I always alter this....

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What are the things you most want to alter in Shadows of Ahm ?

For me, I always want to switch the Minsc weapon abilities at the start. It always bugged me that he had the following:
Two handed sword **
Mace **
Longbow **
Two weapon spec **

I always go to Shadowkeeper, delete his two stars in 'two weapon spec', and give him two stars in 'two-handed weapons spec' instead.

The other thing I always want to change is the Mace of Disruption, the improved +2 version. I am happy to leave it at +2 THACO, but I would love it to hit undead creatures that normally can only be hit by +4 or better weapons, specifically our old friend Gaxx.

I'm not sure exactly how to do that, but I've always wanted to, ever since I learned what item I needed to have along with the basic Mace of Disruption to get Master-Smith Cromwell to improve it.

 

I to would alter Minsc.

First, I would get rid of the stupid Hamster, besides being childish I believe it's supposed to provide some comic relief at which it fails miserably. It also just takes up a quick item slot.

Second, Minsc and his ignorant babblings are way to annoying to listen to through a whole game. As a matter of fact I would just replace Minsc with Valygar.

 

Minsc's two stars in dual-weilding is from being a ranger. Improved Mace of Disruption strikes as a +5 weapon, so it can indeed hit Kangaxx.

 

I make Minsc capable of dualing to Cleric by raising his Wis, then screw around with his weapon profeciencies.
Or I make him a Beserker with GM in Flails and raise his Wis to 17 again.
THere is a thread I made about that somewhere here.

Mace of Disruption has an enchantment of +4 but THAC0 +1.
Improved Mace of Disruption has an enchntment of +5 and THAC0 +2. I myself have beaten Kangaxx with it.

 

Thanks to Shrikant and CamDawg for the information on the Mace of Disruption, I never realised it could hit Kangaxx. I shall certainly use it on him this time around.

Also, I can at least now see why Minsc has the two-weapon spec (not that it will stop me altering it...heh).

 

I often increase the movement speed of all my chars- using ctrl-J on all the replayings of this game can sometimes feel wrong. Create a barbarian, then use SK to copy the movement bonus onto your real party.

Other than that- starting proficiencies often change, partly because I have Ashes of Embers installed, so there are lots of new options available.

nearly forgot... The one thing I ALWAYS change, is jaheira's portrait back to the old version. Much better.

@juaqeen If you find minsc ignorant and childish, you are happily in the minority. Everyone else loves the guy.

 

Speaking of Minsc, I usually take that one point from maces and re-allocate it to two-handed weapons. Later on, I can spend a few points to some one-handed weapon skill and dual-wield them. Sarevok's two-handed sword can server until then.

Second, I change Viconia's class to sorcerer and change her aligment a little; she does better job that way and I do not need to worry about Aerie's Holy Smite damaging her. There are other reasons too, but they aren't that important.

When it comes to mods; virtue, concurrent romances, and that cloak-fix are what I take almost always.

 

Minsc must suck worse than I thought if everyone seems to want to edit the idiot. For me, the best way to edit him, would be to edit him out of the game completly.

The only thing a always change is my PC's stats to match the class I've chosen...that way I don't have to waste 30 minutes clicking the "re-roll" button to get a high number of stats.

 

Enough Minsc-bashing already. Besides, he always carries that tasty little rodent with him. (No wonder he won't let me carry Boo. )

I generally prefer to improve Imoen's strength, while decreasing her charisma. I figure that the experiments Irenicus put her through built up her strength, while disfiguring her as a side-effect, causing her Cha to go down. (Really all I want is to super-charge little Imy while taking the hit in a much less important stat. ) After all, Imoen's one weakness is her weakness.

 

actually, minsc is quite good with dual-weilding.

 

Minsc at least is entertaining and enthusiastic. Valygar drags my morale down and complains about me not having a plan. (Even when I have one.)

 

We all agree that editing NPCs is cheating?
You do what you want, but... you are taking away something from the game. You modify the constraints, making an easier game.
Sure, this dwarf, with ***** in flails will kick ass...
Sure, ** in 2 hands weapons is "handy" for the idiot called Minsc...
But I understand. For Jaheira, for example, it's very tempting as her proficiencies come so slowly. Or Minsc's ** in maces are generally useless. Or ** in long bows for that matter...
Yet I've never done it because it would give me too much the feeling that I'm cheating.

 

One thing you have to consider is that the makers of the game have already edited some of the NPCs. For example, Jaheira had 14 Dex in BG1, but now she has 17 Dex in BG2. I'm not complaining; I just want to point out that they started it. I think it's just fine, so long as you can RP it. (e.g. my Imoen change in the post above, changing proficiencies to what you gave them in BG1, etc.)

 

@will- agreed, if you take points from a prof to make another into grandmastery, then I'd feel guilty too. But removing jaheira's points in club and putting them in scimitar does not bother me. It doesn't overpower the character (the club combo for jaheira is reckoned by many to be extremely nasty). Instead, I do it to make the NPC more fun to replay. Play the game enough times and you'll probably feel the same way.

 

That's the key angryguy. If you play the game enough, you look for something different, and the only constraint I have is that you enjoy playing each time you go through the game.

I would recommend going easy on modifying things first time round, or even the first couple of times. After that, do what the heck you want, as long as you enjoy the result.

Since I started this thread, I have abandoned my original game and re-started with a PC half-elven fighter thief (very powerful combo), an NPC monk (which I have never played before), Viccy, Korgan, Edwin, Imoen.

What I intend to alter this time around is my PC (3* instead of 2* max in dual wielding, the extra * coming off something else) and Imoen. She gets 18 intelligence, and later on, an exp boost to put her on a par with the rest of the party (can't go into details on that without spoilers).

I will take these all through BGII and ToB, though I may well dump the monk for a certain fighter, available only in ToB.

So far I am enjoying playing again, even though I have already played (starting at BG1 to the end of BGII) more than a half dozen times, including solo, and have partially played several more times.

 

Gilden....you started so well. I agree with your movtivation, but for me, pushing your profs beyond their limits crosses the line into cheating.

Also- why give imoen 18 INT? Please don't tell me you believe that she needs it to cast level 9 spells. Not true, not true at all.

 

angryguy, that is exactly what I believed....is that wrong ?

The only reason I did that (with Imoen) was because I intended to go through ToB as well. If I had just been going through SoA I wouldn't have bothered.

 

Well, she should need 18 INT to cast 9th level spells (by 2nd ed. rules). I wouldn't know what the game allows, because I always bump her INT too. After all, I always give her the Tome of Clear Thought in BG1 if I'm going to dual her, so she should have 18 to start with. (It boosts her lore a tiny bit, too.)

 

She doesn't need it for L9's, period.

@gilden- I was referring to giving your MC fighter/thief three * in dual wield. Normally the max is 2, and you used SK to exceed that.

 

Actually, I just tried creating an elven F/T, and I was able to put *** into two-weapon style on the character generation screen! (Fully patched SoA)