I love this game, the first character I played was the battle mage. Even when we started the RtL game, I drew him by chance.

And my opening skill was leadership, the look on my brother's (overlord's) face was priceless.

My friend love Jaes, but I think it's the concept more than his special ability that he likes. When we roleplay, he always wants to play the Fighter-Mage.

Honestly, I think he's one of the poorer heroes to choose from. So he can equip armor and runes, so what? If a "magic" user really wants to use armor, he can and just stick with Staffs. Since Jaes' starting traits are split between Melee and Magic, he's not as good as say Runewitch Andara, who has 3 traits in Magic. It's that split, a jack-of-all-trades, master-of-none. He will never be as good as someone who focuses on either Melee or Magic.

-shnar

Not to mention 4 conquest and only 12 health is still a disadvantage. You may have 4 armor and a rune, but unless you've also got tough I am going to make you my target. It both takes out your offensive capabilities (which are still limited with starting equipment given the 2 dice), and gets me a much easier 4 conquest than a Nanok or a Tahlia. Oh, and traps ignore that special armor you have, too.

I think Battlemage is a good character, but is certainly not elite like Carthos, Landrec, Nanok, Tahlia, Runewitch, Sihlouette, Ronan (imo), and a few others who just always make life sucky for the OL.

The one disagreement I would have with you is in regards to the staff/rune useage:

Yes, a mage could equip armor and use a staff instead of a rune; however, staves tend toward adding range (yellow die), whereas Runes, although greatly varied, do tend toward adding damage (green die). Ah, the number of times I've used a staff and ended up with 5 extra range...and 1 damage.

Daemnor said:

That's not true to any significant extent--at least not past shop level.

Average Dice Per Weapon, by Color:

Shop:
Staves: 1 yellow
Runes: 1/3 yellow, 2/3 green

Copper:
Staves: 1/3 yellow, 2/3 green
Runes: 1/2 yellow, 1/2 green

Silver:
Staves: 1 yellow, 1 green
Runes: 5/4 yellow, 3/4 green

Gold:
Staves: 1.5 yellow, 1.5 green (average includes the Star of Kellos, even though it doesn't have "staff" in the name)
Runes: 4/3 yellow, 5/3 green

Staves have more green dice and less yellow dice (on average) at half of the treasure levels (including shop). And even though they've got slightly fewer green dice at gold level, the staff with only 1 green die also has 2 free surges, which makes up the damage difference.

Now, admittedly, some runes have nice piercing, and others have AoE, and the ones with mostly yellow dice tend to inflict stun. But I think the biggest issue with wearing heavy armor is that staves are rare, not that they're weak.