Newbie questions

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I'm just starting the game and have some questions.

1. Do the NPCs take a share of the loot, like in ToEE, or do they join for free? I want to know this so I can plan my party composition. I know you can get a Sorcerer to join early on, and if he comes with no price tag then I'm definitely not creating a Sorcerer.

2. Speaking of party makeup, I was thinking of starting with a Half-orc Barbarian, a Human Paladin, a Dwarven Cleric and a Half-elf Rogue, on the assumption that I can then get the Sorcerer NPC. Does this seem reasonable, or should I change the races of these characters?

3. What level should I expect to be at the end of the game? I want my spellcasters to get level 8 spells, but if there's enough experience I'd like to multiclass them. On this subject - how does XP distribution for multiple classes work? Looking at the manual I get the feeling it doesn't follow 3E rules, and ECL isn't mentionned anywhere.

4. I've read you can't buy items anywhere in the game. Is this true? Are there people you can sell excess equipment to?

Thanks in advance. I'm looking forward to venturing forth in the game.

 

1. NPCs are like self-created party members, the only difference is that if you dismiss an NPC you can find a version of him/her whose level and equipment only depends on how far you are in the game, not on how you left him.
If you dismiss self created party members they're gone forever.
You can even play the game with 6 NPCs, NPCs have better stats than you can ever hope to create anyway. Starting without sorc is a good idea.

2.A pure class cleric is essential. I don't remember exactly if dwarves get a cha penalty, but if they do I'd rather take another race, since cha is useful for turning.
Half of the enemies you meet are undead, if you can't turn them those battles get slow and awful.
If you want a human paladin take the pregenerated one, he has better stats than you can assign yourself.
HO barbarian and HE rogue are nice add-ins, I'd multiclass the rogue either with barbarian or sorc after 2 levels.

3.Multiclassing works according to the 3E rules, you get the ECL penalty.
Don't bother with multiclassing your spellcasters before they reach level 16, you need as high as possible spells as fast as possible.

4.You can buy and sell items, you'll find the first merchant before your first level up.

 

Thanks for all the info kmonster. I've opted for the ready-to-go Paladin and created all the others. I've made the Cleric also human so as not to get a Charisma penalty. As soon as I started the game I noticed you do not get to pick skills and feats - the computer's assigning them automatically. I certainly hope you get some control on level-up otherwise it's going to get pretty annoying having the computer decide for me which skills and feats I want and don't want to use.

 

Sorry to disappoint you, you can't choose the feats and skills you get.
The only thing you can choose is when you have a multiclass like rogue/barbarian in which class you take level 3,6,9,12,... which infuences the feat you get.

A little extra advice:

When you level up while wearing an item which raises your con you gain less HP than you should , if you wear an item which reduces con you get more XP than you should. So never wear a con raising item when levelling up. You can also influence the HP you get by reloading.
The rogue will level faster than the rest of your party since he gets bonus XP for disarming and lockpicking. When you disarm a chest or barrel without opening it, leave and reenter the area the trap is renewed. You can abuse this for XP gain for him if you want.
A party member gets XP for finding secret doors, searching actively will reduce the XP gain and if you save and reload at such a position you don't get any XP at all.
When the computer rolls dice like crazy and you don't know why you are obviously near a secret door.

 

The XP for secret door trick is working nicely. I'm trying to get Jarial (the NPC Sorcerer) to find them so he can get the XP and level up quickly.

Something strange is happening with Jarial though. He needs 36000 XP to get to level 4. That's not right, though. All my PCs need only 10000. Jarial is also not multiclassed. Why is there such a big gap for the XP he needs to level up? Have I hit some mysterious glitch? (I'm using patch 1.4)

The game's not bad until now. The speed patch makes crossing the long and empty distances much more tolerable. The game does feel a bit boring though - it's vast but essentially empty. The movement interface is awful - I would have thought no one would try anything like it after Arcanum. At least Arcanum had other redeeming values; I hope POR does as well.

 

Seems to be a glitch I didn't experience with Jarial. 36,000 XP are needed for level 9.
Maybe only the display is wrong. If not you'd better dismiss him now and pick him up later when he's level 8 and his spells are more useful.
You could try the following: Save your game, take his equipment, dismiss him and go back to Beriand and Faeril afterwards where he should respawn and look at his stats then.
If this doesn't work you could also wait until you can pick him up as level 8 sorc. Should be after finding the way out of the dungeon inside the walls of MD or even earlier.
Jarial is the only pure class sorc NPC in the game, there's also a fighter/sorc MC with 6 fighter levels, but that's all what you get in arcane magic.

 

This is annoying.

I've tried uninstalling the game and reinstalling it. I tried not using the speed patch. I tried installing all patches sequentially. I tried dropping him and picking him again from Beriand's hideout. No luck. Nothing I can think of fixes the problem with Jarial. I suppose I could forget about him entirely, but I'm having a hard enough time even with him along. Although I'm not sure how useful he'll be when he's got enough XP to be level 9 but is still stuck at level 3.

EDIT: Found a way to get rid of the problem! And it was so easy, too. Jerial starts at level 3 with 33000 XP. I thought I could manipulate his level and abilities so they matched the XP, but having him at level 9 would severely unbalance the game. As I played around with the XP he has (I thought taking it up might level him to 9 straight away, at which point I could take the XP back to its starting point) I noticed that the "XP to level up" kept getting pushed up too. So I thought it might work the other way round... I took his XP down to 6000 (from 33000), loaded the game - and there he was, a level 3 Sorcerer needing 10000 XP to level up, the way he was always meant to be.

[ April 03, 2007, 22:48: Message edited by: Ziad ]

 

A little update on my progress, in case anyone's interested.

I have finally (FINALLY!) emerged from the first (and only?) dungeon, and I have to say the game is not as bad as I expected (not hard, considering I expected something unplayable). It does drawn you in eventually (though it took a couple of hours before it did). It's got some annoying quirks, especially with not being able to select skills and feats yourself, but I've got used to that now. The movement system brings to mind Arcanum, and is even more annoying thanks to useless pathfinding, but the Speed patch does wonders here (and saved my sanity a few times as I had to backtrack several miles). The game keeps reminding me of a lesser, simpler ToEE. Some of the subquests are interesting, especially later on. Combat was tedious at first, but now that my PCs can actually hit (and Jarial can cast decent spells) it's quite fun.

My major issue with the game is size. Yes, I love huge RPGs, but this is pushing it. Ultima Underworld 2, Ultima 7, Might and Magic 6, Baldur's Gate, Arcanum, all of these were huge RPGs, but they were also full of things to do. RoMD is empty - one long empty corridor after the other. Considering how long it took me to go through this one dungeon, I'm really hoping there are no others that are anything comparable in size. The game is still glitchy even with the latest patch - a PC gets occasionally stuck and can't move, combat gets stuck and doesn't start, the previously-mentionned problem with Jarial, and little things like that. They don't happen often, but they require reloading when they do, which is irritating. I'm hoping the game really picks up now that I've re-emerged from the dungeon.

 

You are not even close to done LOL. But keep going - you are about to enter the best part of the game. I kid you not the second half is a total blast and the plot really picks up.

 

I've finally finished the wretched game. The second half is better, that's true, but I still think the game is too big, too long, and too repetitive. I cannot imagine how anyone could have completed it without the speed patch - towards the end I was constantly at 2 notches higher, and up to 4 or 5 while waiting for the opponents' move in combat. Combat is atrociously dull, even towards the end, and the lack of good high-level area of effect spells doesn't help. The Catacombs stretched my patience, as they looked and felt exactly like the first dungeon, and were just as huge. I did appreciate the small twists in the story towards the end, but they're not enough to recommend the game. All I can say is - the game's not as bad as a lot of people here think, but it's still not better than average. Shame, as the surface areas (both before and after the Catacombs) were quite good.