Wizardry 8 - Expanded Mod Part 29 - The Cosmic Circle, The Dark Savant, & The End
3The Dark Savant has already entered the Cosmic Circle, so we must face his elite forces one final time before his confrontation. After disposing of them, the party's skills are reviewed, before the final battle commences... The battle that will decide the fate of the universe.
The Dark Savant is powerful. His spells (Mind Flay or Nuclear Blast) can deal heavy damage, but are probably the 'safest' thing for him to do. His Chroma Glove can cause instant death, and even if it doesn't, it often deals ~65 damage with a single hit. If one of your casters are targeted, they better pray to the old Cosmic Lords, 'cause things could go badly very quick...
The melee Android is probably the most dangerous enemy in the entire fight. It's fast, can attack at least 3 times, deals tremendous damage, disables, and drains stamina, effectively crippling anyone it lands a hit upon. Defeat it first to make your party's life a LOT easier.
The caster Android will open with its Fear ability 100% of the time. Most often, the entire party will fail their saves. This makes things a lot tougher, since it can take even longer to put up defenses and cleanse your team. Leon passing his save made things easier, as well as Lucian, who didn't lose a single round taking down the melee Android. Fear in vanilla W8 is a joke at worst and an annoyance at best, but in this fight it can downright destroy your party if enough people fail to act. I respect this mod's author, FrankieStardust, for including Fear here, as an added layer of challenge. The only other spell by the caster Android worth worrying over is Turncoat. If it lands on one of your fighters, someone will almost assuredly die.
The summoned henchmen aren't powerful enough to demand attention on them, but they aren't harmless enough that their presence should be wholly ignored. Their hits deal ~20 damage each, which can definitely be noticeable if your casters are facing their ire.
Bela can be a decent meat shield in this battle, and he even insta-kills one of the henchmen. Aside from that, his offensive power is close to non-existent, and his breath weapon is just as disappointing.
Vi, who was a powerful heroine at the group's side for nearly the whole time, a valued, respected, and trusted friend, and a necessary healer when needed, spent the entire fight running for her life in an act of utter cowardice. Despite this, she's completely forgiven and welcomed back to the group with open arms, after the fight. It would've been nice to see her kick some ass alongside her friends, but she's more than earned her place in the Cosmic Circle, too.
To conclude, I loved this mod. Very challenging at times, especially during Ascension Peak. The last fight wasn't ridiculous, as I actually beat it on my first try, off-camera. While recording, it took more than a few tries, since there is a good chance someone can be insta-killed by either the melee Android, or the Dark Savant.
I love the mod's harder monsters and different challenges, new quests, and, of course, the new equipment. Seeing better axes, some really nice daggers, and even some new staves and spears made everything so much better. I really had to weigh what to wear, and the penalties on most of the items felt fair and not overly punishing, with a few exceptions. The heroes, wearing the best weapons and armour, were still greatly challenged and I never felt that they were insanely strong against anything at-level that they faced.
Magic felt balanced, too, for the most part. Offensive spells still did fair damage, even at the endgame stages, but it was a bit saddening that Leon was relegated to healing and cleansing duty towards the very end, instead of being purely focused on magic damage like he was for most of the game.
This is actually my second playthrough of the mod, so I was already somewhat familiar with it going in. I'm going to miss this mod, and am grateful for all of FrankieStardust's hard work across the years they spent creating it. Cheers, mate. You made a really good one.
Full Playlist - • Wizardry 8 - Expanded
Other Videos By T Durden
Other Statistics
Wizardry 8 Statistics For T Durden
T Durden presently has 1,349 views for Wizardry 8 across 30 videos, with his channel publishing less than an hour of Wizardry 8 content. This makes up less than 0.09% of the total overall content on T Durden's YouTube channel.