Advice for a Newbie...

[Brak]

Perhaps many of you are sick of newbies asking questions, but for those of you who are in the know and wouldn't mind replying, I would very much appreciate any advice you could give. I started playing this past weekend, with a party that consists of:

*Dracon Fighter
*Hobbit Samurai
*Mook Ranger
*Felpurr Rogue
*Elven Bishop
*Faerie Psionic

Once I got used to the slow pace of battle the game has become quite addicting. So the questions are as follows:

1. Dracons spitting acid, does the damage for this scale or is it only effective in the early parts of the game? If it does scale what is it dependent upon, level, or an attribute?

2. Magic is still a bit confusing. I have read that it is best for a bishop to specialize so they won't be hampered by their slow progression. I assumed this to mean they should choose to cast from 2 of the four "schools" like divinity and wizardry (so she can be healer and cast summons). But then when it comes to the spell selection screen everything is broken down by the six realms...so far I have been assuming it is a safe bet that spells for the divinity realm will be part of my divine school specialty. But what about my wizardry spells? There are wizardry spells in the water realm and psionic spells in the fire realm and peanut butter in my chocolate, and I can't make heads or tails of it. Plus many of the spell books are only usable by my Bishop so now she has spells in 4 realms...have I blown my specialization deal or when I think of specializing her I should only be worried about where I place my skill points? Help me out here, it is confusing.

3. I have heard good things about Bards and am thinking about switching over my rogue to a bard. I know I can pick up an RPC later that is a rogue, but I prefer to have all the capabilities I will need within my control. So can a bard do all the thieving things a rogue can do except sneak/backstab? Will my bard be able to pick locks, disarm traps, steal from merchants and pickpocket NPCs? What are your thoughts on doing this kind of a switcheroo?

[ 01-14-2002: Message edited by: Brak ]

[Kensai]

A-ah, the dragons...

The only thing I can tell about splitting acid is that it heavily depends on Stamina at the momemt it is ... well ... splitted.
The more stamina dragon has - the heavier damage will be.
But it's rather a percentage of remaining stamina that impacts how much HP's an enemy will lose.
Level may impact but not as much.

So you shouldn't expect just to blow off enemy by a high level dragon-fighter, without ... a spellcaster/bard or another dragon .

[Serops]

1. The Dracs breath weapon scales with level, it is not skill dependent as far as I can tell.

2. For Bishops I like to specialize in two schools as well. Your skill in a spell school (wizardry, divinity, alchemy, psionics) and your character's level are the "major" factors in determining what level of spells he or she can learn within those schools (your realm skill is a minor factor here). The realm skills (fire, air, mental, water, earth, divine) primarly effect your chance of making successful cast with a spell in that realm and how many spell points you have in that realm (# and level of spells in that realm also effect spell points). If you concentrate on wizardry and divinity make sure to choose spells from the wizard and priest spell books (you can check this by right clicking on the spell and reading the description). Another way to put it is that wizard and priest spells are in all the realms but not all the spells in a realm are wizard or priest spells. (err..I hope that made sense) Anyway, if I had a wiz/pri bishop I would probably put 3 in wizardry, 3 in divinity, and perhaps 3 in realm skills (just to give them a bit of a jump start) each level.

3. Bards are great and can pickpockets/disarm traps/open locks. As far as switching goes that's a harder question. Some of the instruments require a certain level in the bard class, so you may not be able to use them until late in the game (depending on how many levels you've spent as rogue). I'm sure a lot of ppl make the switch effectively but I've left that aspect of the game alone.

btw/ Never trust a monkey!

[ 01-14-2002: Message edited by: Serops ]

[DraconisRex]

I *think* it scales with stamina. Can't tell you for sure. But it is a good weapon to get rid of nuisance creatures. But I don't like it for fighters.

Dracon bards, rouges, spellcasters, yes. But if you've got a tough fighter-type with dual weilding, you're cutting your own foot off...

[Serops]

Hmm..yea I could've been wrong on the lvl v. stamina thing. Harder to tell since stamina goes up with level. Maybee I'll run two dracs of differing stamina through the monestary real quick.

Hey Draconis, doesn't acid breath on bard bother you as well, since instruments use a lot of stamina?

[Naugrim]

As far as switching a rogue to a bard.. I did this on my party before my current one. I had planned it this way actually, to get the bonus to locks/traps and pickpocket initially then switched to bard at level 3 or 4 when I had the stats worked out (might have been able to do it sooner but for some reason at level 2 I wasn't paying attention and was raising stats based on the ranger requirements instead of the bard [img]smile.gif[/img] . Worked out pretty well, but the only drawback was that I didn't start out with the poet's lute the bard usually gets. Free (stamina aside) sleep spell to start out with can really help out a lot. In my current party I just started out straight bard and haven't had too much difficulty w/o the extra lockpick points.. So it really just boils down to what you want to play..

[Erydian]

Serops pretty much said everything I would have said as far as magic goes. But something to add:

Don't worry about the spells that you've learned from books. Specialization really only applies to allocating your level-up points, and any extra spells that you gain via books should be thought of as bonuses. Read/learn all of the books your skills allow. [img]smile.gif[/img]

[Jodmos]

1. dunno about that

2. My Bish is my main caster and I didnt focus on specific realms, I pushed them all, just keep practicing with spells from different Realms on their highest Powerlevel.
I doesnt matter if they fizzle, skill goes up.
When level up, spent points on the schools like wizardry, psionics and so on.
The realms go up pretty fast by using them.
Your Bish will of course take some time to pull his weightt, but around lvl 10 they really start to kick.
Another advice would be to not spend spellpicks on levelups because you have to, most spells you can find in Spellbooks, saving picks for spells you really need.

3. I LOVE MY BARD !!!!!
The instruments you can find in this game just rock the house.
This is the first time I picked a bard in any RPG and I was impressed of what he (she) is able to do.
Saved my partys butt quite often now.
Having a bard will make your adventuring a bit more easy.


btw your name reminds me to my own I had in Everquest.
You just brought some happy memories back =)

[vesselle]

LOL! isn't brak the evil bug in space ghost cartoons?? i adore that guy... brak... not space ghost.

V***V

[Jodmos]

My name was not brak, but everyone called me this.
Full name was Brakhuul Dreadhammer.

Not bad for a 9 foot tall, evil troll shaman to be named after a cartoon hero.
Damn, i had to know this earlier =)

Spaceghost ? never heard of that.
Is it a TV or comic book cartoon ?