TOPIC: Last Second Changes Made - Sorry! FINAL Contact Sheets

Wade Schwendemann (Dr. Uid) wrote: Why does damage output of one class vs. another matter at all? If you want to be the best damage dealer there is, play Monk (or soon, Wizard). It is a team game. If I'm playing Paladin, I know that my guarding the wizards often means we don't get attacked, leaving them to channel HP into spells.

Because it changes how the encounters are designed? If the meta is that wizards are so overly powerful (OMG auto-hit damage) then the monsters will start being designed with that in mind. If it's more spell resistance or anti-magic fields or AOE, so be it. If it's just more and more HPs, that impacts my Fighter's ability to contribute (as a % not as a #) and being (relatively) useless to the team during combat encounters. (There's a lot more to it then that - social, taunt, re-slides, etc - but this is just boiled down to outright killing.)

I trust Jeff and team to take all this in to account in design, but this is at least one perceived possible unintended consequence.

edit: And "just play wizard" kind of makes me mad. I get the sentiment, but that's a $$$ change and frankly not an answer to let everyone shine.

Arcanist Kolixela wrote: also it's worth remembering that Jeff said he wants Wizards to be top DPS. Why are you looking at ways to nerf Wizard damage when it's Jeff's design intent for them to outdamage Monks and Rangers?

Because the better solution may be to nerf monk and ranger damage than to create a large gulf between wizard, monk, and ranger vs everyone else.

Edit: if this large gulf exists, bards, clerics, druids, Paladins, and rouge (Without Raphiel’s) damage likely becomes moot. All together, they can deal, what, the damage of 1 wizard?

Mike Steele wrote:

Wade Schwendemann (Dr. Uid) wrote: Ok, serious question here.

How does discussing hypothetical damage outputs on classes where powers aren't defined and class cards are about to be re-done actually help anything?

Why does damage output of one class vs. another matter at all? If you want to be the best damage dealer there is, play Monk (or soon, Wizard). It is a team game. If I'm playing Paladin, I know that my guarding the wizards often means we don't get attacked, leaving them to channel HP into spells.

If we kill the monster in 1 or 2 rounds, we all participated. Are there bragging rights in some parties that we just don't have in mine? That seems kind of annoying honestly.

If someone is overgeared for their difficulty level and doesn't tone it down, that would take a LOT of the fun out of it for me.

I guess people (this is not aimed at any one person) just like the debate?

Anyhow /rant

MEC powers do seem defined, they are written on the token. Jeff has already told us that he is going to double the damage of Wizard spells on the Spell card. The entire purpose of this analysis is to show the potential Wizard damage that would result from having the MEC as written and the proposed spell damage doubling. Now seems the appropriate time to do that analysis, in case Jeff thinks any course corrections are required. It's certainly easier to do a course correction now when spell cards are being redesigned and Mage Powers are being developed than afterwards.

I did this latest analysis because the earlier one just focused on the final combat room, while this one shows that the Wizards have the potential to do double spell castings and full MEC at the start of every combat room, which is enough in every combat room to kill the monsters without damage from any other party members in 1-2 rounds.

You say that "If we kill the monster in 1 or 2 rounds, we all participated". That was kind of the purpose of this analysis, that even on Nightmare mode the other damage dealing classes wouldn't need to participate, the Wizards could kill the monsters on their own. I think it would suck a lot of the fun out of the game if every combat room was essentially ended by the Wizards casting enough damage spells to kill the monsters single-handedly in one or two rounds.

Can I please see your Wizard build with 109 HP, +35 spell damage, RoSS, CoE, and MEC or class necklace? I assume there is a level 5 Bard with Legendary life in the party and that is perfectly reasonable, I just want to know how to get to this theorized build! (and I’ll drop MEC).

Endgame wrote:

Arcanist Kolixela wrote: also it's worth remembering that Jeff said he wants Wizards to be top DPS. Why are you looking at ways to nerf Wizard damage when it's Jeff's design intent for them to outdamage Monks and Rangers?

Because the better solution may be to nerf monk and ranger damage than to create a large gulf between wizard, monk, and ranger vs everyone else.

I'm 100% in favor of changing Monk & Ranger character cards so the the bonus melee damage is only applied to one slider instead of both. They would still have a slight advantage in that if one slider misses, the other still gets the bonus. If that isn't changed, every token that increases melee damage just widens the gap between Monk & Ranger and the other melee classes,because they potentially get double the bonus from each.

Matthew Hayward wrote:

Mike Steele wrote:

Matthew Hayward wrote:

OrionW wrote:
...snip...

Until we see that actual Wizard cards and the more detailed rules for the Legendary I am hesitant to comment, but with that said I have a question:

Should we be comparing a 1/game fighter combo that may or may not crit with a Wizard who can reset to full power with either an item (Gem of Last Hope) or a Cleric ability and do it again?

The analysis that two Wizards can do 500 damage in one round to two monsters (assuming the existence of a 40 point non-slide AoE spell) relied on:
1. Both Wizards exhausting a 1/game Ring of Spell Storing.
2. Both Wizard exhausting a 1/game cast of the theoretical 40 point non-slide AoE spell.

So both combos are 1/game.

The Fighter combo, after this, loses very little, they can keep doing this all day long and go down to 70% hit 20% crit on the HF (except for the new rooms where they can reslide 1/room for better values), and 70% hit, 10% crit, 10% triple crit on the DF.

The Wizards, on the other hand are now at 1 HP, don't have a way to cast 2 spells in a round, and need a to either start getting Restore Spell or Crown of Expertise to do a less effective burst with only 1 spell cast a second time. They also need to be burning ~$30 consumables that require a standard action to apply, or they need now full coordination from cleric and or druid classes as well to recharge their HP.

The Wizard Combos are definitely not once per game, like the Fighter example that you give, because the Wizards can do double spell casting and full MEC (assuming healing between rooms) at the start of every combat room via Cabal Bonus plus double spells for a second round in the Boss room via Ring of Spell Storing. Damage in the first round would range from 668 using best spells to 405 using only 0 level spells with Cabal Bonus. In Infernal Redoubt, the Wizards would be able to kill all monsters before the Final Room in the first round, and the two Final Room Boss monsters in 2 rounds (with plenty of damage left over). The Wizards don't even need healing after the first round in the final room to kill the two Boss monsters, they can do it without any additional 2nd round MEC damage. No healing within rooms is required for the Wizards to kill every monster in earlier rooms in one round and the Boss monsters in two rounds.

The Wizard 40 point area attack spell (given Jeff's statement that spell damages are doubling) isn't once per game like the Fighter ability. The Wizard can also cast it via Ring of Spell Storing and Crown of Expertise, getting three castings per game. I'm not counting Cleric Restore Spell on this or Cleric Restore Power for the Fighter, to make it an even comparison.

The Wizard is also not limited to just one round of double-spell casting from the Ring of Spell Storing, they can also double-spell cast once per room via the Cabal Set (3-4 additional double-castings per game).
==============================================
Detailed Analysis:
The two round estimate based on the 110 HP level, and the Cleric healing after round one. Removing the Cleric healing after round one reduces the two round total from 1116 to 960, which is still enough to kill both Boss Monsters

Cast Lightning Storm (Elf Wizard Fireball) for 40 points, add 35 bonus spell damage, channel MEC for 109 points, for 184 damage.
Cast via Ring of Spell Storing Lightning Storm (Elf Wizard Fireball) for 40 points and 35 bonus spell damage for 75 points of damage.
Combining those two, each Wizard can do 259 points of damage in the first turn. With both Wizards, you're looking at 518 points of damage in just the first round of combat, and that doesn't require the Wizard Class Relic or Legendary, just the MEC. 160 points of that would be damage to all monsters while 358 damage is pool damage. Adding in the 160 damage to the second monster gets it to 668 damage in round one.

First round after Wizards cast, Cleric casts Full heal from Relic on one Wizard plus Cure Serious Wounds as instant action on the other Wizard (24 +25 healing bonus). One Wizards are back to 109 HP, the other to 50 HP.

Second Round: Wizard casts Lightning Storm via Crown of Expertise for 184 damage (40 plus 35 bonus damage plus 109 MEC damage) and Ray of Shock FA via Cabal Set Bonus for 71 damage (36 plus 35 bonus damage) for 255 damage total.
Elf Wizard casts Ray of Shock for 121 damage (36 plus 35 bonus damage plus 50 MEC damage) plus Fireball via Cabal Set Bonus & Crown of Expertise for 75 damage (40 plus 35 bonus damage) for a total of 196 damage.
Adding in no bonus damage for a 2nd monster because it's already dead, the Wizards do an additional 451 damage in round 2. That is a total of 1119 damage in the two rounds, only 160 of which is due to damage to a second monster. If it were a room with just a single monster, the total damage would still be 959 in two rounds.

Further, even without any healing after the first round (which would subtract the 159 MEC 2nd Round damage), the two Wizards could kill both Boss Monsters with 960 damage (it only takes 900 on Nightmare to kill both)
===============================================
To further address the one shot wonder comment, even in a room with only casting 0 Level lesser spells, the first round using Cabal (since Ring of Spell Storing was saved for the major combat) could look like this:

Wizard casts Fire Dart for 156 damage (12 plus 35 bonus damage plus 109 MEC damage) and Fire Dart FA via Cabal Set Bonus for 47 damage (12 plus 35 bonus damage) for 203 damage total.
Elf Wizard casts Shocking Grasp for 156 damage (12 plus 35 bonus damage plus 109 MEC damage) plus Shocking Grasp FA via Cabal Set Bonus for 47 damage (12 plus 35 bonus damage) for a total of 203 damage.
The Wizards combined do 403 damage, which is twice as much as needed to kill the Room 2 Snake Fiend on Nightmare Mode, and enough to kill the Fire Fiend in Room 5.

Summary: The Wizards could do between 405 in the 4th best room and 668 in the best room in the first round of every combat room in the Dungeon, partly because of the doubling of spell damage but primarily from being able to use MEC on every single spell. In Infernal Redoubt, the Wizards without any damage from any other party members would be able to kill the Room 2 and 5 monsters in one round and the two Final Boss Monsters in two rounds. This does assuming healing in-between rooms, but between the Cleric, Druid and Paladin there is easily enough group healing to do that even without using consumables.

Please post a build with 110 HP and 35 spell bonus, that equips all the spell feee action items or spell restoring items your scenario requires.

Please indicate if your analysis requires the use of bardsong and at what level.

Please indicate if this build has room for 3 treasure iouns and a treasure charm.

I'm definitely interested in this, too. I'm far from a BIS wizard, but even the "Hypotehtical max" character someone made a day or so ago to show what maxed out wizard HP could look like was 91HP and 29 Spell Damage (if you included the new 10hp stone and 7th tooth), didn't include RoSS or the new epic, no key of healing, no shirt of linked healing, involved multiple volunteer tokens and only had room for CoA for TEs. And don't get me started on the saves.

And, now that MEC is always 1:1 , that character it outdated since losing spell damage for HP no longer makes sense.

Endgame wrote:

Arcanist Kolixela wrote: also it's worth remembering that Jeff said he wants Wizards to be top DPS. Why are you looking at ways to nerf Wizard damage when it's Jeff's design intent for them to outdamage Monks and Rangers?

Because the better solution may be to nerf monk and ranger damage than to create a large gulf between wizard, monk, and ranger vs everyone else.

Edit: if this large gulf exists, bards, clerics, druids, Paladins, and rouge (Without Raphiel’s) damage likely becomes moot. All together, they can deal, what, the damage of 1 wizard?

You truly, honestly think 5 classes can deal a maximum of 30 damage each on nightmare? Assuming you are speaking of the Wizard dealing 150 damage a round with mass amounts of healing required.

Do you truly believe this to be the case or are you just exaggerating to make the divide seem worse than it is?

Arcanist Kolixela wrote:

Endgame wrote:

Arcanist Kolixela wrote: also it's worth remembering that Jeff said he wants Wizards to be top DPS. Why are you looking at ways to nerf Wizard damage when it's Jeff's design intent for them to outdamage Monks and Rangers?

Because the better solution may be to nerf monk and ranger damage than to create a large gulf between wizard, monk, and ranger vs everyone else.

Edit: if this large gulf exists, bards, clerics, druids, Paladins, and rouge (Without Raphiel’s) damage likely becomes moot. All together, they can deal, what, the damage of 1 wizard?

You truly, honestly think 5 classes can deal a maximum of 30 damage each on nightmare? Assuming you are speaking of the Wizard dealing 150 damage a round with mass amounts of healing required.

Do you truly believe this to be the case or are you just exaggerating to make the divide seem worse than it is?

In my party, which just ran nightmare VTD (I have all the builds in my sig, though almost everyone has been adding gear since V1a, so multiple are out of date)

Bard: +5 hit, +6 damage
Cleric: +11 hit, +14 damage
Druid: +20 Spell Damage
Dwarf Fighter: +12 hit, +9 damage
Paladin: +11 hit, +10 damage
Rogue: +13 hit, +9 damage

Total is +71 damage. Bard adds another 3 per person, for another +18. Average wheel damage is probably around 6, for 36 damage. Total for 6 characters is going to be around 122+ which ever spell the Druid casts.

Our wizard is at +23 spell damage and 62HP with 2020 tokens. With the proposed 40 damage fireball, and his RoSS, he will deal 126 damage before channeling any health 1/game. I’m concerned with the wizard relic (which I’m currently jumbled on function due to all the drafts) he will be able to constantly deal more damage than most of the party. Furthermore, I’m concerned that the monster adjustments will push us back down to hardcore unless we convince the Druid to switch to wizard so the two wizards, monk, and Barbarian can pull the rest of the party through combats.

NightGod wrote:

Matthew Hayward wrote:

Mike Steele wrote:

Matthew Hayward wrote:

OrionW wrote:
...snip...

Until we see that actual Wizard cards and the more detailed rules for the Legendary I am hesitant to comment, but with that said I have a question:

Should we be comparing a 1/game fighter combo that may or may not crit with a Wizard who can reset to full power with either an item (Gem of Last Hope) or a Cleric ability and do it again?

The analysis that two Wizards can do 500 damage in one round to two monsters (assuming the existence of a 40 point non-slide AoE spell) relied on:
1. Both Wizards exhausting a 1/game Ring of Spell Storing.
2. Both Wizard exhausting a 1/game cast of the theoretical 40 point non-slide AoE spell.

So both combos are 1/game.

The Fighter combo, after this, loses very little, they can keep doing this all day long and go down to 70% hit 20% crit on the HF (except for the new rooms where they can reslide 1/room for better values), and 70% hit, 10% crit, 10% triple crit on the DF.

The Wizards, on the other hand are now at 1 HP, don't have a way to cast 2 spells in a round, and need a to either start getting Restore Spell or Crown of Expertise to do a less effective burst with only 1 spell cast a second time. They also need to be burning ~$30 consumables that require a standard action to apply, or they need now full coordination from cleric and or druid classes as well to recharge their HP.

The Wizard Combos are definitely not once per game, like the Fighter example that you give, because the Wizards can do double spell casting and full MEC (assuming healing between rooms) at the start of every combat room via Cabal Bonus plus double spells for a second round in the Boss room via Ring of Spell Storing. Damage in the first round would range from 668 using best spells to 405 using only 0 level spells with Cabal Bonus. In Infernal Redoubt, the Wizards would be able to kill all monsters before the Final Room in the first round, and the two Final Room Boss monsters in 2 rounds (with plenty of damage left over). The Wizards don't even need healing after the first round in the final room to kill the two Boss monsters, they can do it without any additional 2nd round MEC damage. No healing within rooms is required for the Wizards to kill every monster in earlier rooms in one round and the Boss monsters in two rounds.

The Wizard 40 point area attack spell (given Jeff's statement that spell damages are doubling) isn't once per game like the Fighter ability. The Wizard can also cast it via Ring of Spell Storing and Crown of Expertise, getting three castings per game. I'm not counting Cleric Restore Spell on this or Cleric Restore Power for the Fighter, to make it an even comparison.

The Wizard is also not limited to just one round of double-spell casting from the Ring of Spell Storing, they can also double-spell cast once per room via the Cabal Set (3-4 additional double-castings per game).
==============================================
Detailed Analysis:
The two round estimate based on the 110 HP level, and the Cleric healing after round one. Removing the Cleric healing after round one reduces the two round total from 1116 to 960, which is still enough to kill both Boss Monsters

Cast Lightning Storm (Elf Wizard Fireball) for 40 points, add 35 bonus spell damage, channel MEC for 109 points, for 184 damage.
Cast via Ring of Spell Storing Lightning Storm (Elf Wizard Fireball) for 40 points and 35 bonus spell damage for 75 points of damage.
Combining those two, each Wizard can do 259 points of damage in the first turn. With both Wizards, you're looking at 518 points of damage in just the first round of combat, and that doesn't require the Wizard Class Relic or Legendary, just the MEC. 160 points of that would be damage to all monsters while 358 damage is pool damage. Adding in the 160 damage to the second monster gets it to 668 damage in round one.

First round after Wizards cast, Cleric casts Full heal from Relic on one Wizard plus Cure Serious Wounds as instant action on the other Wizard (24 +25 healing bonus). One Wizards are back to 109 HP, the other to 50 HP.

Second Round: Wizard casts Lightning Storm via Crown of Expertise for 184 damage (40 plus 35 bonus damage plus 109 MEC damage) and Ray of Shock FA via Cabal Set Bonus for 71 damage (36 plus 35 bonus damage) for 255 damage total.
Elf Wizard casts Ray of Shock for 121 damage (36 plus 35 bonus damage plus 50 MEC damage) plus Fireball via Cabal Set Bonus & Crown of Expertise for 75 damage (40 plus 35 bonus damage) for a total of 196 damage.
Adding in no bonus damage for a 2nd monster because it's already dead, the Wizards do an additional 451 damage in round 2. That is a total of 1119 damage in the two rounds, only 160 of which is due to damage to a second monster. If it were a room with just a single monster, the total damage would still be 959 in two rounds.

Further, even without any healing after the first round (which would subtract the 159 MEC 2nd Round damage), the two Wizards could kill both Boss Monsters with 960 damage (it only takes 900 on Nightmare to kill both)
===============================================
To further address the one shot wonder comment, even in a room with only casting 0 Level lesser spells, the first round using Cabal (since Ring of Spell Storing was saved for the major combat) could look like this:

Wizard casts Fire Dart for 156 damage (12 plus 35 bonus damage plus 109 MEC damage) and Fire Dart FA via Cabal Set Bonus for 47 damage (12 plus 35 bonus damage) for 203 damage total.
Elf Wizard casts Shocking Grasp for 156 damage (12 plus 35 bonus damage plus 109 MEC damage) plus Shocking Grasp FA via Cabal Set Bonus for 47 damage (12 plus 35 bonus damage) for a total of 203 damage.
The Wizards combined do 403 damage, which is twice as much as needed to kill the Room 2 Snake Fiend on Nightmare Mode, and enough to kill the Fire Fiend in Room 5.

Summary: The Wizards could do between 405 in the 4th best room and 668 in the best room in the first round of every combat room in the Dungeon, partly because of the doubling of spell damage but primarily from being able to use MEC on every single spell. In Infernal Redoubt, the Wizards without any damage from any other party members would be able to kill the Room 2 and 5 monsters in one round and the two Final Boss Monsters in two rounds. This does assuming healing in-between rooms, but between the Cleric, Druid and Paladin there is easily enough group healing to do that even without using consumables.

Please post a build with 110 HP and 35 spell bonus, that equips all the spell feee action items or spell restoring items your scenario requires.

Please indicate if your analysis requires the use of bardsong and at what level.

Please indicate if this build has room for 3 treasure iouns and a treasure charm.

I'm definitely interested in this, too. I'm far from a BIS wizard, but even the "Hypotehtical max" character someone made a day or so ago to show what maxed out wizard HP could look like was 91HP and 29 Spell Damage (if you included the new 10hp stone and 7th tooth), didn't include RoSS or the new epic, no key of healing, no shirt of linked healing, involved multiple volunteer tokens and only had room for CoA for TEs. And don't get me started on the saves.

And, now that MEC is always 1:1 , that character it outdated since losing spell damage for HP no longer makes sense.

I think I've got it, but you need to dump the Cabal Set and the Charm of Spell Swapping. With a little finagling I can get to 109 hp with 36 spell damage

Head - Crown of Expertise
Eyes - Lenses of Focus
Left Ear - Earcuff of Inspiration
Right Ear - Earcuff of Orbits
Neck - Ashenne's Arch-Mage Medallion
Armor - Aron's Sunhide Robe
Wrists - Charm Bracelets
Hands - Blessed Tempest Gloves
Mainhand - Drake's +5 Staff of Focus
Missile Weapon - Thor's +5 Returning Hammer of Smiting
Back - Cloak of the Elm
Left Ring - Relsa's Ring of Supreme Focus
Right Ring - Ring of Spell Storing
Third Ring - Ring of Greater Focus
Waist - Arcane Belt
Shirt - Shirt of Focus
Boots - Boots of the Four Winds
Legs - Kilt of Dungeonbane (Con)
Shin - Flameguard Greaves
Bead - Master Ale Drinker's Bead
Charm 1 - Charm of Avarice
Charm 2 - Charm of Awakened Synergy (assume entire party has it)
Charm 3 - Charm of Glory
Charm 4 - Greater Garnet Charm
Charm 5 - Garnet Charm

Ioun 1 - Gold Nugget
Ioun 2 - Silver Nugget
Ioun 3 - Platinum Nugget
Ioun 4 - Banshee Prism
Ioun 5 - Elfstone Shard
Ioun 6 - Charming Cabochon
Ioun 7 - Garnet Cube (or Elfstone Shard)
Specials (that impact stats)
Semi-Lich Skull & 7 individual teeth
Rod of Seven Parts Complete
Gregor's Tome of Focus
Totem Paint Crushed Ruby
Elixir of Vitality

The app (without 2021 tokens) tells me I'm at 88hp and 32 damage
I get 4 more damage from Earcuff of Inspiration to take damage to 36
I get the following additional hp
+1 for using the app (not included in total)
+10 for Elfstone Shard
+10 for Master Ale Drinker's Bead since I'm on an odd constitution number
That should get me to 109. I could throw in a Yew Runestone if I had more and go to 110hp

There are some differences in peoples perspective. For comparison, my current Bard is +22 to hit and +24 damage without Bardsong or any consumables. This increases to +26/+28 with Bardsong.

Based on similar power levels for other characters, I don't have an issue with the new Wizard items or proposed changes to the character cards.

I also think they are balanced against the URs for Clerics and Dr. Uids along with the Cleric relic and legendary.

If the Wizard items get reduced in power and cost in HP below 15 per power then I feel Dr. Uid needs to be removed from Ring of Quick Blessing and the Cleric relic and legendary need to be revisited to keep things in balance.

edwin wrote: There are some differences in peoples perspective. For comparison, my current Bard is +22 to hit and +24 damage without Bardsong or any consumables. This increases to +26/+28 with Bardsong.

Based on similar power levels for other characters, I don't have an issue with the new Wizard items or proposed changes to the character cards.

I also think they are balanced against the URs for Clerics and Dr. Uids along with the Cleric relic and legendary.

If the Wizard items get reduced in power and cost in HP below 15 per power then I feel Dr. Uid needs to be removed from Ring of Quick Blessing and the Cleric relic and legendary need to be revisited to keep things in balance.

Edwin, what similar power levels are you referring to?

Dave wrote:

Mike Steele wrote:
...snip...

because the Wizards can do double spell casting and full MEC (assuming healing between rooms) at the start of every combat room via Cabal Bonus plus double spells for a second round in the Boss room via Ring of Spell Storing.
...
The Wizard is also not limited to just one round of double-spell casting from the Ring of Spell Storing, they can also double-spell cast once per room via the Cabal Set (3-4 additional double-castings per game).
...
Second Round: Wizard casts Lightning Storm via Crown of Expertise for 184 damage (40 plus 35 bonus damage plus 109 MEC damage) and Ray of Shock FA via Cabal Set Bonus for 71 damage (36 plus 35 bonus damage) for 255 damage total.
Elf Wizard casts Ray of Shock for 121 damage (36 plus 35 bonus damage plus 50 MEC damage) plus Fireball via Cabal Set Bonus & Crown of Expertise for 75 damage (40 plus 35 bonus damage) for a total of 196 damage.
...
To further address the one shot wonder comment, even in a room with only casting 0 Level lesser spells, the first round using Cabal (since Ring of Spell Storing was saved for the major combat) could look like this:

Wizard casts Fire Dart for 156 damage (12 plus 35 bonus damage plus 109 MEC damage) and Fire Dart FA via Cabal Set Bonus for 47 damage (12 plus 35 bonus damage) for 203 damage total.
Elf Wizard casts Shocking Grasp for 156 damage (12 plus 35 bonus damage plus 109 MEC damage) plus Shocking Grasp FA via Cabal Set Bonus for 47 damage (12 plus 35 bonus damage) for a total of 203 damage.
The Wizards combined do 403 damage, which is twice as much as needed to kill the Room 2 Snake Fiend on Nightmare Mode, and enough to kill the Fire Fiend in Room 5.
...

I think I've got it, but you need to dump the Cabal Set and the Charm of Spell Swapping. With a little finagling I can get to 109 hp with 36 spell damage
...snip...

The Cabal Set is essential to Mike's analysis.

Throwing it out upends the whole thing.

Matthew Hayward wrote:

Dave wrote:

Mike Steele wrote:
...snip...

because the Wizards can do double spell casting and full MEC (assuming healing between rooms) at the start of every combat room via Cabal Bonus plus double spells for a second round in the Boss room via Ring of Spell Storing.
...
The Wizard is also not limited to just one round of double-spell casting from the Ring of Spell Storing, they can also double-spell cast once per room via the Cabal Set (3-4 additional double-castings per game).
...
Second Round: Wizard casts Lightning Storm via Crown of Expertise for 184 damage (40 plus 35 bonus damage plus 109 MEC damage) and Ray of Shock FA via Cabal Set Bonus for 71 damage (36 plus 35 bonus damage) for 255 damage total.
Elf Wizard casts Ray of Shock for 121 damage (36 plus 35 bonus damage plus 50 MEC damage) plus Fireball via Cabal Set Bonus & Crown of Expertise for 75 damage (40 plus 35 bonus damage) for a total of 196 damage.
...
To further address the one shot wonder comment, even in a room with only casting 0 Level lesser spells, the first round using Cabal (since Ring of Spell Storing was saved for the major combat) could look like this:

Wizard casts Fire Dart for 156 damage (12 plus 35 bonus damage plus 109 MEC damage) and Fire Dart FA via Cabal Set Bonus for 47 damage (12 plus 35 bonus damage) for 203 damage total.
Elf Wizard casts Shocking Grasp for 156 damage (12 plus 35 bonus damage plus 109 MEC damage) plus Shocking Grasp FA via Cabal Set Bonus for 47 damage (12 plus 35 bonus damage) for a total of 203 damage.
The Wizards combined do 403 damage, which is twice as much as needed to kill the Room 2 Snake Fiend on Nightmare Mode, and enough to kill the Fire Fiend in Room 5.
...

I think I've got it, but you need to dump the Cabal Set and the Charm of Spell Swapping. With a little finagling I can get to 109 hp with 36 spell damage
...snip...

The Cabal Set is essential to Mike's analysis.

Throwing it out upends the whole thing.

After seeing a post on the subject there are not that many complete sets running around let alone on runs together that were not planned out.