Gears & Artifacts
for a Master of Flame Control Wizard
In this section I will show you some of the Gears / Enchants that I feel will help us more as Control wizards.
Its easy and tempting to just show a specific setup of items but I think I will do a bad service if I limit your options. One of the better qualities of Neverwinter, is that you can experiment and build with different setups, that will still work just as good as any recommendation out there.
The main reason for this is, even though we need some specific stats, we can gain those stats in different ways. One example is if you use Gears that give Critical you can use Cruel enchants that provide power/recovery. If you use Recovery items you should do the opposite and use brutal to balance your critical rate %. At the end you will gain and cap the same stats.
Speaking of stat caps, what we target stat wise is:
Offensive
1. Armor pen: Your target for armor pen should be
100% if you are doing Castle Ravenloft (only dungeon).
85% but it can be set at 60% if you are new and play in zones below Chult, Once you start doing Chult and its dungeons, get this stat to 85%.
2. Critical: As close as possible to 100%
3. Recovery: I personally play with 18.5k but I will say that is best to be above 14-15k. You can experiment till you see when it feels natural and fluid, going from one encounter to the other and from one rotation to next.
4. Power: Everything else to power. There is no real reason to worry about power as in a dungeon the DC and Paladin will powershare to you.
Defensive
1.HP: On ourselves, its better to use and max HP for our survivability and also the increase in Aura of Courage damage.
2. Lifesteal: Since HP cant be shared from companion's bonding stones It's better to use lifesteal.
Main sources of stat points are Gears & enchants for both us and our summoned companion, Artifacts and Insignia. I didn't include the stats you get from legendary mounts as in the long run, legendary stat mounts are not a very wise investment. When you eventually get your stats to the maximum, those mounts lose their usability and value. On top they don't provide as much damage as one would think compared to mounts like the snail, lion or T-Rex. As you level and gear up of course, using a purple mount for stats (such as armor pen) would be beneficial.
Weapons
From the new weapon sets, we have 3 choices.
Primal weapons set because due to healing from DC and/or Paladin even when not in combat, the buff can stay on for almost 100% of the time which means a permanent 10% damage buff. With the changes to seals in mod 14, its the best and easiest weapon set to have.
Pilgrim set is the 2nd best option. This weapon is marginally better for those who mostly solo as the bonus is easier to activate than primal.
As far as mastercraft 3 set goes, I would not advise spending the AD. If you care for buffing the team, might as well stay with Mastercraft 2 which has the same bonus. The extra weapon damage, welcome as it is wont help much since your goal is to buff.
Gears
This is my choice for gears. They work under any condition and loudout. Situationally there can be an item that may increase our output a bit in some scenarios but it comes at the cost that you have to balance out the stats like crit/armor pen differently in each and evey loadout. The cost for this might be beyond its usefulness, but I'm sure that whoever will go down that path, already knows about what items they need.
Below you will see my selection of gears that I use in any circumstance but feel free to adjust/change it to your needs and play style, while always making sure you balance your stats. You can see a complete list of gears by visiting the Collections in game.
Hag's Rags: Gives 3% damage bonus to all ranged attacks which include RoE, Dis, Ice Knife, Chill Strike, FtF, Conduit Ray of Frost and it does not boost Icy terrain, Oppressive force, Steal time, or smolder.
Jawripper's Gloves : Encounter powers are one of the main sources of our damage and this item will increase their damage both in AOE setups as well as in single target.
Rex Corona: For the obvious gain in power.
Enduring boots: Extra damage when our stamina is full. In most boss fights (where we care mostly for damage) its rare to teleport and even if we do a small investment from boons and armor kits in stamina gain will get us back to full quickly. Better have a +3% buff for 75% to 100% of the fight, than not have any at all.
Upper primal pants. Our dailies now hit for 3% more.
Necklace, Belt & ring
For accessories, we got several options. Some are free and just need farm, some need AD. I think the best thing about the new rings is that most are dual offensive slot rings. That will give is the extra damage we want/need.
Bronzewood and Beaded rings: Mastercraft rings that give very good stats (power/recovery or power/crit) and also dual offensive slots. Work very well on companions too. Good rings to start with till Lady luck gives you better rings.
Ring of offensive action. A very good ring for CWs as we cast dailies so fast that the 3% damage buff works very well for us.
Ring of the Shadowstalker One of the best rings to have. Can be obtained by doing Fane weekly quest in Omu and some luck.
2x same rank rings don't stack but 2 x different rank do stack. (+4 and +5 for example).
Ring of the GraveStriker Excellent ring that can be obtained by doing maps in OMU with a bit of luck. The buff works on companion too and 2 rings can stack as long as they are different ranks (+4 +5).
Mastercraft 3 necklace and belts One of the better sets to have for those who don't like the Orcus set. You can mix and match whichever you prefer for your CW and you will get the set bonus of 1500 recovery.
Orcus Set: Even tho it's not a set, primarily target for CW as it gives +str and +con, it's set bonus makes it worth using it.
Till module 14 the set was not working with a few of our powers but Cryptic now fixed it and it does work with almost everything which automatically makes it the best set for DPS CW. Its difference is not big from the MC3 set but for end game and those who want to have every single % of dps, is the only set to have and use.
Artifacts
When it comes to artifacts, the main one is the one that really counts. Based on its effect it can allow us to do more damage or debuff the boss or activate mount bonuses a lot faster and more often. As for the other 3 there is no right and wrong. Use artifacts that have the stats you need always thinking your loadout and maybe future changes. You can see all the artifacts in game by going to Collections and then artifacts.
Soul Sight Crystal: This is one of the best artifacts for DPS and burst damage. On activation it will make you deal 50% more damage to the mob/boss that you have on your target.
Decanter of Atropal Essence. If you get lucky enough to drop it its a very good artifact for AoE.
Heart of the black dragon: One of the best artifacts to have. I use it since module 9 for both its personalities.
A. Can be used with Artificer's Persuasion and by missing on purpose, you can have the mount bonus up almost all the time.
B. The debuff on bosses helps when you want to assist the main dps to do more damage.
Enchantments
With the changes in the way our CW AoE and DOT abilities work now, we are not left with many choices but fortunately the ones we are left with are good ones. Our AoE/DoT Encounters such as Icy Terrain or Conduit of Ice, can't multiproc enchants any more and so all the Damaging enchants like Lightning, Plaguefire, Flaming etc will only proc once per mob at the start of the encounter.
We are left with 3 options.
Feytouched Enchantment: This is our best option when it comes to dps especially if we run with a Paladin (Aura of courage). It will increase all of our damages both direct and indirect by 20% at unparalleled level. Note that due to the cooldown, its only recommended when its above Transcendent as below that the cooldown decreases its buff potential.
Dread enchant It will make our encounters only, when they critically hit, to hit with 75% more critical severity. That tho should not be interpreted as 75% more damage. In reality for most end game and near endgame CW it will be a 29-30% Damage increase but ONLY to the damage that comes from the encounters and only if it critically hits.
Vorpal: When you are new and try to gear up, Vorpal at perfect can be a very good all-around solution. Its potential increases with your Critical rate, because it increases only critical hits so getting high Critical is a priority.
