Full run through of Gold Box games

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Thinking about starting a full run through from PoR to PoD. Will carry over characters from each one. Obviously due to the limitations of PoR, I won't have a choice to have paladin/ranger (without dualclassing).

Any suggestions on how to go about it? I'm open to all suggestions.

 

Starting at PoR stinks if you want to keep rolling over characters from game to game. It's limited in character selection. In PoD you need more dual-classed characters, as PoD is HARD. I have tried this in the past and have not found that party that carries over easily. Each game requires seperate types of builds. The only ways I see to do this is to either handicap yourself with multi-class characters from the get go or keep all characters as human, single-classed unitl the final game, then dual-class away.

 

So in the latter case, what would your recommendations be?

 

I also tried this for the Krynn trio, CoK, DKoK and DQoK. It doesn't really work out very well. DMC's idea is perfect if yu plan on tackling the BIG fight at the end of PoD, but otherwise, I found each game is setup a little differently and there was no "Best Party Build" to do what you are trying to tackle. I think the following can get through any of the games, but is not the best build for any of the games.

1 - Fighter
2 - Fighter
3 - F/M/T
4 - F/M/C
5 - F/C
6 - Mage

 

Playing through the Krynn trilogie with one party works quite well (I did it), but for playing from PoR to PoD consider exchanging characters between games.

PoR doesn't have rangers and paladins, you can't add them before CotAB.
While multiclasses are powerful in PoR non-humans are horribly weak in the later games because of the racial level restrictions. A half-elf fighter8/cleric5/mage8 won't be very useful in a game for level 40 characters for example.
If you absolutely want to have a non-human in PoD take a dwarf fighter9/thief40 or elf fighter7/mage11/thief40.

You should be aware that hitpoints at level up are rolled randomly, so you have reload at level up in the early games if you want as many hitpoints as characters created in later games.

I played through the games with fighter15/mage, fighter10/cleric, cleric9/thief, paladin, paladin15/ranger, ranger10/mage (the last 3 replaced the dwarf fighter/thief, HE cleric/mage and HE fighter/cleric/mage I used in PoR), other parties will work too.

If you don't want to replace party members between the games I recommend something like

fighter13/cleric
fighter14/mage
cleric9/ranger
cleric14/mage
mage14/paladin
fighter/mage/thief

 

OK, I wrote a long post and the board ate it Here's the short version.

kmonster is right -- you shouldn't play the same 6 characters through all 4 games.

dmc is right that the best build is a Warrior X/Caster Y (Warrior can be Fighter or Paladin or Ranger), but totally wrong that it should be Warrior 39/Caster 40. The optimal builds are Warrior 13/Caster X (not for Rangers though), Warrior 15/Caster X, and Warrior 17/Caster X. More warrior levels mean better THAC0 but worse casting, not to mention delaying the time when the character is truly dual-classed. You probably want to mix those builds in your party.

The X will vary depending on how many random encounters you fight, but when I played through, one typical character was Ranger 17/Mage 29 by the end, and the party was able to beat (I won't say "easily beat") Dave's Challenge. I can't imagine where you would get the xp for Warrior 39/Caster 40.

Can anyone explain why Warrior 14/Caster X and Warrior 16/Caster X are bad choices?

 

Heh, good point about running them through multiple times dmc, though I don't think that's what the OP wants to do. Anyway, how about the first time through, when your entire party is Fighter 35 or whatever? That can't be much fun.

The differences between a F17/M30 and a F39/M40:
Same THAC0
Same spells/day
The latter has 54 more HP, which is nice, but keep in mind that the former still has over 170 HP.
The latter does 33% more damage with *some* (not all) of the best spells. For example, 40d6 Fireball instead of 30d6.

So, although the 39/40 is "better", it isn't essential to beating the game or even the challenge.

 

ahok, got it. You sure must have had a lot of free time in those days.

Regardless, my point is still that a party of 39/40s isn't all that much better than what the OP will get by playing through the game just once, and it isn't needed to beat the challenge.

I think my party was this:
Thief 10/Mage 40
Paladin 17/Cleric X
Fighter 17/Cleric X
Ranger 17/Mage X
Ranger 15/ Mage X
Ranger 13/ Mage X

The Xs were in the 28-36 range or so.

 

Dave's challenge isn't very hard. My party (mentioned in my previous post, by far not the most powerful party possible) didn't have much trouble beating it after finding the hidden resting place. They had to rest only once (It's allowed to rest at least 3 times there) to win all the battles without much trouble. Neither potions nor scrolls were needed.

 

Since no-one answered before:

A 14th level Warrior has the same THAC0 and saves as at 13th level. When he gains 15th level, his THAC0 improves by 2 and all his saves improve by 1. Likewise, 16th level is no better than 15th except for 3 extra HP. Reaching 17th level again improves THAC0 by 2 and all saves (except breath) by 1. There are no further improvements to THAAC0 and saves.

This bizzare THAC0 progression is right out of the 1E DMG, and can be easily verified in-game. (Interestingly, the word "THAC0" comes from 2E; 1E uses attack tables). Saves are never displayed, but I assume they implemented them according to the 1E DMG as well.

 

I believe it would be a better idea to create your characters in Curse of the Azure Bonds and work from there. That way you can use Paladins and Rangers instead of plain fighters. I believe you will have much better success taking a party all the way through doing it that way. Don't dual-class until the last game.

On the subject of character creation, I recall this question since I first got Curse on my Apple II. Is there any benefit to choosing a plain fighter over a Paladin and Ranger in the games besides the broader race and alignment options?
Especially since after Curse, the demihuman races become useless for anything except thieves, although in Silver Blades a dwarven Fighter/Thief is usually better than a plain thief.

 

Fighters have better multi-class options also, not that there are any good multiclass options past the second game.

The main reason to take a Fighter over one of the other two Warrior classes is that they take less xp to gain levels. Faster level gain means better THAC0 (not to mention a few more HP). As mentioned before, THAC0 gains stop at level 17, but the Fighter gets there sooner and so will have a head start on the inevitable dual-class. In the long run, a Fighter/Mage will be two mage levels ahead of a Paladin/Mage, which means more spells/day (until level 29), and more damage on Fireball, etc.

 

I do not remember paladins being able to dual or multiclass. It was against 1ed rules. Likewise rangers could only dual or multiclass with cleric. I do not remember the gold box games violating basic rules.

 

It was permitted in 1E. From the PH, page 33:

In order to switch from one class to another, the character must have an
ability score of 15 or more in the principal attribute(s) ability of the
original class and a 17 or 18 in the principal attribute(s) of the class
changed to. Note that nearly any combination of classes is thus possible,
i.e. cleric 8 fighter, cleric & paladin, cleric & ranger, etc. Alignment will
preclude some combinations.

The Gold box games are based mostly on 1E, with some 2E stuff mixed in, much like some of the 2E Infinity Engine games had minor 3E elements.

 

Thanks for the feedback everyone.

I played through all 4 games (well halfway through PoD) by starting new characters at the beginning. Now I am formally going to go all the way through with the same characters.

My making will be....

F => dualed to Cleric
F
F
T => dualed to Mage
C
M

So I end up with 2 pure fighters, 2 clerics, 2 mages, and a thief.

The question I have now is, what is the optimal level to dual the fighter to Cleric and the thief to Mage? The sooner I can dual to mage the better, as it gives more firepower. What additional benefits come from levelling up the thief character?

I am planning only 1 run-through, so please don't assume any sort of uber levels from re-runs.

Thanks!

 

You can't dualclass in PoR so you have to wait at least until CotAB.

I recommend dualing your thief to mage at level 10 which you will reach at the start of CotAB. You'll get your thieving abilities back during the game and you'll get 1d4+2(mage11) instead of 2(thief11) hitpoints for reaching level 11.

For dualing the fighter to cleric I recommend level 9 or 13. Dualing early will allow you to play a fighter9/cleric10 instead of a fighter 11 in CotAB, if you wait until level 13 you'll get 2 instead of 1.5 attacks per round, 4 extra hitpoints and +1 to hit on the long run.

Consider dualclassing one or even both of your pure fighters to mage at level 13-15. Fighters don't get extra attacks after level 13 and the few extra hitpoints they get afterwards aren't nearly as useful as spells like mirror image, fire shield or level 40 fireballs.
Definitely give 18 int to them at creation to have this option available in SotSB.

 

As kmonster said, level 10 is the perfect spot to dual-class thief to mage.

All fighters should definitely be dualed by level 17 at the latest. Continued fighter levels are barely any better than ceasing to train entirely.

However, the F 9/C is not a good suggestion. Cleric spellcasting is not used much in combat compared to fighting or mage spellcasting, so, like the pure cleric, this guy will have to spend most of his time in melee (or you could make him an archer, I suppose). But his fighting is a lot worse than a true fighter's and overall I think you would be disappointed in him.

Keep in mind that SotSB gives out tons of experience and is pretty easy. This is a great place to level your fighters to 15, then switch to mage or cleric and level that to 15 as well.


My suggestion:
F 17/C
F 13/M
F 15/M
T 10/M
C
M