I'm about to start the game, but the information I could gather around the net concerning attributes seems somewhat diffuse. Some say Strength affects to hit, some don't mention that. Agility may affect initiative, but I guess there must also be a stat that influences damage with ranged weapons, is it agility? Or is it Strength too, like in other Jap crawlers (e.g. Stranger of Sword City)? Not even going to ask about Luck.

My understanding is as follows (note that many effects won't occur until the stat exceeds 15, and that the racial stat cap is equal to the racial base plus 10):

Strength: Affects damage with *all* weapons, including ranged weapons. I believe this does affect accuracy as well.

Intelligence: Affects your chance of learning Mage spells (and maybe Alchemy?) at level up, and also affects the damage done by offensive Mage spells (most noticeable for lower level spells) as well as items that mimic them. The damage bonus comes before elemental attack/defense and high mastery bonuses, so it does get multiplied by them.

Piety: Affects your chance of learning Priest spells at level up. Also affects the amount of healing provided by spells (again, most noticeable for lower level spells) and items that mimic them (including regular potions). Again, this comes before bonuses from Holy attack bonuses and high mastery; however, it comes after the bonus that Servants get when using regular potions. (So, for a Servant, Piety does matter, but is not critical.)

Vitality: Affects HP after leveling up. Note that your HP is re-calculated at every level up (but you always gain at least 1 HP), so you can treat HP gains as being retroactive. Vitality is more important than class when it comes to HP, and is especially useful for Dragonewts whose breath attacks are affected by current HP.

Agility: Affects initiative. Note that some enemies have more Agility than is possible for a party member, particularly in the post-game (one particular nasty enemy I've mentioned a few times is an example of this).

Luck: I am not sure, but in classic Wizardry, this stat allowed you to avoid many chest traps, and I believe it gave protection against status ailments caused by enemy attacks (but I don't know if it does in Elminage Gothic).

Beside trap identification/disarming chance, Luck also affects the chance to Hide of Thiefs/Ninjas (probably together with Agility), Thief steal chance.

Piety also affects the chance to resurrect a character - as does the resurrected characters Vitality.

Strength probably does not affect accuracy, only damage.

Like dgtree wrote, only values above 15 usually count for stuff other then class qualification.

I disagree. Having a better chance of acting before the enemy is useful. In the case of the particular enemy I have mentioned, if you do get lucky to act before the enemy in question, which is more likely with higher Agility, it could save you one or town character deaths.

I definitely recommend making a Fairy Bishop with Magic Essence once you get to the later part of the game; that Agility does make a difference, even if you can't consistently act before some of the nastier enemies. (Magic Essence helps you land status ailments on magic resistant enemies, but only works for mage spells.)

I can confirm that turn order is very important. If you kill/disable enemies before they can act, its very helpfull. And it sucks if you nearlly wipe before you can act...

A fairy Bishop can work, however one has to consider the negatives:
1. Maximum age of 30
2. Low Vitality
3. Glacial pace of learning spells (why I don't recommend Bishops as a starting class)
4. Extremly limited equipment selection (not a biggie, Bishops get sucky equipment anyways)