Larian Studios Forums Divinity - Original Sin Divinity Original Sin - Beta Is the wizard indispensable?

Granted, I've spent most of my play time so far trying out various starting class templates, and doing town quests. I've wandered outside to the west battling level 3 and 4 packs, met the two legionnaires on the lighthouse quest, and haven't really gone any farther than that ... so far. So I'm not really skilled at the game yet, obviously.

I keep wanting to try out different combinations but one of them always seems to be a wizard. I just can't help myself. And not only that, I dump the starting poison spell for summon spider so I've got an extra meat shield.

I just can't bring myself not to have a wizard. Right now my favorites starting out are cleric and wizard. Is the wizard just that good early on where you don't want to start without one? Or am I locking myself in needlessly?

It's a good idea to dump the poison for a spider, because the poison is not that useful in Cyseal.

A wizard is not mandatory. All kinds of classes and class combinations are viable. Some are better than others, though.

For fun, I chose a Shadowblade and a Rogue and later on we started playing coop with those.
It is very well possible to deal with enemies that way too, though it is a bit hard as both classes are "similar", but I have to admit that it makes it somewhat... hilarious and fun! One usually needs a contrast to the other class, e.g. melee and ranged, healer and tank, etc., as that makes things balanced.

If any skill seems mandatory it's the Rogues Invisibility, and only so you can steal tons of gold before hitting level 7 and getting a spell to do the same thing.

Recently I started a game with my gf playing a 2h wielding caster. She's got Man at Arms, Pyro, Hydro and Aero. The premise is access to teleportation, healing and fire spells for the times she cannot charge into combat swinging away with a giant sword (also thick skin and leech for survivability).

I am complimenting this with my Rogue. Dex and high speed (2 speed rings put me at a 9 speed atm) plus the Ranger self teleport means I can deploy behind a mob and maximise backstab to take our casters if needed. I also carry a bow and many arrows in case I need to take out a flaming barrel, or even lay a steamcloud down for the hireling to electrify.

I took out a level 5 guy in town at level 3 without him even getting a turn, thanks to my backstab, high action points and stuns. (my gf and her minion were off exploring something at the time since we split up - usually she does the story stuff while I steal everything in town to fund skillbooks).

I have never used invisibility, either as a skill, a scroll, or a potion, in four plays-thru of different versions of the beta-test. I clobbered the final boss at least once each time, and always had more loot than I knew what to do with. So .. mandatory? "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."

Have not even tried the Wizard myself, but I rarely do play wizards. With that said the classes I started with, Rogue/Priest.

Entire town of Cyseal, looted, not a single issue getting that done. My Priest sat in the middle of town whilst the Rogue went roguish. I used the Priest during a few undead fights, under and around town.

My Rogue started with: Hide(bush), invisible, and stealthy speed. These skills alone took care of the towns looting..still not level 4, and over 6,000k loot+ more to sell.

Just now getting around to leaving town, so I picked up the Fighter (forget her name) as a meat shield.

In my experiance a wizard and a ranger are the easiest choices in the beta. There is a wizard companion in the beta but two are better.

There will be more companions available in the realse version. I sure hope there are more options early in cyseal, as I don't like the two in the beta (way too crazy for my taste).

Playing completely without a wizard makes the game considerably harder. You can't extinguish fires properly and can't do most combos. Arrows don't last forever and you'll have to spend a lot of money on them. I tried it, it's no fun.

I had no problems with extinguishing fires, I picked up Rain (and yes I picked up water skill) with my Rogue. If your familiar with AD&D, my Rogue fits the Trickster Class build, a Rogue with magic affinity.

I also picked greater teleport weight, so things like water/ooze/oil barrels are easy to move..even drop on mobs. <<<---big favorite of mine.

Well duh. I was pointing out that it's hard to do without spells.

Unless arrows come down in price at the vendor, you'll just need to keep each and every water barrel you find. Seems tedious to me when you could simply pop 1 point in water magic to access Rain.

I agree that every class can Work, so no you don't need a caster. However magic has a lot of viability in different areas so it is a good thing to have.

My current party consists of a Ranger combined with Earth, Witch, and Water magic and a Knight combined with Fire and Air magic. Combatwise it works really well as both are durable and have great ranged attacks.

My theorycrafting for release so far is to plan for that kind of setup, so potentially at level 10 I would have these kind of setups:

1) Pure ranged rogue/mage type character:
Focus is to provide buffs, debuffs, and support mainly. Also works as my frontman when adventuring (trap detecter etc.)

Skills: total of 19 available
Ranger(2), Witch(2), Water(2), Earth(2), Sneak(2), Pickpocket(2), Lockpicking(2)

*21 points used, so requires the talent All Skilled Up (+2 ability pts.)
*Skill level 2 requires 3 points allocated

Essential talents: total of 6 available
Light Stepper, Arrow Recovery, All Skilled Up

Attributes: total of 10 available
Dex +3, Int +3, Con +1, Spe +1, Per +2

2) Heavy melee with aggressive casting
Main damage dealer and "tank". If unable to charge into melee, he/she can deal good damage from afar

Skills: total of 19 available
Men at Arms(2), Fire(2), Air(2), Blacksmithing(2), Crafting(2)

*4 points left, currently I am thinking of Charisma and Leadership making this character into the "leader" of the party and the one talking to people in town. But increased Armor and Weapon damage just might be the way to go as Charisma really doesn't change much

Essential talents: total of 6 available
Opportunist, Scientist, Thick Skin, Picture of Health

Attributes: total of 10 available
Str +3, Int +3, Con +2, Spe +1, Per +1

The challenge of the setup:
The challenge so far with this kind of character setup is how to distribute Attribute points for the heavy melee. The reason here being that for some reason heavy armor and strength based weapons require higher attribute than dex or int based weapons.

E.g. an axe of item level 3 might require 8 strength whereas a bow of equal item level and rarity only requires 6 dexterity, thus making warriors increasingly difficult to multiclass as the game progress due to the fact that this problem seems to increase as well, at level 9 I found a level 8 two handed weapon requiring strength of 11. At level 10 within current beta content all dex and int based weapons and armor require a maximum of 8 in their respective attribute.

Basically the consequence is that a multiclass warrior have to wait 1-2 levels before ever being able to use any of the weapons or armor that drop from the enemies you fight whereas int and dex based character can use all dropped items immediately. Something I am hoping they change before release, as it really should be equal opportunity for all character classes.

Two other challenges with this setup are:
a) No main character has Loremaster, but I usually just put that on a follower anyway
b) You spend a lot of points early on to build the character setup, meaning you will have very few ability points if any left to put into increased weapon damage, armor, body building, and willpower. It makes for more difficult early game, but should be easier later

While I play the game for the story, I do try and min/max my experience from a mechanics point of view. I would love to hear what you guys plan to play and why.

There are not 19 skill points available, it's actually more than that. 5 from character creation, 4 from levels 2-5. You get two ability points per level from 6-11 (12), and then three per level afterwards 12-20 (27) = 5 + 4 + 12 + 27 = 48.

21 then my mistake, a good mistake to make though (I know it becomes more after level 10, but I only tested up until level in beta)

Right now my favourite start is the following:

Player 1 - Ranger.
Attributes: Dex 8 Speed 7
Skills: Marksman/Scoundrel, Leadership, Loremaster, Lockpicking.
Talents: Leech/Arrow Recovery
Powers: Ranged Power Stance/Tactical Retreat/Walk in Shadows

Player 2 - Knight.
Attributes: Str 7 Int 8
Skills: Aero/Hydro/Pyro/Arms, Tele
Talents: Thick Skin/Pet Pal
Powers: Minor Heal/Flare/Teleportation

By level 3 I pick up Backstabber and Crafting (for making special arrows) on player 1 while player 2 gets Leech. Skillbooks to find in town are Battering Ram for player 2, and razor's edge for player 1 as definites to really help make this group shine.