Like most MMOs, since its release Wizard101 has added more to the game than new worlds, quests and level caps. The Bazaar, housing, crafting, mounts and gardening were also major additions to the game. One feature that can be considered more of an evolution than an addition, is pets.

When Wizard101 first went live, most pets (other than the school pets obtained at level 48) were vanity items. They didn’t make a difference in questing or PvP unless you happened to get an ultra-rare drop from a boss battle. The best example of this is the Fairy Queen dropped by Smogger; it comes with a a 480-point healing card that could be cast on yourself or a teammate.

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What’s that noise you hear? It’s the rattling at the “front gate,” i.e. the Wizard101 login screen. See, that gate has been locked for some account holders whose accounts have been banned due to in-game exploits. And that humming noise behind the rattling? It’s the dull roar of approval for Kings Isle from the players who have honored the terms of service and, as such, are still enjoying life ITS (player shorthand for “In The Spiral”).

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Sometimes, less is more. Case in point: the 140-character limit of Twitter forced Wizard101 player and “#twizard” MEGALUS to sum up the latest test realm content as follows: “so there isn’t really much to do just much to buy.”

He’s not far from the mark – and that’s not to say that the things to do aren’t fun and/or challenging, or that the things to buy aren’t very,  “Ooooh I has want!” The updates introduced in the Test Realm that opened today are largely about fixing glitches and/or glossing up player’s time in Celestia and Gardening.

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The title of this article is a bit misleading for, as I have found through extensive research on my Pyromancer, there is no way to perfect playing Fire school other than achieving this one pure goal: Have fun with it.

That being said, Pyromancers have a significant common point with Diviners: low base accuracy when casting spells. So while the high damage rates of all spells is empowering, if those spells fizzle consistently your Pyromancer will be executing the Spiral Head Roll more often than the coveted Victory Dance.

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Ah, Celestia. So many marvels in this new world of The Spiral. My absolute favorite thing about this expansion is that it finally allows students of the Life School, also called Theurgists, to realize and demonstrate their true and mighty powers.

I’m best known for shipping the Ice School (witness: my Wizard101 identity as “Icy Wiz”), but I also have a high-level Theurgist. Fiona WillowWhisper was my second Grand Master back when 50 was the level cap. Now, don’t tell Christina IceDreamer, but Fiona regularly dishes out more damage and one-shots than Christina ever has! My nickname for Fiona is “The Beast.”

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According to Wizard101, “Storm wizards are often impulsive, educated, creative, and independent. Famous Diviners are Benjamin Franklin, Lady Circe, and Galileo.” The school is in Ravenwood and the teacher is a frog named Halstron Balestrom. The school tree is named Torrence. He’s a bit of a drip!

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One of the most fun parts of creating a character on Wizard101 is choosing which school of magic your toon will use as they adventure throughout The Spiral. The Wizard 101 website has a quiz for players to take to guide them toward which school would suit their playing style and/or reflect their real life personality. Rest assured, you can pick whatever school you want to play no matter what the quiz results are!

Each school has pros and cons, and no one school is right for everyone (although The Friendly Necromancer might disagree with me.) One of the chief things to remember when weighing the pros and cons is that the school you pick will significantly affect the base amount of health (aka hit points) your toon will have before equipment boosts.

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One of the most fun parts of creating a character on Wizard101 is choosing which school of magic your toon will use as they adventure throughout The Spiral. The Wizard101 website has a quiz for players to take to guide them toward which school would suit their playing style and/or reflect their real life personality. Rest assured, you can pick whatever school you want to play no matter what the quiz results are!

Each school has pros and cons, and no one school is right for everyone (although those dastardly Death School students from Ravenwood Radio disagree with me.) One of the chief things to remember when weighing the pros and cons is that the school you pick will significantly affect the base amount of health (aka “hit points”) your toon will have before equipment boosts.

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Each Wizard101 account (that means F2P or member) allows for six characters. What does this mean to F2P (free-to-play) account holders? Every account holder can explore the free content through the eyes of each of the seven primary schools of magic at Ravenwood. How so, you may ask? There is no fee to delete a character and/or create a new one, at any time, over and over.*

Each of the seven primary schools of magic provides suprisingly different content. Each school has a different professor, classroom, benefits and drawbacks. Students are sent on unique quests to earn spells from their primary school that aren’t available through the use of training points, and therefore are exclusive to that school. There’s not much that can be said without spoiling game content, but I can say that students of the Life School visit Golem Tower for a different reason than students of the Ice School! Future columns will discuss each school in detail.

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One of the more common frustrations in F2P (free to play) models is the lack of bag/bank space available to players before visiting the cash shop or subscribing. Wizard 101 leads the pack in providing slots to store items and F2P players are afforded the same number of slots as subscribing members.

The magic number is 16,066.

That’s not a typo.

Now, to be clear, not all of these slots are available for all items. Let’s walk through the details and then sharpen our pencils to do the math.

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