Unusual Parties

[Dobian]

This is my first time through, and my main party is elf mage, mook psionic, human gadgeteer, wolf valkyrie, cat ninja, and hobbit bard. As you can probably see, my party lacked some serious muscle, so my early game was quite difficult. My late game is going much better, as my two main spellcasters are quite powerful now, and my bard is really handy with the restorative instruments. I beefed up by adding Vi and the android to my party; Vi is now quite good with the mace, but the android is exceptional now that it's got snake speed and is over 100 for martial arts.

[MasterPooBaa]

My fave is the "specialist" party... where there are no simgle classes.
e.g. Lord, Samurai, Ninja and Monk. lots of brute force, plus all reaplms of magic, lots of critical hits, stealth on 2 of them and thievery.

Or lord, samurai, ninja, monk and 2 bishops for kickass magic power.

[MasterPooBaa]

and no, i dont tend to use hands and fists for the monk... find it more worthy to equip him iwth spears... he kicks ass with things like the dread spear or zatochi bo.

[Niob]

I'm currently running a small party with
Mook Ranger, Felpurr Samurai and Elf Alchmist all at lvl 12. I'm about to
leave Trynton now.
Samurai is using Bloodlust but he misses a lot, even he has Dex > 90
Sword 80 and CC 70, that should be enough, I think.
I guess I made a big mistake with the Ranger, I have used him like a fighter
instead of letting him do ranged combats.
The Alchemist is not bad, but nothing compared with a bishop, but a bishop is too easy.
I had a lot of problems with strong single enemies, like Breeders, Bobo or the Golem in Arnika, I skipped them, there is no way and I don't want to change to Normal level.

Can somebody tell him, how to build a strong Ranger ???

Niob

[Wereboar]

To your Samurai with Bloodlust:
Berserk Mode (the only attack mode for Bloodlust) reduces your chance to hit a lot. But the double damage, combined with the extra attack, is worth it (at least until you get Fang or Bushido Blade).

The Ranger: Shoot. Shoot. Shoot.
Maybe let Madras make you a doubleshot crossbow (from two light xbows). You'll miss a lot for a while, but when your ranged skill goes up, you'll starting to get many criticals. I think my high-level rangers score more criticals than my high-level samurai or monks.

The Alchemist. Well, with a Ranger (alchemist spells), i'd probably choosen another profession. Ok, you already have a samurai, but a mage has far more firepower (but you'll miss the early heal and cure spells).
Another possibility would be to start as a bishop, learn some preist spells at level 1-5, then switch to a pure mage.

With small parties, i usually hire Myles and Vi for the Golem fight. The cheat death of the valkyrie helps her survive fo some time (and protect your characters, if she's alone in front rank).

[MasterPooBaa]

Hmmmm... how about a all fairie or all lizardman party [img]smile.gif[/img]

or 1 lizardman fighter and 5 bards.
2 fighters and 4 bishops?
6 rangers?

mage, priest, alchemist and psionic with no fighters?

[Wereboar]

or 1 lizardman fighter and 5 bards.

5 bards is a bit much.
But one of my next parties will be fighter / 3 bards / 2 Gadgeteers.
Correction: Instead of a fighter, i'll use a bishop-priest (bishop till level 5-8 for non-offensive mage spells, then pure priest).
With this party, i'll definately want the Rest All spell.

2 fighters and 4 bishops?

I did 1 fighter + mage/priest/alchemist/psionic on expert ironman without problems.
You suggestion will be quite boring, i fear.

6 rangers?

Will be very hard in expert (missing buff/protection spells).
I played 5 rangers + a priest (which was bishop until level 8 to lean some non-offensive mage spells). Doable, but quite hard against Rapax with the Missile Shield spell. At one point, i was out of plain ammo.
Correction: Was out of plain bolts, and musket balls. The plain arrows had been enough (quite so).

mage, priest, alchemist and psionic with no fighters?

Probably ok at normal, but too hard at expert.
I had to add a bishop, then it worked. I just needed two characters with Guardian Angel (early) or Body of Stone (late).
But this was an non-ironman game. Maybe i'll try again in expert ironman with 2 priests and 2 alchemists.
Update: Tried it yesterday. Two priests are quite useless, with that many potential Healers.
Started again with mage, priest, alchemist, psionic, and two bishops. Now at level 3 (second try). Seems to work when careful, but the bishops are very useless by now (one killed himself in the second fight at the first try, by backfiring spells)

[ 03-26-2003, 12:52 PM: Message edited by: Wereboar ]

[jersey_]

Want an odd team? Find a random number generator (or roll some dice) and randomly have your team chosen. Assigning numbers to professions, races, gender and number in the party (we have been doing 4 to 6 and playing on Ironman).

My current randomly generated ironman party, The Exclamations!, consists of:

D'oh! Male Lizardman Samurai (first Lizzy picture, Burly Voice 1)
Ouch! Male Felpurr Rogue (first felpur picture, Chaotic Voice 2)
Yippee! Female Felpurr Valkyrie (white felpurr pic, Kindly Voice 1)
EEK! Female Faerie Samurai (Blue-winged picture, Chaotic Voice 1)
Oops! Female Hobbit Alchemist (Blonde Hobbit pic, Laidback Voice 2)

Actually a really good team now. All level 17. I've had stranger teams, but none have gotten as far. But, you play whatever you roll and see how far you can get. [img]smile.gif[/img]

[Nomad]

Hiya Jersey, my random IM party was The Dwarf Snowwhite and the Four Sausages:

Wiener, Male Gnome Psionic
Hot Dog, Male Rawulf Samurai
Bratwurst, Male Hobbit Priest
Frankfurter, Male Hobbit Gadgeteer
Snowwhite, Female Dwarf Alchemist

They ascended to become Cosmic Lords so you can make it with most any group.

[jersey_]

Hiya Nomad. [img]smile.gif[/img]

Yeah, it is amazing with the right amount of care what kind of team you can take to the end of the game. aveam ascended with a 4 lizardman team that included a Lizzy Bishop. [img]graemlins/biglaugh.gif[/img]