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Master of Magic Best Build

Welcome to my guide for the 11 Life Book Build in Master of Magic. Due to its healing, buffing and ability to choose the Incarnation spell in chargen, the 11 Life Book Build is one of the best builds in Master of Magic. 11 Life Book Builds are notable for their reliability under varied scenarios, and they often result in the best custom Wizards possible.

Note that I'm currently conducting a Master of Magic Iron Man run with a much weaker 9 Life Book Warlord Build.

Uncommon Life Spell Selection for 11 Life Book Build

We receive all Common Life spells in 11 Life Book Builds. On top of that, we are allowed two Uncommon Life spell selections. Suggested Uncommon Life spell selections are True Sight (which we perma-buff Torin with) and Prayer (another great buff for combat units).

Rare Life Spell Selection for 11 Life Book Builds

We are allowed only one selection of Rare Life spells, but that is all we require: Incarnation for the Torin the Chosen summon. Suggested in-game selection is Lion Heart, which further buffs Torin. We want High Prayer as well.

Civilization Selection

Since Torin dominates the field entirely, civilization selection does not matter unless playing on higher difficulty settings. However, I would suggest High Men or High Elf if playing Iron Man Impossible.

Campaign Progression for 11 Life Book Builds

The first thing you should do is survey the terrain that your initial settlement is built upon. To do that, click Info, then Surveyor and then mouse over your settlement to view its terrain modifiers. Ideally, you want to see "2 food" and "max population 25". Then, mouse over each tile in the settlement's catchment aka production radius.

You are looking for rivers, wild game and nightshade as well as mana, coal, iron, silver, gold and gem deposits. Mithril and adamantium deposits are only found in Myrror. Quork crystals can be found on Arcanus but crysx crystals are Myrror-exclusive.

Next, right-click the settlement and then left-click on the resources to get a breakdown on their sources.

The catchment shown above is extremely rare for a starting settlement. +10 gold per turn is huge.

Two settlements with gold-per-turn bonuses, side by side. The one on the right is the starting settlement.

Two gold deposits and one each of quork and mithril:

Two more catchments: one with 4x wild game, the other with 3x gem mines:

In the below scenario one would build the settlement on the yellow crysx deposit in order to capture 4x blue quork deposits as well, thereby yielding a whopping +17 power per turn.

As a rule, it is best to start on rivers since they confer solid gold and production bonuses, along with good max population scores. You do not want to see desert, tundra, hills or swamp tiles in your catchment, but rather river, forest and grassland tiles.

Not getting a good starting catchment sets you back a bit, but it is usually possible to recover by building new settlements on better tiles or by annexing neutral or rival-wizard settlements that are built on better tiles.

Initial Construction Progression

Suggested initial construction Progression is as follows:

Granary (+2 Food, +20 People per turn)
Marketplace (Tax Revenue +50%)
Farmer's Market (+3 Food, +30 People per turn)
Sawmill (+25% Production of Forest terrain)
Forester's Guild (+2 Food, Production +25% Forest terrain)

Strong focus on food, production and population growth is recommended. Be sure to survey the terrain tile as your first action, but starting terrain RNG should not impact 11 Life Book Builds too much since they quickly annex strongholds on both planes by virtue of Incarnation.

Settlements should be built close together (tight-knit) and their catchments should not overlap. It is much easier to manage a few strong settlements than it is one dozen weak ones. One high-production, high-population settlement should crank out combat units while other settlements farm food, generate mana and research spells. The productive settlement cranks out quality combat units and sends them to garrison the weak settlements, which do not build the Barracks line of buildings. Weak settlements only build buildings that yield food, population, mana and research. To speed up the building of other settlements the productive settlement is often set to Trade Goods, which generates cash-flow.

One of the tricks of Master of Magic is to build what you need and then stop. Build the food/population buildings and then stop. Build for mana and research and then stop. Only the biggest and wealthiest settlements should build the expensive Barracks line. When a settlement stops building it is set to generate population or wealth.

In short, stop and consolidate. Then expand. Stop and consolidate. Then expand.

Note that settlement catchment terrain tiles limit what a settlement can build, thereby limiting its production, wealth, harvest, population and units. For example, without a forest tile there can be no sawmill and therefore no archers or foresters guild. Without a hill or mountain tile there can be no miners guild or mechanicians guild. In addition, if the settlement was not founded on a shoreline or river mouth tile there can be no shipwrights guild, shipyard, maritime guild or triremes, galleys or warships. Thus, if you want archers your catchment must have a forest tile and if you want naval power the settlement must be founded on a shoreline or river mouth tile. Only tile-transmutation can overcome the lack of lumberable or mineable tiles.

If you are unlucky enough to be stuck on an island, you are going to need to build ships or find another way to get to the mainland or move across (what could be) an awkward archipelago.

Assuming High Men civilization, starting city resources and garrison are as follows:

Pre-built buildings are as follows:

And what we can initially build and train is as follows:

If located on the coastline, we can also build a Shipwright's Guild followed by a Ship Yard and Triremes.

High Men units:

Life summons:

Here we can see a prosperous and complete capital city of High Men built by an 11 Life Book Wizard:

And here is our High Men Empire built by an 11 Life Book Wizard:

Order of Initial Actions

Crank Mana acquisition in the Magic Menu.
Begin building a Granary and follow that with the above-listed construction order.
Summon 2x Magic Spirits for scouting purposes (mana-dependent).
Explore caves and such-like for easy mana and gold bonuses (sometimes there are no monsters).
Choose Planar Travel as soon as it becomes available. Often, PT is the first research pick.
Begin casting the Incarnation spell. While the spell is casting, Magic Spirits scout for mana reserves and other landmarks and strongholds that Torin will explore and assail. Depending on mana crystal RNG, you may be able to cast Incarnation in a just a couple years.
You should take any low-tier Heroes and employ them as mules for the magical items farmed by Torin. Later on, kill off the low-tier Heroes and summon or otherwise recruit top-tier Heroes.
The best Heroes to get early are Zaldron (+research), B'Shan (+10 gold per turn), Shuri (scouting & archery), Jaer (air transportation of stacked units), Rakir (scouting of stacked units & spotting), Fang (air scouting) and Serena (healing). Shuri is stronger with Super Blademaster whereas Fang is stronger with Blademaster and Agility. Serena is much more useful with Noble or Sage.
Once Incarnation has been cast, check Torin's mods. Note that Torin is powerful regardless of mod RNG, but Blademaster and Agility are the absolute best mods due to their scaling offense and defense bonuses. Luck is good as well. It is possible to get Torin with Blademaster + Agility, which is amazing (see summons screencap posted above).
Buff Torin with as many relevant Life Spells as you can, such as Heroism and Endurance. Cast Planar Travel on Torin as soon as you get it.
At this point, Torin moves around the map searching for treasures, mana nodes, landmarks and strongholds, taking out basically everything that is stupid enough to get in his way. Don't forget to cast True Sight on Torin when going up against Phantom Warriors and Phantom Beasts, and avoid epic enemies such as Great Wyrms until Torin has some levels under his belt.
Be sure to meld Magic or Guardian Spirits to nodes as soon as the nodes have been acquired by Torin.
When you get Invulnerability, cast it on Guardian Spirits.
Meld to nodes with Guardian Spirits, not Magic Spirits.
Lion Heart and High Prayer are the ultimate buffing spells that become available for research later.
Cast Stream of Life, Prosperity, Inspirations and Consecration on your settlements.
Set the Tax Rate to its maximum once all settlements are buffed with Stream of Life.
Cast Crusade and Charm of Life.
Other than Warlord, very useful retorts for 11 Life Book builds are Alchemy, Node Mastery, Mana Focusing, Sage Master, Archmage and Conjurer (if you're summoning). Note that there is no Life Mastery retort.

As a rule, the best items for Torin are those which grant big bonuses to offense and defense or confer movement rate bonuses and flight or water-walking capability. We don't strictly need the offense- and defense-boosting items, but flight or water-walking is recommended in order to facilitate terrain mobility because we can't abide hindered movement on powerhouse combat units.

In a single attack sequence, a Great Wyrm CAN still slay that demi-god Torin build. However, it is extremely unlikely to do so.

In order of desirability, the best mobility items for Torin (indeed, for almost any Hero) are as follows.

Jewelry slot:

Ring of Dasmiff (+3 Att, +2 to-hit, +1 Movement, Flight)
Helm of the Tides (+4 Att, +2 to-hit, +15 spell skill, Water Walking)
Bracer of Mrad (+4 Att, +4 Def, +3 Movement, +6 res)

Armor / Shield slot:

Suit of Power (+6 Def, +4 Movement, +6 res, Endurance)
Disc of Advancement (+6 Def, +4 Movement, +6 res)
Supreme Shield of Death: +6 Def, +4 Movement, Wraithform, Invulnerability
Protection of Ramses: +6 Def, +4 Movement, Cloak of Fear, Endurance
Holy Shield: +6 Def, +4 Movement, +6 Res, Righteousness

However, it is unlikely that these items will be found short of save-scumming. A Torin that lacks Flight or Water Walking capability is going to be hamstrung if water separates the landmasses. In that case, you need to build ships or find some other way to cross water. Planar Travel may also overcome the problems posed by water (switch plane, move, switch back). Otherwise, Wind Walking spell/Hero or the Flight spell could be options (though you will have to find the Hero or spell, in-game).

Best Weapons for Torin:

The Kick Axe: +6 Att, +2 to hit, Haste, Giant Strength
Maul of Bathory: +4 Att, Vampiric, Elemental Armor, Haste
Golden Axe of Rath: +6 Att, +2 to hit, +10 Spell Skill, Giant Strength
Fang's Avenger: +4 Att, +2 to hit, +1 Def, Vampiric
Double Axe of Pain: +4 Att, +2 to hit, +5 Spell Skill, Flaming
Vampiric Vanquisher: +4 Att, +2 to hit, +10 spell skill, Vampiric
Storm Mace: +3 Att, +5 Spell Skill, Lightning, Flaming
Sting: +3 Att, +3 to hit, +1 Def, Lightning

The Haste weapons are not easy or early finds. If you find any of these weapons, you're set. The Golden Axe of Rath is probably the ultimate Torin weapon that can be found early.

11 Life Book Build Retorts & Secondary Spell Books

Bonus retorts and spell books are not necessary for victory. However, they can make us more powerful or versatile. 11 Book Builds of any kind may not choose Retorts or spell books of other schools of magic in chargen. Thus, they can only be found in the gameworld.

Ideally, we would find the Warlord retort and one each of Sorcery and Chaos spell books (or 2x Sorcery) in addition to our full Life complement. However, we are unlikely to find Warlord short of hardcore save-scumming. Note that Warlord stacks with Crusade, causing ALL of our combat units to eventually reach Champion tier.

Chaos spell books are good for 11 Life Books because they can give us Flame Blade and Eldritch Weapon buffs, but Sorcery spell books are much better because they can give us Flight, Invisibility and Haste. Take for example:

Note that two of those three godly combat units are based on 6 Life Book Builds that also find other spell books in-game. Such builds are potentially more powerful than 11 Life Book Builds, but they are much harder to build and take much longer to build.

Ideally (for 11 Life Book Builds), one would find 2x Sorcery books after researching all Life spells. Check which spells you get with Apprentice. Then, try to farm other Sorcery spells.

Anyway, with the notable exception of Impossible Iron Man vs. Aggressive Expansionist Wizard rivals, I believe 11 Life Book Builds with Incarnation to be an infallible path to victory in Master of Magic.

Rival Containment

It depends on a number of variables, but it is possible to box-in rival Wizards such that they are unable to do very much, if anything at all. This would require that you physically surround their capitals with your combat units.

When Wizards are restricted to their capitals, their research is slow, their mana pools are shallow, their economies stagnate, and their armies are small. In short, they cannot expand or explore, let alone cause mischief.

That means you have all of Arcanus and Myrror to yourself (with the exception of the catchments that rival Wizards occupy).

In a four-Wizard game, I boxed in my three rivals by January of 1413. For the rest of the game, they were unable to do anything.

This meant I only had to deal with raiders and monsters. It also meant that I did not need to guard my nodes because raiders and monsters don't have node-taking units.

Tyranny of the Civ?

Just because your chosen Civ is High Men, doesn't mean you are confined to High Men. You can take over Neutral and Rival towns, thereby gaining the benefits of other Civs. For example, you can take over a Halfling settlement and benefit from their Food bonus and Slinger units. If the Neutral or Rival settlement does not have a good catchment (for farming in this case), you can nonetheless take it over, build Settlers and then establish the Civ in a grassland-heavy area, abandoning the inefficient settlement to raiders, monsters and Rivals. The new Halfling settlement is then set to efficiently produce food as farmers whereas the High Men settlement is set to build and manufacture as workers. In this manner, the Wizard gets lots of food and gold.

Don't build on inefficient and/or low-population catchments if you don't need to.

Next up: Iron Man Master of Magic.

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