I will preface this guide with the following disclaimer: Most of the tips I have here are from my own experience. However, some of it I have adopted from other guides and suggestions. Drue's guide is still the best comprehensive one as far as I have seen (can be found at EQ Stratics Advance Magician Guide). He has also played longer than I. I am only Level 18 and can not say if these techniques transfer well to higher levels. Also, I have included some notes that apply to grouping as well. Mostly in describing the use of spells. Some of the Magician spells are better suited to a group environment, and I make note of those.

As a Magician I have spent most of my advancement solo. This is mostly due to my limited contiguous play time. I usually can get in an hour or two straight with rare stints of 2+ hours.

If you are starting off now (as of 20 July 1999), pets are even better than when I started. They get Kick, Bash, and Spells. Makes them much more formidable in a fight, especially against other spell casting MOBS.

Also, I will make spell "buy" suggestions, but these are only my opinions. Also some of the available spells may have changed. Look to EQ Stratics for a good spell guide. There are many other sites out there too that may have more accurate information, or at least may fill in more info, but this site seems to have the best info over all. I also recommend that you subscribe to the EQMagicians@onelist.com forum (subscribe at One List). There are a bunch of experienced mages in this group that answer questions fairly quickly and *usually* with direct and accurate information from experience.

I will first give you my general play style guide that I am using to very good effect at level 18. This is for outdoor soloing. Dungeons are special, so refer to my Dungeon Guide below for that style.

Typically this is how a round goes:

1. Park Pet (/pet sit down, NOT /pet Guard Here)
2. Cast Fire Shield on it.
3. Find suitable target.
4. Burn with Shock of Blades or other quick cast spell
5. Run back to pet.
6. Sick pet on target if it has not hit me
7. Burn 2 more times
8. Meditate (BLUES ONLY)
9. [Burn again if pet is below 50%]

Now this is where things are interesting. If the pet is blue and my pet is blue or better, I will sit and meditate at this time. Yes that is right. I have the MOB targeted and I keep a running tab on my pet with /pet report health. If it drops below 50% and the MOB is not near death, I will stand up and burn it once more, or twice if it is stubborn or resisted my spell slightly. I try to stay just in the /pet report range but far enough from the mob that it is not tempted to attack me. Some MOBS are DETERMINED to get me and my pet has to keep taunting it back. Sometimes the MOB will make it and strike me. That also is a good time to just plaster it. I have found that this really reduces my down time with blues by about 50%. I use the water pet without Burnout and it usually is healed up just as I have meditated up to full mana. I find if I reduce the burn I can let my pet soak all the damage and finish it off, and be back out searching for another real quick.

HOWEVER, if the MOB is a very tough blue, or a white or yellow, I stay and burn, heavily and even tank for my pet after the second burn. Even if you take some damage, you tanking for the pet a bit keeps it alive long enough to finish off the MOB. ESPECIALLY if it is a Yellow or Low Red.

Keep in mind these are for certain White / Yellow and SOME Reds. I have noticed that some MOBS are tougher than others at the same "level". Some I will have to burn more and tank more while there are others my pet can finish off themselves. As a mater of fact, my water pet at my level has finished off a low blue and one green mob, completely solo, while I was running for my life with another blue on my tail. I did eventually finish off the one blue on me, but was near death and was being attacked by a stray green MOB I was near so had to zone. When I got back to the scene of the battle I had discovered my pet had finished off both the mobs without me and the corpses were waiting (even though I had killed my poor pet by zoning).. Pretty satisfying. Talk about an effective, mana efficient DOT spell!!! If you look at pets that way, we Magicians have by far the best DOT spells around.

Another tip. YOUR PETS ARE EXPENDABLE!!!. I have learned this the hard way. If there is the slightest doubt of survival. Don't think, RUN for the zone, if guards are not handy. I have died way too many times trying to "save my pet" don't bother. It ain't worth the experience loss. They are CHEAP in comparison. We have a great advantage in that if the scene looks grim, we have a sacrificial tank. USE IT.

When soloing Fire Shield is your friend. That is why I avoid Fire Elementals as my pet, I can turn my Water, Earth or Air into a much better Fire Elemental with Fire Shield. The fire shield lasts for about 3 minutes at my level. Enough for one and possibly two fights. If you use it on yourself, you are wasting mana, because it does not last and you should not be tanking that much anyway. Fire shield is also great if you are grouped with one PC tank. Fire Shield the PC tank, because chances are the MOB will ignore your pet in favor of the PC tank.

This is the time when you are petless and have to burn everything. Your melee skills are lame and you end up running for your life as much as you do killing anything. The fortunate thing is that you will advance pretty quick. Attack whites only when you are level 1. From level 2 you need to seriously consider any target you attack. Even some blues will give you troubles, and without meditate, you have a slow mana recovery. But stick with it, level 4 is when you really begin to shine. If you can get in a group that is great, but you will advance much quicker on your own. I found that getting my Magician to level 4 was about twice as fast as getting my Ranger character to level 4. I think they do this on purpose, since as a caster, not having meditate or a pet, you are really weak. I did not even use many of my training points during this time. Just a few to give me a boost in my piercing skill so I was not completely lame at level 1. Save them for later levels (16+) with research. Pick a race that has pretty good intelligence. I picked a High Elf for a good balance, plus the Infra vision. Erudinites have the best native intelligence. But in the long run, it all boils down to personal preference and what you want to role play as. Any minor differences between races will be compensated for in some way. Also save all your pennies. You will need them for your Rank 2 spells. Buy only what you need for level 1.

Here is a list of level 1 - 4 spells, and some attributes. I pulled this info straight from the http://eq.stratics.com site, however I have ranked them with my buy order (top to bottom).

Note: "CT" indicates a spell's base casting time, in seconds

Spell	Who	Description	Skill	CT	Mana
Burst of Flame	Target:	1-6 HP Direct Damage	Evo.	1	7
Minor Shielding	Self:	+AC & Max HP	Abj.	2	10
Summon Dagger	Self:	Summons a Normal dagger (damage 3, delay 21, dissappears on logout)	Con.	2	10
Summon Drink	Self:	Summons a Normal drink (dissappears on logout)	Con	2	10
Summon Drink	Self:	Summons Normal food (dissappears on logout)	Con	2	10
Reclaim Energy	Target:	Unsummon pet for mana	Con	1	5
Flare	Effect:	Shoots a flare in the direction you are facing	Evo.	2	3
Sense Majic	Target:	Sense magic on item you are holding (only works if you are self targeted)	Div.	2	5

Spell Notes:
I believe (can't remember, it was so long ago) you start with your Burst of Flame and Minor Shielding spells. Regardless, they are the most important in my mind to have first.

So far I have found sense magic to be virtually useless. Same is true for the Identify spell. All items have all the information about them visible. I have never heard of the condition where items that are magic don't already tell you. The only thing it does is enable you to practice your Divination skill, which helps when you get your Cast Invisible spell but has no utility value. Perhaps Verant plans on "hiding" object's abilities later on.

Whoo Hoo! You can meditate AND you get pets. Choose your pet wisely based upon your style of play. There are tons of general guides on what the stats of each pet are, so I won't really go into that part. I will provide suggestions based upon MY personal experience and style of play (mostly solo): See my General Pet guide below.

My suggestion for soloing would be either Earth or Water.

At this point you also need to start looking out for buying your cloth armor. Fill up those slots as fast as you can. Kill Orcs or skeletons that carry cloth armor. Beg borrow or buy it. It does make a difference. Eventually you will graduate to more expensive robes and Woven or Netted Magic armor (that still looks like cloth, but is better). But for now you want every last bit of AC you can get. It is cheap, so buy it when you can.. Kill green mobs for cash if necessary.

Spell Suggestions: (Pets are ranked separately, your pet spell is always first in the buy order :P ). It usually is more cost effective to pick the type of pet you will use the most and buy that one and stick to it. Early on, money is tight and even later on you usually don't want to expend a bunch of cash on a pet that you use rarely. It really becomes moot after 16 anyway, because you have to research all of your pets except for one. I will deviate from the one available only when it does not suit me (like when the Fire Elemental is the only one you can buy, I will go to the ends of the earth to research Earth or Water).

Spell	Who	Description	Skill	CT	Mana
Elementalkin Water	Self:	Summons Pet (Needs Malachite)	Con.	4	40
Elementalkin Earth	Self:	Summons Pet (Needs Malachite)	Con.	4	40
Elementalkin Air	Self:	Summons Pet (Needs Malachite)	Con.	4	40
Elementalkin Fire	Self:	Summons Pet (Needs Malachite)	Con.	4	40
*Pick one pet spell and buy the others if you want later
Burn	Target:	2-12 HP Direct Damage	Evo.	1	15
Gate	Self:	Teleport to home point	Alt.	5	70
Summon Bandages	Self:	Summons level / 2 number of bandages (round down)	Con	3	15
Summon Wisp	Self:	Summons Light (Fixed) (must be in main inventory slot, dissapears on logout)	Con	3	30
Fire Flux	Self:	AE 2-12 HP Radius Damage	Evo.	2	23
Sense Summoned	Self:	Point toward nearest summoned creature	Div.	3	5

Spell Notes:
Gate. Well you will wonder what you ever did with out this. Especially when you hit 12 and get Bind Affinity. I use it to teleport away from a bad scene if it looks like my pet won't make it and I am really near death, or to save time when in zone. It is an instant teleport when you are in the zone you are bound too. Like from the entrance to Crushbone to the entrance to Felwith in a second. :)

Summon Bandages: Now this is very useful. Get this one as early as you can afford it (after your primary spells). Practice bind wound often. Bandage other players that have gotten below 50% health (works only to 50% health if you did not already know that), even if you are not in a group. Magicians are the only class that Bind Wound is even an option for. Bandages are just too expensive to buy and practice. I wish I had started practicing with bind wound much sooner. I am currently at only 59 at level 18 and could have been in the high 60's. It really is helpful when you get near death, and you want to get up to a point where you move faster than a crawl fast and there aren't any healers around. Currently I can heal from 9 hp to 155+ with 6 to 7 bandages in a very short time (when my current max HP was at 319, too new to 18 and have not had to try it yet!). That means I am doing about 22-25 hp per bandage. It should be in the 30 to 40 hp or higher range when I am in the high 90's (I am speculating here). Pretty good use of stored mana, if you ask me. This is also good when you are in a group and you want to conserve the Healer's mana. Heal up the tank to 50% and let the Cleric / Ranger / Druid etc bring them to 90%. (A grouping side note , good healers know that they don't need to "top off" a tank, and should just get them up to a safe level that they can heal on their own, while the healer meditates. This increases the groups effectiveness and minimizes their down time).

Summon Wisp is ok if you don't have Infra Vision or Ultra Vision. It is like a permanent torch and will hold you until you get your "glowing" weapon spells. The Staff of Tracing and Staff of Warding weapons cast light and remove the need for the Wisp Light source, unless you choose to use your Dagger or Fang or other non glowing or piercing weapons. I actually have a Magic Torch that is AC 3, +7 Charisma that I carry around I got off a named MOB in Lavastorm. Others carry the Skull of Jhen'Tra (sp?) which gives good stats, an you may want the wisp then too.

Fire Flux I found to be of limited use. If I remember correctly it is a PBAE (Point Blank Area Effect), centered on YOU not your target. Which means that the only MOBS affected are those that are attacking you directly.. Not great since you may not even get a shot off because two mobs are hitting you, not to mention the chance of fizzles. The Rain of xxxx spells are Target centered AE spells, that make much better sense for a mage. I used my Fire Flux spell maybe twice.

Sense Summoned. Hmmm, another in the set of useless mage spells. It basically points you in the direction of the NEAREST summoned creature, be it yours, another mage's or a summoned MOB. Not very useful. Another one that clutters up my spell book that I used once or twice before I found out how useless it was.

Well nothing really new here, just better spells! This is the level that you start to get the really useful spells that will be useful for a long time.

Spell	Who	Description	Skill	CT	Mana
Elementaling Water	Self:	Summons Pet (Needs Malachite)	Con.	5	80
Elementaling Earth	Self:	Summons Pet (Needs Malachite)	Con.	5	80
Elementaling Air	Self:	Summons Pet (Needs Malachite)	Con.	5	80
Elementaling Fire	Self:	Summons Pet (Needs Malachite)	Con.	5	80
*Pick one pet spell and buy the others if you want later
Shock of Blades	Target:	23 + 1/level HP Direct Damage	Con.	2	30
Lesser Shielding	Self:	+AC & Max HP & MR	Abj.	3	25
Invisibility	Target:	Turn Target Invisible	Div.	3	30
Shield of Fire	Target:	5-8 HP Damage Shield	Abj.	4	40
Dimensional Pocket	Self:	Summon 4 Slot Bag	Con.	4	40
Flame Bolt	Target:	Direct Damage Bolt	Evo.	2	40
Eye of Zomm	Self:	Moveable see through eye	Con.	3	30

Shock of Blades will be your primary burn for a long time. Even at my level (since I have spent most of my time in Lavastorm, it is my main "attention getter"). It is rarely resisted, and if it is, it still does damage. The "blade" spells are by far the most versatile DD spells in the Magician's bag of tricks, as they are much harder to resist (conjuration spells not evocation).

Invisibility is a god send for exploration. It is a requirement for me to get to Lavastorm (I am a High Elf, and Lavastorm is on the north side of the Nektlos Forest, where the Guards will KOS me) I have used this to explore most of Norrath. I have been to almost every zone, and the majority of dungeons with this one. Most of level 17 was spent exploring Antontica. I did not visit every zone, but I would say that I covered about 89% of them. The dungeons I visited were: Permafrost Dungeon, Blackburrow (couldn't avoid that when getting to Everfrost Peaks and Permafrost :), Infected Paw, Upper Guk, Soluseks Eye (A and B), Nagena, Beholder's Maze, Befallen. I also visited Crush Bone (level 8), Dagnor's Cauldron and Unrest (level 11). So you can see that Invisible is really useful for exploration.

Shield of fire is a must. Especially solo. I refer to it in other sections of this guide, so won't go into it much here.

Dimensional Pocket. This summons a 4 slot bag that disappears when you log out. It has a very cool property though. Anything placed in this bag becomes effectively weightless. Great when you get chunks, or blocks of ore, or heavy weapons or armor. Just be careful. Don't expect anything to be in your inventory that was in the pocket if you go link dead or log out. But it is great if you are encumbered and want to move out and sell the stuff. Stuff that normally would be left can now go with you. I usually put my summoned food and bandages in here, so no loss there. If I need to reduce weight, I plop just enough in there to un-encumber myself. This spell is hard to find. As far as I know it is only in Erudin, Ak'Anon and Neriak. But they, without notice, change spell locations for uncommon and rare items, so this may not be true TODAY. I had a dark elf buy me mine from Neriak.

Flame Bolt. Well, hmm. Never used it. I really don't care for the bolt spells. I may later on. I accidentally bough my Level 20-23 Bolt of Flame spell. One of those I *thought* I clicked the right spell when I bought it. Anyway, They are line of sight and can miss. They also consume lots of mana to throw away if you miss. However, they are great when they DO hit, or so I hear.
Update: One fellow Mage, that read this guide mentioned that this is really good long distance "fetching spell". If the terrain permitts, you can hit a target from a long way off and cast another dd spell as it is running towards you. Now that really seems cool. I can't wait to try this tactic in the karanas somewhere! :P

Eye of Zomm is really fun to use. You can explore areas that you normally would have to do invisible, or can't go (like past zone boundaries. heh heh). You can also cast "through" the eye, but unless they fixed this recently, you can only cast against things that are within range of your real body, so is limited in this capacity.. However if you are in range, but around a corner, this is good. The disadvantage is that you CANNOT cast this spell while you have a pet. It did not used to be this way, but recently (about a month and a 1/2 ago) they introduced this. Really reduced the effectiveness of this spell to near zero. Humph.

Spell	Who	Description	Skill	CT	Mana
Elemental Water	Self:	Summons Pet (lapis lazuli)	Con.	6	120
Elemental Earth	Self:	Summons Pet (lapis lazuli)	Con.	6	120
Elemental Air	Self:	Summons Pet (lapis lazuli)	Con.	6	120
Elemental Fire	Self:	Summons Pet (lapis lazuli)	Con.	6	120
*Pick one pet spell and buy the others if you want later
Bind Affinity	Target:	Set home point location (target must be in your group)	Alt.	6	100
Summon Fang	Self:	Summon Weapon (damage 5/delay 26) (disappears at logout, was Summon Blade)	Con.	4	40
Burnout	Pet:	Inc Pet's HP, AC, & STR (Lowers HP regen)	Alt.	2	30
Cancel Magic	Target:	Remove magic effect	Abj.	2	30
Ward Summoned	Target:	30-42 HP Damage (Summoned Creatures Only)	Evo.	3	30
Rain of Blades	Target:	20-26 HP AE Radius Damage	Evo.	4	62
Column of Fire	Target:	AE Radius Damage	Evo.	3	65

Bind Affinity. Do I really need to detail this? :)

Summon Fang. This is hard to find. You need to go to Ak'Anon or Erudin for this weapon spell. It may be in Neriak, but I don't know. I got mine in Erudin. Ask about, because, as I have said earlier, Verant moves spells or entire vendors without notice.

Cancel Magic is great when you get some nasty caster casting spells on YOU. You can remove the affect from you or a fellow group member. Also good for removing the burnout spell from your pet (burnout is a permanent spell on your pet until it dies or you remove it). Another great trick is one I adopted in Lavastorm. I am fighting a Fire Elemental, so what I do to get it's attention (instead of a burn spell) is cast Cancel Magic to remove it's fire shield, then sick my pet which has fire shield already cast upon it. I have just turned the tables on the fire elemental. My pet hits it, does not get burned, fire elemental hits my pet and gets burned! Great fun.

Ward Summoned will only work against summoned creatures (elementals, lava crawlers, Fire Imps etc). I have only seen Earth elementals in the open in Steamfont. Fire Elementals, Lava Crawlers and Fire Imps are in Lavastorm. It is a great one for these guys. However the Expulse summoned that the Druids get at level 14 is even better. Does 90+ damage. We get that only at level 20.

Rain of Blades I prefer over the Column of Fire. The effect is supposed to be 2 or three rounds of 20-26 damage. I have only ever seen one round. It is better than the Flux range of spells as it is an AE with the target as the center, so if your and your pet are getting hammered, stand on top of your pet and cast this one on your target... Again any of the AE spells are not really useful except when grouping and your tank is being attacked by multiple targets. Your pet can't "peg" multiple targets like PC tanks can, so is pretty useless to Magicians.

Column of Fire. See Rain of Blades. Never have used it much... Waste of money for me.

Spell	Who	Description	Skill	CT	Mana
Minor Summoning Water	Self:	Summons Pet (lapis lazuli)	Con.	6	160
Minor Summoning Earth	Self:	Summons Pet (lapis lazuli)	Con.	6	160
Minor Summoning Air	Self:	Summons Pet (lapis lazuli)	Con.	6	160
Minor Summoning Fire	Self:	Summons Pet (lapis lazuli)	Con.	6	160
*Pick one pet spell and buy the others if you want later
Shielding	Self:	+AC, + Max HP, & +MR	Abj.	4	50
Shock of Flame	Target:	75 + 1/level HP Direct Damage	Evo.	3	70
See Invisible	Self:	See Invisible creatures	Div.	3	25
Phantom Leather	Self:	Add to AC stackable with shield (Needs Cat's Eye Agate)	Abj.	4	60
Summon Heatstone	Self:	Summon Infra Vision Stone	Con.	5	40
Summon Throwing Dagger	Self:	Summon Range Weapon (20) (disappears on logout)	Con.	4	20
Identify	Target:	Identify Object	Div.	4	50

Shielding . Finally, your next level of Shielding! Makes a huge difference.

Shock of Flame , At level 17 this spell was doing 92 Points of damage. Have not tried it again at 18, as I am in Lavastorm and most creatures resist it anyway. Great burn spell. Nice to be able to hit for some serious hp damage. Also a fairly reasonable cast time. Not as good as Shock of blades, but it does almost 3 times the damage, if it is not resisted at all.

See Invisible . This is of limited (but in its limitation is great) use. You have no indication of which objects would normally be "invisible" when you use this, because they just are visible. So far in my travels I have never been attacked by something that was "invisible". I have been attacked by things while I was in a building and it was outside. Very strange when you can't attack it directly but it can see and hit you. Humph. This spell is *great* when you are in a group that is traveling invisible. No more running "blind" with your group. So I do recommend you pick this one up, because when you do need it, it is invaluable.
Update: Madwand has informed me that Shamans in Blackburrow *do* cast invisible on some Gnolls and they hit you while invisible. I will have to visit there and check this out. I want to see if they stay invisible, or it is mandatory that you have this spell to attack them. :)

Phantom Leather . I personally did not buy this spell yet. I figured it is pretty expensive to cast when you should not be tanking that much anyway. I suppose I will eventually get it and see how it works out, but my initial thought was that it would be a waste of money (requires Cat's Eye Agate each cast) and mana. I do well to stay out of the melee when soloing, so extra HP is not THAT much of a deal. I have some extra money now from Lavastorm (have you gotten the impression that is a great place yet??) I may try it out.
Update: I was thinking about this, and it may be that this is unlike the shielding spells in that it probably stays around as long as you are logged in? I need to confirm this, but that would make it more worth while, in my mind.

Summon Heatstone. Useless for me. I have Infra Vision already, but if you want to be nice to the blinder races, you can summon these for them. Coldstone will be the one *I* get (Ultra Vision).

Summon Throwing Dagger. Well I got this one for the novelty of it. Cool to have a "plinking" weapon. Does not do much damage, but you can "pull" with it or be a tiny bit helpful if in a group and are OOM but do not want to Melee the MOB. Good for other players that like throwing daggers. Also I have heard of people that use it to "twink" their faction. Walk up to a group that is attacking a MOB that would give you a desired faction hit, and toss a dagger at it. When the MOB dies, you share the faction hit. Just be careful the group is able to finish it off, or else that same mob will be after YOU. (_8(|) DOH!

Earth: I was exclusive with earth until I reached 16 when water was my only immediate choice. It was at that point that I was converted. Earth pets are Tough and Strong. They have the best strength and probably the most HP. They need it though. Their Agility really sucks, which means they get hit. A lot. They also have poor regeneration speed. I figure theirs is the worst. But they make great tanks. They take a bunch of beatings and are great taunters. When you hit 8 and get fire shield they really become amazing tanks.

Water: Probably the best middle of the road pet. They are tough, reasonable strength and awesome regen speed. They are more agile than earth, but not by much. They still get hit a lot. The second side benefit of water is their near immunity to poison and disease. I believe they are more dexterous, but I am not really certain on this. My experience is that they hit as often if not more often than Earth. The real selling point of Water though, is it's fast regeneration speed. It actually can recover during a fight. I can't tell you how many times I have done "/pet report health" at the end of a battle and gotten back 90+ or 100. Pretty awesome. Especially when you get burnout (Level 12, I believe). Burnout makes them hit harder, at the expense of regeneration speed, so you get a strong pet that regens at about the same rate as earth for a while. I have noticed however, that after a battle, if your pet sits long enough it regains it's original regeneration rate. So if it was down to 10%, by the time it is up to 40% it starts healing at it's original rate. Pretty cool.

My thoughts on Air and Fire: I tried both, and determined that Fire and Air were too weak for effective solo. Even though fire has a damage shield, I did not find that to be much difference, even at lower levels. Their agility, while better than earth does not compensate for their over all low hit points. Fire shield is great if two MOBS are attacking your pet, but it does not really stay alive long enough to do much damage. Even more so now that all the pets get offensive DD spells. Air's agility is the highest, but its HP and AC the lowest, so while they don't get hit as often, when they get hit, it does a significant amount of damage, percentage wise. I will say Air is IDEAL for dungeons and groups (see my dungeon guide below). Basically I feel these guys are not suited for Solo play. They are more useful in group situations, or for operations in dungeons.

First off, I will say that I have not played in dungeon areas much. For two reasons:
1) MOB trains
2) Pet related woes.

When I get to the higher levels where I will spend more time in dungeons, I will buy or research Air, just for those areas. Air casts invisible on itself, so when it is not fighting, it does not attract stray MOBS. Most groups in dungeons don't like Mages because their pets wander off and drag in nasties when the group is healing. Air reduces this.

Another tip to making you a friendly Mage in dungeons is PARK YOUR PET. We now have a great means of parking your pet, so that it does not chase after any mob that comes near. "/pet sit down". Learn it. Use it. Love it. That command is a staple for me. It has two benefits, one it keeps your pet out of trouble, and two, it enables it to heal faster. Don't worry, if you are in trouble and you get near your pet, it will come running. However (as my experience has shown me in LavaStorm), you have to be in "hailing' distance of the pet (which is a radius from the pet of about 10 meters). There is nothing more frustrating than being stunned by a lava bask, who is munching on you and your pet sits there watching, until you get close. The only good thing is that, (assuming you have full health) you can survive enough to get to your pet. You also have a (for my char at least) a 2 out of 3 chance of resisting the Stone Breath spell the Lava Bask casts, especially when you get to the point that all basks are blue to you. I digress.

Your best bet in a dungeon is to stay as close to a zone as possible. If not you should join a group (I know this is a SOLO guide, but dungeons are really built for GROUPS). However, if your are DETERMINED to solo in dungeons, try following these tips.

1) I reiterate the Park Your Pet directive. Go fishing for your target and bring it back to your pet, if the dungeon layout supports this means of hunting. Many don't, so you just park it when you are medding and letting your pet heal up.

2) Try to get SOW from someone without making a pain of yourself. Offer money or trade for some summoned magic weapon or something. Remember all your summoned weapons will hit MOBS that require magic weapons! That little boost of speed may save you when you start the inevitable train.

3) find an area in the dungeon that is low traffic and has no MOBS about that will attack you (some dungeons, especially at higher levels, have green mobs that will ignore you).

4) KNOW THE DUNGEON LAYOUT. This may seem like common sense, but trust me, when you are being chased, you will quickly get confused if you are new to the dungeon. Nothing is worse than getting stunned, doing the slow spin while you are waiting to get un-stunned, and shooting off in the wrong direction, falling in a pit (like in Black Burrow) or running into a bunch more nasties.

Hunting dungeons is much tricker than hunting in the open. I usually tour the dungeon invisible (If you are below Level 8 when you get the invisible spell, you probably should not really be there, or exploring deep.). Crush Bone, or the open area of Black Burrow may be the exceptions in this case. They have "open" areas that are more forgiving to the explorer, Crush Bone more so than Black Burrow. You can find out what level all the MOBS are, and where they hang out long before you start "hunting".

5) Stay alert, always. You never know when someone will tromp through your little area with 10 Orcs on their tail when they forgot directive number 4.

6) Let your pet take as much damage as you can. You never know when you will need that little bit extra health or mana to escape the dungeon. Try keeping your health and mana up as much as possible. While this is true while in the open, in dungeons it is CUBED.

7) If your pet starts chasing after a runner (a MOB who after getting damaged beyond a certain point starts running), burn it (the MOB) QUICK! Runners in a dungeon are BAD NEWS. They will bring back others or your pet will after it kills the runner. If you are low on mana, you may consider dispelling your pet and fighting it yourself or just running towards the zone and hang out near there until you see the faction / experience gain notice. It all depends on the area and your health etc. This usually happens when you are fighting some MOB and a green MOB decides to join the fray and your pet starts beating it down until it runs.

That is all I really have to offer for soloing in dungeons. It really is different and you will have to find your own style that works well here.