Black_Robe, learning spells

[Yrch]

I passed my conclave test, which was challenging and rewarding.  But I'm having trouble filling out my spellbook as a black_robe.

I remember, years ago, tiers 5+ were pretty sparse, and you had to farm spellbooks to fill them out.  But you started with a utility spell or two, like Conjure Elemental.

So far, I've only found one trainer for black_robes, and that was inside Wayreth.  Town mage trainers won't talk to me. 

So, are town mage trainers worthless post-level-10?  Are there other trainers I can search out in other cities for a few more spells, or should I start trying to pop low level books while I'm leveling?  Hopefully they load in the same places they did 12+ years ago!

[Lyam]

you can only learn from lotus (as you are a black robe) in wayreth.. the town trainers are only good to use as teleport/reloc targets after lvl 10

you  will get a skill (conjure) which allows you to have a friend that gains ranks beside you and that you can spend money on to buff

other than that, its farming books like normal.. books are tiered

[Alecto]

Yes, most of the mid-tier books load in the same places they did 10 years ago.  Only a few zones have had book loads removed, but sometimes the % load for the books is very low.  However, if you focus on just making lots of cash and constantly shouting that you will buy books you can probably get most of the 5th and 6th circle stuff pretty quickly.  Also, it is worth porting from town to town and checking the inn every once in a while.  At this point in the wipe people often just drop books they already have before they rent.

[Yrch]

Lyam, thank you for confirming that info. I wont waste a bunch of time searching for trainers who dont exist.  I also don't see conjure elemental or any other similarly-named-spells in the recent stats dumps for black/white/red robes.

Alecto, excellent tip, i appreciate that.   What do the books generally sell for at each sphere/tier?  So i have an idea how much to save and how much to dump into ranks.

[Brafu]

Conjure isn't a spell (for mages) anymore, but a skill  that you will get once you reach the appropriate level.

[Yrch]

Conjure isn't a spell (for mages) anymore, but a skill  that you will get once you reach the appropriate level.

Oh, interesting!  I definitely like the skill changes made since i last played.  I'm finding combat, travel, and environmental interaction a lot more fluid and enjoyable now, as compared to 12 years ago.

[Alecto]

for 10k-20k you should be able to buy all but the most elite books.  however, you can often get good books for 5k or less

[Brafu]

A lot of the changes in the past 5 years have really improved the game, IMO, and made things more complex and given the game a more unique feeling, especially in class design.

Even the zones have dramatically improved in quality and complexity, which is a very good thing considering what type of competition this game faces when you think about WoW and Skyrim. The same types of people who are drawn to those games are also the types Arctic needs to attract, so it has to compete if it wants to replace players it loses.

Also, I would suggest you focus more on learning the book loads than just trying to buy the books. At this point in the wipe people are selling, or just dropping, books that at an earlier point they would either never have done so, or sold them for huge sums. It's better, IMO, to learn the loads now so that when the wipe comes you won't need to rely upon others loading them for you and hoping they will sell em (and that you can afford it).

[Yrch]

Luckily, i still remember a lot of zones and loads, and what i dont remember is coming back steadily. I also managed to find an old CD ROM with TXT logs/notes/lores.  Roads/routes have changed a lot, but the areas havent moved far.