The usual party selection issue..

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Just started out a new game, and got stuck when I tried to form out my party. Normally, I kind of mix in both what type of character I want to play, and what kind of party I would like to have, and the result of that determines how the PC should be and how the party should be. This time though, I just went for what I personally wanted to play - a fighter/thief, using both bows and swords. Thought about blending in some magic too, but came to the conclusion that it would just be boring in a six man party.

Anyhow, as always, I made the character chaotic neural, hence he's fit for both good and evil partys. Decided to go with evil though.

Male PC:

Elf
Fighter/Thief

Str 16
Dex 19
Con 16
Int 10
Wis 18
Cha 10

Short Bow ** - As I said earlier, I'm gonna use bows. Long bows req. 18 str, and I just couldn't picture my somewhat sneaky elven fighter/thief with equal strenght as our friend Korgan.

Katana * - Planned on using katanas and long swords in close combat. Katanas, for their immense power, the obvious choice for any self-respecting hand-to-hand-combat thief..

Long Sword * - ..and Long Swords, as they are the natural weapon of the elves, as well as that of Amn. Lots of nice ones out there.

One-Handed * - One star for getting the 19-20 critical roll, mainly intended for backstabbing.

Two-Handed * - One star, and well on the way to three. For tough fights.

The usual evil party quartette is of course:

Korgan
Viconia
Jan
Edwin

Since I'm a thief, I don't really need Jan, even though he sure is the highlight of BG2. Have him along every time I'm not a thief though, so...
I was also planning on going with Kelsey, since I've heard some good things about him, though never actually took him along. Does he leave an evil party?

Korgan as fighter
Me as thief and second fighter
Viconia as cleric
Edwin as wizard
Kelsey as wizard

It feels like the remaining slot ought to go to a fighter-type. Had decided on Haer'Dalis, though remembered that his constitution isn't quite what makes a good fighter. Don't need his pick-pocketing either, and his bardsong only ever gets good in the end of the game/ToB (meaning someone has to make room for Sarevok). Also thought about Jaheira... She's a druid, so it makes total sense that she could follow evil people, even more since I'm chaotic neutral - while I don't give a damn, she can preach her true neutrality the best she wants. She makes a good tank, and it's always nice to have more than one divine caster. Kelsey's probably the one who's gonna have to leave room for Sarevok anyhow, since ToB is a fighters world.

Suggestions? Open for any ideas!

 

Fighter / Thief type characters are the best fit for just about any party, especially an evil one. Why noy just stick with the basic four and leave the other two slots as a revolving door for quests and Sarevok?

 

Grab another mod. In particular, I'd recommend Ariena or Kindrek. Ariena is an NE half-orc "pit fighter", and Kindrek is a CE half-giant berserker who hates magic (but since your PC doesn't use it, you'll be okay, I think).

 

I think a 4 man all Evil party is great, but even better with a FMT.

Add in Sarevok later. Smaller parties are more fun in the long run.

 

while kindrek will join the party if your PC is not a mage, he will eventually slay any single class mage/sorc npc =( Not too sure about kelsey though.

 

Tanks for all replies!

How about Kelsey? Will he leave an evil party? Should I even take him along? It'd mighty fine to have another arcane caster, especially in SoA. Magic is not that powerful in ToB, so that's why I thought I could just swap Kelsey for Sarevok. Not even sure Kelsey works with ToB?..

A little edit: How long does it take before the Harper quest sets in? Come to think of it, that ring you get from the mage... it ain't bad.

 

Kelsey *might* leave the party if you take Bodhi's offer. I'm not sure though. He will work with ToB as long as you installed Kelsey-ToB.

 

Thanks, I guess I'm going with Aran once more then.

Heh, yea, come to think of it, that's probably what "kelsey-tob" was for, huh?

 

You really need to be specialised (two stars) in melee weapons, you will gain major benefits, like extra 1/2 attack per round, and THAC0 and damage bonuses. Your melee prowess should be sucky right now, with only 1 attack/round and crap THAC0.

 

Yea, I kinda suck right now, though I just started. Of course I'll get two stars in any weapon I pick.(which is gonna be few on the way)

THAC0 11
Attacks: 3/2

Just level 8 fighter / level 10 thief yet.

Out.

[ February 01, 2006, 17:23: Message edited by: spetznaz ]

 

Interesting breakdown. I'm not sure I would have done it this way, but hey, whatever works. The one thing I find very curioius is the 18 in Wisdom, as I don't see the benefits of this. Even if you're idea is to get good wish options, you have Viconia in your party who also has an 18 in Wisdom, and you could just have her talk to the genie. I probably would have either switched the wisdom and charisma scores, or more likely, dropped wisdom to 10, placed 2 more points in strength, one more point in constitution, and placed the other 5 in charisma.

 

@ Aldeth

I usually go for a high wisdom, for simple reason of better saving throws. I think I get something around a -4 bonus. Used a mod that fixes it. Didn't even think about wish

Neither did I want to powergame or anything. Just make the character I have in my head and not care about anything else. Hence the 16 str and con, even though I'm often up close in combat. As I said, my elven fighter/thief wasn't as strong as Korgan, nor as tough as the toughest of elves. Surely there's gotta be elven fighters with a higher constitution than mine. He ain't the toughest, so he ain't having 17.

Thieves, in my oppinion, either have lots of charisma, making their job easier. OR they look sneaky, false and doubtful. Mine is the latter.

18 wisdom can be explained by the fact that he's an elf, mayby has had a harsch childhood, giving him a perspective on life. Even more the reason to steal.

I've played the game so many times, I've no desire to powergame, go hardcore on the roleplaying or such. Just play and have fun!

Any oppinion or thoughts are welcome. 'Tis indeed good to be back on the boards o' magick!

 

@spetznaz

You have a mod which fixes wis saving throw bonuses? Where did you get it?

 

Don't know whích one it was, it's been a while since I installed them. Might've been baldurash, give me a sec to check.

 

Please, I will REALLY appreciate if you could tell me. I am a mod freak you know! And like creating characters with best wis possible.

 

Hm, can't seem to find it. IIRC, it was one of them mods where you get to select every component as the installation goes on. Now when I'm thinking about it, I'm getting uncertain. Gotta check if my rolls are right. If you really want the correct throws, I guess you could use shadow keeper. I'll keep looking tho.

 

Jaheira is the closest thing to a tank that will stay in your party long-term in SOA. As you know, Minsc will eventually attack Edwin, and Keldorn will eventually attack Viconia. (However, lawful good Keldorn and "chaotic" evil Korgan become bestest friends forever for some stupid reason.)

Your only other alternatives if you want to beef up your tanking abilities will require some micromanagement on your part; either carry an extra suit of plate mail and a good helmet for your F/T (recommended), or use Gaal's Girdle of CON and possibly the Mauler's Arm mace on Viconia to give her 18 Str and Con (NOT recommended). You can rely heavily on summoned critters in the meantime too, spider spawn and elemental summoning, and later, animate dead are good for this.

As for your stats, unless you actually have a mod that does affect your saving throws with WIS by a staggering, staggering amount, I would shadowkeeper those 8 points into CHA instead for better store prices.

I would also strongly recommend you pick between single weapon style and 2 weapon style, rather than using both. For the record, 2 weapon style works just fine with backstabbing. If you ever want the guy to wade into the front lines and do some hacking and slashing, as you indicated you did, then you'd be better off with 2 weapon and ** in either katana or longsword. I'd recommend longsword, because other than Celestial Fury, there aren't any other good katanas until TOB. In the meantime, there are about 9,382 magic longswords in SOA and several other great ones in TOB (Angurvadal is ridiculous).

Shortbow sounds OK, I'm assuming you're going tuigan -> tansheron/gesen. However, there are some very good long bows in SOA. You might want to rethink longbows when you get the gauntlets of ogre power. No one else in your currently selected party needs them, except possibly Jaheira, who could also be given the Girdle of Giant Strength and Sling of Seeking.

 

Problem is, high wis offers a bonus to save vs spells category, BUT only against effects about the mind. Like charm, hold, confusion, dominate etc. But it won't give a bonus against a fireball, for instance, or a Disintegrate spell. So SKing my saving throws won'T work, (or will be cheating as it will be more powerful than intended.) some more complex modding is required I guess.

 

I'd just go with a five-man group until you get Sarevok, and/or use the sixth slot as a revolving door for NPC quests.

Silverstar - I don't think that's possible unfortunately. At best you might be able to lower your save vs spells across the board by WIS. I'm not even sure that could be done cleanly, you can't just invent new 2DAs and expect the game to interpret them. If this mod does exist I'd be interested in seeing how it works!

 

Hm, I might be mistaken about the saving throw mod. I was so sure I had it, since I remember myslef wandering the boards in the past, only to find numerous threads about the "wisdom and saving throw" beeing bugged. I remember beeing happy when I finally found a fix for it, even more as my friend was bugging me about my constant high wisdom. Now I'm unsure, but nevermind. Save vs. mindaffecting is just as well. That's the main reason I got it anyway.

I have no experience in modding or programming whatsoever. I'll leave the thinking to you guys. I'll check through my mods again, tho some mods don't have readme with covering the content, so I'd have to install the mod again, in order to get the "would you like to install .... would you like to install .... would you like to install ...." etc.

Thanks for all replies concering the real topic ! Fer now, I'll stick with Korgan, Kelsey, Viconia and Edwin. Thought about bringing Haer'Dalis along, though I don't think I'll do it. Since I'm going evil/neutral, all remaining fighers are unavailable. Valygar, Keldorn, Mazzy and Minsc are all good. There's only Haer'Dalis who could call himself somewhat of a fighter. Well, there's neutral Anomen and Cernd, but I don't feel that they fit with either me, since I dispise both of 'em, and they don't really fit in with Edwin, Viconia and Korgan. Atleast Kelsey has a reasonable reason (heh) for tagging along. The boy's had a tough childhood, wander around, looking for an adventure etc.

I've played with a Blade once, and it was one of my top three run-throughs. Haer'Dalis with his 9 constitution however... He kinda gets on your nerves too, doesn't he?

@ Killjoy
I'll get a few stars on the way through. Was planning on using the Celestial Fury in SoA, and adding Blackrazor later. Getting 19-20 for critical is nice, both for backstabbing and normal fighting. Since I mainly use bows (Korgan has Fortress Shield and a total of -12 AC, so he tanks pretty well on his own), I just fast-switch to my sword when the enemy is close, instead of always go into the inventiry, unequip the bow, equip another sword, change back etc.
I've got a maximum of two stars in short bow, might pick long bow later as well. In SoA, short bow is superior though.

For the moment, I'm using Blade of Roses and Tugian Bow. I'm going to take the Celestial Fury as early as possible, meaning I'm going to try right about now. Might be hard to, only level 9 Fighter / 11 Thief. Hey, I've been through worse.
I'm also using the Girdle of Hill Giant Strenght, giving me 19 str. It'll do nicely for them long bows. Sarevok has already got 18/00, korgan 18. Gonna get another belt if I'm not mistaken, as well as the Gauntlets of Ogre Strenght, so I'll make most use out of the Sling of Seeking as well.

Edit: For charisma and barter prices, I use the Nymf Cloak (+2), Blade of Roses (+2) and the Ring of Human Influence for a total of 22.

'Nuf rambling fer now.