1. Backup your game installation and especially your save game files before modifying anything.
2. run CosmicForgeU.exe (or wine CosmicForgeU.exe if you’re on a linux/unix type of system like a mac)
3. click on Miscellaneous on the menu
4. Choose View Game Information from the menu
5. You will see all the class names on the top box.
   
6. Select the class you want to modify the mana regeneration
7. Click on Modify Class on the right side button
8. On the upper right side with the Mana Regeneration, choose the spell school you want to alter and double click on it
9. Update the number to be the value you want and hit the OK button
   
10. Repeat as necessary per spell school class/character class
11. Close out the other windows until you get back to the main one
12. Hit Save (not sure if you need this but I do it regardless)
13. Load your game and test the update
14. Enjoy!

The post Wizardry 6: How to Improve the Default Mana Regeneration Using Mad God’s Utility appeared first on Kontroversial Keith.

First, there are a few guides on installing the patch utility. I wrote one up for dealing with the basic utility and there’s another write up that mostly focuses on the encumbrance bug. You might have to do additional stuff to get Wine working on the Mac as this is a dos program. But my write up includes another link that goes into more detail on dealing with things like WineTricks. However, that other guide is aimed more for BaneEdit.exe. I suggest checking the two links to see which fits your situation better.

Once you get the utility setup, configured and running, you will see a general interface like this:

The key piece in this interface is the section called “Patches.” From there, you see another popup/modal with the following:

Here, you will see the various patches that you can apply. Some are reversible, others are permanent. But this screen will show you which patches have been applied. I’m guessing that GoG, etc. might have already applied as few such as the “Affect All” patch, where spells like Nuclear Blast would fail to damage your enemies due to a bug. At any rate, some of these patches are considered bug fixes, so you might consider using them in case you were unaware of an issue (like the Poison debuff one).

The utility file itself comes with a patch notes section for both Wizardry 6 and 7. The most relevant patches I found were the following ones.

Attribute Bonus Generation

The original algorithm both for W6 & W7 is as follows:

Character gets 1d6+4 bonus points (5-10)
If what the character got is less than 9
(S)He gets 1d4+7 bonus points (8-11) 2/3
Otherwise
It is 1/20 that (s)he may gain additional +8 bonus points (13-18) 1/60
It is 1/20 that (s)he may gain additional +8 bonus points (21-26) 1/1200
End

The patched algorithm both for W6 & W7 is as follows:

Character gets 1d19+7 bonus points (8-26)
If what the character got is less than 9
(S)He gets 1d4+7 bonus points (8-11) 1/19
End

To me, this is the most valuable patch of the bunch because character creation in this game is really bad. Unless you really enjoy pain, suffering and endless wasting time in trying to create a character because you have some stupid, impractical notion of honor, be my guest and wither away in agony. However, I think a lot of sensible veterans would have to agree that creating a decent starting character should not take hours by itself. Also, if you want to try different things and take advantage of the game’s issues like Mana Regeneration problems, you practically need to do some level of editing and min/maxing.

In my case, I have applied the patch and I can still roll stinky amounts but it’s far rarer than seeing a 5 show up as my bonus roll compared to before. Since you can get up to 26 bonus points from the start, you can get more flexibility in your starting party. Because if with a utility like BaneEdit.exe that allows you to edit your attributes, BaneEdit.exe won’t work without a saved game and a starting party. So pick your poison here.

Removing Shoot and Throw Attack Restriction.

The problem with missile weapons in this game, especially Bows for me, is that they are mostly worthless. One of the neatest items in the game is the Elven Bow, but it already is plagued by issues like the class and race restrictions. However, you don’t get any bonuses from hiding in the shadows when you attack with a missile weapon, so you do far less damage. Even worse, you can’t multiple multiple swings (or shots) with a missile weapon. In turn, this makes the Ranger an absolutely abysmal class because their armor is bad and their general damage is bad. This patch tries to fix some of these issues by upgrading the number of shots someone can do, which should incentive using a Ranger. The key notes of this part of the patch reads as follows:

The base logic of the game concerning this matter is that when the attack type of the monster or
one of your characters is either ‘Throw’ or ‘Shoot’ type, than ‘Swings per attack’ is defaulting to 1.

The patch removes that restriction, so in that case the monster or one of your characters can ‘Shoot’
or ‘Throw’ more than once per attack (providing that (s)he has ‘Swings per attack’ > 1). Thus the patch
rejuvenates projectile and throwing weaponry.

But there are several flaws in this patch:

• Your character will lose only one missile from its inventory regardless of the number of shots made
  per attack (that is the cheating part – My response: who cares? Ammunition management sucks in general).
• Animation for the missile will be drawn once (does not really matters).
• Some monsters will become VERY powerful, notably ROBOTS. ROBOTS have powerful enough weapons such as
  LASER CANNON, PLASMA CANNON and SPECTRAL RAY which hurts badly the whole party. In the unpatched game
  they will only shoot that once per attack, in the patched version they may (and will) shoot it more than
  once. (My response – Does not apply in Wizardry 6 at least with regards to robots)

In general, this massively upgrades using a Bow and makes the Ranger class more appealing both as an intermediary class (midgame change) where you gain some stealth, can use a Bow and employ Alchemy and potentially as an end game class since the Elven Bow adds Critical Hit. Ranger’s armor mostly sucks but you will get the the Forest Cape, which has some nice resistances. Also, if you swap into the class from a class that has Kirijitsu, then you can nullify a good chunk of the defects in the class from the core game. With a solid Ranger armed with the Elven Bow being able to fire critically hitting arrows from the shadows multiple times per attack, you gain a specialized character that can potentially take down enemies in the rear, especially spell casters or highly resistant enemies that might lob special attacks at your group.

Another thing is that with these upgrades, a mid game Ranger becomes more feasible as you do not have to deal with armor issues still, have lower requirements than a Ninja (which progresses far slower), will gain a fair number of hit points per level and can function as a lockpicker as they have Skulduggery. Also, you would gain Alchemy without having to change into an Alchemist (which would feel pointless mid game) or a Ninja (where you won’t have their garb). So this patch does a lot to improve this class and it’s something that would make me reconsider how I can structure a party because of this new dynamic.

Encumbrance Bug

Another major problem with the original game was how Carrying Capacity/Encumbrance was determined at the start of the game. Strength dictates how much you could carry so regardless of the class you picked, you would always want a fair amount of strength to ensure you could hold anything. Even if you didn’t want to deal with the Mana Regeneration issue but still tried to create any pure spell caster type, if you knew about this bug, you would still need to allocate points into strength as opposed to your true main stats. So the patch corrects this issue by adjusting your CC as you level. I’m guessing that as you improve your strength, your CC should correctly adjust. I’m not sure if it goes down on changing classes but even if you’re a purist, you have to agree that your CC should increase if you get stronger at least. So this is another really good patch to install.

Other Patches

The remaining ones are either enhancements or a few key bug fixes like the Poison debuff one. These mostly are up to you. Some are labeled enhancements like one where a few classes are given an immunity. I’m not that big of a fan of that idea. I still want to keep the base game close to vanilla as possible. There is a patch for resting in the notes, but I can’t seem to find it in the actual list. However, it might be for Wizardry 7, despite how the description sounds fairly general for both games.

On the other hand, you can modify certain parts of the game like Mana Regeneration, which is silly to a degree. Or you can use the utility to even modify the maps, loot, etc. It’s a fairly robust editor that allows you to change a chunk of the game. I would only do this if I was supremely bored with the core game or wanted to give myself some small QoL (like adding a Lute or Ninja garb in the starting chests)

I think though with the above patches I suggested, I would like to give the Ranger another shot (pun partly intended). It’s one class that I think got badly shafted in this game. I read that they managed to fix the class up in later games. But I think having a dedicated ranged class in this game does add a small but interesting dynamic.

The post Wizardry 6: Patching the Game with Mad God’s Utility, Suggested Patches and Ranger Improvement appeared first on Kontroversial Keith.

Tier 1 Items

The Castle up until the Dwarf Mine should be considered in this category. The Castle itself has two vendors: L’Montes and Queequeg. L’Montes is unlocked through a small quest and can be found by locating his missing stuffed beagle while Queequeg is underneath the Castle in the basement. L’Montes doesn’t have much for sale while Queequeg probably will end up being your main spot for selling off gear. In the early part of the game, you probably should use Queequeg to upgrade lower grade armor and a few weapons if you either did a character transfer or if you have the money. Here are the best items I think worth buying from Queequeg:

• Halberd (for Valkyries)
• Katana/Wakizashi (if you did an early class change into a Samurai)
• Cure Poison (easy spot to restock on these)
• Cure Lt. Cnd
• Books of Direction, Knocks, Detection (don’t bother learning these during level ups unless you have nothing else to choose)
• Leather Boots (for most fighter types except Samurai. Also, Bards and Rangers)
• Buskins (Bishop and Samurai’s best footwear excluding Water Wings)
• Cuir Gauntlets (most fighters can use this)
• Buckler (bis Bards if you want more armor and don’t want to dual wield)
• Leather Leggings (for most fighter types and bards; but not Rangers oddly)
• Quilt Leggings (great for Bishops if you decide to take one early on)
• Suede Pants (good for Rangers but these are common enough to just find)
• Leather Cuirass (best entry level body armor for most fighters and the Bard)
• Quilt Tunic (great for Bishops)
• Suede Doublet (for Rangers)
• Feather Hat (for Rangers and Bards)
• Leather Helm (for Fighter types)
• Elm Arrows (worst for bows but cheap and plentiful until you can start farming Drow Elves)
• Quarter Staff (for Mages because a plain Staff just stinks)

The other major items in the castle are:

• Harmonium (in the basement jail)
• An Annointed Cloak (which should go to your Lord)
• An Stud-Cuir Bra +2 (which is decent as a starting body armor for a Valkyrie)
• Breastplate (found in the Captain’s Den in the backroom which is good for your front line non-Samurai fighter)
• Skull Dagger (good as an offhand for a Bard)
• Heraldic Shield (great for Lord or Fighter especially wielding the Sword of Striking)
• Chain Hauberk (good for Lord, Fighter or Valkyrie).

Unless you decided to swap to a Bard, your Bard’s starting Lute will be the best instrument he/she can use for a while. The Harmonium is okay for certain situations but incapacitating opponents and doing max damage is far more valuable in the early game. Otherwise, you’ll have to get lucky in picking one up in the Mines, which I heard has a very low drop rate.

Tier 2 Items

I would argue that the Mines are where some better items start coming into play. You can still survive on Tier 1 weapons like for your Samurai or if you’re still using the Sword of Striking from the box near the entrance of the castle. But I would suggest trying to get to Smithy, another vendor located on the first level of the Mines, as soon as you can. Hopefully by this point, you’ll have 18k worth of gold as he sells a top tier item (the Vulcan Hammer) which is great for a fighter type like a Lord or plain Fighter. Armor-wise, I don’t think he has much but the Mine itself and the Hazard Area have a few random treasures that probably will help upgrade most of your fighters’ armor. Samurai will continue to face armor issues for a while though. The rest of the party probably won’t be able to upgrade any armor in Tier 2. But your spell casters should focus on pushing the spell skills every time they level and cast when possible to increase their Oratory while your Bards (who should be in position #5) can use Hide in Shadows to avoid damage when not playing their instruments. But Smithy’s best items are:

• Vulcan Hammer (priced at 18k from last I checked; you will need to level up your Mace & Flail skill though but totally worth it)
• Lance (small hit penalty but better damage than a Halberd for your Valkyrie)
• Naginata (possibly your Samurai’s biggest weapon upgrade at this stage but you’ll have to swap to polearms)
• Monstrance (a Bishop or Priest’s best weapon here)
• No-Dachi (can’t recall if Smithy sells one here. If he does, then this is your Samurai’s best weapon despite dropping your offhand Wakizashi).

For Monks and Ninjas, your Hands & Feet are your best weapons so don’t bother picking up any weapons. Beyond Smithy, the Mines has a few random armor upgrades and a key instrument that will be great for your Bard:

• Steel Helm (great for any fighter)
• Angel’s Tongue (excellent for your Bard once Sleep stops being effective)
• Wizard’s Ring (quest item that also gives you a small AC bonus to mages; not sure if it goes away after using though)
• Wizard’s Cone (small AC boost and an upgrade to your Mage/Psionic/Alchemist from a Skullcap)
• Shadow Cloak (found in a chest in one of the darkness zones; Should give this to either your Ninja or Bard)

The Pyramid section, which I still consider part of the later mid-game, does pose tougher opponents but there’s not a lot of gear upgrades. However, the main vendor, Kuwali Kubona, has a lot of useful spell books. If you can avoid learning spells during the leveling process, you should pick up any stragglers from her. The only negative aspect is that anytime you travel here and want to speak with Kuwali Kubona, you must present an offering to the Amazulu Queen. Most people I’ve read simply dump their spare keys from the Castle but you should have at least one non-quest item that you’re prepared to ditch when you want to trade here.

Tier 3 Items

The River Styx is the start of the end game for me. Many difficult encounters pop up here and people suggest that this is where you will want to spend time grinding out a few levels to around 11-13 and changing to more elite classes. The most important NPC here (next to Charon) is Mai-Lai as she is a vendor who sells the next major set of upgrades.

• Cat’o Nine Tails (bizarre Mace & Flail categorized weapon that does high damage for a 1H weapon)
• Holy Basher (for your Bishop with a great Knockout effect to boot)
• Blade Cuisinart (great for fighters)
• Helm & Coif (great helmet upgrade for fighters)
• Full Plate U/L (really good armor upgrade for fighters)
• Studded Hauberk (good for Bard and Samurai body armor)
• Stud Chausses (legs for Samurai)
• Chamois Gloves (for Bards, Rangers and even Bishops apparently)
• Silver Gloves (for fighters)
• Silver Sollert (boots for fighters)
• Dragon Kite (best shield for your main tank)

You can just go back and forth if an item is not available from Mai-Lai. Other items you can find in this zone are:

• Water Wings (best footwear in the game; probably should give it to a Faerie and/or Bishop/spellcaster)
• Beastmaster (decent 1H sword found from Minos)
• Devil’s Pipe or Midnight Choice (found in the Hall of the Damn; your next useful Bard instruments)

Isle of the Dead/Hall of the Dead

This zone (the tomb part) is single-handledly the best the spot for gear in the game. There are a few other sections where you can still get upgrades, but this area presents some of the hardest fights in the game that provide your BiS gear. Because of how the area is structured and the general difficulty of the fights, you will want to rapidly dart back and forth to the healing fountains (which I believe are the strongest ones in the game and the last ones you’ll find) as you deal with each encounter and clean up the area. You still will be beset by hard encounters, some of which can wipe your party if you’re not careful.

Insane Skeleton

• Jazeraint Tunic (Best item for Bards)
• Jazeraint Skirt (Best item for Bards but only for females)

Robin Windmarne

• Elven Bow (BiS for elves, especially Rangers as it has critical hit bonus)
• Peacemaker (arrows)
• Chainmail Doublet (BiS body armor for Rangers)
• Chainmail Pants (BiS pants for Rangers)
• Forest Cape (Only Rangers can use this item)

The Black Knight

• Avenger (best sword in the game next to Excalibur which has an exceptionally low drop rate I’ve heard)
• Ebony Plate (U) (best body armor for fighters)
• Ebony Plate (L) (best pants for fighters)
• Ebony Heaume (best helmet for fighters)

Brigerd Woltan

• Maenad’s Lance (Valkyrie’s BiS weapon)
• Armet (decent helmet but doesn’t bet the Ebony Heaume)
• Mantis Gloves (best fighter gloves)
• Mantis Boots (best fighter boots)
• Horn of Promethius (best Bard instrument because you gain unlimited Fireballs)

Haiyato Daikuta

• Muramasa Blade (best Samurai main hand weapon; massive damage from this one!)
• Hi-Kane-Do (U) (best Samurai body armor)
• Hi-Kane-Do (L) (best Samurai pants)
• Kabuto (best Samurai helmet)
• Wakizashi+1 (best Samurai offhand)

Enchanted Forest

At this stage, you can choose to go in challenge Rebecca and the Bane King. If you do, I believe you no longer can return to the castle. But if you want to continue grinding levels and changing classes in preparation for the final stages of the end game, there is an alternative method. In the castle’s basement level, there is a strange set of stairs that leads to a gate that is closed. I think you can only open the gate by confronting Rebecca and the Bane King with a special key. However, this zone, although having just two tiles of movement, is still considered part of the Enchanted Forest and has those monsters as part of its encounter table. So you can effectively just stand next to the stairs and spin around and battle some of the top monsters in the game for plenty of experience. Besides the experience factor, these monsters (Liche, Wraith Lords in particular) can still drop highly valuable Ankhs, Rings and Amulets.

• Ring of Speed (+1 speed on usage)
• Ring of Deftness (+1 dexterity)
• Tora Maedate (+1 vitality for Samurai)
• Ring of Minds (+1 intelligence)
• Ankh of Might (+1 strength)
• Ankh of Youth (+1 vitality)
• Ankh of Arnie (+6 max HP permanently)
• Ankh of Purity (+1 karma)
• Ankh of Sanctity (+1 Piety)
• Ankh of Wonder (mana regeneration I believe)

There are other items too but the motivation for getting these items is to increase your base attribute score beyond 18. I think there’s a limited number of times you can boost your attributes though, so you might want to save your game each time you try. Last time I played, I recall that the Ankh of Wonder additionally gave mana regeneration, which is hard to find in the game. So I included it here as a must have for spell casters, even above resistance or bonus armor since by this point it will take a long time to get your spell pools back up to maximum. I believe the highest level I’ve been able to elevate my attributes was up to 20. That said, I recommend only using these items once you determine your final classes going into the end game to avoid dealing with the attribute reset for a class change.

Another comment I have is that you can still find some other gear like for Samurai’s, Ninjas, etc. as you’ll encounter like opponents. For instance, the Tora Maedate is an extremely rare item that I’ve found off of a Lord Daimyo I believe. And by avoiding the central room in the Tomb of the Dead, you will still have access to Queequeg around the corner to sell off any excess gear. Also, if you have a monk and started the end game, there’s a Jade Figurine with some decent bonuses for your Monk.

Temple of Ramm

By this point, you should have the vast majority of your end game gear. There are still a few limited upgrades.

• Robe of Enchant U/L (for your Monk or Bishop; your Monk should have really good natural armor by this stage so your spell caster should use these)

The other guaranteed items can still be found in the Enchanted Forest encounters.

Other Items

If you have a clue book, you might see additional items that are labeled “not in the game”. That just means they won’t drop so you can edit them in. Or there might be items with an exceptionally low drop rate. The only way to get those is by grinding the highest level items. The Diamond Ring, I’ve read, is given to you by one of the end game bosses but may not appear until Wizardry 7. You can still edit one in if you choose.

The post Wizardry 6: Gear Progression appeared first on Kontroversial Keith.

Patching the Game

First, let me say that I finally got around to installing the Mad God’s Cosmic Forge editing utility. If you have BaneEdit.exe running, then getting Mad God’s Cosmic Forge editing utility isn’t that much more difficult. In my case, I use a Mac so there’s a few prerequisites such as installing Wine. However, as I discovered, there were a few additional things required, which is why I made a small guide for getting BaneEdit.exe and Wine working on a Mac.

Once you get Wine installed and manage to get BaneEdit.exe working, you can use CosmicForgeU.exe which is located on a Google Drive. Then you just unrar the file and run it with:

bash-3.2$ wine CosmicForgeU.exe

You will see a setup menu where it will ask you for the game installation. Since the editor is made for Dos, you won’t see the typical BSD/Unix style directories. Instead, you’ll see stuff like C:\ or Z:\ drive. Your game installation ought to be under the Z:\ drive. My full path was:

/Applications/Wizardry 6.app/Contents/Resources/game

That is the only thing you will need to configure. If you use the wrong path, the editor won’t load properly and probably quit out on you, forcing you to go through the steps again. In essence though, the editor is searching for the main game files so that it can patch them properly. You might want to create a backup somewhere as well as have backups of your saved games just in case.

Once you get the editor running, the main thing you will want to do is apply some patches. The most important of these is for Attribute Bonus Generation. This one is reversible and mostly ditches all the low end rolls during the character creation process. I highly suggest this patch even though it’s labeled as a “cheat” unless you enjoy suffering through hours of getting bad rolls. But if you really want to create an ideal power fantasy type of party, this is your best option.

Mechanics

To really get a long term party you have to understand a few critical mechanics about the game, some bugs and aspects like how mana regeneration operates. I had discussed a few of these ideas in the past but want to summarize them here as a review.

• Strength and Carrying Capacity (CC) – The game has a “bug” where your Carrying Capacity is determined by your strength only at character creation time. If you don’t use the patch (labeled “Encumbrance” in the patch section of the utility), you will be stuck with that amount for the remainder of the game. If you have say a female Faerie character, you will then end up not being able to carry anything. And since Faeries have numerous gear restrictions, you might consider using a Faerie as a kind of mule character especially for things like quest items or potions as they might have extra bag space. However, Faeries also are penalized by an additional 1/3 CC penalty. So I suggest applying this patch to avoid dealing with this problem.
• Faeries, Vitality and Mana Regeneration – Mana Regeneration also is fixed in this game is determined by the class you start off with. That makes Priests and Mages by far the best classes that allow for pure Mana Regeneration. For most classes, you will only receive 1 point of mana regeneration as a basis. Lizardmen are the worst because they have a -1 mana regeneration penalty, which makes them effectively a race you want to avoid. On the other hand, Faeries receive a +1 mana regeneration bonus so combining one with a Mage, for instance, seems like a natural choice for the best regeneration. Likewise, Vitality (rather than Intelligence and Piety for some reason) also determines your Mana Regeneration. This means you will want your character to have as much Vitality at the start as possible. I believe you need at minimum 16 points of Vitality to receive this bonus. Faeries though have a very low starting Vitality at 6, which means you will need at least 10 dedicated points to get the best bonus possible. Note that you can modify the starting mana regeneration values through the utility but do so at your discretion.
• Best Class Mana Regeneration – As far as I can tell, the best classes for Mana Regeneration are Alchemists, Mages and Priests. Alchemist though will lack Magic regeneration, which will be important at later stages in the game for healing and dealing with Undead and Demons. Of course, Psionics have the best Mental regeneration but only have 2 points in the other spell schools. Bishops only get 3 points for Mental and Magic regeneration while the rest are at 1 point. So one idea in creating an ideal party is to start off with only Alchemists, Mages and/or Priests to get the best Mana Regeneration possible. This does pose a problem if you want to take a Bard, which almost is mandatory to survive the initial half of the game.
• Bards and the Lute – Bards are almost universally praised as a must-have as part of a starting line up. Unfortunately, the Bard like other non-pure magic classes, only receives 1 point of Mana Regeneration. You can offset some of this by taking a Faerie and attempting to have at least 16 points of Vitality. However, my major issue with the Faerie as a starting Bard is that their equipment limitation prevents them from using a lot of armor. Most likely, you’ll position this character in the back possibly in the 5th slot. However, enemies can still strike out at them, making them vulnerable especially with their low hit starting hit points.
  Also, if you choose to swap from say a Mage to a Bard at level 1, you will be missing the all important Lute. As far as I know, the Lute is a random drop that won’t appear until you encounter Miner or Major Dwarves, which comes roughly at the midpoint of the game and have a very low chance to drop this invaluable item. So other guides propose you will want to start with the Bard just to have this item. If you insist on having the most mana regeneration possible along with doing an immediate class change at the start, you will have to cheat and use a utility like BaneEdit.exe to give yourself this item. But this issue becomes a question of ethics than feasibility.
• Class Change to Ninja – Like the Bard, Ninjas have some very rare starting equipment that you won’t find until towards the start of the end game when you begin encountering Ninjas themselves. So unlike a Monk, who will most likely just use common Robes (U/L) and Sandals for armor, which are readily available and sold by Queequeg, the Ninja will be lacking in -3 points of armor which is pretty huge at the start. On the bright side, if you can survive a few levels, your armor will improve naturally where the main other penalty is the higher experience requirements. In that sense, you might consider a Faerie because of their natural -2 to armor at the start as well as having a natural base speed of 14, which can influence armor too. You won’t be able to use most equipment for a while though, not even robes nor sandals.
• Class Change to Samurai – Unlike the Bard and Ninja, the Samurai’s starting equipment can be purchased at Queequeg’s shop (namely the Katana and Wakizashi). Also, the Samurai only start with Robes (U/L) and Sandals, which makes them a lot easier and a good choice to swap early on from say a Mage.
• Dracons and their Breath Weapon – Dracons have an interesting small AoE ability that is like a black dragon’s acid breath. For a starting party, it might be tempting to pick one of these races up (like for a Ninja). However, this ability does not scale into the end game and you won’t be using it for long. So I think this race is a bit of a red herring to start.
• Psionic and the Shadow Cloak – Perhaps, the one remarkable thing about using a Psionic is that they have a Shadow Cloak that they cannot use. Only thieves, ninjas and bards can use this item oddly. In addition, there’s only one other known Shadow Cloak in the game that appears in the later stage of the early game. Because this item only supplies a -1 to armor, I don’t think it’s worth using nor having a Psionic taking a spare spot in the party.
• Automated Core Skill Leveling – As you level up, you will get a certain amount of skill points. I believe that a portion of this pool is automatically pre-allocated to the main skills for your class as long as that skill is under 50 points. For instance, a Ranger will automatically have points placed into Scouting. If you want to level specific skills, you should ensure that the class does not have a core skill that interferes in taking precedence for receiving points, especially useless skills like Scouting.
• Class Changes, Attributes and Hit Points – When you change classes, your attributes drop the minimum need for the new class, your race’s starting points while your hit point gains will only increase by 1 until you exceed your previous level. If you have a wide gap between classes in terms of levels, it may take sometime before seeing any significant gain in your life. This situation makes swapping to simple classes like a Fighter or Mage pointless. It’s better to swap from a simple class into an elite or mid-tier class rather than the other way around since your race will determine the other attributes. On the other hand, you will level quickly so besides the starting part of the game, you should be judicious in choosing when to swap classes. Altering several classes at the same time might feel exciting but you probably will want to reload to ensure that you can maximize the number of attributes, hit points and skill points you receive for the new level. If you do this at the same time as other classes, there’s a high likelihood that the other class may get the shaft and you’ll have to reload and get lucky.

The Party Composition

With some of the main mechanics established above, I would like to dive into the party creation.

• Male Rawulf Priest
• Male Felpurr Mage
• Male Faerie Alchemist
• Female Dwarf Priest
• Female Elf Mage
• Male Mook Mage

This initial party seems fairly easy to create. However, the only character that will retain his class for a while is the Mook Mage. But this group will be able to have some of the highest spell regeneration in the game. Compared to my previous “optimized” party, I ended up changing the Faerie from a Mage to an Alchemist with the intention of converting him into a Ninja. In turn, I swapped the Felpurr from the Alchemist role to a Mage with the intention of turning him into a Samurai. Note that I chose a Female Elf Mage but have no Bard. I will admit that this character will be swapping to a Bard at level one where I will give her a Lute (and maybe some Skulduggery since locking picking and trap disarmament sucks in this game). Otherwise, her max Mana Regeneration will not exceed 2 points for the rest of the game. If you’re more of a purist and don’t want any edits (outside of the patch parts), you can go with the Bard from the start and have slightly less Mana Regeneration.

The early class transition will look like this:

• Male Rawulf Priest -> Lord (lvl 1/2)
• Male Felpurr Mage -> Samurai (lvl 1/2)
• Faerie Male Alchemist -> Ninja (lvl 2)
• Female Dwarf Priest -> Valkyrie (lvl 1)
• Female Elf Mage -> Bard (lvl 1)
• Male Mook Mage (no change)

The only two that are pretty much a must-have in terms of the class change after the start of the game are the Bard and Valkyrie. I would suggest giving a few starting fights a shot before making the class switch to see how your survival is. Part of that will depend on your starting hit points. Before going into a deeper look into the timing of the class transition, I want to first examine the minimum attribute requirements for the classes to be able to make this switch possible.

Male Rawulf Priest -> Lord Requirements

The male Rawulf’s starting attributes are:

• Str: 8
• Int: 6
• Pie: 12
• Vit: 10
• Dex: 8
• Spd: 8
• Per: 10

The Lord class has one of the highest starting attribute requirements in the game. The Lord’s minimum attribute requirements are:

• Str: 12
• Int: 9
• Pie: 12
• Vit: 12
• Dex: 9
• Spd: 9
• Per: 14

The Rawulf is one of the better racial candidates to handle this early transition. But to move from Priest to Lord, you will need the following additions:

• +4 str
• +3 int
• +2 vit
• +1 dex
• +1 spd
• +4 per

+15 min points total.

With the utility, achieving this minimum is much easier. In my case, I had previously rolled a Rawulf Priest without the utility and scored 23 bonus starting points. It is possible but extremely rare. Also, it’s worth noting that you do not need to adjust anything for the Priest side of the class. While creating the Priest class, you should dump everything into Theology and pick up Bless and either Heal or Make Wounds. Since I suggest that the Female Dwarf Priest be the one to immediately change to Valkyrie, you might consider placing this character in the back either for healing, utility or minor offense depending on your starting hit points. Generally though, I think a basic Priest can perform decently especially with the attributes required for a Lord.

Male Felpurr Mage -> Samurai Requirements

A male Felpurr’s starting attributes are:

• Str: 7
• Int: 10
• Pie: 7
• Vit: 7
• Dex: 10
• Spd: 12
• Per: 10

The Samurai class also has fairly high requirements but has a reasonable match with a Felpurr’s base:

• Str: 12
• Int: 11
• Vit: 9
• Dex: 12
• Spd: 14
• Per: 8

The Mage class itself requires a 12 in Int, which is only a single point off from the Samurai. This puts the starting schema as:

• +5 for str
• +2 for int (mage)
• +2 for vit
• +2 for dex
• +2 for spd

+13 min points total

13 points isn’t impossible to achieve even with the base game. Since you would want as much mana regeneration as possible and more hit points, I suggest dump as many points into Vitality and the leftover points into Strength (mostly to deal with the CC bug if you don’t intend to patch the game). Also, I suggest dumping every skill point on creation into Thaumaturgy. In that manner, you’ll continue to accumulate some points as you level in your initial chosen spell schools. For that, I would suggest grabbing Energy Blast and Chilling Touch. You want to be able to cast Fireball and Iceball once they become available as well as have plenty of points to maximize your casts. Gear-wise, you’ll only be missing the starting Katana and Wakizashi. You probably can make a fast run to Queequeg and try to buy those weapons when you decide to swap classes. You will not be able to use the Sword of Striking found in the starting chest though.

One idea here is to rush to Queequeg’s before you swap classes and save near the door (or inside). Then reload/go back and forth outside until you can obtain the Katana and Wakizashi. If you can get those, then do the class swap. Otherwise, consider reaching level 2 before the class swap. You might even be able to obtain Magic Missile and start your Magic Pool development. But you might be careful in deciding whether to swap your Lord first or your Samurai. In this situation, I would probably go for the Lord because of how he can make use of the Sword of Striking immediately (unless you give it to the Valkyrie, which I honestly don’t recommend since she will already have a Quarterstaff, which functions equally well as the Spear except for 1 less point of damage)

Male Faerie Alchemist -> Ninja Requirements

A male Faerie’s starting attributes are:

• Str: 5
• Int: 11
• Pie: 6
• Vit: 6
• Dex: 10
• Spd: 14
• Per: 12

Becoming an Alchemist for a Faerie is quite easy as the Alchemist requirements are:

• Int: 13
• Dex: 13

The Ninja is perhaps one of the hardest starting classes to role as well as being a class that is spread somewhat thin as a starting character. But the minimal requirements are:

• Str: 12
• Int: 10
• Pie: 10
• Vit: 12
• Dex: 12
• Spd: 12

Surprisingly, this disparity actually makes the conversion from a starting male Faerie Alchemist into a Ninja difficult:

• +7 Str
• +2 Int (for alchemist)
• +4 Pie
• +6 Vit
• +3 Dex (for alchemist)

+22 min points total

With such high requirements, one might ask why? In my previous iteration of the party, I did a Felpurr Alchemist into a Ninja. So why the alteration especially with the various gear restrictions and penalties for a Faerie as well as a Ninja? The ultimate goal for this character is to go from a Ninja and move him into the role of a Bishop for the end game. In the previous game, my Faerie Mage ended up as a Ninja, which is still quite strong. But the idea of using a Faerie for a Ninja early on is practical: you have a natural starting bonus of -2 armor. Since you’re giving up your Ninja garb (without saved game modifications), you effectively are naked.

However, a Faerie’s exceptionally high base speed along with the starting armor bonus mitigate some of these issues. Once you start casting spells again, you’ll have excellent mana regeneration. Also, I mentioned that you might consider swapping into a Ninja at level 2. Since the Alchemist experience table is quite low, the idea here is that getting one early level before switching to a Ninja would help by racing your Alchemy skill and hopefully acquiring a level 2 spell like Blinding Flash or increasing your Earth pool with Itching Skin. That will get you a small head start since most of your points early on as a Ninja will automatically be placed into Ninjutsu (which can take a fair amount of time to level). If you want to push things, you might even consider getting to level 3 as an Alchemist and seeing if you can get some higher level spells like Stink Bomb by pushing your Alchemy. Because the attribute requirements are pretty high for this transition, you might be off a few to make the change. So this will be at your discretion and situation.

Female Dwarf Priest -> Valkyrie Requirements

A female dwarf’s starting attributes are:

• Str: 9
• Int: 6
• Pie: 10
• Vit: 12
• Dex: 7
• Spd: 7
• Per: 8

The Priest only requires a Piety of 12, which makes it easy to obtain for a Dwarf. Swapping from a Priest to Valkyrie is actually quite natural when you look at what’s needed here for a Valkyrie:

• Str: 10
• Pie: 11
• Vit: 11
• Dex: 10
• Spd: 11
• Per: 8

Thus, you will need:

• +1 Str
• +2 Pie
• +3 Dex
• +4 Spd

+10 min points total

With only that many points needed, you can dump everything else into Vitality then Strength to really maximize your spell regeneration, hit points and carrying capacity. Priests start with Robes (U/L), Sandals, a Quarterstaff and 3 Lt. Heal potions. Valkyries have more armor but still only have a Spear and Sandals. But the Quarterstaff itself only does one additional point of damage over the starting Spear and still allows the wielder to attack from the 4th slot on. So the transition won’t be as bad compared to a Samurai, which is why you can swap from level 1 here.

Also, because the Valkyrie’s core skill is the Pole & Staff, you’ll be leveling this up as you go. In turn, when you start off as a Priest, you will want to dump all your skill points into Theology and pick up Heal and Bless. Once your Rawulf switches to a Lord and becomes the main tank of the group, your Valkyrie’s secondary job will function as a healer and utility person firing off Bless spells in tougher fights. But you will also have a head start to work on Theology because of the early focus. The only rough spot will be Oratory initially, which is why you probably want to cast Bless periodically to keep Oratory from failing.

Each time you level, you should dump your remaining points into Theology. I think Valkyrie’s can access their magic from level 3 or 4. By that point, you should still be able to increase your base Magic and Mental pools as well as use some healing. Then you probably will want to pick up spells like Cure Lessor Cnd, Divine Trap and Dispel Undead as quickly as possible. Cure Poison to me is the holy grail for Priest spells, but that will take some time.

Gear-wise, I think Queequeg sells a Halberd, which will be your best weapon until you meet Smithy. Also, in having a Valkyrie, you can wait until you find the Stud-Cuir Bra +2 on the second floor if you want to save some gold. There are a few other key spots containing low level gear in the basement. You will be sharing some gear with your Lord character.

Female Elf Mage -> Bard Requirements

A female Elf’s starting attributes are:

• Str: 5
• Int: 10
• Pie: 10
• Vit: 7
• Dex: 9
• Spd: 9
• Per: 9

A Mage only needs an Int of 12. For a Bard though, you need:

• Int: 10
• Dex: 12
• Spd: 8
• Per: 12

With the following adjustments:

• +2 Int (for mage)
• +3 Per

5 min points total (or just 3 for a plain bard)

This makes a female Elf a natural choice for a Bard or a Mage transitioning into a Bard. I provide two options here to point out what is needed if you don’t mind manually adding the Lute to the Mage with BaneEdit.exe or if you’d prefer to remain pure. The other major downside about the swap is that you will lose all your initiative advantages because your speed will only be 9. Of everyone in the party, you want your Bard to dish out those Sleep spells as fast as possible. So it might be worth keeping the Bard class regardless (unless you decide to modify her even more).

If you decide to start with the Bard, you probably will want to boost her Vitality to 16, which means, you need 12 points minimum. Then you’ll probably want to give her as much Speed to start. For her starting skills, I would dump all spare points into Skulduggery. You will be leveling your Music skill all the time by using it exclusively until you get more confidence in the others in your party. While you can level Skulduggery through usage, you simply do not find enough opportunities in the game. And early on many doors and chests have tough traps and locks, so you’ll need all the help you can get. As a Bard, your starting weapon is a Sling, which sucks because you have limited ammo. Don’t bother putting any points into that because it’s a very weak weapon and you’re better off using a round to Hide in Shadows to build up your Ninjutsu when you have a chance. Instead, you’ll want to pick up a Buckler for a little extra defense and a Cutless or Rapier. Heck, go with both if you want to try your hand at dual wielding. But your primary focus for a long time will be Sleeping your foes.

If you choose to start her as a Mage, you should pick up Energy Blast and Chilling Touch to begin building up her Fire and Water spell pools. Also, you’ll want to dump everything into Thaumaturgy. You will level fairly quickly as a Bard but your Music skill might not exceed the 50 point amount to allow you to spread your leveling points more heavily into spells. Also, even if you decide to have a Ninja, you’ll probably want to make your Bard your primary lock picker. As you level early on, you’ll have to make some key choices in terms of dividing your skill points between Thaumaturgy and Skulduggery. I personally suggest just giving her 100 in Skulduggery because of how lame the lock picking system is in the game and be over it. Only do something different if you really want to experience a super hardcore grindfest.

In addition, the idea of taking a female Elf is that the long game will gradually transition her into a Valkyrie for the end game. I think if there were extra character slots (which I wish there was), I could try to shoehorn a second Elf into this party just because I like the idea of having a Ranger that can make use of the Elven Bow. Yes, this character can use the Elven Bow too but it seems redundant compared to the Maenad’s Lance, which is one of the best end game weapons.

Lastly, whether you want to start with a Mage or Bard really depends on how much QoL you want to give yourself vs the true grindfest you can suffer. The thing I’ve noticed in taking a Bard is that I didn’t switch classes again for sometime. The majority of the time, I either was using my Instruments (especially the Lute) and building up her Music skill or trying to Hide in Shadows to avoid damage. Spell regeneration didn’t seem to make as huge of an impact by the time my Bard was starting to cast more spells. Also, once you hit near the end game with the Forest, you’ll be resting multiple times consecutively because the spell drain will get very high while number of foes you encounter pile up. The only real mitigation in any of this is simply to build your spell pools into a ridiculous amount to have enough points and a variety of spells at your disposal. So it really depends on how you want to carve your experience here.

Male Mook Mage Requirements

A Male Mook starts with:

• Str: 10
• Int: 10
• Pie: 6
• Vit: 10
• Dex: 7
• Spd: 7
• Per: 9

While a Mage only needs an Int of 12 making your minimal requirements points a whopping 2. I don’t have another class to change into here because I think it’s better to keep at least one Mage pure until the mid game (level 13 or so). By that point, you should have more options and ideas of how this character can compliment your party. Compared to my previous party, the Male Mook Mage there was used to swap into the Samurai whereas the Faerie had been the Mage.

Using a Mook Mage though, you have better overall Vitality and Strength so you don’t have to put as many points into those attributes. On the other hand, you are much slower than a Faerie and more vulnerable due to not having the natural -2 AC bonus. You will have slightly more access to gear overall in the short term but nothing that is a real game changer. Theoretically, you could still take a Faerie Mage but I dislike the redundancy of having two Faeries in a single party. I think with my previous group, I had swapped the Faerie Mage into a Bishop and raced to push his Theology then eventually swapped to a Ninja for the end game. Since you won’t have a great dedicated healer until mid game possibly, you could plan to swap this character into a Bishop and much later into a Monk. You just won’t have as much regeneration nor AC until you become a Monk. If you go the Bishop route as the follow up class to the Mage, then the final class should either be a Ninja or Monk to avoid redundancy with a Samurai or Lord’s spells as well as gaining access to the prized Ninjutsu skill.

The Game Begins

Once you’re in the starter dungeon, you should race to grab the treasure from the two starter chests. The most important item will be the Sword of Striking. While it’s not the best weapon in the game, the +2 bonus to hit is a major upgrade over a Longsword or the Lord’s starting Broadsword. So this makes me believe that you should change your Rawulf Priest into a Lord immediately to take advantage of this starting weapon. The other major item to acquire is the Amulet of Life found in the opposite treasure chest. Most guides recommend selling this off because it’s only use is to revive dead characters (Resurrection). However, it sells for a lot of gold which means if you can get to Queequeg unscathed, you probably can buy most of your missing starter gear (minus the Lute if you decided to take a Mage rather than a starting Bard). I would try to beef up your Lord and Valkyrie immediately with armor. If you have spare gold, get the Halberd for the Valkyrie. But make sure you can purchase the Katana and Wakizashi for your Felpurr, regardless of swapping to a Samurai.

Your Mage won’t require much additional gear at this stage. You probably will want your Bard in the 5th slot so armor isn’t critical at this stage. There are a few items the Bard can use found in the towers so you’ll want to explore those and hopefully be able to disarm their traps to obtain those items. But don’t hit up the towers until you have some basic gear from Queequeg.

I would handle my first class changes immediately. So at minimal, I would do the Valkyrie, the Lord and possibly the Bard (if I decided to fudge things a little). Having the Lord and Valkyrie immediately means you can have two front line tanks, even though I would use the term “tank” very loosely since neither are well equipped at this stage. Thus, you can rush for Queequeg and try to obtain gear after selling off the Amulet of Life and any irrelevant starting gear from the Priest side. Once you have a few pieces of better armor, you should go back to the main castle level and stay near the curative fountains. There’s a better fountain on the upper level that heals and provides stamina. But at this stage, healing shouldn’t be a problem because of the low health pool. Instead, Stamina will be a bigger issue. Similarly, since you used more “pure” spellcasting classes at the start, your mana regeneration should be fairly quick. You might want to avoid resting for a while too.

Here, I would save the game and simply spin around to start getting random encounters. I would try a few out to test if my party can survive. Most enemies at this level won’t do too much damage but I would be wary of Rogues. Use your Bard’s Lute every single round on the largest group of enemies or the deadliest. When enemies are sleeping, you gain a huge hit and damage advantage. Also, you’ll be building up your Music skill.

My main concern are for those that have lower hit points, which is why you probably will want the Valkyrie temporarily in the 2nd or 3rd slot. Both Mages should cast as frequently as they can to build up their Oratory. You might be a little judicious about spending mana though and should monitor your regenerative abilities here. I would suggest if you see the Felpurr getting hammered hard, then it might be worth class swapping to a Samurai and helping out the melee. Your Faerie Alchemist probably would be the better choice to swap classes between the two early on but I would hold off until level 2 or 3 just to continue building up his Alchemy skill. But changing to a Ninja does mean your Faerie can serve as a potential tank because of his slightly higher natural armor. But Hiding in Shadows will be difficult to do reliably for a while. So in a large fight, focus on melee with the Ninja and Hide in Shadows when you know the others can finish off the remaining opponents.

Another recommendation I’ve read is to avoid the Basement level until level 5 or so. I think it’s because some of the foes are a lot tougher and come in bigger groups. The ones to watch out for are Brigands, Rogue Leaders, Tricksters and some Slimes. I think what I tend to do is grind the area near the starting fountain until about level 3 then make my way into the basement or upper castle floor. The upper floor might get frustrating because of all the locked doors. You can find keys to deal with some of them. I believe some keys can be found off random dead bodies of monsters like from Rogues. Others are relegated to quest items. However, you might want to keep a few to give to the Amazon vendor as a sacrifice later on to avoid problems. But they will take up some space.

Regarding early leveling or any leveling in this game: SAVE ALL THE TIME. I made it a habit to save after each successful combat. It’s not terribly difficult to do on these later versions since you don’t have to deal with a floppy disk. But you will want to save and keep a close eye on your experience points as you near gaining a level. The early stages are probably the worst because of how easy it is to get murdered by the wrong encounter. Also, you will want to save frequently to reload so that you can get more ideal stats as you level.

This will become even more important because of the class change and attribute reset. I would suggest that the minimum number of upgraded attributes per level, at least early on, should be between 3-4. Prioritize speed and vitality since you gain more AC, initiative and hit points. Dexterity helps in this regard too but I would put that attribute under your main stat like Strength, Intelligence or Piety.

Along the way, you should try to acquire any spellbooks from Queequeg and pick up potions once in a while like Cure Posion, Cure Lt Cnd and Healing. It will take sometime before you can do your own Cure Poison so just be careful of that situation. Obviously, you want to prioritize your armor and weapons over healing items (unless you are poisoned but at an early stage you should just reload). But I would continuously stock up on healing items and keep them in my swag section.

The hardest encounters early on are the secret Brigand tavern (Captain Matey), the killer boss rat (Fat Rat) and the Zombie in the tower. Some of those might have extra mobs (especially if you decide to put the game on a harder difficulty). So it might take you a few attempts to down those encounters. Along the way, you can use the Belfry rope spot to get mobs of bats to assault you for early easy XP. I think some people use that area to grind until level 5 or 6 because the encounters are reliable.

Lastly, I did read how some people might even change around level 5 just because it’s very easy to get through the first 5 levels, especially if you use the Belfry trick. The main thing is that if you plan on something like this, once you’ve settled into what your real starting build is, you should not swap simultaneously (outside of the initial entry into the game). Being able to level up separately for each character makes the fine tuning of attribute upgrades much easier. If you save a character or two for a later stage class swap, I would suggest waiting until you’re in the Dwarf Mine so you can grind next to the fountains. For instance, you might consider using that point in time to swap your Mage to Bishop. I would evaluate my situation based on how much healing I’d need at that stage. If my Valkyrie is doing fine in the 4th spot, then I would wait a little longer to do the class swap, possibly switching around level 13 so you can race to get the more powerful spells like Nuclear Blast or Astral Gate, which comes in really handy once you arrive at the River Styx. Just know that once you lose your main Mage, you’ll be limited on the spell level you can cast your spells at. So by then you should make sure your Bard can handle secondary AoE/group attack responsibilities.

The post Wizardry 6: Mapping Out A Min/Max’d Starting Party for A Hardcore Experience appeared first on Kontroversial Keith.

• Axe – Not worth taking as there aren’t any great axe weapons. I do like the Bipennis just because I enjoy saying bi-penis.

• Bow – The only character that can really make use of a bow is the Ranger and Rangers generally are a terrible class except for novelty. There is a decent Elven Bow you can obtain near the end of the game but you have to deal with ammunition that does weak damage and you can’t really get multiple attacks per round. Maybe if you swap into a Ranger in the late game where you have already picked up Kirijitsu. But there are other classes that can do a better job.

• Hand & Feet – Once you start getting some serious levels with a Ninja and/or Monk, you can do some of the best damage in the game. Also, you won’t have to lug weapons around.

• Mace & Flail – The Vulcan Hammer you can buy from Smithy is one of the best midgame weapons around as a one hander. But you don’t need to put any points here.

• Pole & Staff – Some of the best weapons in the game that can be applied to several classes are found here. If you play a Valkyrie, you’ll level a polearm naturally. If you play a Priest, Bishop or Mage, you’ll probably pick up a staff of some kind. Two Handed versions allow you to hit from the back rows so when you’re out of spells, this is a great way for anyone in the 4th slot or further back to get a hit off. Not to mention you can knock creatures unconscious with a few 2H staves.

• Shield – Sadly, there’s not a lot of shields in the game and the ones that are available are heavily restricted. The only class that probably should use a shield is a Lord. Bards and Rangers can use Bucklers if you want a little extra AC but it’s not a lot.

• Sling – Since most players will start with a Bard (unless they swap classes into one), you’ll have this as a weapon. But there’s not many upgrades and the ammo aspect sucks. Most likely, you’ll be belting out Sleep spells with your Lute for a very long time. So not a great weapon/skill at all.

• Sword – Some of the best weapons are swords. Lords, Bards and Samurai will certainly want to use this skill. But don’t ever put points manually into it since you’ll be training it through usage naturally.

• Throw – Not many good options. Pretty much not worth the investment unless you’re bored.

• Wand & Dagger – For thief type of characters, you’ll probably want to dual wield with a dagger type of offhand such as with a Main Gauche. For Mage type of characters, wands by themselves aren’t great weapons. But the key is to combine a Wand and 1H staff to receive any passive benefits. The only time you’ll want to attack with a wand is through some backstabbing ability once you get Ninjitsu.

• Legerdemain – Some people think that this is a great skill. However, there’s just not enough traders where it’s worth spending any points. And if you get caught, you should just reload. So don’t bother with this unless you have nothing else to spend your skill points on.

• Music – Pretty much a must have skill. Bards can be useful at any point in the game and you never want to sell off the rare instruments except when you manage to find a rare spare.

• Ninjutsu – Perhaps, the single most powerful skill in the game. Once your party all have Ninjitsu, you will almost all the time be able to hide in the shadows. Once you are in the shadows, you pretty much become immune to damage, except lingering DoT spells until you leave/attack. And even if you’re in the shadows, you can cast spells at your enemies without breaking stealth. It does take a great deal of time to level this skill up but you’ll eventually want every character to have this. When beat the game for the first time, I kept my characters in the shadows and was able to avoid all damage and just messed around against the bosses with zero threat.

• Oratory – Absolute must have for any non-alchemist spell caster type. It might take a few early manual points but you should try to get it to 100% for anyone who can cast spells. If you’re afraid of failure or spell reflection, cast lower level spells like a low risk heal spell to avoid something backfiring. Certainly, don’t cast spells at max level if your party’s lives depended on its success and your Oratory skill is low.

• Scout – Easily the most useless skill of the bunch. Everything can be found using a clue book or by some online hint. For Rangers, this skill has automatic point assignment which prevents your Ranger to obtain better skills like Alchemy or Skulduggery.

• Skulduggery – An unfortunate must have skill that you probably should put points into manually. There’s simply not enough places to practice this skill. However, you could potentially lock yourself out of a critical room. I do think you can get around some of these issues by finding the right keys. But for chests, you probably will get less lucky or require a Divine Trap.

• Alchemy – Not the best of the magic skills but not the worst. Alchemy is great for avoiding the Oratory spell requirement though. So one thing you may want early on is at least one character with Alchemy like an Alchemist who transitions into a Ninja or Ranger if you’re desperate and do not have enough attributes for a class swap.

• Artifacts – Honestly, this isn’t really a big deal. There’s simply not enough good magic items in the games to make it worth putting much effort here.

• Kirijutsu – You will want to place at least one point into this skill so you can level it constantly regardless of a class you swap into. But doing a critical hit during a fight can prevent not only long fights but situations where an OP opponent is rendered dead. All characters should eventually pick this skill up.

• Mythology – It’s nice knowing what a creature is to respond (like certain type of skeletons) to deal with their abilities. Most time you’ll see a pattern emerge. But this should improve naturally so you should only place points into this when there’s no other skills worth spending.

• Scribe – Scrolls seem more useful at a lower level. But I think making gold from them is better than their actual usage.

• Theology – Absolute must have. You need healing, buffs, cures and dispelling of undead. All characters should eventually get this skill.

• Theosophy – The least important of all the spell skills. There’s only three real distinct offensive spells and their main effects are limited to certain opponents. There aren’t any mandatory Theosophy spells either. It is fun to turn your foes insane and that’s about it.

• Thaumaturgy – Pretty much mandatory. You will want a few mass damage dealers especially for the end game.

The post Wizardry 6: Evaluating the Best/Work Skills appeared first on Kontroversial Keith.

The Best Spells

• Heal Wounds – Absolute must have for every party. In fact, multiple characters should take this when they have the chance. If you start off with a Priest, this spell should be chosen as part of your core pool. If you create a hybrid like a Valkyrie, then this should be the first spell once you start gaining spells.
• Fireball – Since I recommend having a pure mage at the start of the game, the thing you should aim for is Fireball. One of the best early mass damage types, it works well because you should be building up your Fire pool up from the start especially since Fire is one of the best damage types in the game.
• Silence – Spell casters are some of the most feared foes in the game. The best offense generally is Silence which nullifies their abilities altogether. It’s a reasonably cheap ability that you can get at a lower level and it helps build up your Air spell pool which is pretty useful for a variety of reasons. This also works against creatures that can emit damaging abilities like the worms under the castle which do high pitch moans that damage your party.
• Cure Poison – Oddly, Cure Poison didn’t make the other person’s list. However, poison is one of the worst debilitating effects in the game and can quickly kill your characters depending on the power level and your resistance. While there are potions to mitigate poison, they either are expensive early on or may not completely remove the effects. And some poisons are so deadly that you may require multiple applications to get rid of the debuff. Lastly, you may not want to fill up your inventory with excess potions so having at least one character have this ability is critical. For myself, I try to race at least one character to obtain this ability as traps and monster debuffs can be really annoying when you get poisoned.
• Anti-Magic – Pretty much a must have in high level fights against any spell casters. Very useful against demons and liches.
• Purify Air – Cloud effects that show up in later stages of the game can be very annoying and pernicious. This spell is great for preventing lingering damaging effects.
• Missile Shield – Some mid game monsters like the Bridge Trolls have some high damaging missile abilities. This spell will help nullify those problems. Same with Drow Elves with their arrows.
• Dispel Undead – Can make a huge difference in some of the worst fights in the game. The Enchanted Forest has numerous skeleton types especially the Skeleton Lords. Dispel Undead, when it works, is an instant death against these legions and you can rack up a lot of experience.
• Astral Gate – Similar to Dispel Undead, this is highly useful against demonic creatures. The only problem is that there’s a good chance of failure especially when you cast this at max level. Nothing hurts worse when a high cost spell goes wrong. But in those scenarios where it works, it’s a life saver. You won’t need this early on but you should be building up your Magic pool to cast higher level versions of these.
• Magic Missile – Massively underrated spell. It’s probably the first modestly damaging group attack spell your spell casters can pick up. For a pure mage, you might even be able to get it by level 2 or 3 which is great to start building up your Magic pool. It won’t do great damage at higher levels but it does have niche uses and is good early on.
• Cure Lesser Cnd – There are a variety of debuffs in the game. You can probably get away with simply using a potion to handle various conditions early on but traps and some monsters will apply these debuffs. Eventually, you’ll want a few people to have this spell.
• Sleep – This is what your Bard will be doing to groups of foes for a while using his or her Lute every round. You can give it to your Mage too to help in cases where there’s multiple packs.
• Divine Trap – Traps are one of the worst things early on in dealing with all the chests. Whichever class you decide to pick as the main lock picker with Skulduggery, you should compliment their ability by having a Priest type of character use one of these especially in the starting zone where there’s a lot of trapped chest. In the mid game once you arrive at the River Styx, there’s more chests but this still is a great spell to keep around.
• Sane Mind – The last thing you want is a party with insanity because they’ll do random things and most likely will try to kill each other. The River Styx has groups of Sirens that can put your entire party into jeopardy unless you’re prepared with combinations of Silence and Sane Mind spells.
• Energy Blast – Not the best spell but it’s a must have for any Mage or Hybrid character at the start of the game. You really want this spell not only to do damage against foes but to build up your Fire pool.
• Direction – Even with various maps online, hint books, etc., you will get lost and lose your direction. Hence, you want this spell especially if you’re grinding areas where you need to go back and forth between areas and use things like Fountains.
• Knock-Knock – I personally think it’s better to use Skulduggery because traps and locks in this game are utter bullshit. But if you want to do things the “honest” way (i.e. not giving yourself a major boost at the beginning with Skulduggery), then Knock-Knock is something you want to pick up as soon as you can to handle pesky doors and chests. Doors in particular in the starting zone are obnoxious and I think you can even get to the point where you simply get locked out permanently if you can’t pick a lock. From what I’ve read though, you can buy the spellbook from Queequeg.
• Blades – To me this is another underrated spell like Magic Missile. For Priest and Psionic spell casters, Blades offers their first group wide damaging spell (Dispel Undead doesn’t count because it only affects undead). Also, you really want to have a variety of elemental damage type of spells since monsters have a different resistances. Lastly, this isn’t a bad spell to pick off any remaining packs of mobs.
• Iceball – Slightly more powerful than Fireball in terms of raw damage, having both is good for times when you encounter packs with an immunity to the other elemental type of damage. Also, in all likelihood, your Fire pool will end up getting depleted frequently so Iceball is a good secondary option while you wait for your Fire pool to regenerate.
• Magic Screen – Even with Silence and Anti-Magic, you probably want this up as much as you can to avoid situations when your spellcasters are depleted.

The Worst Spells

• Resurrection – The penalty for death is pretty high so even if a single character gets killed, you’re better off reloading the game. Only take this spell when there’s almost nothing else to bolster your Magic pool.
• Cure Stone – Like Resurrection except I believe there’s a chance your character might be revived as dead. So if you get turned to stone, you should just restart the game. Again, only take this spell to bolster your spell pool.
• Prismic Missile – On paper, this spell seems cool because of the random effects. In practice, unless you’re just “having fun”, you don’t want to leave your party’s fate to chance. Only pick this spell up when there’s nothing else.
• Ice Shield – I read this spell has very niche cases and is almost completely useless
• Mindread – Really unnecessary. You’re better off using a cluebook than wasting a space for this spell
• Death Wish – Sounds great on paper but it doesn’t really do much when it counts and most times just gets resisted or flat out fails
• Word of Death – Another spell that looks like it should be good but either fizzles or gets resisted often
• Death – Similar situation to the previous two spells.
• Remove Curse – Cursed items are apparently bugged so this spell is moot
• Blink – By the time you are ready to use this spell, you probably should have Ninjitsu for all your characters. Being able to Hide in Shadows is the most powerful ability in the game so Blink is worthless
• Locate Object – You can use a clue book to find anything you want. There’s no need to use this just like Scouting.
• Lightning – I believe this is the only Fire based Priest spell. If you have access to Fireball, that’s a better equivalent spell. The only reason to pick up Lightning is to build up your Fire pool or give your Priest something to do rather than twiddling their thumbs.
• Conjuration – While other creatures may use this ability, I never found it to be worth much except for novelty. I’d prefer to just stomp my foes down rather than waste spells for something like this.
• Illusion – Same category as Conjuration.
• Create Life – See above.
• Mind Flay – A lot of creatures resist mental spells in later stages. Also, I read there’s a bug in that enemies won’t go insane. I can’t remember specifically but this spell is only worth anything in very niche cases later on.
• Whirlwind – I don’t think I use this spell much because there’s better group damaging spells. Also, the cost and damage are not worth it. I only pick this up to help bolster my Air pool for things like Cure Poison. There’s far better damaging Air spells that do decent damage and add debuffs

The other spells mostly are middle of the road for me. Some are fun when used in certain scenarios like multiple DoTs applied to groups of monsters while you’re hiding in the shadows. Others like Nuclear Blast are decent but have the high penalties of failure and costing a lot of spell points. The typical buffs like Enchanted Blade are great later on once you start min/maxing and face high level foes but early on you probably want to conserve spell points for random encounters.

The post Wizardry 6: The Best/Worst Spells to Learn appeared first on Kontroversial Keith.

The Base Party

• Male Rawulf Priest
• Male Mook Mage
• Female Dwarf Priest
• Male Felpurr Alchemist
• Female Elf Mage
• Male Faerie Mage

The races match a bit closer to the suggested starting party. I didn’t want to use the exact same genders though because I had an alternative plan for the end game. The two most notable differences between my party and the FAQ optimized party is that I use a Male Felpurr Alchemist and a Male Faerie Mage rather than a Felpurr Mage and Faerie Bard. I went with the Felpurr Alchemist because of how it aligns closely to a Ninja which is what I wanted this character to change to at level 1. In the case of the Faerie Bard, I figured with all the editing to propel my team back to where I was faster, I’d just skip out on the Bard -> Mage profession change and just put a single point of Ninjutsu and no points into Music. The gear would be added in after the initial save.

From there, I performed five profession changes to the real starting party:

• Male Rawulf Priest -> Lord
• Male Mook Mage -> Samurai
• Male Felpurr Alchemist -> Ninja
• Female Dwarf Priest -> Valkyrie
• Female Elf Mage -> Bard
• Male Faerie Mage

In an “ethical” game, I would have changed the Faerie from a Bard to a Mage but I simply did not want to go through the nonsensical hell of creating another character. In generating this party, I had to come up with four additional characters (and delete some old ones where there’s a bizarre limit). A few things that I had to determine was how to handle the Valkyrie situation. I envisioned having an end game Valkyrie but wanted to limit the number of female characters to 2. In an “ethical” game, I would certainly care about the gender a lot more due to the carrying capacity issue with strength. So to achieve this idea, I removed my other Female Elf Alchemist and turned that slot into an Male Felpurr Alchemist.

Originally, I conceived of doing two Faeries where one would be the Ninja and the other would be the Mage. The problem with two Faeries though is the extremely limited gear. Having a Felpurr would afford me the ability to eventually switch into a Lord and/or Samurai without dealing with gear issues. Then the Faerie could be a dedicated Bishop/Ninja as I progressed in higher levels and I wouldn’t have to deal with worrying about gear.

Since I no longer an employing a Male Dwarf Fighter to turn into a Lord at level 9 (because of starting spell regeneration issues), I could easily start the Dwarf as a Female Priest which would allow me to swap into a Valkyrie. One thing I noticed is how easy it is to roll a Dwarf Valkyrie. I think it only takes 9 bonus roll points. Also, by having a Valkyrie with a head start in Theology from her former Priest class, I would already have low level healing and Bless until level 3. Not to mention, I put her in the 4th slot as she is armed with a pole weapon that allows her to attack from the back row. Lastly, that #4 position allows a little bit of freedom in heavier fights where I need some priest spell casting like Dispel Undead and don’t want to sacrifice some melee attacks. In short, she gets very close to where my Bishop was minus having as many offensive spells.

The Mook Mage was another major change from my typical party. I ended up taking the advice of the FAQ for using a Mook Mage just to get that bonus spell regeneration for the long run. But I immediately swap him into a Samurai which works quite well until the early end game (which is where I’m at). As of now, my poor Mook Samurai just got critically hit by a Chunin because the best Samurai armor just isn’t enough to protect him. But at the same time, I rushed through most of the game this time around and didn’t spend time grinding in the Mines with the Fountain. More on that later.

The Male Rawulf Priest swapping into a Lord is fairly good. Effectively, he’s taken the place of my Dwarf Fighter previously and my main melee damage dealer and main tank. The only unfortunate aspect to this character is that he has almost no ability to develop his Oratory skills. So the bulk of his spells learned have been more utility and curative. This can get nasty when I face large groups of undead since I don’t have my traditional Priest/Bishop or double Bishop setup. The biggest concern is when spells fizzle out but I mostly am focused on certain party members leveling up those spell casting skills while grinding.

The Elf Bard is intended to eventually become my end game Valkyrie. At some point, I do plan to make her a Ranger as well as I have the basic gear for that. Like my Lord, my Bard hasn’t spent that much effort developing her Oratory skills and has mostly been buffing the party or spitting out Fireballs via the Horn of the Prometheus. I think once her Music skill gets to 100, I’ll begin focusing more on Oratory and Ninjutsu in preparation for becoming a Monk, which shouldn’t be as bad considering her Ninjutsu is in the 20s right now.

Because of the early profession change, I haven’t had a need to change again. I am still in the 11-12 level range, which isn’t great. In the case of a normal Fighter and Priest, I would consider swapping their class at level 9. The only character I might change soon though is my Mage as his Thaumaturgy now is level 100. Normally, I would hesitate changing in a situation like mine because of how much power I would be missing in dropping back down to level 1. Since my Faerie would be power leveled fairly quickly, that set back won’t be that terrible. And since I would be swapping him to a Bishop, I wouldn’t lose much outside of one weapon and would continue to build up his high level Mage spells even faster.

The End Game Optimized Party

• Male Mook Lord
• Male Felpurr Samurai
• Male Faerie Ninja
• Male Rawulf Monk
• Female Elf  Valkyrie
• Female Dwarf Bard

In coming up with that base optimized party, I decided to look into the future of what I wanted the end game party to look like. I came up with the above group. This group does not show the other changes in between because I still have not concretely been able to determine the precise levels of when I wanted to make those changes as well as certain things before landing on this final form. That said, there’s a few comments I wanted to make here.

First, I wanted a Lord in the end game group because I wanted a heavily armored tank. While the Valkyrie could also serve that purpose, the Lord class is outfitted nicely. Stylistically, the Felpurr has been my go-to for Samurai. He might not be as great for the spell regeneration when it comes to Magic but he can do everything else equally well. The Faerie Ninja will probably have the best AC overall. Because I’m already developing his Ninjutsu, it should be much easier to transition from Bishop (which is my next class for this character) to Ninja without being forced to auto spend skill points into Ninjutsu.

The Monk also will have tremendous AC in the end game. However, Monks in the end game are a little dry just because they manage to accumulate spells quite quickly and many overlap with Priest spells. With the Female Elf, I spent a long time debating on Rangers and Valkyries. The ultimate conclusion was that I will probably swap to a Ranger before turning her into a Valkyrie to make use of the Elven Bow and to quickly acquire Alchemist spells but Rangers by themselves are dull and this will be done just for fun. Finally, with the Female Dwarf Bard, I could have made her into a Ranger without the Elven Bow and simply have her dual wield, but Bards have better armor than Rangers! Also, their instruments are too useful to be ignored.

One thing you’ll notice is no spell casters for the end game. At least, no pure spell casters. There’s simply no room for any. I think the game really should have allowed for 8 characters rather than 6 to allow more party flavor. Ultimately, the decision mostly comes down to gear and the fact that I won’t play Wizardry 7. I think it would be too painful to do another swap to prepare for Wizardry 7. So this pretty much will be my final party.

The post Wizardry 6: Update on the Optimized Party appeared first on Kontroversial Keith.

To start off, I had to spend time creating four more characters that would replace my last party. The new starting party ended up being:

• Male Dwarf Priest
• Female Elf Priest
• Female Elf Alchemist
• Male Felpurr Mage
• Male Rawulf Priest (from old party)
• Male Faerie Mage (from old party)

In only one instance, I managed to hit a magic 21 bonus roll which was the Felpurr Mage. In the remaining cases, I hit 18 except for the Female Elf Priest whom I think ended up with a 17. Considering how arduous this process was and that I could not obtain the CF utility to patch the game, I think these characters were fine to start.

Before commenting on my current situation, let me briefly address the CF utility. The CF utility is hosted on a Google shared drive and is considered “malware” probably because of the way it modifies (or patches) the binary and a few other files. Because of my general paranoia for ancient files that are hosted in odd areas on the internet, I ended up leaving it alone. If I get a new computer, I might consider giving it another shot. But just to enhance the starting character creation process seems like too high of a risk. But it does infuriate me that GOG has decided not to patch the game further (there are a few key fixes that I think are in place but those are selective).

And if you’re wondering about this CF utility, it is a program that patches the game in a few instances such as fixing the carrying capacity “bug” and the issue with “kill all” type of high level spells like Nuclear Blast. There’s a few of these in the game that are super annoying. I think GOG at least fixed the “kill all” spell problem as I had no issue with those spells (outside of the frequent fizzles). The character creation patch merely updates the minimum bonus rolls so that you start from 18 and can hit up to 26, which makes select the ideal character far smoother.

Given how irritated I was by not having access to this patch, I ended up going through the pain of rolling the new characters. Without the patch, I figured that swapping to the ideal starting class from the “optimized party” would not be possible and I ended up using BaneEdit.exe to update the starting stats (as well as fixing the starting carrying capacity of each character) so that I could swap into the class I wanted. Once I changed classes, I would save, reload BaneEdit.exe, add better starting gear and update my stats and skills so that they felt more reasonable.

So a few things if you want to try this thought experiment out without going through BaneEdit.exe.

• You will absolutely need to spend a crap ton of time to generate a solid starting party if you do not have the CC utility readily available
• In some cases where a race has low vitality, you will need to balance that aspect out with the character you want to swap into as you may not have the minimum stats for that class
• If you don’t start off with a Faerie Bard, you won’t have access to a Lute. If you do start with a Faerie Bard and keep him, you will suffer on the armor side for a while
• Your gear will be crap since you will be loaded up with low AC robes, sandals and staves
• Your hit points might be low since you start mostly with priests and mages
• The only non- Pole & Staff type of weapon you will be guaranteed to receive is the Sword of Striking from the early chest.
• You will have some tiny amount of starting spells. If you’re insanely lucky in terms of starting an Alchemist with an incredible bonus roll where you can swap into say a Ninja, you will have an okay starting advantage as a Ninja with basic Alchemy spells compared to a starting Ninja who won’t get to cast any Alchemy spells for a while.
• Most likely, you will have almost no Skulduggery. This will supremely suck at the beginning unless again you chose to go with a Faerie Bard and don’t mind being near naked for a good chunk of the game.
• If you did something like me where you only intended to keep 2 of the starting classes, you will have really bad stats for a long time and most likely will go through reload hell whenever you level.
• Only do something like this if you’re an absolute masochist and want the most hardcore leveling experience with a slight edge in mana regeneration.
• Mana regeneration still sucks so you’re not getting a massive benefit overall.

As you can see, I think this situation is only ideal if you’re one of those exceptional min/maxer types that enjoy the hardcore grind but will do so with the goal of setting up the ultimate party. Or you can be like me and short cut the whole situation with BaneEdit.exe to get around the suckiness of some bad design decisions in the game (especially if you’re on your millionth or whatever play through and don’t care about cheating)

So let’s evaluate the party here:

• Male Dwarf Priest -> Lord
• Female Elf Priest -> Valkyrie
• Female Elf Alchemist -> Ninja
• Male Felpurr Mage -> Bard
• Male Rawulf Priest (from old party)
• Male Faerie Mage (from old party)

When I switched the Dwarf from a Fighter to a Priest with the intention of making him a Lord immediately, the main effect I noticed was a far slower pace of leveling. Now, it is the Valkyrie who experiences the biggest level gains. On the other hand, the swap from Priest to Lord/Valkyrie allowed me to have two starting Priest spells and a tiny bit of Oratory. Also, that small amount of starting spells helps enable one to begin building up their spell pool a little earlier.

With the Female Elf Alchemist/Ninja, I started off by dumping all of her initial skill points into Alchemy and selecting Poison and Acid Splash for her initial spells. The problem with having a Ninja is that there’s a lot of good skills that you want to invest in early on but every level will most likely devote skills automatically into Ninjutsu (until 51+). So as you’re leveling, you’ll have only a very small set of Alchemy spells for a long time. The only way to correct this issue is to force your Ninja to continue hiding in shadows each round until you get your score up to 51+. But this is very tedious and in the early part of the game almost impossible depending on which slot this character is placed in.

For the Male Felpurr Mage/Bard, I got supremely lucky with the 21 bonus roll. Now, you may ask, “Doesn’t that mean you have no starting Lute?” I do have one and a few other items That said, I think more people would have simply stuck with the Faerie Bard. However, I contend that the Faerie Mage is the better choice as the actual starting Mage because you can get the highest spell regeneration from that combination even if you don’t edit your starting party. The Mage -> Bard portion simply helps give an initial boost to the Bard’s spell regeneration and starting spells.

The Rawulf Priest becomes an interesting thought experiment in this new optimized party world because of all the early class transitions. One idea would be to redo this character into a female so that I could transition her into another Valkyrie. If I went this route, I probably would not use a Rawulf but either a Dwarf or an Elf, maybe even a Human. Then the Elf Alchemist/Ninja would probably change into a different race and flip the gender. You would lose one level of spells but for all intents and purposes the leveling experience would feel almost the same except be more fighter intensive. Or I could keep the same party and change the Rawulf into a Lord. Leveling would be slower but the existing Valkyrie would take over healing/buff duty. That does mean that my front line up would have two Lords, which in truth feels redundant. Also, there will be more competition for gear early on.

The one class I highly do NOT recommend switching to anymore for the Rawulf is a Bishop. One Bishop switch will be sufficient in this party and that character will probably be the Faerie Mage since Faeries cannot use many armor and weapons, which make them weak fighters outside of Monks and Ninja hybrids. And if you do plan to swap your Rawulf Priest to a Bishop, it’s much better to do that at level 9+ to race towards Cure Poison and building up your Theology before focusing on Thaumaturgy. My argument against swapping to a Bishop is that it’s a very lengthy process where it feels better if you only swap one character (the Faerie Mage). What I found was an imbalance for either the Mage or Priest portion of spells. Also, keeping track of which side would receive the Mage or Priest spell upon leveling was problematic which meant I might miss a key moment and assign the other school more skill points than the side that would get the spell. In turn, having two classes take forever to level up means that I would miss out on switching to a class with Ninjutsu earlier. With Ninjutsu, you really want to obtain that skill as early as you can as having a whole party hidden means avoiding annoying mechanics.

The Male Faerie Mage I kept even though I think it would’ve been better to recreate him from scratch to devote more points into Vitality for the starting spell regeneration. But the main comment here is that Faerie Mages are great due to having one of the best overall spell regeneration abilities. If I was more of a purist at this stage, I would’ve continued using the old Male Felpurr Bard to gain the precious starting Lute, despite having lower spell regeneration. The goal of the Faerie Mage is to eventually transition him into a Bishop mid game. I do this to race his Thaumaturgy as high as possible and keep him as the primary damage dealer in the group once he obtains Fireball, Iceball and Deep Freeze. With the Rawulf Priest becoming a Bishop in the past, I could balance the two for their transition as the Rawulf Priest would become a Bishop at level 9 and begin quickly assembling his offensive Mage spells. By that point, much of the healing could be done via the Valkyrie or Lord. The only sensitive spot might be Silence spells which you want to work reliably. Dispel Undead is critical too but not in the mid game.

One comment I do have about a starting Faerie Mage vs Faerie Bard is that if you do want to play more “ethically” with a pure/long term party, you would want to provide one point into Ninjutsu from the Bard side. That little point will go a VERY long way especially once you switch into a Bishop (like I plan to) as you can level Ninjutsu as any class on the go. I often times would find my Mage with a lot of downtime as I await the regeneration of his spell points. Mostly in those cases, I would just Parry -> Rest. But that alone does not offer a great deal of rejuvenation of points. The better option would be to use those opportunities to Hide. So in that situation where you go from a Bard -> Mage (which may sound odd), you at least have a tiny advantage with Ninjutsu.

A few other thoughts. Why not do a Psionic -> Monk type of transition? The Psionic’s only advantage with regards to spell point regeneration is having 4 for Mental. But there’s only three significant Mental spells and in my experience aren’t great in the end game. The only reason to start with a Psionic at all is to acquire their Shadow Cloak, which ironically they cannot use. Monks are better end game classes that you transition into rather than start with.

What about switching the Felpurr Mage into a Samurai? Samurai are great front line fighters especially in the early game. Gear becomes very problematic in the mid game because there’s not many boots or gloves they can wear. They shine once again near the end game once you obtain their high end armor and a Muramasa Blade. The reason I prefer Bard -> Samurai is to compensate weak armor by having access to Ninjutsu. Depending on when you transition into a Samurai, you can place such a character in the 4th slot for a little added protection behind your front melee characters who have better AC (which may include a Ninja and/or Monk!) If you do swap a Mage into a Samurai, you can scrap together reasonable gear from Queequeg and to a lesser degree Smitee that’ll take you far enough through the mid game and into the early part of the later game.

As usual, I’m still theorycrafting various scenarios and trying different things out. I might play around more with that starting party just to see what other ways I can swap around classes and races for that ultimate optimized party notion.

The post Wizardry 6 Ongoing Optimized Party Experiment appeared first on Kontroversial Keith.

The Optimized Party

• Male Dwarf Priest
• Female Rawulf Priest
• Female Elf Priest or Mage
• Female Felpurr Mage
• Male Mook Mage
• Female Faerie Bard

So the concept is quite interesting because at first glance, your impression might be how can a party like this survive. The way this party works is that you need a utility that updates the initial rolls for a starting character to guarantee 18-26 points. That way, you can assign as many points into Vitality and Strength then divide the remaining points into the actual class you want to be. Otherwise, you’ll probably spend a significant amount of time trying to roll these characters’ bonus points (I’m not sure if the GOG version is patchable which is the one I have; it probably isn’t though). After starting the game, you change professions into the class you really wanted to aim for but receive the optimal amount of Mana regeneration from your Vitality, Race and Class bonuses. The article did suggest a starting party but didn’t use this one but you can see where the author might be heading with this basis.

A few things to note here are the heavy use of Mages and Priests as well as the Faerie. The thing about Mages and Priests is that they provide some of the best spell regeneration in the game. There is a handy table in the FAQ regarding Mana regeneration for each class:

Some important notes here:

• Non-magic oriented classes provide very weak regeneration
• Bishops only provide Mental and Magic at optimal rates
• Psionics give the best Mental regeneration but Mental spells are mostly weak here
• Alchemist also give good regeneration except to Magic and Mental. Again, Mental is weak but Magic is very useful at later stages in the game where you require frequent healing and dispelling of Undead and Demons.

With the Faerie Bard suggested above, the idea is to give the Bard +2 to spell regeneration on top of whatever Vitality bonus you can get. Faeries give +1 to all spell schools for regeneration. Also, for a starting party, you will most likely want a Bard because of the Lute they bring for the free Sleep spells. Even if you decide to ditch the Faerie Bard in changing professions at the start, you will want the Lute as the initial Bard character is the only way to acquire this item (not to mention that Lizardmen receive a -1 spell regeneration penalty which means you should avoid this race at all cost). And from what I’ve read, having a Vitality of 16 and up gives another +1 to spell regeneration.

While I understand the concept of min/maxing ones Mana regeneration, I still feel this really isn’t optimal for a starting party. For instance, I’m not really happy about the Mook Mage. I prefer a Faerie Mage because that means your Mana regeneration is even higher at the start. However, in taking two Faeries, you will run into a lot of equipment issues down the line. So sacrificing the Bard’s starting Mana regeneration and going full in for the Faerie Mage’s regeneration are the better choices here.

Nonetheless, I do admit to liking this concept a lot and I want to play around with this idea a little more here. I want to compare the FAQ’s suggested optimal starting party with a recent one I did:

• Male Dwarf Fighter
• Female Elf Valkyrie
• Female Elf Ninja
• Male Felpurr Bard
• Male Rawulf Priest

So this party was not unlike my previous one. The main difference was ditching the Male Dracon Ninja for a Female Elf Ninja. Admittedly, this was one of the hardest things to roll and required a minimum of 18 bonus points. I did try to roll a Female Human Ninja but that requires even more points. Without that utility that “fixes” the stupid starting bonus problems in Wizardry 6, I figured that it would take me forever to get a Female Human Ninja to start. But the principal in getting the Female Elf Ninja was to later change back to a Valkyrie and make use of the Maenad’s Lance weapon, which sat around collecting dust on my last play through. Also, I did use BaneEdit.exe multiple times to fix various issues like the stupid encumbrance bug, bad starting stats, gear, etc. just because I wanted to experiment a little more and speed back to where I was.

Right now, I’m in the end game grind mode where I’m running into a few problems mostly with gear and redundancy. As well planned as I had thought I done this time around, certain problems took my notice at this later stage of the game. The main one was the transition of my Mage and Priest into Bishops then changing later on. Part of the issue is that the time needed to level these characters is pretty high. In the case of my Rawulf, I gradually swapped him into a Monk where I’m having an impossible time deciding if I should make one last class swap (to a Ninja). I have a lot of spare gear sitting in my bags that feel as though it’s all going to waste. Then I have my Faerie Bishop whom I have yet to make a swap to a Ninja as I want to acquire more spells. Some of this is just bad planning. But I haven’t really attempted to sit down and determine what every single level should look like in terms of spell acquisition.

I’m not saying I did a bad job (outside of cheating) but it does make me wonder if I could further optimize what I have. In reading that article, I began thinking about the problems of Mana regeneration which made me take a second glance at my current party. So let me talk on how I see certain immediate problems given the way I’m playing:

• Male Dwarf Fighter -> The idea here was to swap to a Lord at level 9. By the time you hit level 9, you should be able to have 100 skill in Sword which means you can fully devote your skill points into Theology. The downside is that your Mana regeneration will always be really bad.
• Female Elf Valkyrie -> I have two Valkyries, an Elf and a Human. I ended up taking the Elf due to a better starting bonus. However, like the Dwarf Fighter, the Priest spell regeneration will be mediocre throughout the game.
• Female Elf Ninja -> This character took way too long for me to roll and I had multiple doubts on whether I could pull it off. Worse yet, the starting stats were the bare minimal. So I couldn’t even put any bonus points into Vitality, even though I could modify her encumbrance value via BaneEdit.exe. That means, her spell regeneration would be stunted throughout the game.
• Male Felpurr Bard – >You may notice that the suggested optimized party included a Felpurr Mage. I’m certain that was done to allow the player to swap to a Samurai quickly while receiving the bonus Mana regeneration points.
• Male Rawulf Priest -> My best bonus roll character. I can’t recall if I put enough points into Vitality to acquire the additional Mana regeneration. I did swap this character to a Bishop early on (level 9) after I rushed his Theology.
• Male Faerie Mage – I kept him as a Mage for a while as I developed my Rawulf Bishop. It took time before I felt any confidence in allowing my Rawulf to cast spells. Also, I gave my Bard the Prometheus Horn which allowed me to be lazier

So my party by comparison isn’t that far off except that I lack the optimized Mana regeneration route. Also, in this latest play through, I started to question the double Bishop class swap. Maybe for one class that’s fine but two might be much. Similarly, I had a lot of “redundant” class swapping moments where I was trying to synergize the class being swapped into from the previous class. For instance, going from a Bard to a Samurai seemed like a natural choice given that it would take less to get his Thaumaturgy finished (or acquiring the last spells) I think that works when you didn’t do what I did which was using BaneEdit.exe. So that brings me to my next point:

To use BaneEdit.exe or not use it?

At this stage, I’m trying to push faster just because I don’t want to spend hours in one zone grinding for half a level. I’m not talking about my usual Enchanted Forest spin-to-win area either but the lower level stuff. I could always try one of those “power gamer but hardcore route” type of deals in using a strategy such as the optimized party but center is closer towards the way I was going. However, since I no longer am young and that there’s other things I wish I can do as well, doing the “long grind” type of deals feels like a waste of time. Given my feeling on this subject, BaneEdit.exe just becomes a must for my own sanity (not to mention I did beat this game ages ago and everything here on out is just for my enjoyment and experimentation)

Now, that we got that issue out of the way, let me preface that I want to construct a similar “optimized” party but with the qualification that I will be using BaneEdit.exe to modify them because of how I detest certain aspects of the game (namely weak starting gear, lack of vendors for class gear and the irritating drop in attributes after swapping professions). Not to mention I don’t think I can patch my game. This version of the party is meant to immediately swap to, account for the lack of a patch utility to allow for the 18-26 min bonus roll, account for the inability to modify spell regeneration with a tool and edit their base equipment as a result of being able to obtain certain mid/end game items:

• Male Dwarf Priest -> Lord
• Female Elf Priest -> Valkyrie
• Female Elf Alchemist -> Ninja
• Male Felpurr Mage -> Bard
• Male Rawulf Priest
• Male Faerie Mage

The class to the right means the immediate change of profession upon entering the game. Theoretically, you could avoid BaneEdit.exe for each character except the Bard and possibly the Ninja. A Monk might be easier to deal with if you can nail down the exact stats because you would just require robes and sandals for gear to start and those are sold by Queequeg. Also, the hybrid classes would receive higher than normal spell casting and Oratory skills at the start. For the Ninja (if you manage to get one), this is huge since most of your initial points as you level will end up going towards Ninjutsu, which is infuriating to level early on. Without BaneEdit.exe though, your Skulduggery will suffer early on and those doors and traps at the beginning of the game suck.

At the very least after getting this party assembled (where I would only take bonus rolls of 18+ to dump into Vitality) and before the class change, I would probably use BaneEdit.exe at least once to provide enough stats to be able to immediately switch into the ideal starting class as well as changing some gear around (like adding a Lute and Ninja uniform). Admittedly, I would dump 100 points into Skulduggery simply because doors and traps in this game suck and I have no patience for reloading. Also, I would adjust each characters’ encumbrance level just because the design of that is stupid.

Probably, the biggest change in this party structure is the immediate swap of my Dwarf into a Lord. The advantage of going from a Fighter into a Lord is that Fighters level very quickly and don’t have any particular skill that the game auto assigns skills into upon leveling. I find that by the time I get to the Mines, my party will hover around level 9. Swapping from a Fighter into a Lord class means that I will be able to assign points into Theology fast. While this is kinda true, I found that the class swap really didn’t do me that much of a benefit since my Valkyrie was in a similar position. The only difference was that my Valkyrie had less points assigned into Pole & Staff by that point. So that makes me question whether the class swap was worth it outside of being easier to do at a later stage.

I’m not going to lie and I will admit that if I tried this “optimal” party, I’d give myself an advantage of multiple BaneEdit.exe upgrades just to get through the game faster. That idea alone changes my strategy drastically compared to a more “purist” ideal. In that situation, going from a Priest into a Lord is much more fluid and provides better long term value. However, when it comes to the rest of the party, given my lessons on my current play through, what other things can I change?

The big questions revolve around the Priest and Mage. Originally, with my last two parties, I would switch the Priest and Mage into a Bishop. The Priest would be the first to change classes at level 9. The idea there is to rush towards Cure Poison and having a dedicated healer early on. Then at level 9, swapping to a Bishop would allow him to put his points into Thaumaturgy to build up his offense while filling in missing lower level Priest spells. I still think there is some value to this strategy but the issue becomes gear later on as well as determining when to swap to another class like a Monk (which is what I prefer him to be in the end game).

Monks are a class that start very slow due to developing Ninjutsu. If you go from a Priest/Bishop into a Monk like me, you’ll find that you can devote all your leveling points into Theosophy fast since most likely you will use a 2H weapon that automatically levels as you use it (like say a Holy Basher). That means, by the time you’re ready to swap to a Monk, your Pole & Staff skill should be maxed out, freeing you to put your points into non-trainable skills like Theosophy and Kirijutsu. But with Mental spells, there’s a very large overlap between Priest and Psionic spells and there’s not a lot of unique Mental spells. That means you’ll cap out on your Psionic side very fast, leaving you to twiddle your thumbs around as you try to play level catch up to your Bishop class (and most likely you’ll be forced to push your Bishop level high to get as many spells as possible)

A different way to deal with this issue might be to also switch this character into a fighting class like a Lord early on to finish up his Theology aspects. That would give the Priest some fighting capability. However, it also makes him feel redundant when you have a Valkyrie or Lord already in the party. Another way to handle this is to swap this class to a Bard mid game. Now, for my last two sessions, I leveled my Bard up high before swapping him into a Samurai. Part of the issue with Samurai is that their gear stinks until you hit the Hall of the Dead. The other thing is that the Lute in particular is incredibly useful up until  that point. The Angel’s Tongue is decent but I read that Bless doesn’t stack which makes the Horn of Prometheus the only instrument really worth using in the later stages of the game.

Swapping the Priest to a Bard at level 9 rather than a Bishop does limit their end game Priest spells at an odd point. But one reason to do the swap early on is to move to a class with Ninjutsu and Thaumaturgy since hiding in shadows becomes crucial and it’s something you’ll want for each character. Acquiring Ninjutsu early on means you’ll have an easier time adjusting to a class like a Monk or Ninja. Also, in swapping to a Bard, I could switch my Bard to a Samurai earlier and move my Valkyrie into the 4th party slot. But the nice thing is that my new Samurai will have some Ninjutsu developed through being a Bard and begin critically hitting from Kirijutsu.

The problem with the Bard I’ve found is that at some point, I ended up ditching the class and having a fair number of instruments taking room up in my pack. There’s some other gear that I acquired for a Bard too which meant toting excess items around. The early levels of a Bard can be rough because of how the game will constantly put points into Music until it’s above 51. On a positive note, you’ll be playing your instrument at every combat turn so leveling Music is quite easy. It’s just tedious. On the other hand, because of the previous Priest class, you’ll probably have more points in Oratory which I found more painful to level once I became too dependent on my instruments. So the mid game switch might prove fruitful.

The Mage is a harder situation because of how dependent you will be on a good one. While the Bishop sounds like a great idea on paper, in practice, the Bishop is a bit of a scam class. It takes forever to level one and the spell split becomes infuriating to keep track of. If you’re a Faerie, you lose out on some key gear whereas a pure Faerie Mage has some very good pieces. So you want to get your Mage to a reasonably high level before swapping because this character will be your big hitter in large fights.

The downside of a pure Mage is that due to the general slow Mana regeneration in this game, you won’t be able to cast spells all the time. XP grinding sessions generally only occur at three stages: the very start, the mines by the Fountain and in the Enchanted Forest from the Castle Basement connection point. There are two additional regenerative fountains, one on the island in the River Styx next to the Tomb of the Dead and the other being in the Hall of the Dead. The Tomb of the Dead ground floor spot is an awful spot to grind XP because of the spell casting demons you’ll face. The Hall of the Dead is slightly better but suffers from bad, low XP mobs. I simply prefer to acquire the end game items from the mini bosses in the Hall of the Dead then heading to my spot in the Enchanted Forest area.

Regardless, the Mage is both one of the most powerful classes in the game by itself and one of the weakest because of the downtime. Now, when it comes to class swapping, one may think that changing into a Bard might work out well due to the complimentary nature of the spells. Also, a Faerie has naturally lower AC compared to other races while Bard’s have mediocre gear. Finally, many people prefer to play their Bard almost bare to get the most out of as many instruments as possible (or least not use any weapons).

However, the Faeries simply don’t have enough gear options to make them worth playing anything besides a pure Mage, Alchemist, Psionic, Bishop, Monk or Ninja. A Bard almost would be worth it once the Faerie Bard could level his Ninjutsu up to a respectable level. Then that character could play their instruments or cast spells safely from the shadows all the time. One thought here is that if you decide to swap to a Bard from a Mage rather than a Priest, you would do so around level 9-10 where you should have the bulk of the group spells (like Fireball, Iceball, etc.) and enough Oratory skill that you won’t lose too much in the switch. You would have to forgo most spell casting until your Music skill is at 51+ and you will need to practice Ninjutsu at every opportunity. But your overall armor should be the same or you should be unhittable once you get your Ninjutsu up.

The downside of not switching to a Bishop for a Faerie for the Mage is that you probably won’t be able to acquire Priest spells. The only other class that you could switch into is a Priest but you lose out on a lot of attributes. If you change to a Lord or Valkyrie, you won’t be able to use most gear, which defeats the purpose of swapping into a tankier class. For myself, I like the idea of my Faerie ending the game as a Ninja simply because of the massive AC advantage that combines the Faerie’s naturally low AC with the various bonuses that a Ninja receives.

Perhaps, the solution here is to just transition one class into a Bishop (Faerie Mage). With the Rawulf Priest, I can always end as a Lord to finish up his Theology. One class route for the Rawulf might look like Priest -> Bard (level 9) -> Monk (?) -> Lord. It’s a little roundabout but I get more transitions during the mid game around level 9-11 and less downtime with a Bard class.

I’m still working out the kinks with this party. I have a general idea of what my end game party will look like. I think part of the missing component has been the mid game and Ninjitsu parts. Unfortunately, it’s looking like my poor Faerie won’t receive it for a while given the need to swap to Bishop down the road. The main solve here will be to fix mana regeneration for the end game. I don’t know how much of an impact that will be though. Generally, what I’ve done lately is equipping everyone with an Ankh of Wonder which provides bonus regeneration. Regardless, this is an interesting thought experiment. I might revisit this if that urge to start from scratch hits me again. The downside is that I’d have to create more characters and hit 18 min in all their attributes to get close to this ideal party. Either that or I’d have to track down this so-called patch/fix that un-fucks the stupid RNG of the bonus rolls.

• Male Dwarf Priest -> Lord
• Female Elf Priest -> Valkyrie
• Female Elf Alchemist -> Ninja
• Male Felpurr Mage -> Bard
• Male Rawulf Priest
• Male Faerie Mage

The post Wizardry 6: Crazy Starting Party for Optimization appeared first on Kontroversial Keith.

The Tomb of the Dead likewise has bad mobs for this style of grinding. Deciding that the bulk of the zone was not great for grinding out levels, I moved onto to finish the area and went to the Halls of the Dead where some of the best end game gear lie. There were a few very nasty encounters where my injuries and low mana began causing me some concern. Ultimately, the goal was to locate the restorative fountain as quickly as possible and run back and forth until I claimed all the mobs and mini bosses in the area. I did save the samurai boss for last since the gear I was toting around was beginning to weigh on me and I needed to sell the rest of the items to make room.

Along the way, I tried to use the restorative fountain as a zone to grind experience but the mobs were not consistently putting out great XP for the effort. So I decided to go back to the most reliable spot in the game for XP grinding: the gated area above the basement for the Enchanted Forest. While I have used this particular spot for grinding out my levels, the primary change here is that most of my party now had adequate gear finally. Since then I’ve mostly stayed in this spot to begin finalizing my party for the end game. As it stands, my party composition now appears like this:

• Male Dwarf Lord level 14 (formerly a Fighter)
• Male Felpurr Samurai level 10 (formerly a Bard)
• Male Dracon Ninja level 15
• Female Elf Monk level 9 (formerly a Valkyrie)
• Male Rawulf Bishop level 14 (formerly a Priest)
• Male Faerie Bishop level 11 (formerly a Mage)

This party composition probably could go all the way to the end game. However, I’m planning on doing a few more class changes. For now, the way this party is operating is based on several things:

• The Dwarf Lord is rushing all major Priest spells and will probably stick to the class for now while the Samurai and Monk are built up. Eventually, I’ll have the Dwarf Lord switch to Monk once the Monk’s Ninjutsu is at an acceptable level (which helps her AC).
• The Felpurr Samurai is the biggest damage dealer in the party as he’s armed with the Muramasa Blade. Since I managed to get the Bard’s Thaumaturgy to 100 before swapping classes, I can focus all skill points into Kirijutsu. Once that’s at 100, I should have around 37% critical chance which combined with the Wakizashi should make him into a fairly efficient killing machine.
• The Elf Monk is quickly dumping everything into Theosophy with 1-2 points placed into Kirijutsu. Ninjutsu is slowly leveling though as is her Hands & Feet skill. I’m avoiding placing her into the melee slot until Ninjutsu significantly improves so she can have a much higher AC. Otherwise, every level I’m mostly just collecting spells.
• The Dracon Ninja is taking a long time to reach maximum Alchemy. There’s only a few spells I’m really after at this point (namely Deadly Air) but I can never spare any extra points into Kirijutsu sadly. But once I get Deadly Air, I’ll be primed for changing into a Bishop. Not necessarily the best race to change into a Bishop but it’s either that or I have to swap him into a Lord and/or Samurai.
• The Rawulf Bishop is starting to split his leveling between Thaumaturgy and Theology depending on which spell side he receives. But he’s got adequate room for doing either or focusing while my Faerie catches up. Once he’s done with this class, he’ll move into the Monk as his final class.
• The Faerie Bishop has a maxed out Thaumaturgy skill so everything is being dumped into Theology. It almost feels that when I change the Ninja to a Bishop, I’ll have to swap the Bishop to a Ninja at the same time. But since I battle Ninjas almost all the time, I probably should just save some gear. It’ll be easier for the Faerie to become a Ninja than the Ninja to become a Bishop initially.

After this party, the final party should look like:

• Male Felpurr Lord
• Male Dwarf Samurai
• Male Rawulf Monk
• Male Faerie Ninja
• Female Elf Ranger
• Male Dracon Bishop

In a way, I really regret making the Ninja a Dracon or the Dwarf a male. Given that I ended up editing the party here and there anyway, I think I could’ve gotten away with a far better end game party. Like not being able to use the Valkyrie’s end game lance sucks. Having a Female Dwarf would’ve solved that issue. But that’s something to consider in the future after going through this play through.

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