Ultima VI: The False Prophet/Magic

There are 80 spells in Ultima 6, divided into 8 circles.

Reagents prices
The table shows the price of the reagents in Gold Pieces per every magic shop.

Best deals are highlighted in green; easy-to-access locations are highlighted too.

Spell list

 * C = circle, level, and MP
 * R = reagents cost
 * G = gold pieces price to learn spell

For the reagents costs, the most convenient values have been used. See the table above.

Healing spells

 * L1 Create food (food allows to recover health points when camping for the night)
 * L1 Heal
 * L1 Dispel magic (removes status ailments)
 * L4 Great heal
 * L4 Mass dispel
 * L8 Resurrect

Field spells
These spells can be used when the Companions are not involved in a battle. Many of these can also be used in battle.

 Travel:
 * L1 Help (teleports to Britain Castle, but drops Experience)
 * L4 Wind change
 * L7 Gate travel

 Orientation:
 * L1 Light
 * L3 Great light
 * L3 Peer
 * L4 Locate
 * L5 X-ray
 * L7 Wizard eye

Companions:
 * L3 Protection (prevents damage from traps, reduces combat damage)
 * L6 Mass protect (prevents damage from traps, reduces combat damage)

Items:
 * L1 Detect trap
 * L1 Douse
 * L1 Ignite
 * L2 Unlock magic
 * L2 Vanish
 * L2 Reappear
 * L2 Telekinesis
 * L2 Untrap
 * L3 Dispel field
 * L5 Seance (speak with dead characters; useful before learning L8 Resurrect)
 * L5 Pickpocket
 * L5 Reveal (reveals hidden traps and/or removes invisibility from enemies)
 * L6 Replicate (makes a copy of a non-magic and non-numbered item)
 * L8 Armageddon (kills every character, enemy and animal in the video game except for the Avatar and Lord British; useful for safe exploration, but DO NOT save after casting it, or you cannot complete the video game)

Magic items:
 * L1 Detect magic (determines whether an item is magic or not)
 * L4 Animate
 * L7 Enchant (enables staves to cast spells)

The lv.6 spell Replicate affects "normal" items, but it will always fail if cast on magic items (e.g. a lightning wand) or numbered items (e.g. golc coins, arrows). In order to replicate a magic item, you should use the combo L4-Animate + L6-Clone. Be careful, because an animated magic weapon will attack the Companions!

The lv.7 spell Enchant can only be used on a yew staff. It will enchant the staff with a second spell chosen by the caster. A staff can be enchanted with up to ten spells at a time. When using the staff, it will cast the spells in the same order as they were cast on the staff. This has many useful applications: (1) it allows to cast lv.8 spells when still at lv.7; (2) it allows characters without MP to use spells; (3) it allows the Avatar to cast spells when he is out of MP. In later Ultima games, this spell is completely different: it will become a lv.2 spell that simply upgrades arrows and bolts only.

Completion spells:
 * L2 Trap
 * L3 Magic lock
 * These two spells have no real use for the player. They exist because the player will find trapped chests and magically locked doors throughout the game. If such obstacles exist, the spells that create them must exist as well: this is the only reason for these spells.

Support spells
Support spells are battle spells that target the Companions or summon more allies:
 * L2 Infravision
 * L3 Mass awaken
 * L5 Invisibility
 * L6 Charm (cures charmed ally, or inflicts "charm" status, i.e. control an enemy)
 * L7 Mass invisibility
 * L8 Eclipse (allows the party to flee)

Summon spells:
 * L4 Conjure (summons an animal)
 * L5 Insect swarm
 * L5 Energy field
 * L6 Clone (creates a copy of an ally)
 * L8 Summon (summons a demon)

Disabling spells
Disabling spells are battle spells that target the enemies without dealing damage:
 * L3 Curse (reduces defense of enemy)
 * L3 Repel undead (undead enemies will flee)
 * L6 Negate magic (neither enemies nor companions can use magic for a while)
 * L7 Fear (enemies will flee)
 * L7 Mass curse (reduces defense of enemies)
 * L8 Mass charm (affected enemies will attack each other)
 * L8 Slime (turns enemy into slime)

Paralysis spells:
 * L2 Sleep
 * L3 Mass sleep
 * L4 Sleep field
 * Asleep enemies can wake up when attacked.
 * L5 Paralyze
 * L6 Web
 * L6 Confuse (enemies will stop fighting, and behave as if the Companions were not around)
 * L8 Time stop

Attack spells
Attack spells are battle spells that deal damage to enemies, but they are generally less effective than ranged weapons.

Notes:
 * Poison gradually lowers the target HP; the spellcaster will gain no experience if the enemy dies by poison damage.
 * Magic fields: enemies will not step on a magic field; either create a field on an enemy, or create a barrier to prevent melee combat; the spellcaster will gain no experience if the enemy dies by field damage.
 * Wind cones and 5x5 area spells will damage any ally in the targeted area.
 * Instant-defeat spells are the only spells effective against enemies resistant to magic (e.g. dragons).

The effects of attack spells are rather similar, and they can be better summarized in a table, as follows:

SNES cut
30 spells (out of 80) were removed from the SNES version. The main reason for this is that such spells were harder to implement and the SNES cartridge has limited memory.


 * Animate, Conjure, Insect swarm, Clone, Summon: the SNES artificial intelligence was limited, and could not handle more characters in battle.
 * Vanish & Reappear: required extra memory for all the vanished items.
 * Fire field, Poison field, Sleep Field, Energy field: all these required extra sprites.
 * Wind change: no wind in the SNES port.
 * Enchant: very difficult to implement.
 * Infravision, Ignite & Douse: torches and light spells are sufficient.
 * Confuse, Web: 3 other paralysis spells are sufficient.
 * Trap, Magic lock: these spells were already almost useless in the original version.
 * Further spells that were removed, for similar reasons: Detect trap, Detect magic, Telekinesis, Pickpocket, Seance, Replicate, Wizard eye, Eclipse, Slime, Armageddon.