Dual class: level 9 or 13?

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Yes, I was using EasyTutu, and not vanilla BG1.

Hmm, is it really too overpowered? I guess it's a real big head-start.. since I've just started, I may just SK my character's xp to 161k and restart.

Incidentally, if anyone could give me some pointers on how to play this game, that'd be great. Seems to me I could just hack and slash my way through BG1Tutu, and now.. it's sad to say, but my party actually got owned by Amalas and the Beastmaster in the Copper Coronet. A few things of note:

1. Why does everyone say Minsc can tank when his AC is so horrendous and he tends to get hit more than he can dish out, especially with a 2-handed sword?

2. Any easy quests that I should do quickly to get some cash and reputation so I can equip my party to a semblance of the power I had at the end of BG1Tutu?

3. I've done dual-classing before, many years ago, but I seem to have forgotten how hard the transition is. My berserker at the end of BG1Tutu was unstoppable (that may be in a huge part due to the equipment I had), and now I'm totally lost as a mage. I seem to end up hiding in the backlines and doing 1 silly sling attack a round. So.. any tips/tactics to quickly adjust my mindset as that of a newly-created mage and not that of a raging, well-armed berserker warrior?

Thanks in advance!

 

Install Improved Anvil and play on insane. Your 225,000xp probably won't feel overpowering once you do that!

 

Marceror: Since I haven't played BG2 for at least 5 years or so (I think), I'm just going to do a vanilla run first, then install some mods once I've finished it.

 

That seems like something a manual or guide should tell you. That's a pretty important peiece of information right there.

 

Well, as kmonster said, if you imported a character from pure BG1 (with ToSC) into BG2, your character's xp points would be set to 161k.

Seems this only happens because I was using EasyTutu, and since it's the same engine, it must have used my character's accumulated xp.

 

If you want Minsc to tank you should go sword and shield and heavy armour .

Circus Tent in Waukeens Promenade, Slavers quest in Copper Coronet, Solve the murders in the bridge district and the Trademeet Main quest (along with the Djinnis) comes first to mind. Those gives both good cash, exp and rep points IIRC. The Shadow Thieves quest in the Docks also gives good cash and exp but no rep.

Just keep him in the back and use him for offensive spells untill you regain your berserker abilities. Once you get those back buff him up with stuff like stoneskin and spirit armour and wreak havoc in melee .

BG2 is more of a casters gam than BG1 was, explore different spell combinations and I'm sure you'll be the lean mean killing machine you were in BG1 again once you get the hang of it.

 

If you start with 64,000 XP more or less doesn't matter much considering that 1 mage level more or less costs 375,000 XP. No need to restart, you've earned the XP in BG1.

Many players only see Minsc's high strength and conclude super tank and don't bother changing this opinion during the game. You already found out that he isn't that great as tank but other things he can't do better either. Important for tanking is getting AC so low that enemies need a 20 to hit.

You don't have to worry about your mage's efficiency. A simple mage/ghost/spirit armor spell or one of the overpowered robes will grant good AC, stoneskin and mirror image will make him immune to the first 10+ of the rare hits which overcome the AC and those spells can even be recast easily.
3 low level spells alone turn mages into overpowered tanks and there are even more to vastly increase this huge imbalance. A pure mage could wipe the floor with a berserker.

Don't be worried about loosing some battles the first time, the game has quite some unfair situations. If you loose an encounter at a area transition, just enter a building, cast your buffs and repeat this area transition. Even a a simple protection from evil can make the difference.

A simple but cheesy way to get a good start is pickpocketing. Save your game, have Jan pickpocket someone, save again,pickpocket the next. Use some potions of master thievery and rob the shops you can.
Robbing the scrolls from the merchant in the back of the Adventurers Mart yields both XP for scribing and spell power.

 

Man, if you're going for cheese you may as well rob stores that buy fenced goods, and then sell the stuff back. Rinse. Repeat. (This works great with expensive wands).

 

Klorox: I was contemplating doing that, but decided not to, because if I'm going to do that, I might as well SK myself a million gold or so. Kinda takes out all the challenge of finding the money at the start, plus deciding what next to spend on: weapons, armor, or spells?

In any case, after trying out some other tactics, I now feel more comfortable with combat in BG2.