Ignite Wizard Build Guide

Introduction

Welcome to our Ignite Wizard Build guide! In this build, we’ll walk you through everything you need to know to utilize the Ignite Wizard. This includes Skills, Perks, Stat Priority and more!

This Wizard build focuses on the ability to convert from a traditional ranged caster to an incredibly deadly diving melee assassin. The Wizard is a very powerful class capable of multiple playstyles. However, the standard Wizard build relies on the “Meditation” skill to replenish spell charges. For the Ignite Wizard, however, we discard Meditation and instead pick up the “Arcane Shield” skill. Once the role of this build is understood, any player can cause devastation versus any team or class.

Skills

The recommended skills required to run the Ignite Wizard build are Spell Memory and Arcane Shield. Spell Memory allows the player to equip up to 5 spells – based on your allotted spell memory stat points. This is because each spell requires spell memory stat points to use in battle. Arcane Shield is crucial to the success of this melee-focused build. The Arcane Shield is a fast-activating protective barrier that absorbs 20 damage and deals Arcane damage when destroyed.

Recommended Ignite Wizard Build Spells

As seen further above, the spell set-up for the Ignite Wizard is simple, yet flexible. Having access to a PvE clearing spell, a hard-hitter and the Ignite Wizard combination of Ignite, Haste & Invisibility is the bread and butter of the build.

Solo and Group

Ignite
Magic Missile
Haste
Invisibility
Fireball

Alternative options

Zap
Lightning Strike
Chain Lightning

Zap is a spell that could easily become recommended in place of Fireball with enough gear. Due to Zap scaling incredibly hard while also being a fast-casted spell. Lightning Strike is another hard-hitter alternative to Fireball, however, remains to be a tricky to master spell. Finally, Chain Lightning is another powerful spell best suited to solo-play. Chain Lightning can deal incredible ranged AoE damage, but comes at a very risky cost of potential self-damage.

Perks

For this Wizard build, we recommend the following perks:

Mana Surge
Arcane Mastery
Fire Mastery
Ice Shield

Typically, in a Wizard build you’d most likely find perks such as Quick Chant or Sage. However, this build plays a much more dive-heavy melee approach. As a result, taking Ice Shield for close-range defense, while synergizing both Mana Surge & Arcane Mastery for damage is the optimal approach. Fire Mastery also synergizes well with the build, making targets healing 50% reduced and increasing the damage of Fireball, Zap and Ignite.

Stat Priority

Additional Magic Damage
+All Attributes
Will
Strength or Agility
Any other Magic Damage modifier

Within the stat priority, it should be a no-brainer that +All Attributes is a great all-rounder stat to obtain. Will is the primary stat that scales the Wizard’s Magical Power, however, in a melee-focused build – Strength & Agility share the spotlight as viable stat choices. Strength allows for more HP while dealing more physical damage. On the other hand, Agility provides movement speed and faster attacks, both approaches to stat priority add value to the build. Finally, Additional Magic Damage is a must-have for any Wizard build. This includes the Ignite Wizard Build, as a result of raw numbers being added to the damage formula scales your damage dramatically.

Gear

Weapons

For this build, the Wizard has a go-to setup. For the Ignite Wizard, we recommend equipping a Crystal Ball paired with the Rondel Dagger. This weapon combination provides simple but effective gameplay – at a budget too! The Rondel Dagger acts as our melee DPS tool, the same tool that we can Ignite to deal huge melee damage to players. The Crystal Ball is our catalyst for casting our spells, this means we can have both of our primary tools out at the same time! Alternatively, you can play with a Spellbook and Crystal Sword. This provides a slower DPS approach to melee than the Rondel Dagger, however, brings more range to the fight.

Armor

For the Ignite Wizard Build, we recommend using a decent combination of cloth and leather where appropriate to get the best protection-to-movement speed ratio. This can be the following:

Wizard Hat or Leather Cap
Oracle Robe
Wizard Shoes or other cloth shoes
Rawhide Gloves
Loose Trouser

The above loadout provides the best possible resistances without compromising your movement speed. Oracle Robe, in particular, provides a great amount of armor, while being cloth and lightweight! Try to build your loadout with the above in mind to yield the most optimal results. Finally, do not forget to find the associated stat priorities required for the build!

How to Play the Ignite Wizard Build

The Ignite Wizard build is a simple yet deadly approach to the Wizard. As an Ignite Rondel Dagger user, the goal of the build is to buff yourself up with Ignite, find your way to the enemy back-line and efficiently assassinate their support/squishy. However, there is steps required to execute this strategy and some key notes to consider.

One of the key elements of the Ignite Wizard Build is the ability to cause complete chaos and panic in the dungeon. This chaos comes in the form of weaving Invisibility into your strategy. This style of gameplay can be very confusing for even good opponents to track and allows a lot of creative decision-making.

A key downside however to this build is that even though you have utility spells to help potential teammates, the chances are you will be almost exclusively casting them on yourself. The build is very selfish, but provides value in the form of immediately deleting an opponent from the fight.

A final note to remember, as a result of not playing Meditation, we have a heavier reliance on the following:

Resting by pressing G to recharge spells.
Using Clarity Potions to recharge spells.
Using Campfires to recover health and recharge spells for the team.

Ignite Wizard Solo and Group Gameplay

Compared to standard Wizards typically buff-balling a melee frontline class to lead the charge, the Ignite Wizard looks to find the earlier entry to the fight. This build plays out much like a stealth assassin would. A common habit to build is to Haste your support teammate just before you look for the fight. After that, prepare your rotation, as you’ll be the first in at lightning speeds! Start by casting Haste on yourself as it is the longest duration buff for yourself. Once you’re hasted, cast Ignite and once you are ready to dive, finally cast Invisibility on yourself. During your Invisibility window, you have 5 seconds to either find a spot to recast a couple of buffs out of sight or reach the opponent’s backline undetected.

At this moment, you can begin your opener by activating your Arcane Shield. You must activate the Shield the moment you engage to prevent damage dealt to you, with as much duration as possible. With your Arcane Shield up, all that’s left is to attack your target with your Ignited Rondel Dagger! The amount of damage you deal is incredible, you often melt people with the first 3 stabs, quickly dispatching opponents.

After your first target has been eliminated, if you can convert the Ignite duration long enough to attack the second target, immediately melee them. If Ignite times out, however, we suggest backing off to either reapply buffs or heals, or peel a little and begin to use Fireball. If a player begins to run away or around you, Magic Missiles or Zap is a good finisher too.

Solo

The joy of the Ignite Wizard build guide is that all of this is achieved easily with the Rondel Dagger & Crystal Ball due to the lack of weapon swapping. The actual casting of the buffs and preparation for a fight is done within an instant too, leading to a very high-flying gameplay experience. The largest downtime you’ll experience is between fights, and recovering spells.

Playing this build solo doesn’t require many adjustments other than being more careful about the targets you pick, and weaving out of a fight more.

Multiclassing Options

Multiclassing is a very experimental feature in Dark and Darker. As a result, there is going to be a ton of possibilities and build tweaks. As we and the many players of the game push further into the wipe to test Multiclassing, we’ll update this build with our recommendations! To see more on Multiclassing and what it means for the future of Dark and Darker – check out the 2024 Roadmap.