Wizardry 6 party looks quite a bit different than in previous games. Wizardry 6 marks a new generation with new races, new professions, a new magic system, and a new skill system.
“There are things you must know.”
Wizard
What is new?
Mouse support is ON by default but you can turn this off and use the keyboard exclusively as well. You will also find a hot-togglable difficulty setting in Game Configuration. Use the Level setting to scale difficulty and XP gain per your needs.
There are now 11 Races with unique resistances and some with abilities. There are 14 Professions with varying access to skills and weapons. Each Profession has statistic requirements and each Race has specific starting statistics. It is possible to make any race profession combination at charcater creation if you are awarded enough Bonus Points.
The new Skill System consists of 10 Weaponry Skills that raise by using the weapon but you must have at least 1 point to equip. There are 6 Physical Skills and most raise with use as well. Scouting and all 8 Academia Skills only raise by spending bonus skill points when leveling up.
The new Magic System consists of 4 Spellbooks each associated wih an Academia Skill. Raising the skill gives access to higher level spells in that Spellbook. Each Profession has access to 1 or 0 Spellbooks and if you change Professions you will remember spells you have learned.
Character Generation
You can take a few paths to reach your character and party goals.
Path 1: Play the starter party of six characters that is already created.
Path 2: Make 6 of your own characters with Race and Gender of your choosing. Each character will get a random number of Bonus Points that you can allocate to to obtain access to one of the 14 professions. You may or may not get the professions you want due to minimum statistic requirements for each profession.
Path 3: Spend some time making multiple versions of each of your characters until you get enough Bonus Points to access the starting professions that you may want. The maximum bonus points appears to be 18.
Path 4: Design a party as six careers each with a progression of professions to collect specific skills and spells as you play through this game and the next games in the trilogy.
Statistics
Statistics cap at 18 during character creation and during level-up. The real maximum value is 20 but the only way to reach it is using items that permanently boost a statistic. While these items can be used to help reach statistic minimums for a profession change, it is more efficient to use them only on a final profession after a natual 18 is reached.
Strength affects Weapon Damage Bonus, Stamina, Carry Capacity.
Intelligence affects skill bonus in Thaumaturgy, Alchemy, Theosophy.
Piety affects skill bonus in Theology, Theosophy.
Vitality affects Hit Points, Stamina, Carry Capacity, Mana Regen, and Scouting skill bonus for a Ranger.
Dexterity affects Weapon Hit Bonus, Max Swings per Attack, and Skulduggery skill bonus for a Theif.
Speed affects Base Armor Class, Max Attacks per Round, Initiative
Personality affects reactions with NPCs
Karma affects more than you think, don’t settle for a extremely low karma.
Gender effects little but does have some impacts to know about. Female characters will have STR-2, PIE+1, KAR+1 and only Females can be Valkyries. Gender adjustments may impact the amount of Bonus Points required to reach professions you desire.
Race effects Starting Statistics and therfore the amount of Bonus Points required to reach professions you desire. Race affects Resistances and also imparts Special Features for a few select races.
Design your Party
The initial profession defines starting equipment and mana regeneration. While it is possible to upgrade your equipment, it is not possible to drastically change your mana regeneration after starting a character. A character that starts as a Mage will always have more mana regeneration than a character that starts as a Fighter regardless of the current profession. Any character can boost their mana regeneration by +1 if they have a Vitality of at least 16.
Profession Change
A character’s profession can change during the playthrough, find the option in the Edit menu item while viewing the character. Profession change becomes possible when a character meets the minimum statistic requirements for the new profession. It is possible to change to a profession that you were in the past. You can build some robust characters like a Theosophy casting Thief with Music skill, a Dual Weilding Kirijutsu infused Lord, a Theosophy casting Ranger with Mind Flay, or a Hide to Backstab Fighter wielding a 2-hander.
Profession Change does NOT modify:
- Hit Points (HP)
- Stamina
- Already Known Spells
- Realm Spell Point (SP) totals
- SP Regeneration
- Already Known Skills
- Inventory, Karma, Gold, Age
Profession Change DOES modify:
- Each statistic is reset to minimum for new Profession or the Race value
- Any new Profession Skills are learned at 0 level
- Resistances are recalculated per new Profession
- Character Level is reset to 1
It may seem like a kick in the elbow to have your Level Reset but it is a boon actually. Consider that you will zoom through the early levels in just a few fights and each level raise is another opportunity to allocate skill points and to pick new spells. Just don’t change profession for the whole party at once, stagger them so that the high level party members can carry the low levels through the initial fights.
One risk to consider is statistics that raise during level up are randomly chosen therefore you can get stuck in a profession if the bonus point stride to the next profession is too great. The max gain for any statistic is 1 per level so consider a Gnome Fighter to Samurai has a Speed stride of 6 to 14! That means you need to roll a Speed raise 8 times for a Gnome Fighter to become a Samurai, that is a lot as level gains take longer as you get higher.
The very first profession change can be more predictable because the extra bonus points during character creation can be selectively allocated. It can be helpful to use this boon for large strides.
Profession Goals
Decide what you want from each profession in the career so you don’t change too soon. Spells are only learned from the spellbook of the current profession so be sure to focus level-up skill points in Acedemia for spell goals. Consider these example builds:
Beast Lord
- Create a Hobbit Mage with Bonus Points spread towards Ninja
- Mage -> Thaumaturgy(54) for Magic Missile, Fireball, Iceball, Blink, and Magic Screen
- Ninja -> Kirijutsu(70+)
- Lord -> Theology(90) for Lifesteal and other support spells
- Final Notes: Lord can dual wield Cat’O Nine Tails/Diamond Eyes for a lot of damage with a Lethal chance due to Kirijutsu. Mage start has SP Regen focus is Fire/Water/Magic which is aligned to the spells we chose. As a bonus, once this character gets to Wizardry 8, the Lord has a skill bonus to Dual Wield.
Flay Ranger
- Create a Fairy Psionic with Bonus Points spread towards Ninja
- Psionic -> Theosophy(98) for Knock Knock, Psionic Blast, Mind Flay
- Ninja -> Alchemy(54) for Fire Bomb, Acid Bomb, Armormelt
- Ranger -> Scouting(70+)
- Final Notes: You want a Ranger to import into Wizardry 8 for Scouting. Psionic start has SP Regen stacked on Mental, but balanced and boosted by Fairy race. Ranger does not need Kirijutsu so a headstart on Alchemy is nice.
Boss Bard
- Create a Felpurr Alchemist with Bonus Points spread towards Samurai
- Alchemist -> Alchemy(54) for Stink Bomb, Acid Bomb
- Samurai -> Thaumaturgy(98) for Fireball, Iceball, Asphyxiation, Firestorm, Nuclear Blast
- Bard -> Music(70+)
- Find Notes: You want a Bard to import into Wizardry 8 for Music. Alchemist start has SP Regen focus Fire/Air/Earth which is aligned to spells wo chose.
Character Builder
This simplified character builder uses Vitality to caculate starting Hit Point and Mana Regeneration during character creation. It is possible to adjust your Vitality over time in order to estimate career Hit Point total. You can also add additonal Professions, which will union new Skills and refactor Resistances. Build your whole party and switch between them to plan it out before you spend time grinding for a high bonus roll. (it is a work in progress)
Character Transfer
It is possible to transfer your Wizardry 6 characters into Wizardry 7 and then into Wizardry 8. The result of these transfer often times will strip some gear, stats, experience levels, and spells. The purpose of this power reduction is to balance with new parties starting at level 1. The results of transfering characters can also vary based on the endings that you receive in the previous game.
Some but not all gear will transfer to Wizardry 7, see the Gear Database to know exactly which gear can successfully transfer to the next adventure. As for Skills, you will retain all known skills that you learned through Profession Change! So your Mage that used to be a Bard will still have the Music skill, albiet with a reduced starting value. As you level up in the next game you will be able to add skill points to Music skill even though you are not still a Bard. This preserves the excitment of developing robust multi-profession characters that stay robust when transfered to the next game.
Attribution
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