Hi all, I'm new to wizardry 8. its a great game...my friend who also plays wiz8 told me this is the best forums around, so I guess i'd post here from now on.

When I play a party...I'd like to choose one versatile fighter/magic leader kinda guy then I try to get the minimal number of party charcs. to support him. i.e. human shields etc. Obviously, I like this bcoz the fewer party members the faster the leveling.

With that in mind, who would be the most versatile charc in the game:
I was thinking:

1) An elfen ranger with a bit of alchemy
2) A fairie ninja with a tad of magic

comments?

Hmm, depends, if you want him more versatile magic-wise then I'm not sure you want a hybrid character, not sure what you're going for though. The Ranger is great for auto-scout, the Ninja will have stealth and also can open locks. The Faerie ninja is a melee beast with the right equipment; Ranger will be better in ranged combat.
If you really want magic variety then a Bishop is best, but they're not the greatest fighters.

I am trying what I think will be a really versatile character in my party now, made a Mook Ninja who's getting trained to start in sword, bow, stealth, crit and locks/traps. I am eventually going to switch him over to Ranger when the latter 3 skills are as high as I want them to be - he'll be able to wear better armor, still use Alchemy, and use the Giant's Sword which is a pretty amazing mook-only, extended range sword that rangers can use, but not ninjas.

Perhaps u can give me some sugestions.

What build would be nice for a versatile leader character. I want someone that I can build the rest of the party around. I heard the mages are powerful, but in late stages and only when they can be protected.

Btw. I really like the ranger build, what races are good for rangers. mooks are great rangers, how about elves and humans?

I don't like mook because you have to waste 8 hours of you game time for something unnessasary. Human should be nice, since they are average in everything.

instead of mage try bishop instead, bishop can learn ALL spell the game have to offer. and that's make him very powerful during end game. with all those funky spells up his sleave. ;)

Well it's true, your Mook will get sidelined for 8 hours of game (not real) time, but I just rest then so it's no big deal. They are really good rangers and can use the only extended range sword in the game, and you're guaranteed to find one (probably will find more like 4 of them!). Str/Dex are the best things to go for first with this kind of ranger, and let him train in melee (sword) and with the bow.

Humans and Elves can be good rangers too, had an Elf who I tried to make a potent Alchemist as well as with a bow, skimped on melee with her and she was really good as a ranged character.

If it's your first time through the game then you want at least one Ranger for auto-scout, that's invaluable. Bishops are great but harder to develop than the pure casters, so you might want to take 2 pure csters, like say a Mage and Priest. 2 Bishops is a pretty awesome combo, if you have each one take 2 schools you can cover all four that way and they're not too bad to develop.

Also a Bard is a really good choice, they can take care of your thief duties, are pretty good in melee and have music for spells - they're really handy early on especially.

But go for more of a team thing, every character you choose should have a role and they should fit in well with each other, don't worry so much about a lead type, make the party strong.

i haven't found i necessary to have a 'leader'. It really doesn't matter which char. is highlighted as you wander around, each situation automatically responds to the highest-skill char anyway.
I am fond of parties of 3, my favorite so far has been Mook Ranger, Mook Gadgeteer, who i switch to Fighter at L12, and a Bard, usually Felpurr (for Speed), who also switches to Fighter.
For me the requirements that MUST be met by my parties are:
=One really fast char who casts Haste. (the others don't need to invest much in Speed that way)
=These spells for survival--Element Shield, Magic Screen, Soul Shield, Silence, Missile Shield and Armorplate.
=Stealth. With the above-named party, everyone spends one level (L4, usually) as Rogues to develop Stealth (+10 AC).
=Lots of damage, both at range and in melee. (that's why i pick Mooks--the Giants' Swords are the best removers in the game. They're not the ONLY extended-range swords, there's X-Cal, but it's 2-handed and slower. And once they're Fighters, they can use Tripleshot X-Bows, which remove targets really fast.)
=Alchemy. If you have a Ranger, Ninja, Bishop or Alchemist, they can bankroll your party by mixing potions.
It is possible to have all these things with a Solo, but one char has to hit so many more times that battles become ridiculously long, esp if you have to keep breaking off to restore Mana.
If you really wanna rock, just start with a Mook Fighter in the place of the Ranger and add a Bishop for a total of four.
(i played something close to that last time, they walked through much of the game, now my challenge is to make it without a Bishop or Faerie Ninja...)
You can also swap the Mook Ranger for a Faerie Ninja, but only if you know where to search to find the hidden stuff until your Gad gets the Searchlight...

Is a Giants' Sword 1-handed? Here they're listened as 2-handed.

The ninja has most skills to choose from.

Only the GS is extended; ExCal is 2-handed but still short range. And the GS is a 2-hander as well.

Er, sorry, i had the qualities confused, i'm sure i knew X-Cal is short range, i used it a lot in W-7. This is my first time with Mooks, though. I haven't got to one yet, but i'm still impressed with GS, a whopping 30% KO can't be beat by anything else around.
Something i'm wondering about, all these great Swords have no curses, but most of the best non-sword weapons take away your Ranged attacks.
WUWT?
The exceptions to the Ninja's versatility are mostly in terms of usable equipment. Many Ninja skills can be maxed in one level of practise (of course, some of that's really boring).
But, probably the easiest solo who never changes class is Ninja.

i gotta admit my LORD turned out far more beefy than what i expected.
very important party member with the armourplate/magic screen/guardian angel/bless combo. and of my characters he is the one with the highest kill count... probably due to the greatbow, diamond eyes and fang [img]smile.gif[/img]

following im in order of # kills is samurai, ninja then monk.

Yah, and that HP regen really comes in handy sometimes, esp early when it involves a more noticable %. Dualies at 125 really makes DE work hard.
I started a thread a bit ago about comparing Eagle Eye Bow with Tripleshot Xbow, i never considered the Strong or Great...Would you use a 3X if you had one, or would you keep the Great?
Would you use The Masher instead of Fang? Or Ivory?

unclear on what 'versatile' means, re: a character. IMO, you don't really want versatility so much as expertise: No point in most chars. knowing more than one weapon, for instance.

Am very fond of hobbit samurais. They develope quickly, reach a high skill in sword very fast since the off hand weapon is also a sword, get critical hits at a pretty high rate, and have high natural resistences.

Seems best to get them the bloodlust sword early on, as it gives them the berserk attack. Its cursed, so the bow skill stagnates until you can get a light sword, which is also a one hander. By the time you get it, your speed will be high enough for many attacks per round. In the meantime, pracitce your mage spells!

Late in the game, when it seems unlikely that I'm getting any more good spells, I switch 'em to fighters, for the sake of the berserk attack and faster leveling.

My hobbit sams always have the highest kill stats in my party, always...

Oh, would go with the 3X over any other bow in the game: the extra attacks simply do more damage than the extra damage per attack, and hunter quarrels probably do more damage for the cost than any other commonly available projectile.

Not a bad idea to start bishops as priests or mages, and switch around level 5: lets them build the skills of their primary spell books faster. As the game winds down, they can be switched again to the class of their second, third or fourth spell book: they'll stop learning spells from other books, but they get a nice bonus for the type of magic they are weakest in, and the levels are much closer together.

Just a thought, mind you: I'm not particularly good at this type of game, I just enjoy them.

Oru

An excellent point ! I thought about it and yeah, because most charcs play in parties...expertise in one area > average in many areas...

Which brings me to my next point...under this idea, I find it hard to find a legitimate reason to use the Human race. Can someone enlighten me on this?

Humans are average in everything. and besides, you are a human in RL. ;)

Yes, more skills doesn't make the character much better, but perhaps...more versatile?

Far better to have 100 skill in the weapon of choice than 25 in each of 4 weapons! Same with magic skills, really. Thats part of why NPCs suck so bad: they have a wide range of skills, all far behind where a character of similar level would be. Sgt. Glumph has only 25 modern weapon at level 11, fer inztenz.

I think its a good idea to play around in the game for a while to get an idea of the weapons available and how the various stats effect skills, then start over with characters you have a clear plan for: In my case, I only use sword weilding melee fighters, as the swords seem far better than any other weapon group. Even the beloved CoC just not worth the effort, IMO. Last party, my fairy ninja had about equal kill stats to a dracon valk that switched from polearm to sword relatively late in the game. Have a feeling that if the game environment had been larger the other weapon categories may have been filled out a little better. As is, any of the good swords are at least as good as the best of the other weapons, and are far more plentiful.

I never play a human character, either: no point, as I already am one. Simply find the other races more interesting. Am currently playing a party of 2 rawulfs, 2 felpurrs, and a Hobbit samurai. Of course, can't find a ring o' beasts for love or money...

Think the next group will be 4 hobbits, 2 sams, 2 bishops.

Suppose a human char. might be ok-- no big holes in the stats to fill, might be well suited for some classes, can't think what though.

Oru

For me, mook are best as rangers, since mook make you waste 8 hours of game time. I always substitute mook ranger for human ranger.

I don't like elf because they have a lousy potrait.

I don't see why you would loose 8 hours? I have often a mook and don't rest. If you refer to the mook hologram kidnapping then you don't know the trick I see [img]smile.gif[/img]

Let's enlight you: Press rest and then sleep 20 minutes or so (just the time to hit the KB again) and your mooks wiil be all back! ;)

Bah! I don't like to waste 8 hours of game time, since my attitude is to beat games in a record time. 8 hours is a big difference you know? ;)

Back to that Samurai thing, if i'm running a Sam, i switch from Bloodlust much 'earlier' than when you get LS. There's a nice weapon at Marten's Bluff.
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Bushido, about 40% drop off Raven Rapax, you can even go straight from Crock (where i go right after my first visit to the Tree), to killing Raven, just save right after Raven is locked in there, reload as needed. You can also PP Antone for an Enchanted Wakizashi.

Alas, didn't know about Bushido blade till I'd passed that part of my current game. Will try for it next time.

Only took about a dozen or so attempts to luck into lightsword, and ExCal had also loaded [checked that before bothering with the ghosts-- since Rubble is broken in my game, I needed to get to nessie the 'back way', through bayjin].

Still, have lightsword fairly early: haven't done many of the trang missions, only one of the umpani, haven't been to the rift, most of the wildernesses, or any of the retros yet-- went for nessie as soon as both bishops could summon elementals. Launched those 2, plus 2 canned, and hid behind a rock twiddling thumbs till the ol' girl had gone to the great Loch in the sky...

Oru

err...I though Fang is better than Bushido. and Fang is easier to get ( because it's always there ) than Bushido.

My samurai always use Fang.

You can be fifth level and get Bushido. I'm usually around 8 with a party of 6.
Long days before you're casting Summon Elemental or living through the SE Temple.
Then, of course, you can trade up; it's not like you're stuck with these things...

[ 06-25-2002, 05:25 AM: Message edited by: otter ]

Yes, exactly: great fun to track down the all the great weapons, and 'upgrade' your arms as opportunity allows.

Plus, the ones you no longer need are worth a ton of gold, super important if you don't have an alchemist to build pandemonium powders...

Oru