Character Ideas

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I'm a BG fan, but I've never played NWN. I'm borrowing the game from a friend, and here's some character ideas I'm considering before I start. I'd appreciate feedback.


I presume that the half-orc fighter 4/barbarian or pali 3/fighter or wiz 1/fighter or other power-playing characters are fun, but I’m not thinking much about them. Perhaps I'll end up with one of those, but here's where I started.

Human
Paladin 3/Cleric of the Sun (Destruction or Travel or Healing) 17

12
12
14
10
14
15


Advantage: Lots of deanimated undead. Lots of plate mail. All resistances and abilities of Paladin, building up to 2 level 9 spells with the cleric. Second tier fighter, crossbow and sword. Why not mace? Because the undead who need blunt trauma will never make it to melee range.

Disadvantage: Very little. A balanced character with extremely good resistances. Can keep a party alive in more ways than one. A stay-back sort of fellow until the going gets rough, though. Clearly supporting cast and not the star of the show until later levels of cleric kick in.



Skills: Concentration, Spellcraft, Persuade

Feats: I’m not sure. This may come down to RP decisions. Combat Casting, Empower Spell, Extend Spell (super-cat’s grace, bull’s strength options) is my first choice.

Druid Selections
All seek balance. Druids suck a bit, so multi is necessary for balance. They are not leaders, for all should be equals.


Half-Elf or Human
Monk 3/Druid 17

14
14
14
10
16
8

Monkey Man
Advantage: This selection focuses on shape changing. Since the druid moves to unarmed combat in his animal form, he gets the +2 unarmed attack, cleave feat, scaling, unarmed damage, unarmed attack bonus, improved unarmed strike, flurry of blows, evasion, stunning fist, wis ac bonus, deflect arrow (at 2nd), monk speed (at 3rd) all given to an animal character. This moves him from the “oh no, I need a tank, quick get the druid!” to a dangerous attacker, especially at 16 when he takes an elemental shape. Spells to slow attackers and summoning to take the brunt of attacks while the others use distance weapons round out his usefulness. Can solo through early levels, only needs help when attackers get too tough to delay all/kill off the rest one by one.

Disadvantage: Lots of potentially useless class abilities, skills, and special features. Must boost wisdom at all costs, secondarily boost strength, next const. This is Bigfoot, the Raging Badger, the Wounded Wombat.

Skills: Concentration, parry, druid skills for fun

Feats: Toughness, rest focused on doing unarmed damage.

Halfling
Rogue 3/Druid 17

12
14
14
12
16
10

Slinking Druid
Advantage: This focuses on fixing the problems in the Druid character by adding skills and some help to the shape-changing abilities. More well rounded than monkey man. A good single player who could solo a bit by boosting thief skills.

Disadvantage: Doomed to mediocre AC and resistances. But still better than a regular druid if I really want to play one.

Skills: Focus on spell casting.
Feats: Focus on spells. This is an improved druid, which improves the warrior aspect, but he’s not feral—he’s a druid who has lived close to civilization enough to gain some skills.



Bard
Elf, half-elf.
Blade or Gallant subclass, no MC.

10
14
12
14
10
16

Advantage: This is a much-loved multi-player character and good leader of the band in single player. He is focused on long bow as his weapon of choice, thus the Blade/Gallant subclass makes him useful. Lore bonus is always good as is low priced buddies to hire in single. Song is always good. Magic as brain-damaged Sorcerer is helpful.

Disadvantage: Horrible solo character. Only fair melee. Hard to start. But beloved in multi. Needs strength.

Skills: Perform, spellcraft, persuade, discipline, hide/move silently. Perhaps heal.

Feats: Martial weapons, feats to improve bow. Skill focus (perform) helps.

 

My rational thinking is not at best at the moment (I had a few Red Labels and some strong ale ), but if my calculations are correct, I'd like to make one simple comment about the Pal/Clr. Don't mind me if I'm wrong though...

You have 14 Wisdom and you want to cast level 9 spells. So you would need to improve your wisdom from 14 to 19, which you achieved at level 20. IIRC, there would be no possibility to improve an other stat.
For every 2 stat-points you gain 1 ability-modifier, so having 14 charisma would have the same modifier as 15. If you'd drop your charisma one point, you get 2 points back to spent on strength (better BAB and more fighter feats) or intelligence (skills).
Unless you need 15 charisma for some feat you have in mind, but I can't remember there is one...

 

@MoN: You do pretty well with a few Red Labels! I agree with your take completely on the Pal/Clr...drop that Charisma by 1 pt. and put 2 points into Str....you are afterall a Paladin...you gonna swing a featherduster?

Also, forget the Half-elf for the Mon/Drd and just go with human...the extra feat is worth more than the quasi half-elf abilities.

I would also go with an elf for your bard, that way you will get longbow and longsword proficiency automatically.

Otherwise, they look like they might be fun characters.

 

If not for the feats: you need 13 Str for Cleave, and Cleave is quite nice in this game.

 

Thanks guys! I'll make that adjustment to the pali/priest. I think I'll keep the strength low and raise intel for skills. He's not a burly man.

I put in my application for ALFA. We'll see if I make it in.