Awakening - Has anyone tried the Arcane Warrior - Battlemage combination yet?

Remove all ads!

Arcane Warrior + Battlemage looks like a really great combo, but I have yet to try it for myself. I originally played Awakening with my Dwarven rogue (assassin, duelist, legionnaire scout) and had a blast. I resolved to keep Anders, the only mage I actively used, as a pure casting mage. I really wanted to see what a high level “pure” mage was like in Dragon Age.

So now I want to see what an arcane warrior/battlemage is all about, but as I’ve decided to start from the beginning of Origins, it’s going to be quite some time before I get to experience the battlemage specialization.

I’m curious if others have tried this combo yet, and if it really works out as well in practice as it looks to on paper.

 

Yeah I played an arcane war/blood mage/batltlemage through awakening. They're pretty much unbeatable. Nothing can damage you really (especially if you're going to play through origins with it first).

Dunno how they manage with aggro and such, I've only soloed one.

 

The new Specializations with the Arcane warriror specialization is killer. Both offer some great spells.

The Healer Specialization is also great as it helps the character with their health regen when it battle.

 

Woot, finally had the time to come back and post again.

First off, Shapeshifter >> everything else.

The Arcane Warrior is actually a lot less effective in Awakenings. Not the AW's fault, general monster damage simply does not improve much from Origins->Awakenings. Meanwhile, any other mage can now reach around 40-50 armor easy, besides enjoying other defenses (dodge, spell resist, etc.) granted by the new skills/items in Awakenings.

Battlemage and Keeper are both terribly overpowered, offense-wise. Battlemage/Arcane Warrior/x is a great combo if you play a melee spellsword. Battlemage is ideal for frontline mages, like a Shapeshifter-centric or Arcane Warrior-centric build (insane DPS and excellent utility skills, but you need to be near your enemies to optimize them). The Keeper favors Bloodmage/Spirit Healer-centric, support/disable focused mages (massive burst damage and mostly keep away/keep still/anti-knockdown skills, along with one of the few passive heals that work well regardless of Blood Magic).

 

Welcome back Scythe! Wait, what? Scythe is a fan of shapeshifters?? That’s new!

So when is your updated shapeshifter guide for Awakenings going to be shared anyway?

So it sounds to me like there’s potentially an opportunity to lose the heavy armor and perhaps even some of the sustained armor and defense spells. Which means that the AW can become just that much more flexible, with not only top notch melee and tanking abilities, but dare I say a decent mana pool as well.

I still have a ways to go before I get my AW to Awakenings, but I’ll be interested to play with different equipment/spell configurations once I get there. My AW is currently level 16 in Origins, wearing Cailan’s armor (the set bonus reduces fatigue nicely), and is really starting to show some deadly melee potential.

This is the highest level AW I’ve ever played, and I’m having fun learning to play him not as a warrior, or a mage, but as both simultaneously. In battle I like to start by targeting an enemy caster with a spell that knocks him/her off their feet, then run in with my sword to hack away. Perhaps mid fight I’ll hit the caster with a cold spell, and if a party member needs help, provide a healing spell. I have enough mana that I can cast a good handful of spells during a fight while still keeping all of my sustained spells going (usually combat magic, rock armor, arcane shield, and flame weapons (Wynne takes care of cold weapons).

I’m filling several different roles (healer, controller, damager, tank…) in a backup capacity, but I have someone in the party who is better at each of those roles. Alistair is my dedicated tank. Leliana (respeced as a dual wielding cunning based rogue) is my dedicated damager. Wynne is my dedicated healer and controller. My AW simply complements whichever of those roles is most in need of support during a given battle, and most often, is doing a bit of all of them.

There is an awkward point in the AW’s life, from around levels 7 – 12, where they simply aren’t good enough at fighting to justify using them as a warrior. It’s better to keep them working as a traditional mage most of the time. But beyond those awkward levels they start becoming something truly spectacular. Fun stuff.

 

The guide's in its final stages, needs proofreading (it's been like that for 3 weeks now). I'm back to working on it, currently testing some stuff I've been reading about in the EA Boards/Dragon Age Wiki so the guide is as up-to-date as possible when I submit it. Apparently these days wizards are fighting dragons toe-to-toe, warriors are outdamaging wizards, and people are playing as darkspawn.

True. Perhaps you can go further and try reducing the fatigue on Combat Magic by having your Wynne replacement (in Awakenings) use that new -fatigue sustained, it drains a lot of mana but you can just give that character mostly +stamina/mana regen items. Cherry on top: +elemental damage runes are torso armor-only (robes don't have "sockets", sucks).

 

As a AW the most fun spells are those where you can stun or reduce your enemies movement, attack, damage etc...