Grimoire of Vaporous Wizardry and using Empower to replenish spells

[Not So Clever Hound]

Hi Folks,

I've only stumbled upon this now because to my great shame I only ever play Bloodmage as Wizards... maybe you did know this already?

If you're playing a non-Bloodmage, when you have the Grimoire of Vaporous Wizardy equipped, using an Empower point to replenish spell pool refunds not 1, but 2 spells per level (except your last one, Tier 7 for MC and Tier 9 for SC, which only gets 1 spell).

Even better, you don't have to commit to using Grimoire of Vaporous Wizardry at all! Just have it in your quick items, pause the game, switch to it, use the Empower point, switch back to your main Grimoire and you have simply doubled the normal amount of spells replenished.

It's not game breaking but hey, a very basic SC Wizard has 17 Spells + 9 refunds = 26 Spells. The same SC Wizard with Vaporous Wizardy (even as secondary Grimoire) has 26 + 17 = 43 Spells. You can do a lot of things with 65% more spells to cast!

So even without being a cheesy little monster and permastealing spells, you could cast e.g. 4 Shadowflames + 5 Freezing Pillars + 5 Wilting Winds + 3 Meteor Showers/Missile Salvos in a single fight. 5 Enervating Terror, 4 Death Rays...  And if you just want to use the Vaporous Grimoire temporarily, having a couple layers of Concentration (e.g. Combat Focus + Spirit Shield + Arcane Veil + Upright Captain's Belt = 4 layers) is enough, no need to go down the Rekvu's Fractured Casque + Injury path. Or simply get a paladin to cast Hands of Light on you.

Especially with BPM considering the Blood Sacrifice and Brilliant nerf, SC Wizard is growing on me!

EDIT: cherry on the cake if you're playing a Loremaster that can refund more than 1 Empower Points to max easily with Sasha's Scimitar and Her Revenge/Her Tears, this makes Chanter/Wizard No Subclass strictly better than Chanter/Bloodmage, at least with BPM! If you factor in that it can get anyway all Tier 1-3 vancian caster spells for free, that could potentially be one of the very strongest Solo options for BPM.

Edited January 2, 2022 by Not So Clever Hound

[Constentin Lévine]

It is great! As a backup grimoire on lasting fight, it is really cool

[Not So Clever Hound]

Yes! A No-Rest Loremaster can even cheese the BPM Empower Mechanics nicely:

1. Take useful Empower passives e.g. +ACC and +PEN (you have a grand total of 3 ability points to spend at Tier 7, so tough choice)
2. Empower an inocuous spell on yourself outside of combat e.g. Confusion (you now have the passive BPM +ACC/Pen buffs until next combat end)
3. Go start a tough fight and use your Empower point to replenish your spells with Vaporous Grimoire when needed, while benefiting from those nice Empower passives
4. Once done, pick an easy fight and Empower Her Revenge to refund all your Empower points
5. Rince and repeat

Sorry Elric  

Edited January 2, 2022 by Not So Clever Hound

[Elric Galad]

19 minutes ago, Not So Clever Hound said:

Yes! A No-Rest Loremaster can even cheese the BPM Empower Mechanics nicely:

1. Take useful Empower passives e.g. +ACC and +PEN (you have a grand total of 3 ability points to spend at Tier 7, so tough choice)
2. Empower an inocuous spell on yourself outside of combat e.g. Confusion (you now have the passive BPM +ACC/Pen buffs until next combat end)
3. Go start a tough fight and use your Empower point to replenish your spells with Vaporous Grimoire when needed, while benefiting from those nice Empower passives
4. Once done, pick an easy fight and Empower Her Revenge to refund all your Empower points
5. Rince and repeat

Sorry Elric  

Foor you are to tell me, now I will have to patch it out  
Enjoy it while it lasts (or use previous versions when it stops  )

Edited January 2, 2022 by Elric Galad

[Elric Galad]

On 1/2/2022 at 10:22 AM, Not So Clever Hound said:

If you're playing a non-Bloodmage, when you have the Grimoire of Vaporous Wizardy equipped, using an Empower point to replenish spell pool refunds not 1, but 2 spells per level (except your last one, Tier 7 for MC and Tier 9 for SC, which only gets 1 spell).

I guess it's because Empower refund half of your ressources rounded up.

So every Tier with 3 casts get 2 casts refunded.

This should work with any equipement adding spell cast (and BPM's Great Soul). Sure, none would be of equal magnitude as Grimoire of Vaporous Wizardy, but still...

[Not So Clever Hound]

10 hours ago, Elric Galad said:

I guess it's because Empower refund half of your ressources rounded up.

You're correct. And a Wizard with Vaporous, Adratic Glow and BPM's Great Soul has 5 Casts of tier 1 spells, so they get 3 tier 1 refund with an Empower point 

I just checked.

[Not So Clever Hound]

On 1/2/2022 at 11:24 AM, Elric Galad said:

Foor you are to tell me, now I will have to patch it out  
Enjoy it while it lasts (or use previous versions when it stops  )

Ha! I'm late and only seeing now that you made good on your promise. Fool, I.

Empower Passive Rework
All the following changes are from <Version 1.4>
<Version 2.0> Removed a glitch that allowed using Empower before battle to get benefit until end of next battle.