====== Air ======

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**Air** is one of the eight Paths of [[magic]], and one of the Elemental paths.

It is one of the more versatile paths, focusing on mobility, ranged combat, powerful battlefield-wide buffs, and armor-negating lightning damage. It is particularly useful on thugs, who enjoy ??Cloud Trapeze?? to force advantageous combats and the personal buffs to win them. It is notable for having a number of ways to convert air gems into immediate power, such as mass use of ??Summon Air Elemental??, the mass use of ??Cloud Trapeze?? to deploy mages where needed, and powerful mid/late game army buffs like ??Fog Warriors??.

It is a difficult path to boost, since there are no boosters available before {{path>A4}}. Battlefield boosting is provided through ??Summon Storm Power??, which (at {{path>A1}}) allows any air mage to boost their level by one, but only functions in a ??Storm??.

Air is somewhat limited underwater, most-notably on the mobility and weather fronts, but it's not rendered completely useless (unlike [[Blood]]) and it's arguably less-restrained than [[Fire]].

==== Standout air spells ====


??Summon Air Elemental??, which drops high mobility tramplers in the enemy backfield, is an excellent battlefield summon.

Ways to enhance and impede mobility:
  * ??Cloud Trapeze?? is one of two common magic-phase ritual movement spells (along with ??Teleport??), with all the options this provides
  * ??Flight??, ??Gift of Flight??, and ??Mass Flight?? allow troops to fly; ??Storm?? shuts down (most) fliers.

A line of evocations that deal armor negating shock damage:
  * ??Lightning Bolt?? is excellent for sniping single targets
  * ??Thunder Strike?? is more difficult to cast but can deal substantial damage to groups of troops that don't resist shock
  * ??Wrathful Skies?? is a powerful battlefield wipe
  * ??Orb Lightning??, ??Chain Lightning??, and ??Shimmering Fields?? are less-used but are niche.

Self-buffs that are especially useful to help thugs survive combat:
  * ??Mistform?? is excellent against nonmagical damage
  * ??Mirror Image?? adds survivability in melee

Spells that enhance or suppress ranged combat:
  * ??Air Shield?? and its army-wide cousin ??Arrow Fend?? shut down archery hard
  * ??Mist?? and ??Storm?? reduce precision (and Storm eats arrows)
  * ??Aim?? and its army-wide cousin ??Wind Guide?? increase precision

Very powerful mid-lategame battlefield buffs:
  * ??Fog Warriors??, which can make an army almost immune to nonmagical damage
  * ??Mass Flight??, which can allow a superior melee army to force a victory quickly

Air also has some notable forging options. ??Owl Quills?? are a useful early research booster, ??Flying Boots?? are an excellent mobility option, ??Chainmail of Displacement?? is a solid item on defense-based thugs, and ??Dancing Trident?? can contribute to repels. ??Storm Staff?? has the niche role of allowing a battle to begin with ??Storm?? active, shutting down enemy fliers from the start.

Air's notable globals include ??Dark Skies??, a powerful defensive global when combined with fear effects, ??Gale Gate?? (the air gemgen), and ??Perpetual Storm??.


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