Wyrmic Guide

[shwqa]

Wyrmics are a defensive melee character with plenty of lot range ability. They use wild-gifts skill that use equilibrium for most of their skills which are not affected by fatigue. Their wild art skills deal decent damage but don't scale very well so you tend to find yours skill doing huge damage early game but only about an extra 100-200 damage by the end of the game. However almost all wyrmic skills give you more control over the game. There are many skills that give crippling debuffs in large AOE. Other moves let you rearrange the terrain to your advantage. Combining this with the many passive resist and incredible healing makes Wyrmic a slow but steady class.

Lets start with which races are helpful

Races:

• Conac: 1/5 A wyrmic really doesn't need that extra category and without racial skills you will probably have extra generic points not doing anything.
  
  Higher: 1/5 Thanks to the fungal arts tree you really shouldn't need an extra way regen or get equilibrium.
  
  Shalore:3/5 Extra speed and critical hit is pretty nice. Timeless can help out against nasty effects but don't really combo well with any wyrmic skills.
  
  Thalore: 5/5 Thaloren wrath scales with willpower and by the end of the game gives an extra 20% damage and damage reduction. It is very helpful for hard bosses. The third skill is an extra 20% blight resistance, 10% resist all, and disease immunity. Corruptors tend to be the hardest hitting enemies so that is extremely nice. The other skills are great too but I tend to only put 1 point in them.
  
  Halfing 4/5 Halfing make great wyrmics. Luck of the little people help with the lackluster damage that wyrmic tend to have. Duck and dodge makes you even harder to kill. Indomitable gets rid of annoying stuns. They work best as mindstar wyrmics.
  
  Dwarf 5/5 Dwarves start with all the right stats and have great hp growth. The first two racial skills are decent but not really worth putting more than one point each. Power of money is a great skill if you don't gamble all your money away. Stone walking is a great escape plan for times of trouble.
  
  Yeek 3/5 Surprisely not a bad combination. the first three racial skill are all pretty helpful. Thanks to bellowing roar and acid spit a wyrmic can easily clear the yeek starting areas.

Class Skill Trees

• Technique/Two Handed Weapons: Wyrmics start with a 2handed weapon and it completely viable, however I prefer 1handed weapons and a shield. Death dance deals nice damage and targets everything surrounding you, just watch out for allies. Berserker is a amazing skill combined with ice armor you can avoid the -armor penalty and get huge boost to accuracy, physical power, and most importantly stun resist. Warshout combos perfectly with bellowing roar. You can use bellowing roar and 4 turns later use Warshout 6-8 turns later, use sand breath. This will turn even the most deadly enemies into a joke. I'm not a big fan of Death blow it seems a weaker version of swallow. My recommended point distribution 1/5/5/1.
  
  Technique/Shield Offense My preferred weapon tree, It supirisng does more damage than the 2handed weapon tree. As a bonus you also get more defense and resist with this build. Shield Pummel deals okay damage but it can stun enemies which makes it very helpful. Riposte gives your enemy a debuff when you block, it allow you to deal double damage for 1-2 attacks. At level 4 riposte makes assault deal crazy damage. Overpowered is not all that helpful, I never really needed an enemy to be knockback. Assault is the bread and butter of a 1handed shield build. Deals shield damage and then 2 critical hits with your weapon. It will be your highest damage skill by far. With riposte and assault you can deal 900-1.5k damage. My recommended point distribution 1/4/1/1 at first and then 5/4/1/3 depending on how many spare class points you have.
  
  Technique/Combat Technique This tree does not start unlock, you need to spend a category point on it. It is a pretty useful tree, but I only get after I unlock higher dragonic, 1.3 fungal, and 4 infusions. Rush really helps with annoying spellcasters, but bellowing roar, sand breath, and lightning speed can all help you with them. Precise Strike increase you critical hit rate which helps with Wyrmic's damage. Perfect Strike helps with annoying enemies with high defense, but most those enemies have low hp so wild-gifts skills can deal with them. Blinding Speed is a great skill, extra speed can really helps with bosses. It can be hard to find the skill points to max blinding speed. My recommended point distribution 5/0/0/0 or 5/1/1/5.
  
  Technique/Combat Veteran Nothing in this tree is worth using your class points on. Now that the life regen has been boost it can be tempting to put points in it, but fungal art should be able to handle all your healing needs. The spell saves are nice but wyrmics already have high saves. Ignore it for other skills.
  
  Wild-Gifts/Sand Drake aspect A very helpful tree that needs few skill points. Swallow deals extra damage and can instant kill an enemy while healing both hp and equilibrium, if their health is low enough. I don't think swallow is good enough to put points in but later in the game swallow is very helpful even at 1/5. Enemies with blurred mortality survive past 0 hp for a long time, swallow kills them instantly. Quake is another skill great a 1/5, it can shuffle the landscape which can take you from being surround to having cover and fighting 1 on 1. Great if you suddenly find yourself being hit be a far away spellcaster. Burrow again is helpful at 1/5, you can destroy walls by walking into them. Again if you are surround you can make a tunnel and fight 1 on 1. Or if there is a hallway with mages on the other end, make a new path and sneak up on them. Combine with lightning speed to make long tunnels. Sand breath is the best breath for wyrmics. It deals the most damage and blinds. Most enemies and bosses have low resistance to blind. While blind mages throw spells randomly, and it is hilarious seeing a corruptor kill its own allies. My recommended point distribution 1/1/1/5.
  
  Wild-Gifts/Fire Drake aspect Bellowing Roar is one of the favorite skills. I rush to max it before level 10. It deals about ~200 damage the whole game. At a AOE range of 7 that will clear most the screen for the first half the game. Bellowing roar also confuses enemies, which is great against mages. I used bellowing roar almost every battle of the game. Bellowing roar followed by Corrosive mist will destroy most normal monsters in the game, allowing you to focus on elites/bosses/rares. The rest of the tree focuses purely on damage, but they aren't really worth putting points into unless you are doing a niche build. My recommended point distribution 5/0/0/0.
  
  Wilds-Gifts/Ice Drake aspect Ice drake is pretty good tree that I can never seem to find points to put into it. Icy Claw deals high damage and can freeze at level 4. Icy Skin give a huge armor bonus and deals damage to the enemy on hit. Points in icy skin have diminishing returns but it still nice to boost. Icy Wall can buy you some time which can save your life. Icy Breath freezes enemies which is pretty nice, though many enemies have stun resist so that debuff will get resisted more than others. My recommended point distributions 4/4/1/5 or 1/2/0/0 if you can't afford the class points.
  
  Wild-Gifts/Storm Drake aspect A pretty terrible tree. Lightning speed is a necessary skill, it either can be an escape or a poor man's rush. It is also nice for catching up to escort when they wander off. Get it to level 3 to get an extra turn and then forgot the tree. my recommended point distribution 3/0/0/0
  
  Wild-Gifts/Venom Drake aspect This is a great skill tree. You could max the whole tree if you wanted but I don't because I couldn't spare the points. Acidic Spray is a missile spell that deals decent damage and has a chance to disarm. I don't think any can resist disarm, so that nice. At level 5 is becomes a line spells. Corrosive mist is another favorite of mine. At the end of the game is deals ~80 damage a turn for 12 turns in a radius of 5. Again this is no corrosive resist so it helps to damage your enemies in melee. Almost every combat I would use bellowing roar and then corrosive mist. I would max this before level 10. Dissolve is flurry's weaker cousin. You deal 4 hits at low nature damage but 2 (or 3?) of the hits can blind the enemy. Corrosive Breath is a great breath disarming your enemy and dealing ~250 damage end game. My recommended point distribution either 5/5/5/5 or 1/5/1/5 to save points
  
  Wild-gifts/Higher Draconic Abilities This skill tree starts locked, but I suggest unlocking at level 10. Prismatic slash is a decent skill. Maxed it deals ~210% damage and give a random debuff and then ~250 damage in a radius 4. If you got spare class points and want another damage skill this will do, otherwise just put 1 point in it. Venomous Breath is highest damaging breath by about 100 damage, but its deals damage over time. The debuff it gives lowers enemy healing about about 30-60% which can be helpful for bosses with annoying large healing/regen. It also requires the least amount of class points to get, out of any other breath. Wyrmic Guile is just a straight passive skill. It combines very well with berserker, with both skills max you can have stun immunity and huge boost physical power, accuracy, and critical hit rate. If you aren't putting points in berserker, then it isn't worth more than 1 point. Chromatic Fury is the whole reason to get this tree. At 5/5 it grants you 10% damage increase and 20% resistance penetration to all of your sources of damage including melee. That is huge increase to damage and help with any annoying high resistance monsters.

Generic Skill Trees

• Technique/Combat Training By the of the game your going to want this tree at 5/5/5/5/0. Quickly raise armor training, but the rest you can take them when you need them.
  
  Wild-Gifts/Call of the wild Meditation lowers all of your damage by 50% ignore it. Though early game it is helpful to turn on when your running from bosses and turn it off before you go back to fighting. Nature's Touch is a great skill. Even just 1 point in it makes your life easier. By the end of the game 1 point will heal ~300 hp and gains about 70-90 hp per extra point. One the best parts of the skill is you can use it on escorts which makes those quest much more bearable. Also a good strategy is to use meditation, since it doesn't cost a turn, then use nature's touch, then turn off meditation. Earth's eyes is not really worth putting points into unless you want the next skill. Nature's Balance can be a great skill for people that want a more magey wyrmic. Otherwise ignore it.
  
  Wild-Gifts/Harmony This tree starts locked but can be unlocked by completing the sand tunnels, so don't waste the category point. Water of life is a great 1 point wonder skill. Disease are deadly by the second half of the game. If not a thalore, you want a point in this skill. Elemental Harmony is a can be great random buff sustain. Luckily fire seems to be the most common elemental damage you will take. If you got the spare generic points max this skill. The rest of the tree is too niche to be worth your time for a wyrmic. Other skills can do their jobs better, ignore them.
  
  Wild-Gifts/Fungal This tree is what makes wyrmic so powerful. It allows you to have constant healing from regen infusions, while having them not take a turn to use them and give you -4 equilibrium a turn. Basically this tree solves any healing or equilibrium problems you might have. I suggest using your level 20 category point to make it even better, even if you are anti-magic which gives it another boost. Wild growth makes a regen infusion last another turn (you still get the same healing per turn). At 3/5 or 4/5 you can have 2 regen infusion on auto use and have constant healing the whole game. In fact try to get this skill to 3/5 by level 4, and take advantage of constant healing. Fungal Growth doesn't help if you have 2 regen infusion on auto use, just put 1 point it. Ancestral Life make your infusion not less of a turn to use and lowers your equilibrium while you are regaining hp. Max this ASAP. While it doesn't say this, the turn gain back does scale with mind power. With the tree at 1.4 and 104 willpower I was gaining 4% of a turn when I used an infusion. With the superpower prodigy it might be a decent way to gain turns. Sudden Growth with just one point this will be your most powerful healing spell.

Helpful Prodigies:

• Draconic Body A helpful healing passive. It can turn an almost death moment to near full health combined with the constant healing of a regen infusion
  
  Spell feedback Deals about ~300 damage to spellcaster by the end of the game. Because of wyrmic's high armor and regen, spellcaster tend to be the last threat to wyrmics.
  
  Superpower Extra mind power helps a lot of things for Wyrmic and the 30% willpower modifier on weapons can make you deal a lot more melee damage.
  
  Corrupted Shell An extra 150 hp is huge that probably more than an extra 12% of a normal end game hp with a dwarf wyrmic. It gives about an extra 21 saves at only 60 con, which with a dwarf or thalore you are likely never to get a debuff again. The extra 21 defense is just the cherry on top.
  
  Windtouched Speed An extra 15% global speed is always nice. A yeek wyrmic with elemental harmony and gaining turns from ancestral life could be a very deadly build.
  
  Spine of the world Always a helpful prodigy
  
  Craft Hands If you got stone alchemy then get this prodigy
  
  Lucky Day This is nice for Halfing wyrmics, the passive evasion gets you about 95% dodge.
  
  Cauterize Prevents you from dying but leaves you with low health. Since you recover hp very quickly that tends not to be a problem. Has a faster cool down than Draconic body.
  
  Draconic Will Prevents all debuffs, but it is an active skill. You could put it on auto-use on sight of an enemy and it would probably always be helpful. Shalore can increase the duration of this effect.

[shwqa]

Reserved in case I need more room.

[lukep]

Excellent start (we need guides like this for all for the classes). One point that bears mentioning about Highers and their regeneration: It takes no time to use, but still recovers energy like other regen effects. This means that you can use it to get a completely (or, at lower level, mostly) free turn for your next action because of Anscestral Life.

[shwqa]

Excellent start (we need guides like this for all for the classes). One point that bears mentioning about Highers and their regeneration: It takes no time to use, but still recovers energy like other regen effects. This means that you can use it to get a completely (or, at lower level, mostly) free turn for your next action because of Anscestral Life.

Thank you! I just won with one and thought I write this.


Hmmm that is pretty interesting. At higher levels you could get a completely free turn from that. That is not bad.

[supermini]

I'd recommend putting 5 points in both assault and shield pummel. Assault gets a bonus to weapon damage from talent level (as far as I can tell), even though the tooltip is misleading.

Code: Select all

if hit then
			self.combat_physcrit = self.combat_physcrit + 1000
			self:attackTarget(target, nil, self:combatTalentWeaponDamage(t, 1, 1.5), true)
			self:attackTarget(target, nil, self:combatTalentWeaponDamage(t, 1, 1.5), true)
			self.combat_physcrit = self.combat_physcrit - 1000
		end

As for shield pummel, extra talent points extend the duration of the stun which is a very good effect to inflict, especially on casters.

[supermini]

I guess this is a good place to put my 2h build that won me the game on roguelike:

http://te4.org/characters/13640/tome/a4 ... 5ddd2d0f1a

Stats: I treated con as a 4th stat. With a high hp race and class, you can afford to do this (qualify for thick skin with gear bonuses). I went for cunning to improve my anti magic talents, but you can go dex as well.

2h weapons: 1/5/5/0

I agree with OP here, even though I ran Berserker buff without Icy Skin and tanked with regen for the most part (except Grushnak and Gorbat, and a few stair bosses). That allowed me to run AM shield with a bigger buffer before I enter the equi fail zone.

Combat techniques: I went just for rush. It's not that good with 1.00 mastery, but it helps against casters. Not something you necessarily want to max early on, but I'd start with 2 points there early on and add to it later.

If you decide to boost dex, and rely mostly on physical abilities, precise strikes is something to consider. It will save you points in combat accuracy and the critical hit is quite nice. Breaths use mind crit rather than physical, so it's not something to use if you go breath heavy.

Perfect strikes has one important effect that is not mentioned in the tooltip - blind fight. It allows you to nail those nasty dreadmasters and ruin banshees without the normal miss chance that applies for invisible/stealthed creatures. If you find withering orbs you will not need that, but otherwise be sure to put one point in it. There is also a sword that has the same property, but it is arcane powered so it won't work for AM.

Blinding speed is something you might want to go for, as the speed buff helps greatly in opening of combat, especially against a large number of casters. It's something I regret not getting with my wyrmic, as it would have helped in a lot of sticky situations.

Sand drake aspect: 4/1/1/5

Swallow is a mixed bag. If you're not running AM, you will use it sparingly. If you do run AM, it will become essential at the higher levels, as it allows you to NOMNOM weak opponets to shave off a huge chunk of equi and prevent your shield from failing. The damage is also pretty good with a twohander. I'd run it with one point for the most game, and invest in it in the end if you find you are using it a lot.

For the rest, I agree with the OP.

Combat veteran:

I went with one point in quick recovery to shorten rest times (as they were annoying near the end of the game). You might want to consider spell shield, as it will reduce the chance of spellshock (that reduces all resists by 20%). It's not something I would rely on to save me from impending doom though - magical wild is a much safer option.

Fire drake aspect:

I agree with the OP here, 5 points in bellowing roar.

Cold drake aspect:

Icy claw has a nice damage multiplier for 2h weapons. If you luck into the Gaping Maw, the cooldown becomes much better. I wouldn't rely on it for freezing though, I managed to freeze 3 or 4 mobs in the entire game and I used it on a regular basis. I'd suggest running 4 points in it, because the equi cost is very very cheap.

Icy Skin is the bread and butter of most wyrmics. I'd go for 3 points there, even though I used it very very sparingly. If you try to run this with AM shield, you will start failing very quickly. Otherwise, it's awesome.

Icy Wall is one of those skills that's really good for specific situations - it can block off pursuers, it can block the escape for a fleeing mob. You can wall off half of the pride entrance rooms with it, allowing you to take on 2 half-packs instead of a full one. I'd put 2-3 points in it.

Frost breath is convenient to use because it is in a tree that you want to put points in. I'd go with either 0 or 5 points.

Venom drake aspect:

I can only testify to the usefulness of dissolve, as I haven't used the rest very much. On a weapon with on-hit effects, it becomes brutal.

I've used it also on this Wyrmic: http://te4.org/characters/13640/tome/64 ... 982562b2f1 (adventure mode winner) in combination with Legacy of the Naloren trident, and it obliterated enemies.

Storm drake aspect:

I agree with the OP here, 3 points in Lightning speed. Caster wyrmics might consider tornado, as it runs on mindpower, but that is outside of my experience.

Higher draconic abilities:

Prismatic slash: This is a mixed bag for me. The effects are very good but the cooldown is really high and the cost is high. The AOE on it is kinda weak on high levels. Even with a wyrmic that went high on mindpower, the aoe damage was anemic. I went with 5 points but I had to refrain from using it often, due to the cost.

Venomous breath: Reduces healing. That's...useful I guess. It does damage over time which is...not.

Wyrmic Guile: 5 levels gives you 10 cunning, 50% knockback resist, 25% stun and 25% blind. Get it. If you're running berserker, this puts you at around 80% stun resist, one ring/amulet away from stun immunity - a luxury shield wyrmics might not have in Dreadfell.

Chromatic Fury: Works great if you go either breath heavy or more physical. The resistance penetration and the damage bonus is quite good. This is not something you'd necessarily want to focus early on though.

To be continued.

[SageAcrin]

I cleared my own Wyrmic a bit ago (http://te4.org/characters/10195/tome/1d ... 99aa2d6fdd) and I do have some thoughts on this.

Of course, since I cleared before the new skillset changes, they're mostly theoretical. On the other hand, I actually made those two categories, so I have a good idea of the theoretical.

Also, I generally played a very spellcaster-like Wyrmic with basic physicals as a backup. This colors how I feel about some skills.

Stats: Str/Will/Cun primary. Strength because nearly everything you use, ranged or melee, runs off of it, Will for the stuff that doesn't run off Strength, and Cunning for Mindcrit which works for nearly everything you have. Dex is nice, but you have non-accuracy backups, and can reach a nice reasonable amount for most purposes just by leveling Combat Accuracy and keeping an eye out for accuracy boosting equips. Con is nice, but you're a +2 HP class that doesn't even have to be up close and personal if you don't want, and have no skills that run off of Con. Mag is pretty pointless, magic builds of Wyrmic are a waste.

Races:

Generally agree with that assessment. Halfling is better than it's given credit; You can get a massive surge of Mindcrit(which is rather hard to build) with their racial skill, and the rest of the abilities are pretty useful. Building Cunning is, as mentioned, pretty reasonable for this class. But otherwise, yeah.

Skills and general build notes:

Twohanders: A good way to get through the earlygame that's a lot more viable to stick with later, now. Mostly thanks to skills outside of the category, admittedly. Death Dance synergizes well with the new Bellowing Roar and Warshout is a good disabler, but the most interesting thing about the category is the huge Stun resistance off Berserker, to be honest. That gives you a very nice status defense, and combined with Icy Skin, enough damage to really wreck the earlygame without much downside.

Sword/Shield: Really good for the end of the game, especially on more caster oriented builds-I specifically invested 1/1/1/1 in it when I played, just so I'd have Assault for the final fight. Heavy shield builds are a lot more viable now that there's more secondary abilities. 4/4/1/3 is a good build-Shield Pummel hits max Stun at 4, Assault starts getting notably diminishing returns around 3.

Combat Techniques/Veteran: Not worth the effort, in general. Techniques is only good if you feel you have no use for unlocks at all(which, in fairness, is quite possible, Wyrmic has relatively low unlocks), at which point you can use it for the same reasons any other physical fighter would, but I find it overkill on a fairly mobile and versatile fighter already. Veteran's nice for a point or so in the first two skills, just to make life easier and simpler, but overall not major.

Sand Drake: Yeah pretty much agreed here. Swallow is either fairly bad outside of niche situations(annoying below-0 life enemies and very lategame enemies with tons of life, but if you're at melee range you should still swing for more than the thresholds it IDs at, for the most part...) or pretty great (If you are a melee fighter and need all the damage buttons and equi you can get for AM). Quake/Burrow are as stated, and Sand Breath might be the best ability Wyrmic gets, period. (Of note, Sand Breath has a 100% blind check. Unlike the other status elements.)

Fire Drake: Devouring Flame notably can critical hit, unlike most DoT. That can end up a crazy amount of damage if you're building up Mindcrit-over 1500 damage total over the DoT duration, from what I recall. This makes it not too bad if you're going for a more ranged oriented build-Wyrmics can keep enemies in DoT better than most classes, due to having decent status at range. Otherwise, basically agreed-Flame Breath is a nice fourth breath target(you don't really need more than four), but otherwise is dull. (Sadly, my run was before Bellowing Roar became great instead of an instant 1 and forget.)

Ice Drake: Generally great. If you're not leveling at least something in this, you're probably in the wrong class. Ice Wall is a good 1(I never have seen enough point in leveling it-this is a durable class with many other good 1s for escape and area control.), otherwise the rest are great for different purposes and builds.

Storm Drake: Sadly pretty bad, yes. Lightning Speed is a killer 1(and if I was going to level one of Wyrmic's many utility and area control skills, it'd be this, personally-at 3 it goes to three turns, which is a huge amount of area to cover in three turns.), and Tornado's okay(unwieldy, but really damaging, stuns, and can mindcrit.), but otherwise, pass.

Venom Drake: Did not exist when I cleared. Acidic Spray is kinda weird-it's good long term for more caster oriented Wyrmics, and it's a good short term skill for Wyrmics that have trouble in the earlygame, but it isn't good for heavy physical builds. Corrosive Mist should be one of the best skills on the tree-It effectively provides a big chunk of accuracy/APR, and potentially does lots of damage over a big area-even for melee builds, this is still worth considering, particularly with Superpower. Dissolve does a ton of damage if leveled(especially with on-hits like Mindstars. And the Legacy of the Naloren, though I didn't think of that when I made it.) and the breath is a decent filler breath.

Higher Draconic: Also didn't exist when I cleared. Prismatic Slash is a good 1, and can be leveled for a decent backup crowd control and more damage. Venomous Breath got nerfed from the original idea I had for it(Lost about 1/7th the power I initially had it pegged for...mostly because people kneejerk disrespect DoTs, particularly poisons, and I was trying to account for that.), but does still do some of the highest damage to area to cost ratio of any attack on Wyrmic, and nukes healing too-You can reasonably blow off 1200-1500 over six turns with this, over a 9 cone, which isn't too bad in theory. Wyrmic Guile is decent, but not really standout-mostly, it's a passive, for Wyrmic, which has very few passive effects, and synergizes well with Berserker. Chromatic Fury is great and probably should be 5ed by most Wyrmics-even physical ones like +10% physical damage and 20% physical resistance penetration, and the effect is much harder to reproduce for Wyrmics that are functioning like casters, making it even better for them.

The Generics are mostly simple: Fungus is a good 5/1/?(depends on how much you value the Equi gains)/1, Call of the Wild is mostly good but you should at least 3 Nature's Touch for sure, and Wyrmic gets a free unlock of Harmony from eating the Heart, so you should definitely pick up at least 1/5/0/0 for a nice set of unreliable but powerful bonuses(unless you really hate Elemental Harmony, or are running heavy AM and the cost is too much).

Playstyle:

Generally speaking, Wyrmics come in two major playstyles to me: Melee(where you pick up all the melee skills possible, pick a weapon tree and level it heavily, then use breaths for status and sniping, with some utility skills for defensive reasons.) and ranged(Where you level the melee skills a lower amount, pick up multiple breaths and Mindpower based skills, and blast people mostly from high range, with your melee as a cheap, reliable backup.).

In the case of the former, AM is an interesting and powerful option-while you run tons of things off your Equi, making failure of the Shield much more of an option for you than, say, a Berserker, you also have tons of Mindpower to run it off, and you do have Stamina backup skills. In this case, managing your Equi is very important-keep sustains besides AM Shield off, be conservative with Equi use, keep secondary escapes and generally just play it cautious, and it should be really insanely hard to kill you.

In the case of the latter, Equi is far less of an issue. AM Shield is a lost cause, but AM Wyrmic for ranged is still an idea, for Resolve and Aura of Silence. Personally, I just chucked it. Running other sustains doesn't matter, and ramming into fail rates with Wyrmic is, as long as you have a backup escape and some heals, very minor. I would commonly get into 20%+ fail rates, but what it mostly meant was that I lost 20% of my damage, erratically. I could still heal, move, etc., which is a very important distinction. Generally speaking, with Wyrmic having a lot of fairly high CDs, this isn't even a big deal, since I usually missed out on a basic physical or something instead(since failed skills don't go on cooldown, thankfully).

Regardless, you want to at least dip some into the good skills on the other end(Sand Breath and possibly a second breath for melee as well as all of the escapes, not that you can avoid them on the way to most of the damage skills...and ranged Wyrmics should consider Berserker for the status resistance and backup physical, and Prismatic Slash for the combination of Mindpower and physical damage.). Wyrmic is never a straight melee fighter and shouldn't be played that linearly, and playing it as a straight caster means that you have to put up with fail rates when you don't need to.

So yeah, that's basically my thoughts on Wyrmic, off the top of my head.

[greycat]

Much as I want to do well with a mindstar Wyrmic, I've not had much luck with them. They're so crippled in the midgame, which is the most dangerous part of the game for me.

I've done well with sword-and-shield Wyrmics. They have a couple problem areas that need to be taken into account:

• Accuracy: If you're not boosting Dexterity or Combat Accuracy, you're going to have trouble hitting some things. Monsters with high Defense (like Subject Z) will just laugh at you. I suggest focusing on Combat Accuracy whenever you can spare the Generic points.
• Curse of Death: If you're hit with Curse of Death, it shuts down your regeneration. You can still heal with Nature's Touch or Sudden Growth. I strongly suggest having a magical effect-clearing wild infusion, and saving it for this effect, or:
• Impending Doom: If you're hit with this one, not only does it shut down your regeneration, but it also shuts down direct heals (Nature's Touch, Sudden Growth, probably even Swallow). Killing the NPC who put it on you will remove the effect. If that's not an option in the next turn or two, then you'd better have that magical wild infusion ready to go. Ironically, escaping usually doesn't help, as the effect continues to hit you, and now you can't kill the bastard who did it in order to remove it.
• Sustain removers: Monsters that can remove your Wild Growth sustain won't cripple you as badly as Impending Doom will, but the 20 cooldown on Wild Growth means you'll be hampered for a while. It's easy to miss a sustain going away in the middle of a fight, so be on the lookout for it, and be ready to escape to a safe place to get things going again.

It has been pointed out on IRC that Impending Doom appears to ignore your saves. That's just mean, and might be a bug, and might or might not be fixed in some future version....

[laru]

Thanks, shwqa, for stating this thread and everybody else for your contributions! I've been struggling with wyrmics for a long time and never really had any success with them; after reading this I've got a pretty good idea what I was doing wrong with them.

Btw, about Impending Doom: apparently it also goes away if you go up/down the stairs. Might be a viable option with lightning speed/movement infusion.

[Sirrocco]

I've been running a wyrmic lately with the basic idea that I would crank breath weapons as my major source of damage, and get my other damage sources on the cheap where I could, and it's been interesting and workable so far (though I'm still only lvl 25ish, so we'll see how it rolls into endgame). My melee plan is actually mindstars, largely because that means I get some boost to my mincrit, and I can ignore both dex and the weapon-boosting generics. If I wander into a nice shield, I'm likely to go mindstar/shield, but otherwise I'm rolling with dual mindstars. It also means that I can pretty much ignore any powers that are based on weapon damage, for anything other than unlocks as my weapon damage is fairly pathetic (I haven't gotten a mindstar mastery escort, sadly). I'm also ignoring meditation and the tree behind it - I get my equilibrium recovery from the fungus tree (5/1/5/0 plus AM boost means I get +6 turns on my regens and 4 equilibrium each turn) and from resolve. I've noticed a few interesting tactical things.

- Venomous Breath: I've put one point in it in order to get to Chromatic Fury and (to a lesser extent) Wyrmic Guile, and if I spend more, it'll be because I've run out of things to invest in. The problem is, not only is it Nature, and thus really very easy to resist, but it's also a DOT, and thus relatively easy to purge. It doesn't affect things that are immune to poison, and I'm not sure, but I think that it's affected by saves as well. Technically, it may do more damage (eventually) than any of the other breath weapons, but practically speaking, it seems that it rarely does anything like as much, and in a lot of cases seems to do nothing at all. Worse yet, Chromatic Fury doesn't even boost it.

- Given that I have no use for melee attacks, and little interest in investing heavily in caster attacks that will eventually be rendered largely obsolete by breath weapons, my initial 11 points go into maxxing Lightning speed and Frozen Armor. Max Lightning speed is very interesting. For example, it persists through running up and down stairs. Showing up on a new floor with a nearly full duration of lightning speed up can give you all sorts of useful tactical options for those cases where things might otherwise go sour (and is really *quite* helpful in a few specific circumstances like the crypt). One point in burrow also stretches a lot farther if your next turn is spent firing off lightning speed.

- Boosts to global speed (like, say, from a certain pair of yellow boots) make lightning speed that much better - cranking both the number of steps you get to take before it runs out and the speed of each individual step.

- High levels of lightning speed also makes adventurer parties a lot easier to deal with. Fire off lightning speed and scout the area. If the enemy classes are ones that you can deal with easily, position yourself however you wish to be positioned and kill them. If they're liable to be a significant threat to you, just keep on running past and use the exit. Mind you, the wandering Zig squads have rather diminished the effect of adventurers. After a little while, you'll be hard-pressed to find any.

- Ice wall is quite nice even at only one point. It's possible that I will eventually get to the point that I want to put points into it, but I'm pretty happy with it as it is.

- Sand breath really is awesome, and should be 5 points for almost any build of wyrmic.

- I know that most of you will know this by now, but a combination of solid healing, durability boosts of various sorts (armor, HP, etc) and damage-when-hit is really very solid as an overall strategy for the early and middle-game (it can't be your only strategy, but it really does get you quite far all by itself). Wyrmics aren't necessarily the absolute best at this (dwarven mindslayers seem to do it better) but they have a number of very solid advantages (frozen armor, the fungus tree, a class that can handle heavy armor pretty well, a class that makes enough use of strength that you can max the heavy armor skill if you want, and decent HP)

[greycat]

- Venomous Breath: [....] The problem is, not only is it Nature, and thus really very easy to resist, but it's also a DOT, and thus relatively easy to purge. It doesn't affect things that are immune to poison, and I'm not sure, but I think that it's affected by saves as well. Technically, it may do more damage (eventually) than any of the other breath weapons, but practically speaking, it seems that it rarely does anything like as much, and in a lot of cases seems to do nothing at all. Worse yet, Chromatic Fury doesn't even boost it.

Well, for certain zones it is quite useless (undead in particular). Against orcs, it works rather well. The thing you didn't mention is that it's an insidious poison damage-type, which reduces the monster's healing modifier for the duration as well as inflicting damage. If the monster has strong healing/regeneration, then consider using this as a debuff rather than a straight damage attack.

[Sirrocco]

...though if you are doing that, you probably want to fire off Fire Breath first, in the hopes of soaking any potential wild infusion

[supermini]

If you're running without weapon skills, you probably want to consider Acidic spray and Corrode (and, when you run out of ideas, Tornado). Those skills scale off mindpower. It's quite possible to dump con and pump str (for breaths), and then wil and cun (for mindstars and mindpower).

[BFrost]

Right now I'm playing as a purely ranged wyrmic, so I skipped weapon techniques altogether. I'm mainly pumping WIL, with CON and STR secondary and some CUN for crits.
My class talents are right now (level 40-ish):
Sand drake aspect: 1/1/1/5. Sand breath is awesome
Fire drake aspect: 5/0/0/0. For most ot the game. Right now will probably put points in devouring flame to have yet another will-based ranged attack.
Higher draconic abilities: 5/1/5/5. Venomouth breath seems meh, prismatic slash is pretty cool when mosnters are in melee range.
Venom drake aspect: 5/5/0/0. Acidic spray is my main attack. It's a beam that does a lot of mindpower-based damage. Cool Corrosive mist is great at close range too.
Storm drake aspect: 1/1/5/5. Tornado is super-fun to use, lightning breath is ok but not great
My general talents are right now:
Fungus: 5/1/5/1. Non-stop regen is awesome
Combat training: 5/1/1/0/0.
Call of the wild: 1/1/0/0.
Harmony: 1/0/0/0. Waters of life is a useful one-of
Antimagic: 5/1/1/1. Silence is nice, AM shield costs too much equilibrium to sustain for a ranged wyrmic.
Conditioning: 4/1/5/0. Will put 5 in vitality eventually.

Seems pretty powerful. I was lucky enough to get spellhunt remnants and get them fully powered before Dreadfell. They rock Take that, Grand Corruptor!!!
Was not lucky enough to get double source wild infusions or good sources of teleport. So we'll see how this goes.

[Bonzard]

I won with a Halfling Psi-Blade-Caster Antimagic completely ignoring strength maxed willpower and constitution first, then cunning.
My main damage came from "in order" acid spit, devouring flame, the first multi hued ability, tornado. "tornado last because when monsters stack up on you aim at one a 2 or more squares away from you just so you don't get hit by it"
Burrow was major impact especially when used with lighting speed or speed infusion, in my opinion it is the best escape in game.

Mid-game my class abilities looked a something like this:
Venom 5/0/0/0 only acid spit because mindstars are naturally very accurate.
Fire 1/1/5/0 I maxed bellow roar late game just for the mass confusion effect
Sand 1/1/1/0 ESCAPE!
Multi 5/5/5/5 first thing I maxed after acid spit and devouring flame and my escape.
Storm 1/5/3/0, I maxed out static field, It's amazing on high health bosses.
Ice 0/0/0/0 Late game I maxed out the armor thing it has a high equilibrium cost for a caster best left for late game I say when I can spare the cost and points, Ice wall could come in handy I just never used it.

Mid-game General abilities where something like this:
Fungus 5/0/0/0
Antimagic 1/5/0/0
Halfling 1/5/0/0 at end game I had 71 luck so my bonus defense was AWSOME!
Harmony 1/5/0/0 for the devouring flames 44% global speed thing
Psiblade 5/1/5/1 It was a very evasion focused build
Call of the wild 1/3/0/0 in late game 3 in the heal was still enough to heal me to max health I think I had really high heal mod...

Prodigies First one was Lucky day, second was spell feedback "I was having trouble silencing all the mages in the prides this helped a TON.

My infusions where 1 regeneration, 1 movement speed, 1 wild and, 1 heroic. Early game I had 2 regenerations but I figured I only needed one.

I didn't get any of the breaths other than the multi hued one and I got that one just for the fantastic heal de-buff, because they don't do any good damage with 17-25 strength

Tip: for the burrow/lightning speed escape in mountain walls like Daikara, or Urkis lair you can move through them but cant breath its a good idea to pay attention to your mini map and find pockets inside the mountain to hide/heal in. "some mountain walls can be dug into to open a pocket too"