Is it just me, or is Icewind Dale relentlessly sucky?

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I'm having almost no fun playing this game. D&D wasn't made for this kind of dungeon crawl, with wave after wave of bad guys, with the super low hit points, the crappy mage spells, and the relentless large ammount of hit points the good guys lose when fighting the bad guys, and the totally usless healing potions and spells. Cure light wounds only heals 4 hit points. If I have 3 of those memorized, that's only 12 hitpoints! That's totally useless, especially in this game.

 

It's just you.

The setbacks you mention, which are minor, are part of the challenge of the game. It's true that IWD is pretty linear and lacks the depth of other D&D RPG's, but that wasn't its intent anyway. It was meant to be a combat-heavy dungeon crawl based on the mechanics of D&D, and successfully so.

Suckage, even of the relentless variety, is in the eye of the beholder. But if you're letting little details like the low return on heal spells ruin the game for you, are you playing for the right reasons?

 

"Sucky?"

Well it comes up short of BG1 and BG2 but it's not a bad game.

The two big drawbacks:

1) Story. No NPCs with there own backgrounds, sub-quests, and chit chat with other members. That really made BG so much more fun to play.

2) Gameplay. I really, really, really, hate the random item generator thing.

 

I'd have to say it's just you.

Sure having NPCs is fun, but your party is much better (in my opinion) when you can decide on the characters yourself.


On top of that, the story and music is AWESOME.

 

Well, I like the music, and the lack of NPCs doesn't bother me, it's just that Icewind Dale is a dungeon crawl shoved into a ruleset that doesn't really allow for dungeon crawls. I shouldn't really have to rest every time I fight a battle. In fact, I rarely ever USE my healing spells, because they have such a low return. It's easier to just rest, but that annoys me as well. You should be able to win without resting every battle.

 

IWD has a better soloing feeling to it than the BG games. Taking your lone FMC from level 1/1/1 to levels 30/30/30 is sooo great.

 

I know what it stands for. D&D isn't designed for this kind of dungeon crawl, ie: wave after wave of monster, filling the entire dungeon. As for healing spells, sure I get better healing spells later on...1 or 2, that I can memorize, and I can only use them once per day per memorized spell. You usually don't get to a high enough level to get enough high level healing spells to make it feasible to heal all 6 of the guys you have, and still have enough left over to heal them again before resting.

 

Its just you, as everyone is saying. Icewind Dale is a great game. And about the "low level mage spells"... Maybe they should have high-level mage spells at low level. Because that would be TRUE D&D. Not

No offense man, but if you dont like Icewind Dale, then you dont like Dungeons and Dragons.

 

Same here, I think it's you. Give the game another chance. And try not playing with a full party, since the game is kind of easy. Playing with just 2 or 3 party members (try 3 clerics for max. healing)can be a blast in IWD. Although this may not count for much with some gamers, I really thought the hand-painted 2D dungeons and landscapes were exquisitely done. I agree also that the soundtrack was top-flight as well as the all the artwork.

 

@Sandstar:

I don't want to harsh your gig, or anything. I don't know if you're just looking for emotional support, or if you're want results. So, don't get bent if it doesn't seem like I'm offering you the emotional support you need.

But,

1. You're not having fun. You need to do something about that.

2. Super Low Hitpoints. Crappy Mage Spells. Both of these are curable with a character editor. Level up to level 30, and give your people wands of fireball, and scrolls of cure serious wounds, and death fog. That is, cheat. If you're opposed to "cheating", you can lower the difficultly down to "easy", and put maximum hitpoints when leveling (it's an option in the config program).

3. Personally, I took the killsword out of Baldur's Gate 2, and ported it over to IwD. The killsword is this sword the QA and "path critical testers" use when they're making the game, to help them not have to micromanage the combat. It's rediculously powerful, and nothing withstands more than one hit. I actually have two versions; one that's a straight port, and one that has a SUPER long range that gibbs things from across the screen. It makes fights really one sided, and your machine will slow to a crawl when there's a bunch of gibbs flying everywhere and your people are mowing a path through the horde, leaving nothing but a trail of dead and broken bodies to mark their passage. Anyways, it speeds back up after all the gibbs stop moving, so it's not a permanent problem.

4. You're missing a really good game if you don't play IwD. You've gone to all the trouble of loading it, I'd rather you take just the little bit of extra time to play through the game, and walk away from it with at least a halfway-decent attitude toward it.

5. Heh. There are other games that are even more "dungon crawl-ish" than Icewind Dale. Dungeon Siege is definately one of them.

6. It really sounds like you're new to Dungeons and Dragons. WELCOME ABOARD! It takes some time getting used to the rules and how everything works, but you did pick a good game to start with. Rolling up 6 random yahoos, and playing through a module of slightly epic proportion, is how it's done with Pen and Paper D&D. After you finish IwD, you will have the information and skills you need to tackle any of the other hardcore D&D games. Like Baldur's Gate, or Dungeon Siege, or Temple of Elemental Evil, or Icewind Dale II.

 

Uh, I liked Baldur's gate. I've probably played it through 7 times. It wasn't nearly as relentlessly difficult as IWD is. I know about rolling for maximum hitpoints, I do that. It hardly matters when you have 3 giants swarming down on you, and each of them are doing 20 points of damage per hit, while an accolyte is casting paralyze....which always works.....so you lose all your savings throws.....so you're pretty much dead. I'm not a newbie to D&D, tho I admit I haven't played it as much as some of you have. And Dungeon Siege isn't a D&D rules game, is it?

 

Just think of Icewind Dale as opportunity to powergame instead of RPing and you will find it easier I think.

Sure it can be difficult but with more monsters to kill means more xp to level up. After playing it through once, I have never played it at any other setting than Insane as the XP rewards are better (Easiest also gives the same XP rewards per enemy but less spawned enemies and I think some areas don't respawn them). There is nothing like seeing your party wield some awesome firepower. I do agree that lack of high level mage spells tend to suck but at least no enemies casts Time Stop or worse Imprisonment LOL.

 

I always enjoyed the game, and I usually play it on Hard level so I get double xp. The main thing is to use some form of tactics, and if you have the Heart of WInter expansion then use a bard. A bard at level 11 or 220 000xp which is really low gets the War CHant of Sith and that alone makes Healing/Clerics redundent.

Try a change of pace and tactics and you should find it more fun.

 

Bards are that cool in IWD!?

I should have taken one then...

Next time!

 

Memorize some buffing spells instead and make sure your frontliners don't get hit in the first place. AC -20, STR 22, saving throws <6, it's all accomplished through spells.

 

Then may I be so bold as to suggest, Sandstar, that the "relentless suckyness" in question here is actually your own skill? That the problem isn't the game, but the fact that you apparantly suck at it?

If that's the way you're looking at it, then from my point of view, Ninja Gaiden for the original 8-bit Nintendo is the worst game ever. EVER. Game kicks my ass every time.

 

I suppose you COULD claim it's due to my skill, but why is it that I can beat Baldur's gate 1 and 2 pretty easily, whereas in IWD, I get beaten fairly regularly?

 

Y'know why? I guess you're a cheeser that miss-use the traps, timestop and other things that is not, thankfully, inplented in IWD. All others than you like it, so just chew on that, mate.

 

How can I misuse traps, timestop, and whatall when I have no idea what they mean, mate?