Playing BGII for the second time

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I’m not sure why we have so many threads about people’s new parties and games but I guess most of like writing about what we’re doing, and there are some people who do like reading this stuff, so here goes.

As has been mentioned in some other threads, I am attempting my second ever game over Baldur’s Gate II. My first game is covered in another thread somewhere.

This time I have installed Ease-Of-Use and Unfinished Business. I chose Unfinished Business because it felt more ‘official’ (a bit like a Director’s Cut) and added rather than changed the content of the game. As I can’t actually remember everything from the vanilla version, I’m not sure if I will notice all the changes anyway.

My character is a half-elf Cleric / Ranger called Liam, using the cool hooded Ed Norton portrait from Keyser Soze. I chose this character because I wasn’t sure exactly what sort of party I would end up with so I wanted a reasonably versatile PC. A swashbuckler would have been preferable for me from a party balance point of view but that would have been too much like my previous Kensai / Thief character.

At this stage, I plan for this character to attempt to romance Aerie. I chose Aerie because this seemed a bit different from all the recommendations to choose Viconia or Jaheira and sounded more challenging.

The beauty of playing again so long after the first game is that I can hardly remember anything about the game and what I’m supposed to do, so it’s a bit like playing a new game again. It’s taking me a while to get used to the BGII interface and rules again, after a year of NWN, but it’s mostly coming back to me.

So, coming out of the dungeon and dealing with the circus tent, I have a party of Liam, Minsc, Jaheira, Yoshimo, and Aerie. I think I will end up subbing out Yoshimo shortly because he’s not going to be there long-term and I don’t want him consuming XP that could be better going to someone else. So I suppose that means that I will have to go and get Jan. He’s in the government area, right? Not sure what this means for the long term make-up of my party but I guess that means it will be based around Liam, Aerie and Jan – so it will certainly need beefing up with some tougher tanks. It also means it will probably be short of high-level spell casting ability, which might be a bit of a challenge.

Any thoughts are, of course, welcome.

 

Hmm, R/C, Aerie and Jan takes care of everything but tanks. Damn. Korgan's out of the question because he'll break the romance with Aerie, but Minsc is a must. Your R/C can tank, especially with FoA and Crom, meaning you only really need one more.

Mazzy! She makes a great tank even when dual-wielding, and is a dead shot with a short bow. Most people don't take her because they don't want to go to the Temple Ruins early, but it's really no problem. You can always come back for the Shadow Dragon later, and in the meantime you can just stroll right by him with...[spoilerish]. All you really need is some magic weapons to hurt the many shadows, and you'll be fine. At higher levels most people run into a lich, but at lower levels there're just a couple mummies and skeleton warriors, nothing that can't be easily handled.

Who to put in the sixth spot, though? Sarevok springs to mind, but you'd have to either go through SoA with only five or drop someone when you get there (which you probably wouldn't do). You might try Valygar for the backstab, or Haer'Dalis if you can handle micro-managing a Blade. And of course Jaheira would work too. *shrugs*

 

The main issue with party composition is the balance between doing people's quests and having long term members in early. Given that I don't play very often, I will probably lean towards trying to as many NPC quests as possible, so that will mean that the composition of the party will change a lot whilst those quests are being done. This can be tricky with people like Jaheira whose quest lasts for ages and overlaps with other people's. This is yet another reason to get rid of Yoshimo, as he does not have any quests to undertake.

Hmm, no Korgan again? That's a little bit annoying as I didn't have him last time either.

 

Mazzy is a good tank. I would like to point out that you only need to go into the temple and free her. Once she's in your party, just leave and come back later. Don't worry about the rest of the dungeon. Mazzy won't complain about it unless UB does something about it.

Minsc I would highly recommend, especially with Jan and Aerie.

You could just stick with 5 people and use the sixth spot as a revolving quest door. This would give more xp to you multiclassed characters.

 

Consider edwin for the mage spot ^^b
Really powerful mage, and IMHO the edwina phenomenon has to be one of the most memorable bg2 moment that every player should experience at least once. As for tanks, 2 iron skins tanker means you really do not need tanks that badly imho. Personally I will be leaning towards mazzy, jaheira, edwin, jan and aerie as your long term companions. Plenty of spellcasting fun which should provide a different experience than your last run. No shortage on the banter aspect either with jan picking on everyone, edwin get picked on by everyone, edwina^^, 2 hot women fighting for your hot R/C, and the good vs evil conflict between your members.

 

It should. After all, the love of her life was captured with her. (He's the other shadow accompanying the Shadow Lord.)

Hmm, that would open the door back up for Sarevok. Keep it to five for the extra XP and the extra slot for NPC quests in SoA, and put Sarevok in when it's no longer an issue.

 

He's not an option 'til ToB though, which means he'll be level 16 when your party is upwards of 18-21. It might be best not to run a whole ton of a quests and bash in the XP, just so when you get there, Sarevok isn't way behind in xp. Honestly, without doing 50% of the optional quests (not even watchers or anything through SoA), my party was average level 18-20 (17/18 jan) still.


Korgan is a really awesome character to have I think. So it is somewhat of a shame if you're really up to romancing Aerie.

 

That doesn't make much sense, omni. Sarevok will be level 17 no matter what, so you have the option of having a party just as low as him, or a more powerful party that can help carry him.

At that level, the differences aren't too big. You're better off maximizing the characters you can in SoA (although I wouldn't go to Watcher's Keep, unless you just want to go shopping).

 

Sarevok won't be that far off from your party. specially with multiclass members in it. And he has a little nicety or two that makes up for it.

 

@Fel - I never played with UB, so I didn't know, but I thought it best to give a warning in case they (the mod's programmers) changed things. And yes, I did know about Patrick.

As for Sarevok, am the only one who has him level up when in the party? I always see him at 19 and have to level him up.

 

Oh well, sounds like I can't easily have Korgan and Aerie so I'm going to have miss out on one of them. I think I'll just go with the flow and see what happens.

Jan is on board and now and hasn't shut up for long. The story seems to have directed me towards Umar already (must be something to do with being a Ranger - as last time I ended up at the D'arnise Estate first).

I don't remember much about what happens at Umar, other than that hilarious Umar Witch Project thing.

 

Yep. Gaelan Bayle usually gives you a push toward your stronghold, and it's just your luck that Jan is in the same district with the two people who send you to Umar.

So, do you still have Jaheira? Have you dumped Yoshimo yet? Details, bird-boy!

 

No, I haven’t dumped Jaheira or Yoshimo yet. I’m trying hard not to ‘plan ahead’ (because that seems to go against the whole concept of role-playing) but Jaheira is still there because I hope to be able to do her quest, which I think is a bit tweaked with Unfinished Business.

Also. Yoshimo is still there because I find his traps to be useful and Jan only has a measly 5 points put into this skill. Although, for a Bounty Hunter, Yoshimo’s trap skills seem to be bit low as well.

Don’t expect details of my game to come through thick and fast because I’m not like you guys who manage to complete whole chapters in a few minutes. It took me an hour and 7 reloads just to get past those angry dwarfs in that bar just after you get out of the dungeon. One of them confused Minsc (not hard) and when he started hacking at Jaheira, it was all over.

 

Heh, HB2: The Return of HB!

The original Arya(?) run was a fun read... who was in your party again?
I only remember Anomen... Hey! why not take him again!
Otherwise, did you want to try a different set of characters this time?

Also, I don't think it's such a big deal to take Yoshimo... yeah he leaves, but the way he does is interesting in the game if you haven't seen it, and XP points aren't so very hard to come by in this game that you need to optimize your game. Plus, you conveniently get another thief (Imoen) right when Yoshi splits, so no worries.

I'd say, just have fun and see where the game leads you. And btw, has Aerie said anything about visiting Qualye yet?

 

Bion - last time I had a variety of people, but (in order of longevity) I had:

Arya (Kensai / Thief)
Minsc
Nalia
Keldorn
Anomen
Viconia
Imoen
Jan
Sarevok
Jaheira (only in Chapter 1 and a bit of 2)
Mazzy (briefly)
Valygar (briefly)
Haer D'Alis (briefly)

Aerie has not mentioned Quayle since we left the circus.

I never had Korgan, Edwin, Aerie, or Cernd.

 

This isn't going to turn in to 500x2 thread describing your runthough again...is it?

Please tell me you aren't going to take Minsc again. This being your second runthrough, I highly advise you take more evil NPCs. Your last game was nothing but good/neutral NPCs save for Sarevok...you need more variety, Harby. Korgan is *the* perfect replacement for Minsc, and Edwin is great, with several humerous banters.

 

Well, I don't know if it will end up being 500 posts but that will depend on whether anybody is interested in it. BGII is a big part of what SP is all about after all and I haven't really posted anything about since last year.

As for Minsc - at this stage he does NOT figure in my long-term plans, for the very reason you mentioned: that I am looking to do some different stuff. He probably won't be going to Spellhold but he might stay long enough to do his new Boo quest, if I can fit that in. At the very least he will hang around until I come across someone better. At the moment, he is our only pure tank so he has to stay for now, to hack at things with the Sword of Chaos.

 

Please take Edwin when you can get him. I had played several times never taking him. Had read various threads and was sure I knew what happened to him. When it did I laughed so hard I cried.

Korgan is your best tank but hard to keep. He is a one man army. Awesome. I have only had Mazzy briefly in my parties so can't judge and of course I won't ever have Anomen unless I'm playing a male PC and not sure even then.

 

Hmm, so your main guys were Minsc, Nalia, Keldorn, Anomen, and Viconia (with Sarevok in ToB).

Now you have Minsc, Jaheira, Yoshimo, Aerie, and Jan...

One way to decide is through RPing. Would your new PC like Minsc or think he's a danger to the party? Though *you* know Yoshi won't be around so long, would your PC like him (again, a nice plot device if he stays). Does your PC really like turnip jokes all that much?

Why not keep Jaheira and Aerie together? They have nice banters (actually, banter pack might have been a good mod to install, tho you might have to restart...) Jaheira can be an excellent tank and mage killer with a strength belt and the right spells. And Aerie is like a walking spell dictionary... (and why not hold off your romance plans til you've heard what these two have to say...)

Your PC, Jaheira, Aerie, and Yoshimo are already a balanced party: 1 fighter, 1.5 cleric, .5 mage, 1 thief (to 1 fighter, 1.5 cleric, 1 mage, .5 thief with Imoen). You could really fit anyone into this party.

You might run into Valygar soon; if you like backstabing and you want your R/C to wear heavy armor he might be good (and you haven't used him that much). You might run into Haer'Dalis later, who you also haven't used much; like Jaheira, he can be very strong at melee if you prepare him correctly (plus he has some interesting dialogue, and he'll add some arcane power to the party)....

 

Well, I can only have Edwin if I happen to find him and I'm sure I never found him last time. Don't tell me where he is - if I come across him, I'll come across him and see what happens.

Anyway, Yoshimo got killed by an Umber Hulk! Jaheira managed to revive him using the Harper's Call, but we subbed him off a bit later anyway, because he wasn't really pulling his weight after Jan took over most of his old roles.