Why are Invokers in BG1 so disadvantaged?

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I have always wondered this as I always use Dynaheir and she cant do much with lvl 4 and 5 spells in BG1.

For their level 5 spells, all they have available in the game without mods is cloudkill, which is a horrible spell to use in combat situations due to it hitting party members as well. Invokers already sacrifice the ability to use Confusion and Chaos, and on top of this their spells hit everyone including party members .

Also, I dont think there are any Cone of Cold scrolls in all of BG1 either? I modified in a Cone of Cold scroll while destroying my Chaos Scroll to keep it somewhat fair, and am still looking for Shadow Door and Animate Dead which I am certain are available in the game.

Also, there is a mod which stops your invoker spells from hitting party members? It would be nice if BG1 also had the Wall of Fire and Sunfire spells, but the only ones that were put into the game were Cloudkill and Cone of Cold with the latter being inaccesible since they didnt put a scroll anywhere (I never found one when I first played, and guides on the internet say it is available through hacks only).

Or why did they have to make Dynaheir an Invoker while she is the only useful good aligned mage in the game? I dont think it is possible to have Edwin and Minsc in the same party, and I always take the storyline characters - Imoen, Jaheira, Khalid, Minsc and Dynaheir.

The only thing that Dynaheir can do in Durlags tower without any modifications is sling fireballs and lightning bolts, I dont even think there are any usefull lvl 4 invoker spells like Ice Storm available either. Her lvl 4 spellbook is full of Dimension Door and Minor Globe of Invulnerbility, and lvl 3 has Haste / Slow and Dispell magic since I have 6 wands of fireballs stocked up for damage, but they are poor at soloing other mages because they have no Spell Breach in BG1

Invokers in BG1 suck. Oh wait - They can sling their huge numbers of Magic Missiles with the Ring of Wizardry so that makes them useful. On the whole, I have always been frustrated with invokers in BG1.

*I've nearly finished Durlags Tower and can move onto BG2 soon*

 

There really aren't many high level spells for Dy to use, true, but for me at least, she has always been about fireballs and magic missiles... like a walking artillery unit. She deals out damage, and does so majestically.

So, IMHO, invokers have their uses in BG1, like all other classes - their focus is simply on good old high damage/low level spells.

Even if you feel that Dy is no longer that useful to you in Durlag's tower, I'm pretty sure that her magic missiles and fireballs helped the party get to the tower in the first place.
Her purpose might have been just that - dealing out solid damage until the rest of the party becomes buffed/leveled enough to take over the damage business.

 

Any mage can do this with wands. It would be better if BG had metamagic feats that would allow invokers to use empowered fireballs for their level 5 book, but I guess it doesnt matter since I hacked in a Cone of Cold scroll. A nice feature would be to allow specialist mages to empower spells from their chosen spell school only, and normal mages can empower any spell they like - This would broaden the advantages / disadvantages of that extra spell per level.

For invokers in BG, their usefulness is limited to fireballs - Dynaheirs biggest use was blasting Sarevok and luring him away from the mage with the AoE death spell.

I fired fireball at them, and only sarevok came out allowing me to kill him .

That stupid death spell in the final battle is ridiculous and Jaheira only had two spell slots available for death ward. Conjurers are the best specialist mage in BG1 and BG2 since the only usefull spell they lose is Identify (I have never found any use for higher level divination spells).

Oh well, at least I still have like 50+ charges of fire wands left to finish off BG1 with

Oh, I do believe that invocation spells are the best ones in the game, but they are all about damage numbers and useless against enemy mages. One of my favorite tricks is strolling around the enemies in circles with an Aganazars Scorcher as it is far easier to manoevere in battle and for party members to avoid it then fireball. The problem is that after fireball / lightning bolt, Invokers in BG1 dont get anything better unless you hack in a cone of cold scroll. In BG2 though they become godly (Fireball, Ice Storm, Sunfire, Chain Lightning, Delayed Blast Fireball, Incendiary Cloud etc etc =D)

The only thing that is useful in Durlags Tower is Imoen with a ring of invisibility and a pack of meatshield tanks to lure everything back to.

Yay! I found a use for dynaheir in Durlags Tower - 2x Webs, 1x Stinking Cloud, 2x Cloudkills then spam fireballs on the chessboard lol.

 

I believe the saving throw penalty and bonus for specialists was implemented in BG1. The real advantage is fewer (5% fewer) enemies make their save when an Invoker shoots out a fireball (or other spell within their school of magic). More damage and higher death toll are always good.

In pnp the specialists also got an additional +1 damage per hit dice -- too bad that wasn't implemented.

 

SERIOUSLY?!
I've never known this in all my years of playing BG1. Where did you get the information from?

 

I dont think I have ever noticed specialist mages recieving a bonus to their roles, even intelligence bonus for rolls wasnt implemented in BG, and it clearly isnt in the manual. I know they implemented this feature into NWN, but the only benefits specialist mages in BG get is the extra spell per level, at least I am sure it has always been that way.

For that reason, conjurers become the best specialist class to play as the only spell they lose which is of any significance is identify.

And if being a conjurer does give you +1 to conjuration spell rolls, Glitterdust > Greater Malison contigencies for ownage. Im not sure if they stack though.

I'm going to be using normal mages in my current game though. Imoen / Aerie, Me and a modified Nalia in Imoens absence to play around with (Nalia = lvl 7 thief with 100 pick locks + detect traps, Imoen will be a lvl 12 theif then Dualed to Mage).

I want some fun this time with my own customised character builds, but I dont want to lose the character storylines and plots.

I'll also have to modify Jaheira to a human Fighter / Druid so she gets more Druid levels.

And does Aerie get a Holy Symbol at all? The manual says Clerics get a holy symbol at lvl 26 and 4050000 EXP, but Aerie can only get 4 mill EXP in her cleric class . I was going to ask in a new thread, but I'll keep all my questions in one place.

Ultimately, I want this for my party:

13 Kensai / 28 Mage

12 Thief / 30 Mage

14 Fighter / 28 Druid (Modified Jaheira)

Multi / Dual Cleric with at least lvl 26 and Holy Symbol (I was going to modify Minsc to Ranger / Cleric and more Wisdom, but he loses what he is good at and his weapon profiencies and I lose a tank - Maybe I can modify Aerie to a 20 Conjurer / 27 Cleric)

Any two others. Currently I use a party of 5 for faster EXP - Jaheira, Minsc, Nalia, Aerie and Me, only Nalia is modified to 7 thief levels to replace Imoen untill I save her. I will modify Jaheira and Aerie after they have achieved the required experience levels for the changes (Once Jaheira is a lvl 15 Druid and Aerie is a lvl 20 Mage).

It is cheating, but since I've already finished the game 2 or 3 times before, I want to play with my own custom characters now.

 

Invokers are undoubtedly the specialist mages with fewest spell restrictions in SoA and ToB. The only useful spell they lose is Greater Malinson, and maybe Luck. All of the other enchantment spells are useful only in the beginning, and as the game advances, they become more and more crap IMO. Maybe this is the reason why the Invoker is so weak in BG1 - because there even low-level enchantment(disabling) spells like Sleep are very useful.

As for your second question: Aerie will get her Holy Symbol at clerical lvl 25 (as will all other clerics). I have played the game with 6-person party, Aerie in it, and she had a Holy Symbol. Mind you, you have to play the game in a very specific way in order to accumulate the needed xp for her to get the symbol at the end of SoA or beginning of ToB. Without resorting to xp exploits or xp caches like Sendai's derro slaves or killing Fire Giants at the walls of Saradush.

 

Deathmage -- I really don't know. I've always thought that (and the additional spell per level) was the advantage of a specialist. I could be wrong.

 

Yea this is why I picked one. After you get into BG2, Greater Malison is the only spell that you really need to use from Enchantment. In BG1, Horror has the same effect as the others like Chaos and Confusion.

Originally before BG2, Invokers lost both Enchantment and Conjuration which made them the worst specialist mage in the game, particularly with the lack of higher level spells, although they were still fine with slinging fireballs and magic missiles. BGT somewhat fixes that by letting them use Conjuration again.

You can also just use Glitterdust instead of Greater Malison.

 

Dynaheir is for heavy artillery, as mentioned, dear friends...pick her up when you're at a high enough level and she'll already have fireball in her spellbook!

Cloudkill is a wonderfully powerful spell in BG1 with proper scouting and maybe some extra help from a Web or Entangle or two. Have your hidden thief (or invisible wizard or bard) scout out the enemy location, withdraw out of sight, toss a few Webs or Entangles (or even Grease!) to impede their movement, then bomb the site with Cloudkill. It kills your foes dead, my friend!