Tome of spells not working well.

[Yoadm]

Hi guys,

I've been trying to level (buy up) an archmage to arcane mastery, and seem to have hit a dead end. I kept buying level III tomes, untill I have only 6 spell spheres to go (water, death, and 4 others of the original spell spheres). Somehow, no matter how many new tomes i buy, I don't get any more spell spheres lvl III, and it is really frustrating.

Is it intentional?

 

[tesb]

i don't know the exact code for the spell tomes III, but it might be. i used this tactic as well and it seems you have to gain some levels with your mage regardless.

i usually play with grigory and upgrade 4 adventures to archmages. choose no promotions until i bought nearly all tier III spells and then choose arcane mastery promotions. usually i still have to gain some levels until i have them all even with the hero promotion.

 

[tinstaafl]

I also don't know the code, but i always thought it is simply that you can get a spell that you already have. If true: This means, as you are approaching all 20 or so level 3 spells, the probability to get a new one will decrease. if you lack 25% of spells you only have a 25% chance of getting a new one.

Note that this doesn't mean you are getting a new spell with every 4th spellbook. If you are just a bit unlucky, you may not be getting new spells for a series of 7, 8 or even 9 times in a row. And when you finally get a new one, your probability for a long streak of blanks trying to get the next one is again worse.

If you are planning to try to get the last spell this way, you could easily go 1000s, (in fact millions) of turns without getting it.

Getting arcane mastery is possible though, with the wildmana guardians option on, preferably also the "more mana" option. 10 or so spellbooks placed on govannon/hemah AFTER he has reached 100xp by his hero promotion will usually do the trick. you may need to fight a few battles to get the last needed xp if you still had to take a couple level 3 spells by promoting. But the 2 times i tried it, just short of 300xp were enough, and the spellbooks/hero promotion already amount to about 250 typically. There's a more extensive guide somewhere in the pedia, too.

 

[Yoadm]

i don't know the exact code for the spell tomes III, but it might be. i used this tactic as well and it seems you have to gain some levels with your mage regardless.

i usually play with grigory and upgrade 4 adventures to archmages. choose no promotions until i bought nearly all tier III spells and then choose arcane mastery promotions. usually i still have to gain some levels until i have them all even with the hero promotion.

Yeah, well problem is that you need to be lvl 6 before you can even start purchasing tomes lvl III, so you still need to invest in 5 worthles promotions before you can get good ones..

 

[Yoadm]

I also don't know the code, but i always thought it is simply that you can get a spell that you already have. If true: This means, as you are approaching all 20 or so level 3 spells, the probability to get a new one will decrease. if you lack 25% of spells you only have a 25% chance of getting a new one.

Still, like 15 tomes and no promotion, despite having 6 lvl 3's to go? Strange, imo.

Getting arcane mastery is possible though, with the wildmana guardians option on, preferably also the "more mana" option. 10 or so spellbooks placed on govannon/hemah AFTER he has reached 100xp by his hero promotion will usually do the trick.

Really? what do the guardian's spellbooks do?

 

[tesb]

invest in 5 worthles promotions

combat I to V is not that useless

Really? what do the guardian's spellbooks do?

they give experience in addition to new spells

Still, like 15 tomes and no promotion, despite having 6 lvl 3's to go?

yeah getting those last lvl 3 promotion can take a while and you spend a ton of gold on them. i usually go out with my mages and kill stuff to gain xp instead of buying books it is faster that way since you can only read one book a turn.

 

[Yoadm]

combat I to V is not that useless

Well, if you want to reach arcane mastery and don't use them to directly further this they are ..

yeah getting those last lvl 3 promotion can take a while and you spend a ton of gold on them. i usually go out with my mages and kill stuff to gain xp instead of buying books it is faster that way since you can only read one book a turn

But you don't waste XP on usual promotions, right? You go out killing while saving money for books.

 

[tesb]

i do the following
1) promote 4 heros to arcane units (adept)
2) get combat 5 to get lvl 6
3) buy spellbooks III until 100 xp is reached
4) declare war and farm xp with the untis

i usually play without omnipotence victory, i just want really strong mages

 

[tinstaafl]

Ok, 15 blanks with 6 to go sounds like exceptionally bad luck. perhaps i'm wrong about how it works.

Really? what do the guardian's spellbooks do?

They give level 1 2 or 3 spells of one of the 4 spheres (necromancy,alteration...).If i recall correctly afetr researching arcane... uh dunnno, the tech that opens up hemah/govannon, any unit that redas a spell book has for each spell of the sphere:
a 100 % chance to get it, if it's a level 1 spell
a 60% chance if it's a level 2 spell
40% for level 3
and gets 15 xp
Typically, after you read 2-3 spellbooks of a sphere you lack one level 3 spell in it, or even have them all.
If you use Hemah or Govannon, you don't have to pick combat promotions, because he's already an archmage. Except, if you still want to try buying level 3 books because of the "level 6" clause that you mentioned. But after reading a couple guardian spell books, you can typically already choose a few mastery promos, even if you still lack a couple level 3 spells, so maybe still no need for combat1-5.

Anyways, i did it twice with the amurites, but i had "more mana" turned on on top of the mana guardians, which results in about 10-12 spell books if you take out one or two rivals early enough.

 

[Yoadm]

i do the following
1) promote 4 heros to arcane units (adept)
2) get combat 5 to get lvl 6
3) buy spellbooks III until 100 xp is reached
4) declare war and farm xp with the untis

i usually play without omnipotence victory, i just want really strong mages

Hmm, good call. I have two, right now, each missing 4-5 spell spheres. It's so frustrating, and I don't wanna waste exp on those spell spheres because then I will never get to omnipotence.

 

[Calavente]

I agree with tinstaafl :
with arcane mastery and mana guardians :
2spellbooks (maybe 3) of a school allow you to have 3-4 lvl 3spells out of 5 of any school.
with 2 lvl 3, you ougth to have a chance to have a master promotion available (sometimes the spellbook doesnt give you the lvl2 but only the lvl3).
with 3 lvl 3 you are sure to have one.
(beware, master of nature and life needs : alteration spellbook AND divination spellbook).
+for each spellbook you get some xp : 10-30.
I found that it was harder to promote with an adept than hemah or govannon : with adept/mage..Etc you get some free promotions : each time, there is a promotion that you use that doesn't allow to level up.

with grigori : getting combat V is nice as it allows twincast that is good for master-level spells.
at (with some books) you should attain level 6 with (5 promo + 1free promo=6promotion) with combat 1-5 + 1master level. then upgrade from adept to archmage, get 2 free promotions
in the end, compared to a hemah-govanon hero, you got combat 1-V with 3 free promotions +2. (and waiting 100xp before reading the spellbooks is better)

If you can wait for having 10spells books and having 6masterlevel promotions... and thus no use for combat-1-5... it's even better but not necessary.
+camp near a wild law mana ... and hope to get wild valor or ?inspiration? for +1xp or +2xp per combat on said adept : useful for getting xp through combat once you upgrade to archmage with some masterlevel promotion enhancing