Theorycrafting my party

[dannyaic]

Hey guys how are you? Just getting around to playing this one, and having a lot of fun, reminds me of the earlier MM games. I think I’ve finally decided on a party but I wanted to get opinions, since I’m not sure if it’s topo squshy

Barb

GM Maces/dual wield

Bladesmaster

GM Daggers/dual wield

Runepriest

GM Fire/Light/Magical focus
Expert air (For Eagle eye)

Freemage

GM Dark/Magical focus
Master Water/Earth
Expert Prime

The idea is between all the dual wielders including the Magic focus guys, agony will proc thirteen times a round against bosses, and against mobs, Fire and blademaster should be enough to sweep them away. But is it gonna be a case of now being powerful enough at the right times, or should I be fine?

[Traul]

That is a well-thought build and it can probably work, but it sounds a bit complicated for a first playthrough, and I am not sure it is any stronger than the more straightforward options. It all comes from GM Dark. Picking GM Air or Prime instead and default builds for the melee fighters would make things much simpler.

Besides that, here are a few possible tweaks to consider:
-Agony will not crit, so GM focus is wasted on the freemage. Maybe GM Dark and Prime?
-GM Light is overkill on the runepriest, M is all you need for resurrection. Don't forget you need points for Mysticism and defensive skills as well.
-You could use a ranger instead of the blademaster to remove the need for Eagle Sight and Air Magic altogether.

[dannyaic]

Thanks for the reply.

The gm for light was for the multiplier; not necessarily for the spell. Too much healing you think? I was worried cause the party didn’tt have a tank.

Gm for dark was the same thing, but I hear ya on the magical focus. If that’s the case maybe I bring it to expert and that’s it and gm prime.

I’m playing on adventurer so I wasn’t too worried about mysticism. I’ve been putting points into vitality and spirit.

A ranger instead of the blade master? Won’t that severely cripple his damage out put if we’re putting points for perception instead of might? Or am I missing something?

Thanks.

[Traul]

Daggers are supposed to rely less on Might. Lower physical damage and higher attack rate kind of cancel each other, but they still get the same magical damage as other 1H weapons, so the overall magical output is doubled, which is exactly why you chose them to work with Agony. So with daggers, one typically goes for Dragon's Breath enchanted weapons (extra magical damage on the whole monster group,), then Destiny becomes better than Might to increase the damage output because crits affect magical damage. Besides, your daggers need to hit and dual wielders naturally have lower attack stats than 2H fighters, so a little bit of Perception is not bad even for melee.

The main advantage of the blademaster is his Promotion ability to act again after a kill. When choosing between blademaster and ranger, you are really trading that for GM bow.

[mpnorman10]

I would like to point out the value of focus in this game in two senses.

Magical focus for a magical party is, in my experience, incredibly powerful. Of course, as pointed out above, one needs to have spells that are capable of critical damage but when you do, for example GM in Air or Fire, then it is incredibly powerful, even or especially toward the end of the game. The level (Expert-Master-GM) of the spell impacts what spells can be cast and their minimum average power, but magical focus and the crits it gives raises that average power considerably. It is not inappropriate to think of Magical focus as a spell amplifier which, on the average, it is. One only gets one spell per round (some of which last several rounds) so increasing the average power of that one spell directly increases the damage potential of the character.

The other sense of focus is in the party. In the party concept above, the intent, because of both the Runepriest and the Freemage appears to be focused on magic. Because those characters are squishy (there is nothing wrong with that) this party will probably cast magical light shields and earth regeneration a lot, but those spells can benefit 3 (or 4) just as well as 2. Yes, I understand in this game that having a character with high strength and high perception (in addition to magic and some vitality for at least one character) is necessary to reach all areas and complete all quests, but the strength and perception can both be focused in one character, for example a Blademaster. By this principle a Barbarian, which does not usually need light shields or earth regeneration might be better in a party without squishies. Instead consiser a Shaman (orc magical guy) for GM Water and other appropriate. If light shield and earth regen are used for the freemage and runepriest anyway, this char will also benefit (and having an orc in the party will open up at least one area not accessable without one. Regarding parties, there are no wrong answers, but it is something to consider because if light shield and earth regen are already being cast for the runepriest and freemage then the shaman would also benefit from those "for free", in a sense. It is just something to consider.

The principles of focus also apply to other, such as melee or range oriented party concepts but the game design, requiring at least one character in the party high in strength, perception, magic and to some degree vitality in order to reach all areas limits the flexibility of party design in this game. That limitation exists, by design, but the focus principle, in degree, is still one factor to consider in party design here.

[dannyaic]

You know, I had to read that a couple of times before I really caught on to what you were saying there haha. But yeah you’re right, that part hadn’t been considered either. Unfortunately it’s impossible for one party to experience every single thing the game has to offer. Ultimately we CAN limit ourselves or say those things don’t matter and move on. I’ve accepted that I won’t be able to do everything because I find defenders to be very much underwhelming, and I can’t play a party through these types of
Games if I don’t like a class for whatever reason. I don’t loke rangers, defenders or shaman, so I won’t use them so certain strategies go out the window because of that.

However, you did give me a good idea for a might/perception guy and I now have a new party forming, one that is much more straightforward as the other poster said. Thanks to both of you.

[Frostfeather]

I know this is extremely old, but I'm posting here to remind myself: Agony doesn't work with Magic Foci.

I swear it used to and they changed it around the same time they nerfed spell crit chance, but I could be misremembering.

At any rate, if a group is to be built around Agony, it's probably going to revolve around daggers, which you can only GM really late. And in the case of Blademaster, you are much better off with swords anyway (at least for 95% of the game.