Wizard Slayer Kit
CaptRory
Member Posts: 1,660
I never really took a long look at it because it's rather restrictive what with the No Magic Items bit. I was looking some other things up and got to reading about it.
How does it work in practice? How many levels do you need to invest in it if you wanted to dual class? The biggest increase in Magic Resistance is at level one after all.
How does Weapon Speed affect your Number of Attacks? If you made a character more based on just stabbing a mage over and over to neutralize him, would you be better off dual wielding daggers? What about the Crossbow of Speed? I was thinking of dual classing to a rogue. Make a Mager Killer Assassin sort. Just sneak in and stab the heck out of him.
Also, the poison dagger in BG is supposed to be pretty good at stopping mages on it's own, keeping him from casting with poison damage.
Sorry I'm getting kind of ramble-y.
How does it work in practice? How many levels do you need to invest in it if you wanted to dual class? The biggest increase in Magic Resistance is at level one after all.
How does Weapon Speed affect your Number of Attacks? If you made a character more based on just stabbing a mage over and over to neutralize him, would you be better off dual wielding daggers? What about the Crossbow of Speed? I was thinking of dual classing to a rogue. Make a Mager Killer Assassin sort. Just sneak in and stab the heck out of him.
Also, the poison dagger in BG is supposed to be pretty good at stopping mages on it's own, keeping him from casting with poison damage.
Sorry I'm getting kind of ramble-y.
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http://forum.baldursgate.com/discussion/4005/an-in-depth-look-at-the-wizard-slayer-kit-suggestions-to-improve-it-for-phils-reddit-request#latest
If however you're wanting to dual in BG1 I would advise doing it at level 7. At which level you gain another 1/2 an attack and can still surpass the fighter levels and regain their abilities (unsure what the new cap will be but in standard BG dualing a fighter at level 7 you could become a level 8 thief).
As a wizard slayer/thief in BG1 however you will never gain use any item to counter their class restrictions. The dagger of venom is a fantastic item for mage destruction. Wizard Slayer is probably the worst class to dual, a much better (& more cheese) fighter/thief dual is Kensai/Thief.
The natural magic resistance isn't worth not being able to use magic items - the cloak of balduran yeilds 25% resistance in BG1 and in BG2 there are also items that provide magic resistance.
When I've played a fighter/thief in the past I've had a elven fighter/thief multi. They're great and don't have the uphill waiting period that duals have/can use skills from both classes through-out the BG series.
From Gambanshee: http://www.gamebanshee.com/baldursgateii/strategies/wizardslayerthief.php
Wizard Slayer/Thief
Race: Human
1st class: Wizard Slayer to level 15
2nd class: Thief to level 38
Ok here's how it works: Since the expansion pack now allows you to go to 8 million experience points, you can go to 15 as a wizard slayer for 15% resistance AND still have room to get to 38 as a thief. The great thing about thiefs are the high level class ability "use any item". That skill OVERIDES your wizard slayer restrictions that doesn't allow you to use magic items. In fact it overides ANY item restrictions. In other words you can use the 2 handed wonder Carsomyr!! So add another 50% magic resistance to your 15 and you have 65, add the ring of gaxx and you have 75. And since your a thief and should use leather armor, add the evil leather with +20 magic resistance and you have 95. And of course the amulet of power for a whopping 100% MAGIC IMMUNITY and level drain protection. PLUS you can backstab at *5 the dammage, set traps ( about 9 i believe ), and steal some nice scrolls that you can cast... improved mantle anyone? With that combination nothing can harm you. You can even be REAL cheesy and equip the staff of magi ( automatic invisibility ) and backstab without even having to get away from enemies. When your invisibility is blown just go to the equipment screen and re-equip it. Only problem with this is it makes the game a bit too easy... o well ;-)
Submitted by: Evil Eye
I had always thought about trying that, but at the end of the day, it'd take 1.32mil XP just to regain your fighter levels, and then you'd need a grand total of 4.61 million before you'd finally hit HLAs.
That's just craziness. And for what? Some magic resist and applying spell failure on hit? I just don't see it.
I guess you'd be pretty bad-ass with Carsomyr on that guy, though. Dispell on hit to get rid of buffs and then spell failure rates mean you'd shred the high level dragon encounters and possibly the final battle. Just not seeing it as worthwhile, though. So many other builds can do all of that and not be total suck for 3/4ths of the entire saga.
My suggestion would be to only try this (dual) class if you have experience with the game. Definitely not for newbies. Beginners are better off with a Berserker/Cleric or the more popular Kensai/Mage.
You can do this in BG1 too by dual-classing Imoen into a mage (which most people do anyway).
It is even easier if it is your main character the one who is dualing into a mage. Remove EVERYONE from the party and get all the xp for yourself.
I've often used the Carsomyr as my Elven fighter/thief as well against magical/enemies that can't be backstabed.
Aside from this wizard slayer/thief dual I see no reason to dual past level 13. Level 15 will be a difficult uphill period to surpass. Kensai/Thief allows combat bonuses against all foes, rather than spellcasters alone & coupled with UAI yeilds another -2 AC. If you're concerned about resisting magic - the cloak of mirroring takes care of most magic attacks directed at you.
I've though about a wizard slayer/thief before but in my view the bad outweighs the good.
If only your second class could be a kit. Fighter/Assassin or Fighter/Swashbuckler.
Imagine fighter/assassin with Greater Deathblow. Guaranteed max damage on x7 backstab with Staff of the Ram +6. Glglglglglglg (read that as Homer's gurgling when he likes something.)
The discussion thread on how to improve the kit referenced above is an interesting read. I'm honestly not sure what the best answer is...
I do think, though, that if the concept for the kit is a person who eschews magic to begin with, that to later dual class to Thief and eventually acquire the 'Use Any Item' HLA makes no logical sense.
I prefer the solution that the kit be made more effective in some way, and that there be a restriction against dual-classing it. Or if they improve the kit and still allow dual-classing it, then remove the UAI HLA from the Thief class in that particular combination.
Anyway, in BG2 the higher level spell selection is usually sufficient for me to handle enemy wizards with my mage(s). And when in berserker rage, Berserkers and Barbarians are immune to mind-altering spells. Point being that one doesn't need Bala's Axe by BG2. Not that one needs it to defeat mages handily in BG1, either.
But all that said, I'll be honest that I have never played a Wizard Slayer, so I have no actual idea how good they are or aren't. I could see how they may be underestimated, at least, if not the best class/kit. (If they were the best I'm sure players would have discovered that long ago!)
Nevertheless, this discussion makes me want to try to get the most out of one, though!
Not to be able to use magical items in BG (besides weapon) is a HUGE PENALITY, the fact that you can dual to thief doesn't justify this problem, the class itself is problematic.
The magic resistance that this class gains is nothing in comparission to monks, and i should truly ask: WHY?
The only thing i liked in this class was the NPC based on it, Kindred, this NPC is awersome but use him and valen on the same game play and you gonna kill probally 50% of all NPCs you interact during the game.
IMPORTANT: this ability DOES not bypass Protection from Magical Weapons and similar spells as you erroneously imply.
Spell Disruption per se it's not that bad, mainly because it bypasses Stoneskin, but it's only a decent ability, not a game-changing ability. Inquisitor's Dispel Magic is a game-changing ability.
Well, I assume Barbarians and Berserkers enrage at the start of the fight, before you hit them, not after you hit them.
Afair Spell Disruption does not affect divine spellcasters.
You're highly overstimating the value and effectiveness of magic resistance, probably because of vanilla's AI being quite dumb.
A Level 20 WS has 40% magic resistance, and any mid lvl mage can almost completely remove that with a single 5th lvl Lower Resistance spell.
Magic resistance per se would be great, but only if the WS had a wat to protect it from LR, it has not.
But I love spellcasting. And I can't quite square having mages in the party when I have a PC who hates wizards!
I have never tried playing a party without a wizard... So I think at some point I may very well try building a party around a Wizard Slayer using just warrior class NPCs and/or custom PCs to round out the party.
How do you think a WS with Wizard Slayer Rebalancing would perform in, say, in a game with SCS II installed? (Or SCS for BG:EE for that matter.) Because that's how I'll be playing, I'm sure, after the first vanilla run when each EE is released.
e.g.: Kensai/Thief; Berserker/Thief and so on.
There is nothing a Wizard Slayer does that another dual-class fighter can't do just as well (or better).
Balancing the class based on one HLA in Throne of Bhaal won't help it in BG:EE or BG2:EE (which is like 20-30h of gameplay). Wizard slayer is a viable kit but not a great one. It's probably the first kit people want changed (next to Shapeshifter and Beastmaster).
And you're wrong about MR between Wizard Slayer's and monks, monks achieve 100% Mres faster than Wizard Slayers. Care to explain me why a WS would get 100%Mres faster?