A6 - Dual-wielding singleton

[Oskar]

Since dualwielding is tons of fun and I just finished the demo with a party, I want to make a human dual-wielding warrior/magic-user hybrid singleton. The only question is, what traits should I use?

Should I go Divinely Touched + Natural Mage and go for a tank, Divinely Touched + Epic Warrior and go for a glass-cannon (small armour) type or Epic Warrior + Natural Mage in an attempt to balance it out?

The magic use (will include priest spells) is pretty much just going to be for buffs (mainly haste) and dispelling barriers.

 

Cheers

[Randomizer]

There are several places where you need to inflict large amounts of damage of a specific type. So Divine Touch and Natural Mage are probably the best combination. You will need some spell capability so you do want to be able to wear decent armor and cast daze near the beginning.

 

Good Luck.

[Mea Tulpa]

Divinely Touched + Elite Warrior, hands down -- and you should really use a Nephil instead of a Human, as those extra battle disciplines will really come in handy.

 

EW's Parry will do more for your tanking than whatever armor you give up by not having NM -- and that is likely zero armor. The best armor usually doesn't encumber anyway, with a few minor exceptions, and you can get around that a bit by equipping accuracy up items.

 

Your blades will do more damage than your spells anyway, so the Blademaster is a lot more important than extra mage skill. You don't need to cast every single mage spell anyway.

[Randomizer]

The better non-encumbering armor doesn't come until after you reach Mertis unless you want to go for tool use 12 to steal some decent robes. There aren't many items to balance out encumbering armor early in the game.

 

You can get blessed plate in the demo with it's -20% chance to hit.

 

I know from A5 that parry doesn't build up quickly enough on it's own to compensate in the early game.

[Oskar]

While I agree that a Divinely Touched Natural Mage would be more powerful, a dual wielding divinely touched elite warrior that has to wear light armour seems more appealing and interesting the more I think of it.

A nephil with gymnastics would take it further in that direction (dual wielding jumping, twisting, turning nephil in flowing robes! talk about bad-ass), but I dislike all of the nephil sprites

 

Oh well, thanks for the help, now, onwards, to character creation!

[VCH]

What does the (- chance% to hit) thing really do. I've never missed much of anything in Jeff's games and I've always equipped the bulkiest armour as soon as possible.

 

It doesn't reduce damage done I hope? What about for mages?

 

 

And I agree dual-wielding is super powerful. I for once had to give up my knight fighter (sword/shield) in favour of increased damage dual-wielding does or at the worst equal damage to max for a single weapon.

[Oskar]

I think after you can cast mage spells with a maximum of -5% to hit chance without having natural mage. (Using the chain mail you find the deep storage with some bracers prevented me from casting spells)

[Alorael at Large]

It reduces accuracy. It reduces accuracy very slightly, and your chance of missing drops to negligible very quickly anyway. The major concern is, as Oskar says, that characters with a net hit penalty greater than 5% can't cast mage spells without Natural Mage.

 

—Alorael, who thinks most of the spells you need can be cast before fights. Remove armor, cast, put on armor. Laborious, but it lets you skip NM for the more impressive EW.

[Randomizer]

In Avernum 6 you can't change/equip armor when the enemy is in sight even if you aren't in combat mode yet.

 

Natural Mage trait gives you 20% more compensation versus bulky armor.

[Mea Tulpa]

That extra Blademaster is also important if you want to use battle proficiencies more often. Which you definitely do. Battle Fury is incredibly important for a singleton, I have to imagine.

[VCH]

That's good to know. I'm always tempted to go with robes etc for more freedom of movement like one needs in NWN for mages, but I see it's not necessary. As far as I know Avernum is one of the few games were you can kit your mage out in full warrior armour and suffer no real penalty.

[Alorael at Large]

No penalty beyond not being able to cast without Natural Mage or over a very high limit even with NM. 25%? More?

 

—Alorael, who wonders where the squishy, robed wizard idea came from. Gandalf didn't wear armor, but he did charge into battle with a sword and never took a blow from anything less than a Balrog.

[Mea Tulpa]

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SquishyWizard

 

Maybe there's a literary precursor -- I haven't read Zelazny -- but I suspect it originates from D&D's attempt to balance classes.

[VCH]

Why do wizards wear robes? I would think playing naked would be even better.

[Randomizer]

Originally Posted By: VCH

Why do wizards wear robes? I would think playing naked would be even better.

It depends upon the source material. Some cover up to hide their underdeveloped bodies just like battle alphas in Geneforge games do for modesty. Mostly it comes about from the idea that mages are scrawny bookworms that aren't physically inclined.

Some mages due have armor, the battle mage that was added to Hackmaster does this. I can't remember a literary source at the moment.

[Alorael at Large]

Actually, the origin may go all the way back to Amadis of Gaul and the other chivalric romances. The hero was the knight, and he frequently got a wizardly ally and companion. He notably wasn't the one hewing down giants and dragons. Or possibly the fact that mysticism and alchemy were intellectual pursuits for pencil-necked pantywaists.

 

—Alorael, who has no idea where the armored wizard trope first appeared. He can come up with quite a few examples, though. He suspects that it's also probably rather old. The sidhe might qualify.

[SevenMass]

Personally, I kind of like the idea of the wizard being someone who survives and thrives, not by being tough, but by being smart. The word wizard comes from wiseart, which contains wise, and the word Mage, comes similarly comes from Magi, which comes from the ancient Persian word for "wise/learned man."

 

So what would be the ultimate awesome for such a guy? It would be that he strategises his way through the word! Staying at a distance, manipulating event so that he never has to fight, and thus doesn't have to be "tough."

 

And for the magical wizard from fantasy fictions and RPG's, this means to me, that he manipulates events with magic as well as strategy. He makes sure he is at the right place, at the right time, and applies the right magical effect or spell so that he wins the day. Like a chess player who advances his goal without losing pieces, the wizard advances without losing HP.

 

Now in a lot of games, Avernum included, this is not always possible. which is a kind of sad, because I like the idea.

 

I mean, that is my vision of what a wizard should be.

[*i]

That model could work in a non-traditional RPG where we don't have lots of grinding, but very little combat. The closest example I've seen of this in a more traditional game is playing a mechanics/leadership heavy agent in Geneforge.

 

I suspect a lot of the modern model of weak wizards comes from the practicality of game balance in things like D&D. If wizards were so awesome at both physical and magic, why would anyone not want to play a wizard?

[Dantius]

Originally Posted By: SevenMass

It would be that he strategises his way through the word! Staying at a distance, manipulating event so that he never has to fight, and thus doesn't have to be "tough."

Emperor Palpatine much? What about Hari Seldon? This is relatively common in Sci-Fi, just not in Fantasy.

[Alorael at Large]

It's relatively common literary figure. Or trope.

 

—Alorael, who suspects it's less common for protagonists because it's less fun to write about someone who just drops hints and sends others about on their tasks than it is to write about the guy with the sword, raygun, or absolutely nothing at all except a horde of enemies bent on his immediate destruction.

[SevenMass]

To clarify, the wizard I'd like to play isn't too far removed from the action. Otherwise it can't be a real adventurer.

I'm thinking more of something a bit like the Magnificent Bastard but with a bit less "playing with peoples emotions" and a bit more of being "his own most useful piece."