I really need an opinion from all of you

Remove all ads!

Thank you all for the great help.
I´m gonna try a new game with two druid characters ,and develop them in different ways.
I guees , by the end of the game the horizon looks clearer to me...

 

I know I´ve probably been reading too many walkthroughs, but the Ranger(1)/Druid(29) seems (to me, at least) to have a little more of an edge. Give it a good bow, dual wield and a great leather armor, and it will rock.
You lose a single druid level, but you do get the level 1 Ranger bonuses, a decent tradeoff IMO. The druid will be a lot better at holding its own. And I guess 1 level of Ranger wouldn´t qualify as "crazy multiclassing"......

 

Frankly I find the multiclassing in 3e to be somewhat obscene, and so always use pure classes. You get so many feats in IWD2 that you really don't have to bother with multiclassing to make a fighter/druid. I don't understand how anyone could consider a druid to be lacking in any way. A druid really can do a bit of everything, and all of it passably well. My druids always start out holding their ground in kill percentage with my other front line fighter (usually a ranger), but by around level 8-9 the druid pulls ahead, and even by the end of the game the sorceror still doesn't catch up.

Then again, I would never leave home without a bard. Bards are a perfect complement to a druid, and if I ever bother with a 2 person party that's what it will be - druid and bard. It's a shame that bards can't fight and sing at the same time like in NWN - it means that they have to be micromanaged, and that's just annoying.

I also tend to go melee heavy with feats right from the start, and lean my stats that way too. Start a druid with 14 12 12 10 18 10 and get greatsword or axe proficiency. Dual wielding is cool and is certainly implemented far better in IWD2 than in BG2, but the value of the extra reach (to counter the notoriously appalling IE pathfinding) and big hits (to get through DR) of the big weapons shouldn't be underestimated.

Use Beast Claws to death until you get two attacks and have someone to cast Bull's Strength, by which time the greatsword has the advantage.

Get the Wildshape Panther feat at level 6 and use items and buffs to get the ac up to a reasonable level. Throw in Bardsong, Bull's Strength, Stoneskin, Mage Armour and Haste and watch him go Don't forget to switch between forms for the healing when the fight gets down to the line. If only shapeshifting didn't negate the buffs *sigh*.

Also, let's not forget that druids can summon nifty weapons for any situation. My first party wiped several times on their first Crystal Golem, and didn't have a blunt weapon between them (slings didn't work). With just Bull's Strength and Shillaleah (sp?) my druid cleaned the golem's clock in seconds. Fire and ice and moonblades all have situational uses.

If you don't have a ranger and the druid isn't leading then build up the Animal Empathy skill - it's great stealing your enemy's pets

The Lightning and Summoning spells have already been covered in this thread, and suffice to say, they are rather nice.

 

Single class characters are great for the normal game. You'll want for your spellcasters to level up fast. But in HoF Dual-class rules. You don't need more than 8 levels as a paladin or 11 levels as a bard. And a few levels as a paladin for a cleric or a few levels as fighter for a druid&cleric are nice to have in HoF. The only ones I never consider DC-ing are the Sorcerer and the Monk. The rest are pretty much mixed up. Try an evenly leveled elf (any subrace) fighter/ranger for a great tank.

 

Or you can just multiclass for the fun of it. Like my Disciple of the Watch Barbarian Bard Cleric. It just seemed to suit his personality the best, even though it probably makes him less powerful than a pure cleric.

 

I think this topic was already dead and (surprisingly) I´ve discovered that it´s still alive.How luck, because I wanna to put some more logs on the fire:
Recently, I´ve finished my (1000 time) HoF game with NO DRUID and an (to me ) outstanding record:
NO SUMMON ANIMAL OR UNDEAD trough the entire game.
Far from sounds boring, it seems to me the best game ever, nothing between you and a horde of hard SoBs, antxious to tear you apart in a million little pieces.
I´ve to recognize that it´s not a walk in the park, but it suits my kind of play like no other strategy, so anyone who want to try it, be my guess!
An entire new game opens, you have to careful watch every aspect of the figth, knowing that you can only rely on your party members (and their weakness and strengths) to walk away from a battle(c´mon, this sounds exactly like the real life to me).
I love it!
But I´m a man of words, so the next thing I´m gonna do it´s try the All-migthy and versatile PC that many people claims that the druid is.

 

Hey guys,I need an opinion too!
This is my party formation:
1.Level 24 Aasimar Paladin of Ilmater
2.Level 24 Gold Dwarf Fighter
3.Lev 20 ranger/lev 4 bard half-elf
4.Lev 24 Drow cleric
5.lev 20 mage/5 thief gnome.

Just showing off... )

 

Wow. I'm so jealous! Your party rules.