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 4. Battlefield boosting is provided through Summon Storm Power, which (at 1) 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.

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.

Magic
Concepts	Blood Hunting • Communions • Empowerment • Gems • Items • Magic Sites • Research
Categories	Combat Magic • Ritual Magic • Notable Spells
Paths	Fire • Air • Water • Earth • Astral • Death • Nature • Blood • Holy
Schools	Conjuration • Alteration • Evocation • Construction • Enchantment • Thaumaturgy • Blood • Divine