Opinions for the Perfect Party

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People seem to be awfully limited in the picking of their 'evil' parties. Though people with good characters often work to keep their rep low enough for, say, Viconia, I surprisingly never see people with evil characters trying to keep their rep high enough for a good-aligned NPC--even though keeping your rep in the average range is good for your pocketbook too. What's up with that?

'Evil' parties can be as varied as good ones. You can have any of the neutral characters. You can have Anomen and make him fail his test. You can have Korgan and Minsc together, now there's a deadly pair of berserkers to flank you. You can have Jaheira and Viconia together and listen to them cat-fight, and Jaheira turns into a formidable warrior who can cast insect plagues. You also don't HAVE to have Jan. Imoen won't leave the party or even threaten to no matter what your reputation is, and in fact if it drops to 4 or so, she even complains less than the neutral people.

Bottom line: there is no "perfect party" or one single party that you "have" to have. There are tons of different good, viable parties no matter what your alignment or character class is.

 

If you're (partly) roll-playing you should always take Imoen along with you; She's your sister FCL! If I made an Evil party I think it'd be:

PC
Korgan
Viconia
Edwin
Imoen (Yoshimo or Jan before getting her back)
MP created Half-Orc Warrior, kick him out in ToB for you-know-who... (I don't know if Extremist would flame me if I say )

This party has it all... 2 tanks, a priest, a thief (Imoen is good enough, especially with some equipment) and 2 mages...

 

I happen to think that Duharrel's party is kinda evil...

Duharrel... more Chaotic than evil, but the choices he makes are definitely not "good" sometimes. He has no problem accepting "murderous" quests.

Korgan, Viconia - obviously

Yoshimo - tehcnically neutral, but willing to steal and/or backstab even children so again, you have to wonder.

Minsc - technically neutral , "butt kicks for goodness, so you wonder... but has never seriously threatened to leave

Aerie - the only obviously good member in the party and she has stayed though my rep once dropped to 4.... She did bitch alot however.

I think the key, like someone already said, is to go for an average rep, 9-11, in order to not be too abused by merchants. Honor among thieves and crooks my behind!

[This message has been edited by Kailynne Johanne (edited September 04, 2001).]

 

Just a short note and I wont bug anyone with alignment issues anymore. (this week anyway)

The D&D setting uses the word evil. But deciphering the alignment descriptions from their many books, makes the word SELFISNESS more appropiate. Sure, if the entity has a low intelligence and is chaotic, then violence and mayhem could be key words too. The alignment has ties to the ATRIBUTESCORES too. Most PCs can replace the word evil with Selfish in their alignment description. exceptions are those who are intelligent, but only exsist to put pain to others in more or less sinister and cunning ways. They use the "evil" alignment too. Not easy when we only have two words to describe a character.

 

Minsc is definitely not neutral. He's a good ranger hero and he won't shut up about it. Try to make him. (-:

 

Yaaaah! Just thrashed SOA for the first time after months of bugs/crashes/restarts with the following merry band...

-Juan the chaotic good conjurer.
-Viconia for companionship and clericy goodness
-Immy for extra magic and scallywag skills
-Haer'Daelis for MORE magic and arse-kicking skills (don't look at me like that; Haery eats Balors for breakfast!)
-Valygar; always a requirement as he is a pretty smooth fella, can backstab, gets a few druid spells without a significant risk of spell failure (a la Minsc) and doesnt rely on double handed swords like too many of the NPCs do. The thinking man/lady's fighter
-Korgan; my one true tank. Soaks up damage and is immune to lots of stuff when berserking. Replaced by a certain hefty gentleman post-SOA for a bit of variety.

Im thinking of eschewing my magic loving days in the future for a more warrior based party. Hmmmm...

 

I tend to think that it is good to have a party set up this way:

2 fighters
2 clerics
2 mages

Somehow fit a thief into these (Imoen, mage thief - or Nalia =P)

Also- the fighters equipped with close range attacks, as well as the clerics. Mages equiped with whatever randed weapons they can use: I prefer a short bow over the sling if it is available.

If Jaheira is in a cleric slot I might give her a sling due to the fact she gets hurt really quick in a fight.

If it works out the way I want, a fight will occur and the clerics and fighters will run in and fight while the mages cast spells from behind, and when healing is needed the clerics are right there.

I notice this tactical setup tends to decay in later levels if attention is not paid to cast spell thrust or breach on enemy spellcasters. Protection from normal weapons foils my front line. Ruby Ray of Reversal does wonders too...

Caliban

 

Hey, thanx for changing the topic. That was pretty good I guess.

And it looks like everyone had good ideas or parties here. Btw, it's not relly recommended to mix opositive alignment NPCs, right? Cause I'm playing a good party, but I want to get Edwin, Viconnia, and all those good people.

 

You can have them in the party - unless Keldorn is also included.

Just don't make reputation of 18 or higher, ok?

 

mixing good and evil makes some very interesting NPC interaction, though they might start fighting or tell you to choose.

But fascinating roleplay

and baddies leave when your rep exceeds 18 like Extremist said

 

ach heres a fun party to mess with

you
Hear'dalis
aerie
viconia
anomen
keldorn

he he fun fun they almost always are talking.

 

If you want to mix parties with different alignments without them fighting (i.e. Keldorn and Viconia, Edwin and Minsc, etc...) you can download the Happy Group patch right here at Sorcerer's Place.

 

Well, ignoring the NPCs for the moment my perfect party would probably look something like this:

Monk
Ranger/Cleric MC
Kensai/Thief
Thief/Mage DC
Archer
Undead Hunter

Using the NPCs I'd probably have this party:

Monk
Anomen
Keldorn
Aerie
Mazzy
Imoen

Of course there are heaps of party combination which will result in very powerful parties, it just depends on what you like. Personally, I like a well balanced party probably with a slight tilt towards fighters - I like to be able to have 3 or 4 front line fighters in my parties.

-- Tiger