Wizardry The Wizardry Series Thread

[PorkBarrellGuy]

Myles: mercenary, thief, gentleman.

 

[TigerKnee]

Don't want to multi-quote properly.

VIT/PIE for Gadgeteers (and Bards for that matter) don't make a difference in the long run - if you need more Stamina in combat, you down a pot or get a Stam restoring spell cast on you. The +Stam regen items doesn't really make a difference in-battle either, it's just for Quality of Life out of combat.

Monks should be either Human or Hobbit depending on whether you want to actually using their spellcasting. Dwarf is a meme IMO and doesn't even pay off as well as Fairy Ninja. Martial Arts is actually really good in the early game with an actual fitting race so you can pump up the standard Str/Dex.

Don't underestimate Slings and Throwing - raising it early game means someone can toss all those Cherry Bombs and other items around and the higher end stones honestly aren't a slouch. It ended up surprising me in my 6 Fairy martial class run.

 

[coldcrow]

Finally... Unlikely that I will continue with this party. It takes too long to achieve the goal of an "immune party", and the damage on enemies is too low (at least with martial arts) and therefore unsatisfying. And that thing with Stealth was so essential, that it should be taken into account very thoroughly when building a new party... Back to the manual.

Dwarven and monk damage resistance = (vit/10)%. You do not need vitality on every party member, but Iron Will maxed on everyone is just bonkers. Everyone who had a piety party knows what I speak of.
So a party where piety is useful, besides being a requirement for Iron Will and fulfilling your theme of a tank-party. I have to add I usually play with Random_Passerby's mod, which adds items, so some weapon classes get a bit more love.
Dwarf Fighter (Sword-Shield)
Dwarf Fighter (Axe-Shield)
Dwarf Valk
Dwarf Priest-Lord at lvl2 specialized in staff (staff of doom)
Rawulf Gadgeteer
Elf Bishop (3 school)

Getting Iron Will for everyone sacrifices power though. You want to max pie/str first for the first 4, then dex/spd. You won't get many attacks for most of the game, but it's bearable. Once your hybrids develop their priest spells your dudes won't die. There you have your 6-wheeled, slow-moving tank.

PS: You can choose to raise Vit instead of str for the 2 frontliners, but that will seriously cut their killing power.

 

[theSavant]

So I made a unified Dwarven Priest party. My starting equipment were Maces which could 5% K.O. I thought I could make „All-in-one“ characters, which are both Melee Attackers and Spell Casters. I gave them attribute points to Vitality, Piety, Strength (Starting with 76 points both in Vit, Pie and 70 in Str).

At Level 9 I reached "Iron Skin" and "Iron Will". I then played until Level 10, and made 10-12 points in Iron Will, and 17-21 points in Iron Skin.
I think Iron Skin is the same as "Natural Damage Resistance" of Dwarfs and the "Damage Resistance Bonus" of Monks. At the current level I have also 20% Damage absorption. I guess a Monk who reaches Iron skin would have yet another Damage Resistance stack ontop of it (so it could be 3x Damage Resistance for an Iron-Skin-Dwarven-Monk. With having priests I did not have that Monk bonus though). Besides all the magic resistances have increased from 25% (default starting value) to 32%. Fire resistance is even higher because Dwarf had a bonus. But still impressive for having reached Level 10 only.

However the party still didn‘t feel very robust against enemies, despite the Damage Resistance and using Shields. I had the Mace & Flail attribute at 80 (for everyone), the Shield skill at minimum 70 (for everyone) and Close Combat at minimum 55 (for everyone). I still got hit way too often and too hard. The lack of health points (77 HP everyone) might also be responsible for that. A pure fighter would have much more already. Also I really missed having Stealth. It seems to me that Stealth is slightly better than shields.



What annoyed me a lot (beginning of a rant):

- So I wanted to buy better maces (i.e. war hammers, scepters). I couldn't, because the Priest class didn't allow me to wield much other types of maces.
- So I wanted to buy better shields (i.e. heater shields). I couldn't, because the Priest class didn't allow me to hold anything else than weak Buckler shields.
- So I wanted to buy better armor (i.e. bronze gloves, metal greaves). I couldn't, because the Priest class didn't allow me to wear them.

COME ON!! There are gloves and greaves (icon looks metallic) I found in the monastery and can wear without problem, so what? Even if these things are restricted because of heavyweight, why can't I use some lightweight cloaks and cowls either? Nope, only usable for Ninjas. COME ON!! I can almost wear and equip nothing at all. This is ridiculous. This is exactly the thing which annoyed me in Drakensang, when a Sword-wielding Knight couldn't equip a Pirate-Sabre. Totally annoyed me back then. I don't know why I didn't realize these restrictions before. Maybe because my party was so diverse, that I always found someone who could equip or wear a specific item, and was „satisfied“. But now with this unified „All-in-One“ party I really noticed these restrictions. I think this system is stupid.
Especially because: with these restrictions you can‘t even plan you characters in advance. For example, if you have this memory of awesome hammers, scepters, maces (all category Mace & Flail) in your mind (from the last playthrough) – and then you'll suddenly find out, that you can‘t equip most of these weapons with your character "just because it is so" - although he starts with Maces, can skill Maces, has high Mace skill. COME ON!! I mean how am I gonna plan my party, if I can't even rely on "has mace skill - can use ALL maces"?

F.U.C.K. T.H.I.S. S.H.I.T.


Because of these heavy restrictions I realized it doesn't make much sense to try "All-in-One" characters anymore. There is only one reasonable way to go:
- Make your characters „Archetypes“ or „Pure“ classes
- Make your party a combination of the usual Tanks & Glass Cannons

That priest party seemed good on paper (think about all members hitting in unified manner K.O. on the enemies, casting in unified manner "Paralyze" or "Make Wounds", and at the same time "immune" to everything because of Iron Skin/Will), but wasn't that great in reality.
I think if someone wants to go with a „unified“ setup („unified“ by means of reducing micromanagement), it‘s probably better to go for 3 unified tanks in front and 3 unified casters in the back. Then you also know that the fighters can equip all good things, the priests only equip bad things. My unified priest-fighter-casters was neither, because they couldn‘t even wear and equip half of the interesting things, because of shitty restrictions.


Stopping playthrough and uninstalling...


(PS: I didn't know that the starting level (Lower Monastery) allows you to grind at least until Level 10, because there is a never ending respawn of Slimes, Rats, Spiders. Funny to know though...).

 

[aweigh]

Haven't you ever played a Wizardry game before?

 

[Darth Roxor]

maybe before making themed munchkin parties, you should first learn the game?

Because of these heavy restrictions I realized it doesn't make much sense to try "All-in-One" characters anymore. There is only one reasonable way to go:
- Make your characters „Archetypes“ or „Pure“ classes
- Make your party a combination of the usual Tanks & Glass Cannons

i've recently finished the game with a party of sam/monk/4x ninja, so i respectfully disagree

 

[Dungeon Lord]

Hmmmm, I might have a great idea from these posts, using an unified dwarven party for my next Wiz8 replay.
I need very strange ideas for replays because I have played Wiz8 approx 20 times, trying or finishing every mods.

I finished the game using an all-caster party: mage,priest,alchemist,psionic, 2xbishop
the question is how different this party from the 6xpriest?

 

[Piotrovitz]

...

Priests in Wiz are squishy pure casters that are meant to stay in backrow with staff or sling, unlike self-buffing semi-tanks in full plate that you know from D&D or other games.
If you want the latter type, just roll with full Lord party and you won't have any problems with weap/armour. RPing wise, dwarfs are cool and fit Lords imo.

If you're going full autist and are bent on doing a run with some wonky party, just use the Cosmic Forge editor and mod the shit out of item restrictions.

 

[aweigh]

Actually priests don't really utilize staves or slings, they use (some) hammers and maces and flails, which are usually M-ranged, and they can wear slightly better armor than the Thief.

EDIT: To clarify they can use some staves and slings, obviously, just that it's not their archetypal Wizardry weaponry. There are also some unique spears for priests in some games.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Actually priests don't really utilize staves

They can use Staff of Doom though, that's a good enough reason to roll with staves for them.

 

[Piotrovitz]

Yep, not to mention Ebon, Rammbus and Bonebasher which you get much earlier.

I just rolled dragon FGT, cat SAM, dog LOR, gnome GAD, faerie BIS, elf ALC.
Expecting to have smooth sail, just want to see how gadgeteer and pure ALC will do late game.

I usually had two bishops, wizardry/psionics and divinity/alchemy, and without doing any grinding it always turned out that lvl 7 spells are useless, i.e despite having 90-something in main schools (can't remember realms), it was always better to cast, say, blizzard than 2-3 dice lower tsunami. Same with other lvl 7 stuff. Wanna see if pure casters are worth the flexibility of a bishop.

 

[theSavant]

Haven't you ever played a Wizardry game before?

No. Wizardry 8 is and was the only Wizardry.

maybe before making themed munchkin parties, you should first learn the game?

Learning contradicting things like: I can't equip most maces even though I have the Mace&Flail skill? That's sick.

Priests in Wiz are squishy pure casters that are meant to stay in backrow with staff or sling, unlike self-buffing semi-tanks in full plate that you know from D&D or other games.

If they are meant as pure casters, then they shouldn't even have the Mace&Flail weapon thing. But if they have the skill, then it should be usable.



When the rules of the game are that I can't equip weapons even though I have the weapon skill, then that rule is misleading bullshit. It adds unnecessary complexity, confusion when building the character, and ends in frustration once you find out about it.

I have still no idea why I couldn't equip these other hammers/scepters (even though they belong to Mace&Flail). Taking a wild guess, I think it's because they made a difference between "heavy weapons" and "light weapons". Is that it? I don't know, because I already uninstalled. And I didn't even find a fucking clue in the official Wizardry 8 manual about such a restriction.
In comparison even the system of Morrowind made more sense. I could equip every item I wanted, and yet there was a clear difference between light and heavy armor/weapons. Only the amount of training defined how good or bad the item becomes in combat. This made more sense than the "you have the Mace&Flail skill but are not allowed to equip most Maces" thing from Wizardry...

 

[Piotrovitz]

Dude acting like he's just discovered that there are class-restricted items in cRPGs

 

[Darth Roxor]

Learning contradicting things like: I can't equip most maces even though I have the Mace&Flail skill? That's sick.

or learning super-obvious things like: priests cant equip heavy armour

 

[theSavant]

Defend this shit:

That the priest can equip a Mace (starting equipment), but cannot equip a simple Warhammer which also counts to Mace&Flail. That's neither logical, sensible, nor "super-obvious". It's nowhere described. Not even a hint in the manual. You can only find out by playing the game and getting frustrated because you can't equip it. When you create a character which has the Mace&Flail skill, you should be able to rely on that. But you can't. And that's just misleading, stupid shit.


Anyhow it was a good idea to start an unusual party, so it reminded me of what bothered me most in game (aside from slow battles). I have just forgotten these things after all these years not playing the game. I'll now refrain from seeing Wizardry 8 as the Holy Grail, because this shit annoys me quite a bit. Also makes it easier to give Bards Tale 4 a chance...

 

[Darth Roxor]

Defend this shit:

That the priest can equip a Mace (starting equipment), but cannot equip a simple Warhammer which also counts to Mace&Flail.

a warhammer is a fighter's weapon

a mace is a glorified club

also considering how there's like a hundred million billion good maces out there in wiz8, this really is a fucking stupid complaint

 

[CptMace]

Why, fuck you too.

 

[octavius]

Learning contradicting things like: I can't equip most maces even though I have the Mace&Flail skill? That's sick.

or learning super-obvious things like: priests cant equip heavy armour

They can in most CRPGs, so that's hardly super-obvious, or even obvious.
In most CRPGs priests can also use warhammers.

 

[Darth Roxor]

priests are not clerics

 

[coldcrow]

This thread made me launch another run, too. First time trying a ranged party: hobbit fighter, human valkyrie, hobbit ninja, hobbit ranger, hobbit gadgie, fairy bishop. All except bishop starting to max out dexterity and senses first. The ranger is on modern weapons - in random's mod you get one of them as early as you can reach burz. After that strngth and speed for the fighter and valkyrie, and speed and int for everyone else.

 

[PorkBarrellGuy]

Encountered an annoying bug in Trynton. Go to scale a ladder, party gets stuck and can't break free. End up having to reload and lose a bit of progress. Note to self: save before scaling ladders in Trynton.

 

[Citizen]

priests are not clerics

Is priest a fighter-cleric multiclass, or is it the other way round? I prefer my divine spellcasters armed with big hammers or clubs, beating the shit out of heathens and heretics. Not the sissy wimps praying to their sissy gods behind the party's backs.

 

[Piotrovitz]

coldcrow, is random passerby mod any good?

I tried Flamestryke's one some time ago and as far as I remember it threw a lot of OPd uber stuff at you, which made the game way too easy.
Christian Coder's mod was very decent though.

 

[PorkBarrellGuy]

Aren't Warhammer Fantasy priests actually called Warrior-Priests to begin with?

Anyway, I think "cleric=fighter/priest multiclass" actually gels with the common perception of clerics in systems that take notable cues from D&D's influence.

 

[coldcrow]

coldcrow, is random passerby mod any good?

I tried Flamestryke's one some time ago and as far as I remember it threw a lot of OPd uber stuff at you, which made the game way too easy.
Christian Coder's mod was very decent though.

I think it is. It just adds lots of items, mostly in underused categories, and even nerfs some of the OP weapons. I like it because it adds variety without making the game easier or way harder (like Dodd's). almost all of the new items are random drops, so grinding becomes even more enjoyable.

PS: It also buffs the droplists of the factions considerably, so exterminating Bugs, Unicorns or Humans becomes very attractive.