Henchmen stats

[Dunbar42]

So I've taken on the agent-wannabe (I forget her name ) and I'm wondering what stats to upgrade.

 

I've noticed that increasing her strength seems to increase both her chance to hit and damage with her ranged spells; is there any real need to raise her dex?

 

Endurance provides obvious benefits, but what about intelligence? I've never had a problem with her running out of energy to cast spells...should I ignore int and go for end?

 

My current plan is to max out strength and then endurance; is this the way to go?

[Toenail Returns]

Dexterity helps for her because she has a ranged attack.

[mok]

Inteligence is way more important the Endurance.

You may not need the energy now, but you will soon. Wait til you get to a prolonged battle and your spells are running you 75 or 100 (or more) energy each -- and you're casting 2 or 3 times in a round.

 

My agent had over 1000 energy at the end and would still have gladly taken more -- didn't need that much most of the fights, but for the bigger ones I did.

 

There are 3 battle spells which cost 100 or more energy. This in addition to the 3 blessing spells using 100+. Your better healing spells are taking 50-75 per (unless you use mass restore which is 150). And your mental magic can take some nice chunks of energy as well, if you go that way -- 80 for terror, 120 for strong daze, 200 for mass madness.

 

Plus, if you're playing the agent right, you shouldn't be getting hit enough that you need many hps.

 

Strength is worth a few points just to avoid the encumbrance issue. Otherwise, your best bet is to pour everything into your ability to kill things before they kill you. Many on here will tell you to ignore just about everything but battle mag and spellcraft, but I like to go w/ a little more well-rounded agent and take a few points of melee/QA/parry so I can survive if I get cornered or run out of energy.

 

Dex is useful for dodging and it also helps you to go sooner in the round making it a nice stat to boost for an agent.

[Dunbar42]

-T-O-E-N-A-I-L-:

 

Actually, I'm not sure dex helps, despite what the game description says. Well, I know I have increased her str and seen her chance to hit and her damage increase; I should try bumping her dex and see what effect that has. But so far str has seemed to be the way to go.

 

mok:

 

Um, thanks for the advice, but I was referring to the agent henchman you can take on just outside the beginning area (greta is it?).

 

But for an agent, I agree with you; intelligence is of prime importance.

[Micawber]

Don't neglect Greta's intelligence. As well as increasing her spell energy (very useful later in the game when she learns to cast essence orbs) it will also reduce her chances of being terrified or charmed. It can be pretty nasty to have your creations turn on you, but if you keep their intelligence in line with their other stats, it's not likely to happen.

[Zeviz]

I think dexterity has higher priority than endurance. It's always better to not get hit at all.

 

As for intelligence, I didn't need it until I bought her spell upgrade half way through the 3rd island. (After that spell upgrade, I had to start increasing her intelligence, because she was running out of energy in long battles.)

 

However, strength and dexterity are two primary skills for her, because with those skills high enough you don't need much endurance (most enemies miss) or much intelligence (most battles are over before you run out).

[Walter]

Actually, though it might not be the case for you, for creations, including alwan and greta, increasing dex only seems to increase chance to avoid attacks. Unfortunately, even with investing heavily in it from the start you are unlikely to end up with them dodging a large enough fraction of attacks for it to be worthwhile instead of increasing endurance, so I would avoid increasing it until you've maxed out the rest of the stats. As for energy, I've never used greta, but people here seem to indicate that once you upgrade her attacks she'll use more, and even more so once you are able to cast mass energize, so unless you are frequently having her run away terrified it is probably better to hold off on it at the start but to get some a bit later.