Gladiator Guild Manager – Cryomancer Class Attributes Guide

A short guide on what the different attributes do for a cryomancer class and some key milestones and rough guidance.

Guide to Cryomancer Class Attributes

Note: Credit goes to mahrgell

Foreword

From now on, we will use some standard abbreviations to make everything more readable.

• Strength = STR
• Agility = AGI
• Intelligence = INT

Introduction

The Cryomancer is the first real support gladiator you will encounter, focussed on freezing/pushing back enemy gladiators. When starting with default settings you don’t start with the necessary building, but you can build it and Cryomancers can appear from day1 in the gladiator shop.

In other computer games, you would probably classify the Cryomancer as a disabler/debuffer. It’s main task is to freeze the enemies, and since he has a huge cooldown on this, he occasionally helps out by pushing an enemy away. Oh, and don’t expect any significant damage from your Cryomancer. This is someone elses job.

Similar to the Pyromancer, the Cryomancer lacks any defensive abilties, so you should be extra careful when facing the initial barrage of enemy fire.

Bonus Tip

Give the Cryomancer an extra look when you think about playing PermaDeath. It’s freeze/pushback allows some odd strategies based around only or almost only DPS ranged characters that can work surprisingly well in Permadeath, when you just want to kill anything before it even got the possibility to hit you.

Skills

Frost Bolt

An AoE Freeze on enemies, which leaves them helpless for quite a while, ready to be picked off by your guys. This skill is the reason why you may want a Cryomancer in your lineup.

Sadly it comes with a significant cooldown and most likely your later Frost Bolts won’t find clustered targets again. On the plus side you have an extremely quick cast time, which allows you to win a lot of “who shoots first” duels.

Be aware there are several items which interact with frozen enemies. This might be an additional consideration for your strategy.

• Damage: 10 + 1 INT.
• Freeze Duration: 3.5 + 0.01 * INT.
• AoE: 1.7 + 0.14 STR, caps at 3.5.
• Execution Time: 0.35 – 0.002 * AGI, caps at 0.15.
• Cooldown: 11 – 0.046 AGI, caps at 6.

Icicle Shot

A medium damage ranged attack with comparably low range (5.5) It’s main purpose is its pushback. As an interesting side note, the damage is flagged as “Direct damage”, which means it can’t be blocked by any skill. Then again, the damage is nothing to write home about but it’s nice to know it isn’t in vain. Originally the skill has quite a long cooldown, so you will see your Cryomancer idle a lot.

• Damage: 3.5 STR + 0.5 INT.
• Execution Time: 1 – 0.005 * AGI, caps at 0.5.
• Cooldown: 4 – 0.03 AGI, caps at 0.75.

Effects by Attribute

Strength

• 0.14 Frost Bolt AoE (caps at 13 STR, +106% improvement).
• 3.5 Icicle Shot damage.

Agility

• -0.002 Frost Bolt execution time (caps at 100 AGI, +133% improvement).
• -0.046 Frost Bolt cooldown (caps at 108 AGI, +83% improvement).
• -0.005 Icicle Shot execution time (caps at 100 AGI, +100% improvement).
• -0.03 Icicle Shot cooldown (caps at 156 AGI, +433% improvement).

Intelligence

• 1 Frost Bolt damage.
• 0.01 Frost Bolt freeze duration.
• 0.5 Icicle Shot damage.

Summary

• There are gladiators, where you wish you would get 10 or 15 points per level up, because there are so many critical stats you need sooner than later. And then there is the Cryomancer.
• Generally the Cryomancer should be the last character to get items and imho it isn’t worth leveling up its building, because you really don’t need those items nor the extra XP.
• You need 13 STR, because you want that AoE asap. And then?
• There is a minor decision here, which is centered around: Do you want one Frost Bolt, because this is your opener, and you don’t care about anything later. Or do you want multiple Frost Bolts for prolonged battles?
• What you gain per point of INT is really underwhelming, but if all your care is your first Frostbolt, then this is probably still the best you can choose.
• Due to the insanely long cooldown of Icicle Shot, it isn’t worth considering STR for the damage.
• So this leaves you with AGI and the second route of multiple Frost Bolts. AGI allows you to quicker cast your next Frost Bolt / Icicle Shot and scales quite well. The question is just how useful those further casts will be. With the AGI build you also can’t skip Stamina entirely, but since you have abundant points, this won’t be an issue.
• I personally chose the AGI build and was sufficiently satisfied, but this wasn’t a PermaDeath game, where I would most likely go for INT.
• In the end, this means you can easily stat comfortably into Health and hope your Cryomancer acts as an arrow magnet, protecting squishier back line targets.

TLDR

• Get 13 STR asap.
• You can put a good chunk in Health, as the value of your skill points is rather low now.
• Dump everything else into AGI if you want multiple casts or into INT if your main concern is your alpha strike.
• If you go for AGI, you may need some Stamina.
• Don’t level up the building or give the Cryomancer items unless everyone else in your party is fully kitted.