And you have to be a gadgeteer to use it. If you want the critical strike bonus, then get the single ranger level fast and go right back to gadgeteer.
Which is easily worth the tiny crit that the ranger is going to give you. You get a detect secrets item so you wont need "search all the time", just turn on search and dont run everywhere.
Okay I have another dual-classing question. What are the drawbacks of dual-classing my Dracon fighter into a ranger? His close combat is near godly, the weapons he uses overlap, and berserk and KO abilities don't seem to be worth it.
Okay I have another dual-classing question. What are the drawbacks of dual-classing my Dracon fighter into a ranger? His close combat is near godly, the weapons he uses overlap, and berserk and KO abilities don't seem to be worth it.
You will lose the Berserk ability, get less hit points per level, and go up in level slower.
Berserk is definitly worth it and you should be berserking all the time.
Later in the game all the highest AC items are fighter/lord/valk only.
Okay I have another dual-classing question. What are the drawbacks of dual-classing my Dracon fighter into a ranger? His close combat is near godly, the weapons he uses overlap, and berserk and KO abilities don't seem to be worth it.
The weapon overlap may eventually stop. After a certain point, rangers top being able to use the better melee weapons. Similarly, some of the best bows are for rangers only.
Berserk is great when monster start to really have lots of hit points and you have enough stamina and accuracy to use it. Until then, it's excellent if you use it on a paralyzed, knocked out, or sleeping target (though the last one is hard to set up).
The KO ability triggers more often as you gain levels from what I can tell.
As the post above me said, a lot of the better armor is only for fighters, lords, and valkyries (samurai get by with their unique armor).
Also, lugging around enough arrows for a ranger can get annoying.
If you're going to dual class the fighter, lord or valkyrie would be better fits if you don't have another heavy armor character. Even then, I question whether it's worth it. Valk maybe if it's a female that's already using polearms, but lords are often viewed as having gotten the short end of the stick.
I already have a lord, and the dracon is male. So I guess I'll keep it single-class. I have my Gadgeteer in the sniper role anyways. I just need that arrow attachment so the omnigun does some real damage (boo bullet stones).
I already have a lord, and the dracon is male. So I guess I'll keep it single-class. I have my Gadgeteer in the sniper role anyways. I just need that arrow attachment so the omnigun does some real damage (boo bullet stones).
Quarrels do the most damage
stones are next
arrows after that.
You have to get the right stones though.
Also you should be able to toss at least throwing knives and darts, which might include shruikens for things like death stars if you find any.
Arrows have the most reliable status effects, then stones, then quarrels.
Mystic Arrows[the best you can purchase] do 8-20 damage.
Medusa Stones[the best you can purchase] also do 8-20 damage.
Lightning Bolts[the best you can purcahse] do 10-30 damage.
Anyway, buy spike or impaling stones, you should be able to pick them up in Arnika, Trynton, Martens Bluff, or the Umpani base. They have less reliable, but better quality status effects on them.
Okay I have another dual-classing question. What are the drawbacks of dual-classing my Dracon fighter into a ranger? His close combat is near godly, the weapons he uses overlap, and berserk and KO abilities don't seem to be worth it.
The weapon overlap may eventually stop. After a certain point, rangers top being able to use the better melee weapons. Similarly, some of the best bows are for rangers only.
Berserk is great when monster start to really have lots of hit points and you have enough stamina and accuracy to use it. Until then, it's excellent if you use it on a paralyzed, knocked out, or sleeping target (though the last one is hard to set up).
The KO ability triggers more often as you gain levels from what I can tell.
As the post above me said, a lot of the better armor is only for fighters, lords, and valkyries (samurai get by with their unique armor).
Also, lugging around enough arrows for a ranger can get annoying.
If you're going to dual class the fighter, lord or valkyrie would be better fits if you don't have another heavy armor character. Even then, I question whether it's worth it. Valk maybe if it's a female that's already using polearms, but lords are often viewed as having gotten the short end of the stick.
Lords can be very worth it later in the game, but getting the right hammers can be rough.
There is, hands down, no better damage dealer in the game, than a properly setup dual wielding str/dex/spd powerstrike berserking fighter.
You will do so much damage its ridiculous. Top him off with an enchanted blade, superman buff, and armor melt on your enemies and you will cut through them like they werent there. Hell, i cut through them like they arent there with a saumari and monk who havent hit 85 in the relevent skills. And fighters are significantly better. Like having a Samuari that always lightning strikes.
Even without dual wielding, weapons like the giant sword will keep you doing so much damage its laughable[9-33 dmg, extended range, +5 str, 30% KO]. Now, a ranger can use that. But a ranger uses that at 9-33 damage and a fighter uses that at 18-66 damage.
While the second best sword in the game can be used by rangers, the best is fighter/lord/valk only. Though Rangers can use the vampire chain[custom made item, best custom in the game] and do the dual wield chain thing as well as a fighter it still doesnt make sense to get rid of the double damage bonus and stronger armor for a weak ranged critical ability[unless taken early]
Anyway, the point is to stick with the fighter. Just get them in range and have them use potions and powders when they arent.
I guess I can do a quick and dirty journal of what I've done so far.
Party:
Makoto, Female Human Samurai
Katrina, Female Dwarf Fighter
Nyrika, Female Faerie Ninja
Sythel, Male Human Ninja
Fiona, Female Rawulf Priest
Vynromad, Male Elf Psionic
My front line fighters were all female due to some of the stamina regen items in the game being female only.
I have two ninja in my party because the Faerie will wind up with the Cane of Corpus, possibly the most powerful weapon in the game but one that is cursed and un-removable. As the thrown auto-penetrate and thrown critical ability of the ninja is pretty damn powerful, I decided having a second one to still get use out of that was worthwhile. Plus, they can split up thieving skills, which helps since ninja have so many skills to spend points on as is.
I chose psion over a mage to have something different, have something that could backup heal, and something that wouldn't go insane.
Went through the monastery, got to the Arnika road. Started making my way towards town. OMFG I HATE this part of the game! It's like the game is taking a bunch of babies and raking them over a bed of nails . . .
Eventually make it to Arnika. Proceeded to buy and sell stuff from Antone. Got Sythel some decent melee weapons, frequented Anna's store for thrown weapons for the ninja. Robbed the bank vaults, put Bloodlust on my samurai. Eventually Makoto will be able to hit with the thing instead of just winding up exhausted from the extra attacks. Picked up the wheel key from the temple.
Spent some time killing the enemies in town for experience, made my way back to the monastery to use the key. Things hurt a bit less with better equipment and more experience, but still got rough quite often. Demon sting rides backup on my fighter. Demonbane sits her inventory. Until Katrina hits reliably enough, she's sticking with the Diamond Epee's bonus to hit.
Made my way towards Trynton, clearing out the graveyard on the way. I hate those damn plant enemies. Missile using creatures expose just how clunky the move-as-a-party mechanic Wizardry is. On top of that, plants have so many status effects they throw at you I'm surprised my entire party hasn't somehow gotten VD and cancer already. With that in mind, I pretty much beelined for friendlies and proceeded up the tree-city.
So the last battle i just fought. I got death clouded so many times it was ridiculous.
And someone died each time. I think each and every member of the party died more times in that fight than they had in the entire game.
I am level 20. Only 3 survived due to circumstances beyond my control
ed: everyone died at least two times in the fight.
As I understand, it's normal for that sort of thing to happen in the beginning/endgame and not so much during the middle. Perfectionists can get miffed because the number of deaths for each character is logged. Sucks to be a perfectionist.
Party:
Makoto, Female Human Samurai
Katrina, Female Dwarf Fighter
Nyrika, Female Faerie Ninja
Sythel, Male Human Ninja
Fiona, Female Rawulf Priest
Vynromad, Male Elf Psionic
Props if you can get to the endgame, where Ninjas are decent characters. Until then, it's going to be rough.
...Is it just me, or does this game take a lot longer than it should? And how good is the Flamstryke (sp?) mod if you've played through the vanilla once or twice?
no clue about flamestrykes mod. But i do know it has a bunch of unbalanced things in it.
Also, while multipule deaths in a battle isnt out of the question in the late game this was just ridiculous. I had full Magic Screen (7), Element Shield(7). Magic Screen(7) protection up with all characters sporting quality resistance gear and i was still getting hit consistantly with elemental instant kills.
I purify air'd through an entire air spell point allocation on my level 20 straight priest and death cloud was still up for a majority of the battle.
ed; He will do fine getting to the end-game. The only things that he has that develop late are the ninjas.
Props if you can get to the endgame, where Ninjas are decent characters. Until then, it's going to be rough.
They've passed the painful early phases, though in this case even that wasn't so painful since I took great advantage of auto-penetration of thrown weapons. Dual wielding throwing daggers and shurikens, heck even feather darts, is great for dealing with monsters that don't seem to want to take damage. I got ahold of the Cane of Corpus with a level 12 party before I last stopped playing, so things are looking up. My human ninja has the disadvantage of not really having a reliable selection of quality weapons though. He's switched around weapon types a few times, though he was mainly brought in to use ranged stuff anyway.
...Is it just me, or does this game take a lot longer than it should?
It's not just you. Back when the game came out, I wasn't quite able to put my finger on it, but having to watch so many "monster got hit" and "monster dodge" animations really slows down combat.
Props if you can get to the endgame, where Ninjas are decent characters. Until then, it's going to be rough.
They've passed the painful early phases, though in this case even that wasn't so painful since I took great advantage of auto-penetration of thrown weapons. Dual wielding throwing daggers and shurikens, heck even feather darts, is great for dealing with monsters that don't seem to want to take damage. I got ahold of the Cane of Corpus with a level 12 party before I last stopped playing, so things are looking up. My human ninja has the disadvantage of not really having a reliable selection of quality weapons though. He's switched around weapon types a few times, though he was mainly brought in to use ranged stuff anyway.
...Is it just me, or does this game take a lot longer than it should?
It's not just you. Back when the game came out, I wasn't quite able to put my finger on it, but having to watch so many "monster got hit" and "monster dodge" animations really slows down combat.
Yea, it really does. But even then i dont really see it as longer than it should be. Just doesnt really seem like that to me with so many creatures doing their things.
As for your human.
1. Pick up the vampire chain from ferro and look for nunchucks. Vamp chain and nunchucks are both mace/flail and both have nasty status effects. Wont do the damage of the Faerie, but you will be nasty enough in melee so that it wont matter.
for wand/staff weapons, all of which listed will be primary/secondary weapons. The Winterwand is good. The Rod of Sprites is fantastic
The coil of the serpent is cursed and a primary weapon, but decent. Though i think a nunchuck/vamp chain work is better since they are the same weapon type, and let the faerie use the wands. The Winterwand has a set drop, but the Rod of Sprites will be tough to get a hold of.
Another option and easy to get a hold of is a stun rod[Sadok sells them] has no to hit bonus and a low iniative, which is a polearm. But with 20% paralyze and 75% stamina drain that shouldnt deter you from using one.
for wand/staff weapons, all of which listed will be primary/secondary weapons. The Winterwand is good. The Rod of Sprites is fantastic
I went out of my way to hit the waterfall cave with the wand and enchanted wakizashi. I was mainly interested in the sword, having kinda forgotten about the wand over the years, but it has indeed proven itself quite useful. Paralysis on a fast weapon has ended many fights against small groups (or solo) of tougher enemies.
The coil of the serpent is cursed and a primary weapon, but decent. Though i think a nunchuck/vamp chain work is better since they are the same weapon type, and let the faerie use the wands. The Winterwand has a set drop, but the Rod of Sprites will be tough to get a hold of.
Another option and easy to get a hold of is a stun rod[Sadok sells them] has no to hit bonus and a low iniative, which is a polearm. But with 20% paralyze and 75% stamina drain that shouldnt deter you from using one.
I toyed with the idea of polearms initially, but then decided that I'd rather get multiple attacks in for multiple critical strike chances. He was using dual nunchucka for a while. Now I've got him with dual ninja-tos for the 5% kill chance. I'll have a clearer picture of what to focus on after the chests from Bayjin. Finding sais would pretty much cement me with daggers for at least one hand.
If you have the nunchucks, stick with them. 15% KO is nothing to sneeze at and you can upgrade to the vampire chain, which not only does significant damage, but also has 100% stamina drain, uses the same skill as the nunchucks[so your faerie can use the winterwand in the second hand for a really nasty one two punch with the cane of corpus
The vamp chain has an extended range which is nice as well. 100% stamina drain is just plain disgusting. The +10 mace/flail bonus and autoheal on hit is just icing on the cake.
In my opinion, high percent status effects are almost always better than low percent kill effects. When you KO something its as good as dead anyway, cause your fighter is just going to go berzerk on it for 500 damage in the next round[if your other guys dont get to it first].
High stamina drain is probably the most deadly against big single opponents, and the vamp chain does that well.
Only problem is getting a wing and getting the heart. But on the plus side, that fight will get you a couple giant blades, which not only do great damage, but have an extended range and 30% K.O. effect on them.
ed: The main thing is that everything in the game will eventualy drop due to lack of stamina. Nothing, as far as i can tell, is immune to stamina drain.
I finally hit level 10 (with the Bard/Fighter/Gadgeteer - not the hybrids or elites yet).
My party is rocking along pretty well. The fighter and gadgeteer have their second attacks with their preferred weapons. The bard is getting pretty good in melee with swords/daggers and should be ready to dual into a rogue when the time comes. The Bishop is a glass cannon thanks to low HP, but one that hits so very very hard it's worth it.
Sadly, my Alchemist and Lord seem to be dropping behind though.
Alchemist spellbooks seem to be rare so I don't have a great spell selection yet and the spells I do have aren't too amazing. There's only so many times I can cast acid splash before I go crazy. Is there anything I should be doing to beef the guy up?
As for the Lord, he does pretty good damage with his dual-wield sword/hammer combo, but it's not near to the level of the Fighter and not a huge amount more than the bard. He's my heal battery in order to raise his magic skills, but aside from Paralyze I don't have too many spells I use regularly (make wounds < bow at this point). I'm tempted to dual him to Priest, though if there's one thing I'm hearing here it's that you should dual anything but a Bard/Rogue.
I know I'll lose the better armor going to priest, but it's not available yet (in general - some things are). The additional spellcasting power, especially given that divinity is my lowest-ranking school, is tempting. How bad an idea is this?
Alchemist spellbooks seem to be rare so I don't have a great spell selection yet and the spells I do have aren't too amazing. There's only so many times I can cast acid splash before I go crazy. Is there anything I should be doing to beef the guy up?
Off the top of my head, Kunar in the Umpani Camp and Crock in the Swamp have a better selection of alchemy books than you find in Arnika and Trynton.
I played this game back in 2002. The thing I remember most about it (besides the frustration of dying over and over) is that when I invoked the area map, it took a ridiculously long time to render. Like 20 minutes, sometimes, on the Arnika-Trynton road. If I needed to look at the map, that was snack time.
Did anybody else have this problem? Was it just some weird artifact of my OS, hardware, or video drivers? Or did the game's code suck that bad?
It wasn't a powergamer box, but neither was it a complete crap system for early 2002 -- Athlon 850, 64MB GeForce 2 GTS, 256MB of memory, Windows 2000.
I really liked the game in spite of this problem, and would probably have finished it if I hadn't gotten distracted by Final Fantasy Tactics.
I played this game back in 2002. The thing I remember most about it (besides the frustration of dying over and over) is that when I invoked the area map, it took a ridiculously long time to render. Like 20 minutes, sometimes, on the Arnika-Trynton road. If I needed to look at the map, that was snack time.
Did anybody else have this problem? Was it just some weird artifact of my OS, hardware, or video drivers? Or did the game's code suck that bad?
The game's code sucks that bad. On a more modern machine, the map rendering time still takes a long time.
This was Sir-Tech's only 3D game that made it to market to my knowledge and it shows.
I hate that damn map anyways - I only use it to mark doors or chests I can't deal with yet and need to come back for.
The one nice thing about the game is generally you can figure out where you are just by looking around. The exception being Arnika-Trynton road and its generic rolling hills of doom. I hate that place so much - I always seem to get the most horrible random encounters there.
I had one that had some undead-heads that seemed unfooled by chameleon, went hostile at very long range, and promptly insaned my entire party. This was when I was level 8 or 9. I had to reload, retreat to a hidey-hole, and rest until they went away far enough I could sneak past them.
Set/Return Portal can't come fast enough for me. I needs me some levels.
Dear god, my party is level 16-18 and I just entered the sea cave. I'm getting my fucking ass handed to me down here, Death Rays, Psi Sharks, can't even recast light, Vi ditched me, sweet mercy mother of god.
I was fine all up to this point, but Sea caves can eat it. I've even got 2 of the retro dungeons done.
I'm trying to decide whether I should leave this place and go somewhere else.
Dear god, my party is level 16-18 and I just entered the sea cave. I'm getting my fucking ass handed to me down here, Death Rays, Psi Sharks, can't even recast light, Vi ditched me, sweet mercy mother of god.
I was fine all up to this point, but Sea caves can eat it. I've even got 2 of the retro dungeons done.
I'm trying to decide whether I should leave this place and go somewhere else.
Sea Caves or the underwater section?
Keep up magic screen. The first thing you should cast in ever battle should be element shield [as high as you can cast it]. Then start wailing away.
Yea, underwater section, holy crap I finally made it through, that place sucked. It's those stupid inkys, sometimes they get like 5 hits off a single attack.
Yea, underwater section, holy crap I finally made it through, that place sucked. It's those stupid inkys, sometimes they get like 5 hits off a single attack.
Yea, I usualy just end up running through that section if i dont have someone fast with the element shield. On my last playthrough, i did it at level 12[my god it was horrible]. I had to turn the difficulty down for nessie [:(] and it was just "run" "run" "run"
Ran the whole thing in a single combat encounter hoping not to die, got through the load and ressed the ones that did. Thank god for return to portal.
I had to drop all Vi's gear at the entrance, and then plow through the place systematically turn by turn quick saving before any inky encounters. It was methodical...
It's funny when you come out the other side and rayjin's are no longer a threat to you.
Is there a reason that Vi Domina can't use the Air school of spells? She's definitely high enough level to be casting sleep (level 11), and she can't even train in Air Magic on level up. Is this a bug? Is this some attempt to stop her from getting Set/Return Portal? Because if so, I'm sure tempted to dual her into a fighter or rogue.
DAMN YOU THREAD. Don't make me play this AGAIN. I've finished it twice. It took around 100 hours of my life each time. This time I might have to go gadgeteer, since I never have.
Posts
The Omnigun is the best ranged weapon in the game at level 24. Nothing else comes close.
ed: actualy its level 26.
Omni gun goes from
Blind 10%
K.O. 5%
Kill 1%
To
Blind 10%
K.O. 10%
Kill 2%
Sleep 1%
Paralyze 1%
Poison 1% (Str 5)
Hex 1%
Disease 1%
Frighten 1%
Drain HP 1%
Drain Stamina 1%
Drain SP 1%
Nauseate 1%
Insane 1%
And you have to be a gadgeteer to use it. If you want the critical strike bonus, then get the single ranger level fast and go right back to gadgeteer.
Which is easily worth the tiny crit that the ranger is going to give you. You get a detect secrets item so you wont need "search all the time", just turn on search and dont run everywhere.
You will lose the Berserk ability, get less hit points per level, and go up in level slower.
Berserk is definitly worth it and you should be berserking all the time.
Later in the game all the highest AC items are fighter/lord/valk only.
The weapon overlap may eventually stop. After a certain point, rangers top being able to use the better melee weapons. Similarly, some of the best bows are for rangers only.
Berserk is great when monster start to really have lots of hit points and you have enough stamina and accuracy to use it. Until then, it's excellent if you use it on a paralyzed, knocked out, or sleeping target (though the last one is hard to set up).
The KO ability triggers more often as you gain levels from what I can tell.
As the post above me said, a lot of the better armor is only for fighters, lords, and valkyries (samurai get by with their unique armor).
Also, lugging around enough arrows for a ranger can get annoying.
If you're going to dual class the fighter, lord or valkyrie would be better fits if you don't have another heavy armor character. Even then, I question whether it's worth it. Valk maybe if it's a female that's already using polearms, but lords are often viewed as having gotten the short end of the stick.
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3DS: 3454-0268-5595 Battle.net: SteelAngel#1772
Quarrels do the most damage
stones are next
arrows after that.
You have to get the right stones though.
Also you should be able to toss at least throwing knives and darts, which might include shruikens for things like death stars if you find any.
Arrows have the most reliable status effects, then stones, then quarrels.
Mystic Arrows[the best you can purchase] do 8-20 damage.
Medusa Stones[the best you can purchase] also do 8-20 damage.
Lightning Bolts[the best you can purcahse] do 10-30 damage.
Anyway, buy spike or impaling stones, you should be able to pick them up in Arnika, Trynton, Martens Bluff, or the Umpani base. They have less reliable, but better quality status effects on them.
Lords can be very worth it later in the game, but getting the right hammers can be rough.
There is, hands down, no better damage dealer in the game, than a properly setup dual wielding str/dex/spd powerstrike berserking fighter.
You will do so much damage its ridiculous. Top him off with an enchanted blade, superman buff, and armor melt on your enemies and you will cut through them like they werent there. Hell, i cut through them like they arent there with a saumari and monk who havent hit 85 in the relevent skills. And fighters are significantly better. Like having a Samuari that always lightning strikes.
Even without dual wielding, weapons like the giant sword will keep you doing so much damage its laughable[9-33 dmg, extended range, +5 str, 30% KO]. Now, a ranger can use that. But a ranger uses that at 9-33 damage and a fighter uses that at 18-66 damage.
While the second best sword in the game can be used by rangers, the best is fighter/lord/valk only. Though Rangers can use the vampire chain[custom made item, best custom in the game] and do the dual wield chain thing as well as a fighter it still doesnt make sense to get rid of the double damage bonus and stronger armor for a weak ranged critical ability[unless taken early]
Anyway, the point is to stick with the fighter. Just get them in range and have them use potions and powders when they arent.
I've always wanted to play a Wizardry game so I'm kind of excited for this Let's Play thread
I dont know where Why is, but I am about to take it to the Dark Savant and kick some ass on ascention peak.
This is why I'm excited for the updates; I have no idea what you're talking about.
Please Why, you're my only hope!
Wizardry 8 is 3d, really complicated, nethack. Your goal is to go get the things then ascend.
The Dark Savant is a bad guy with a really cool helmet.
Party:
Makoto, Female Human Samurai
Katrina, Female Dwarf Fighter
Nyrika, Female Faerie Ninja
Sythel, Male Human Ninja
Fiona, Female Rawulf Priest
Vynromad, Male Elf Psionic
My front line fighters were all female due to some of the stamina regen items in the game being female only.
I have two ninja in my party because the Faerie will wind up with the Cane of Corpus, possibly the most powerful weapon in the game but one that is cursed and un-removable. As the thrown auto-penetrate and thrown critical ability of the ninja is pretty damn powerful, I decided having a second one to still get use out of that was worthwhile. Plus, they can split up thieving skills, which helps since ninja have so many skills to spend points on as is.
I chose psion over a mage to have something different, have something that could backup heal, and something that wouldn't go insane.
Went through the monastery, got to the Arnika road. Started making my way towards town. OMFG I HATE this part of the game! It's like the game is taking a bunch of babies and raking them over a bed of nails . . .
Eventually make it to Arnika. Proceeded to buy and sell stuff from Antone. Got Sythel some decent melee weapons, frequented Anna's store for thrown weapons for the ninja. Robbed the bank vaults, put Bloodlust on my samurai. Eventually Makoto will be able to hit with the thing instead of just winding up exhausted from the extra attacks. Picked up the wheel key from the temple.
Spent some time killing the enemies in town for experience, made my way back to the monastery to use the key. Things hurt a bit less with better equipment and more experience, but still got rough quite often. Demon sting rides backup on my fighter. Demonbane sits her inventory. Until Katrina hits reliably enough, she's sticking with the Diamond Epee's bonus to hit.
Made my way towards Trynton, clearing out the graveyard on the way. I hate those damn plant enemies. Missile using creatures expose just how clunky the move-as-a-party mechanic Wizardry is. On top of that, plants have so many status effects they throw at you I'm surprised my entire party hasn't somehow gotten VD and cancer already. With that in mind, I pretty much beelined for friendlies and proceeded up the tree-city.
More later.
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And someone died each time. I think each and every member of the party died more times in that fight than they had in the entire game.
I am level 20. Only 3 survived due to circumstances beyond my control
ed: everyone died at least two times in the fight.
As I understand, it's normal for that sort of thing to happen in the beginning/endgame and not so much during the middle. Perfectionists can get miffed because the number of deaths for each character is logged. Sucks to be a perfectionist.
Props if you can get to the endgame, where Ninjas are decent characters. Until then, it's going to be rough.
...Is it just me, or does this game take a lot longer than it should? And how good is the Flamstryke (sp?) mod if you've played through the vanilla once or twice?
Let 'em eat fucking pineapples!
Also, while multipule deaths in a battle isnt out of the question in the late game this was just ridiculous. I had full Magic Screen (7), Element Shield(7). Magic Screen(7) protection up with all characters sporting quality resistance gear and i was still getting hit consistantly with elemental instant kills.
I purify air'd through an entire air spell point allocation on my level 20 straight priest and death cloud was still up for a majority of the battle.
ed; He will do fine getting to the end-game. The only things that he has that develop late are the ninjas.
They've passed the painful early phases, though in this case even that wasn't so painful since I took great advantage of auto-penetration of thrown weapons. Dual wielding throwing daggers and shurikens, heck even feather darts, is great for dealing with monsters that don't seem to want to take damage. I got ahold of the Cane of Corpus with a level 12 party before I last stopped playing, so things are looking up. My human ninja has the disadvantage of not really having a reliable selection of quality weapons though. He's switched around weapon types a few times, though he was mainly brought in to use ranged stuff anyway.
It's not just you. Back when the game came out, I wasn't quite able to put my finger on it, but having to watch so many "monster got hit" and "monster dodge" animations really slows down combat.
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Yea, it really does. But even then i dont really see it as longer than it should be. Just doesnt really seem like that to me with so many creatures doing their things.
As for your human.
1. Pick up the vampire chain from ferro and look for nunchucks. Vamp chain and nunchucks are both mace/flail and both have nasty status effects. Wont do the damage of the Faerie, but you will be nasty enough in melee so that it wont matter.
for wand/staff weapons, all of which listed will be primary/secondary weapons. The Winterwand is good. The Rod of Sprites is fantastic
The coil of the serpent is cursed and a primary weapon, but decent. Though i think a nunchuck/vamp chain work is better since they are the same weapon type, and let the faerie use the wands. The Winterwand has a set drop, but the Rod of Sprites will be tough to get a hold of.
Another option and easy to get a hold of is a stun rod[Sadok sells them] has no to hit bonus and a low iniative, which is a polearm. But with 20% paralyze and 75% stamina drain that shouldnt deter you from using one.
I went out of my way to hit the waterfall cave with the wand and enchanted wakizashi. I was mainly interested in the sword, having kinda forgotten about the wand over the years, but it has indeed proven itself quite useful. Paralysis on a fast weapon has ended many fights against small groups (or solo) of tougher enemies.
I toyed with the idea of polearms initially, but then decided that I'd rather get multiple attacks in for multiple critical strike chances. He was using dual nunchucka for a while. Now I've got him with dual ninja-tos for the 5% kill chance. I'll have a clearer picture of what to focus on after the chests from Bayjin. Finding sais would pretty much cement me with daggers for at least one hand.
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The vamp chain has an extended range which is nice as well. 100% stamina drain is just plain disgusting. The +10 mace/flail bonus and autoheal on hit is just icing on the cake.
In my opinion, high percent status effects are almost always better than low percent kill effects. When you KO something its as good as dead anyway, cause your fighter is just going to go berzerk on it for 500 damage in the next round[if your other guys dont get to it first].
High stamina drain is probably the most deadly against big single opponents, and the vamp chain does that well.
Only problem is getting a wing and getting the heart. But on the plus side, that fight will get you a couple giant blades, which not only do great damage, but have an extended range and 30% K.O. effect on them.
ed: The main thing is that everything in the game will eventualy drop due to lack of stamina. Nothing, as far as i can tell, is immune to stamina drain.
My party is rocking along pretty well. The fighter and gadgeteer have their second attacks with their preferred weapons. The bard is getting pretty good in melee with swords/daggers and should be ready to dual into a rogue when the time comes. The Bishop is a glass cannon thanks to low HP, but one that hits so very very hard it's worth it.
Sadly, my Alchemist and Lord seem to be dropping behind though.
Alchemist spellbooks seem to be rare so I don't have a great spell selection yet and the spells I do have aren't too amazing. There's only so many times I can cast acid splash before I go crazy. Is there anything I should be doing to beef the guy up?
As for the Lord, he does pretty good damage with his dual-wield sword/hammer combo, but it's not near to the level of the Fighter and not a huge amount more than the bard. He's my heal battery in order to raise his magic skills, but aside from Paralyze I don't have too many spells I use regularly (make wounds < bow at this point). I'm tempted to dual him to Priest, though if there's one thing I'm hearing here it's that you should dual anything but a Bard/Rogue.
I know I'll lose the better armor going to priest, but it's not available yet (in general - some things are). The additional spellcasting power, especially given that divinity is my lowest-ranking school, is tempting. How bad an idea is this?
Eventualy you will pick up lots of good buffs. Armorplate, Magic Screen are long lasting out of combat buffs, Superman, and bless in-combat buffs.
You should be casting bless all the damn time as it is. And make sure you pump divinity at level up, that is what gets you access to spells.
In order to pump alchemy without much fuss make lots of potions, but make them one at a time.
My ninja has gone up 5 points of alchemy in one level by just mixing like 50 alchemy potions and doing it one at a time instead of in batches in 5.
Off the top of my head, Kunar in the Umpani Camp and Crock in the Swamp have a better selection of alchemy books than you find in Arnika and Trynton.
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Did anybody else have this problem? Was it just some weird artifact of my OS, hardware, or video drivers? Or did the game's code suck that bad?
It wasn't a powergamer box, but neither was it a complete crap system for early 2002 -- Athlon 850, 64MB GeForce 2 GTS, 256MB of memory, Windows 2000.
I really liked the game in spite of this problem, and would probably have finished it if I hadn't gotten distracted by Final Fantasy Tactics.
The game's code sucks that bad. On a more modern machine, the map rendering time still takes a long time.
This was Sir-Tech's only 3D game that made it to market to my knowledge and it shows.
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The one nice thing about the game is generally you can figure out where you are just by looking around. The exception being Arnika-Trynton road and its generic rolling hills of doom. I hate that place so much - I always seem to get the most horrible random encounters there.
I had one that had some undead-heads that seemed unfooled by chameleon, went hostile at very long range, and promptly insaned my entire party. This was when I was level 8 or 9. I had to reload, retreat to a hidey-hole, and rest until they went away far enough I could sneak past them.
Set/Return Portal can't come fast enough for me. I needs me some levels.
I was fine all up to this point, but Sea caves can eat it. I've even got 2 of the retro dungeons done.
I'm trying to decide whether I should leave this place and go somewhere else.
Damnit. typed in the quick reply window instead of the edit window. How awkward.
Sea Caves or the underwater section?
Keep up magic screen. The first thing you should cast in ever battle should be element shield [as high as you can cast it]. Then start wailing away.
Yea, I usualy just end up running through that section if i dont have someone fast with the element shield. On my last playthrough, i did it at level 12[my god it was horrible]. I had to turn the difficulty down for nessie [:(] and it was just "run" "run" "run"
Ran the whole thing in a single combat encounter hoping not to die, got through the load and ressed the ones that did. Thank god for return to portal.
It's funny when you come out the other side and rayjin's are no longer a threat to you.
Oh... don't try to have someone leave with stuff in their inventory when your party inventory is full, heh.
I am sure there are less than legal methods of attaining the game. But Amazon and Ebay were able to hook me up with used copies for < 20 dollars.
Ebay has a few
Attained searching for "wizardry 8 purchase" on google.