Well since I am a white clan, I don't know how well this guide can benefits those at black side.
But I believe that there isn't much differences.
First, let's start about the mobs you should kill and should not kill, by level.

I will not list mobs below RC8, for two reasons.
All the mobs are below those levels are far too easy to grind, and don't seem to matter if I list them or not.
Second, I was not a mage before RC8, so I don't have any experience to share upon that subject.

RC8 to RC10, you should be partying and killing monks.

Tips #1: While in party, you have two things you can do. And this is good for all the partying you will do in the future.
First, it's to pull/lure mobs to the group for them to kill it.
Or, you can skill up your spells. Mainly, I found the second option more viable.
And by leveling your skills, I meant you should be using cheng 1 of that spell.
Since it is a 0.4sec casting time, you cast it faster, henceforth, more xp gained.
Damage doesn't seem to be a big factor.

RC10-RL1, you should be killing Drunken Swordsmen (Inside the entrance of Death Valley). Again, you can party here.
Mobs you want to avoid: Any version of Lightning shadows. They are range, you can't kite them well.

RL1-RL5/6, you should be killing Raiders outside the first village of Jinan.
They are fast, but they are packed. Kill the lower ones and hit stronger when you gain levels.
Alternative mobs : Blood Thieves (wolves riders).
Not suggested, since there is already too many warriors in that area. You can solo well raiders anyway.

RL5-RL8/9, you should be killings Brown Bears, south east of the 2nd town in Jinan.
You should aim mainly for regular brown bears, since the warriors will let them alone, due to a damage bug.
But you can take on easily Bigger ones, or if you want fast kills, small bears.

RL8-RL12, you should be killing Shadow Disciple, north of Brown Bears (not the ones across the bridge).
By this time, you should be able to lure and kite the female ones well. And warriors won't kill them, cuz they are packed.
If you find that they are not enough (many nukers maybe), there is disciple of same kind just north of Tiantan Shrine.

Mobs you want to avoid: Monks. Three reasons.
One, they are too hard to kill, compared to any other mobs near your level.
Two, they are too packed, respawn can easily kill you.
Three, there is too many warriors there by now. Not a good grinding spot.
Of course, if you want to party, it's your best bet at monks. But you can gain better xp by soloing.

FD1-FD4/5, you should be killing Green Toad Demons, found east of the Exit to Hefei.
They are packed nearby the bridge. One side got normal ones, the other powerful. Take the easier ones first, and so on.
Warriors won't come kill them, because they hit hard and they usually 3-4 gank the melee players.
So you got your grinding spot warriors-free. You can actually go to this area at RL11, if you feel you are good enough.

FD5-FD8, you should be aiming for Axehead Demons and Stoned-skin demon.
They are found south of the toads.
You can easily kill them, and warriors won't go near the boss in the area, but you can lure one by one.
Axehead Demons are also found north of the third small village. They are more packed there and are funner to kill.

Alternative mobs : By FD7+, you can kill Bloodclaws, found on the thousand bridge area.
They are good if you can kite them. Personnally, I hate them. Why? because they are bugged.
If, like my friend, you can kill them easily without caring about the bug, then go for it, since it's a better target.
The bug makes them warp to you instead of actually running/walking toward you. I cannot kite something I can't see.
But that's just me.

FD8-SM1, well, I am around that level. There is a better Bloodclaws called Soulbreaking Bloodclaws.
They are found inside the Hell Valley entrance. They are packed at entrance, so you can kill them by luring them.
Alternative mob: There is some demons a little deeper inside, in a wide area. They are Swordsmen or pole users.
They are not suggested tho, since they either have high Chi Kung Defense, either lots of life.
They move as fast as female disciple.
Another Alternative mob: Four-Armed demon.
There is a corner near the river side, where there is no mobs and you can lure.
Of course, the river side can block your line of sight from time to time, but that's something you are already used to.

Revealing new spot.
FD7+, in Nanchang, there is a place north of of the west-most village that got Red Wolves.
That's the name of the mobs, they are actually yellow to you. Very easy mobs, slow and low life.
North of it, there is their counterparts, blood red wolves, also as easy.
The West-most village can be reached by going south from Hefei's entrance, no need to use the road.
Mobs you want to avoid: Hawkeye.
They move hella fast, even with your slow and paralyze, they might catch you and hit you before you kill it.

Tips #2: Before FD1, don't use the bleed spells, because once you get FD1, you will get a better one.
So, use only the slow spells for the time being, its effect is better, and damage would be the same.
Besides, using only the slow spell will level it quicker, so it's for the best.

Tips #3: Try not to use your shield, if not in danger. If you are leveling, you want to cut your downtime.
Your shield uses about 3-4 spell-worth of mana.
Henceforth, it's like for each shield you cast, you could have done 50% or more of damage to any mobs' life.
If you need the shield to kill the mob, then the mob is probably too hard for you and you should change the area.

Tips #4: Don't use either Steps or Meditation buffs. Their ratings and damage is something you can live without.
If you got them at cheng 10, they both takes 3 mana/each per ticks.
See it this way, are you willing to trade about 2 wisdoms for 1000 mana?

Tips #5: Level your wisdom buff, it's so awesome at higher level areas.
With more wisdoms, you do better damage and miss less. It's a life-saving buff in situations.
Level it with the hold-the-skill-button tricks when you want to go AFK.

Tips #6: Basic and Advanced Lightfoot don't share the same cooldown.
Yep, so in dire situation, you can switch your hotbars and use the basic one and once the other cooldown is done, use the advanced one.

Tips #7: Before SM, I'd suggest you to solo. It's boring I know. But it's better.
At FD7, in group, you will gain about 0.01% while the mobs u solo give you 0.08%.
It means that every single guy in the group needs to kill 1 mob at the same amount of time you kill one to be advantageous.
Besides, in group, the mobs are too crowded, and you will tend to aggro more than usual, without wanting to.
Solo is better, party for you, it's mainly for fun factor.

Tips #8: If you want to start a mage as a new character, don't choose it at first choice.
Take a warrior, then level with it. They kill faster and it will be a lot easier to level.
Then when you level it to around RC8-10, change into a caster.
So you can train some of your skills and can take on higher lv mobs later on.
Bad side of this, if you do this, you may not be able to change your build further on. So think wisely.

New section added.
STRATEGY ABOUT BUILDS
Many people asked me about Essence vs Wisdom builds.
Usually, I would say go search in the forums , but found out there isn't much place to look.
So I'll share my knowledge on that matter, although this is a leveling guide, not a strategy one, but meh.

There is two major differences between Essence and Wisdom.

First, it's their damage power. Let make this clear.
Essence increases Chi Kung base's damage, so it's always a constant upgrade.
Wisdom increases the skill's base damage, so it's not a constant upgrade.
Essence adds exactly 4 damage per skill point, and Wisdom adds X per cheng of that skill.

In a previous post, I said Wisdom added (cheng of the skill)+1, but I found out that it is not the case.
Different spells add different values, or that the mathematical logic I used was wrong.
Either way, Wisdom do increase your damage higher than Essence once you have better cheng of the skill.

Before around cheng 4-5 of any skills, Essence increases better damage than Wisdom.
Last thing, to see your CK damage, open your char menu (press C), then look at your Chi Kung damage.
That's the base, to see your wisdom modifier, use any attack spells, then it shows your real damage.

Second big difference between both, it's the downtime value.
Basicly, with more mana, you will kill longer, and meditate less.
I need ~150 mana to kill one mob. It is about 4 Essence.
So, in theory, every 40 essence you have, you can kill 10 more mobs before you med.
10 mobs at RL lv, means 1.5% more xp before meding.
That is about 10 less meditation than wisdom build with only 40 essence more.
And everyone knows that during a Meditation's time, a caster can kill 1 or 2 more mobs.

As for damage, they probably, at that time, do ~200 more damage than you with the same skill's cheng level.
But as time goes on, you will know that they can do about 400 more damage (at cheng6 of FD1 spells) than you.
Remember that in PvP, damage are cut and in PvE, 400 is not a great difference when your spell do 4k+.
So, in those terms, it's actually your choice on what to do. Level quicker? or do more damage?

A friend of mine said to me, they will start a mage and will go Essence until RL12 Chi breathing,
then reset the stats into wisdom.
But keep in mind, your real damage spells start at FD1.
With so many wisdom, your new spells' damage will be lame compared to a decent Essence-build.
And if you think you can level those spells quick, then you are wrong.
I got those spells at FD1. I am FD10, and they are nearly cheng6. And I used books too. So rethink this strategy.

Last point, it's about Constitution.
Constitution is quite useless for mages, be it in PvE or PvP.
In PvP, you will need to have over 75 constitution to survive a warrior's finishing skill.
And it will leave you enough time to run, and die the next 3 sec, with shields.
Don't waste that much on Constitution.

On PvE matter. To me, Constitution is my error ratio.
In theory, a mage should never get hit, with the paralyze and slow spells.
But it comes sometimes that you make a few mistake or you have a bad luck situation.
Either you miss too much, altho your awesome 200 wisdom, or that you went too deep inside, and mobs respawn.
So, for those mistakes/bad lucks, that it's where my hp kicks in. More life = more forgiveness for those times.
If you are feeling as an exceptional and lucky pro, you don't need a single point in Constitution.

I have 40 Constitution and I kind of regret it. I should have put 30 or less.
Now, most of the time I med, I got over half my life point.
And ya, sometimes, when I have less than 100 hp, I go into a killing frenzy, ignoring the flash life bars.
Because I can do it, so I do it.
The only times I died, it's when I got bad aggro and 2 spells miss succesively. So I die pretty rarely.

Oh god, I just remembered something CRUCIAL on any caster build.
What you need as equipment, it's +movement speed. Seek them out!
With more speed, you will kite better, and less chance to get hit.
There is cloths in the third zone that have slots (hair and shoes). At that place, you can also buy +5% slots-trinkets.
Also, try to do the "secret solver of the four god clan" as soon as possible. It gives you a neat +10% movement epithet.

If you have question/tips/note about this small guide, then let me know.
My In-Game Name is ShinShi (capitals at S). Yes I admit it.

THis is great!
I can see you spent a lot of time on this.
I can't beleive I've been using the first bleed skill u get, its already level 3 >.< doh! Im switching over to level only the slow and the one you get at OC10 w/the 8 sec. CD.

i tink mage r too powerful and i htink they shuldnt be in this game

i agree with you on the getting a high pool of mp to start with it realy helps beacuse of the face your attk rate only gets batter after u go to ess..

you dont [b]REALY[/] even 20 con mine is at 30 and its a bit high i can suck down 3k mp and not even get hit but it just depens on how you use your skills.

and you may do less dmg than wis builds but they dont have the standing power you have i can knock out 30-40 mobs that are yelloe or orange my level and not meditate once while a wis build can only do 10 or 15 (just an example) ul eventualy level faster because of the lack of down time.


changhai... erm have you played as a mage? we are not that powerful we have limited skills and at higher lvls like FD in one hit my hp is halfed... iv only got 1k but still. Rember this game is balanced learn to take advantage of when you have, the ability to do more with less is key in this game.

why do you think so? Why not lay down some hardcore evidence to support your claims? How about some more opinion or argument? How is this badly misspelled lump of garbage supposed to help anyone out in any way at all? Or do you not know what you are talking about. . .
Man, I despise these kind of posts >.<

Wisdom is defeinitely the way to go. IF you get it high enough you can even CRITICAL red mobs. you can either have high essence or high CON. You dont need both to be high becuase of mana sheild, so I would think 30 con is good unless u wanna PvP, in which case you should put your con at 50.

Lmao!! ROFL!!
err have u actually logged in and played? Coz as far as i know warriors are the "over-powerful" char not us nukers.
It's the reason why there're like80% of them in the whole 9d community.

very very nice guide! only disagree in some small parts!
1º a mage don't really need more then 700hp why? if u lvl the shield skill u get a lot of protections even when trevellhing in zones filled with ranged agresseive red mobs! i got my shield at lvl6 it gives almost extra 500 points of protection.
2º as essence goes, only the enough to have about 4.5k of man or maybe 5k that's really very near the value u gave =)
3º about rc7-8 wisdom is the STAT, not 2 or 3 points in it by lvl but 4 and eaven 6 when u lvl the tier =)

as a final note i think u should start at mage in oc1 and lvl only your slow skill! i say this because, whell higher skills tend to take more time to lvl and the first ones are already very slow and in my case, a rc8 hd mage i got the slow skill to lvl 4-5(don't recall ) and it gives like1100-1400 dmg (or somethign like it) and no high lvl skill gives that much dmg but some have very VERY nice side effects

P.S: GL & HF

nice job*claps his hands*

regarding the hp issue, it depends on whether you're into PvP or not.

If you are then you certainly need abit more for const 700 will render u in a 2hit kill by a warrior.
1st their stun will remove whatever shield you have
2nd their power smash will finish up the job.

and i'm talkin about warrior my same level (i was RC6 when i 1st duelled that warrior with only 945 hp and his smashing did a whooping 75% to my hp).
75% of 945 has already exceeded 700,
of course you can try not to get hit but it's quite hard so it's better to have some hp cushion
to help.

As mage myself I have con at least 50 at rc 6. Cuz altho we are range attackers, mobs normally respawn randomly and suddenly behind ur back, smash and hit you. With turbo that need 6 seconds to recast, it may be too late to survive if 3 mobs gang u in the same time.
Plus, I died in my journey to datong (at rc 6) cuz i cant cast my jade protection due to some bugs and those lighting guard (whtever it's called) killed me just right before the village gate. Really pain in the &#!@.

Mage for pvp wont work no matter high the con is, since the strength is too low. 1 smash = half hp so it's kinda useless. And warr has that lighting attack with 25 range to own mage. So nuker, i guess is only a supportive char for pvp.

Oh we can win trust me, when we get high enough that is, right now just let em enjoy the glory xD
btw, that lighting attack that u say with 25 range, can be foiled ya know.

one look at the range and u may think wow this skill rox, but the loophole is such that it can't be activated for any target lesser than the 25 range. Basically, at the start of the match u just buff urself with the shield and LF right close up the distance.

Too many people asked about builds more than the guide itself. Mostly noobs XD.

Well, so in that case, I removed the tips 9, and change it into a whole new section about strategy on build.
Also, corrected a few Type-O, and revealed my secret spot to see more mage.
Because, the damn warriors are everywhere now.

I hope my guide helped some people out there.

Thank you very much! I just started my HD mage today. Been faring OK, except being KS'd everywhere I go. I focussed on WIS at job change and placed 100 WIS there. Should have done more ESS to start with. I had to meditate after just a few kills (but I do hit hard and kill reds with criticals nicely)... 110 WIS, 20 CON, 30 ESS (+/- a couple points) at OC 7. Now I have 1000+ VE and can go through many green-yellows without med (6 or 7).

I'm looking forward to the higher skills and different areas. You're leveling guide will cut down on my deaths from wandering around looking for the best mobs for whichever level. Thank you, again.

--Ty

i started a wu-tang mage and went the opposite way. at OC4 i had 60 ess 25 con and 7x wisdom. my VE pool caps at roughly 2k. although i dont hit as hard as a mage with more wis, i can knock down tons of enemies before i have to med. focusing on raising wis now for more accuracy and crits.

IM confused IN some way what skills I need to up most as a dragon bergan wisdom con and essense ...Do I need to up strength or dexterity I already ruined one character Please can u write a good build for me I hope u help me guys thanks