A party of bards

Remove all ads!

After all this talk of IWD2 dying, I decided to pull out the CDs and give it one more try. But no powergaming for me this round. No, I'm going to the complete opposite and playing a party of...bards!

I call my quartet "The Mercenary Choir". I have a soprano (Serenity), alto (Quintessence), tenor (Leif), and bass (Travis). As befits such a crazy concept, each bard is a chaotic neutral. They're charming, covetous cads addicted to wild living and healing potions.

Each character has a 20 Charisma and 18 Strength; the other four attributes are randomly distributed to provide some variation between the bards. I have my 18 Constutition tank, a 14 Intelligence skillmonger, etc.

They're not pure bards...each one has four fighter levels, for the weapon specialization. But, to make it even harder - and goofier - my bards are aasimars. That means they triggered the 20% experience penalty once they hit level six in bard.

Yes, if I were powergaming, a much better idea would be to mix paladin-sorcerers - the paladins are the aasimar's favored class, the charisma bonuses would stack, and the sorcerers have a much better spell selection than the bards. But that wouldn't be near so much fun as my ruthless quartet.

I'm just about done with the Ice Temple, and, inexplicably, this round is the easiest of all my IWD2 adventures. I'm doing better with this intentionally crippled party than my carefully-crafted "power" parties.

Full disclosure: I'm using Weimar's minimum-experience mod, as minor compensation for my four-person party and my ECL penalty. I'm also using the infinite-stacking mod, which is a real moneymaker since I can now vacuum up and sell everything I find. Those two mods do make the game a li'l easier, but not outrageously so.

With this group, I may not be able to beat the game. But I can PLAY it.

 

Is this not rather difficult? I tried a party of clerics once and a party of monks, only to give up since it was frustratingly hard. I think that a party of certain races rather than classes would be more fun, but each to his own. Perhaps it would be fun, though I predict that I would give up due to rather limited spell selections, item options and skills.

 

I played with a party of drows that were escaping from Luskan (just to fall into something worse). I had my female bard (the leader!!) my cleric, another fighter-cleric, and a bunch of male servants (one fighter, one wizard and one ranger)

Very funny to roleplay a party of self-interested group of drows that must fight in favour of those who they hate so much, just for their own survival .

 

party of bards.wow.song of death!

i think that your party is great both in powergaming and plot..because bards are "jack of all trades but master of none" they can be a good fighter with spells to power up.and nice thief to..(not very much,but they have the hooded shirt).then a sorcerer.

but the most fun of that,nothing is most disgracing losing into batch of tenors..

 

My powergaming mind tell me that if I create a all bard party like you, when they all reaches bard's 11 Lv, all sing the best song in battle, except the most warrior type of my bard(protected with spells) go hack and slash.

Anyway, I will not do that.

 

And how would you call it? Bremens Brass Band? Fantasy Adventure Fanfare?

 

My vicious quartet has just finished clearing the Fellwood. (Fortunately they had a map courtesy of my previous IWD2 incarnations.) Right now they're each Bard 8 / Fighter 4, heavily burdened by that 20% experience penalty.

I've assigned each bard a different weapon, and the Fighter levels give them specialization. The soprano wields a two-handed axe; the alto uses polearms; the tenor lugs a greatsword; and the bass has a hammer-and-tongs (I mean, shield). For those few monsters that only respond to one damage type - for example, bludgenoning-vulnerable golems - I have my bass fight solo, with the other three bards each playing a different song.

Level 1 and 2 bard spells are not that useful, but the level 3 spells are great - Confusion, Haste, and the four Emotion spells. Much more fun, and useful, than pure fighters - if still less powerful than mixing fighters (or paladins) with sorcerers.

After playing for awhile, I see that the infinite stacking mod is a lot more unbalancing than I'd expected. I've taken to stacking a hundred healing potions and then mass-medicating my bards between battles. Plus, now that I can limitlessly stack missile ammunition, I can pick up everything that isn't nailed down and sell it for...yes, potion cash. Granted, they are heavy drinkers, but THIS heavy?

I think I'll stick with calling them the Choir, since these covetous cads are only interested in what they can "acquire". Oof, sorry...