Wizard vs Cipher

[Myrten]

I'm thinking about my first character and from the RP point of view I like both Wizards and Ciphers, but can't decide between them, so can anyone help me decide ?

 

For Cipher I'd go with guns and as far as I know Arquebus is the best option right now, for wizard I guess I should go with staff and rely on spells/blast.

 

 

Arguments for taking Cipher over Wizard:

 

• almost unlimited spells when compared to Wizard's per rest spells 
• better accuracy
• damage bonuses and very good weapon damage
• unique dialogue options

 

Arguments for taking Wizard  over Cipher:

 

• spells seems to be stronger than Cipher's powers
• lore bonus

Which one do you find to be a better ranged DPS/crowd control class? Also, it would be great if anyone could suggest a good builds for these classes.

 

[MasterPrudent]

The one additional point you get to lore by taking a wizard over a cipher is almost completely irrelevant. I wouldn't factor it in to your decision making process.

[Myrten]

The one additional point you get to lore by taking a wizard over a cipher is almost completely irrelevant. I wouldn't factor it in to your decision making process.

I agree it's not very relevant but to be honest I couldn't find any other advantage of taking wizard over cipher... 

[Azmodiuz]

I tried both, for the same reason. I couldn't tell what I wanted either. I then tried the other classes.

[Giantevilhead]

Wizards have a much greater variety of spells compared to the Cipher's powers. The Cipher also can't change their powers while the Wizard can switch out their spells. The Wizard also has more spells that do different elemental damage so they will benefit more from talents and items that increase their elemental damage.

 

One other advantage the Cipher has over the Wizard is that they have high level powers that can do raw damage, which I believe is irresistible or very hard to resist.

[Azmodiuz]

Doesn't a cipher get focus to cast something ? And to get focus they need to hit something, right ? Wizards do not need to build up their focus..they just cast...  Combat only ever lasts 2-3 rounds usually on hard, and on normal and easy, when I tried the otherday, most combat was ended within one shot/hit from everyone on my team.  Well placed spells did very much. Wouldn't be room to build much focus.

 

thats one thing about this game, in the old IE games and such, combat was much longer. 

Edited March 21, 2015 by Azmodiuz

[Shdy314]

Yes but they start with half their max focus (which is usually plenty) and if you do just one hard hitting attack from say an arquebus or blunderbus you can get lots of focus.

[Azmodiuz]

lol, or an arbalest, seen those too.

[Bryy]

The one additional point you get to lore by taking a wizard over a cipher is almost completely irrelevant. I wouldn't factor it in to your decision making process.

Yeah, it all depends on how you intend to build your character, and you get seven of them.

[Striped_Wolf]

The one additional point you get to lore by taking a wizard over a cipher is almost completely irrelevant. I wouldn't factor it in to your decision making process.

Not a huge factor, but if you plan on going into Lore, it may be the difference between being able to use a high level scroll and not.

@ Lore 10+ that free point is worth quite a bit.

Edited March 21, 2015 by Striped_Wolf

[Bazy]

Blast is really good...

 

But the correct answer is druid

Edited March 21, 2015 by Bazy

[Myrten]

Blast is really good...

 

But the correct answer is druid

What's so good about blast? It's damage seems really low and it's not raw damage.

 

What's so great about druids?

[Azmodiuz]

Do we not only need lore 10 (or any skill, for that matter), or am I creating that maximum myself ?
I do not fully understand where I got that idea, either because is the number 10 and it seems like a decent max, or something else.

Anyone know how high skills go to, or should go to, i.e no need for maximum past x level...

I know the highest lock i've seen was level 10, but only in one of the beta builds.

[Luckmann]

The one additional point you get to lore by taking a wizard over a cipher is almost completely irrelevant. I wouldn't factor it in to your decision making process.

 

If you get Lore 10, there's potentially 34 Skill Points saved by being Wizard and taking any background that gives +2 Lore.

 

Thirty. Four.

 

Even if you do the same as a Cipher, that's still 10 Skill Points saved, potentially pushing any other skill up to 4 (1+2+3+4). Because of that one +1 to Lore that Wizards get over Ciphers.

 

So yeah, I'd say that the +1 matters, depending on what you want to do.

 

Do we not only need lore 10 (or any skill, for that matter), or am I creating that maximum myself ?

I do not fully understand where I got that idea, either because is the number 10 and it seems like a decent max, or something else.

 

Anyone know how high skills go to, or should go to, i.e no need for maximum past x level...

 

I know the highest lock i've seen was level 10, but only in one of the beta builds.

It's hard to know for sure, but I can tell you that the theoretical maximum in any skill is 15, but that forces you to focus on that skill exclusively and get +4 from Class and Background.

Edited March 21, 2015 by Luckmann

[gkathellar]

Ciphers excel at debuffs and damage, and have some neat tricks for helping their allies. If that's what you're looking to do, I recommend playing a Cipher.

 

Wizards have some defensive spells and AoEs to make up for not matching the Cipher in its specialty, but if that's what you want to do, I recommend playing a Priest or a Druid instead.

 

Yes but they start with half their max focus (which is usually plenty) and if you do just one hard hitting attack from say an arquebus or blunderbus you can get lots of focus.

 

Basically this. A cipher can open the fight with a quick succession of two or three powers, hit once, and snag enough focus to use a few more powers.

 

What's so great about druids?

 

Druids have the best AoE spells, in addition to healing and a few buffs. With respect to actual spellcasting, they're probably the strongest class and the most interesting. There are good reasons to use one over a wizard.

[Odd Hermit]

Depends on the rest of the party composition.

 

Ciphers bring strong single target ranged weapon damage. Wizards can specialize for AoE ranged damage. Wizards have more versatile/stronger spells and can chain cast. Ciphers have unlimited phenomenal cosmic power as long as they keep generating focus anyway. Ciphers have some very strong "pulling" options which can waste enemy resources. Cipher is a bit more durable.

 

I prefer Cipher overall and they feel more of a "staple" class in my party compositions to me, but I took both in a PoD run through and they each pulled their weight.

 

A Druid is currently superior to Wizard but they're balancing them both a bit before live so we'll see how things turn out.

Edited March 21, 2015 by Odd Hermit

[Myrten]

Ciphers excel at debuffs and damage, and have some neat tricks for helping their allies. If that's what you're looking to do, I recommend playing a Cipher.

 

Wizards have some defensive spells and AoEs to make up for not matching the Cipher in its specialty, but if that's what you want to do, I recommend playing a Priest or a Druid instead.

 

Yes but they start with half their max focus (which is usually plenty) and if you do just one hard hitting attack from say an arquebus or blunderbus you can get lots of focus.

 

Basically this. A cipher can open the fight with a quick succession of two or three powers, hit once, and snag enough focus to use a few more powers.

 

What's so great about druids?

 

Druids have the best AoE spells, in addition to healing and a few buffs. With respect to actual spellcasting, they're probably the strongest class and the most interesting. There are good reasons to use one over a wizard.

 

Depends on the rest of the party composition.

 

Ciphers bring strong single target ranged weapon damage. Wizards can specialize for AoE ranged damage. Wizards have more versatile/stronger spells and can chain cast. Ciphers have unlimited phenomenal cosmic power as long as they keep generating focus anyway. Ciphers have some very strong "pulling" options which can waste enemy resources. Cipher is a bit more durable.

 

I prefer Cipher overall and they feel more of a "staple" class in my party compositions to me, but I took both in a PoD run through and they each pulled their weight.

 

A Druid is currently superior to Wizard but they're balancing them both a bit before live so we'll see how things turn out.

 

Thanks for the info, I'm planing to go with party more or less looking like this:

 

1) Main char  - Arquebus Cipher or Wizard (based on your comments I'd rather go with Cipher )

 

2)Tank - Warrior with shield

 

3)Melee DPS - Barbarian with 2h great sword

 

4)Stealth DPS - Rogue - not sure if I should go with melee weapons or ranged (guns too?) It would stack nicely with Cipher's spell making all attacks against a target flanked

 

5)Healer - Priest

 

 

6)AoE focused ranged DPS - Wizard

 

I'm thinking about replacing either Priest or Wizard with Druid. Can Druid be the only healer?

[rjshae]

I wonder if at some point (after release) there will be a re-balance patch that will alter the effectiveness of the various classes?

[Azmodiuz]

 

The one additional point you get to lore by taking a wizard over a cipher is almost completely irrelevant. I wouldn't factor it in to your decision making process.

 

If you get Lore 10, there's potentially 34 Skill Points saved by being Wizard and taking any background that gives +2 Lore.

 

Thirty. Four.

 

Even if you do the same as a Cipher, that's still 10 Skill Points saved, potentially pushing any other skill up to 4 (1+2+3+4). Because of that one +1 to Lore that Wizards get over Ciphers.

 

So yeah, I'd say that the +1 matters, depending on what you want to do.

 

Do we not only need lore 10 (or any skill, for that matter), or am I creating that maximum myself ?

I do not fully understand where I got that idea, either because is the number 10 and it seems like a decent max, or something else.

 

Anyone know how high skills go to, or should go to, i.e no need for maximum past x level...

 

I know the highest lock i've seen was level 10, but only in one of the beta builds.

It's hard to know for sure, but I can tell you that the theoretical maximum in any skill is 15, but that forces you to focus on that skill exclusively and get +4 from Class and Background.

 

how is all this going to work in an expansion where we hit level 20 or something ??  The system is flawed, heavily. I naturally have concerns.

[Luckmann]

how is all this going to work in an expansion where we hit level 20 or something ??  The system is flawed, heavily. I naturally have concerns.

That's impossible to say, really. But yeah, the system gets increasingly problematic the higher the numbers get. For example Divinity: Original Sin features a similar system, but the skills (called Abilities for some reason) are practically capped at 5 (6 with bonuses), so it never becomes a problem. But even there it's a bit of a problem because you can get those +1 to the skills from items, so in many cases you stick to low levels to "abuse" the bonuses in order to save points.

 

In PoE, the scale goes a lot higher, but you also get a lot more points, but there's also less skills. It gets increasingly wonky the higher you go, so how they'll rectify it at higher levels is debatable. However, at the end of the day, I don't think that it's really a major issue, especially since I firmly believe that the differences matters more at lower levels than at higher ones.

 

A difference between 1 to 4 probably matters a lot more than a difference between 9 to 10 or maybe even 11 to 15.

[Azmodiuz]

we, we see alot of locks at 6-7-8-9 mechanics. 
to cast many of the spells on scrolls we find, we need the level of the spell in Lore. so like 1-9
survival is good at any level, but the checks I've seen were 4+ (I think) Athletics too was 4+

[Mr. Magniloquent]

The wizard has a single buggy summoning spell that will be acquired late game. Their defensive spells are not worth using. I have found their damage potential to be uninspired. Even specialized to maximize debuffs, their durations for inflicting status effects is woefully short absent a critical hit. Targeting their spells proves as much a liability as an asset when casting. Given how frequent combat is, their spells per day are also lacking. Honestly, there is nothing good about the wizard class in PoE. Take a Druid instead.

 

The Cipher may be one-dimensional versus the Wizard's two dimensions, but it's single trick actually works. The have an quasi-inexhaustible arsenal of lengthy, low-risk, disabling and domination spells, which are tremendously useful in PoE since those are the only two effective or meaningful ways to defend against enemies. Cipher, without question.

[Azmodiuz]

The wizard spells can be mechanically better, but damage wise can be uninspiring.

[aeonsim]

So with regards to Cipher vs Wizard both have there advantages.

 

The Cipher has higher single target weapon damage, is a bit more survivable in a fight where they don't use spells and can constantly cast a small range of moderate damage and small aoe or single target debuffs which mainly target will, they're some of the best single target debuffs in the game.

 

The Wizard (assuming blast/penetrating blast) has lower per hit damage but it's AoE to a reasonable size area if they have decent Int, and there implements are all best of damage types, the result being that there single target damage is lower per attack but there total damage is generally higher due to the AoE. They then have a decent foe AoE raw damage 2x per encounter ability that dazes. Their main focus however is the spells where they have a massive range of spells that gives them every damage type in the game and the ability to target pretty much ever defence in the game and nearly all of them are AoE, or can hit multiple targets for reasonable damage at a decent range. There debuffs are generally AoE and they can apply nearly every affliction in the game but are often a little bit weaker than the Cipher ones, but with a bigger AoE. There buffs are pretty much all self targeting and range from pretty decent to crappy.

The downside is that they only have a limited number of spells they can cast per day and they only have a limited number of there spells immediately available as they need to switch grimores. There summons (2 weapons and a Clone) are ok to decent.

 

 

In general the Cipher is a better single target caster who can go on for ever and briefly mix it up in melee if needed. The Wizard is completely AoE focused, damage and debuffs might not be the best but they hit alot of people at once, but a highly resource limited and thus require careful play. And assuming you've got spells left to cast you can pretty much do anything to some degree or another.

 

The Druid is partway between a Priest and a Wizard lots of AoE damage but less range of types/forms and defences targeted (and the damage has been reduced post 480) with a decent melee ability that is lower damage than the Cipher but has greater survivability, they can also "heal" to a degree and have a limited number of debuffs.

[Myrten]

So with regards to Cipher vs Wizard both have there advantages.

 

The Cipher has higher single target weapon damage, is a bit more survivable in a fight where they don't use spells and can constantly cast a small range of moderate damage and small aoe or single target debuffs which mainly target will, they're some of the best single target debuffs in the game.

 

The Wizard (assuming blast/penetrating blast) has lower per hit damage but it's AoE to a reasonable size area if they have decent Int, and there implements are all best of damage types, the result being that there single target damage is lower per attack but there total damage is generally higher due to the AoE. They then have a decent foe AoE raw damage 2x per encounter ability that dazes. Their main focus however is the spells where they have a massive range of spells that gives them every damage type in the game and the ability to target pretty much ever defence in the game and nearly all of them are AoE, or can hit multiple targets for reasonable damage at a decent range. There debuffs are generally AoE and they can apply nearly every affliction in the game but are often a little bit weaker than the Cipher ones, but with a bigger AoE. There buffs are pretty much all self targeting and range from pretty decent to crappy.

The downside is that they only have a limited number of spells they can cast per day and they only have a limited number of there spells immediately available as they need to switch grimores. There summons (2 weapons and a Clone) are ok to decent.

 

 

In general the Cipher is a better single target caster who can go on for ever and briefly mix it up in melee if needed. The Wizard is completely AoE focused, damage and debuffs might not be the best but they hit alot of people at once, but a highly resource limited and thus require careful play. And assuming you've got spells left to cast you can pretty much do anything to some degree or another.

 

The Druid is partway between a Priest and a Wizard lots of AoE damage but less range of types/forms and defences targeted (and the damage has been reduced post 480) with a decent melee ability that is lower damage than the Cipher but has greater survivability, they can also "heal" to a degree and have a limited number of debuffs.

I think it's more of a design goal, but I'm afrait it doesn't work in practice - I've just completed BB with Cipher, and party wizard simply couldn't compare his blast damage to 80-120 dmg per shot I got from my arquebus.