The most valuable NPC to all Parties?

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I would have to say that there are 4 NPCs who tie for the "most versatile" title:

Haer' Dalis (What Scythesong Immortal said. Bards, especially Blades can do almost anything if the player has enough patience)

Imoen (for reasons mentioned in the earlier posts)

Jaheira (ditto)

Anomen (a more defensive version of Jaheira)

The others are more or less specialised in their respective fields.

As for most valuable? I always have Imoen along no matter what alignment my party is. So it'll have to be her, I guess.

 

Haer'Dalis and Edwin, no party is complete without them.

 

well, IMHO, Jan is the most versatile and here's why. He will eventually backstab better than any other NPC in the game (actually, fairly soon, I'm confused at the guy who said Jan can't backstab) he has more spells than any other multiclass could because he's an illusionist, he becomes a great thief and a great mage -- AND he's the only one of 2 NPCs who can Use Any Item, and THAT makes him a powerhouse of versatility, IMHO. One round he summons something, the next uses a wand of the heavens, the next buffs something somehow, heavens again . . . . he rocks.
Aerie's spell versatility is also highly impressive.

 

Let's not forget you can use Aerie to stick Clerical spells into Contingencies and Sequencers. That becomes VERY powerful as you get level 7 Cleric Spells.

 

To add on Gopher's post:

You can also use the Robe of Vecna to cast speedy cure spells as well.

 

Thank you Gopher.

Anyone that questions the power of a cleric/mage really needs to learn to use one. That is one of the only classes that can stand toe to toe with a decked out sorcerer or Blade and give a good fight.

 

To add to Klorox's post:

Cleric/Mages (ie. Aerie) make the ultimate party healer. Give her the Robe of Vecna like he said, and memorize Improved Alactrity and Time Stop if you have them. Now, when anyone is in danger in a fight simply cast these two spells and prepare to heal/buff your party to the limit.

This technique is even better when you have prepared Cure Spells or Buffs in Spell Sequencers or similar spells.

You yourself can become even more powerful if you place a [Greater?] Contingency with Shield of the Archons, Spirit Armour, Ironskin/Stoneskin, Mantle(s) and so on.

I'm getting a bit off topic now, but if you can gear Aerie up like that, she'll be nigh-on invincible at high levels. Cleric 20 / Wizard 20. Ooooh! (if you fancy cheating, why not try a Clr/Src 20/20?)

 

Cant do that lol. Ide have to say the most versatile NPC is imoen, shes a good mage, and a good theif (the second best one you can take into tob if your not theif yourself). After that would be Jahiera, who can fit tons of roles, and is an ass kicker no matter what she does.

 

I've never relied on NPC mages to do anything except to breach combat protections. Most of the time, they just stand around doing not much. Hack, hack, hack win. Repeat for all enemies. When I took on Demogorgon the first time, both my mages (Aerie and Imoen) died from some power word spell. So I just hacked everything to bits with Sarevok. Reliable as hell.

 

Well Tassadar, we all have our own preferences, most valuable npc/'s in general would be personal playing style more then anything else, but for versatility there are universial choices for something like that, and considering pretty much half the npc's have been included you could probably take nearly any npc and use them in a versatile way, whether its through class, items or the aid of others.

One thing I tend to find though is most people when they only just get into the game tend to start getting into magic in a big way the first or second time, and don't mind taking a couple of minutes to prepare, but the more you play the more impatiant you get and start going for speed over power, and on rare occasions or particulary difficult fights only then people tend to use magic to it's full power or at least that's what I think from personal expirience.

 

Okay guys, how about we start with the tales of our adventures (or misadventures) as we travelled in the lands of Amn (or the places around it)!

Since I posted this thread, then, I think it would be nice if I start it off!

Well, lets see. There was a moment in the middle course of the game, in the city of the Sahuagins (the fish-folk), since it was the first time I was playing the game, I had virtually no clue on how to solve ANY of the quests in the thrice-be-damned city.
And those fish guys are nat exactly appetizing. So, I decided to RID the whole face of Faerun off a small colony of fish guys!
With an oath to Talos! I set out to carry the StormLord's will.

First on the to kill list, was that priestess. The sorry excuse for a mutated seabass did not worship his Holiness and had a plead for justice! and *gasp* ORDER!
With my henchmen with me, I struck the evil beast down and resulted with the Fish King's wrath!

And from then on, my holy crusade went down the gutter...
having not rested for nearly a day, our exhausted band madde a reckless charge at the rebel prince's hide-out. A bad mistake, Edwin threw a fireball at the snot, and we got a brawl in our hands.

First analysis: We are fatigued.
Second analysis: Airie has spent her last magics!
Third analysis: I really cannot be bothered with these guys!

So, a contingency plan was made. Keldorn and the fighters (me, Talonian Priest!. Minsc and Korgan)are to mow our way to the king in a desperate attempt to let Edwin and his three Cacofiends to do the work for us! (smart...don't you think?)

Small resistance to our assault, and we manage to push through.NO SWEAT...

Well, that's until Edwin starts to cast and we realised that keldorn has only enough protection spells for five. and we decided that Korgan should die doing what he loved most, fighting.(sad)

With a storming entrance we smashed through the King's men or fishes or whatever. And I slayed the beast. Took the items. gave hi a curse that sounds like, "say hello to Korgan for me!"
And the bugger bit the dust.

And the rest was history, yet another corpse and a ruined civilisation all to my name. heh heh!

 

OR you could have done that and gotten an extra 300,000 exp for completing the quest...

 

OK, if we're talking most versatile, you simply have to chose a multi-classed or at the very least a dual-classed character. By definition, they are more versatile than any single-classed characters - I don't think I have to explain why, as it should be self-evident to anyone who has played the game through more than once. Yes, Haer Dalis' is powerful, but I will take two classes any day over one.

So our options are of the multi-variety:

Jan
Aerie
Jaheira

And of the dual-variety:

Anomen
Imoen

Given those choices, I will eliminate Anomen straight away, as his cleric's THAC0 quickly surpasses his fighters THAC0, so the only benefit he gets is the ability to go beyond one star in weapon proficiencies - not versatile enough. Also, I think we can eliminate Imoen. Yes, she is very versatile, but compared with Jan, the only thing she has is better mage abilities. Jan is a far better thief, can get the UAI ability, can get the super-powerful traps, and has a much better THAC0 (and he can use bows as soon as he earns a proficiency point). Imoen, no matter how much you buff her, is never going to get off a backstab like Jan either. Jan will eventually get a 5 times backstab, something that Imoen will not be able to touch (assuming all other things are equal regarding buffs, etc. Plus, he will eventually be able to get the same spells as Imoen, it just takes him a little longer. So if we're talking high XP characters - like 5 million XP or more, I'll take Jan over Imoen. For lesser XP values, like say, 3 million, I'll give Imoen the nod.

Aerie is also very good. With a robe of Vecna, she really takes care of almost all spell casting needs. At higher XP levels, she can be the party's only healer, and she comes with a decent array of mage abilities as well. Extremely versatile, especially given the fact you can throw cleric spells in her spell sequencers. I love my multi-classed cleric/mage that I've played, and honestly, the cleric/illusionist was fun too, although I felt that the loss of spells didn't offset the extra one per level I got for being a specialist.

Jaheira is also an interesting sort. She has healing abilities and can tank with the best of them, as soon as she learns how to cast iron skin. What many people forget about iron skin is that it improves with levels, and once Jaheira passes that 3 million XP hurdle, her levels sky-rocket - I think she only needs something like 150,000 for each of the next 10 levels or so.

Given that the MOST versatile character would be a fighter/thief/mage PC, but that we're counting NPC's, I would rate those three as follows (mind you it is very hard to decide here, and an arguement can be made for any order among these three):

1. Jan 2. Aerie and 3. Jaheira

Jan is first because he brings to the table stuff no other NPC can. Aerie is second because of access to so many spells. Jaheira is third because the tanking ability can be accomplished with so many other characters.

 

I agree with you for most of that Aldeth but I think Anomen is more versatile then Jahiera since Cleric spells are more buffing and healing based then Druids, and the lack of mage killer spells can be made up for, but the extra healing cannot, and Anomen when he's buffed up and wielding Crom could probably take on quite a lot of the noc's in melee and nearly all the mosters without too much effort. But Anomen can only JUST make up for how damned he is with his power.

And as I said in my previous post we all have our preferences.

And also Aldeth if it was a choice of two out of the lot of NPC's would you rather Jan with his versatility, slower leveling up, and inferior mage skills, with Jaheira and her forementioned abilitys? or Imoen who has been described well enough by now with Haer dalis, who can also lay theif traps as HLA's and with a few misleads can even turn Imoen into a fearsome fighter?

Again this will come down to personal choice as player x might not like npc x, and player y might not like npc y, and personal likes and dislikes is usually a major influence with any decision such as this one.

 

I would say Sarevok or Edwin if you are not a magic user.

 

I don't think there is a most valuable NPC to any party. Each plays their respective role and they work along side one another. However it would more than likely be a mage NPC (if the PC isn't a mage that is) because there are some enemies that you can not defeat without a breach spell or a spellstrike/pierece magic spell.

 

Correct you are. Its the Mages and that is the end of it all. Mages rule! Edwin and his legion of Chaos!

 

But out of all the classes the Swashbuckler is the most versatile, his thief abilitys, fighting ability's, ability to use any item, and also cast spells from scrolls mean he can steal, and fight and can also make a backup Mage and Cleric with scrolls, so he is basically a bit of everything.

One of the main differences between versatility and someone specilized like Sarevok is that a versatile character can't exactly reach the potential of a Specilized fighter like Sarevok, but this isn't to say they aren't as good.

Take Jahiera and Sarevok for example, Sarevok could easily kill Jaheira if it wasn't for her Iron skins but if they all of a sudden had a fight without any time to prepare Sarevok could win by going into a few GWW's because Jahiera can only use a hla or cast Ironskin, and by the time she can cast GWW Sarevok could bring down her skins, and would likely win because of his greater HP. And likewise if Jahiera had about 10 seconds to spare befor the fight she could prepare ahead of time and go straight into a GWW and would almost certaintly win.

It's like a F/M or a Blade, compared to a full class Fighter and a mage, the Blade and F/M can never cast as many spells, but later on they can beat any fighter without any difficulty at all the F/M because he can cast Alacricity/Hardiness x3/ Critical strike and GWW (or just timestop) and it's all over, the Blade because he can cast images to sing him to almost unhitable ac and virtually double damage.

But I think a good way to look at it is this: Would it be better to have a party made entirely of specialty characters who can be the best at what they do, or a party of all versatile characters who can each only get less powerful in a single thing but are also good at other skills as well that boost the rest of party's power?

 

Hey Casey,

Lots to reply to here. First, I agree that the combination of Haer Dalis' and Imoen is very powerful. As you said, Imoen levels as a mage much quicker than Jan, and Haer Dalis' makes up for Jan's advantages by being able to set traps (at high levels) and also gets the UAI ability. Plus, no one is going to argue that Jan is going to be able to contribute as much as Haer Dalis' does in melee combat. About the only thing that you lose out on in this combination is the backstab ability, and quite honestly, I don't backstab all that much anyway. So that will work.

As far as the comparison of Jaheira and Anomen, I'd still have to go with Jaheira, with the exception being at the very early stages of the game. Jaheira does miss out on some of the cleric buff's, but gaining skills like Ironskin and Insect Plague, and later on Summon Greater Elemental, more than make up for what she misses. Plus, she will be a much more proficient fighter than Anomen at higher levels (her fighter levels will quickly pass off Anomen, and because she is a multi-class, she also gets fighter HLA's. So, IMO, once you hit ToB levels, Jaheira is much more useful than Anomen, Like you said, it's a personal preference.

Finally, onto your last question, of whether or not it is better to have a party of versatile characters, or a party that has individual specialties. I usually build my party based on individual specialties. In fact, my current game is the only time that I have ever had all three multi-class NPC's in the same game. It is working quite well, although I am hesitant to say this is the way to go, as I'm only in Chapter 3. I have had enough mage power with Jan and Aerie combined, and Jaheira and Aerie allow me all the buffs from both the Cleric and Druid classes (granted I still need to get more levels as neither of them are presently capable of casting 7th level spells). I filled out the rest of the party with my PC Undead Hunter, Minsc, and Valygar (just because I hardly ever use him, and I feel I have probably underutilized his talents that he may have). I am deliberately not taking Imoen, Edwin, or Nalia, because I am trying to see if two multi-classed mages are going to be sufficient at the more difficult stages of the game, and similarly, I am also staying away from Anomen and Viconia, because I am trying to see how well Jaheira and Aerie can handle things without a "true" cleric or druid in the party. I also took an undead hunter, because I usually take Keldorn. So, my current game is going to answer that very question you have, but I just don't want to give the final verdict just yet, as I am still in the early stages. I just hope I haven't changed so many things around that I end up no being able to answer what parts are better and what parts are weaker.

 

Bards are *the* class of versatility by definition. It is the whole point of their existence i.e. a little bit of this and a little bit of that. Unfortunately, a 'little bit' often isn't enough, which is why I find them unappealing.
I think the whole point of D&D is to work with others. There are some who can do much but only the thief can remove traps and this is a big deal. In my experience of soloing with a berserker mage, the only thing I can't handle is traps! And believe me, my 20th level berserker, 21+ mage (grand master of the quarterstaff (and you know *which* quarterstaff, don't you?)) is a powerhouse! Sure he's versatile but not versatile enough!