My previous blog explored some thought experiments on the direction I wanted to take my party. After growing frustrated at the little zone that leads to the Enchanted Forest in the basement, I ended up making some modifications to my party to help give myself a little boost. Without actually increasing my XP, I mostly had augmented certain skills, attributes, etc. since I realized that the grind to return to a previous state in my past gaming situation had slowed down at the mid-game point. Since I’m also in the middle of the new Diablo 4 Season 7 (or rather taking a pause because I’m somewhat bored with it already), I didn’t want to spend the next year just grinding away. At any rate, the thought experiment has changed as a result of the updated path as well as where my party is now. So I want to look at things in terms of my next moves when it comes to changing professions/classes.
Currently, my party composition looks something like this:
- Male Felpurr Samurai Level 15
- Female Elf Monk Level Level 15
- Male Dracon Ninja Level 14
- Female Human Valkyrie Level 17
- Female Elf Bishop Level 14
- Female Elf Bishop Level 14
As it stands, my little “boost” allowed me to give everyone Ninjitsu and Kirijitsu. I won’t say how high but it basically lessened the necessity for changing to certain elite classes. But as I was able to push forward faster, I set a goal where I wanted to try and obtain some of the most powerful spells per class on each character before swapping professions. With that said, my Monk and Valkyrie came out ahead. Originally, I had thought about swapping my Valkyrie to a Bard. What I’ve come to realize though is that the Bard is better off as an early stage class than later on because of the stat drop upon changing professions. Also, the Bard’s gear just sucks at the higher end and losing all that melee prowess really hurts especially if you grind for long periods in that Enchanted Forest zone.
Originally, my idea was to change the Monk into either a Lord or Valkyrie then turn my Valkyrie into a Monk. I hesitated though because I wanted to switch both my Bishops into melee characters, where they would both become a Monk and Ninja respectively. However, the progress for gaining all the high level Priest and Mage spells make the profession change at this stage feel premature. So I’m now reconsidering that the move would be to go back to the first idea of doing the Lord/Monk swap until my other four characters are ready for a class change.
The other issue is that I believe it is a poor idea to change all of your party’s professions at the same time. While you still have the old skills at a high level, you lose access to a lot of powers. The better option is to only swap once you have nothing left to gain. Some people prefer swapping professions earlier because of the sheer amount of experience it takes to level during the mid-game (9-11+). The main downside in that approach is that unless you started with more basic classes (e.g. raw fighter, mage, priest, etc.), you might be missing out on key spells or be forced to select your old class or some a class with a redundant spell school (e.g. Samurai -> Bishop).
I suppose all this boils down to planning in terms of your strategy. If you enjoy prestige classes like I do, then it’s better to change professions once you obtain the best spells, imo. So that requires a longer term strategy and grind. If you hate dealing with the rolling classes and want a fast leveling experience as well as not dealing with poor low level gear (because Samurais, Ninja and Monks have a hard time finding upgrades if any exist at all), then going with less restrictive characters would be better and allow for earlier profession changes.
That said, in my case, I’ve already made my bed and unless I decide to start from scratch, I’m going to stick with the prestige path, which means a longer stretch of leveling prior to changing professions. With that idea in mind, I think the immediate goal will be converting my Valkyrie into a Monk and the Monk into a Lord or Valkyrie. Now, in terms of choosing a Lord vs a Valkyrie, here’s my views on the matter.
Valkyrie vs Lord
On paper, a Valkyrie functions very closely to a Lord. They virtually have the same weapons and armor and can access priest spells (Theology). However, the Lord gets more hit points than a Valkyrie and requires more experience to level up. And you can only choose a female as a Valkyrie which means you will have a small strength penalty early on.
Valkyries are better starting classes than Lords though because of the lower attribute requirement. So if you want to play a class paladin style (i.e. fighter + priest) type of class, the Valkyrie is much easier to role at the start and easier to level.
At the mid-late game though, the Lord starts to become a little better. I would argue that the mid-game profession change the Lord is better if you don’t intend to change professions anymore. When you start from level 1, the attribute penalty won’t be as bad as the Valkyrie and you can probably catch up quickly while not suffering too much on the damage end. Like if you had a bland fighter, then a Lord would be a logical step to swap to once you gain enough attribute points.
The end game though becomes a little muddled because if you end up swapping a few times, you still need to catch up with the old class. That’s where a Valkyrie would be easier if you intended to swap a character’s professions multiple times. Also, the Valkyrie has a few pieces of late game gear that make it worth using.
Back to the Party
With that thought in mind, I’m going to list out the latest thought experiment in my party progression:
- Samurai -> Ninja (Alchemy) -> Lord (Theology)
- Monk -> Lord / Valkyrie (Theology) -> Bard or Ranger
- Ninja -> Bishop (Theology / Thaumaturgy)
- Valkyrie -> Monk (Theosophy) -> Samurai (Thaumaturgy)
- Bishop -> Ranger (Alchemy) -> Monk (Theosophy)
- Bishop -> Ninja (Alchemy)
The ordering here is the evolution of my characters not necessarily when I should change them. Notice that I do not include any pure spell casters like a Priest or Alchemist. There’s really no reason to use them in later stages of the game. A few notes here.
The Valkyrie and Monk are the immediate ones I would change. It’s probably a lot simpler if I exchange their classes and positions in the party. The nice thing about swapping my Monk to my Valkyrie is that she already has some points placed into Polearms so the swap won’t hurt badly. Also, I won’t have to worry about AC since my Valkyrie’s Ninjitsu already is at 100 (as well as Kirijitsu). Also, my Valkyrie’s Oratory is quite high which allows me to put all emphasis during leveling up on Theosophy, obtaining Psionic specific spells and filling in the gaps that may overlap between Priest and Psionic spells.
After those two swap classes, the next one on the list probably will be my Samurai. At this point in time, my goal is to quickly obtain the Nuclear Blast spell and any other powerful Mage school spells before the class swap. His Thaumaturgy is at 85 which means it’ll take at least 2-3 more levels until I can max that skill out and get the highest level spells. I don’t have to be a completionist in this but the Nuclear Blast spell is a high end nice to have. Also, when I swap to Ninja, the nice thing is that the Enchanted Forest zone has plenty of ninjas to fight, which drop all the gear you’d need.
My ninja will probably continue to level as a Ninja for a while. Right now, his alchemy skill is at 64 and it’s taking a ridiculous amount of time to gain levels. I expect that the Bishops and he will take some time before reaching a point where I feel comfortable profession swapping.
I did mark one of the Bishops as having only a single profession swap. The way I see it, in all likelihood without the aid of more books, it’s really hard maximizing a Bishop. Also, having all that power then doing the sudden profession swap means you’ll be losing a great deal of spell power until more classes come online. So I’ll keep at least one Bishop in that profession for a while.
However, for the other Bishop, leveling as a Ranger will make things very quick. I read someone posting how Rangers are a dud class. I think that’s only true for the end game if you don’t swap professions or don’t try to make use of certain end game gear. I think a Ranger with Kirijitsu and a bow might do quite well in situations where you have a potent singular foe that neither spells nor melee can touch, which is why I partly included one as the last potential profession swap in the end game.
At any rate, I might give this a try soon. I think the current strategy in the near future is to swap the Monk and Valkyrie around (probably just going to do a literal profession and gear swap), hit a low level area like the Mines with the fountain and grind until level 6-7, return to the Enchanted Forest zone and power level them back up. That does mean the other four characters won’t be leveling in the near future until both the Monk and Valkyrie are at a reasonable spot, but getting them back up to where they’re functional (usually around level 11) would be the immediate goal.
The real nasty part about profession changing is the loss of multiple attacks. At least what I’m seeing at the moment, my Monk and Valkyrie do significant damage and destruction as just melee. So I’m hoping that retaining the other skills will make the re-leveling process bearable.
One thing I am thinking of doing in the near future is posting a party composition blog. I will discuss the benefits of what I’ve done but I might talk about other parties now that I’ve read other posts on the subject matter. I don’t know if I’d want to restart the game from scratch at this stage. But I think it is an interesting discussion to be had.