OOTS Party

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I want to know what Belkar said to the Golems after finding himself ineffective...

 

I shudder to think of the puns Elan made from that

 

Hey, even if daggers are his preferred weapons, it's not all that far-fetched to assume that in his utter rage of futileness he starts flailing around with is arms in a way that he succeeds in scoring a bludgeoning hit here and there.

 

Having just played a party thru IWD1/HOW/TOTL, I think that I can say that a "problem" with traps in 3e is the difference in numbers of HP. In 2e, HP totals pretty much cap out at around level 10 with only small numbers of HP (1 or 2) added per level above that point. OTOH, in 3e, you get the same dX number of HP (plus any CON bonus) at every single level without change. In the end, 3e characters have so many more HP that it tends to make damage producing traps seem rather lame.


As for the traps in LoS r2, I did increase damage by 50%, but made no other changes. I pretty much did it this way because it was the quickest, easiest upgrade that I could do. I suppose that I could further increase the amount of damage, but after some point it would seem pointless. You either end up with a trap that simply kills outright, or produces damage that can just be healed, if you're willing to ignore it. At some point you have to start adding some secondary effects, such as poison, or confusion, etc. to make the traps nastier. Or have the traps simply trigger nasty spells, such as Horrid Wilting or a Fireball.

 

Actually, DMC, many of my IWD2 parties have only 1 arcane caster and 1 divine caster. It's entirely possible to succeed in IWD2 with such a party. I think that my very first party may have also had a wizard as the mage, rather than a sorc, because IIRC, I wasn't familiar with sorcerers back then and stuck with the familiar ol' wizzy.

 

I'm with you on the time loop. It does tend to be rather confusing, even for an experienced player.

 

The most frustrating thing for me in the time loop is all the forced resting, especially on top of waiting for the histachii dude earlier. I don't like having my game time shoot up from 18-odd days to 26+ just from going through Dragon's Eye. I know Targos isn't in danger after Act I, but it still feels like giving Isair and Madae too much time to catch their strategic breath.

-Max

 

I guess that I've never really bothered to worry about the day count.

However, I do agree that it's frustrating to have to wait for Nheero so often. Luckily, if you have a pally in your party, you can skip a lot of the waiting. You can also skip some waiting if you don't bother giving Nheero the sabotaged potion (and give up the XP) and just use it immediately. It was really, REALLY frustrating for my in my most recent party which didn't include a paladin, I let Nheero have the potion first and went thru all the motions.... man, oh man, was that tedious and annoying ... waiting for Nheero to go on his little histachii walkabout, then to wait for him to research Thoraskuss' love of disguises and Feyrs, and so forth and so forth. Dragon's Eye in IWD1 was much more fun when you didn't have to worry about this sort of crap, and you could just kill (pretty much) everything in your path to complete the area.

 

Amen, brother! After long consideration I decided: IWD1>IWD2
If only the IWD1 Tutu would be continued/finished.

 

I won't say that IWD1 is always better than IWD2 (or visa-versa). I played a run of both games last month, and I've got to say that there's something to be said for the relative simplicity of IWD1's 2e characters. You really don't have to worry about Feats or Skills, except for weap. profs for everyone, and skills for thieves. OTOH, there are things about 2e I don't like, such as the racial limitations on class selections, and weapon limitations.

There are certain areas in IWD1 (mostly in HOW) that I don't like because they are SOOOOOOOOOOOO linear. Mind you, the storyline is entirely linear in both IWD1 and IWD2, and I accept that that's just the way it is. But what gets really annoying is how in certain HOW areas, there's only one way in and one way out, and the only path of "movement" thru the area is just one long path without any choice to "go left or go right". Most of the other areas in base IWD1, you aren't forced to go down an entirely singular path thru most areas and there is some room for variation.

Of course, IWD1 has in its favor the fact that you have HOW and TOTL to extend play whereas IWD2 has no such add-ons.