Wizardry Wizardry 8 - surviving high level mobs

[Desiderius]

Bloodlust sucks.

It buffs the martial Swords so just using those (Sam starts with Kat + Waki).

 

[Piotrovitz]

I hear you - nukes are underrated. It's just that any sentence that includes "by endgame" is theorycrafting and ignores quality of life while playing the game (describing what you've got your Bishop doing is the opposite and perfectly viable tbh, but I like hybrids who can nuke weak stuff and ko hard stuff while bringing some other utility).

Yeah, but the coolest hybrids (samural, monk, ninja) have just too many skills to raise in order to make them good dmg dealers AND capable casters in a natural way, i.e without casting buffs and rest spamming. Valk is probably the only exception here, since she has nothing but polearm to raise on lvl ups.

That's why I always make my hybrids as pure dmg dealers, just to add some variety - felpurr samurai is always way cooler than another dracon fighter.

 

[Poseidon00]

The text input and question asking system in older RPGs like this one was peak design. You actually have to think about what each individual NPC might know, because it won't all be revealed by clicking all available options. The story becomes less of a backdrop and part of the puzzle to solve.

 

[Desiderius]

I hear you - nukes are underrated. It's just that any sentence that includes "by endgame" is theorycrafting and ignores quality of life while playing the game (describing what you've got your Bishop doing is the opposite and perfectly viable tbh, but I like hybrids who can nuke weak stuff and ko hard stuff while bringing some other utility).

Yeah, but the coolest hybrids (samural, monk, ninja) have just too many skills to raise in order to make them good dmg dealers AND capable casters in a natural way, i.e without casting buffs and rest spamming. Valk is probably the only exception here, since she has nothing but polearm to raise on lvl ups.

That's why I always make my hybrids as pure dmg dealers, just to add some variety - felpurr samurai is always way cooler than another dracon fighter.

Felpurr starts with enough Speed and Sense that those skills go up on their own once you get them started. Already in the high 30s leaving Monastery with no grind. Had intended to use Bow too but think that training needs to go to casting instead.

I’m a little concerned that the low Piety is getting in the way of learning Realm skills tho. Once I pick up Vi and especially the robot I can focus more on the casting for awhile.

Hybrid nukes are for clearing out the chaff/training for buffs (just like Bishop), Psi specialist is for the big blasts with benefits.

 

[Desiderius]

I prefer Ranger to Ninj and I get robot for Monk, plus I like the unique Psi stuff and want to Power Cast that shit ASAP.

Mook Psi is going to have Eagle Eye and Power Cast both by like level 9 or so. It’s crazy, and those Stats are great for leveling peripheral skills too.

I guess eventually he’ll get there on Throwing/Sling too, especially since zero PIE means Spell pts are tight.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

That's a common misconception. I've always rolled with two bishops and end-game they had their casting skills in 80s/90s, without any need for grinding (unless you count casting armorplate/magic screen/light before resting after a major fight). IMO it's a perfect scenario, like ending some game just before you hit the level cap. Really, you don't have to rest spam and cast light dozens of times to get the Bishop realm/magic skill up to a level when it becomes useful. Once you get fireball, you will use it extensively in Arnika and Trynton. Same with freeze flesh or whipping rocks. Early-mid game you cast those excessively, so the skills will grow in a steady and satisfactory pace.

It's not a misconception, for bishop to make sense you need to justify picking him and need for him to start pulling his weight early. Sure, you can get by casting low level spells on 1-2 dice when you have at least two books to level up and your skill bonus is in goddamned artifacts and you might even get to 90 by end game, but what's the point.

Also, have to disagree on the necessity of metaknowledge on where to get the books. Lots of useful spells are available at major vendors (e.g Swamp), and the other ones you just pick on level ups. Even if your bishop covers 2-3 schools, you don't have to get all the spells - just the crucial ones. On certain level ups, where you can chose only sucky ones (razor cloak, shadow hound, chameleon etc) you just save your pick, and once you hit the next tier, you get what you want.

And how do you know which books to buy and which to find? How do you decide if you get haste or heal all via level up or wait until you find them? What do you do with good spells that can be found, but pretty late game? How do you know what to do with alchemy spells, when there's so few of them sold in Arnika? Etc. Bishop makes no sense with just level ups, you need books and you need to know where and how to get them.

 

[Zombra]

I was hoping for a skill or spell like invisibility in other games that lets you sneak past monsters. It looks like Chameleon is such a spell. Unfortunately it seems neither this nor the CC spell Insanity is available to my party, because I am running a pretty classic party with a Mage and a Priest.

The Terror spell is your low level Insanity substitute. Your Mage knows it. Use it!

Also, "stealth" is a thing whether or not you have Chameleon running. On Arnika-Trynton Road, you should always be able to see enemies at a distance and they will not come straight at you just because there is line of sight; they have to be close enough. If they are coming towards you but combat hasn't started yet, simply back away to stay out of "trigger range".

Enemies are almost always on their way somewhere - watch what direction they're moving in, and don't be there when they get close. Even in a straight corridor, you should be able to backtrack and hide in a side passage, branching road, other room etc. to let them pass. Trynton Road has plenty of loops and side roads to sneak around on. Of course you don't want to hide from everything, but you can pick your battles. Absolute worst case, if something is too tough to fight and you can't dodge around them, leave the area and come back later - spawns are random and when you return there will likely be something different on the road. (Note, leaving the zone and coming back immediately will not reset spawns. Be patient and go explore somewhere else.)

Lastly, even in a bad fight, running away (even from crabs) should work. Make sure you are using the Shift key to sprint. Sure, if you wait too long to retreat, your whole party may be killed, but if one or two party members die, you should have time to escape. Bounce back with some Resurrection Powders (always keep a small stockpile of these .. if you made it to Arnika, you should have enough $ to buy at least one or two from the temple). Note it is OK to carry a dead party member for a while and build up money to buy a resurrection item, not the end of the world. Don't blow all your gold on shiny new weapons if you don't have any resurrection items.

Be very careful about using Resurrection Powders in combat. Your party member will come back to life with like 2 hit points and may immediately die again. Often it is better to run away first and resurrect somewhere safe so you can rest and heal up. Or just finish the fight without that person and resurrect them afterwards.

Also, you said something about never resting. Don't be dumb. Resting should be your primary means of replenishing hit points, and more importantly, spell points.

 

[Lonely Vazdru]

Games too easy to care about planning party builds.

Finally someone makes sense in this hair-splitting circlejerk.

Wizardry 8 should of been on the n64 so all the 12 year old kiddos could play it.

Oh, well.


Edit : Please DarkUnderlord reverse title of members who use "of" instead of "have" to illiterate, thanks.

 

[Invictus]

Bishops are the quintessential Wizardry “recipe”; if properly developed they are the ultimate “combo” class that can fill any role as healers, buffers, crowd control or damage dealers... you don’t have to metagame them but try to actively develop their magic skills to make sure you have a wide variety of spell skills for the best results or simply focus on a couple of elemental schools and go from there

I have used Dracon Bishops since Wizardry 7 and they take a bit to hit their stride but when they do they can be very powerful with a pretty deep spell pool to work with; I mostly used them as buffers for Enchanted Blade, Magic Screen and Armor and focus their spells mostly on crowd control like terror, web, paralysis and the odd fireball
Bards are simply awesome too but a properly developed Bishop feels more versatile and rewarding

 

[coldcrow]

I have used Dracon Bishops since Wizardry 7 and they take a bit to hit their stride but when they do they can be very powerful with a pretty deep spell pool to work with

This is so stupid. Are you sure you played Wiz8?
Dracon Bishops are pretty retarded in Wiz8 - all you get is more HP and a Breath attack you wont use. On the downside all relevant caster stats take forever to develop: 100 int/pie on lvl 21, 100 spd on lvl 25 lol.

PS: A Dracon Alchemist however can be quite good, with maxed Str/Int, the ability to use shields it can be a better true hybrid than a ranger or ninja, who usually specialize only in combat.

PPS: The class for a bishop in wiz8 is either elf or faerie. Elf if you want to have more spellpoints than you can count, or fairie if you want to cast FIRST. Anything else is a waste of statpoints.

 

[gunman]

Lastly, even in a bad fight, running away (even from crabs) should work. Make sure you are using the Shift key to sprint.

I know about using shift outside combat, but do you mean using shift even after choosing "run" option while in turn based?

One of the problem is the relative high movement points of creatures compared to spotting range and the map size. You have pre-position before every single battle, otherwise the enemies will surround you in turn 1.
Also more than once I tried to sneak between two groups of monsters (with chameleon spell) only to trigger combat and find myself surrounded from all directions. This often happens in Trynton, before reaching the tree. There is a very high density on monsters there when you first enter the map.

 

[Desiderius]

Lastly, even in a bad fight, running away (even from crabs) should work. Make sure you are using the Shift key to sprint.

I know about using shift outside combat, but do you mean using shift even after choosing "run" option while in turn based?

One of the problem is the relative high movement points of creatures compared to spotting range and the map size. You have pre-position before every single battle, otherwise the enemies will surround you in turn 1.
Also more than once I tried to sneak between two groups of monsters (with chameleon spell) only to trigger combat and find myself surrounded from all directions. This often happens in Trynton, before reaching the tree. There is a very high density on monsters there when you first enter the map.

If you use a Scouting class (the mod I'm playing adds Scouting to Psionic) you can turn off Search and turn the tables I think. Not 100% sure but been managing aggro pretty well this time through. Can also use that out of combat sprint to move from safe area to safe area.

 

[Zombra]

I know about using shift outside combat, but do you mean using shift even after choosing "run" option while in turn based?

Apologies, it's been a while. You are correct - turn based "run" mode is already as fast as you'll get.

There is definitely a lot going on in Trynton, can't expect to "ghost" your way through. In tighter maps you have to pick your battles and control where the engagements happen instead of trying to avoid them entirely. Also remember there is no shame in retreating from the map entirely to come back later for different spawns. Once you're across the bridge though there is a decent amount of open space, try going the long way around and see what you see.

Personally I never rely on Chameleon for anything - it's not an invisibility spell, just reduces enemy sight range by some indeterminate amount.

 

[Desiderius]

Had a nice run going on CC mod up to Trynton then borked it trying to add the enhanced mod as someone suggested in GOG Forum.

Has anyone successfully combined these mods and/or can anyone suggest a load order?

 

[Poseidon00]

Got past Trynton so far, almost level 10, exploring the graveyard right now. Without major spoilers, any places I should check out/things I can miss/kewl secrets?

 

[Piotrovitz]

Sure, you can get by casting low level spells on 1-2 dice when you have at least two books to level up and your skill bonus is in goddamned artifacts and you might even get to 90 by end game, but what's the point.

The point is flexibility - I'd rather have mage/psion Bishop, which throw spells 1-2 dices lower than pure caster , but has the luxury of having crucial CC/nukes from wizardry book plus bunch of useful spells from psionics book, e.g haste or hypnotic lure. Psionics spellbook also has couple of nice AoE DD's, like ego whip or psionic blast.

And how do you know which books to buy and which to find? How do you decide if you get haste or heal all via level up or wait until you find them? What do you do with good spells that can be found, but pretty late game? How do you know what to do with alchemy spells, when there's so few of them sold in Arnika? Etc. Bishop makes no sense with just level ups, you need books and you need to know where and how to get them.

You don't need to go full meta with books, as your two-school Bishop doesn't have to get every possible spell that's available to him.

If you pick Iceball or Haste on level up and then later find it for sale in, say, Swamp vendor, you just live with it. If you haven't pick them up, you're lucky and can spend the spell pick on something extra. Like I've said - there's no need for meta/powergaming and planning ahead what to pick and what can be potentially bought. You will have enough level ups to pick up all the necessary spells for 2-school Bishop. If you're lucky, you will just end up with some extra flexibility, but if not, it's not that you char will be gimped until rest of the game.

Damn, I have to stop posting here before I dump my Grimoire playthrough and start another Wiz 8 run : [

 

[Piotrovitz]

Had a nice run going on CC mod up to Trynton then borked it trying to add the enhanced mod as someone suggested in GOG Forum.

Has anyone successfully combined these mods and/or can anyone suggest a load order?

I doubt it's possible to run more than one big mod in Wiz 8 - there's just too much potential clashes.
Even if you will manage to pull this up, you don't have guarantee that the game will not crash anytime or at some particular moment.

 

[Piotrovitz]

Got past Trynton so far, almost level 10, exploring the graveyard right now. Without major spoilers, any places I should check out/things I can miss/kewl secrets?

There's a 'secret level' available to enter from graveyard, but it's just too cryptic to figure out on your own on how to access it - as far as I know, there aren't any clues (or maybe there are, available through casting mindread on someone etc).

There's not much content or unique loot there, just bunch of random fights that will give you extra xp.
If you're interested just google 'wiz 8 retro dungeon'

 

[Desiderius]

Had a nice run going on CC mod up to Trynton then borked it trying to add the enhanced mod as someone suggested in GOG Forum.

Has anyone successfully combined these mods and/or can anyone suggest a load order?

I doubt it's possible to run more than one big mod in Wiz 8 - there's just too much potential clashes.
Even if you will manage to pull this up, you don't have guarantee that the game will not crash anytime or at some particular moment.

It ran fine until I tried to level up and had -19 bonus points lol.

 

[Poseidon00]

(or maybe there are, available through casting mindread on someone etc).

I have been casting mindread on everyone I can lol. Psionic Rawulf because I like dogs. No clues in the first two areas at least. This is quickly becoming my favorite RPG to date. I tried Wiz 6 and Wiz 7 because I was getting into 8 so much and man, those are brutal.

 

[Piotrovitz]

There are one or two more retro dungeons - again, with no unique loot.

They suppose to emulate the wireframe dungeons from first Wizardries, but
#1 They look awkward/like shit in 3d
#2 There's no interesting puzzles inside - you just wander aimlessly, trying to find a teleporter outside
#3 Entries to them are so cryptic, that there's no other way than to check it online - I'll spoiler the graveyard one for you:

Spoiler

There are several tombstones that have runes engraved on them - if you click on them, they start to glow in blue. Once you activate all of them (six or seven), you have to exit the main graveyard gate, go around the outside wall back to the area with the graves/crypt, and use a dagger (only simple, non-enchanted one will work) on a northeast pillar. That will spawn a mushroom ring next to you, that serve as a teleporter to the dungeon. Inside there's a couple of fights and absolutely nothing worth of interest, and you just have to find the similar mushroom ring that will teleport you outside.

 

[jungl]

I remember a cool mod I used when I decided to replay the game that made all the loot tables for the rare items guaranteed to spawn. light saber, murasama sword etc. I guarantee you if you play the game normally without the mod you will never see these awesome items or know they existed. Only problem is they make a already easy game extremely easy.

It makes you wonder how much of the game was rushed and how many ideas were scrapped maybe the developers planned content for the player to achieve these items.

 

[Desiderius]

The mod just eliminates store bought items from the loot tables of the best chests, which just guarantees you won't bust out, it doesn't mean you're guaranteed to get the good stuff, although it places some of the good items in game as well, it nerfs the ones that are truly broken.

 

[Desiderius]

Got past Trynton so far, almost level 10, exploring the graveyard right now. Without major spoilers, any places I should check out/things I can miss/kewl secrets?

There's a 'secret level' available to enter from graveyard, but it's just too cryptic to figure out on your own on how to access it - as far as I know, there aren't any clues (or maybe there are, available through casting mindread on someone etc).

There's not much content or unique loot there, just bunch of random fights that will give you extra xp.
If you're interested just google 'wiz 8 retro dungeon'

Once you know how to get to the first one you can figure out the other two, and the last one at least has a very good drop from the final boss.

 

[Piotrovitz]

Once you know how to get to the first one you can figure out the other two, and the last one at least has a very good drop from the final boss.

Pushing runes is fine, but how the hell you're suppose to know you have to stick dagger/short staff/longsword somewhere?

I never really bothered with the ones other than the cemetery one - what's the drop from the final boss?