The Lore of the Magus Class
From time-to-time in the world of Alganon, a child will be born with superhuman powers. Those that are born with great strength are recruited to become Soldiers. Those that show a natural bond with the beasts of the fields are driven to wander off into the forests and become Rangers. Those who show a natural affinity to control the very elements themselves are trained to become Magi. In the universe of Alganon, there is an element the scholars call Essence. This strange energy is the source of all magic, and a Magus is first taught how to control the Essence that grows inside them - for using their focus to control this powerful force will be the method they use to control the other elements.
Essence, however, is a very volatile substance - it is very difficult to contain. With the right training, all Magi learn to contain and then release their essence energy, allowing them to explode into a maelstrom of pure energy. They also learn to put this essence to a different use - the summoning of powerful elementals.

By focusing their own essence, a Magus can summon and bind the power of fire, ice, or even the power of the storm. A Magus who chooses to specialize in fire will prefer to summon pure, elemental fire, and merge with it - converting the essence inside the Magus into fire, and providing the Magus with a powerful affinity with the flame. Now, the Magus is capable of using his flame-infused essence to alter the results of his spells. This ability to become one with the elements is the Magus's greatest asset.

Magus Skills, Traits, and Abilities
To understand the roles of any of our classes, you must first understand our dual role system. Every class in Alganon, the Magus included, is designed with a core role in mind. This role is something that every member of that class can perform. If you are looking for a specific role, you can easily search by class, because every member of that class is capable of performing their core role. To prevent this from causing them to be repetitive, and to increase the value of adding a second member of a given class to an existing group, players can also choose a second role as their specialization. They can then become proficient in one of three additional roles, without giving up their core role. This makes it easy to find a role, and yet allows for great variety inside each class.

The core role of a Magus is area-of-effect damage. Any Magus, no matter what their specialization, can open up a Can-'o-Whoop-Essence and use it to strike at many targets at the same time. In their core affinity, a Magus is better suited to do small amounts of damage across large numbers of enemies than to face off against a single target.

A Magus who wants to focus on one target at a time will want to specialize in Flame. By spending their ability points in the flame tree, and switching into Flame Affinity, a Magus can become a powerful single-target damage dealer, doing large amounts of damage to a single target - even so far as to ignite their opponent, allowing the Magus to continue damaging a target, even if that target manages to escape from casting range.

A Magus who specializes in Storm (electrical) energy is a very different class than a Fire Magus. A Storm Magus specializes in threat management. Designed for raiding and group classes, the Storm Magus has tricks to manipulate and control the enemy AI, including interrupts, crowd control spells, and the ability to directly influence the threat of their party members. If your tank has trouble keeping agro due to your crazy mad DPS, switch to Storm Affinity and help him out.

A Frost Magus is the most unique of our specializations. A Frost Magus is designed to be an AoE Tank, capable of dealing with large numbers of enemies and keeping them busy while their group mates take them down. They will do so through use of their Frost Elemental. A pet that can take large amounts of damage and deal large amounts of threat to multiple enemies.

The Magus Amongst Other Mages
We hope our difference in combat roles - such as the support and tank options - for the Magus are enough to make us stand out. We designed all of the Magus abilities around these roles, to make sure that players will be able to settle down into a role, and, more importantly, is good at it. We chose their core to be AoE damage because we find that to be crazy fun in other games and we want to bring that to Alganon.

Channeling of Flame, Storm, and Ice
Although there is some overlap, and it is possible to cast spells from one school while in the affinity of another school, the following rules usually apply to the elements in Alganon.
Essence damage tends to be minor, but far reaching. It is generally used for area-of-effect spells, or for spells that are focus-efficient. If your plan is to "Kill them all," you will likely want to use Essence spells.

Flame damage tends to be for high-damage, single-target attacks. It is generally used to put the hurt on a single target. This is the "glass cannon" spec. If your plan is to "Kill them first," you will likely want to use Flame spells.

Frost damage tends to be used for defensive spells. This not only includes healing and enhancing the Frost Elemental for tanking, but also includes snares, which protect the Magus from melee damage. If they can't hit you, they can't hurt you. When we release PvP, this affinity will focus entirely on increasing the survivability of the Magus. If your goal is to "Outlive them all," you will likely want to use Frost spells.

Storm damage tends to have more of an effect on the AI or psychology of an enemy than their health bar. In PvE, this includes interrupts, crowd control, and threat management. When we release PvP, we plan to severely reduce the use of crowd control against other players. It's no fun to be unable to play. However, don't expect that to make the Storm Magus worthless. You can expect Storm spells to make you swear under your breath and scream for everyone to target the "little bastard" that the Storm Magus wants you to target. Think of the tricks you've played to confuse and manipulate opponents in PvP, and imagine spells that make those mind games easier. That's the Storm. If your goal is to "Mess with their heads," you'll likely want to use Storm Spells.

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