The Mage Class Starter Guide

Explore the Mage class in Dragon Age: The Veilguard. Learn about staves, orb and mageknife combat, mana management, and specializations like Evoker, Death Caller, and Spellblade.

In Dragon Age: The Veilguard, mages wield two distinct weapon sets: the traditional staff and the close-combat orb and mageknife. You can switch between them freely using the d-pad, but specializing in one is recommended for skill point allocation.

Staves

The staff functions similarly to its Dragon Age: Inquisition counterpart. Standard light attacks shoot elemental bolts, with the final hit in a combo firing multiple projectiles. Holding the attack button charges these light attacks for extra damage, but they don't combo. Light attacks also build staff charges and regenerate mana. These charges empower the heavy attack, a wave of energy that deals more damage with higher charges. You can also build charges by holding the attack button. While wielding a staff, you can block attacks by conjuring a barrier (hold attack buttons), which consumes mana. Unblockable attacks will still hit you. The Evoker specialization focuses on staff combat, offering passives that enhance heavy attacks and synergize with control and projectile skills.

Orb and Mageknife

This weapon set offers a hybrid fighter/mage playstyle, akin to the Arcane Warrior or Knight Enchanter from previous games. The orb recovers mana and builds Arcane Bomb stacks on enemies, while the mageknife deals damage and detonates these bombs. A typical combo involves three orb strikes to build a stack, followed by a mageknife detonation. You can interrupt combos to dodge, block, or use skills, detonating bombs when convenient. The orb is a mid-range weapon, and the mageknife is for close combat. Charging the mageknife performs an overhead chop that fires a blade beam, retaining its bomb-detonating ability. Further upgrades can allow you to throw the mageknife. Arcane Bombs can be powerful enough to rival skill usage. Downsides include the need to be closer to enemies and less inherent AoE compared to the staff, though upgrades and skills can mitigate this. Blocking with the orb and mageknife initiates a parry animation; a perfect parry can leave enemies vulnerable, but mistimed blocks result in taking damage.