Sorcs and Wizards

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I want to get people's opinions about sorcerers and wizards in a certain context. I'm sure that most people who have been around here for a while know that I'm a veteran IWD2 player, and not some newbie... so these aren't newbie questions...

I think that the majority opinion about sorcs and wizzy's is pretty well set at this point that sorcerers are far superior to wizards, at least within the context of IWD2. (And, yes, I also know that there's a minority opinion to the contrary.)

My question at this point is this ... How many people have used a wizard (or even a specialist wizard) as their party's primary arcane spell caster, if only for the challenge?

I ask this because I've been planning my next party and have seriously considered trying a wizard as my party's primary mage. I've read some old posts in this forum where it's suggested that the best way to make a wizard work within IWD2 (and the limited availability of scrolls) is to use an ECL class (Tiefling or Drow, being the best choices) to slow down the wizzy's level progression so that it doesn't end up having spell slots without scrolls to fill them. (Alternatively, multiclassing in a level or 2 of another class can accomplish much the same thing.)


Anyways, thoughts? Opinions? Please remember that the point of this thread isn't to argue whether or not sorcs kick a$$. It's to ask whether you have or would consider using a wizard instead of a sorc, if only for the challenge?

 

I've had a Rogue1/ConjurerX as a primary spellcaster for a 4-man party, with a sorc who was supposed to be a backup caster. That was the first time I played the game and I don't think I would do it again. The early access to high-level spells and spell focus feats just does not compensate for the dearth of scrolls combined with the lack of Int-boosters with a dash of tactical rigidity on top. Put me down as a "no thanks." Honestly, if I can't have a sorc I'd probably rather have a cleric.

Purposefully trying to slow down advancement with ECL or multi-classing in order not to outrun spell slots seems, well, counterproductive to me. What's worse, having some spell levels you don't utilize effectively or having fewer and weaker spells but not "wasting" any slots? ECL races might be a good choice for a wizard, but only because the opportunity cost for ECL is lower than it would be for a class that can utilize more levels effectively. That logic leads inexorably in one direction though... why not pick a class that CAN utilize high levels effectively? You might pick a wizard over a sorc if you were constrained by your choice of race (e.g. you want a Tiefling) or role (need a utility infielder type with lots of skill points), but in that case you already know whether you're going to be taking an XP penalty so the point is moot.

-Max

 

I always take a wizard because you can multi-class them much easier than a sorcerer. Just because charisma is only useful for bards really

 

Well, CHA is also useful for paladins.

 

Int is only useful for Rogues, though[1]. Only Wis has a semi-broad range of utility. Edit: oops, crucis is right, CHA is more useful than Int for paladins.

-Max

[1] Well, anyone doing skillmonster-type jobs, whether or not they actually take levels in Rogue.

 

Max, it seems like you're not interested in the challenge of playing a Wizard. (Mind you, the point of this thread wasn't to "challenge" people to play wizzies...) It sounds like you're only interested in taking the easy path of sorcery.



It seems to me that the paucity of scrolls is an easy enough issue to fix in a mod... just make add some higher level scrolls to the various merchants that already sell arcane scrolls so that it's not an issue. Of course, you then have the question of just how high a level of arcane scroll should, say, Souma in the Wandering Village, have. High enough so that a plain ol' human single-class wizard in a party of 6 is satisfied? But what about a wizzy in a smaller party that will have more XP and a higher level?

Issues of relative number of spells that they can cast in a day, etc., this is a major reason why sorcs function better within IWD2, since the game (or mod) designer doesn't have to worry about balancing availability of arcane scrolls across the various scroll selling merchants. The sorc will be able to learn new spells whenever it's time to learn new spells. The wizzy can only do it when the scrolls can be found or purchased.

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I'd say that INT is useful for Rangers, though it's not as if rangers need to worry about all that many different skills. IMHO, the only skills that are really needed by a ranger are Hide/Move Silently and Search, though a couple of points of Wilderness Lore isn't a total waste.

Bards can get a lot of mileage out of INT.

Certain cleric domains may want to take more than just Concentration. Lathander and Talos clerics might want to take some Spellcraft so that they can take the Spirit of Flame or Scion of Storms feats. Druids fall into this category as well.

Also, monks may want to have some INT so that they can take the Hide and Move Silently skills, at least if the player likes using stealthy tactics.


All this said, I'd agree that the primary two roles that really like lots of skills are the thieving role, and the arcane skills role (whether it's filled by a sorc, a wizzy, or a bard). And I suppose that you could also include a party spokesman role.

 

Not just a sorc, I said I would play a cleric as well. Maybe even a bard. Asking for opinions and then insulting people when the opinion offered ("Yes, I have; no, I wouldn't") is not the one you wanted seems like a losing strategy.

Substantively: obviously a lot of the issues with wizards would go away if the game had been written differently, with more high-level scrolls available sooner and with more Int-boosting items. Are you trying to gather data for a mod? If you want a modded version of the game that makes wizards better those are the pain points I would attack.

-Max

P.S. Another way to address it in a mod, if modding is powerful enough to make it happen, would be to add a quest like the Banite quest that boosts Int. Also, you could make the Transmuter potion in the underdark boost Int by +2 instead of whatever it does now, put some permanent Int-boosting potions in as random boss drops, etc. It would be in keeping with the class flavors for wizards to have fewer, more powerful spells because of higher DC, and sorcs to have more numerous but weaker spells. Even in the current game that's how sorcs and wizards start out in the Prologue and Chapter 1, the balance only gets skewed later on.

 

Max, I was NOT insulting you. Maybe gently tweaking you a bit. If you were insulted, then you were looking to be insulted. Did the smiley go right over your head?

Actually, I only wrote the post cuz I was curious about the initial post's question. However, I have been considering whether to make high level scrolls available earlier in a next rev of LoS. And INT-boosting items wouldn't be a bad (or difficult) idea either. Probably wouldn't hurt to have some wizzy only, non-INT related items.

 

Yeah, the Cloak of Mystra is a pretty nice example of wizard-only item early on. I tend to think you can do pretty much anything you want to boost wizards in your mod without hurting the flavor of sorcs, since the "free and automatic spell learning" of sorcs is already pretty distinctive. Keep it within reason of course.

I think making personal comments about other posters is always going to be counterproductive, whether you add smileys or not. Let's keep our focus on the issues.

-Max

 

As noted before, the shortage of scrolls isn't all that severe for a six person party, much less for a wizzy with ECL penalties and/or mix-in levels. The strangest thing IMHO is that you don't get any decent level 7 spells (well, compared to DBFB anyway) until you've almost completed Chapter 5, and then all of a sudden Chapter 6 is filled to brims with both level 8 AND 9 spells.

Even with these penalties, I find that having a wizard taking care of most of the miscellaneous chaff (Alchemy and Knowledge: Arcana) and either thieving duties or party diplomat is such a nice synergy that my parties usually enlist a wizard first. Any remaining slots, if any, will be filled with sorcerers, though.

 

The biggest wizard advantage over sorcerer is that you reach spell levels faster (when they reach level 17 in chapter 6 a wizard will be able to cast level 9 spells, a sorcerer won't for example), don't give this advantage away by slowing down the wizard's levelling.
I don't think your game will be much harder if you have a min-maxed shield dwarf diviner instead of a sorcerer as main caster.

 

I didn't realize that wizzy's gained its spell levels more quickly, so I looked it up (well, at least in the game manual's tables). And you're correct. While both wizzy's and sorcs gain a spell level every other level, the difference between the two is that wizzy's get SL2 at level 3, while sorcs don't get SL2 until level 4. And then both gain a spell level every other level from that point forward.


Don't worry... if I do anything to help out wizards, fiddling around with the spell table wouldn't be in the mix.

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Well, if the only serious deficiency is level 7 spell scrolls (and perhaps just the "good" ones), that's a fairly narrow thing and should be quite easy to rectify. Heck, just put some level 7 scrolls in Malavon's store inventory should fix that deficiency well enough.

 

As a tabletop DnD gamer, one piece of advice I have to offer is the following: never take LA(level adjustment) races for spellcasters. LA hurts any class, doubly so the spellcasters, for obvious reasons. For obvious reasons, those same obvious reasons(am I giving you headache yet?) don't apply to IWD 2.

I have a pureclass wizard and a paladin 1/sorceress X in my party. I will admit, the sorceress has been much more useful and versatile so far. The main reason for that is probably, as has been mentioned already, the fact that you get spells as you level up. All to often it happens that the poor wizard attains new spell level and doesn't have any spells in the spellbook because there are so few scrolls around. Adding few more of those would help greatly. Maybe the problem is that I have a five man(well... two man, three women, but the principle carries over) party so they level a little faster than developers probably imagined they would. But yes, adding more scrolls to the merchants would go a long way towards making wizards more useful and would probably make them more viable choice.

Wizard only items would be great as well. I noticed that most INT boosting items give wizard an odd bonus to INT. Perhaps boosting them so they give an even bonus would make them more useful. If a ring gives you +2 to INT intead of +1 you immediatelly gain a +1 bonus spell and all benefits associated with increased intelligence. But if you only get a +1 to INT and you have an even INT score you have to wait some time to level up before you start reaping the benefits. Wizard only quest that boosts INT sounds nice too. Malavon Despana sounds like a perfect NPC for that, if you ask me. Or maybe something similar to tomes in BG... tomes that can be bought from merchants. Just don't make them too cheap if you decide to take this way.

To answer your original question, yes, I would consider taking wizard as my primary spellcaster. For challenge, if nothing else.

 

It's not strictly about high-level scrolls either. I have been looking for an Improved Invisibility scroll for my decoy for about two acts now and haven't found one, although the tank does know it. Having to rely on finding/buying scrolls can be kind of a hassle.

I've never used a wizard as my diplomat but it's an interesting thought. It's not like you *NEED* high Charisma to be a diplomat, Charisma just gives you a skill bonus, and if you have enough Int you don't need the bonus.

-Max

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As an aside: sometimes odd-level bonuses are nice. Since you can only get +7 stat points from levelling up, the odd bonus may be just enough to push you to the next breakpoint--IF you manage to level up to 28 of course.

Example: Every God's Ring gives +5 Wisdom, which combines nicely with +7 Wisdom from levelling for a net of +12.

As an aside and further illustration: JUPP's 5.2 dreadmaster decoy recommends spending 5 points on Wisdom and 2 on Dex, but since you're going to be using Chimandrae's Slippers w/ Dex +5 this is actually a waste of the last Dex point. You could instead spend 6 on Wis and 1 on Dex and avoid taking one of the +1 Wis/-2 Con potions to get more hit points. Alternatively you could spend it on Int (13->14).

-Max

 

I would actually say that the above statements are more true for Wizards. Sorcerers are hurt by ECL since they have no scroll availability issues. However, if scroll availability doesn't match up well to a non-ECL race wizard in a 6 person party, then a wizard isn't really hurt that much by either a little multi-classing or using an ECL race.

However, it does seem like a bit of meta-gaming to know that ECL race wizards (such as Tieflings and Drow) aren't hurt by their ECL due to lack of spell scroll lack availability. So if the appropriate scrolls were available earlier, ECL race wizards would "regain" the proper penalty caused by their ECL.

I think that the principle that mere +1 stat bonuses are weak holds for all stats, not just INT. A +1 stat bonus is only useful if the stat in question is on an (unmodified) odd number. IMHO, item stat bonuses should have a minimum of +2 to guarantee an actual increase in the stat's modifier. I don't mind odd numbered bonuses... what I do mind is bonuses of only +1 since it doesn't guarantee that the changed stat provides an improved stat bonus. (Wow ... that item changed my STR from 16 to 17. Big freaking deal....)



Ahhh... tomes. Funny that you should mention tomes. I actually have some item files for tomes for each stat floating around somewhere.

I also have around 40+ additional items (about 50/50 split between normal and HOF mode items) that were good to go that were never installed in Rev 1 of LoS because I'd held them back as possible new battle squares rewards. However, I've come to the conclusion that trying to redo BSQ is simply far more work than I'm willing to take on, at least for now. So I'm trying to think of places where I can spread these 40+ new items around the game. (6 of these items were tomes for each stat.) These items are mostly moderately leveled items. I didn't make the normal mode versions too high because they were intended to be placed in the Ice Temple, plus, I wanted to leave "room" for improved HOF versions.

I also have one item that was fully installed in LOS rev 1 with one minor oversight ... I forget to place it in its container in the location where it should have been found. (Ooops.) That's been corrected, and if I do do a rev 3 of LOS, this item (a nice set of elven chain mail) will be able to be found in its intended location.

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Max, I must have missed this PS last night.

These ideas are quite doable. Oh, I think that tweaking the transmuter potion from adding +5 HP to adding +2 INT would be easier than creating some sort of quest. (Of course, in IWD2, mini-quests often tend to be VERY "mini". One could easily argue that the transmuter thing in that drider lab would qualify as a "mini-quest".) I have to admit though that limiting this to only transmuters seems a bit on the narrow side. How many people are going to use transmuters, after all?

Regardless, very interesting suggestions...

 

I've outlined reasons for this strangeness later on in the same chapter, mainly dealing with if you expect to reach level 28 or not. That decides if you need to use the last level-up point to boost DEX or WIS, on top of the boni granted by the potions.

 

It's when you consider mid-late game nuking/killing power that Sorcs are superior to Wizards. If you already have that part covered, then a Wizards might be more useful.

woot new gem

 

Scythesong, I've already updated Malavon and Sheemish's stores to include some spell level 7 scrolls. The real question that I have is this ... is this enough? Or is the lack of scrolls a bit larger than merely a lack of SL7 scrolls in this region?

 

The lack of higher level scrolls in certain regions is more of a designer flaw than anything. It is inhibiting, yes, but only if you find yourself in the situation. But since my parties usually don't focus on nuking anyway I tend to take several of the level 7+ spells for granted until I'm almost at the end of the game.

I guess scrolls can be forced to drop/spawn(pickpocket) via reloading for those who really want to make use of those slots, but you can just have your wizard take a few rogue levels until scrolls become available.

I've never considered shopping for scrolls or items an impediment. I will use any advantage I can get to make my game as easy and straightforward as possible. Although it can be argued that all you really need to finish IWD2 are your characters and certain powerful drops, that's not powergaming.

Lack of scrolls is not a problem if you're taking a Wizard, since this implies that you'll also be taking along other arcane caster (Bards or even Sorcerers) giving you access to the spells your Wizard will lack. Having a Wizard as your main and only caster is doable but not ideal in IWD2, naturally. "Main caster" in IWD2 implies having very good nuking skills, especially for HoF.