Battle mage with tech

Tis I! Lukan the witless here, the one without wits! You all thought I was gone, but atlas I am not. The rumors of my dismay have been greatly exasperated!

It has been a long time since I've played Arcanum, and trying to get back into it again. I'm thinking of doing a Half-Ogre Battle Tech-Mage. I know an oxymoron in this game but I plan on using low level buff spells like shield of protection or strength of earth to help buff my damage or resistances. the question is what low level spells aren't affected by Magical/Technical Aptitude and give a flat bonus.

 

All of the attribute booster spells aren't affected (Strength of Earth, Agility of Fire, etc.). IIRC the resistances of Shield of Protection are effected and will eventually go to zero with tech high aptitude, but I think you always get some AC so there is some benefit. In terms of other colleges, most if not all of Temporal is unaffected (Tempus Fugit definitely isn't) and it offers all the juicy benefits it would do normally.

Welcome back! Style a while and enjoy our "hospitality".

 

Here's a question: are you able to CAST any of these spells with a high tech aptitude? So, is there really any point in a techno-mage? Apparently, if your TA's above 95%, you can't cast spells. Is there a table for failure %?

 

As mentioned, unless Drog has patched it in his latest patch (which I doubt), all the ones above work fine even at 100% TA (i.e. you can cast them every time without fail). Annoyingly, I don't think Conveyance works IIRC, which means you can't ping around the map like a mage.

Most of these seem to be spells you cast on yourself, so I would wager most self-cast spells will work with 100% TA but I haven't tested this.