Perhaps, I managed to stumble upon a winning combo that has kept my interest going in my latest Wizardry 6 play through. That combo is the party that I have created from the previous blog post where I’ve managed to make it work and feel reasonably satisfied with the results. Is it perfect? By no means yes but is it better than what I had hoped? Absolutely. Let me talk a little bit about where I am and where I hope to go at the moment.
I’m beginning to enter the mid-game portion of Wizardry where I’m in the early stages of the Mines. I just burnt all my gold buying the Vulcan Hammer but the cost is certainly worth the expense. Effectively, my Dwarf Fighter’s damage has doubled and feels more reliable. The side effect of equipping the Vulcan Hammer is that you also gain 50% fire resistance and can cast Fireball. I doubt that outside of an absolute emergency, using that inherent ability would be a good idea but it is there.
In addition, I purchased the Fauchard and Monstrance for my Valkyrie and Priest respectively. Unfortunately, I don’t see any good upgrades for my Ranger at the Smitty NPC shop which sucks because her damage is quite low. I know there’s a Great Bow in the game that provides better hit and some valuable critical strike 5% capability. But I read that it’s only available as a drop from Highlanders and NPCs. Even when I was farming the Enchanted Forest zone, I was not able to stumble upon one (only Vex Bows) so I’ll have to wait for that to come my way.
Something I learned as well is that if you can hide in shadows, you can assault from the rear. I feel like a complete idiot not knowing this was possible (although I figured something like this might in the game but I didn’t try). As a result, I’m going to arm my Bard with a Cutlass and begin backstabbing with him to practice his Sword skill prior to swapping him into a Samurai. Slings are simply a useless weapon in the game as they deal almost no damage and have virtually zero upgrades outside of ammo. They might be better suited for a pure spell caster type but long Staves are far better (unless you have Ninjitsu and wield a wand, short staff or dagger). I would like to try having my Bard dual wield but the video I saw of another Bard backstabbing only utilized a single weapon. I do know that Bucklers can be used by Bards so I might try that too just to help boost his AC slightly.
Either way, this situation changes a lot with my strategy and how much more effective I can make this party. For instance, my end game party might see more modifications in terms of a few more class changes. For instance, I might consider using a Lord as part of the end game party to help with front line tanking since a Ninja could be positioned in the rear. Generally, I’ve made my whole party hide in the shadows once they all acquire Ninjitsu so this switch in tactics doesn’t really change too much for the end game.
One takeaway though from this lesson is that my latest starting party combinations probably would not change. I am slightly frustrated with the progression of the Ranger though. I don’t think I’m really getting as much out of her as I’d like since her damage is just so low and the amount of skill points I can allocate per level feels gimped as a result of the stifling and totally useless Scouting ability. Given that Rangers have Ninjitsu, I’m inclined to equip her with a Cutlass and the Skull Dagger (if dual wielding is permitted for Rangers) and see if that changes the game play. Her Bow skill isn’t great and the damage is very low where I’m less inclined to continue using it until I either find better arrows and a better bow. I will use it in the interim to push it past level 51 to prevent he game from automatically adding points into that skill though.
If I do have one complaint about this party (besides the Ranger’s ineffectiveness), it’s that the Mage aspect is really lacking. I was hoping that the Bard would be the one to dominate by this point but I think the Bard’s intelligence is quite low. Also, for whatever reason, I’m not seeing enough skill points even after pushing my Music skill past 51. While I’ve read that intelligence does not play a role in the number of skill points received per level, something is amiss. I have seen my Bard receiving up to 9 skill points though but I had to reload the game a few times until that number came up. However, his spell power is low and I’m at the point of the game where more groups are popping up. So this can be disconcerting. It makes me question whether or not taking the Ranger was worth it at all at this stage of the game or if the Ranger really is better off as a mid to late game upgrade.
Along those lines, I’m beginning to wonder if having a Dracon as the Ninja was a good idea. It seems like a common way to roll a starting Ninja but the main purpose for using a Dracon is the Breath attack. In truth, I’ve used the Breath attack once this entire time. The only other starting race that might be good for a Ninja is a Faerie due to the bonus AC. You would need a very high bonus roll to be able to play a Faerie Ninja from the start (and a male one too). Given that situation and looking at my end game party, the Faerie still works despite the gear limitations because of how I eventually change my Ninja’s class to a Bishop. By then you should be able to use the important items for a Bishop.
So what I might try is seeing if I can help the damage out a bit in changing weapons for my Bard and possibly my Ranger. I read that some of the low damage from the Ranger is due to her low speed. I don’t want to give up just yet on my Ranger. But with these new seeds planted, I had one final party idea:
- Male Dwarf Fighter
- Female Elf Valkyrie
- Male Faerie Ninja
- Male Felpurr Bard
- Male Rawulf Priest
- Female Elf Mage
I eliminate the Ranger completely in this party and save it for the late stages of the game. I change the Ninja to a Faerie (if I can hit the roll) so I can use more exotic, Faerie-only items in the end game as well as gain bonuses to both AC and magic regeneration (which comes out handy for the later change to a Bishop). Instead of using a Female Elf Ranger, we go with a Female Elf Mage that focuses more heavily early on for offensive magic to deal with groups during the mid game. That alleviates a lot of pressure from the Bard and gives me a secondary source of Sleep spells early game and more single target damaging spells like Energy Blast.
Since I do have a Female Elf Bishop around, I could substitute the Female Elf Mage for a Bishop. That gives me more healing early on but the mid-game slows to molasses as a result of the slower experience progression as well as spell progression. In starting with a Mage, I’ll be able to build up towards Fireball, Iceball and Magic Missile earlier with having a far bigger spell pool. Then in changing to a Bishop mid-game, the progression picks up again as I develop the Priest theology side. In doing that, my Bard can focus more on Skulduggery with a few points tossed into Thaumaturgy as well as doing the occasional backstabbing with a Cutlass to begin building up his Sword skills.
I think if the Ranger had better armor options, she would make for a better front line character. Like if she were able to use up to chain mail, she could serve as a melee character. Or if the Ranger had Kirijitsu, I could devote a few points into that periodically. But the early game with a Ranger feels awful. The only positive in having a Ranger at all in a starting party is seeing another character with high hit points. Or if this stupid game wouldn’t auto assign Scouting skill points every level, I’d have enough spare points to put into Alchemy and she would feel more useful lobbing spells in slot #4. Everyone else has a clear purpose at this stage. Maybe the only real benefit for the Ranger is having Ninjitsu. But you can’t backstab with a bow so your damage is still gimped.
The one major downside about swapping the Ranger for a Mage is that you will share the leveling experience with the Bard and Priest in this party. That means, anytime you level you will have to carefully select whether or not you want to keep the results. Because of that issue, the Bishop might be slightly more preferable, although you would early on level in parallel with the Ninja. You could go with a Monk instead of a Ninja but I think Ninjas are better than Monks for a long period and you wouldn’t really gain the same benefit for a Faerie Monk compared to a Faerie Ninja (I think the AC is slightly better for a Ninja as well as having a guaranteed long term Skulduggery assignee once you convert your Bard).
You * could * simply kill the Bard to create an artificial starting XP penalty but that seems silly as you’ll lose a point of precious Vitality. But this problem is more due to the stupid way the leveling process occurs (there should have been a button that a player could push to level up their character). Now, I did see someone using an Alchemist as part of a starting party which is somewhat intriguing because you won’t have spell failures due to a low Oratory score. While the idea is intriguing, the issue I see is that you can’t beat a Mage’s offensive spell book. You do level up as fast as a Valkyrie and probably can transition into a Ranger. If you did that transition, the main benefit would be fast level during the mid-game, low gear requirements for the transition and being able to lob spells while in stealth mode. But you still would incur the issue with Scouting that ruins the leveling experience with a Ranger for me. Not to mention when you drop your attributes down to a Ranger’s minimum, you lose a lot of the benefits from a well rolled Ranger from the start. So that transition doesn’t sound enticing for a mid-game profession change. In that scenario, a Dwarf would actually make good candidates for the Alchemist with a Ranger mid-game class change in mind. It just kills my desire to end with a Valkyrie (I guess I could make this character a female….)
In addition, by using an Alchemist in the starting party rather than a Mage, you’ll be building up your Air spell pool much faster than anyone else. So you don’t have to worry about your Priest pushing their Air spells as hard since the original goal was to get Cure Poison as soon as possible. Here, the Alchemist becomes responsible which allows the Priest more freedom in selecting other key spells like Cure Paralysis. You still will want multiple characters with curative abilities overlapping but you don’t have to put all your eggs in one basket. Also, you’ll be building up your Valkyrie as the secondary healer which should help offset the pressure on the Priest. Also, compared to a Mage, your hit points will be higher. If you go with a Dwarf, you should be able to survive just fine.
Why not a Psionic? Unlike an Alchemist, the Psionic does suffer from being forced to deal with Oratory skills. Meaning you still can fizzle a spell and be Silenced. In playing a Monk, I found that Mental spells are easier to resist as well so it’s just better to run with a Monk than a Psionic. At least with the pure Alchemist, you’ll get off guaranteed spells. Blinding Flash is one of the better early ones too so this character can debuff enemies in conjunction with your Bard.
Again, none of this is set in stone. It’s just theorycrafting where I’m trying to find interesting ways to play a game while figuring out where the rough spots are. At least for now, I’m still going to give the Ranger a chance for a bit longer. But I am tempted to start all over and use either a Mage or Alchemist given these new ideas I put down here.