Originally Posted by biglevo

I would ask if you're building for pvp or for maps but if you're making one for pvp you're already in trouble. It kinda depends on how you wanna play, but you should probably max the staples like flapper, antigravity, and enhanced magic missile, and get at least 1 lvl in everything else (except furnace don't even bother) because most of the skills have utility in maps. If you're feeling bold and want to clean up in tower you can max lava potion and acid cloud.
I wrote a skill guide on the wiki:

http://www.kikosho.com/qt/wiki/index.php/Scholar

There are a couple things I didn't know but that should at least give you an idea of what is what and how they work