The latest member benefit is arguably the best one of all -- a free training point reset, something that hasn't been available since the Astral schools debuted in Celestia. As the benefit ends today, this post is a bit late, but hopefully may be of use to some people now or in the future. Here's how some of my Wizard101 characters spent their new training points.
Note: If you're a Crowns player that wants to reset your spells, buy a membership only if it would cost over 5,000 crowns to reset.
Arlen's old spells included:
Ice to Tower, Life to Satyr, Infection, Spiritblade, Sun to Colossal, Sharpened Blade, 6 Polymorphs, and 4 Astral spells. The polymorphs seemed outdated, but I tested them out a bit again to make sure I wouldn't miss them. It was clear that the Celestian morphs belonged back in, well, Celestia. Yes, they were fun to use, but who can live without Colossal and critical block in today's Spiral? With that, I reverted to a clean slate.
Training back up to Tower Shield and Satyr was a foregone conclusion, though there were some cutbacks. Not only did the polymorphs go -- so did Infection and Amplify (made moot by Reliquary, the aura for Myth's attacks). I am still convinced that Empowerment is an underrated card, though. If anything, it's more useful nowadays, as bosses always attack with spells of 4+ pips. No matter your wizard's school, I recommend training it.
Next, I finally trained Death to Feint. I had only neglected to do that with my Conjurer owing to the fact that Minotaur, Orthrus and Basilisk used to be a big part of my attacking. As double-hits and DoTs, Feint isn't useful there, but Celestial Calendar (and maybe even Ninja Pig) makes it worthwhile. With that, Potent Trap also became much more useful. Also, there were some Azteca polymorphs that I considered. The Jaguar wasn't quite as great as I imagined, but it still bested Celestia's Treant. Without a Life Mastery amulet, that spell will clearly be useful.
Seeing this after resetting puts things into perspective. Other schools often account for about half of your spells -- don't take retraining lightly, put some thought into it.
The new Shadow spells were such a mixed bag that I decided against them on Arlen. Once my Life wizard reaches that point, though, Dark Shepherd seems like a good fit in that it's easy to please for a Theurgist. Plus, it'll make Tarlac feel like a Necromancer :P. Other than that, maybe Dark Fiend would be good for an Ice; I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. For a reminder on the costs and benefits for Shadow magic, here's Swordroll's guide.
Outside of Arlen, other spells I took into account were the ZF Astral spells and AZ polymorphs. Berserk, kind of like the aura version of Feint, is good for those who can take damage, like Life and Ice. Mend is also good for Life, but they don't need the Jaguar polymorph, obviously. Storm and Fire can definitely use the Icehorn morph, though. Frozen Armor is a really good buffer when you're full of pips, and Icehorn has several good buffs and shields for afterwards. Just be wary that it has no critical block.
Last but not least, don't forget the short-term necessities if you're a lower level. This logic applies to spells like Amplify and the Treant polymorph. In Azteca, Jaguar and your school aura will eliminate the need for those spells, but they're still worth having around before that point. Arlen actually had Sap Power, a spell from the hidden Marleybone trainer, that sacrificed minions for 4 pips. That was very useful to use on the 0 pip Golem minion, but the need for it isn't around anymore. There are tons of training points available nowadays, so don't be afraid to use a few for short-term needs. After all is said and done, my wizards will still have about 10 TPs remaining.
In the meantime, if you're still reading this on Sunday... remember to visit Lincoln and reset all of your character's training points in the next few hours!
Happy Training!
