Welcome to Xornn's Guide to Enchanting. Within I have undertaken the task of providing you with one simple thing--everything I know about Enchanting, and the best advice I can give to you on becoming a truly great enchanter. (source)

Note: This is a solid guide, but somewhat outdated in terms of efficiency of the way to kill things that Xornn recommends. For example, mobs generally do not resist enough to necessitate using a form of Tash on every mob. Slows are also not always necessary (for example, if you're using the highest possible level on your pet and you root rot the mob down to 50% or less before your pet goes in, your pet can usually handle itself just fine...so when summoning a pet just use Reclaim Energy until you get the highest possible level for your pet and you won't need to slow every fight (I usually just slow when it's a mob that's 1 level below me or above and it works out fine)). So make sure you take this with a grain of salt and crunch numbers/practice things in game to see what's actually needed in order to be the most efficient. Don't just follow the way Xornn says to do it as it's not always the best way.

Introduction

"The gloom of the recessed flooring in this dank pit assaults us, threatening to over come the torchlight borne by the noble and powerful barbarian warrior to my left. The cleric is humming a gentle mantra to herself, and her beautiful elven cheeks are lost to the droning chants of meditation she is lost to. The dwarven paladin that joined us at the entrance to the castle is thumbing the blade of his mighty axe nervously, though he labels the emotion 'alertness'. Behind me the wizard, a human far from his homelands and allies, is quietly boring a hole into the back of my neck with his gaze, but I put those thoughts to the back of my mind. The last member of our party, a druid whom I've spent many day's travelling with is now pacing nervously about in the confines of this stone chamber, longing to be outside in the winds and light that she can trust. However, I am the enchanter, and her heart follows me into the foulest places.

The warrior looks up suddenly towards the door of the chamber, and a reflecting glint draws my attention momentarily to the wizard behind me--smiling. I've only seen the wizard smile for one reason... someone is about to die. No sooner than my thought completes, the dwarf is up and screaming battle cries to Bristlebane as he locks into combat with a hulking drolvarg bodyguard! The barbarian stands opposite the beast and their melee begins in fury. They swing with a ferocious and deadly speed, granted them by my own magics, and I utter the power words to draw a binding force around the drolvarg, making it's movements sluggish and predictable, so much so that it can barely muster the will to swing at the burly fighters. As the beast howls out, three more drolvargs storm into the room... an ambush then!

Before they can decide who they will slay, I'm calling upon spells of mesmerization, and sieze the entire crowd under a hypnotic trance in seconds. I choose one of them to become my slave, and bend its mind to my considerable will. Quickly it finds turning on it's comrades to be not only feasible to consider, but the only action it's capable of. The cleric replenishes the warrior's health as my new minion joins the assault. I begin summoning binding roots of magic force to adhere the remaining beast to the ground, helpless to strike me as my short trance begins to fade. I quickly re-mesmerize them with a stronger, safer magic that will bind them for minutes, as the first of them goes down under the fury of my demon minion and the fighters. The wizard chuckles as the beast goes down in a burning heap, and I'm left with no doubts as to who finished the wicked thing.

Suddenly my mind-bent servant wrests his mind out of my reach again and charges me with renewed spirits, slamming a heavy blade into my side. The mystic shielding permeating the air about me stops the blade from cleaving me in twain, but feel the impact I do. In a moment I will address my injuries, for this is not the time to worry about trivial matters such as dying. I call upon a quick burst of magical scintilation, and a circle of sparkling lights flashes around me, stunning the loosed beast as I spun to face it. I feel a crooked grin creeping onto my face as I reclaim its mind into my grasp again, and dare to sit before it as I command, "Slay a drolvarg bodyguard, minion." Helpless to resist, the beast lumbers to the melee at hand and commences to kill its companion in arms. The wizard rises from his meditations, signalling the death of the next beast, and the third is quickly beset upon by our full wrath as I re-root its movement to keep it worrying about the closer threats.

As the beast falls, the barbarian looks to me, and the cleric mends my broken ribs from the impact. "Well done enchanter, surely we were bested if naught for your skill." I nod. The wizard clears his throat behind me, and it goes unnoticed--but I know how much he assisted--that's why I demanded his presence on this excursion.

"So..." chimes in the squat paladin, "you keeping that thing charmed or not?" I glance over at my forced pet, feeling the rage it's unable to call to the surface.

"For now, yes."

That is enchanting. That is what you are here to learn about, should you choose to walk this road long enough. Now for the bad part--this is the most difficult class to play well. Bards are more complicated, and a warrior is no less important to a group, but the enchanter gives the least room for error, the least understanding for mistakes, and the most expectations from your fellow adventurers. Most who travel this road will not achieve the 8th Circle, not because they aren't good enough, but because they don't find enough reward in the journey. My advice to you:

Play a warrior. You will have great fun killing mobs with reckless abandon, and warriors require intense battlefield awareness, believe it or not. My second character is a warrior.

Play a wizard. There is a sick pleasure in vaporizing mobs with fast casting, mana efficient nukes, on top of porting and multi-kiting. My third character is a wizard.

But you're not going to. You're going to play an enchanter--that's alright, just remember I tried to talk you out of it. But who knows? Maybe you're one of "us"... the truly elite, the masters of control and manipulation. The ones that save their group time and again, and stare down massive creatures with only a few spells and a robe between them and a quick, messy death.

Maybe you are The Enchanter; only time will tell.

Creation

"Drekaar strolled calmly from the dark halls of The Spurned. Neriak was sprawling in front of him, nearly black to those not among the Tier'dal, but here, this deep into the home of Innoruuk's Chosen, an outsider was unlikely, save the occasional ogre or troll lemming succumbed into service by promises of power and respect. Drekaar chuckled to himself at that thought--respect to one of those oafish boobs. Not here, not in this grand city; his finely honed eyes scanned the ancient buildings before him as easily as if it were daylight. He was the destined one, Innoruuk's loyal servant, determined to control and manipulate those around him by their own hate..."

Race
There are five races to choose from if you wish to play an enchanter: Dark Elf, Erudite, High Elf, Human, and Gnome. From a racial faction standpoint, there is no matter as to which you take, as you will be able to cast an illusion to become whichever race suits you. Dark Elves have a good starting Intelligence, but suffer from a low Charisma, have natural ultravision (nice to not have to cast it constantly) as well as the ability to Hide (useful for breaking charm), and suffer from the worst faction (without using illusions). Erudites have the highest starting Intelligence, but also carry a low Charisma with them, and a low Agility rating (not terribly detrimental, as you'll pick up a minor Agility raise quickly enough, and it's only a factor if you become encumbered), plus a very good faction throughout Norrath (again, without the use of illusions). Erudites are also nearly blind at night, though this impediment will only sustain through level 4, when you can use illusions to gain better vision. High Elves have the highest total attribute points, as well as an excellent starting Intelligence and Charisma, the stats of the enchanter, plus Infravision allows you to see at night fairly well without spell use. The Human has balanced stats, with a 75 in all categories, and 85 in Intelligence and Charisma. They are also blind like Erudites, but you will find this is actually a good race, especially when you find your 55 Strength high elf encumbered every other loot. The gnomes are quite frankly the cutest race in existence (at least the wood elf ladies think so) and prepare to get your head rubbed a lot for luck. There's something classic about seeing a gnome with a charmed giant in tow, and you have a good starting Intelligence, decent faction (without illusions) and infravision to accompany your smallish cuteness. In the end, it really doesn't matter, I promise you. Look at the races, learn about their history, and take what intrigues you... they all level at the same rate after all.

Class
Okay, just making sure you were paying attention. I suggest Enchanter, unless you're reading this guide for some other weird reason.

Statistics
Every enchanter you meet in your travels is going to tell you something different. Here's what I'll tell you though--Intelligence gets you mana, Charisma does help with mezzing and charms, even if only a little, and Armor Class does make you live longer. Resistances are good, especially vs. Magic, and in the end, you're just going to take what you feel comfortable with. If going from 130 Charisma to 180 makes you more confident in your crowd control abilities, then that's what you should take. I just want to cover your bonus points here--put 15 into Intelligence, and 15 into Charisma. This will give you a nice start on getting both stats to 200. Some say go for as much Intelligence gear as you can, because Charisma raising gear is cheap, others say go for Charisma because the Intelligence raising gear comes with Armor Class usually, and me, I say split the points and you'll still make 200 in each stat just fine, have a nice Armor Class and Hit Point total, and room to drop some resistance gear on. I spent level 52 naked just to see what it was like, and outside of less room for making mistakes, it wasn't really that noticeable. I often forgot I looked naked, and was puzzled when people handed me spare robes and such.

Religion
This is the part that upsets the enchanter community as a whole; when your faction is determined with a mob, several factors come into play--race, class, religion, and your deeds. Race we can change, class usually isn't a large modifier, and if you want wood elves to like you don't kill wood elves. But religion is the damper that makes illusions useless. My first enchanter was Bromm, who made it to 13th level before I realized that following Quellious was going to keep me from entering Neriak, even using Illusion: Dark Elf and Alliance. Verant shows no signs of implementing an Illusion: Religion, so play Agnostic, unless you don't care that most of your racial illusions will do very little for you faction-wise. (A high elf that worships Innoruuk is still KOS to the Felwithe authorities.) I started over from Bromm, creating Xornn, who is most definitely Agnostic.

After you finish with your creation, spend some time on a name that you'll want remembered. Mezzinbob might have a funny sound to it, but in the end, is that who your mighty Phantasmist is going to be? Mezzinbob Likestocharm the Phantasmist? I think not.

Name decided, enter Norrath and take your steps on this long journey...
--Xornn Mier`noen

Spell Lines

Xornn glanced up from his rough hewn desk for a moment, sensing his young apprentice shuffling in the other room. Perhaps his study lessons were a bit excessive tonight. 'Oh well,' thought the old high elf, 'better he find my training too demanding than the battles he faces.' There was a bit of rhythmic chanting in the far chamber, even audible through the heavy oaken door. Xornn felt a small crack of a smile creeping onto his tired, aged face and smote it quickly--so his apprentice finally got the spell right, no need to get emotional.

BOOOOOOM!

The hinges of the door buckled and stone powder dripped away from the mounts. Xornn stared impassively at the damage, waiting for the door to open as it would... now.

Jakonis, high elf apprentice to Xornn Mier`noen, Master of the 6th Circle, pushed the door open on complaining hinges that groaned as they bent into angles they were recently warped out of. He was young, and though his body was tired, his eyes and cheeks were full of fire and somewhat controlled excitement. 'Still too emotional,' thought the master, 'but I suppose I was full of zeal at some time, too.' The young apprentice's robe was scorched and still smoking at a point, apparently from the proximity of the enchanter's explosion.

"Are you alright?" Asked Xornn, sure to hide his genuine concern.

"Y-yes, Master Xornn. I finally got it right, but my aim is off."

Xornn made a point of staring at the damaged door for a second then returning his looming gaze over Jakonis. "I've noticed. You'll have time to work on that." His apprentice visibly shortened at the thought of more practice tonight; his master had pushed him hard tonight. Jakonis spoke up on his own, generally not allowed during training...

"Master, I don't understand why I have to practice so much to use such spells as these... this is not what will save myself and my friends when adventuring..." he drifted off, already scolding himself for speaking, as Xornn just let the eerie silence linger for a good while longer, till Jakonis seemed ready to melt.

"You will become a master with all of your powers, for the most unlikely spell will save you in the most unlikely of times, thereby saving your 'friends'." But you've done enough tonight, your aim can wait until the morning. Jakonis barely held back a sigh of relief--his shoulders looked tired.

"Yes, Master Xornn." He paused a moment, as was appropriate, to phrase his thoughts correctly; such discipline was necessary in order to make him think before acting, but think quickly. "Shall I fetch a supper for you before I retire to sleep?"

Xornn waived a dismissing hand at the thought of eating, "Nay, I've eaten my fill already today," he lied, no need to be helpless, apprentice before him or no. "Besides, you've got a door to repair before you get any sleep, and we're starting in the morn quite early. Now run down to the Shop of All Hollows and see about getting some fresh hinges."

Jakonis slumped visibly this time, but quickly straightened himself, hoping Xornn had not noticed, or at least wouldn't scold him. "Yes, Master Xornn, right away." He shuffled out of the chamber quickly, retrieved his travelling cloak and hustled out the door. The shop would be closed already, but Xornn knew Jakonis would figure something out--he showed promise in that.

As Xornn went back to scratching a quill upon parchment, a smile crept onto his lips.

There are 42 separate "spell lines" or effects, available to the enchanter, more than any other caster receives, rivaled only by the shaman. Some are essential to enchanting, others are merely parlor tricks that will see little to no use. All of them should find their way into your spellbook, if only to know you've completed your collection. Listed below are the 49th (12th Circle) and below spell lines you will attain as you become a master enchanter. Further spells at the 13th Circle and on will see discussion, but not here.

Nuke
Chaotic Feedback (8), Sanity Warp (16), Chaos Flux (24), Anarchy (34), Discordant Mind (44)
Pure mana to damage. Magic-based all-or-nothing nukes, because the resist check is for the built-in stun effect (only a split second, but interrupts casting). No stun equates to no nuke landing. The stun is also a large source of aggro (all stuns are) which is what leads to enchanter nukes being labeled "uber taunts". With an 8 second recast on all of our nukes, chain-nuking is often utilized to speed firepower. Not really that lacking in mana efficiency, enchanter nukes lack time-efficiency.

Charm
Charm (12), Beguile (24), Cajoling Whispers (39), Allure (49)
Truly one of the most awesome spells in the enchanter arsenal, as well as one of the most dangerous. With one cast, a power-hitting, high-hitpoint, created-to-challenge-players-in-groups mob becomes your pet. Capable of dropping mobs more powerful than itself, or several in a row that are weaker, especially with your assistance. However, this mob is yours for a purely random duration; at any moment you could be the only thing near the top of the ex-pet's hate list. Truly, the risk versus reward is extreme in both directions. An amazing power both in solo and group situations, granting the ability to transform a deadly attacker into a powerful ally. Duration will always be randomly generated, though is seems a higher Charisma will help lower resists on your initial cast. Level-caps on the target mob are the real difference between the various charms, as Charm only allows you to affect up to a level 24 mob; after that you must use Beguile, which bears a larger mana cost, and greater casting time. With each upgrade, it takes more mana to charm your target, and a longer casting time to establish your hold.

PB Stun
Color Flux (4), Color Shift (20), Color Skew (44)
Fast-casting, short-duration, point-blank stuns; these spells stun mobs in a radius centered on you, buying time for further uninterrupted casting, as well as offering the ability to "stun-lock" at 20th level and on. Mezzing, charming, and rooting are the most common follow-up casts to these spells. Casters cannot cast while being hit (as reliably, anyway), and only the enchanter is equipped with spells to make casting time available--we're built to be rushed. As you reach 44th level and attain Color Skew, you will discover that first you don't usually have room in your lineup to keep three color stuns memmed, and also that you can channel Color Shift as easily as Color Flux, but more on that later, under stunlocking and the appropriate Circles.

Root
Root (8), Enstill (29), Immobilize (39), Paralyzing Earth (49)
There are two classifications for the Root series; short duration and long duration. The longer durations (Enstill and Paralyzing Earth) carry longer casting times, but the chance of a very long root time accompanies them. The 39th and 49th roots also have a lower resist rate, making them hold better, but at a much higher mana cost. All roots allow a save to break each tic, as well as every time a direct damage source lands (such as nukes), meaning that holding a mob that is being nukes is still best left to 8th level Root. When not being nuked, the higher level roots can be quite useful, though most fights will never last long enough to require more than a 30 second hold or so. The real point is what root does, and that's aggro-management. Rooted mobs attack the closest melee target available, making it a fantastic way to force a mob to fight the PC/Pet you want it on. The movement stop is a perk, useful when soloing or stopping a running mob. Root allows the enchanter a cheap and controlled way to aggro the animation, or a fast save to get a mob off of a caster, or to keep a mob aggroed on the closest tank (rather than say... the weakly armored ranger), or perhaps just a chance to let the enchanter meditate in peace after a debuffing round. Don't rely on one of the many root casters to do these things for you however, except possibly a wizard, who has lived by Root for ages; you never know when you'll need a root now and your group may not realize it. Root is also one of the single most effective ways for anyone in your group to assist with crowd control. Rooting isn't going to break mez (as long as it's not a damage root that healers get), and the worst thing that could happen is someone rooting a mob right before you charm it. Even that isn't so bad, as if it was rushing you, interrupted charm would have been a lot worse.

Single Mez
Mesmerize (4), Enthrall (16), Entrance (34), Dazzle (49)
Mezzing is the most oft-called upon power of crowd control. For a short expenditure of mana, a single mob is stunned for a set duration, or until damaged in any way. The effect can be renewed over itself, meaning that if you can meditate back the cost to cast mez before the duration fades, you can hold a mob in place forever (and you will sometime). By the time an enchanter has Clarity, mez-medding is quite simple. By 50th level, with a meditation around 25 mana/tic, combined with 6 mana/tic from Clarity, over the course of Dazzle (125mana 96second mez--or 16 tics) you can regain 340 mana in 14 tics, leaving 2 tics (12 seconds) for renewing mez, even with a resist. Allowing 2 tics per additional mob, it's possible to hold 3 mobs mezzed at once without running out of mana for a very long time. Probably the most difficult part of mezzing is targetting; Target Nearest NPC can help out a lot, and be sure to keep a large clock (or watch with very visible seconds) near you when timing durations. Just a quick glance can give you a spot to check on how long you have till mez runs out. Mezzing also carries with it a small memory blur ability, seeming to be more effective with the smaller mez spells. However, breaking mez is a science that tanks should learn quickly. Always have them Taunt twice if possible, and open with a Kick or Bash as they break mez. If this is still getting you rushed on the break, or this isn't available (say with a non-taunting tank as your lead fighter, then don't forget you have a spell called "Root", which is great for aggro management, and you always have it memmed anyway, right?

Attack Slow
Languid Pace (12), Tepid Deeds (24), Shiftless Deeds (44)
Hands down, the most powerful debuff available to the enchanter. while the enchanter gains their slow spells more quickly, the shaman has the ability to cast slow faster, and more efficiently; however in the absence of a shaman, the enchanter is left with the task of slowing a mob. Secondary to the primary slows (enchanter & shaman) is the bard, who can use a snare/slow song at no mana cost, and kill two birds with one stone. To understand the amazing level of effectiveness granted by an attack slow, consider the effects:
A standard mob has an attack delay of 30, swinging every 3 seconds, or gaining 20 attack tics per minute of combat. A 50% slow (attained around 40ish) turns the delay into 60 (New Delay = 30 / 0.5), reducing the mob to a 6 second attack tic, 10 swings/minute! With one cast, you have cut the offensive ability of the mob to half. No other debuff is as effctive as this. Simplify the effects to whatever explanation impresses you most--half damage output; doubles tanks' hit points; doubles tanks' haste (as they will inflict twice as much damage before receiving 20 attack tics in return).
Whenver it is possible, someone must attack slow every mob fought, always--to do otherwise is to ignore the most effective debuff in a melee combat. If stunlocking or fearing, then an attack slow isn't needed, but groups don't do this often, and attack slows are the priority to land.

MR Debuff
Tashan (4), Tashani (20), Tashania (44)
1 second casting time, 10-30 mana cost, for an unresistable magic resistance debuff. Magic resistance. Every spell in our books saves against magic. In 1 second you can quickly and easily make your own spells more effective. At 44th, taking 1 second and 30 mana before a slow is better than waiting for 6 seconds to bounce 200 mana off of a mob (Shiftless Deeds). Yes, tashing mobs does carry some abnormal aggro, but with just a little care (and/or rooting) it can be quickly and effectively dumped onto any mob that might be on the receiving end of magic-based spells in the future.

Berzerker Shield
Berzerker Strength (20), Rampage (39), Berzerker Spirit (49)
Massive Strength buff accompanied by a negative Agility, but also bearing an ablative HP Shield, which allows you to ignore the next (x) damage received (200 with Berzerker Spirit). Unfortunately the effect of the spell is only marginally useful. First, the duration is only 5 minutes, requireing constant re-application. Secondly, when the HP shield fades, so does the rest of the effect. At 49th, the HP shield of 200 is used up very quickly in most fights. Combined with an attack slow, this can be used as a pseudo-heal on your tank to buy heal time or (more likely) to keep your animation from taking damage while soloing. Basically this spell is used most effectively as a rune that will not use up a reagent each cast, but carries a 12 second recast delay with it.

AoE Mez
Mesmerization (16)
One of the most powerful contenders in the crowd control arsenal--if used correctly. Also extremely dangerous, much like charm--and many times an aquired taste among enchanters. This is basically a level 4 Mesmerize (24 seconds), with a 5 target capacity--including yourself. While the short duration requires a bit of casting to maintain, a well-placed AoE Mez can lock down an incoming train rushing a caster/healer... when you just can't afford the time required to single-mez mobs. If 4 mobs jump a tank--single mezzing and perhaps a bit of PB stunning will do just nicely, and be much safer. When a train adds and rushes the cleric? Well you'll get one--maybe two--of them mezzed before the healer is juice on the wall. AoE Mez cannot be overwritten by single-mez, meaning that you either stay committed to refreshing AoE Mez often (and single-mez resists as they break free)--which isn't bad as 70 mana comes back quickly as you get high enough that you need to AoE Mez with frequency, or utilize charms and roots to set up the mobs for a switchover to single-mez. You can charm an AoE mezzed mob, then renew your AoE, and of course your pet will not be affected. Learning the right time to AoE (not around higher level mobs that resist too much) is the true discipline required to master this power. This is a spell that should always be ready to cast if there is a possibility of being trained, even though it may go the whole night without seeing a single casting. Also important, is to raise you MR as high as you can, to minimize the chance of mezzing yourself if you stand too close to the target the effect will radiate from. 100+ MR leaves the chance of mezzing yourself extremely slim.

Dispel
Taper Enchantment (1), Cancel Magic (8), Strip Enchantment (24), Nullify Magic (29), Pillage Enchantment (44)
As you can see, enchanters are the undisputed masters of dispelling; while most casters can the ability to dispel magical effects, the enchanter gains the ability to not only strip up to 4 at a time, but to cancel effects as though they were up to nine levels higher! The 1st and 8th level versions cancel one effect, the 29th cancels two effects at 4 levels higher than your level, the 29th cancels up to 4 effects, and the 44th Pillage Enchantment cancels up to 4 effects at 4 levels higher than normal. (At 53rd enchanters gain the ability to dispel as a 62nd level enchanter.) There are two primary uses for dispelling (outside of the PvP environment, which is the aim of this guide); removing damage shields, and removing charms from players and charmed pets you have buffed--removing both the charm and buff together. In order to dispel a player, they must be in your group. When you begin encountering mobs with damage shields, dispel it quickly before debuffs are cast, so you don't catch them as well, and healers will thank you. (The average 40ish warrior, dual wielding will have an attack delay around 20, and with dual wield in double attack, land about 60 hits per minute. With just a 10 point damage shield on a mob, that's 600 damage per minute per tank that is being stopped with one dispel. For further proof, don't dispel a DS'd mob and see how much your tanks melt.

DOT
Shallow Breath (1), Suffocating Sphere (4), Choke (12), Suffocate (29), Gasping Embrace (49)
A mana efficient DOT (comparable to same level DOTs other casters/healers have) which carries the added effect of a DD impact, as well as a Strength & Agility debuff. At 49th level, it's 50pt DD, -30 STR -30 AGI, and 660pt DOT, all for 200 mana! The downside? Duration. A mob must sit still or be running (natural or feared) to take full damage from a DOT, and hte DOT takes 108 seconds (1min 48sec) to go to duration, inflicting a full 710 points. Lowering STR has very little effect on a mob (more explained in STR debuffs), and lowering AGI drops AC by 1 for every 3 points (10 in this case) so only the AGI has any real impact and even that is small. At 49th, a necromacer's lifetap DOT (which nicely adds the damage done to the necro's HP), does 720 in 54 seconds. So why such a long duration for the enchanter DOTs? (Specifically 29th and 49th, Choke and below are fast DOTs.) The debuff effect attached requires a longer duration so that the mob stays debuffed. Unfortunately, the debuff has minimal effect. Still, if you have longer duration fights, where the DOT will go to duration, this is a very good, extremely mana efficient source of damage. However in the fast paced fighting of EverQuest (even soloing), the 29th & 49th DOTs will see little use.

Shaman Debuff
Disempower (16), Listless Power (29), Incapacitate (44)
Dubbed "shaman debuffs" because the shaman gets them first, and typing AC/Strength/Agility Debuff takes too much space up. This debuff can honestly be put about on par with enchanter DOTs when a good melee of 2+ tanks/pets is in the fight. While the STR drop incurred by this spell is rarely useful, the AC & AGI drop (thereby dropping more AC) can severely lower the AC of a mob, making them much easier to hit, and therefore bring about a faster kill, preventing damage to the group, which is the goal of all debuffing. Especially handy when fear kiting, as the AC drop can make 2 or more pets much more effective--although if only one pet is on the mob, a DOT will usually have more effect, and the concern for spell slot room will usually limit you to one cast or the other.

Fear
Fear (4), Chase the Moon (16), Invoke Fear (39)
Fear causes a mob to run to "fear wells", a certain set of points/paths in every zone. They have maximum durations of 18, 36, and 48 seconds respectively, and check for a break each tic. A feared mob cannot cast, attack, or use its special attacks. Feared mobs also take full damage from DOTs, making them very handy spells in fear kiting situations. Fearing a snared/darknessed mob will cause it to slowly flee you (the safest way to fight in the game usually), but usually will require a partner for the enchanter. Trying to kill a mob running at full speed is difficult at best, as your animation (or any pet for that matter) does not hit will on the full run. Fear can be useful also in sending a mob running away, outside of its seek radius, thereby forgetting you. It is possible to snare a mob with Strength debuffs by encumbering it, but more on that in Strength debuff tactics; it's very costly in mana and very conditional as well.

Manatap
Wandering Mind (39)
This spell carries with it one of the banes to all enchanters; a recast delay. A two and a half minute delay to be precise, which means it must get its own spell slot if you wish to use it. However it's extremely powerful--by casting this spell on a mob with mana (you won't be able to cast on non-mana mobs), you gain a "mana regen over time"... MROT? Basically the efect is 6 mana per tic for 20 tics (2 minutes, 120 mana). That's Clarity on you for two minutes, and yup, it stacks with Clarity! This spell can be a very welcome addition when fighting in the proximity of casters frequently, but teach your tanks to leave the casters till the last kill, allowing you to possibly milk another manatap from them. Note that even if a mob dies after being tapped this way, you will still possess the mana regen effect for the full duration.

Manadrain
Mana Sieve (34)
This spell carries no long recast delay, costs 150 mana, and can drain away up to 370 mana from your target. No one receives this mana though, it's just lost. During raids against mobs that heal or nuke excessively, a bank of enchanters sieving mana in a "chain-drain" can be quite effective. (Lady Vox the Complete Heal casting dragon comes to mind.) Outside of raiding situations, this spell will see little use, and mobs that cast are usually easier to just stun when they try to heal, and doesn't require a special slot set aside (because you always have at least one PB stun memmed, right?).

Single-Stun
Whirl Till You Hurl (12), Dyn's Dizzying Draught (29)
This spell is highly resistant, and even when it lands, it checks to break every second, and every time the mob is bashed, possibly every time damaged. What this equates to is a practically useless spell unless used on green mobs that are no danger to you (as your level overcomes the horrid resist rates). However when the spell works, it can land a stun effect for up to 30 seconds, and DDD is a backup stun when you have an early break, though it's mana cost is prohibitive. The reason this spell line is so bad is that at one time it was so good. Encounters were trivial with an enchanter chain-spinning mobs till they died--so Verant nerfed the spell line into a useless pile.

Blind
Eye of Confusion (8)
Blind will cause a mob to move somewhat erratically, but do not think it will keep you from being attacked. Basically if a mob would need 3 seconds to close a gap between you and it, the mob will need 4 seconds if blinded. Blind will last up to 18 seconds, with a save each tic. The true use of Blind spells is during PvP fighting, both to disorient your opponent, and keep them from "bagging" (putting away their equipment in bags so you can't loot them when they die).

Aggro-Reduction
Lull (1), Soothe (8), Calm (20), Pacify (39)
Like Whirl Till You Hurl, this spell line was a one time immensely powerful, allowing caster to calm a mob for 2 minutes so that it wouldn't aggro or assist mobs beyond the radius the spell reduced it to. (1 pace in the case of Pacify... mobs are wider than one pace.) This so trivialized encounters that should have been crowd control nightmares (as single pulling was easy), the spell line was nerfed into oblivion by giving it an extreme resist rate, and giving bounces the chance to aggro. Still, it does possess some use on green mobs, where your level drastically reduces the chances of resists or drawing aggro.

Memory Blur
Memory Blur (12), Reoccuring Amnesia (49)
The blur line allows you to do just that--make a mob wipe its hate list clean. However, the higher level a mob gets, the less likely this is to work. By the time you push into the 40ish range, memory blur isn't very effective, and you will find that rooting a mob is usually more handy; it casts faster, requires less mana, is always memmed anyway (right?), and will usually allow the tanks to resume their positition at the top of the hate list before it wears off. Often enough to compare to the times memory blur doesn't work at least. Memory Blur is also extremely handy for PLing, as you just take a mob to near death, blur it, and then whoever kills it gets the experience. This is because wiping the hate list also has the side effect of erasing the damage list, thereby starting the race to 51% over again. Reoccurring Amnesia is a repeated Memory Blur, that appears (very difficult to tell how well it works) to try wiping the hate list on cast, then retry every tic for 4 tics or until it succeeds--you're still only getting one blur from it, just a blur 4 times as likely to take hold. As Memory Blur can often take several casts to "take" at higher level, this is necessary. However, blurring just says, "Soandso blinks a few times," rather than giving a resist. (The spell is unresistable... whether or not it works is another thing.)

AoE Memory Blur
Mind Wipe (39), Blanket of Forgetfulness (49)
AoE blurs are just a regular blur, and more. They blur everything around the target in a large radius, including your animation if it's fighting (more on that in Kamikaze Tactics), and for some reason seem to land better than single-blurs (not heavily researched, just an opinion really). The principle is still the same however; you see a lot of "blinks a few times" then find out if it took hold. Can be useful in raids when a healer or caster is being summoned by a mob (say during a planar raid) and an AoE blur can get the mob back to fighting the tanks quickly and efficiently, or also used in tank-mezzing (see Glossary) in order to get the mob to fight a different tank while another gets healed.

Animation
Pendril's Animation (1), Juli's Animation (4), Mircyl's Animation (8), Kilan's Animation (12), Shalee's Animation (16), Sisna's Animation (20), Sagar's Animation (24), Uleen's Animation (29), Boltran's Animation (34), Aanya's Animation (39), Yegoreff's Animation (44), Kintaz's Animation (49)
These are our loyal, kamikaze pets. Kamikaze, because once they start a fight, they fight to the death, unless you find a way to make them stop (memory blur). They are dumb, uncommandable, don't have a good defense, don't really damage as well as a mage or necro pet (though for their level they actually hit harder... just don't summon at as good a level), and generally serve only one purpose:
They are a target for you to haste. Enchanters are only powerful when they have something to manipulate, and our animations are no exception. While they won't tank with the staying power or damage output of a mage or necro pet, they are quite capable of acting as a relatively free DOT that does signifigant damage. At level 12, your animations will be able to inflict magical damage, and by level 29 they will dual wield if you hand them any one handed weapon that is Secondary Slot equipable. At 39th they begin to regenerate at NPC rates (30hp/tic) and by 44th all summons will regen quickly. Whereas a magicians pet is about tanking the mob till it dies, or the necro pet tanks until the fear kite is going, the enchanter just hopes his animation survives the fight while putting some extra damage on the mob. Enchanters can solo quite well with their animation (especially if charm soloing doesn't fancy your nerves), but just consider them one more tool for playing EverQuest the way you enjoy. Be warned that if you intend to do any crowd control in a group, then an animation is a bad choice to have up. Once you are hit, your little friend will be all over it, as deathly loyal servants tend to do. Because you can't command it, you can't guard it, which can cause your animation to wander a bit in cramped areas or spots with bad pathing. Your pet will always attempt to stand northwest of you when possible, so if the thing you want to camp is northwest of where you meditate, get used to looking at Mr. Kamikaze a lot.

Strength Debuff
Weaken (1), Enfeeblement (4), Ebbing Strength (12), Feckless Might (20), Insepid Weakness (34), Weakness (44)
Before I discuss the usefulness of a pure Strength debuff (which enchanters excel at), let's talk about how damage works. I used to think enchanters were real math geeks, memorizing every number they could find and constantly doing calculations during battle, but warriors scare me. They've gotten the most accurate formula for damage computations to date, and that's what I base my opnions of STR debuffs on, and they've held sound through hours upon hours of testing. When a mob is struck, the damage yielded is derived from the damage of your weapon, your skill with the weapon, your class damage bonus (warriors gain this from 28th on) and your Strength. Unfortunately, the STR portion involves dividing your STR by 100, yielding about a 10 point damage difference between 100 and 200 Strength. Even so that's a lot of extra damage--if your hits averaged higher because of this. However, your most common hits will be your weapon damage x2 + class damage bonus, and weapon damage x2 + class bonus + 1. The second most common damage strike will be 1 + class damage bonus. Harder hits due to Strength will be much more rare, and even having 1 Strength will have very little impact on your damage output. However it WILL lower your Attack Rating (ATK) by lowering strength, but as hitting is controlled primarily by level and weapon skill, even this won't be a massive impact. Now add on top of that--a mob's damage appears to be based on it's level doubled, plus or minus a mob type modifier. STR has never shown me a reduced damage hit, or reduced the strength that the mob hits with for me. It has shown a slight decrease in the amount of hits, but it's a very minimal improvement, not even approaching the effectiveness of just throwing an attack slow for much less invested mana. (To get a large STR drop, you must toss on your STR Debuff, Shaman Debuff, and DOT the mob.)
So why would you ever use a STR debuff? Well firstly it's very handy in PvP, but I'm not here to talk about PvP, so skip that... but obviously a warrior with 1 STR and 100+ encumberance won't be getting around too well. A snare effect can be achieved through STR debuffing, if you can get a mob encumbered. There are only two ways to achieve this, though--the first is to fight mobs that are always carrying large amounts of coin or bronze armor, the second is to carry around something heavy (like a block of clay) to hand to the mob. Unfortunately, this often requires charming the mob, as killing even non-KOS mobs tends to make them KOS eventually. While this will allow you to fear kite solo, it's quite mana hungry, and with the time you will invest in encumbering a mob, you will be better off just getting a snare/darkness partner.

INT/WIS Debuff
Curse of the Simple Mind (29)
Remember mention of those parlor tricks? This is one of them. A quick casting debuff that might actually serve a little purpose in PvP (15 INT or WIS is 150 mana at level 50 lost), but in the normal PvE game, this spell only does one thing of true usefulness--"Soandso looks stupid."

AoE Nuke
Gravity Flux (39)
If you make a habit of adventuring with wizards or druids that like to multi-kite (snaring multiple mobs, rounding them up, then nuking them all at once till they die), then this spell will allow you to actually help. Otherwise, this nuke will see practically no use, ever. When it lands, the mob is thrown extremely high into the air, and falling damage can be quite fun for PvP application.

Mana Regen
Breeze (16), Clarity (29)
Every tic, these spells regen mana... 2/tic with Breeze, 6 with Clarity. Quite simply, this is just an amazing buff, allowing you to enhance every caster in the group. If someone in your group can use mana, buff them. Be prepared to be asked for crack, coffee, c1, and about a thousand rude ways to interrupt you. Some enchanters weather this storm of mana regen requests, others hole up like hermits and react very badly to requests. Some people will donate, others will be asses. Just remember it's only one person, not everyone is rude and callous. Make sure druids remember that you gave them regen when you need a port, and cast these buffs on every wizard you ever see. They will be the one saving your life some day, when they burn down a mob you can't hold any longer in seconds.

Personal Shield
Minor Shielding (1), Lesser Shielding (8), Shielding (16), Major Shielding (24), Greater Shielding (34), Arch Shielding (44)
Every caster gains this line of spells, allowing you to buff your AC, HP, and MR. This is a critical buff to have up at all times, as it's akin to wearing a very good breastplate a warrior would have on. The hit points are something all enchanters need at all times, and the MR is very useful when AoE Mez is flying around in cramped quarters. This line will not stack with the Talisman series of the shaman (pure HP buff), so tell them not to cast it on you, as the MR and AC is just as important to you.

Charisma Buff
Sympathetic Aura (20), Radiant Visage (34), Adorning Grace (49)
Charisma does lower resist rates when both mezzing and charming, and this is a free way to get a large buff to your Charisma (40 at level 49). Optionally, you might want to toss this buff onto anyone doing some charming, plus be prepared for requests to get CHA buffs from low CHA classes looking to buy something.

Intelligence/Wisdom Buff
Insight (39), Brilliance (44)
Insight raises primarily WIS, and some INT, and Brilliance is the opposite. Buff it on any caster that doesn't have 200 INT or WIS for healers, as it's a lot of extra mana. However, it's not a large priority when mana is tight, as a half mana cleric is getting nothing from this buff until medding to full. A gallon of water in a 2 gallon jug is the same as a gallon of water in a 3 gallon fishtank.

Strength Buff
Strengthen (1)
This is 10 STR, and enchanters never get another STR buff, which is odd considering the Berzerker Shield series. This spell really never needs cast, ever... label it among parlor tricks if you like, but at low level that small ATK raise the STR will give might be worth lobbing on.

Rune Shield
Rune I (16), Rune II (24), Rune III (34), Rune IV (44)
These are an ablative HP shield like the berzerker series, only they have no recast delay, take longer to cast, and use a reagent (Malachite for 16th, Bloodstone for 24th, Jasper for 34th, and Peridot for 44th). These are a nice buffer to have up (long duration till used up) when about to make a big crowd control break-in, or to buff up the puller. They stack with anything, and classes able to consume their HP for mana are able to "chew up" these shields instead.

AC Buff
Haze (4), Mist (12), Cloud (20), Obscure (29), Shade (39), Shadow (49)
This is a targetable AC buff, quite useful actually. Only a small amount weaker than equivalent cleric AC buffs, and much more mana efficient (70 mana vs 300 mana at 49th). Buff yourself and other casters with this buff and let the cleric blow mana on the tanks, who need every point of AC they can get.

Haste
Quicken (16), Alacrity (24), Augmentation (29), Celerity (39), Swift Like the Wind (49)
Haste. Increases the attack speed of target, be it your animation or a tank. Don't bother hasting mage and necro pets, their pet buffs will take care of that, and include other stats. Augmentation is actually a weaker haste than Alacrity, but is longer duration and includes Stamina regen, AC and AGI (thus AC) buffs. Haste is the most effective aid you will offer to all melee groups, period. 60% haste at 49th, means that in a two tank group, you've added more than a third tank to the group that doesn't take xp, as far as damage is concerned.

Vision/Levitation/Breathing
Enduring Breath (12), Serpent Sight (12), Levitation (16), Ultravision (29)
Shifting Sight grants infravision, and Ultravision is self-explanatory. Barbarians, humans, and erudites will love you for these spells, and at night in the outdoors all non-dark elf pullers appreciate the vision. Enduring Breath forgoes the need for air when travelling underwater, and Levitation allows a person to float (slowly drifting down). Enduring Breath requires a Fish Scale reagent, and Levitation consumes a Bat Wing. All of these spells help a player in their environment, hence the same spell series.

Invisibility
Invisibility (4), See Invisible (8), Invisibility versus Undead (16), Improved Invisibility (50)
Fairly self-explanatory spells. Note that turning invisible will kill your animation, break charm, and See Invisible will not allow your pet to survive you blinking out. Improved Invisibilty is a self-only spell, that grants a 10 minute set duration invis. (Invisibility and Invis vs Undead are random duration.)

Remote Viewing
Bind Sight (8), Shifting Sight (20), Cast Sight (34)
Parlor tricks mostly, and a chance for some nifty screeshots. This spell allows you to see through the eyes of your target, and you can also "hop scotch" to other targets you pick up during their travels. Duration is until your stamina runs out, though the farther way the target gets the more jumpy the "transmission" gets. Nice way to pass time when you're bored, and actually had use once when a rogue was trying to find my corpse and I was using his eyes to tell him if I saw anything familiar. Note that any spells you cast while using these spells will still come from you, with normal range restrictions. You can renew your stamina with stamina regen spells during the effects. Bind Sight is just the borrowed sight, 20th is with infravision, and 34th uses ultravision.

Stamina Regen
Invigor (24), Extinguish Fatigue (44)
Both of these spells will increase stamina regen drastically; Invigor will cause a stamina bar (the yellow bar) to fill up in just a tic or two, while Extinguish will flat out fill the bar as it lands. Tanks wielding heavy weapons can often get low on stamina, making them swing sluggish and reducing their combat abilities minorly. Keeping the cleric or shaman on their butts while you hop up to refresh stamina is a good use of your powers.

Identify
Identify (16)
Some items in EverQuest have special information attached to them, discernable by cast Identify on them. Very few times have I used this spell, however it will supposedly begin requiring more use in the future.

Direction
True North (1)
This spell will spin you to face North when cast, which does actually come in handy when you're totally lost and your friend says, "As long as you don't head north you'll be fine."

Faction Buff
Alliance (8), Benevolence (20)
Faction setting for the current target will increase until you zone for you. Alliance can possibly shift a mob one direction (say from dubious to apprehensive) and Benevolence can usually always get one shift, sometimes two. (It depends on the distance from Indifferent cons... the closer to the middle you get the easier it is to slip one way or the other.)

Enchantment
Enchant Clay (8), Enchant Silver (8), Enchant Electrum (16), Enchant Gold (24), Enchant Platinum (34), Enchant Vellium (44), Enchant Adamantite (49), Enchant Brellium (49), Enchant Mithril (49), Enchant Steel (49)
Each one of these spells requires a bar of the appropriate metal for a reagent, and it simply turns the item into an enchanted version of the first. The Silver through Vellium spells are for making enchanted jewelry, and the last four metals are used in crafting enchanted cultural armors (Mithril is for High Elves, etc). At one point in time, the "enchant ore" spells required a large amount of extremely rare gems in order to enchant bars, but this requirement was taken away by Verant, as no one was interested in dumping huge amounts of resources for very substandard armor (considering the level required to enchant the ore). I've not seen Enchant Clay as of yet, but I'll assume it's planned for pottery.

Bottled Mana
Thicken Mana (12), Crystallize Mana (20), Clarify Mana (29), Distill Mana (39), Purify Mana (49)
Each spell in this series has application in Tailoring, Pottery, and/or Smithing--such as Thicken Mana for Wu's Gauntles, Crystallize Mana for Imbued Idols (also required for Enchant Clay), etcetras. (I did not know these were all implemented, thanks Teraine!)

Sentinel
Sentinel (8)
Possibly one of the most annoying spells in the game, as it spams people in the area of it's casting continually with messages of being watched. Worse for you is that every time a mob passes through the radius (centered on where you cast it) you are notified. The spell will last for about 6 minutes, but does actually have some use. The primary time I would use this spell was when I needed to run to buy food or meet someone from the docks, and didn't want to miss the boat. I just cast Sentinel and ran off. When the ship arrived, I was notified of it's pulling up to the dock, allowing me to run up quickly to get on. I've also found this spell useful when camping a spot and needing to keep my head in the spellbook (pre-35), so a sentinel dropped where the pop would be was handy for letting me know when to stand up. Still... mostly a parlor trick.

Bind/Gate
Gate (4), Bind Affinity (12)
I list these as one spell series because they both deal with your bind point. Gate teleports you (self only) back to your bind point, and Bind Affinity allows you to change your bind point to just about anywhere, or bind group members in city zones and a few other special spots.

Damage Shield
Feedback (29)
This is the only damage shield enchanters receive, inflicting 11 per hit. While this isn't much compared to the higher level DOTs of mages and druids, it is better than nothing, and quite useful when soloing. This will also stack with Illusion: Fire Elemental, granting 25 per hit!

Illusions
Minor Illusion (1), Half-Elf (4), Human (4), Gnome (8), Wood Elf (8), Dark Elf (12), Eruidite (12), Halfling (12), High Elf (12), Barbarian (16), Dwarf (16), Tree (16), Iksar (20), Ogre (20), Troll (20), Earth Elemental (24), Skeleton (24), Air Elemental (29), Water Elemental (29), Fire Elemental (34), Drybone (39), Spirit Wolf (39), Boon of the Garou (44), Werewolf (44)
24 different illusions, one that's targettable (on 44th level or higher). Each illusion grants something, be it faction or special abilities. A general consensus shows some upset at no more illusions received after 44th, but the largest request among enchanters is for Illusion: Religion, so that you can hide that, and not be forced to play Agnostic.

Learn all of these spell lines, and master what situations all of them are good for, as understanding exactly what your spell line can do is the way to learn tactics and understand why they work, as well as giving you an idea of how new ideas should work...

Tactics

Xornn bobbed freely in the air, his body a transformation of air into a vaguely humanoid body. Even though he had scantly any weight, the wind gave him pause and passed around him. He truly preferred this method of travel in the Ocean of Tears, skimming across the water freely. On an isle across the shore, he and Rhedd, his druid wife of many years, stared out across the water at the seafury cyclopses stomping about their hill of an island. "So," began Rhedd, "what are we doing today?"

"Hunting seafuries, I believe, wife."

Rhedd waved a dismissing hand at Xornn and turned away from him as she pretended to act pouty. Unfortunately, it never fooled Xornn--but fortunately, Xornn had the good sense to pretend it did. "I'm sorry, dear... just a little poking fun." Xornn poked a finger of air into the small of the wood elf's back and the cool touch caused her to shiver. She spun about quickly, her cheeks flush with red and eyes aglow.

"Fear kite?" she queried?

"What else?" asked Xornn rhetorically.

"Good then... incoming seafury cyclops!"

Mastering tactics is the true road to victory for the enchanter, as learning each "building block" of tactics allows you to develop instinctual reactions to situations, till finally you're reacting intelligently to your environment, rather than trying to analyze data, determine the best course of action, then implement. Recognize and react is the secret to master enchanting. Understand what is happening quickly, and deal with the event before it consumes the scenario unfolding. Below are the primary categories of Tactics I believe are critical to master, as they cover just about every aspect of play.

Kamikaze

Xornn picked a bit of grass from the ground he knelt upon, and rubbed it between his fingers. A floating pair of swords paced next to him, watching for that moment when it would be called into service. Across the plains of South Karana the young enchanter saw a gnoll heading on patrol, away from the Splitpaw Lair--that would be the one.

Quickly the enchanter was up and running, closing the distance to the gnoll patrolman as his animation followed in tow. As he neared to the gnoll he began to call on the poisonous bite of Tashan, draining away the gnoll's ability to resist Xornn's powers. The gnoll quickly charged the enchanter, sure of a victory against the robed intruder--though the beast man should have called for help.

As it reached Xornn, the mystically hasted swords smashed into the gnoll on an intercept course, as Xornn backed away from the fight. The gnoll did not look concerned with the animation, for though it could hurt him, it was not very durable, and soon enough the enchanter would fall. Then the gnoll felt a binding grasp of magic slowing his thoughts, dulling his reactions, till it felt like his body was moving in slow motion--or perhaps everything else was just so fast. Really, the whole point was inconsequential, as the gnoll felt an explosive jolt in his mind, and literally felt his eyes trying to bulge from their sockets as his head began to burn, and his lungs could not find purchase on air. Then, as he stared dumbly at the viscious swords mortally wounding him, his slow mind managed to piece together a sentence in Common Tongue: "Prepare... soul... gods... await you." Well, he'd heard the words, but that was the most sense he could make of them, before he died.

Kamikaze Tactics are about using your animation in battle. The animation is dubbed Kamikaze, as once it begins fighitng, it will fight to the death. There's also some similarities in the kamikaze pilots of WWII only having enough fuel to get to the battle, and animations only having enough hit points for half of a fight, but in the case of using the animation, we want to try and keep it alive, and optimally taking no more damage than can heal in the time it takes you to be ready for the next fight. If you consume 40% of your mana in a fight, then your animation should get to full health by the time you recover that mana. There are several classes of Kamikaze available to the enchanter, but this section will cover the most difficult, Kamikaze-Soloing. (The animation is best used in a fear-kite, like all pets, but that will be covered under Kiting.)

Pure Kamikaze
Lineup: Nuke, DOT (or Second Nuke), PB Stun, Root, Single Mez, Attack Slow, MR Debuff, Swap Slot (Haste)
The "pure" form of kamikaze uses your animation as a DOT that costs the amount of HP you lose getting it into the fight. There are two drawbacks to your animation tanking however. First, the animation has terrible hit points and defensive skills, making it very susceptable to death in short order, and secondly it makes crowd control next to impossible since you can't call it off. Since you're soloing, we'll just assume you're not trying to do multiples at once. You must do 51% of the damage to a mob if you wish to take full xp, as you only get half experience if your pet should do more damage than you, thus the necessity of loading nukes for the fight. The nukes are also there because you need to get the mob dead before it gets your pet dead. From 29th on, you should probably just load your second strongest nuke instead of your DOT, as your animation won't last 108 seconds in a stand up fight, so your DOT isn't going to go to duration. However using your secondary nuke to chain-nuke you can drop a large amount of damage onto the mob quickly. You will get a feel for when your DOT is on long enough to be worth the mana, and when it isn't. The PB stun is there because you always have one loaded, just in case you need to get a spell off and are having trouble, and Root is there for the immobilization (and aggro management, keeping the mob fighting your pet instead of you). Single Mez is there in case you lose your pet and need a break (just keep in mind if you DOTed the mob or not), and your Attack Slow is what keeps the animation alive for the fight, by effectively increasing his defensive abilities--or making the mob take longer to smash your animation into oblivion, however you wish to look at it. MR Debuff is the opening pull spell, as it makes all of your spells land better, and the Swap Slot should typically have Haste loaded, as it's very important to keep your animation swinging fast, but also try to keep AC buffs on the pet (every little bit helps).
Typical fight will go as follows: Tash mob, get hit *pet goes in*, Attack Slow mob, Nuke (lead with DOT if loaded so works the longest), Root (shouldn't need PB stun vs a slowed mob), Nuke. Now if Root holds, chase that with your secondary nuke (if not using DOTs) too keep the damage going. If root breaks you will most likely need to reRoot the rushing mob, and your primary nuke will be ready to fire by the time you finish with that.
Using Pure Kamikaze, it's easy to outrace your pet in most cases, and the animation's damage really adds up fast. The whole objective is about killing the mob before it kills the pet. When using this tactic, aim for lower blues, which you can kill fast and readily, but won't be such a threat to your animation as bigger blues and higher cons will be. What a mage or necro solos at one spell level, you should be there at the next spell level usually. (If a 34 mage hangs out somewhere, try that place around 39.)

KS-Kamikaze
Lineup: Nuke, Berzerker Shield, AoE Blur (or Single Blur), Root, Single Mez, Attack Slow, MR Debuff, Swap (Haste)
Quite similar to pure kamikaze, the goal in KS Kamikaze is to kill steal your animation at the end of the fight. This is much easier to accomplish after you reach 39th and gain an AoE Blur, which allows you to call your pet off. Basically the idea is to attack slow the mob as usual, then just keep putting Berzerker Shields (or Runes if you prefer) onto your pet as they fade, which will allow you to keep the pet healthy while you just keep regenerating the mana the shields are using. With an attack slow, the shields will usually stay up for awhile, to this can be a slow and time-consuming kill. As the mob turns to run, you stand and blur it, then immediately follow with your nuke to kill it and claim full experience. However, with a hasted, dual wielding, double attacking animation, it can be rather tricky to KS Mr. Kamikaze sometimes. Once you gain the AoE Blur, you can blur the mob and call your pet off (he forgets he's mad at it) all at the same time.

Stun-Kamikaze
Lineup: Nuke (or 3rd PB Stun), 2nd PB Stun, PB Stun, Root, Single Mez, Attack Slow (or Nuke), MR Debuff, Swap (Haste)
When you aren't concerned with outracing the pet (such as while clearing out greens) one of the best ways to dominate a mob is stun-lock kamikaze. Just load up all your PB Stuns, and get to stun-locking like mad while the animation goes to town on the mob. Having an Attack Slow ready is really just an option, and often a good spell to keep memmed there is either your nuke (if running 3 PB stuns at 44th+), or a DOT since it will take some time for the animation to kill the mob, even if it's just standing there under constant stuns.

No matter which method you elect to follow, just remember that Kamikaze Soloing is about mana effective kills and reducing downtime. Being able to kill a white conning mob is great--really. But if I can kill two blue mobs and recover in the time it takes to kill one white mob and recover, I'm getting better experience off the blues. There are many other debuffs I don't suggest using, like Shaman Debuffs & Strength Debuffs, but that's because they aren't mana effective, and usually even if you get them on the mob it's not worth it by the time it's on. These tactics are fast and mana efficient, especially with some practice, and getting a feel for what your animation can handle.

Last rule of thumb, never be afraid to tip your hat to the animation and gate/zone. Tiny Daggers are cheap--experience is costly.

Kiting

Drekaar stood impassively looking at the young cyclops--'For a cyclops at least,' thought the enchanter--walking out of the entrance to the canyons in East Karana. A young human ranger was fidgetting beside him, obviously quite skittish about the upcoming battle. He was pacing a bit, practice swinging his swords a bit--contemplating why he let this dark elf talk him into coming here.

"Because you're weak-willed," answered Drekaar for him, much to the ranger's shock. "It's no matter, I'll compensate for you. Just snare the mighty Broon, I'll handle the rest." With that, Drekaar began to summon the call of Tashan...

Now the path to Kamikaze fun doesn't have to be a solo one... no sire. Anyone capable of snaring is your best friend. Get that old animation summoned and hasted, then fire away with Tash at your next victim. On the way in they snare/darkness it, and you take a hit to get your pet in. Then fear it. Use your best fear (Fear at 4th, Chase the Moon at 16th, Invoke Fear at 39th) because duration on the fear is what matters. Charisma doesn't appear to affect duration significantly, and even partnered with a necromancer you should fear. Fear is a spell that needs to be cast in a fear kite. The other spells are DOTS and movement slows. Both of which you suck at past 12th level, so stick with what you're good at. After your fear hits, it's pretty much up to you what's next. I'm a fan of dropping a DOT on there (just to fit in really, as our DOT is just so slow) and chasing it with the Disempower line (drops AC, making the pet hit better, though it's more effective with 2+ tanks/pets). Meanwhile your partner will nuke like crazy (wizard), DOT like mad (necromancer or druid), or flat out melee (ranger) the mob until it falls over unceremoniously. Clarity will keep the mana flowing, and all but the wizard are able to heal in some way or another. Kamikaze-Fear-Kiting, besides being extremely fun to say, is terrifyingly effective as a killing style.

Fear Kiting
Lineup: Nuke (or DOT), DOT (or Shaman Debuff), PB Stun, Root, Single Mez, Fear, MR Debuff, Swap (Haste)
The primary damage spell is typically a DOT, because it debuffs AGI, which debuffs AC, which makes Mr. Kamikaze hit harder. At the same time though, bear in mind that if your DOT is only on for half duration before death occurs, then the DOT only did half damage, and very likely, just nuking it once would have shelled out that much damage, so past about 20ish or so the primary damage is often just as good as a nuke. AC Debuffs from the Shaman line are not to be underestimated though--anything that makes your pet hit more often can't be a bad thing, but it's also not critical. If you don't wish to keep the AC debuff up, then just keep a primary/secondary damage setup ready to go.

Fear is the all important role. That mob needs to be following either your or the snarer (snared) or fleeing you at snare speed. (Note--don't exploit by fearing mobs into objects, it's cheap and can get you in trouble too.) If it's on your animation, fear had better be inbound, because you don't attack slow a feared mob (which is why that slot gets replaced).

That's really all there is to fear kiting, hence it's appeal. Simple and safe. A wonderful way to drop amazing amounts of mobs, for great experience. After a night of fear kiting, force yourself to hit up a dungeon to keep your crowd control skills sharp, because it's hard to leave that amazingly fast and safe experience fear kiting gives--thus the appeal of necromancers who fear kite without a partner. Fear kiting is also sometimes the only way to fight certain mobs that were designed to hit extremely hard, and enchanters that can fear kite on par with a necromancer are a welcome addition to a group then.

Full groups don't usually fear kite well, because it's slower than the speed that a nice balanced group could just hack a mob to pieces. However if you're running a group of say, enchanter (you), necromancer, druid, and rogue... you don't really have the tanking ability for the druid to manage heals. But if you have the rogue pull, the druid snare, and you fear while the necro starts lobbing on those mind-numbing DOTs... mobs will die fast and all the while no one is in great danger during the fights.

Beware again the addictive nature of fear kiting... many a chanter has been turned to necromancy after a taste of this tactic.

Mez Kiting
Lineup: Nuke, Secondary Nuke, PB Stun, Root, Single Mez, Mesmerize (4), MR Debuff, Swap (Rune)
Mez Kiting is a particulary effective way to kill casting mobs, as the largest threat say--a wizard--poses is the ability damage you fast. Mez kiting allows you to not only ignore the recast delay on your nukes, but to even med some mana back until it's time for mez to break. Because the enchanter nukes aren't as effective as other casters, it's important to use the technique primarily with low hit point mobs (conveniently most casters have low hit points for their level). Essential is some form of movement enhancement however, be it SoW or boots that grant SoW effects, or a bard in your group, or potions... you need to run fast. The technique is simplicity. You sinlge mez your target, tash it, then root it before the nuke. (If root doesn't break, great... if it does, start running while spells ungrey.) Then remez the mob and med a tic or two. Use level 4 Mesmerize for this as it's the cheapest and most mana efficient mez you get (only 20 mana for 24 seconds). ReRoot the mob if you like (nice to not have to run when it holds) and nuke again. Rinse and repeat. The secondary nuke is to finish mobs without throwing a full sized shot at them, and you keep your main single mez loaded in case of adds, needing to med up a little more from resists or what not, just single mez and mez-med back to good health.

Charm

A sharp wind blew across the Commonlands, snapping at Drekaar's silken robes as he gave his staff some purchase on the ground and put some weight to it. He'd been watching from his vantage atop the tiny bluff for some time, looking for the right one. "There," he exclaimed to know one in particular, "that is my new slave." Walking with no great expedience, yet still covering the ground between himself and his target, Drekaar prepared the enchantments for enactment. A quick flash of blue signaled the barking of Tashan alerting the willowisp in the distance, but the creature's fate was already sealed as Drekaar completed the rite of charming. It floated gently over to him and took its place at his side.

"Why hello, little slave." He smiled satisfactorily to himself as he felt the tiny spirit of light fighting to break free of Drekaar's control. "Now now, lemming," he scolded, "there's no need for that--you're in my service until I tire of you, but if you satisfy my need of you, perhaps I shall allow you to live when I'm through." The will of the spirit sagged, feeling Drekaar's iron grip squeezing its instinctive thoughts.

Some time later, Drekaar stood over the corpse of the tiny willowisp grinning eerily. The air about the creature still teemed with wavering energies from psychic feedback Drekaar had finished the willowisp with. "As you can see, dead one, it's very difficult to satisfy a Child of Hate." Drekaar turned and scanned the commonlands again, spotting a young kodiak travelling by some distance away.

"There," he exclaimed to no one in particular...

I'm going to make a quick statement before we get too much more into this.

Charm is the most powerful tool the enchanter has, in both versatility and effectiveness.

That said, it's also pretty much the most dangerous thing you can do, except when facing certain death anyway, you might as well charm something that might save your (and your groups') butt! The basic revelations about charm from the research done by myself and my fellow charm-nuts:

Charm resist rates are minorly impacted by higher Charisma.
Charm duration is random, and not visibly affected by Charisma.
Charm is a massive aggro producer.
Charm is broken by duration expiring, turning invisible, or if dispelled.
Charm mobs respond to /pet attack, /pet back off, /pet guard here, /pet guard me, /pet follow me, /pet who is your leader, /pet sit down (sends mob back to spawn point or patrol pathing)

There are two primary situations in which you use charm. The first is charming one mob to two or three other mobs, just watching over the fight and giving the pet an "edge"; you may or may not have a partner (especially a healer) with you, but the situation is a charmed mob fighting a non-charmed mob, and nothing else is between you and the mobs but charm (and root). The second application is in groups, where you are charming a mob to increase the groups damage output. Effectively this is a form of offensive crowd control, and will see deeper discussion in that section of these tactics. Here I will be discussing charm-solo, which refers to any time your charmed mob is soloing another mob, and you're the one the one keeping them fighting. Even if you have a partner to heal you, when charm breaks it's you that is getting your head beat in, so we'll just keep calling it charm-solo.

Charm Solo
Lineup: Nuke, Charm, PB Stun, Root, Single Mez, Attack Slow (Edge), MR Debuff, Swap Slot (Rune)

Primary damage is obviously your strongest nuke. Charm is a selection typically based on what level you need to charm. Always use the lowest version of charm (12th Charm, 24th Beguile, 39th Cajoling Whispers, 49th Allure) you can, to conserve mana. (The exception is at 53rd when you aquire Boltran's Agacerie, and it's fast casting time, but let's stick to pre-51 here.) The Color Stun is whatever version you need to cover the recast for your charm. Color Flux with Charm, Color Shift with Beguile, Color Skew with Cajoling... (wrong here... you have to mez after you start using Cajoling... more later). Root is the key to recharming instead of dying, as you keep the enemy mob rooted at all times--thus when charm breaks only the ex-pet rushes you. Your Single Mez should be your strongest version (especially after breaking charm and needing to med for a bit before killing pet or re-charming), but after you need Cajoling Whispers to charm, you'll find that Color Shift doesn't buy you enough time, even if you backpedal a long way off. At this point it's necessary to use Mesmerize (level 4) to hold the mob still while you cast your charm. I typicaly drop Mesmerize right into the single mez spot, and honestly don't even need to mesmerize much. Usually charm will hold through two fights, so just don't press your luck going for the third.

Next is the third most important part of charm solo. The first was charm itself, as it's not very exciting otherwise. The second is Root, because dying sucks and two mobs rushing you while trying to recharm is a good way to die. But the third most important is the "edge", or the advantage you give your pet to ensure it wins. Before considering it, just forget DOTs--never remove your ability to mez the mob when things start hitting the fan. Of all the methods I've tried, only three show real use... Damage Shielding, Haste, and Attack Slows. That's the ascending list of mana cost, and effectiveness, though Haste while less effective in the damage "edge" is more useful for shorter charm reliance.

Of course the Tashan line is present. You really want to take a chance at charm-soloing without dropping the MR of the mob? Didn't think so.

To finish is the fabled swap slot, which will usually contain your latest Rune, because losing hit points is what slows down charm solo, because that's when you really have to grind to a halt and heal up. Otherwise you can often charm solo for 20 minutes or more at a time without stopping pulls.

First a look at how to "do it". Find the mob you wish to be your pet. Start small and work your way up as you improve in ability. And by the way, spend your time auctioning for items and other "downtime" with a little greeny charmed. It'll break charm plenty often on you, and won't kill you. Get used to regaining the charm as quickly as possible. Hold it as a pet for an hour without losing your mana quickly. Learn the timing and how long you have to get it charmed again. Then move up to a bigger mob. Keep upgrading mobs till your charming the big dogs and kicking butt with them. That's the only secret to charm solo, really...

1. Gain control.
2. Regain control.
3. Regain control...

I think you get the point. As long as the charmed mob is hitting the enemy mob--and not you--you're doing something right. The only tricky part of charm soloing is making sure they keep fighting each other. Anyway, charm your pet and /guard it at your "pull area" (a spot with few/no wanderers), or if you're in a place with non-aggro mobs (like oasis) just head off with the pet in tow. When you find the mob it's going to fight, Tash that mob and run to pet. As you get there /pet attack the pet in and spin around--root the enemy mob right away. Then your pet has "the edge" be it a damage shield (actually cast before pulling), haste (again do this before pulling), or an attack slow on the enemy mob (my preference, and cast right after rooting). Once this is all done, have a seat and use F1 to target your pet (press twice) and F8 (target nearest NPC) to watch the mob's health. The whole affair is much easier from 35th on when you have automed, and if you don't wish to meditate during 12-35, there's no shame in that. You can get by without medding just fine, but you'll have to take breaks more often. If root breaks renew it, but always stay targetted on your pet whenever possible. When charm breaks (eventually it will) you want to have it in your sights already. Best case scenario break, the pet rushes you and the other mob is rooted. Color Stun and charm (or color stun and mez if using Cajoling/Allure) then send the pet right back in. Worst case scenario (setting aside trains), Root breaks, followed by charm on pet. In this case, get them under control, through mezzing, stunning, rooting, and spitting if it helps. If it's looking nasty, just zone. You can bend their will anytime you want, which is pretty damned cowardly and devious. During the two mob rush when you're getting pounded down isn't the time to be a hero. If it doesn't look like you'll get control quickly, just zone--when you're solo there's no one to show off for, no tanks that can't Gate... just you and your experience bar.

That's the basics really. Charm pet, pull mob, sic pet, root mob, keep mob rooted. When pet is nearing death, invis (or if charm breaks between pulls) and then either Root-Nuke it out, or Mez it and go get a new pet to kill off your old pet (getting to be my favorite way to do things since mobs are getting so big). Let me take a moment to discuss "the edge" though. When I use a damage shield, I'm going to take out one mob, and have a pretty wounded pet. I won't have to help it kill the other mob (most likely) and it's cheap mana wise. However I'm not getting two kills out of the pet before it's damaged goods.

Damage Shield Pros: Cheap mana cost, no increase in danger on charm break.
Damage Shield Cons: Minimal effect. Usually ensures a pet victory, but only one.

Hasting the pet is an awesome edge, but also the most risky. The mob will kill much faster, equating to less damage during the fight, and less time in the fight itself--that means you don't need charm to hold as long, which is very important. With a 60% haste buff on the pet, it will kill a mob in 66% of the time it takes it without haste. That means it will also only take 66% of the damage it would have been dealt. Unfortunately most mobs just just about kill each other around the same level, so you end up with a pet in the 40% range on health after the first fight. Now that fight ended about 30 seconds faster than normal, which is good, but will most likely need help to finish the next fight. Also bad is the charm break, as a mob swinging 1.2 seconds faster (with SLtW) rushes you. If root breaks also, you're in for some heavy trouble.

Haste Pros: Faster kills, works with shorter charms, less damage taken in quick fights.
Haste Cons: Very dangerous pet, needs help finishing second pull.

Then my preferred method is still the attack slow. Using Shiftless Deeds a 49th, a mob changes from a 3 second attack tic to 6.5 seconds! Instead of taking 66% of the damage it normally would by using haste, the mob takes 46% percent of the damage it would take. This pretty much means the mob will have just over 50% health for the second pull, and be nearly dead when it's time to kill the pet off. Plus, when charm and root break together, the enemy mob swings so slow you can almost ignore it while resetting your charm, making the worst case scenario so much less dangerous. So where's the downside to this? Mana cost for one... Feedback is 70 mana for the fight. Haste is 250 mana for two fights. Shiftless Deeds will be 400 mana total, and has a chance to resist, where buffs don't. The fight also isn't sped up in any way. Even with a damage shield the fight ends faster--but with attack slows the pet just swings like normal--but in a game of control that normal speed swing is what I'm interested in. Honestly I get about two fights per charm in easily using the attack slow for "the edge".

Attack Slow Pros: Pet lasts the longest, charm breaks easiest to handle, two mobs per charm easy.
Attack Slow Cons: Longest fights, most reliance on charm, more mana costly.

Honestly this is about all there is to the real essence of charm soloing. There's more to it than just this, but that's the stuff you need to know... the rest you pick up with experimentation. Word to the wise:

You will have horrible charm durations. You will be chased to zone or die horribly. You will get a train on you that you can't do anything about. And non-smokers die every day.

(You will also get the hang of it, and have amazing stories to tell about that one pet that killed 5 mobs in a row and you finally had to blur it because it was too tough to nuke out still.)

Manipulation

"Your pet is on the wrong attacker, mage!" Xornn frowned at the slip by the magician; if the creature had attacked the caster then the old enchanter wouldn't have scolded him, but this was just poor observation that had him siccing his elemental on the wrong target. Xornn released a burst of scintilating color into the froglok as the earthen servant backed away from the fight, and a spell of mesmerization was placed back over the undead amphibian. "Hurry up and get that thing on the right mob so the monk stops taking damage!" scolded the high elf, and the mage quickly did so, but Xornn noticed Immuiend, wizard and Xornn's long-time friend, was sitting down from rooting the only unhypnotized frogman in the chamber. It was now attacking the paladin out of requirement rather than choice, and the monk was meleeing without receiving damaging impacts which the paladin's plate mail repelled much better.

"You know a great deal about our groups' abilities, Xornn," informed the magician.

"Yes," answered the enchanter flatly.

"The better to manipulate us with, dear magician," added Immuien.

When I use the word Groups, I'm referring to anything with more than two people, though honestly I'm speaking of the six-person, full-sized, dungeon crawling group. This is the enchanter's natural habitat, with five readily available targets of manipulation. Before getting too far into your role in the group, the composition of the group needs some discussion. The primary elements of a group are crowd control, tanking, healing, and nuking. Most of these tasks will fall under a certain class's responsibility, and any full group (especially in a dungeon) typically contains 2 tanks, 1 crowd control, 1 primary healer, 1 secondary healer/nuker, and 1 nuker. Any ideas you may have adapted about the "perfect" group, drop them now. This is about the most accepted group, and it's well suited to just about anything. The above mentioned combination could easily turn out to be a warrior, rogue, enchanter, cleric, shaman, and wizard. Or maybe shadow knight, monk, bard, shaman, druid, necromancer (more likely outdoors). There's two constants in most groups at higher levels. They all want a cleric, and they all want an enchanter.

In your early life as an enchanter, it will be very diffficult to get teams working together, as your groupmates have spent level 1 to as much as 20 just soloing or hitting everything they see. Tactics with crowd control hasn't been necessary yet (though it would have worked better). As they progress closer to 30 however, they find that non-crowd control fights are costly, dangerous, and nearing impossible. The way to survive these times when your potential isn't recognized is to be patient. Teach regular group members how to work with crowd control. Nag the party to choose a lead tank and /assist them at all times. Show them how much easier and faster the kills are with just one or two well-placed mezzes. If necessary, gripe at them--you can't be afraid to take charge, because one of these days, there's going to be a horde of mobs mezzed around you, waiting to squish you like a grape, when the lead tank paladin will turn to you and say, "What do we do?" That time is the wrong time to hesitate, so get it out of your system while you're still young.

When fighting in a group, you have one golden rule, above all other rules, regardless of what anyone claims, so important of a rule it doesn't even get numbered:

Know the limits of your group.

You're going to hear amazing stories of 15-pulls and uber charms and miraculous saves. What doesn't take place often is tales of horrid deaths and nightmare corpse retrievals. Learn quickly what pulls are too much and what mobs you can't take down unless you're above a certain strength. If studying these pages tells you that a 4-pull should be manageable with only 20% mana, but you need 30% everytime there's a 4-pull, then don't cross your fingers and hope, tell the group you need help or they need to get out. I guarantee you, explaining that "Xornn said I should have the mana left" will do little to appease those staring at shrunken experience bars and wondering how to get to their body. What I'm saying to you is, Think for yourself. If you don't agree with a tactic I suggest, toy with it. See if there's something you like better. In many cases, I'll bet you find that's about the best way to do it, because I spent eons trying different ways. But I choose my tactics based on the most reliability, not necessarily the best potential. I'm here to teach you how to enchant with confidence and courage, not how to hot dog and amaze your friends. Some of that will happen anyway, but it will be after you've mastered the basic building blocks of the enchanter's arsenal. As I recently heard Ben Afleck in Bounce, "You can't be brave if you aren't scared."

Beyond the golden rule, you have three duties when grouped:

Crowd Control
Buffing
Debuffing

All three sections are covered separately, but this is the order that it usually takes priority. Before worrying about anything, every loose mob should be mezzed, rooted, or charmed. These are the weapons of crowd control (AoE stuns are the hilts of those weapons I guess). After crowds are taken care of, mana regen and haste should be on anyone that can use it. Other buffs have their novelties, but the most important is regening mana and faster swinging. Both are massive contributions to the group. When the buffing is taken care of, then you debuff, mana permitting. My selections on debuffing are limited to slowing attack speed or stunlocking, as they are the well-spent mana, while our other debuff lines are lacking to say the least.

You follow these three rules (under the umbrella of the golden rule) and you will shine as an enchanter. You'll find that grouping is really just a huge juggling contest of aggro, mana management, rushing heartbeats and mezzed mobs. You're going to drop the balls in flight, a lot--just keep trying and you'll stop dropping them so much in time.

What I still want to address is the other classes and how you should be expecting to manipulate them. Some classes, like the ever-steady warrior, are quite simple. You drop haste onto them and let them kill. Or the cleric, who just needs your mana regen and a chance to get some healing done. But there are finer points than this, specific to each class, not just as to what buffs they need, but what to expect of them, and demand if they don't provide it. For example, a Paladin excels at aiding in crowd control, as a tank that can cast Root. Many paladins however don't use this ability often, as no one has expected them to--be the first.

There are three main class "sections": Tanks, Healers, and Casters. The tanks are the Warrior (obviously), Paladin, Shadowknight, Monk, Ranger, Rogue, and Bard. Among the tanks, haste is the most pivotal buff you can cast on them, as it is focussed 100% on what they do--hit mobs for damage. Beyond that, you must consider what to expect of them, if you have caster hybrids, give them mana regen--they need it too, and while they may have less need to cast, they also have very little time to meditate--because they're fighting so you can meditate. Your lead tank, who everyone /assists, should be a Warrior, Shadow Knight, or Paladin whenever possible. All three of these classes have very high defensive abilities, and can "tank" mobs the longest. The Monk, Ranger, and Rogue have high offensive abilities at the cost of some defensive powers--they are often referred to as "paper tanks". They look pretty schnazzy till the pounding starts, then your healers start complaining about keeping them alive. The bard is a bit of an odd-ball, able to fill in as a tank, but excelling at augmenting the entire group with mana regen, haste (both stacking with ours), slow healing, attack slows, snares, pretty much a horde of abilities they have. It still doesn't hurt to haste them, as many will still be getting some tanking done while playing their cute little songs. (I love to tease bards--honestly they really make a group strong.) Being more specific among the tanks:

Warrior
Expect to see this class at the forefront of every battle, the one going berzerk all the time before the cleric starts healing, and doing most of the gruntwork. Their job isn't just looking at the mob and pressing attack though. You'll find they are often more aware of the battlefield than even you. These heavy tanks should be calling out any adds they see, and be used to turning off attack, targetting a stray mob and pressing Taunt to pick up the aggro. A good warrior manages to keep everything pissed at him, as he can survive the longest while you do your job.

Paladin
Retain the defensive power of the Warrior, but now give them a multitude of defensive spells at the cost of their offensive abilities. They don't fall that far behind really, and taking damage is the priority, anyway. They have some appreciable healing ability, especially when healing a caster, and that blessed Lay on Hands, which will likely be used on either the cleric or enchanter when the time comes. Root and a non-damage stun allow the Paladin to even assist you with difficult mezzing. Also remind a paladin puller of his Lull line. While it's extremely aggro-inducing and highly resisted, when you're facing a 3-pull anyway, what have you got to lose?

Shadow Knight
Excellent tank, still defensively on par with a warrior, and toting around the spells of a necromancer as well. Lifetaps, darkness snaring, AC debuffs, this class has a lot of aggroing abilities, especially nice for breaking mez. They can even set up their own fear kite in a pinch, and the ability to feign death can stop a bad pull in its tracks, or even just make corpse retrieval less painful.

Monk
Paper tank, withers in combat compared to the plate mail toting cousins above. Shells out very appreciable damage, has many stunning abilities, and fights nearly as well naked as equipped, making them very nice when you need to fight back down to your bodies. The ability to feign death is home to the monk, and you may often find groups with a good monk puller very boring as they single pull one mob after another. I'm not one to mind this, but others don't like the monotony. Most good monks will bring you however many mobs you want in.

Ranger
Another paper tank, with some alarming damage output. The problem is these aren't a good combo. They shell out fast, hard damage, then draw aggro and get dead or drain the healers out of mana quickly. Snares, DOTs, some nukes, SoW, a nice realm of offensive and defensive magic, well rounded out hybrid, with the ability to dual wield, unlike the shadow knight or paladin. Like all paper tanks, you're going to want another tank in the group most of the time, though don't think of the ranger as going down in 3 seconds after the pull arrives. They just take a lot of damage, which can be easily fixed with some well placed rooting for aggro management.

Rogue
Damage. Lots of it. Fast. The rogue has some amazing weapons, hits hard and fast, and once they get in behind the mob, the backstabbing starts. Rogues can shell out more damage per minute than a wizard that is running their mana well, and don't need mana to do so. Rogues are able to lower their aggro after a backstab to keep the mob looking away from them, so they have enough defensive ability to stay in for the time they need. As far as groups go, it's hard to go wrong with a rogue secondary tank, or to drop them into the "nuker" slot (since they shell out so much damage with backstabbing).

Bard
And the "pseudo-tank", dubbed because the higher a bard gets, it usually equates to the less tanking they do, as they begin "twisting" songs together (stacking up songs by switching instruments and playing a new song every 6 seconds, a lot of clicking usually). Still, the bard wears heavy armor, and has access to good weapons. In a pinch they can tank very well, but don't plan on their songs lasting real well while getting hit. The bard is capable of doing pretty much anything the group needs done, and about the only common substitute for an enchanterless group.

Next is the healers... comprised of the Cleric, Druid, and Shaman. As the healers progress they develop into that one role completely (especially the Cleric)--buffing and healing.

Cleric
The cleric is the strongest healer available to a group, and this is the role they are assigned to with that reason. Able to wear plate armor, they are afforded a good deal of protection for a non-tank, but truly excel as their healing capacities blast ahead of the other healing classes. As they advance into the greater ranks they pick up the amazing Complete Heal (excellent for healing high hit point tanks), Celestial Heals (heal over time) that chuck life onto a target for several tics, excellent for healing when a group member isn't taking damage extremely fast, and fast casting heals for when you're getting smacked around and need health to stay alive. Clerics also carry a root line, and stun lines (though many of them do damage) and can assist with crowd control, but honestly they are usually too busy with healing, and trust me they are best left to this task. Beyond healing powers they possess many strong AC and HP buffs, and should always keep a symbol on the main tank and you, the enchanter. Some complain of the cost (cheap ones) of the reagents, so just carry a stack of the reagent they need to shut them up. In most cases, you will not need a symbol to do your duties--but the big trains are stopped by the enchanter that had the forethought to get as many HP as possible through buffing. While the other healers can get the job done in most cases, the last, final appeal that makes a cleric almost mandatory in groups is the ability to ressurect people, and restore experience lost from death. As you advance in levels, lost experience becomes more and more of a penalty, as leveling becomes so much slower.

Shaman
The shaman is a strong healer, but not on par with the cleric. They carry a multitude of spell lines, the only class to rival the enchanter, and many of our powers parallel those of the shaman. They get a great range of buffs, including an inferior haste at corresponding levels, but as we bear inferior slows there is the balance lain. The shaman picks up many powerful DOTs, decent nukes, excellent resistance debuffs (though the spell can be resisted, unlike the Tash line, plus they gain the ever valuable Root to aid in crowd control. Plus, the shaman is much tougher in a melee than the enchanter--so Rooting and Slowing during a crowd control can buy you a lot of breathing room, since the shaman can tank for much longer than your robed frame. Lastly, the shaman is one of three classes to receive Spirit of Wolf, a movement buff.

Druid
Heals on par with the shaman, great nukes, nice DOTs, damage shields, teleports and evacuation spells, snares, damage-roots, non-aggro aggro reduction... all of these are part of the druid arsenal. Many of these spells don't function correctly (or at all) indoors though. For the outdoor group, it's hard to beat a good druid, who can tank longer than an enchanter, snare mobs, knock the life out of a mob quickly, or heal with proficiency. Of course the druid can SoW as well, and is one of the few classes adept at damage shielding.

The tanks and healers aside, this leaves the casters, intelligence based mana-users...

Wizard
Wizards are the culmination of damage from mana. Their spells are almost entirely nukes, in some form or another, in fire, ice, and magic based strikes. They gain a reduction to resist rates, have a good selection at all levels, plus have the ability to snare, stun and root (excellent crowd control aids). They posses direct nukes, AoE nukes in several forms, AoE rains (like an AoE Nuke DOT centered on an area), plus PB Nukes in a radius. Add to that the ability to Teleport/Evac, and you've got a very strong class--that is the most underrated class in the game. Wizards are not about massive damage output over the long game. They are about burning a mob to the ground (or freezing or blasting) in record time. Their nukes cast faster, are more efficient, and resist less--but because most tanks can outdamage them in the long run, they get sold short. If you see a wizard seeking a group, grab them, and find out why they are so good at rooting--because they've lived and died by the spell since creation. While that tank over there may outdamage your wizard per fight, when the group is looking haggard, the healers are running out of mana, and you're finding it difficult to hold this last mob still, it's the wizard that stands up and obliterates the creature. Then let them med through the next fight, they earned it.

Magician
Most magicians turn out to be solo-fiends as they grow, which is understandable since they have such a strong pet, great nukes (almost as good as a wizard), and massive damage output. They never need anything as they can just summon what they require, and on top of that have the ability to kick out some impressive damage shields. When they finally start grouping at high level, many are atrocious pet handlers, and this causes much resentment with pets (with necromancers too). With a brief bit of study, a magician can become an expert at pet control. Firstly all pets should be on Guard at all times to prevent wandering. If there's an add to the fight, they should Back Off the pet and make sure the mob gets under control. If you get into a situation of the pet on the wrong mob, you have a responsibility to help out with PB Stuns while the mage gets the pet /assisted onto the correct mob again, then you can resume your crowd control. Or sometimes, just let the pet fight the mob, and make that the next target to go after. Learning to use a magician can lead to some amazing fighting power, especially with a tank that you aren't terribly concerned with losing. Be wary though, a mage with no pet is crippled in ability, as they have very few ways to deal with a mob on them.

Necromancer
The same rules for pets that apply to magicians apply to necromancers. Beyond that, the necromancer is one of the least competent grouping classes, because they have little practice. Necromancers can fear kite from level 4 to level 60 without aid. However in the group they are the masters of trading. Trading life for mana, mana to another, life to another, lifetapping mobs for hit points, even acting as crowd control occasionally with a crippled form of mezzing they possess. All in all the necromancer can be an extremely powerful group member, once they learn how to group.

Enchanter
I think you understand what an enchanter can do. All I remind you of is that most of our abilities don't stack, and that's why enchanters tend to not play nice together. If you wish to run two enchanters in a group (or in a raid situation must work with others), each of you take on an aspect of crowd control, buffing, or debuffing, and only do your share unless the other needs backup. The higher level will always handle crowd control, and haste if theirs is superior. The lower enchanter is usually relegated to mana regen and attack slows, plus roots and stuns to aid in crowd control. Many times, a second enchanter is most useful when they hold a charmed pet with them, as they have little else to focus on for group responsibilities. Two enchanters in a group is possible and feasible, and in some specialized groups even suggested (stun-locking teams), but usually the group is better served by another class--as enchanters tend to clash when in the same group.

Crowd Control

I'm sitting on the north side of a vast pyramid, deep inside the Temple of Cazic Thule. I came here at the behest of a group of adventurers making claims of the lizard men advancing on their party, and I had grouped with them in the past. Now I'm regaining my magical energies from the last battle, a simple one that only required I slow the lizard that came in. As the paladin gives out a battle cry, my attention is drawn from my meditation and I rise to meet the incoming attackers. Looks to be four, no five of them at once--certain doom for these adventurers, except I'm here.

Quickly I throw a spell of mesmerization over all of the foul things, catching all but one of them. The paladin and rogue break one of them lose right away as they fight, but that's of little importance to me. I'm paying attention to the one charging me now, and a quick burst of color leaves the creature stunned before me as I drop a longer lasting hypnosis over it. Then I return my attention to the last three and recast my shorter duration, group control over them before charming one. I root the other two to the ground and drop my powerful hypnosis over them, and my forced minion attacks the lizard with the tanks, though it dies fast. Wasting no time I root the one that charged me to the ground and send my charmed pet at it, and the tanks figure out quickly which one I want dead next.

My charm breaks free and I quickly stun and recharm the lizard, just as the current creature dies abruptly and the paladin roots the next mob for me--intuitive, I like that. They launch a full assault on the creature and it dies fast, so quickly that I only mesmerize the last lizard one more time during the fight. As charm breaks again I stun it and mesmerize it, then resume my meditations calmly while they finish off the lizard that patiently watched this whole scene. As it falls the healer calls out that her mana is waning, and warn them of the same. The paladin eyes the last lizard, my ally for most of the fight, and though his jaw is strong and his eyes are stoic, I sense fear in his body, though placed in fear for his friends, not himself. "How long can you hold it?" he asks me.

I give a curt glance at the lizard man. There is a bit of drool beginning to leak from the side of its mouth, and I've already regained twice the mana needed to mesmerize it. "Forever, paladin... forever."

There are five primary tools of crowd control; four are the bricks, and the fifth the mortar. Your job is to play the role of the mason, building a fortress of safety from the mobs around you, who will gladly end your life when you make a mistake.

So don't make a mistake.

Single Mez
AoE Mez
Root
Charm
PB Stuns

These are the tools you will hold your enemies at bay with, and the most important role you have in just about any group you join.

Single Mez
This is quick, easy and safe. It's use is always conditional on good group control, meaning use of /assist at all times by your group to stay on the same mob, so you can worry about what needs controlled, as opposed to what isn't being damaged. During a larger pull, single mezzing can be too slow to get the job done however, especially when a non-tank is the target of those mobs. Of utmost importance is to learn the timing of the single mez; know it's duration mentally, till you get nagging feeling when it's about to break; keep a large analog clock on your desk that you can glance at whenever a mez lands, giving you a "landmark" for when you need to remez the mob. One mez spell will not overwrite another, so remember what has been mezzed when. Whenever possible, mesmerize all of your mobs in a row, so that after renewing one mez you can move on to the rest and track the timing easier, as well as allowing you more uninterrupted medding time.

AoE Mez
When you need a large group of mobs locked down quickly, this is the spell to cast, especially when your tanks are not the target of assault. A caster or healer can go down very quickly to 3+ mobs, and this spell will have a much better chance of saving them. Be warned that switching out of AoE Mez can be difficult and frustrating, as you try to Root or Charm mobs under the effect before it wears off--but it's better to be frustrated than dead--or even worse, without a healer and knowing you're going to die.

Root
King of aggro-management, a rooted mob swings at the closest target, and this is the best way to get a mob off of the wrong person, or to buy you time for a longer casting spell when a PB stun won't cut it.

Charm
The dangerous, yet rewarding way out of a bad situation, not only stopping damage to the group (duplicating mezzing) but using that damage upon your enemies (shortening the need for CC considerably). The gamble is that random duration though. It's a lot of mana to dump into a quick charm-break, but sometimes even an 18 second charm is 18 seconds you had to gather your wits or get some CC done, plus it's 6 attack tics that mob was hurting the current target--which is a lot of damage, and 6 tics you would have to do CC. Every tic a charmed mob is hitting something, that's a tic you won't have to hold a mob still for.

PB Stuns
Every time you need to cast a spell and a mob doesn't agree with that idea, the PB stun is what buys you the time to do so. Every time your healer is aggroed and you need to stop it from hitting them now, a PB stun will stop it in 1 second. If nothing else is working in a crowd control, due to bounces, bad pet control, DOTs on the wrong mob, a PB stun is the spell that gives you time to think or cast, making it the connecting spell for crowd control.

So I've told you the tools... now what? It's simple really. You typically use single mez when possible, as it's going to be the most reliable and mana-efficient. If you must get several mobs mezzed fast, you use AoE mez and work on switching when you can. If aggro is a problem, or a mob has been DOTed (or isn't mezzable) Root is there to save the day. When trying to switch out of an AoE Mez situation, or a DOTed mob, charm is a great way to turn the tables on a fight, and in the middle of all this mez, you use PB stuns to keep people healthy while you work.

Learning crowd control is more about interpretation and reaction than planning. The spells memorized are how you intend to control a fight, the spells cast during the battle are purely dependent on the need. Learning to recognize what is needed when is how you become a master. My only real advice to becoming a master of crowd control is to practice. Go to a green conning camp that is no threat to you and try to crowd control it. Open up with an AoE Mez, charm one, and try to kill the camp off without running out of mana. It's good practice because the charmed mob will kill about as quickly as a group would at that level, and you will have charm breaks to deal with. When a mob hits you, you have to back the pet off after it's controlled, giving you an understanding of what the magician has to deal with in group. Use your current spells, not weaker ones that will suffice for the greens. The object isn't to kill the camp, it's to manage your mana while doing it, to get a feel for how many is too many, then push that limit.

Now try dropping a PB Stun amidst those mobs and doing it with 5 things aggro at once. After that, move to a bigger camp. Get a partner with you when it becomes dangerous, and keep practicing. You will reach a time where you look back at advice I've given, and say, "That's why Xornn said to try this!" But most important above all, beyond anything you read here... discover what works for yourself. If you try my tactics repeatedly, and it's not working for you, change it! Maybe your connection speed affects what you can pull off... maybe AoE mezzing just isn't for you... maybe you'll never cast charm in your life, but you love to stunlock! That's fine--just as long as you know you're doing the best you're able.

If you were hoping you'd learn more from reading this section, I hope you can look back and see that I've told you everything you can be told. I'm just hear to teach you how to learn what it means to control a crowd. To actually deal with the pumping heart and anxiety of crunching impacts to your body, you have to be there--you have to do it.

Buffing

"Master Xornn," said Jakonis, beginning a question during his training, "you teach me of controlling my enemies and manipulating my environment..."

Xornn made no indication of hearing Jakonis, but nodded to no one in particular as he looked over the rocky crags of the Dreadlands.

"But you say very little about my accentuations I've learned... when do I cast haste on whom? What is more important, mana or speed when my own mana is tight? Should I use my armoring spells of protection?"

Xornn continued to scan the edges of the rising mountains, apparently occupied with whatever he was looking for. Jakonis thought of repeating his question, but knew that somewhere inside, deep down, Xornn had already answered... it just hadn't gotten to the surface yet. When Xornn snapped his gaze to Jakonis, he felt himself flinch, and bit down on his tongue to hide a smile--master had such a flare for the dramatic.

"Does your fighter have haste? If not, grant it upon them. When both mana and haste are lacking, are the tanks fighting--or are the healers low on mana reserves? Cast accordingly. If you aren't doing anything, and your armor spells are faded, cast them." Xornn looked at Jakonis sternly. "Really, apprentice, you have a habit of answering your own questions."

This will be a short section, as there's only one real rule to buffing people... well... two.

First, get crowd control done. Second, if the buff in question will appreciably aid the target, cast it. Mana regen is always good for anyone that uses mana. Haste is a must for those in melee combat. Magic resistance is a given for yourself, and if there are casters among your enemies then your group needs it too. Intelligence and Wisdom buffs raise maximum mana, but aren't terribly important when mana is tight, because they aren't doing anything then. Armor class buffs can ease the clerics mana load when needed, and things like vision or stamina regen are just spells you cast as needed.

Buffing is recognizing a need or spot to be improved, and casting the spell to accomplish that. The only other trick to buffing is remembering when it needs refreshed, and planning mana around that. For most spells, you can buff yourself with it first so you get a reminder to refresh it. Spells the whole group will receive or that have high mana cost (that you need to med up for--like hasting tanks) should be tracked on an egg timer or such to remind you when it's time to start getting ready for that buff session. Buffing isn't hard, it's just an important priority--which is why many enchanters can get by just on buffing alone.

Debuffing

"Attack that one." Xornn pointed at an aviak passing by them.

Jakonis stripped away the birdman's resistance as it rushed him, and quickly his enchanted animation was meleeing it. A blue glow swirled about the creature for a moment and it's attacks became sluggish and predictable. Soon after the creature was dead, and the apprentice's animation was in well-enough condition. He was beaming with pride as he returned to his masters side, but quickly calmed his features as he stood before Xornn.

"Why didn't you mesmerize it first?" Xornn demanded.

"There was no need, it's wasted mana for one spell the animation will be just fine through," he answered calmly.

"Why an attack slow, why not our impressive arsenal of strength debilitation?" Xornn scolded.

"While I could reduce the birdthing to a weakened shell of itself, it would still be a hard fight for the animation; my attack slow gave my pet the best edge my mana could afford me," Jakonis was thinking the words as he spoke, rather than quoting his Master, and continued to answer Xornn's next question as well, "there's no need for further effects after the slow, it's all that was needed, and more is wasted mana."

Xornn hid a smile badly. "Nonsense! If you wish to afford your animation the best edge, your powers of color stuns should have been used!"

Jakonis smiled. Not a happy, young man's smile, but a darker, knowing smile of someone in control of his world. "Master, I couldn't let the animation have all the fun, could I?"

Xornn looked long and determined at his smiling apprentice, and his own cracking smile faded slowly. Jakonis in turn began to look confused, wondering if he had overstepped his bounds. "That is all, Jakonis, I am finished." The young enchanter looked shocked for a moment--Xornn had never called him anything but apprentice, ever. Xornn suddenly reached out and clasped Jakonis by the arm and hugged him. "I've no more to teach you, brother."

With that, he released his embrace and teleported--to wherever it is Xornn goes when he's alone.

I've talked at length about the merits of various debuffs in the spell lines, and they will see specific mention in the Circles, but here, there is little to say. Debuffing is one of the lowest priorities for an enchanter, and crowd control is the ultimate debuffing already.

MR Debuff
Attack Slow
Stunlocking

These are the three buffs worth casting in most situations, and a good enchanter will find the mana to use them in a group. While other debuffs have their places, those times are exceptions to be discovered, not spent in long discourse on this site. If you've been following this guide in order, then you're ready now. There's nothing else I'm going to tell you now that will change how an enchanter is mastered. The Circles will contain specific information about spells available, advice on Tactics at those levels, and other details not done justice by general description here in these Tactics. Quests and Tradeskills will have nothing to do with leveling, added for the sake of convenience and tips. Lastly is the Stories, which I invite you to submit to when you have tales of your own to regale.

Controls

Xornn summoned up a mystical shield about himself and looked over at the tents in the distance. Kobolds wandered in and out, from tent to tent, grumbling to themselves in their own barking language. Beside him, the short gnome fidgetted, and Xornn called upon magics to become a gnome--at least by appearance--himself.

"I'm ready, Master Xornn," said Bigglewiggins.

Xornn sighed and turned to face his young apprentice. "If I were concerned with your state of readiness, you would know it." The gnome shrank, comically so given his diminutive stature. "Enchanting is not--will never be--about being ready." With that Xornn cast a spell of evocation, and one of the kobolds dropped dead as it's mind warped into pudding. As the rest began to charge in aid of their fallen brethren, the teacher turned to face Bigglewiggins and sat down.

"Control them now, Apprentice."

Controlling your enchanter is just as important as what spells you memorize, what tactics you use, and how quickly to commit to action and carry your plans to fruition. The longer it takes you to move, cast and target with your enchanter, the less room you have for mistakes, for lag, and for bolts of lightning. The first thing to cover is the keyboard setup:

Q - Auto-Attack
W - Consider
E - Forward
R - Reply
T - Tell
I - Inventory

CAPS - Target Nearest PC
A - Target Nearest NPC
S - Turn Left
D - Backward
F - Turn Right
G - Hail

Z - Spells
X - Toggle Fullscreen
C - Sit
V - Crouch
B - Recenter View

Space - Jump

Z allows you to quickly get to the spellbook without using up a valuable slot in your hotboxes. X allows you to leave your spellbook without standing (post 35 you have automeditate, and don't need to keep your face in the spellbook). C allows you to quickly sit/stand without using Hotkey slots, and V let's you crouch. Crouching is very important, as it is a 100% effective way to stop casting a spell. If you are crouching when a spell completes it's casting, you will not finish the spell--guaranteed. You also will not interrupt either, plus you don't have to run around like mad trying to stop a spell. B will recenter your view, as I highly use the "strafing" by holding the right mouse button down while pressing left and right to sidestep. Combined with a little mouse-looking, I can sidestep around a group of mobs without ever losing sight of them.

In order to use mouselooking and strafing effectively, you need to be able to control most of your character from the left hand, and without having to mouseclick often (such as casting). This is why the top 6 boxes of every hotkey bank I have are spell slots in the order they are memorized. (1 is Slot 1, 2 is Slot 2, etc). Slot 7 is always Tash or some spell I don't need to cast in the thick of getting hit, and 8 is always my swap slot. The end result is being able to effectively move about the battlefield, keep all mobs in sight, quickly get about and have access to targetting and casting buttons without having to pause for moving the mouse pointer.

Running
Now, there might come a time when you need to run, and you don't have Spirit of Wolf. In these cases, you can "strafe-run" to get away from the mob, by strafing left or right, and forward at the same time. This will cause you to run diagonal, and might just be the difference between you living and dying.

Targetting
This is one of the most difficult things to do as an enchanter. Everyone else can just use /assist to target the mob they need to be attacking, but the enchanter has to target everthing else. The best ways to target are as follows:

Target Nearest NPC
Strafing and circling till the mob in question is closest is usually faster than trying to left click with the mouse. On a two pull, it is usually easiest to stand behind the tanks, and target nearest, as they will push mobs back, leaving the unattacked mob closest to you. When using target nearest after getting your target fire off your mez, and watch the mob's health during casting. If it should drop at all, crouch out fast to stop you spell. You haven't wasted any time really, because you needed that much time to find a target.

Flashing Names
Your current target's name will flash. This is especially useful with same-name mobs, and you just have to left click the mess trying to see a flashing name change (target nearest works also). This is really a pain in the butt, and involes left clicking accurately, but sometimes (especially when you have some time to get mez landed) this is a good way to target, or especially after an AoE mez, trying to get mobs Rooted.

PB Stunning
This is a tad less tactical method of targetting; clear your target window (Escape) and PB stun then step back. The mob that rushes you isn't fighting anything else typically.

Turning
This might come off as a tad simplistic, but it's the difference between getting interrupted all the times while moving, and casting spells cleanly. Right before you cast any spell, turn just a little. If you have any forward or backward momentum, it stops the instant you turn. You can use the mouse-look feature or keyboard to do this, just turn a fraction before any cast where you might have moved at all. Get into the habit, and when it's time to PB stun, backpedal and cast a spell, you will turn at the end of the backpedal without thinking about it, and cast your spell instead of interrupting.

Learning to control your enchanter quickly and effectively is just as important as understanding how to manipulate everyone around you the best.

Research

See the Research Page.

Okay, you just dropped a point into Research. Now what? Well, it's really simple, and extremely frustrating. You buy the Tome of Enchantment, and you carry it around with you when you want to research spells. You must find two page "halves" that go together (like page 23 left & right of Tasarin's Grimoire) or two consectutive number "whole" pages (example page Page 8 & 9 of Velishoul's Tome). Put both of these into your Tome and press "COMBINE". Now it will do one or two of three things:

Give you a skill raise in Research. (Research raises very fast, 2 in 3 combines raise usually till you cap for your level.) Still, it gets so hard to find the pages you need, most chanters get the skill capped by their late 20's and then just dump points into Research each level to keep it maxxed. With Xornn, I combine spells I already have for training research each time I ding, and if I'm not capped in the skill when it's time to research a new spell I need, then I max it out. This saves me some practices for other junk like raising languages, and also leaves me a lot of researched spells to give to other chanters. (I never sell them, ever.) You become trivial at a certain level of spells, meaning the level of spell it produces) about the time you hit the following Circle (assuming Research stays capped). So when I'm at 39th the 34th spells are trivial for me to combine now.

Second thing that can happen is you get a new spell! Congratulations! Get to scribing! Now you can still combine the spell (with more pages) for practice, and you don't have to worry about failing!

OR, you fail to combine them, and lose the pages. Easy come, easy go.

I've listed what pages are needed for each research spell, as well as what wisdom-based caster gets the same spell (meaning you can go to their guild and just buy the spell) pretty well, and I'm reviewing the spell lists too. While a magician might find this easier to train with, enchanters and wizards have such easy requirements to do research, and you usually get a horde of pages for spells you already have, it's easier to just practice with the live pages.

Sometimes you'll see reference to "faded" pages. That means that to get say... Velishoul's Tome page 108 (the first faded page you have to research for a spell), to pair up with 109 for Feedback, you must find a "Faded Velishoul's Tome page" and put it into your Tome and press combine (all by itself) which may give you a skill raise, plus give you page 108 or fail. However, levels 24, 29, and 34 all have a faded page in their list of needed pages. If you get a "faded page of salis writ", you can bet it's the right side of salis writ page 90. But if you get a faded Velishoul's, it's either page 108 (level 29 Feedback) or page 16 (level 24 Invigorate--cleric spell). I'll try to find a faded page to offer a merchant soon, and see how much they offer for it, because the 16th level page sells much cheaper.

Now, getting pages is the hardest part. They will drop off certain mobs from the level of the spell and about five levels up. So typically you either have to group to fight the bigger mobs that drop your pages, or else you go to a zone with that type of mob and auction. Mesmerization is the first research spell you have to research. Going to Oasis and auctioning "/auc WTB Tasarin's Left & Right 26" will get you a lot of help in getting the pages, as crocodiles drop enchanter research materials. (Actually crocodiles drop necro pages too... and maybe some mage. Don't remember seeing any runes--wizard.) Mages only have to research pets. Necros have to research pets and a few dots, a lot of which shadow knight guilds have. Enchanters must research 3 to 4 spells a level, but at least 2 are available to wisdom casters (who don't have research). Wizards only have like five major spells they ever need to research, and the rest are typically AE nukes that they will have better versions of by the time they research it.

Stories

One of the most rewarding aspects of this profession is the amazing feats one can pull off while seeming to be the eye of the storm. Calmly dancing with death in a great cavorting madness you pulling into a symetrical rotation of killing--and you make it look easy. After the fight is over, the real entertainment begins, and the sign of all great enchanters--the storytelling. The majority of the stories following are from Caster's Realm, in the Enchanter forums; I highly suggest supplementing this guide with the discussions on that board, as it's the true home of enchanters. Others are direct submissions, and all bear an idea of what to expect in playing your enchanter (though many are the extreme cases).

Spellbounder L'Arety

Centaur Village I had the honor of wowwing some people a few nights ago with all the tricks I had up my sleeves.

I met up with a a good friend of mine and she wanted me to group with them. They were pulling Centaurs out of the village. They just wanted my Clarity ehhehe.

Anyway, we were in one house with an archer, a charger, and a foal. I said I am going to beguile the archer (143 charisma) and get him out of the picture. I began the casting, not bothering to Tashan since they will all attack me... then as the purple bar went down, I saw what I had selected. The freaking charger! Trying to move around to cancel, it was too late, the charm went off...

Bracing for a flurry of hard blows from the charger as he resisted, I slowly took my finger off the color flux. He approached, and did that cute lil' pet circle.

"Ummm, charger is my pet..." I said cautiously.

"Whoa" the tank said as he proceeded to wreack havoc on the archer.

/pet attack

Archer didn't last long =)

and the charger kept being my pet for 40 seconds after the archer death.

Athos

A Bad Day for Phinian

December 19, 1999

Phinian Findlegrump looked out over the rolling hills and rocks that comprised his home. He glanced to his right and noticed the windmills gently turning the lazy afternoon breeze. A dull low growl in his stomach informed him it was almost time for his shift to end, and for him to head back to Ak'anon. Mrs. Findlegrump was sure to have his favorite mushroom stew ready, a thought that was meet with another growl from his empty stomach. The little one was sure to be home for the holidays. "Well, he ain't so little anymore", thought Phinian. His son had weathered almost forty seasons now, and in a few more years would be ready to enter Watchman Training, following in his fathers footsteps to guard this wonderful city. His city.

He let a small sigh of satisfaction escape his lips when these thoughts bounced around his mind. He turned to give the area one more look, then started to head back to the city gates. A sudden flash of spell fire caught his eye off to his right. 'Intruders, Alert, Defend the City' his mind cried. He clutched the grip on this sword a little tighter, and turned to his right, preparing to shout the alarm that would bring the other watchmen in the area to his aide.

At least, he tried to turn. His feet, nay, his whole body was locked. His muscles refused to move, nothing would respond. Yet time moved on. He could see out of the corner of his eye a dark figure emerge from cloud of haze he may or may not have seen before. 'Sorcery!', his mind thought.

"Actually", the little gnome in the black robes said, "it is more like Alteration, but enough of that, most likely too far beyond the likes of you to understand."

'Treachery! Who was this gnome that would dare cast upon a Watchman!', thought Phinian.

"Oh, hardly a gnome dear Watchman, your pardon for a moment", said the little gnome. One small gesture and the gnome was no more. Standing in its place was a Dark Elf, similarly clad, clutching a eerily glowing wand. "Athos is the name dear Watchman, and you have the distinct privilege of serving my needs".

'Never vile elf', thought Phinian. 'I will never serve the likes of you, nor your kin, I would rather die first'.

"Well Phinian, that you will do. All in good time. But first, let me remove that nasty temper of yours", said Athos.

Phinian watched in horror as the Dark Elf gathered more spell fire, it coalesced in between his hands, and finally leapt out towards him, engulfing him with colors and sounds he and never experienced before. Slowly, his anger, his frustration, his memories, all slipped away. He was peaceful. He felt right in listening to this elf. He felt he owed this elf his existence. It was necessary that he serve this elf, and his needs.

"Very good Phinian", said Athos. "We may now proceed. Your fellow watchman up ahead, Dreeb I think his name is, go... go kill him. He has wronged me, and needs to die". With a wave of his hand, Phinian's muscles returned to him. He gripped his sword tighter, and spotting Dreeb, let forth a battle cry like no other he had ever uttered in his life, and sprang forth to attack Dreeb.

What transpired Phinian knew not. His inner mind was secure, safe, in a different, happier place. His outer mind witnessed the horror that was the battle. His outer mind screamed in shock as his sword cut through his long time friend Dreeb. His conscious thoughts were only of blood, lust, and death. His sub-conscious thoughts were only of pain, sorrow, and loss. He may have remembered the being bathed in spell fire as the dark elf sat back from a distance, casting spell after spell upon Dreeb. He may have remembered Dreeb's first weak attempt at blocking Phinian's sword blow, and the garbled, questioning, astonished words that struggled from Dreeb's mouth as Phinian thrust again and again at him. He may have remembered the killing blow he inflicted upon Dreeb, pulling his sword from the slain corpse, and fixating on the blood that flowed slowly from the haft of the weapon back down along the blade. All of these images and sounds he might have remembered, but most where locked in a cloudy haze that was his mind. Only one event clearly stood out in his mind...

"You have done well my Phinian. I will end your suffering now, and I promise to make it painless. Remember these words, your family loves you, your city loves you, you have served your race well. Be proud my little warrior...", said Athos as he began to cast his final spell.

...Phinian's mind cleared long enough to see a Dark Elf standing in front of him, a smile on his face, words of power dripping from his mouth and forming into an almost tangible cloud of mist. The last words he heard were coming from the Dark Elf's mouth... "I was never hear...", and Phinian blacked out.

He woke up to see faces of his fellow Watchmen standing around him.

"Git up you traitor", spat Watchman Halv. "Yer a disgrace to the Watchmen, and to all our kind. What was yer price Phin? How much did they pay you to slay yer own kin?"

Phinian, confused, looked around at the angry faces of his friends. He reached out to grab a hold of Prynn, a long time friend, and noticed the dried blood on his hands.

"What?", Phinian muttered.

"Tokens of yer handy work Phin", growled Watchman Prynn. "I hope you have made peace with Brell, for you'll be visitin him up close and personal like before morning shine tomorrow".

Still confused, Phinian looked frantically around to see some sign of what was going on. His eyes met and locked on a the ground five feet in front of him. There he saw Watchman Dreeb's bloody corpse, with his sword lying next to it.

The group of Watchmen dragged Phinian away in shackles as his screams of confusion and outrage began. None of the watchmen noticed the cloud of haze standing next to Dreeb's corpse, chuckling softly to itself.

Izlano

The Runaway Animation

December 21, 1999

Upon reaching the fifteenth rank I found myself hard pressed to find a place where the denizens were challenging but not overwhelming, but since I typically keep to myself I was finding it very difficult to find one. I went to North Karana, Befallen, Lavastorm, and others, each of which was good, but not good enough since I would either require a party to assist me, or would be swarmed, or both.

I then found the Oasis and finished my work towards the sixteenth rank (which seemed to take an eternity). I thought highly of this place as, although dangerous in areas, I found that I could compentently adminsiter my skills without too much difficulty.

With my newly acquired spells of the sixteenth rank I accompanied a collegue of mine on a trip to Oggok (which didn't go as well as planned). After his business there was cut short, I suggested we go to Upper Guk to see what it was like. He agreed and little stood in our way through Innothule with the exception of a poor human paladin that attacked me, being fooled by my dark elf illusion which I keep up for the vision. Poor fellow indeed. Upon reaching Guk, my companion jokingly asked "I wonder how long we will last in there". I laughed, reassured him that since the guards out front were green to both of us (myself an enchanter at the rank of sixteen, and he a mage at fourteen) we should be allright inside, and so we went in.

There were froglok bodies everywhere. It seemed as though someone had cleared the place out, so we looted a few of the corpses with the hopes that more frogloks would come, and they did. All we found were weak compared to us, so I practised my new spells and we defeated all with ease. A few actually gave us some needed experience with our abilities, but mostly it was the same old thing we'd come to expect from such inferior creatures, including the running.

One of the sentries, not particularly interested in fighting us, ran away quickly, my animation in tow. Worried that the anumation may attract more denizens I followed. He had attracted a single priest which didn't seem to tough, but tougher than the rest, so I helped the animation to kill it, using the vast majority of my mana. This creature, too, ran, just before dying and I thought little about it... that is until the warriors swarmed in.

All around me were frogloks, obviously miffed at my presence in their homeland, and I had no choice but to run. I ran across the rickety bridge that had lead me here in an attempt to get closer to my companion who was meditating but instead lost my footing and fell. Luckily I didn't fall into the water but instead landed on the ledge next to the opening. Unfortunately it was too late... I cast colour flux to try to buy me time, but I could not manage to get close enough to the opening. I pondered falling into the water to evade these creatures, but before I could act my vision failed me, and I found myself outside their lair.

My companion, upon witnessing my fall, sent his pet in and gated out, the air elemental giving him the opportunity that I didn't have. We met back in front of Guk, and my only words were "Ok. So I won't bring a pet next time."

It is back to the Oasis for me, for a time. I must learn to use my abilities better before I commit them to a place such as Guk.

Glossary

CC
Crowd Control, your primary role as an enchanter. Refers to any methods used to keep mobs from participating in a fight, through mezzing, charming, or even simple rooting.

Mez/Mezzing
Using Mesmerize type spells to lock a mob up under a set duration stun that is broken by damage.

Slow
Attack slows, the most effective debuffs in the game.

Debuff
Reducing the combat effectiveness of a mob, through slows, snares, AC drops, etc, but typically reduces damage output of a mob.

Buff
Beneficial spells cast onto allies such as haste or mana regen.

Crack
Common name for mana regen spells, also known as Coffee, C1 (for Clarity) or C2 (Clarity 2) Usually stated "crack me pls" and will become quite annoying.

Haste
Buff that increases attack delay. Three types which stack: spell haste (ours), item haste (such as Flowing Black Silk Sash), and song haste (from bards).

TW
Taiwaneese. Most common ESL on Nameless Server.

ESL
English Second Language. Players that do not speak English as natives, and can be a bit difficult to communicate with.

Tic
6 seconds. The game clock runs spell durations on "tics" which can be measured by bard song pulses, mana regen jumps, hp recooperation, and your little blinking eyeball animation.

Attack Tic/Round
One cycle of the attack timer, measured by the delay of your weapon (divided by 10 is seconds) modified by haste effects.

PB Stun
Point Blank Stun. Area effect spell centered on caster (who is not affected).

AoE
Area of Effect. Spell that covers an area centered on target (can affect caster) has a 4-5 target limit.

HP Shield
Buff that stops "x" damage before fading.

DS
Damage Shield. Buff that does "x" damage to whatever hits the recipient.

Kamikaze
Using animation to solo. Animation fights to the death and is uncommandable... Mr. Kamikaze just seemed like the right name to me. Since my earlier days of animation solo, I seemed to have coined the phrase "Kamikaze Solo" now.

Break
Several meanings. One, to stop a mez effect with damage. "Tank broke mez" Second is to kill mobs in a staggered order at their spawn point so they don't all spawn at once. "It was a good break on the Hands room!" Breaking a room isn't just killing the mobs one at a time so they spawn one at a time (since they will spawn on a set timer... typically 6 minutes outdoors, 15 to 30 minutes in dungeons) but meaning you're going to have to move into a room with several mobs, or pull several out of an area all at once--hence the need for an enchanter. "Cazic Thule Throne Room is a tough break for a 29 enchanter."

Throw
To cast a spell. I use the word a lot... "Then I throw tash on it..." and I also coin the word fire a lot. "Fire in a dispel."

DOT
Damage Over Time. Does a certain amount of damage each tic, half if the mob is mobile and not running. Slow source of damage but typically extremely mana efficient.

MROT
Mana Regen Over Time. Gives mana back per tic, just like a DOT.

DD/Nuke
Direct Damage spell. You cast, damage occurs.

Proc
Process effect. Thusly named from old text-based RPGs that had a file called "process" files up to run special effects. Procs are any effect that occurs from an item, either by right clicking the item (like JBoots) or through a random chance while attacking (like Short Sword of Ykesha).

Reagent
Spell components needed to cast, like Bat Wing for Levitate or Jasper for Rune III.

Con
Consider. A yellow "conning" mob is 1-2 levels above your level for example.

Mob
Any non-player character, but typically refers to a creature you fight for xp. Comes from the old text-based RPGs, where NPC's were stored in .mob files.

Bounce
To have a spell resist, or be unable to land a spell. "I bounced three slows before giving up."

Chain-Nuke
Throwing a secondary, weaker nuke in to fill the recast delay of your primary nuke.

Aggro/Hate List
Priority of attacks for an NPC. Rooted mobs "aggro" the closest player. Damage, heals, debuffs, etc all raise your standing on the "hate list".

Stunlock
Chaining multiple stun effects together, rendering the target helpless.

Mem/Memmed
Devoting a spell slot to a particular spell. "Had to keep Theft of Thought memmed all the time because of the recast delay..."

Channel/Cast Through
Regaining your concentration and continuing your spell cast despite the damage you've taken. The higher your Channeling skill, and the lower level the spell is (in relation to your level) the more likely you are to channel it. Channelling Root (level 8) is much easier to channel than Dazzle (level 49).

Mez-Medding
Maintaining a mez-lock an a mob while meditating back up. After you get mana regen spells, it's possible to meditate back much more mana that a mez uses, allowing you to recover mana while the mob is under a mez induced stun.

Tank
Any melee class, but more specifically, Warriors, Shadow Knights, and Paladins--all heavy AC classes.

Caster
Casters who get their mana pool based on Intelligence... Magicians, Necromancers, Wizards, and Enchanters.

Healer
Casters who base mana pool on Wisdom (plus they have many heals). Cleric, Druid, and Shaman.

Papertank
Tanks that don't exactly stand up to punishment as well as the plate wearing cousins. Monks, Rogues, and Rangers. All three typically outdamage other tanks, but trade that offensive power for defensive weakness (comparatively--they don't melt... just not as hardy as a warrior).

Flight Jockies
Bards. They run around like helicopter pilots, thinking they can do pretty much whatever they want and fill every role of the group. Well... they can. A good bard can do so much... they just have that "Top Gun" Maverick attitude, which is why I call them jockies.

Darkness
Necromancer darkness DOT, which includes a movement imparing effect.

Snare
Druids and rangers get a snare spell that impares movement.

Tash/Tashing
Lowering the Magic Resistance (MR) of a mob. Unresistable spell (cure poison can remove) that casts quickly.

PvP/PvE
Player vs Player / Player vs Environment. PvP servers have spells work differently, such as AoE spells having a chance to affect your own team, etc. Xornn is on a PvE server, and as such this is a PvE guide. Dueling is not the realm of this guide, though I'll leave this advice. Mez, Blind and Nuke are the only weapons you need, and anyone that raises their MR even half heartedly will own you.

Seek Radius
Range a mob can tell you are around and will pursue you. If you mez a mob and leave it's seek radius, it won't come after you unless you get too close again. (Seek radii are typically very large.)

Nerf
From time to time, Verant changes the way something in the game works. When the change is for the worse, it's called "nerfing" Whirl Till You Hurl and Lull were heavily nerfed spells.

PL/PLing
PowerLeveling. Helping someone to kill mobs WAY too powerful for them in order to level them faster. With low levels, easily accomplished with DS and heals (or HP Shields), and at higher level with memory blurs to wipe the damage list.

Blur/Blurred
To clear the hate list. A blurred mob is one that has successfully been wiped, clearing it's hate list off.

Tank-Mezzing
Used on unmezzable mobs often in planes. A tank fights the mob solo while a healer keeps them alive. They have no aspirations of killing the mob, just keeping it hitting them while another mob is killed.

Add
Called out when additional mobs add to a battle. Tanks have a responsibility to call them out as the enchanter is often extremely occupied with targetting, memming spells, and casting during battle. "add" called out in group alerts the enchanter to get it under control.

Rootparking
Casting immobilization spells (Root, etc) on a mob and getting away from it, leaving it unable to harm anyone. Used commonly by shamans and wizards, but also by enchanters trying to crowd control a giant. The end.

Xornns Enchanter Guide

Contents

Introduction

Creation

Spell Lines

Tactics

Kamikaze

Kiting

Charm

Manipulation

Crowd Control

Buffing

Debuffing

Controls

Research

Stories

Spellbounder L'Arety

Athos

Izlano

Glossary

Navigation menu

Views

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Search

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community

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