Dispelling the Viconia Myth

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I think it depends on the time in the game as who is the most powerful.

Beginning of game -- Jaheira, with Anomen a close second (he would be higher if the proficiency points were reasonable). Viconia is reasonable but Aerie and Cernd are weak.

Middle of game: Viconia and Anomen seem to stagnate. Jaheira stays powerful, but Aerie and Cernd leap in power. Aerie is self explanitory -- arcane + divine spells = many enemies dead. Cernd really starts to shine with all the spells and GWW. Cast stoneskin, shapechange and he becomes just as deadly as Jaheira (with better spells).

End of game (SoA with ToB installed): Cernd really comes on strong, he gets the most HLA's of the bunch and can really dish out damage -- the huge boost in spells is awesome. Viconia and Anomen also make huge gains here with their HLA's and Anomens advantage in combat is not really a factor anymore. Jaheira stagnates somewhat due to the 1.5 million experience points to gain one level in druid (it will be far into ToB before that hurdle is passed). Aerie, while still powerful does not have access to 9th level spells until late in ToB -- hence, she does not have access to arcane HLA's until very late.

ToB: They're all killing machines. Midway through ToB Jaheira gets her spell boost and Aerie get 9th level spells (and the good arcane HLA's).

 

From a power perspective, Viconia isn't the best, IMO. Anomen is a better fighter, and so is Jaheira. Aerie is a more powerful magic-user later in the game. However, she has several important advantages.

1. She's evil, which makes her the natural choice for an evil party. Jaheira can fit with the evil PC, but can't turn undead and doesn't gain spells as quickly, IIRC. Plus, more often than not, controlling undead is better than blasting them into oblivion.

2. As Aldeth has stated, the Strength issue isn't much of a problem, as there are so many STR-enhancers (both items and priest spells) as to make this almost insignificant.

3. As the wabbit has stated, she's hot. And slutty. While I have a few issues about the Viconia romance script, I don't see an evil character putting up with either of the other two female romances. I would have liked to see a different path for the evil PC romancing Viconia, though.

4. With decent items, Viconia is a useful second-rank fighter. She can tank pretty well with a good AC and priest spells except anyone except the main bosses in BG2.

5. Anomen is a self-righteous knob who I can't stand except in small doses. Viconia has no problem with who she really is (unless you try to convert her) and doesn't need membership in the ultimate BG2 old-boys club to feel validated.

6. "Validated" is not a euphemism, by the way.

7. I don't usually take Keldorn along with me - if I'm good, I'm not going to take him from his family. If I'm evil, I sure as hell don't want a paladin hanging around me.

8. Late-game, you can have a mage (usually Edwin for evil parties) cast Wish/Limited Wish, and have Viconia speak to the djinn. 18 Wisdom really comes in handy there...

 

YAY!!!

Viconia stinks!

BTW, edit the first post, she has an 18 WIS, not INT.

 

@Klorox Yes, obviously I meant wisdom, not intelligence. I fixed it - hopefully everyone understood what I meant, as I referenced it more than once, and used wisdom the other times.

 

Jaheira is IMo really crapy NPC. She she can nor fight neither cast. Since I dropped her in first game, never tried to take her again.

 

Actually without her buffs to do some very nice enhancing of her being a multi-class fighter. That's exactly what Jaheira would be. You'd have her loaded up on healing spells and her lower level raise dead spell because she's a harper.

Healing and mediocre fighting sounds exactly like a cleric to me.

 

I keep Jaheira in the party because she's integral to the story (at least to a point). She's a mediocre druid due to her relatively low wisdom, but that's easily resolved with a few Tomes of Understanding. After all, shouldn't she get wiser as the game progresses?

Later in the game I give her a custom scimitar I created (+4 with a few bonuses) so her fighting ability can keep pace.

 

Each one has their traits; make the best of it. Personally, I make the best of it by turning her into a sorc.

 

I do exactly what Zamiel does. I like all of Jaheira's dialog and quest content too much to drop her, so I cheat a bit to make her a better NPC instead (change her weapon proficiencies around, edit some of the clubs/staff/scimitars, give her a custom shapeshift, etc). She'd be far better as a ranger/cleric because of the Flail of Ages and righteous magic, but instead she's stuck with +2 weapons or the staff of Rynn until TOB/WK. Yuck.

 

/rant
Women play BGII!! Wish some of you would remember that. Really annoys me when you assume only males play cRPGs
/end rant

Years ago when I first played BGII I took Anomen. IIRC that lasted about 5 mins real time pushing it maybe 10 but I doubt it. I couldn't stand him. In fact I almost tossed the game figuring if that was the romance for women the whole game probably sucked. Luckily for me I stuck with it but without Anomen. I have never since taken him despite all the great things I hear here.

Not having Beren's interest.
I got bored with Jahaira after a few plays.

I take Vicky if my PC is neutral or evil. I take Aerie if my PC is good. Both are excellent.

I've never played Cernd all the way through. Based on my experience I agree with Wirhe and others. It is what you the player makes of the character. I've had Aerie turn into a killing machine and not that far into BGII either. In fact the last time I took her she was holding her own in the circus tent.

I don't use SK to change any of the original cast. Of course some mod may make changes but that's okay with me if it's not too drastic.

 

As with all the NPCs in my party, I edit Jaheira periodically as I see fit using SK or NearInfinity. For instance, I give her a third proficiency point in scimitar/et al., then a third point in either club or sling, as opposed to adding useless proficiencies for weapons she'll never employ. Viconia, meanwhile, gets another point in mace and flail. In fact, considering Viconia's age and relative experience, she should have more proficiency points than most.

One of the few major complaints I have about the BG rules system is how restrictive weapon specialization is. I'd love to be able to play BG2 with IWD2's rules (and interface).

 

Weapon specialisation isn't actually for non-fighters at all. THAC0 progression is what's meant to reflect a character's progressive experience with using weapons, not weapon specialisation; specialisation is just a bonus for fighters to give them exceptional fighting abilities (extra attacks, damage, etc). A cleric would spend most of their time serving their god and honing their divine abilities.

 

And some men may be fans of the Backstreet Boys, but you're both in the vast minority. I do agree with you that Anomen's romance sucks, and that there should be more romance options for female lead characters. Haer'Dalis, Edwin, and Valygar are all sensible options. And I don't see why lesbian romances should be excluded, either--makes me wonder if any such mods exist.

 

@Zamiel: Kelsey and Tsujatha are both well liked. A Haer Dalis romance is in the works over at G3.

 

You can create your own lesbian romances just by changing a global variable, if that's your thing. It'll make no sense in parts though, since the ladies assume you're male (the same with Anomen calling a male character "my lady" with the AnomenMatch global properly subverted). Maybe if you edit their portraits to give them biker jackets and mullets it'll make it easier to suspend disbelief.

 

Viccy's always been the biggest problem for me, her absolutely terrible HP (110 as her max hp at 40 for me) almost always make her the first to go down in my group (inspite of her SR and low AC). I found great use for her Greater Command and Hold Person, but her terrible con makes her such a liability (same goes for Aerie, but spell turning and stone skin help Aerie make up for this).

Viccy always comes with my Paladin of Ilmater, because I love day and night romances, but I wouldn't even care to guess the number of times she's died (I think my Paladin is the only who's died more then Viccy, just because he's the primary tank and and his massive HP delegate him to eating spells)

 

Yeah, her HP sucks badly.

You can have her use the girdle of fortitude, that'll give her roughly 20 additional HP and it lasts eight hours per use. Righteous magic and holy power stack, and they both give her an extra HP/level up to 20, but they're both short term spells unfortunately (one round/level, both).

 

There's an item mod available at RPG Dungeon that makes the con bonus from the Girdle permanent while the item is worn. This makes a lot of sense, since every other stat enhancing item in the game works this way.