Advice please on Hybrid Party

[Gimli]

Well for where he is now in the game, with a run over into the swamp and to Crock he can buy the Hayai Bo if he wants to go the staff route. Z Bo is a ways off if the characters are 8th level.

[el_kalkylus]

I also like the fact that I would eventually have six portal casters and 3 casters for Summon Elemental.

That's alot of work you know. Your hybrids then needs to get at least 60 skill points each in their magic realms, so they better start using that magic alot. I thought about that too when I made my current party with a lizardman ninja. The thing is, that I only wanted him to fight, so I had to scrap that idea.

Well for where he is now in the game, with a run over into the swamp and to Crock he can buy the Hayai Bo if he wants to go the staff route. Z Bo is a ways off if the characters are 8th level.

Well ok. That's what I meant, (i.e start building staff skill) but it wasn't too clear I guess. I just recommend the zatoichi bo...

[ 10-04-2002, 09:13 AM: Message edited by: el_kalkylus ]

[Krull]

Just thought I would let you know how my party is going. Their weakness to magic spells is now becoming more evident as I've started to meet the Rynjin and their mental spells are hurting as I've yet to get Soul Shield. The good news is that the Ninja has the CoC so she's a lot more useful.

Anyway, I've decided to give Bayjin a miss until 1) I'm stronger and 2) I've got Soul Shield and the other usual buffing spells.

One problem I'm having is that although I try to get them to cast all their spells in combat, there realm skills are not going up too well. Intelligence helps to raise the realm skills I've heard. Is this correct and, if it is, as anyone figured out what your minimum Intelligence score should be to help raise the realm skills?

It's all very well me talking about having six portal casters but, as el_kalkylus said, I've got to wait until, I calculate, at best level 16 before I get them.

One thing I'm going to do in future, have a Bard in all my parties. I think they must be esential in any party. Do you agree?

Thanks.

[True_Moose]

Originally posted by Krull: One thing I'm going to do in future, have a Bard in all my parties. I think they must be esential in any party. Do you agree? Thanks.

I tend to have a bard or gadgie in all my parties. I like gadgeteers more though...there effects are better IMHO.

[Oruboris]

Nope. Had one or the other in all my early parties, but now I find them a little cumbersome.

Last 2 parties, I used only four characters with no NPCs. Both groups had a pair of bishops, first also had 1sam, 1valk, second had 1ranger, 1ninja.

Really love the ranger's auto search: so nice not to have to turn the search on and off.

IME, in a party of 6 the hybrids aren't going to get the really useful spells until awfully late in the game: would be very certain to boost magic schools with every level, and train the realms by keeping as many buffs and aids [like hypnotic lure] going as manna will allow.

OTOH, maybe I'll have to give it a try with a party of 2: sam and valk, perhaps...

Oru

[Krull]

Yes, the lack of magic is really starting to bug me, I don't think I'll try something like this party again as it's so frustrating. Melee wise they are excellent but...

The one thing I forgot all about is that with Vi, I have three Divine spell casters (there's a pun in there somewhere). Bit of overkill there. If I restarted, I think I would drop the Lord and Monk for a Bard and Bishop. I can get RFS-81 and my Bishop could handle the Psionics. What do you think?

I should say that I have several parties on the go. The reason is that once I reach Arnika for the first time I get bored, and then one of you talk about your particulr party and I think "Hmm, that sounds interesting" and I try it for myself. The furthest I've got into the game is with the following party. Done all of the T'rang and Umpani quests except the last ones as I'm trying for the Alliance, and I've just reached Ferro:-

Liz Fighter (The Avenger)
Felpurr Samurai (Light Sword - the Gods smiled at me in the Sea Caves)
Hobbit Bard (Fang)
Mook Ranger (Great Sword)
Hobbit Gadgeteer (Omnigun of course)
Elf Bishop (Diamond Eyes)

Doing nicely thank you. I found a sword 'The Avenger' which I've given to my fighter and he does 80-100 points of damage per swing. But what has surprised me the most is my Gadgeteer. I was able to make the gadget that does 'Negate Air' and I'm amazed how successful it is. Rapax minions just melt away (well, most of the time), can't wait until my Bishop also learns it. I'll have to rethink my thoughts on Gadgeteers now as I never really used them before because they develop rather slowly.

Anyway, I'm grateful for all your replies and excellent comments. Just one thing, could somebody answer my Intelligence question in my previous post? How high does it have to be to help pushing up the magic realms more often? I'm assuming 50-60?

[el_kalkylus]

I should say that I have several parties on the go. The reason is that once I reach Arnika for the first time I get bored, and then one of you talk about your particulr party and I think "Hmm, that sounds interesting" and I try it for myself.

I believe you are not the only one. [img]smile.gif[/img] If you are looking for power parties, go for specialization (i.e. don't develop more than 2 or sometimes 3 skills at once (depending on if they are independent skills or not...)), and bring more pure casters to the party, that is my suggestion. For example, a fighter, mage and bishop are dominating the beginning (especially the mage).

Just one thing, could somebody answer my Intelligence question in my previous post? How high does it have to be to help pushing up the magic realms more often? I'm assuming 50-60?

If you want a particular skill to raise faster, then right click on that skill to check the controlling attributes. The higher the controlling attributes are, the faster the skill will raise. Intelligence affects many skills, such as close combat, ranged combat, mythology, wizardry, fire, earth, water etc.

[MaskedFrog]

I have never played with a bard in either of my two parties. I finished the first time with a party of six including a Sam, Ninja, Ranger, Gadgeteer, Psionic, and Bishop. Never missed the bard.

I am now on my second go through this time with only a 4 person party to start and picking up RFS along the way. This time I am using a Lord (Dual Wield sword and mace eventually some good sword and diamond eyes), Mook Ranger, Gadgeteer, and Bishop. To be honest I am not sure what I would do without my Gadgeteer. Lightning rod early on then advance to hypnotic lure now using noxious fumes from port-o-potty. All at a higher level than my Bishop can cast. Someday I will give up my gadgeteer for a bard just not yet. And just for people who think rangers are weak. My ranger has the most kills by at least double maybe even triple. The tripleshot crossbow makes short work of most monsters. Only problem is keeping her supplied with ammo.

I do believe having at least one pure caster in a party is useful. They can just concentrate on casting spells and build up there skills quickly.

[Wereboar]

Once again I've got bored with my present party so thought I would go out the whole hog and have a complete hybrid party as follows:

I played several hybrd parties lately. Well, i started many of them. Usually only 4 characters - valkyrie, monk, ninja, Samurai (to have all realms covered). No RPCs.

With normal playing style, ignore offensive magic. With many spellcasting during combat, you'll have decent attack spells and mana around level 11, and think it starts to work well. But soon after that, most enemies will have high resistances, and you'll be lost without powercast.

The game will be hard during mid-game. With pure casters, you can cast the protection spells (magic screen, missile shield ...) early at high level. With hybrids, it takes much longer (more than 4 levels, cause your magic skills will be much lower)

My last hybrid party was fun. I went the powercast routine for all of them. I didn't use a range weapon, but a short and an extended weapon for all of them, and spells for range.
However, due to concentrating on intelligence, their melee power was quite bad until around level 15.
Party was:
Samurai: Dual swords, and giant sword
Valkyrie: Dual maces, and poleram
Monk: martial arms, and staff
ninja: martial arms, and throwing

Human Monk (Critical hits, Martial Arts or Staff?) advice here please?

Martial arts.
In my party, the monk dished out great damage at the end. About 50% more than my ninja. Thats the effect of the 25% martial arts bonus. You'll get many attacks even without haste, and the damage seems to be strongly related to the skill.

I realise that this will be a slow building party with no magic until level 5 but was wondering about giving them one level of the appropriate magic school to get some extra magic points. I would stagger this so it happens before level 5 is reached (for example, Samurai to Mage and Lord to Priest at L2, Ninja and Ranger to Alchemist at L3 etc).

I didn't do this, for role-playing reasons mainly. In addition, whats the advantage?
You'll get a few skill points in the realm, but you have one level less of your real class. And i'm pretty sure that your samurai level (for example) vs monster level is the main factor when it comes to criticals.

I know I can pick up RFS-81 at the swamp but wanted to cover all four magic schools.

But he doesn't fit the theme...

I also like the fact that I would eventually have six portal casters and 3 casters for Summon Elemental.

With that melee-heavy party, you'll not need many elementals.

The Ninja hardly does any damage and the Samurai keeps on missing with Bloodlust.

For a ninja, that normal (unless you have cane of corpus). The class is all about criticals, not damage.

For the samurai, the reason is the berserk mode of bloodlust. You'll do double damage in berserk mode, but you'll miss much more often, until your skills are very high. But the extra swing of bloodlust is often wort it.

When the Samurai does hit something and it does no damage, it says something like no penetration. What attribute do I need to penetrate their armour, I'm guessing Strength?

Try using armormelt, when you have the spell.

If you fight against enemies with high armor class, it might be woth to use throwing weapons with your ninja even when in melee range. You'll rarely miss the enemy, and always do some damage (ninja thrown auto-penetrate)

On a related matter, is there any way you can get one of your party to do all the identifying and so just have them building up their Artefact skill? It seems to be quite random at the moment. Everybody seems to take it in turns to identify things.

Everyone tries to identify anything, so everyone gets a skill increase sometimes. For success of the identification, only the highest skill counts.

One problem I'm having is that although I try to get them to cast all their spells in combat, there realm skills are not going up too well. Intelligence helps to raise the realm skills I've heard. Is this correct and, if it is, as anyone figured out what your minimum Intelligence score should be to help raise the realm skills?

There's no minimum score. But the higher the better.
Most skill have two controlling attributes. For the realm skills, its intelligence and piety. Take the average of the two, and combine them with your skill. Your skills will improve faster the bigger the difference is. Once you reach the stats (say, fire skill 50 with 55 int and 45 pie), further increase will be very very rare.

I'm really missing my Bard though. Where else can you get a L5 or better Bless spell while climbing Trynton's trees?

Ever heard of spellcasters? A priest or a bishop will do it.