Piotrovitz
Savant
Nice combo, you'll mow down everything with this party even on hard.
-
Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.
"This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.
Wizardry The Wizardry Series Thread
- Thread starter Major_Blackhart
- Start date
TBH that berserk sword from vaults is doing most of the killing now. x2 or even x3 attacks from it mostly twice a round is murder right now.
I'm still amazed about the blacksmith recognizing his weapon but thought that his brother made it.
I'm still amazed about the blacksmith recognizing his weapon but thought that his brother made it.
Piotrovitz
Savant
Yeah, bloodlust seems to be practically endgame weapon for some of non-fighter melees.
Piotrovitz
Savant
I never finished any run with gadgeteer (couldn't stand shit running away from omnigun's blinds) - can anyone tell how are they standing with late game gadgets, like the ones with tsunami/earthquake/boiling blood/prismic ray etc? Can they use them at least few times before stamina drops to zero, assuming you're not putting all your points in vit/pie?
If you import from Wiz 7 you can use the mystery ray as a p. cool weapon for the gadgeteer for a longer while. I dislike using the omnigun until it can use arrows/bolts, because rocks weigh so fucking much, and so do gadgets. Also later when you get the rapid fire mods, you burn through the ammo like a cadillac through gas, which means you gotta carry even more of the fucking rocks, and stack even more encumbrance on top of your party. Plus better rocks are more rare than better arrows or bolts, I find.
In any case, I finished Wiz 8 with gadgeteers twice - once with a generated goy, once with Madras. The gadgets are hella good imo, especially some of the convenience-types like armourplate and heal all, and you'll usually have so many of them later on it's a headache to decide which ones you really want to carry. That said though, you need a generated gadgeteer for him to be real effective, since Madras is barred from nearly all the late (or even mid) game areas, which means constant -20 penalty to engineering that bars him from all the big stuff. Nevertheless, there are a few lower level ones that remain useful throughout the entire game anyway, like port-o-potty (noxious fumes) or holograph projector (guardian angel).
In any case, I finished Wiz 8 with gadgeteers twice - once with a generated goy, once with Madras. The gadgets are hella good imo, especially some of the convenience-types like armourplate and heal all, and you'll usually have so many of them later on it's a headache to decide which ones you really want to carry. That said though, you need a generated gadgeteer for him to be real effective, since Madras is barred from nearly all the late (or even mid) game areas, which means constant -20 penalty to engineering that bars him from all the big stuff. Nevertheless, there are a few lower level ones that remain useful throughout the entire game anyway, like port-o-potty (noxious fumes) or holograph projector (guardian angel).
Grampy_Bone
Arcane
My last game was fighter-valkyrie-monk-ranger-bard-bishop
I made a serious attempt to make all the hybrids into full spellcasters. This included spam-casting knock-knock and divine trap over and over again in Arnika. In the end I had all of them with 90 casting skill and 7th level spells.
-Valkyrie was the most useful as a backup healer and especially for curing status effects.
-Monk was also useful for buffs and a few status removers (sane mind). Also had really good offensive power with higher level psionic spells
-Ranger was pretty worthless and made me hate alchemy in general, all his spells did garbage damage
-Bishop I made into an uber-caster, I specifically used her for offensive spells and as usual I was let down by them. At least she ended up with so many spell points I could basically spam spells every round of every battle.
On my gadgeteer run I found those gadgets just didn't come until it was far too late in the game for them to make any real difference. Once you're on the roof of Rapax castle you're pretty much solid for the rest of the game so no more gadgets are really going to matter. Conversely I've always found getting early access to free Heal all, Haste, and Freeze All via the bard to be incredibly helpful.
Stamina loss shouldn't really be a problem though as long as your gadgeteer is female and you stack stamina restoring accessories. Even if you fall unconscious every round you'll be back up on the next one and able to use another gadget.
I made a serious attempt to make all the hybrids into full spellcasters. This included spam-casting knock-knock and divine trap over and over again in Arnika. In the end I had all of them with 90 casting skill and 7th level spells.
-Valkyrie was the most useful as a backup healer and especially for curing status effects.
-Monk was also useful for buffs and a few status removers (sane mind). Also had really good offensive power with higher level psionic spells
-Ranger was pretty worthless and made me hate alchemy in general, all his spells did garbage damage
-Bishop I made into an uber-caster, I specifically used her for offensive spells and as usual I was let down by them. At least she ended up with so many spell points I could basically spam spells every round of every battle.
On my gadgeteer run I found those gadgets just didn't come until it was far too late in the game for them to make any real difference. Once you're on the roof of Rapax castle you're pretty much solid for the rest of the game so no more gadgets are really going to matter. Conversely I've always found getting early access to free Heal all, Haste, and Freeze All via the bard to be incredibly helpful.
Stamina loss shouldn't really be a problem though as long as your gadgeteer is female and you stack stamina restoring accessories. Even if you fall unconscious every round you'll be back up on the next one and able to use another gadget.
theSavant
Self-Ejected
- Joined
- Oct 3, 2012
- Messages
- 2,009
Good, that you mention this.
This reminds me that in the late game my ranger went out of arrows (once he can shoot 2-3 arrows at once they are dwindling very fast). I had bought out all existing shops who sold arrows, and in the end my ranger had nothing to shoot anymore. This sucked. And I had only 1 ranger. And he still used up every existing arrow in the whole game...
Which reminds me that a party with 2 ranger (archers or crossbowmen) will never work because of ammo problems. Heck, it's even problematic with only 1. And then they become totally useless.
That said, the gadgeteer never went out of ammo, because he could use everything as ammo. Also reminds me that training "slings" is one of the most useless skills in the game.
Last edited:
I don't think I've ever run out of arrows at any point in Wiz 8, even when going both ranger + gadgeteer tbh. In my experience the arrerz are so omnipresent in fact that there are always some shrikes lying around even if you gotta scrape the bottom of the barrel.
Piotrovitz
Savant
Valk is the only hybrid I always turn into supporting spellcaster - she has so few skills to raise (only polearm and close combat actually), that you don't have to spam-cast anything to make her viable. If you take gadgeteer, you can probably skip entire Priest spellbook on your Bishop, since gadg has all the crucial priest buffs.
Ranger caster is useless imo - most of the alchemy spellbook focuses on ranged DD and it's better to bump up his firing speed, give him double shot crossbow and focus on insta-kills, instead of chipping mobs slowly. Pure alchemist is very decent though, casting high level toxic cloud or acid bomb at the beginning of fight with Rapax do speed up things noticeably. Quicksand is also nice for flying mobs at the ascension peak.
High speed Samurai would be awesome caster, with throwing debuffs/element shield before everything else moves, but he has so goddamn many crucial melee-related skills to raise, that there's no way around grinding wizardry and elements by spam cast>rest.
I never rolled with Monks, since I take wizardry/psionics Bishop + Bard, but I suspect they can be turned into decent supporting casters. Insanity/haste/armormelt are useful through the whole game and they're not that high level.
I'm planning my first run with Lord and I think he should do as good as Valk - especially I'm taking Priest level at the start and wanna make him 2H, so he can skip dual wield/maces or shield.
Thank for info on Gadgeteer - will take him on nearest run, though Bard's instruments seem much superior and offer greater fleixibility. Not to mention that with Bloodlust and all the Shakesperean armor pieces she's awesome front liner.
Bumping up question about usefulness of Silence - does anyone ever bothered with it?
Dunno if it's just me, but it never seems to land.
Piotrovitz
Savant
Same here, the only pain in the ass with multiple ranged chars is the weight of the shitload of ammo you have to carry around.
- Joined
- Oct 14, 2012
- Messages
- 1,879,250
Well, the most similar one is DW Bradley's Wizards & Warriors - playing it right now for the second time. The first time I really didn't like it, but now after playing some more I have to say that it's actually pretty good, despite the criticisms I have about it.
theSavant
Self-Ejected
- Joined
- Oct 3, 2012
- Messages
- 2,009
So I still got this fixed idea of how awesome a pure Dwarven Monk party could be:
- Goal 1: easy to maintain (no weapons, armor)
- Goal 2: make them kinda immune to damage (further enhanced by IRON SKIN)
- Goal 3: make them kinda immune to magic (when reaching IRON WILL)
My party consisted of 4 members, all using Martial Arts, and arrange in a way so everyone can attack the same enemy (1 left, 2 in the middle circle, 1 right). I played until reaching Level 9.
Result:
First of all I came to the conclusion, that skilling STEALTH is imperative. Without this skill you just take too much damage. Actually it should be imperative for any fighter type (note, that the pure fighter class hasn‘t got this skill. So if you want a party with fighters, it‘s probably better to start with a class which has stealth, train it, and then make a class change to Lord, Fighter, Valkyrie, whatever). I found the "Seekers" in the Monastery brilliant to train Stealth. It took around 1.5 hours (getting spitted at) to get all 4 party members to 90 or so.
The next thing was, that I wanted to reach IRON WILL and IRON SKIN asap. The problem here is, that you must only distribute points to Vitality and Piety on level up. At level 9 I got 75 points in Vitality and 68 points in Piety. So in order to reach Iron Will/Skin it would require an additional 10 level ups. So basically at level 19 I could profit from these. A fucking looooooong way to go. Also the game is often finished at the early level 20s, so what‘s the point in getting these skills almost at the end of the game?? Nargh... I was hoping to reach those at level 15 or so.
This would have been possible (almost) if the Dwarf didn‘t start with negative attribute points at the beginning. But unfortunately he does, and needs 3 level ups to overcome the penalty. Damn penalties!
Now the other frustrating part was, that I couldn‘t spend points into Strength/Speed/Dexterity/Senses until then. Which means I hit less, made less damage, criticals were rare, number of attacks didn‘t increase. Therefore enemies took forever to kill with Martial Arts. In fact it took so long (level 9 party against a single level 10 Rapax Fighter), that my party went unconscious(!) because they had to kick and punch so often. This was not fun. Totally not viable if you think about the hordes of Rapax in the castle. And this was despite always putting points into Critical Strike (I had approximately 55 points), Martial Arts (had about 70 points). It‘s like these abilities were totally held back because I couldn‘t put points into Strength/Speed/Dexterity/Senses. The only thing which made me endure longer battles was Stealth. It sometimes allowed me to go into „Defending“ mode for all party members and wait for a few rounds to let Stamina fill up again. But still not good enough, because whenever an enemy landed a hit, the stamina was reduced as well. 2-3 Rapax and I was done done...
The low damage also made me consider equipping weapons instead of Martial Arts… but unfortunately Monks can not use swords and shields. Fuuuuuuu…. However I saw that it‘s possible to use extended weapons like Polearms, Spears, Staffs. Maybe it‘s better to go for these type of weapons instead of Martial Arts. Didn‘t try it out though, because I already put so much points into Martial Arts. Though I think that with equipped weapons the amount of swings/initiative decreases in comparison to Martial Arts. It can‘t be much worse though… but then again both types of attacks are held back until level 19, because I can‘t spend points into Speed/Dexterity anyway.
What I did like, was the damage resistance and it was enough so I didn‘t need any armor (Monks can‘t equip them anyway). I think the default damage resistance is 7% and the Monk damage resistance is also 7% (combined 14% at starting the game). At level 9 the damage resistance has grown to 18%. I don‘t know how much further it goes… maybe 25-33%? Also it seemed to me that they weren‘t bothered too much or too long by status effects. At least that was very satisfying.
Another note (as a reminder for myself or for those who don't know): I initially thought that the IRON WILL applies only to Magic Resistances, which are listed as Bonuses (i.e. the Bonus of 12 against fire magic for Dwarves). The thing I didn‘t realize was, that basically every race starts with a default magic resistance of 25 against every type of magic (Water, Fire, Air, Earth, Divine, Mental). Bonus and penalties are just added or subtracted from the default value of 25 (therefore the Dwarf had overall 37 fire resistance in the beginning). This also means, that IRON WILL should increase all magic resistances (and and not only the bonuses).
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.
- Goal 1: easy to maintain (no weapons, armor)
- Goal 2: make them kinda immune to damage (further enhanced by IRON SKIN)
- Goal 3: make them kinda immune to magic (when reaching IRON WILL)
My party consisted of 4 members, all using Martial Arts, and arrange in a way so everyone can attack the same enemy (1 left, 2 in the middle circle, 1 right). I played until reaching Level 9.
Result:
First of all I came to the conclusion, that skilling STEALTH is imperative. Without this skill you just take too much damage. Actually it should be imperative for any fighter type (note, that the pure fighter class hasn‘t got this skill. So if you want a party with fighters, it‘s probably better to start with a class which has stealth, train it, and then make a class change to Lord, Fighter, Valkyrie, whatever). I found the "Seekers" in the Monastery brilliant to train Stealth. It took around 1.5 hours (getting spitted at) to get all 4 party members to 90 or so.
The next thing was, that I wanted to reach IRON WILL and IRON SKIN asap. The problem here is, that you must only distribute points to Vitality and Piety on level up. At level 9 I got 75 points in Vitality and 68 points in Piety. So in order to reach Iron Will/Skin it would require an additional 10 level ups. So basically at level 19 I could profit from these. A fucking looooooong way to go. Also the game is often finished at the early level 20s, so what‘s the point in getting these skills almost at the end of the game?? Nargh... I was hoping to reach those at level 15 or so.
This would have been possible (almost) if the Dwarf didn‘t start with negative attribute points at the beginning. But unfortunately he does, and needs 3 level ups to overcome the penalty. Damn penalties!
Now the other frustrating part was, that I couldn‘t spend points into Strength/Speed/Dexterity/Senses until then. Which means I hit less, made less damage, criticals were rare, number of attacks didn‘t increase. Therefore enemies took forever to kill with Martial Arts. In fact it took so long (level 9 party against a single level 10 Rapax Fighter), that my party went unconscious(!) because they had to kick and punch so often. This was not fun. Totally not viable if you think about the hordes of Rapax in the castle. And this was despite always putting points into Critical Strike (I had approximately 55 points), Martial Arts (had about 70 points). It‘s like these abilities were totally held back because I couldn‘t put points into Strength/Speed/Dexterity/Senses. The only thing which made me endure longer battles was Stealth. It sometimes allowed me to go into „Defending“ mode for all party members and wait for a few rounds to let Stamina fill up again. But still not good enough, because whenever an enemy landed a hit, the stamina was reduced as well. 2-3 Rapax and I was done done...
The low damage also made me consider equipping weapons instead of Martial Arts… but unfortunately Monks can not use swords and shields. Fuuuuuuu…. However I saw that it‘s possible to use extended weapons like Polearms, Spears, Staffs. Maybe it‘s better to go for these type of weapons instead of Martial Arts. Didn‘t try it out though, because I already put so much points into Martial Arts. Though I think that with equipped weapons the amount of swings/initiative decreases in comparison to Martial Arts. It can‘t be much worse though… but then again both types of attacks are held back until level 19, because I can‘t spend points into Speed/Dexterity anyway.
What I did like, was the damage resistance and it was enough so I didn‘t need any armor (Monks can‘t equip them anyway). I think the default damage resistance is 7% and the Monk damage resistance is also 7% (combined 14% at starting the game). At level 9 the damage resistance has grown to 18%. I don‘t know how much further it goes… maybe 25-33%? Also it seemed to me that they weren‘t bothered too much or too long by status effects. At least that was very satisfying.
Another note (as a reminder for myself or for those who don't know): I initially thought that the IRON WILL applies only to Magic Resistances, which are listed as Bonuses (i.e. the Bonus of 12 against fire magic for Dwarves). The thing I didn‘t realize was, that basically every race starts with a default magic resistance of 25 against every type of magic (Water, Fire, Air, Earth, Divine, Mental). Bonus and penalties are just added or subtracted from the default value of 25 (therefore the Dwarf had overall 37 fire resistance in the beginning). This also means, that IRON WILL should increase all magic resistances (and and not only the bonuses).
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.
theSavant
Self-Ejected
- Joined
- Oct 3, 2012
- Messages
- 2,009
Uhm... after playing a while with the party above, I made some other observations - with regards to combat speed:
- Camera-Auto-Rotation (options menu) should be OFF. Do not use Snap or Pan, because it produces additional waiting times in combat (the camera would always rotate to the attacking enemy first before your attacks start). I'm pretty sure about that.
- The animation modifications from the GOG forum (combined with WizFast) seem to me slightly faster than the one from the "Enhancement thread" in here
- With the Melee-Only party I could often activate "Continuous Turns" in combat. This also made combat quicker. With mages in the party this wasn't possible, because they always required me to specify and retarget spells each turn. It's actually one of the reasons why I wanted to try a non-mage party.
Besides, Mouselook Toggle should be used, as it's definitely more relaxing to use... well at least for me
- Camera-Auto-Rotation (options menu) should be OFF. Do not use Snap or Pan, because it produces additional waiting times in combat (the camera would always rotate to the attacking enemy first before your attacks start). I'm pretty sure about that.
- The animation modifications from the GOG forum (combined with WizFast) seem to me slightly faster than the one from the "Enhancement thread" in here
- With the Melee-Only party I could often activate "Continuous Turns" in combat. This also made combat quicker. With mages in the party this wasn't possible, because they always required me to specify and retarget spells each turn. It's actually one of the reasons why I wanted to try a non-mage party.
Besides, Mouselook Toggle should be used, as it's definitely more relaxing to use... well at least for me
PorkBarrellGuy
Guest
Which of the spellbooks is overall the weakest for sheer utility? I'm guessing not Divinity. Psionics seems to have a number of buffs and convenience spells as well. What about Alchemy and Wizardry?
Piotrovitz
Savant
TBH I never understood the point of running with such parties. Same with solo faerie ninja, where you have to grind stealth on mudcrabs for hours in order to survive early parts, just to steamroll over everything once you get cane of coprus. Is this even remotely fun or entertaining? : |
PorkBarrellGuy
Guest
Sometimes a cheese party turns into a challenge party. At least, if the devs had any foresight.
Piotrovitz
Savant
All of them have their use, that's why it's always best to take two bishops with complimentary schools. Wizardry is probably the best one.
I'd say the Divinity is the weakest one actually, since the best buffs are available from gadgets. Even if you don't roll with gadgeteer, there are multiple ways to get the crucial spells
Armourplate is relatively low level and you can use valk or lord to cast it.
Magic screen the same + it comes with Bard's instrument.
Web is in Wizardry spellbook.
Heals and ressurection are in Alchemy spellbook.
Soul shield is in Psionic spellbook.
Superman while being a nice buff, comes in potions, which you can find plenty of.
Level 6-7 Divinity-only spells are mostly useless.
All of this makes pure Priest the worst class in the game.
theSavant
Self-Ejected
- Joined
- Oct 3, 2012
- Messages
- 2,009
Yes, it can be entertaining, fun, challenging.
My very first playthrough some years ago was very thorough: I had a party of 6, all of them having a different profession - and half-way through the game I changed all of them to other professions. So I got to experience almost every profession, weapon and magic spell in the game. And of course also all of the environments and secrets. I really took my time for that one.
But after that most of its charm was gone, and I wouldn't want to play it as thorough anymore. A new playthrough should be faster to play, less micromanagement. That's why I went with Melee Only, less than full party. I can't befriend myself with the Solo Faerie Ninja challenge though.
My very first playthrough some years ago was very thorough: I had a party of 6, all of them having a different profession - and half-way through the game I changed all of them to other professions. So I got to experience almost every profession, weapon and magic spell in the game. And of course also all of the environments and secrets. I really took my time for that one.
But after that most of its charm was gone, and I wouldn't want to play it as thorough anymore. A new playthrough should be faster to play, less micromanagement. That's why I went with Melee Only, less than full party. I can't befriend myself with the Solo Faerie Ninja challenge though.
PorkBarrellGuy
Guest
Is Bard viable in front-line melee or is that too many points to spread around? Contemplating a Lord-Samurai-Gadgeteer-Bard-Bishop-Bishop run now.
Actually, what if I crossclassed from Fighter to Bard at level 2 to have a bit better combat skills under my belt and better gear? Losing the Poet's Lute would suck pretty hard, I think, but is it a fair tradeoff? Sleep is useful CC but it's also low-level.
Actually, what if I crossclassed from Fighter to Bard at level 2 to have a bit better combat skills under my belt and better gear? Losing the Poet's Lute would suck pretty hard, I think, but is it a fair tradeoff? Sleep is useful CC but it's also low-level.
Last edited by a moderator:
Piotrovitz
Savant
Bard is decent as fuck as a frontline melee - had her on my last playthrough on hard, and with Bloodlust she was dishing out nice dmg.
Stats don't have to be spread out thin - you just raise STR/DEX and couple of point in VIT and SPD. Since she won't be playing instruments each round, stamina is not much of a problem, so I wouldn't worry too much about VIT or PIE. Plus there's almost whole set of Bard-only Shakesperean armour, with each piece providing some nice skill/stat/resistance bonus.
Fighter 1>Bard X makes total sense if you're planning to go melee, and that's exactly what I did.
I never use sleep spell, so losing the lute wasn't much of a problem. If you have two bishops you won't use it either. Lvl 2 spells like insanity or blinding flash are way fucking better at CC.
Stats don't have to be spread out thin - you just raise STR/DEX and couple of point in VIT and SPD. Since she won't be playing instruments each round, stamina is not much of a problem, so I wouldn't worry too much about VIT or PIE. Plus there's almost whole set of Bard-only Shakesperean armour, with each piece providing some nice skill/stat/resistance bonus.
Fighter 1>Bard X makes total sense if you're planning to go melee, and that's exactly what I did.
I never use sleep spell, so losing the lute wasn't much of a problem. If you have two bishops you won't use it either. Lvl 2 spells like insanity or blinding flash are way fucking better at CC.
PorkBarrellGuy
Guest
>fight with some Higardi fucksticks
>cast Sonic Boom
>doesn't stick at all
>cast Terror
>nope
>Blinding Flash
>nope
>Sleep
>lol nope
Repeat a few times until I run out of spell points.
God damn RNG hates me today.
On a happier note, the new party is doing well, though Monastery's a cakewalk anyway. Beat Gregor without even using my stinkbomb.
>cast Sonic Boom
>doesn't stick at all
>cast Terror
>nope
>Blinding Flash
>nope
>Sleep
>lol nope
Repeat a few times until I run out of spell points.
God damn RNG hates me today.
On a happier note, the new party is doing well, though Monastery's a cakewalk anyway. Beat Gregor without even using my stinkbomb.
Piotrovitz
Savant
Not sure about exact resistances, but insanity tends to land on Higardi hobos pretty well.
Missile shield is kewl, since casted even on 1 or 2 spell lvl it deflects like 90% of all their ranged attacks.
Goddamn, just writing/reading about Wiz 8 makes me want to dump everything else and start another run.
Missile shield is kewl, since casted even on 1 or 2 spell lvl it deflects like 90% of all their ranged attacks.
Goddamn, just writing/reading about Wiz 8 makes me want to dump everything else and start another run.
PorkBarrellGuy
Guest
Not sure about exact resistances, but insanity tends to land on Higardi hobos pretty well.
Missile shield is kewl, since casted even on 1 or 2 spell lvl it deflects like 90% of all their ranged attacks.
Goddamn, just writing/reading about Wiz 8 makes me want to dump everything else and start another run.
I still beat them largely because I had Missile Shield, Bless and Enchanted blade all up and running. Just ended up clobbering the shit out of them in slow motion. The worst thing they seem to do is occasionally poison with their thrown attacks, but Missile Shield seems to make half of them go poof anyway.
As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.