Hello, I’m trying to figure out wand of warding but all it seems to do is stay afloat for 1 turn before shooting a beam at an enemy and then subsequently dying. Am I using it right? Also, if I become a battlemage with it, what does it mean when the wiki says that it will “Heals all sentries on current depth. More advanced sentries get healed more.” How is is supposed to heal something that dies in 1 turn and also I haven’t seen these “advanced sentries” either. Please help!

  • DarkNightoftheSoul
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    9
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    edit-2
    4 months ago

    It consumes its health pool to shoot. It only has enough health for one shot when you only put one zap. If you zap it again, it will grow and be able to sustain more than one shot; more zaps, more health and damage. You can upgrade the wand to get the crystal to a higher (more advanced) level doing more damage and sustaining more shots before dying: A wand+0 can support a crystal of level 2, +1 can support level 3, and so on. You can alternatively place more lower-level crystals (eg., a +2 wand could place 2 level 2 crystal sentries) and that’s where “heals all on current depth” comes in. It’s dying in one turn and not advanced because you haven’t invested more than one zap on it. The whole idea with this wand is that you’re investing turns spent zapping up front to get that time/turn investment back in the form of damage, sort of like an action-economy battery.

    • littletranspunk@lemmus.org
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      5
      ·
      4 months ago

      It’s great in that aspect to have an ambush tactic on enemies that come into the room. Not useful for all things, but it can be useful, like any wand.

      • Vencedor@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        1
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        3 months ago

        Nah, the wand of living earth isn’t useful at all. I just transmute or convert to arcane resin those

        • CrayonRosary@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          3 months ago

          Are you joking? Wand of living earth is one of the best wands in the game. You get armor and then a little dude to take aggro from you.

          • Vencedor@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            3 months ago

            If you want a turn of aggro, or, in fact, five turns of not being hit, just use a transfusion wand. Or use a wand of blasting and get rid of them. Or corrosion and let them melt. But that thing just dies in one thing the second you enter the prison. It’s useless, it doesn’t even deal big damage, and the armor is only 50% of all your received damage, and breaks very fast.

            • CrayonRosary@lemmy.world
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              1
              ·
              3 months ago

              Maybe you haven’t leveled one up enough. It’s good. Lots of people place it in S tier. It’s OK if you just don’t like it, but calling it bad is disingenuous.

              • Vencedor@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                1
                arrow-down
                1
                ·
                3 months ago

                But why would I level one of those so a random guy has more hp when I can level up my armor and be inmortal?

  • buo@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    5
    ·
    4 months ago

    To add to other comments:

    • This wand is much more useful when upgraded, since you get more powerful wards/sentries.
    • The first three zaps produce wards, which shoot a specific number of times.
    • The next three zaps produce sentries, which will zap once every two turns until killed.
    • You can place wards anywhere you have vision, even across walls.

    I’ve tried playing with a staff of warding once or twice, but I don’t think I’ve managed to win yet. It’s a fun wand but it requires planning and careful management of charges. One thing I enjoyed doing was placing a couple of sentries in a spot that mob patrols would frequent. No more random mobs to worry about!

  • Riversedgeknight1@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    3
    ·
    4 months ago

    Also don’t use it near enemies, since they can attack it and generally will one shot it. Place it several times away so that it can get it’s shots off first.

  • seaQueue@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    4 months ago

    Upgrade your wand and investigate how the wand mechanics work. Warding is a great wand but takes time to learn well.