As the guy quoted below said - go with bard on a first-time party. Don't be fooled by how crap bards are under most systems - in Wiz8 if you are using a full party they are the strongest class in the game. I say 'using a full party' because they are a support class - no good in solo or small group adventuring. But they can get most of the best spells in the game via instruments - which means they can spam them once you put the inevitable stamina-regen necklace on them, and with those items unlike normal casters they are fully rested (stamina-wise, which is their 'mana') after each battle, rather than having a good chance of getting caught with no mana. What's more they can have decent hitpoints AND don't overlook them as a melee fighter with a sword (though bow is decent too). Fairly standard 'power-gaming' (not silly power-gaming but good to make the 1st playthrough easier) is to give the bard the cursed sword (that gives you beserk) you get in the bank vault. They'll use it almost the entire game and do awesome damage with it. The advantage of giving it to the bard is that on top of their being able to get decent sword skill, unlike other classes they don't need to change from melee to range when the mobs are out of melee range (the only disadvantage of that particular cursed sword is that you need to cast uncurse to unequip it - which makes it impractical for fighters/rangers etc who you want to switch to their bows/guns when creatures are out of melee range) - when the mobs are out of the bard's melee range the bard will be using the instruments anyway. Put the bard on the flank and the sword will guarantee that any mob that gets close enough to threaten that flank gets a smackdown, while the bard spends the rest of the time using instruments.
From memory - and I could be wrong - a bard also is a useable substitute for a rogue in that you can put the bard on lock-picking duties and they'll be good enough to suffice.
Also, have at least one mook - you'll need it for a quest. Best to make it a mook ranger - they'll primarily be a bow-user, but they'll be able to get a great two-handed sword that only Mooks can use as their back-up weapon when mobs flank them and get to melee range.
So, easy cookie-cutter party (easy early, decent middle, very strong late-game):
- fighter (focus on a melee weapon, but also give him/her a gun to take shots with while mobs are approaching - bows are more practical, but you'll have several other party members using those already)
- DON'T TAKE A VALKERIE - why? They ARE the best melee class in the game, and a decent caster, but you'll get a fantastic NPC one very early on.
- samurai if you want a 3-melee front line(could be another fighter, but just to mix things up - and so you have at least one crit-based melee class. Just don't go a lord - in Wiz8 valkeries do everything they can do but better) BUT I'd actually go ranger instead. Reason for this is that you can get a valkerie (as mentioned) early, and her and your fighter are enough of a front line. The bard (with cursed sword) and ranger can hold their own in melee enough that you can put them on the flanks and expect them to live if they do get forced into melee combat. And the ranger will do a ton of instant kills late game. Also, from the mid-game your 2nd recruited NPC can be a superb monk. That will give you 3 front-line classes and 2 hybrids (ranger and bard) that can survive if flanked. You really don't need that 2nd front-liner on creation. Go the mook ranger and if you want a samurai for coolness replace the fighter instead (will make the first dungeon harder, but progressively easier after that)
- 2 bishops, each focusing ONLY on 2 scpell schools. Basically one is your priest and one is your mage or psionic. In earlier wizardries that was a bad idea as bishops would get spells slower, but in Wiz8 it all depends on how many spell schools you spread yourself out over. So using a bishop with all the points in priest and something else, and another with all the points in 2 mage schools is just as practical as having a mage and a priest, except that you get more flexibility late-game. These characters are your 'long-term' investments - trust me, late game you'll appreciate them much more than a mage and a priest.
- bard - for reasons above
- either gadgeteer, or ninja. I prefer gadgeteer - they are both good ranged classes, but the gadgeteer gets some good 'spells' via crafted items that gives him more flexibility than the ninja
catfood said:
I'm a first timer with Wiz8 too, been playing the game for the last couple of weeks or so.
My party is like this:
- Dracon fighter: general tank
- Dwarf monk: at first I thought I made a mistake since I saw how I had to to wait 2-3 levels until I was able to increase his attributes, but right now he is my main killing machine and has the most kills
- HUman bard: probably my favorite representation of a bard in any game; at first I was using a bow but then I realised how awesome the instruments are and I'm using them almost exclusively now
- Rawulf priest: can heal, cast buffs, the usual stuff
- Hobbit rogue: I guess a party wouldn't be complete without a character such as this
- Mook psionic: insanity is awesome, nuff said
They are level 15-16 and playing on normal it's already too easy. The party I made seems to be of the cookie cutter kind, so you might want to try out something more exotic for some challenge. Right now I'm blazing through most enemies and I'm thinking of upping the difficulty level. As I understand it the beauty of the game is to make some non-conventional builds and see see how they develope throughout the game.
Unlike most modern games Wiz8 is simply huge, so make sure ou have enough time to play it. I've probably put at least 30 hours in it and I think I only finished about 60% of it, though a lot of that time was spent in battles.
