A guide to buffing

[Truper]

The Panther said:
Hey! Did you steal this from me?

Not unless you've been playing since Dom1
Actually, I stole it from Alex Poger from some discussions on usenet years ago.

I would only quibble with one thing here, you need to go to Astral 4 on your wyrm if at all possible, for this allows your sacred mages to get an additional point of magic resistance when blessed. It also helps a lot with the dueling later on.

The reason I often end up with only Astral 3 is that moving from 3 to 4 costs 32 points - nearly enough for a scale. I don't think a single point of MR is worth all that much - if you even have sacred mages. Astral 4 would help with dueling, but not enough to matter that much, unless you are in a position to provide communicants. One of the main attractions of the Astral Wyrm is that he's cheap, as well as effective. He's also a nice way to get into the water, which is otherwise tough to do early - especially if you can forge him a Horror Helmet

[WraithLord]

Truper said:
...
Astral 4 would help with dueling, but not enough to matter that much, unless you are in a position to provide communicants.

AFAIK for the purpose of magic duel only the base astral level counts. Empowering through items or communion doesn't count.

[Alneyan]

Empowerment proper does work, as it raises the basic level, but I believe it is what you meant. Everything else will be void.

I believe the Banner of the Northern Star might work too, as one of my mages survived a lot of Magic Duels with this item in hand, and +6 in base astral; he could have been very lucky though. On the other hand, a +5 mage with the Banner and Power of the Spheres will get killed very quickly.