Something I like to do other than photograph NPCs or analyze random facts about WoM is to have NPCs battle one another. If you’ve done this before, you might know that there’s two ways to go about this: Having some nearby NPCs aggro one another and fight, or gather a large group of NPCs from across the map and make them raid camps and fight minibosses, among other things. This post will focus on the latter.
I suppose this can be used to create a roguelike mode for WoM, if that interests you.
There are multiple factors to consider when going about this. These include, but are not limited to, how easy it is to find the NPC, how difficult they are to maneuver around the map, if the player can withstand being attacked by the NPC, and how well the NPC can handle battling random wild NPCs or entire camps or outposts. This list will exclude non-combatant NPCs, such as shops and civilians.
I’ll need to define a term here- This will be important later on. Environmental DoT refers to clouds, puddles, and glass shards, created by poison, ash, magma, acid, and glass. These deal 19 damage to NPCs, as long as the one who created them was an NPC themselves.
I will divide this post into two categories: Positive and Negative rep NPCs. Negative rep NPCs do not have a rep shield, so groups may only consist of one type of NPC (bandits, dark wizards, etc). This is important to factor in when doing the ranking, and does have significant impact on certain NPCs. I do have more experience with negative rep armies, but I will still rate both as best as I can.
Negative Rep NPCs:
Bandits - S Tier
If you think this is ridiculous, I don’t blame you. However, bandits are a top tier NPC for an army, and the general default for me when I create a negative rep army. The reason for why is fairly simple. Bandits, despite being somewhat weak and not particularly tanky, are one of the most numerous NPCs on the map. Bandit camps (camps specifically, not outposts) are one of the most common structures, and contain up to 5 mid to high leveled bandits, which are capable of taking out a group of bounty hunters or low to mid level scouts/wizards. Like most regular NPCs, they spawn in groups of 1 or 3 across wilderness areas as well. You can locate camps with certain apprentice quests as well, making finding many them fairly easy.
Bandits have a level range of around 5 - 50, and are capable of doing 5 - 35 damage. Archer bandits are the strongest, due to having higher damage ranged attacks, though they lose maneuverability as they don’t dash as often, making it difficult to get them up ledges. Dagger bandits have the most maneuverability and a fast attack speed, as well as a ranged throw attack, though this leaves them vulnerable for a few seconds, and they are also poor clashers with enemies with shortswords. They also lack good damage, often doing damage on the lower end (10 - 20 per stab). Shortsword users though appear weakest, with average damage, no ranged attack, good clash, slow attack speed, and decent maneuverability. A fairly average bandit in terms of abilities, it is more of an all-rounder.
Dark Wizards - A Tier
Dark Wizards are fairly powerful NPCs. Even a low level one does the damage of a higher level bandit, and high level dark wizards are capable of a blast spam, a powerful ability capable of destroying enemies like wizards and scouts. However, they are a little more difficult to find, only spawning in groups of 1 or 3, but their power makes up for this. However, there is one flaw with them: environmental DoT. As I mentioned before, they do 19 damage per tick, but the problem is that these items can damage other dark wizards, making any NPC that can create them undesirable, and if you accidentally recruit one that does, they need to be killed quickly or else they can cause more harm than good. Dark wizards also can easily fall behind if they continuously use spam spells, as they won’t move for a while when they cast. Generally, with how much NPCs move around, faster magics are preferred, but as long as they don’t cause unintended friendly fire, a dark wizard group can be decently powerful, capable of taking down council outposts or even heroes.
Pirates - D Tier
Pirates are just a worse version of bandits. Pirates can’t use bows, are only available on some shorelines, and worse of all, usually fall into the ocean when you try to get them off their ship. This makes pirates impractical units outside of their one niche: fighting NPCs on beaches, where they won’t drown after disembarking their ship. They’re decently proficient at this, but other than on beaches, they’re not too useful.
Villains - B+ Tier
Villains are more powerful dark wizards, some even capable of hover. They can kill several guards in some cases, and their usefulness varies by their equip set. Unfortunately, villains are incompatible with dark wizards and also difficult to find more than one or two of. This makes villains a much more strategic unit; while losses of bandits and dark wizards can be somewhat easily replaced, villains dying or losing too much HP can severely worsen your combat ability. However, if you only have one villain, you can use environmental DoT to your advantage, allowing you to kill enemy NPCs more quickly per tick of DoT is the enemy is caught within it.
Sun Rage/Darksea Bandits - C Tier
On the surface, these seem useful. They’re bandits that spawn in groups of up to 8, in relatively common land structures. However, the game counts them as separate NPCs from regular bandits, meaning that they can’t be used in regular bandit teams. Different factions can even clash with each other, making these bandits horrible for long-term success. They’re suitable for short term battles, but due to the difficulty of recruiting more and the mediocre stats they have, they can’t be placed high at all.
Rising Mist Bandits - D Tier
Smoke arrow spam, plus all the downsides of the Sun Rage and Darksea Bandits. The majority of these NPCs being archers isn’t enough to save them. Laggy, annoying, and battlefield-obscuring, these NPCs are best avoided.
Minotaur - A+ Tier
The negative rep boss, this NPC is incredibly powerful. He can solo heroes, soldier swarms, and even occasionally captains. He can heal upon being hit by random players, which increases his damage as well. He destroys most in his path, and isn’t too hard to guide around the map or withstand some hits from either. His only disadvantages are that he can be difficult to find without a tracker, and that he is more likely to be interrupted by players aiming for his drops.
And with that, we move onto positive rep NPCs. They have a rep shield, which makes them usable with each other, but for the sake of this post, I will rank them based on usefulness within a group consisting of only themselves.
Positive rep NPCs:
Wizard - A- Tier
Similar to dark wizards, they are decently powerful magic users. However, these NPCs are outclassed by MC Scouts, a more common magic user with similar abilities. Still, at least they are a good substitute for when you can’t find many scouts, and without the worry of friendly fire, they are a useful unit to include on the team.
Bounty Hunter - B Tier
Unlike bandits, they aren’t as common, spawning only in groups of 1 or 3 across the map. They still aren’t very powerful, being the positive rep counterpart of bandits, and are generally just useful in providing some support damage rather than being the NPC you want to focus on gathering.
Magic Council Scout - S Tier
A common magic user NPC that can be found across the map. They also are capable of reaching level 50, which wizards can’t do. It’s a more insignificant ability, but not one to be ignored altogether. Other than that, there’s not much else to say regarding them. They’re essentially just a more common wizard. Of course, watch out for environmental DoT when using them as always.
Mercenary - D Tier
Same reason as pirates. They’ll just run into the ocean in most cases, and are only useful on beaches or shores.
Magic Council Guard - B+ Tier
Guards are common NPCs that can be found in the tower. You can easily gather up to 15 guards, with the two on the captain’s floor being inaccessible without angering the captain. However, they get stuck in the tower easily, and are more than capable of killing you if you have too many. They can also be difficult to kill if you wish to remove one with environmental DoT, as they use their high jump spell frequently.
Magic Council Commissioner - B Tier
Guard with a beam spell. There’s only ever one on the map, in the base floor of the Silent Tower, so it’s mainly useful to support. Just the commissioner by itself may have issues fighting tougher NPCs.
Magic Council Soldier - C- Tier
Guards that despawn. Not very useful due to this, as they can vanish anytime.
Heroes - A Tier
Stronger wizards. Slightly stronger than commissioners, with both a higher max level and lower minimum level than them. Still, scouts are more effective, though heroes can be used to support them due to the lack of friendly fire in positive rep teams. They’re fairly powerful by themselves still, but do require careful management due to the scarcity of them.
Magic Council Captain - F Tier
Powerful but pointless to use. They’ll just kill and arrest you, as even one can be difficult to manage.
The Exiled - A+ Tier
The positive rep boss, capable of AoE, wall-piercing attacks. However, don’t expect him to get out of bodies of water too easily, and he can be difficult to heal from the damage he does to you, as he can attack through walls. He’s immune to weapons, which is a benefit against bandits, but he’s still vulnerable to magic users. Still, a powerful unit, especially with his invincibility, though he will almost certainly attract players, such as with his loud sound effects from Raging Storm.
King David Silver - B- Tier
A level 500 fire user that resides in Summer Hold. However, there are many problems with using him for an NPC army. His damage is rather high for a single player to tank many hits from, doing several hundred with his beam and blast. He can also get stuck easily, in the midst of his hover spell, or more commonly, flight spell. He’s better off ignored, as like captains, he’ll probably be a bit too much to handle.
Final rankings:
S: Bandits, Scouts
A+: Exiled, Minotaur
A: Dark Wizards, Heroes
A-: Wizards
B+: Guards, Villains
B: Bounty Hunters, Commissioners
B-: King David
C: Sun Rage/Darksea Bandits
C-: Soldiers
D: Pirates, Mercenaries, Rising Mist Bandits
F: Captains
Not related to the post, but I do have another quick poll. I have two ideas for the next article:
- A Part 2 of this post, where I go over tips and points of how to go about doing NPC combat
- My average/routine experience in WoM, as requested by Shellseawing in my poll I conducted a while back.
I plan on doing both, but just want to know which one people find more interest in.
- NPC Combat Guide
- My Average WoM Experience
0 voters