, does NOT stack with Dirge) or Unyielding Benediction from a Templar (which it DOES stack with).L90, 280 AA's.  Click here to see a sample AA configuration.  This is basically your "I just hit L90 spec."  Most of this step went into the newly opened heroic tree.  Most of your points went toward the second line, where Potency, Crit Bonus and Reuse live.  Since these stats are shared, we are improving our own character and our pet at the same time.  We also picked up another 20 crit bonus for our pet in the third line, as well as some Ability Modifier for both Master and pet in the first.  Soulburn, our end ability, is now in our arsenal.  Learning to use this ability well goes a long way toward making your mark as a Conjuror.  Soulburn turns all of the HP the pet currently has into a damage spell, leaving him with 1 HP.  This can be bad.  Cast Soulburn, follow it immediately with Crystal Blast, and follow Crystal Blast immediately with Heal Servant.  Your pet will spend only a fraction of a second with 1 HP using that sequence.  Minor note:  We also swapped our points out of Minion's Critical Strike over to the Conjuror tree, Strength of the Elements.L90, 320 AA's.  Click here to see a sample AA configuration.  This is your standard DPS AA configuration.  The biggest point of contention between Conjurors at the end game is on the Summoner page, specifically the choice between the AGI (Teamwork) line and the INT (Reanimate) line.  AGI is your biggest potential for DPS.  There is no arguement.  INT is probably better until you and your companions are more experienced.  The logic goes like this:  The biggest decrease to yor damage dealing capability is losing your pet.  When your group / raid is inexperienced / learning / underequipped, pet deaths happen more often, thus, Reanimate serves to mitigate that.  As you gain experience, your pet dies less often, and thus Teamwork provides you more DPS.  See what works best for you.Prestige AA'sThis section reserved.  I'll update when the LU is in final form.  It's on test right now, and the finalized version is expected in the next 30 days or so.

Tricks of the Trade

I mentioned very early on in this article how important the L14 Grandmaster version of Defensive Haven would be to you.  Here it is.  When we talked about Soulburn, you'll note that the damage of Soulburn is based on the Hit Points of your pet.  The more HP your pet has, the more damage Soulburn does.  Hello L14 Defensive Haven.  This spell increases the HP of your pet, while also increasing it's hate gain.  Higher levels of the spell do provide more hate gain, which is beneficial to your tank pet.  However it is very bad for your Mage pet.  On the other hand, the L14 version provides exactly the same HP bonus as the highest level version in your book.  Thus, you get the benefit you want, more HP, while minimizing the disincentive, the hate gain.  You should be running Defensive Haven L14 Grandmaster 24/7.

We talked earlier about how Plane Shift would slowly deteriorate in value as you got higher in levels, and here is where that happens.  One important caveat of Soulburn is that you cannot Soulburn a Plane Shifted pet.  Since Soulburn can be cast every 30 seconds, and Plane Shift lasts one minute, you are actually losing DPS by allowing Plane Shift to run it's full course.  Enter the macro.  You'll need to create a macro for casting Soulburn that consists of two lines.  The first line needs to be the command /cancel_maintained%Plane%Shift:%Fire.  The percentage signs are single spaces.  The second line is an ability, Soulburn.

The "Click here to see a sample configuration" links are broken.  Could you fix them?  I'm really eager to see what you have set up.  Thanks!

[Solarax]

links are working for me

[arthemis1er]

I would advise to add a list of spell that are not worth or even that should not be cast :

MUST NOT CAST : Communion I and II... This cancel your conjuror raidwide buff

NO REASON TO CAST (if fighting allmost anything that has AOE and from level 90 and above) : Aqueous Swarm, Roaring Flames... They takes time to use and wont do any damage and will die on the first AOE.

[arthemis1er]

ssor02 wrote:

The "Click here to see a sample configuration" links are broken.  Could you fix them?  I'm really eager to see what you have set up.  Thanks!

Beetny is not working with Firefox for some time now. Switch to IE for this one

[ssor02]

Melpheos@Everfrost wrote:

ssor02 wrote:

The "Click here to see a sample configuration" links are broken.  Could you fix them?  I'm really eager to see what you have set up.  Thanks!

Beetny is not working with Firefox for some time now. Switch to IE for this one.

Thanks, but have always been using IE.  However, the links have started working again for me.  Must have been a temporary Beetny problem.

[Brigh]

There are some fights even 90+ where Roaring Flames and Aqeuous Swarm I have used and they didn't die. 

I was under the impression from previous posts that RF has a better chance of survival anyway. Sometimes you have nothing else to cast and so RF would be the first choice if waiting for CB/WoV/FA/etc to refresh.

For those asking about rotation...there you go. Don't wait for FA to expire its DoT. Press it again when it is up since it has a front loading DD.

[Brigh]

I want to know why you didn't put any points into Enhance: Elemental Toxicity on the sample Heroic tree?

[fearGod777]

/capson

STICKY PLEASE

/capsoff

THIS is a guide. Fantastic!

Thanks.