re: an all mages troop?

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1. I bought IWD the ultimate collection so it has HoW and IWD II. I also downloaded the expnasion file(98mb). I also have BD II. I wished to got BD I also. With the game this fun, it's a shame when the price now is so low.

2.I do not planned to do a all mages troop. Just for discussion. I have thought about using fighter/ranger type but unless there is an automatic way for the players to switch himself. Right now just keep my fighters alive by feeding them with potions already took most of the fighting time already.

 

1) What's "BD"?
2)What do you mean "unless there is an automatic way for the players to switch himself"?
3) In IWD1, archers rule the day. You need melee types as well, but if all (or most) of your characters use missile weapons and wait until the baddies close, you're going to have a much easier time with things.

 

It's BG II.
What I meant is if the char can switch their weapons( close combat and long range ) by himself depending upon situations. Some chars do that but some do not such as fighter types.

 

Just hit pause and switch weapons.

 

In a doc on building chars posted at SP "tips and tricks), the author cites an arcane troop of 1 pal and 5 magic perons. He did say that the going is tough at first but becomes powerful at the end. He also says that a Bard is useless but a Druid is king.

In another sample troop which includes :

1 pal
1 thief
1 druid
1 cleric
1 mage
1 conjurer;
The last 5 starts as a fighter/ranger.
Sounds pretty interesting. I think I will try it although I prefer fighter over paladin. Paladin over emphasize on charism( min=17). This may help to buy stuff cheaper but nothing else.

[ March 23, 2007, 01:19: Message edited by: iceman ]

 

Bards are not useless, they have many advantadges.
- They are the optimal diplomats, you can get more than 2,000 extra XP and over 100 gold for the bardic dialogue options in the prologue.
The granted 15 cha allows the cha-based dialogue options and optimal shop prices (with friends).
- Even with 3 wis they're soon able to identify anything because of the +10 lore bonus they get per level.
- They can cast spells at higher levels as mages, which is very useful for the level-dependent spells, 18 rounds lasting haste is better than 14, 18 HD of shades are better than 14 HD, 18d6 damage is better than 14d6 ...
- There are some useful bard-only items
- Bard songs are very powerful, especially with HoW installed. Being able to get your party healed by having your bard sing the level 11 song often saves you the painful searching for a place to rest and allows your priests to memorize more offensive spells.

Paladins have the advantadge that they get a long lasting "protection from evil" special ability which is cumulative with both the cleric and mage version, so they have +2 AC and +4 all saving throws compared to fighters starting from the beginning.
But I also prefer fighters, the extreme offensive boost they get when they reach 5 points in their weapon, taking a little race which gets +5 in the important saving throws. A good aligned gnome (for the +3 AC and immunity to fatigue from the "helm of the trusted defender" ) axe-fighter can be fantastic.


You'll have far more fun with a fighter/thief (dwarf) or fighter/mage/thief (HE) multiclass than with a dualclassed human.
This way you keep on getting fighter benefits through the whole game, get more than enough thieving skill points and don't have a dualclassing period where you are unable to disarm traps.

Without HoW conjuration is a great specialist mage school, but with HoW you loose evocation spells like magic missile, fireball or stoneskin. Illusionists or transmuters are better now.
I'd prefer a combination of bard and dualclassed illusionist.
If you want to have two mages a conjurer/illusionist combo can handle all spells, no need to take a non-specialised mage.

Use the IWD creation guides rather as inspiration than as perfect instruction for powergaming, you won't find one without serious flaws .
But you don't need an ultra strong party to beat IWD anyway.

 

Well, To have a druid together with a cleric helps getting 2 copies of (animate dead) which I prefer over summoning monsters. And I'll get to try a druid.

Your idea of a conjurer/illusionist is nice. I'll keep it in mind. Probably I should modify the troop:

fighter
fighter6/druid dual
fighter1/thief dual
ranger3/cleric dual
fighter2/conjurer
fighter2/evoker

[ March 23, 2007, 17:51: Message edited by: iceman ]

 

Clerics and druids get different spells, some priest spells can be cast by both, some only by clerics and some only by druids.
"Animate dead" is cleric only while all other priest summoning spells are druid only for example.
But a level 6 cleric you can already cast 3 "animate dead" in a row, at higher levels even more. Mages can also cast this spell once you find the scroll.

I'm not a fan of dualclassing at level 6, you just get 1 profiency point compared to level 3 while for fighter level 7 your druid would get an extra half attack per round even while shapeshifted.

You cannot dualclass at level 1, I'd at least wait until level3 for being able to master a weapon. But a multiclass fighter/thief will be far superior, he'll get more attacks per round and hit better.

Your ranger/cleric will benefit the least from the 3rd level, he'll just get 2-4 extra HP and an useless profiency point while the fighter/mages would get extra 6-8 HP and be able to put a 3rd point in a weapon which grants +2 to hit and +1 to damage.

 

Uh, I read this somewhere but actually I do not understand what it means. Because after the first cast, the quick cast slot at the bottom of the screen disappears so how can I cast? or I just click 2 more times?

[You need to use square brackets to make quotes. And enabling receiving private messages since you've stripped your account of all other possibilities of private contact would be a good idea. -Tal]

[ March 23, 2007, 23:09: Message edited by: Taluntain ]

 

It works the same way as casting 3 magic missiles in a row for mages.
I guess you already know how to select spells so that they are available for casting after rest.
Instead of selecting 3 different spells you just select the same spell three times.
If you click the spell casting icon (not one of the quick spell slots) after resting the spells you've memorized and are ready to cast are displayed, you just have to select the one you want to cast. If you have a spell memorized more than once you can cast it again when you finished your first casting.

 

Oh. So you are saying that I can only memorize a limit number of times depending on the level? I thought it depends on the number of free slots.

 

You have to decide what to memorize before you rest. The number of free slots in your mage book or priest scroll you can use for memorizing depends on the caster's level.