Character selection

[Max]

Wooooooooooooooooohoooooooooooooooo.....ok some of you may remember me from the W&W board....I certainly see a few familiar names here, so a big hello to you and to all those new paople I am about to chat to.

Ok heres the score, I have the game as of yet uninstalled. From what I see I shouldn't compare this game to W&W as there seem to be many differences. So my main question is character selection from the Wiz 8 web site I see there are character types here that I have not seen or used before, so what should I start with. I have read through the best tips topic so I know I must have a bard in my line up and I would think one maybe two fighters and a mage or two but thats as much as I know, any pointers here would be great.

Also is there any advantage of re-rolling characters.

I'm going to install now so I'll check back here before I start. I hope I enjoy this board as much as the W&W board.

[Merkin]

Chracters are on a point-buy system so re-rolling not an issue. This is my first time in a Wizardry game, so I'm playing through with a pretty "vanilla" party, but having very good sucsess. Current line-up is:
Dracon Fighter
Felpurr Samurai
Mook Ranger
Halfling Rogue
Dwarf Priest
Faerie Mage

I am thinking about replacing the rogue with a bard. They can still pick locks, and there are some very cool bard items available early in the game.

[Sazerac]

DEFINITELY a thumbs-up on the Bard! Those instruments come in VERY handy, and even with the stamina drain, a Priest casting "Stamina" spells on him/her can definitely counteract that.

If you need a rogue, you can always pick up Myles (NPC) in Arnika, the first main town.

There's a lot of debate currently on the Samurai...most people are finding them not worthwhile; hard for them to hit and do damage, at least at early levels where it counts.

Kudos on the ranger in this game...in fact, this is a game where missile weapons rock, so make sure ALL characters get a few points in at least one missile skill. Rangers get scouting ability to be able to see hidden items, and they can hit criticals with their bow weaponry.

Fighters are great in this game with their Berserk capability; mine is now dishing out MAJOR damage per strike, and when their sword or other weapon of choice skill gets above 50 they start doing double striking.

Definitely take a Priest and a Mage. The rest is kind of up to you, but balance out spellcasters with fighters. This is NOT a game in which you want to be changing characters, so plan your initial party accordingly.

And, no, there is no randomness to the character roll, so choose a race and profession and run with it! BTW, those who get the greatest bonuses are NOT always the best for that class, I've found out!

Cheers,
-Saz

[vesselle]

~~max~~

hi! i have a party very similar to merkin's.

i have a bard who is learning lockpicking. but you will run into recruitable npcs who fill in other areas. like, oh say, a real rogue ::whistles nonchalantly:: and a few others.

i love the ranger! wow!! one shot,insta-kill early in the game is great!

so far, i found that they were a bit weak in the first area, but i think that's mostly from fumbling around finding each char's strong and weak points. And learning how to use them best.

just so you don't get surprised, a LOT of peeps have re-started 4 or 5 times, trying to get a good team. the upshot seems to be, its not the class necessarily, but how you take advantage of their best points.

anyway, i am sure you will love the game. it's fantastic. see ya when you report back in!

V***V

[Max]

Kewl stuff that was just the kinda response that I was after, thank you all kindly.

I must add one point here though...this is kinda of topic, but I feel I should add this.

Upon opening my game to install, I found no game inside the box only a load of A4 sheets of paper cut in half to add weight to the box. As you can imagine I hit the roof. Luckily, I took the game back to where it was purchased and they changed it with no problems. I didn not think this would be the case as the seal had been brken on the box and they could have refused to do this. As I say I have been lucky.

But as a WARNING to others please open any software you buy in the shop/store where you purchase it, and check it fully before leaving the store. Once the seal is broken the store does not have to replace or change the software the proper procedure would be to contact the maker or publisher of the sofware to argue your case with them.

The store only changed mine because they had heard of this happening before, other stores may not be so amicable. I'm sure this is not an eppisode that only applys to Wizardry 8, it just happend to me on the purchase of this game but there may be other Wizardry games out there with the same thing.

Oh! That's just TERRIBLE! [img]graemlins/madhell.gif[/img]

Some people ought not be allowed out of their houses you know?!

I wanted to tell you how great a Monk is...I have an Elite party of all human males and the monk just rocks beyond words...martial arts, polearm, staff & wand...throwing...the dude can shoot a sling blinded and hit his target while those with uninhibited site couldn't hit the broad side of a barn. I am glad I added him to my crew.

[Virgil]

One quick point. In W&W, the plan was to start basic characters and switch them to other classes during the game. In W8, this doesn't work so well. The best plan is to pick a balanced party and stick with the same classes through out the game. Some class changes, like mage to bishop or priest to valkyrie, make sense, but switching a bard to a gadgeteer or an alchemist to a lord tend to be counter productive.

[TomeTraveler]

The samurai has been satisfactory for me, though he took a while to develop--samurais are only as good as their weapons, and he didn't begin to shine till I gave him Fang. My entire first party (well, the first party I've finished the game with) in fact, was rather slow-developing (samurai, monk, ninja, ranger, gadgeteer, bishop).

To echo someone else's comment, the monk rocks. She maintains a substantial lead in kills, fighting barehanded. My faerie ninja, on the other hand, was a disappointment until I gained the cane of corpus.

The ranger worked out well: the raw power of the other physical classes isn't there, but her scouting is *such* a convenience that I can live with her simply being a ranged weapons expert and swinging a polearm from the flank (just to keep in practice, and save ammo).

The gadgeteer--I had to have one, it being the one new class, and he's fun (and has a lot of character) but he's definitely the weakest in my party, combatwise. You don't find the components for the most powerful gadgets until late enough in the game that the opponents' magical defenses will render the gadgets mostly useless, the water cannon being the major exception.

Finally the bishop, my sole "primary" caster. He took a long time to develop (and being a dwarf, even longer than most bishops), having split his training points three ways among wizardry, divinity, and psionics and trusted to practice to build his casting skills. I suffered through a lot of fizzles and backfires before he finally began to shine, but I'm well satisfied with him now. His direct damage capacity kept the party alive during the middle levels (later, with opponents mostly shielded and resistant to magic, his direct damage spells find a lot less use but he still earns his pay. I imagine one could build a bishop faster by starting 'em off as a mage or priest, but I've already built up an aversion to changing classes in Wizardry 8 (didn't like it that much in 6 or 7, either, but it was so powerful a tool in those that I did it often anyhow). However, I'd think that any two-caster party could do as well or better, if rather than starting off with the "standard" priest/mage combo, they took 2 bishops, the first specializing in wizardry/alchemy, the second in psionics/divinity.

If I were trying to make a variant of this party to go through again, I'd replace the ninja and gadgeteer with fighter and bard. There are a *lot* of nice instruments out there for bards and the NPC bard I had stayed with the party only a short time.

Enjoy the game!

--TT

[Scronan]

Hi,

Thought I'd add a comment or two here, my current party is:

Gnome Valkyre (Import from Wiz 7)
Human Fighter (new)
Mook Bard (female, new)
Elven Ranger (import)
Felpurr Mage (import)
Rawulf Priest (import)
Vi Domina
Madras

I agree with Sazerac fully, both Bards and Rangers are AWESOME in this game! Now that my Bard has got her hands on some really useful instruments, I rarely use magic from my Priest. The dulcimer of mending is a godsend, and I've found two of them so far. Just make sure your Bard is female so she can use some of the stamina regenerating items, and make sure their Piety and Vitality is high. She's also not a bad fighter, but works more with tripping up the foes to let the front line fighters take em out.

Also, Gageteers are pretty useful. I've got Madras up to level 16, and now his Omingun fires arrows and bolts. He has over 100 in ranged combat about 95 in Modern weapon, so he's doing 3 strikes twice per round. It uses up rocks and arrows like no tomorrow, but he can do some good damaage. And the high level gadgets some in VERY handy.

I'm also planning on switching my Priest and Mage once they get level 18 and get level 7 spells. I've been working with buying (or ahem stealing) magic books so they can learn the best spells faster. I think the Priest would make a great Bishop, and I'm not sure about my Mage. My original plan was to make him a Samurai like he was in Wiz 6 and 7 (he's come a long way!), but I may do Ninja or Monk.

Also, when making magic users, keep the following in mind:

Work on the realms of Fire, Water, Air and Divine. Once you can get either Knock Knock (Earth) or Divine Trap (mental), go to a chest or door as is appropriate and just keep casting the spell at level 1. In usually 30-60 minutes, you can get your character 75+ in that realm and your base magic skills (Wizardry, Power Cast) will go up as well. This will really help your magic user to get powerful fast. For instance, my Ranger developed really good combat but no magical skills. Once I got him Knock knock, I worked on a door until his Earth magic went up to 90. Also, his Alcemy went from 30-60, which enabled him to get all the spells he was missing out on after a few more level ups. Now his magic packs a punch. [img]smile.gif[/img]

There's a lot of variation in this game, so I think there's a lot of ways to do things, but that's half the fun! Instead of having to switch class to make uber characters, in Wiz 8 it seems you just have to make any class the best they can be. [img]smile.gif[/img]

Good luck!

Scronan