PC A general guide For mages in terraria "pre Hardmode"

[Cave Johnson]

Before you start your mage adventure, here are some helpful tips to get started.
(Tips Initiated)
Tip #1: Mages are glass cannons, so if your feeling tenacious, have all of your accessories the menacing modifier.
if the boss is too hard, make all of your accessories the warding modifier.

Tip #2: Mages have a unique mechanic called Mana. Mana is all of your power to cast your magic. make sure that you have mana stars "crafted with fallen stars that fall out of the sky at night at the work bench" and plenty of mage accessories.

Tip #3: If you feel powerful enough, you can visit the underground jungle and there will be some useful Mage stuff down there "as well as an armor set!" Tip #4 Gems can be found underground which is VERY important for mages considering so many mage stuff can be made with it.
keep in mind that some of the items are "Evil biome" exclusive.
(guide Initiated) Accessories: "Pre-Boss"
start like you usually would. get some wood and make yourself a house and some crafting spaces. "a storage area is helpful too"
here is some accessories that you can get just before your first boss and how you get them
list: Band of starpower "gotten by breaking shadow orbs in the underground corruption"
Nature's Gift: rarely grows in the underground Jungle
Hermes boots and cloud in a bottle: both found in chests in the Underground.

pre EOW and BOC
Basically after your preparing, you should have beaten the goblin army by now and have access to changing modifiers and the tinkerers workshop to allow the binding of accessories.

Horseshoe on a balloon and the Hermes boots upgrade should be made along with the mana Flower.

Pre Skeletron
after the Evil bosses, you should now be able to fight Skeletron.
The only mage specific accessories that I am aware of right now is mana flower and magic cuffs. magic cuffs is Band Of Starpower+Shackle
and mana flower is Nature's Gift+Mana Potion.
and Celestial magnet, which is made with the magic cuffs.


Mage Armor

Now, there are 3 armors in pre Hardmode "one of them is not really and armor set at all"
Pre Boss
the first armor set is pretty simple. there are Gems found Underground can make mage robes. Now, you may be Wondering: Cave Johnson! This isn't even armor! It doesn't have an armor set bonus! " I will be making guides that make you understand all this confusing-sounding stuff, such as Armor set bonuses" Well, what you are gonna read may sound weird. BUT, With the ore helmets and leggings in together with the robe, it makes an armor set bonus. for every robe, its gonna need 10 of the gems of what you are gonna be making the robe with, and a robe "crafted with silk at a loom" then you just need some ore armor "copper armor, Iron armor Silver\tungsten armor, etc." overly complicated if you ask me
pre evil bosses\Pre skeletron/pre wall of flesh
Jungle armor And Meteor armor

Now that you have your gem robe and a preferably high defense Ore armor Loadout,
you are gonna want to head to the underground jungle to power yourself up more. One of the upgrades being the Jungle armor.
the full Jungle set is gonna need: 10 stingers "dropped by Hornets and Spiked slimes.", 2 Vines "dropped uncommonly by man-eaters"
and 32 jungle spores "found uncommonly on the ground in the underground jungle" the armor set can be made at a work bench.

meteor armor is pretty simple.
if you go to the underground corruption with some bombs "Combustible Lemons, preferably' """not part of the guide""""
and break a shadow orb with a hammer or bombs. soon, the words "A meteorite has landed!", then you have to explore the world for the meteor
"it wont be underground, trust me" trust me, you will know what it is when you see it. however, there is a catch. in 1.4, you cant just bomb a meteorite. you have to dig it. I suggest you have a accessory or something that stops you from burning on blocks "obsidian skin potion, or obsidian skull'' once you have the meteorite ore, smelt it in the furnace, and go to your anvil and make the armor, make sure you get enough for the space gun, since the set bonus for it is " space gun costs 0 mana"
Weapons:
Pre boss\ pre evil boss\pre skeletron
You can use gems to craft magic staffs at a anvil,
if you are desperate, you can find a wand of sparking.
since I cant think of anything else because I'm lazy, you can reforge your staff to be the best modifier "mythical"
Pre skeletron
you can farm demons in the underworld to get the Demon Scythe, which will be useful against skeletron. make sure you reforge it, too.






ok, you made it this far, You Vs. the Wall Of Flesh.

you can use the obsidian key you found in those locked chests after you beat skeletron in the dungeon to get some "hot" new weapons against the wall of flesh. after you open the chests, you will now be able to fight The Wall. make sure to make plenty of potions and prepare yourself. throw a voodoo doll "gotten from voodoo demons in the underworld" and throw it into the lava once you are ready.

come, child. Face The Wall.

(Ending Sequence initiated)


Thanks For Reading My Guide!
I did it all for science, really. but I also made it for the greater good of humanity! ''as good as it is right now"
please tell me in the comments about the guide and say if you want me to make more guides!
Go, Future Starter! I believe in you!

(Beeeeeeeep)

 

[Sora_92]

I think there are a few mistakes there...?

And somewhere it sounds a bit odd, like, anyone in the forums is probably not a total noob, and likely knows how to get materials like stingers or vines, but let's put that aside. maybe it's not a bad thing to add it, just in case.


Mages aren't all that much glass cannons, it really depends on armors and accessories. Some armors really offer pathetic defense, like gem robes, but meteor or jungle armor has pretty good defense stats, IMO.

As for gem robes by the way, I'm confused what you mean by ore helmets and stuff? Mage robes do form sets, when paired up with the magic hat (sold by traveling merchant) or the mage hat (100% chance to be dropped from Tim, and he's much more likely to appear, if you're wearing a gem robe)
These hats paired up with the robes give set bonuses too. and you actually still have the leg-guard slot open to equip something there without affecting that set bonus, to try to balance out a bit that gem robes offer very low defense. - they do give you tons of mana though.

You can easily get the jungle armor pre-bosses though, if you're good enough with surviving in the jungle.

Meteors on the other hand (as of 1.4) won't fall prior EoW/BoC being defeated.


As for mana, indeed it's important, but there are several ways to restore it.
Mana flower is good, but if you keep casting spells it will keep drinking your mana potions, giving you a roughly -40% on your magic dmg. which is horrible, when you do it the middle of a boss fight. yes, it will go down and then wears off very quickly, but only if you stop casting spells, which can be a problem in the middle of a boss fight.
This certainly allows for continuing to attack though, at the cost of the reduced attack power.

Magic cuffs offer a different approach, with you restoring mana when taking dmg. this is a great way on normal mode (not expert or master) but can be difficult to utilise on higher difficulty, since you can't afford yourself to get hit that much, because things hurt a lot more. they are awesome on normal mode though, IMO.

Don't forget mana regen potion however! While you pronbably won't use it for regular adventuring, in boss fights it can be extremely useful. it regens your mana even when you're moving, though it's slow, but if you stop spellscasting and running for a sec, it will restore your mana to max in only a few seconds.


Also, there are several intriguing magic weapons. (speaking about pre-hardmode)
there are the gem staves, which might be the easiest to make, and can be quite powerful with the right modifiers.
wand of sparkling would be cool as a starting weapon, but it depends on worldgen if you actually have one nearby.
there is waterbolt, but now it's post skeletron, so, it's kinda weak that time, because it's slow. by the way demon scythe is quite slow too, if you want to use it to hit stuff far away.

there are some other things though. there is the space gun too, but there are some other intriguing weapons, like the bee gun (it's a magic gun) which is quite powerful.
in the dungeon, there is the mentioned water bolt, but there's also aqua scepter, which is like a pre-hardmode golden shower, without applying ichor on enemies. and there's the magic missille, which can be controlled by the player and even homes in on enemies!

and, once you get a shadow key, you can aquire some powerful fire weapons either from shadow chests, or obsidian lock boxes from obsidian crates from lava fishing.
flower of fire is alright, but the more awesome thing there is the flamelash, I think. it hits twice, homes in on enemies, and can be controled by the player. it's basically a stronger variant of the magic missille, with just one drawback. it's a fire weapon, so it doesn't works in water.


So, there are a few mistakes and stuff, I think, but that aside, overall, it's an okay guide, I guess.

 

[Cave Johnson]

I think there are a few mistakes there...?

And somewhere it sounds a bit odd, like, anyone in the forums is probably not a total noob, and likely knows how to get materials like stingers or vines, but let's put that aside. maybe it's not a bad thing to add it, just in case.


Mages aren't all that much glass cannons, it really depends on armors and accessories. Some armors really offer pathetic defense, like gem robes, but meteor or jungle armor has pretty good defense stats, IMO.

As for gem robes by the way, I'm confused what you mean by ore helmets and stuff? Mage robes do form sets, when paired up with the magic hat (sold by traveling merchant) or the mage hat (100% chance to be dropped from Tim, and he's much more likely to appear, if you're wearing a gem robe)
These hats paired up with the robes give set bonuses too. and you actually still have the leg-guard slot open to equip something there without affecting that set bonus, to try to balance out a bit that gem robes offer very low defense. - they do give you tons of mana though.

You can easily get the jungle armor pre-bosses though, if you're good enough with surviving in the jungle.

Meteors on the other hand (as of 1.4) won't fall prior EoW/BoC being defeated.


As for mana, indeed it's important, but there are several ways to restore it.
Mana flower is good, but if you keep casting spells it will keep drinking your mana potions, giving you a roughly -40% on your magic dmg. which is horrible, when you do it the middle of a boss fight. yes, it will go down and then wears off very quickly, but only if you stop casting spells, which can be a problem in the middle of a boss fight.
This certainly allows for continuing to attack though, at the cost of the reduced attack power.

Magic cuffs offer a different approach, with you restoring mana when taking dmg. this is a great way on normal mode (not expert or master) but can be difficult to utilise on higher difficulty, since you can't afford yourself to get hit that much, because things hurt a lot more. they are awesome on normal mode though, IMO.

Don't forget mana regen potion however! While you pronbably won't use it for regular adventuring, in boss fights it can be extremely useful. it regens your mana even when you're moving, though it's slow, but if you stop spellscasting and running for a sec, it will restore your mana to max in only a few seconds.


Also, there are several intriguing magic weapons. (speaking about pre-hardmode)
there are the gem staves, which might be the easiest to make, and can be quite powerful with the right modifiers.
wand of sparkling would be cool as a starting weapon, but it depends on worldgen if you actually have one nearby.
there is waterbolt, but now it's post skeletron, so, it's kinda weak that time, because it's slow. by the way demon scythe is quite slow too, if you want to use it to hit stuff far away.

there are some other things though. there is the space gun too, but there are some other intriguing weapons, like the bee gun (it's a magic gun) which is quite powerful.
in the dungeon, there is the mentioned water bolt, but there's also aqua scepter, which is like a pre-hardmode golden shower, without applying ichor on enemies. and there's the magic missille, which can be controlled by the player and even homes in on enemies!

and, once you get a shadow key, you can aquire some powerful fire weapons either from shadow chests, or obsidian lock boxes from obsidian crates from lava fishing.
flower of fire is alright, but the more awesome thing there is the flamelash, I think. it hits twice, homes in on enemies, and can be controled by the player. it's basically a stronger variant of the magic missille, with just one drawback. it's a fire weapon, so it doesn't works in water.


So, there are a few mistakes and stuff, I think, but that aside, overall, it's an okay guide, I guess.

Thanks! this is my first guide and I didn't expect it to do to well, but thank you for giving me the advice!