Wizardry 6--When to change classes?

[Iznaliu]

Traveler

That is a horrendous name for a party member. Just letting you know.

 

[Deuce Traveler]

Traveler

That is a horrendous name for a party member. Just letting you know.

It actually is worse. Travelr. I could only type in 7 character keys.

 

[Deuce Traveler]

Ok, I just finished the pyramids and have decided to swap my many character class changes. I now have:

Dwarf Samurai. Started as a pure fighter, swapped to priest and back a couple times, then went ranger for the hit points, then lord as a stepping stone to samurai. Maxed out theology, sword, and oratory. Have skills points around the 70s in bow and alchemy. Am level 1 and have 0 skill points in thaumaturgy and kirijitsu. I'm thinking of focusing on kirijitsu as he steadily levels up.

Two Human Valkyries. One started as a priest and the other a fighter, and they went back and forth between the two classes a number of times before becoming valkyries. They are both level 10 and have maxed out theology and oratory, but one has maxed out poles and staffs and the other sword. They both have nearly all the theology spells.

Faerie Ninja. Boy this one took work. She started as a bard, went to thief, back to bard, then to mage, then to bard, then to ranger to step towards ninja, then finally ninja. She is now level 4, has most mage spells, has 76 in mace and flail (uses a whip, thinking of having her start using the longbow), maxed oratory, nearly maxed skulduggery, maxed thaumaturgy for mage spells, only a few points in alchemy, and now just starting to put points in kirijitsu. I plan to put all her other points she gets into kirijitsu from here out.

Two Elven Bishops. Bounced back and forth between mage and priest a number of times and are now at level 6 and 7, with almost all the spells learned. They both have a ridiculous amount of spell points, and have maxed out oratory, theology, and thaumaturgy.

Anyway, I think I've dicked around with character development and am going to focus on finishing the game now. I honestly had the most fun with character builds as it helped my OCD part of my brain. I had to do a lot of grinding, I admit.

 

[Leitz]

I'm in the last third of the game and there is all of a sudden this question in my head which I can't really answer myself right now. Why should I not change my 'magelike' characters into a mage several times to get all the spells? It seems to be the only way to get a lot of spells in a 'short' amount of time. Changing them back and forth more than once should be possible if you plan it right.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

I'm in the last third of the game and there is all of a sudden this question in my head which I can't really answer myself right now. Why should I not change my 'magelike' characters into a mage several times to get all the spells? It seems to be the only way to get a lot of spells in a 'short' amount of time. Changing them back and forth more than once should be possible if you plan it right.

I recommend class changing as much as possible. However the reasons not to are:

1. You don't like to grind
2. It's not really necessary
3. You want higher levels for better stats/miss chance/resists
4. Resetting stats is a major pain in the ass

 

[Leitz]

I have another question: Wizardry 7 is much longer than WIz 6 (the last time I gave up during 7 and, in anger, called it a piece of shit; but this time I'm gonna make it!), is it not a much better place to give all the chars all the skills and so on. Why should I bother too much with this in Wiz 6, when importing into Wiz7 will take all of my spells etc.?

 

[Grampy_Bone]

I have another question: Wizardry 7 is much longer than WIz 6 (the last time I gave up during 7 and, in anger, called it a piece of shit; but this time I'm gonna make it!), is it not a much better place to give all the chars all the skills and so on. Why should I bother too much with this in Wiz 6, when importing into Wiz7 will take all of my spells etc.?

You'll lose 80% of your skill levels from importing, and all spells over 3rd(?) level. Anyone with 100 sword will go down to 20 sword.

It is useful to have at least 1 point of ninjutsu on everyone and kirijutsu on your fighters, so they can put points into it at level up regardless of class.

 

[Iznaliu]

You'll lose 80% of your skill levels from importing, and all spells over 3rd(?) level. Anyone with 100 sword will go down to 20 sword.

This isn't as bad as Wizardry 8, where you lose almost all skill points.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

You'll lose 80% of your skill levels from importing, and all spells over 3rd(?) level. Anyone with 100 sword will go down to 20 sword.

This isn't as bad as Wizardry 8, where you lose almost all skill points.

The 80% skill point reduction was the same for me in Wizardry 8; all my characters who had 100 Ninjutsu were reduced to 20 Stealth, which is still enough for +2 AC for the whole party. Spells were all gone though.

What really bugged me about the import process for Wizardry 8 was the way it handled attributes. No carry-over from existing stats, all characters were reduced to starting stats for their race/class and then it assigns the bonus points for you.

This was disastrous for some characters. I had a Mook Lord I wanted to make into a fighter for berserking Giant's Blade shenanigans. Unfortunately Mook lords have a penalty to starting points in Wiz8, so he got really hosed. Other characters fared better but the allocation was still dumb. My valkyrie put all her points into piety and vitality, my monk went full dex and senses. Only the ranger did alright. I ended up going back to Wiz7 and class changing all three of my melee characters into Fighters, then re-importing. Then they received plenty of bonus points and put them all into Str and Dex, like I wanted.

 

[Iznaliu]

The 80% skill point reduction was the same for me in Wizardry 8; all my characters who had 100 Ninjutsu were reduced to 20 Stealth, which is still enough for +2 AC for the whole party. Spells were all gone though.

I'm pretty sure the maximum for magic skills on import was 16 or something.

 

[biffthestiff]

Hopefully this is the right thread for this, despite being a 7 year old thread.

I'm doing a few weeks of pre-game research before I start playing Wizardry 6. In one guide, I saw this recommended party:

two Valkyries, Samurai, Bard, Priest, and Mage. This is a good party that you can stick with throughout the game, or (at around 10th level), have the Priest and Mage switch classes with each other, the Bard switch to a Ninja, and the Valkyries and Samurai switch to a Ninja for only one level (picking up a skill point in Kirijitsu) and then back to their former classes, so as to not lose their previously banked skill.

(I think the guy made a mistake mentioning that the 2 Valks and Samurai switch to Ninja for Kirijitsu: the Samurai already has Kirijitsu, it's Ninjitsu he wants for the bonus AC)

Anyway, what I don't understand is this: if my goal is switching my fighters to Ninja for 1 level only to pick up Kirijitsu and/or Ninjitsu, why would I wait to do this at L10? Why not do it at L2 (assuming I don't want to start as a Ninja for gear reasons), then switch back ASAP? It is my understanding that you lose all your stats, accumulated resistances, and other bonuses when you switch classes. Wouldn't I want to get this out of the way early?

 

[Butter]

You would want to switch as soon as your attributes allow it. You also generally want to stagger your class changes so you don't have a full party of low level characters halfway through the game.

 

[biffthestiff]

You would want to switch as soon as your attributes allow it. You also generally want to stagger your class changes so you don't have a full party of low level characters halfway through the game.

Let's say I rolled a perfect bonus (or cheated) at character creation and my Valkyrie can be a Ninja already. Let's say her stats are 12 across the board (meets minimum reqs for both classes). I immediately switch from Valk to Ninja. My stats will be brought down to the Ninja class' minimum, 12/10/10/12/12/12/12, which is almost enough to switch back to Valk: I only need 1 PIE and 1 VIT. At the next level up, I upgrade PIE and VIT, and now I can switch back to Valk.

It seems to me, based on what I read, that the above scenario brings more benefit when done early on, compared to doing it at L10. Because all the hidden bonuses (resistances, stats, chance to hit, etc) accumulated on level-up would remain, whereas if I did this at L10, then the Valkyrie would have discarded those bonuses during the class change (I read that these bonuses are reset on a class change).

The only way this isn't true, is if you keep those bonuses when you return to the same class. This is what I'm trying to learn.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

brings more benefit when done early on,

Generally yes. The main benefit of class changing is farming skill points and learning new spells. You don't want to change too early or too late, because you'll miss out on those skill points or spell picks.

Because XP requirements are doubled each level, there is a sweet spot for class changing where it requires minimal grinding. The XP needed to get from level 1-7 is the same XP needed to get from 7 to 8. So at a certain point it's more efficient for skill point farming to class change than to level up in your current class, as long as you can meet the stat requirements.

Idk what guide you read but I did all my class changing in Wiz6 in the mine area, right around levels 6-8.

The only way this isn't true, is if you keep those bonuses when you return to the same class. This is what I'm trying to learn.

It's not quite true. The things that carry over are:

-Current skill levels
-Known spells
-HP & MP
-Your miss reduction bonus

All other level based bonuses are lost. The last one has a quirk to it though. Every level your miss chance goes down a few % points. When you reset your level to 1 for a class change, you don't gain any miss chance reduction for levels you've reached previously, except the level where you class changed. So if you change class at level 7 each time you will gain the miss chance reduction for level 7 again. This theoretically allows you to power grind miss chance reduction forever, though it's totally not worth it. There is a save editor that lets you see the hidden stats though if you're curious.

HP works a little differently. Every level the game re-rolls all your HP. If this new total is higher than your current total, your HP increases to the new total. If it is not higher, you gain 1 Hp. This means lots of class changing can push your HP above average with many +1 Hp gains, but never truly too high. So don't be scared off by 1 HP gains, it will all even out in the end.

 

[biffthestiff]

So it turns out only the first 2 characters can use short-range weapons. That's pretty awful and really limits the builds since most of the good weapons are short-range. In Wizardry 8 you could put people on the flanks to hit with short swords.

My party right now is:
1. unarmed Monk 2. sword Samurai
3. spear Valkyrie 4. sword Bard-to-become-Ninja
5. staff Priest 6. sling Mage

Took me a while to realize the bard/ninja can't do melee attacks, because I was too busy casting Lute.

The Valkyrie's fine in the middle row, she'll have her pick of extended weapons only she can equip. The Samurai is locked in for a front-row spot, because his best weapon (Muramasa) is short-range.

That means the Monk and the Ninja are fighting for the 2nd front row spot and the other has to go in the middle row and change his weapon to extended. I went over the equipment list and the only non-shitty extended weapon equippable by Ninja (or not an impossibly rare drop like Zatoichi) is Cat'O Nine Tails.

Is the Cat9 the right way out of this? Or do I give up on the Monk and make him a Valkyrie? It feels wrong to have 2 identical classes, and a total of 3 different Divine casters. I brought the Monk for variety.

 

[Butter]

There's no middle row. The middle-left character is in the front row, and the middle-right character is in the back row. Put your spear Valkyrie in the middle-right.

 

[octavius]

Yeah, Valks and Monks can use spears and staffs to attack from the rear. So you have some flexibility.

 

[biffthestiff]

After a whole day of playing, I think I finally "get" class changing.

I initially thought there's 2 main advantages:
1. You get to level up all over again, which means being able to put more points in your preferred skill shared between the two classes. (though for many skills grinding covers that too)
2. You get to carry over a great skill (usually Kirijitsu) to a new class that wouldn't have it otherwise

These are definitely great advantages, but aren't that convincing for casual players (and yes, I'm a casual playing Wiz6) compared to doing a little bit of grinding. But now that I'm level 5, and seeing my Mage wasting his picks on crappy tier 2 spells, I believe the most crucial advantage of class changing is spell selection. It seems literally impossible to get the best spells if you don't change classes.

Let's say you intend to play a pure Mage and you put every single skill point in Thaumaturgy (doable for an autistic minmaxer). You're going to miss out on many good spells because your Thaumaturgy will be too low to unlock the next tier of spells at level up. You'll be wasting your limited number of spell picks (of which you get about 12 at most) on mostly tier 2-3 spells, if you're lucky you might manage a tier 6 spell.

Whereas if you started out as a Bard, pumped Thaumaturgy for 10 levels picking whatever spells you can, then switched to Samurai, pumped it further and selected even better spells, then when you finally switch to Mage, you're at like 75 Thaumaturgy and at level-up you're picking tier 5 spells right from the start. Within the next few levels you should be able to reach 100 Thaumaturgy to pick the two tier 7 spells.
(maybe you can get to 100 from just a single class change, and yeah, you probably want to finish as Samurai instead of Mage, the point stands)

I guess it's time to restart.

 

[octavius]

I found that it's not that important in Wiz 6, but in Wiz7 it's almost mandatory to switch classes to get useful spells ASAP. In Wiz6 you can spend your skills points freely, but in Wiz7 you have different pools of skill points, so you are forced to waste points on weapons skills that increase fast naturally.

 

[Jarpie]

IIRC on my playthrough I waited till level 10 or so to switch the classes even though it probably wasn't optimal.

 

[TheDeveloperDude]

I had switched classes at the Hall of the Dead. Now that was exciting! Fighting the fixed encounters using a low-level party.

 

[biffthestiff]

Let's say I start out as a Valkyrie, get to level 9, switch to Priest, then switch back to Valkyrie. Will the Valkyrie be level 9, or 1? In other words can I ping-pong between the same 2 classes over and over to learn every Priest spell by starting over at level 1 every time?

 

[Butter]

Let's say I start out as a Valkyrie, get to level 9, switch to Priest, then switch back to Valkyrie. Will the Valkyrie be level 9, or 1? In other words can I ping-pong between the same 2 classes over and over to learn every Priest spell by starting over at level 1 every time?

You always start at level 1 when you switch to a new class. Valkyrie doesn't start learning Priest spells until level 3 though.

 

[biffthestiff]

Is the Run command just for trolling the player?

After a companion died in a fight, I wanted to reload quickly, so I ran from the fight. I ran straight into another fight. Ran from that one, into another fight. This happened FIVE times in a row. I didn't bother checking if it would happen more, I just ended up restarting. And this is on floor 1, where you need to walk like 100 steps to find an encounter.

There's being hardcore and there's being just plain unfair. Don't put a Run command if you don't want players to run. I wish fixing this was among Cosmic Forge's patches.

 

[octavius]

There is a Run command?