New all purpose Baldurs Gate thread

[Jamski]

Drogue - there is absolutely no point in putting *'s into Sword and Shield. The +1 AC vs arrows is worthless, compared to how precious the weapon profs are.

Belm should always be in the off-hand too. Why? Becuase it gives +1 attacks per round with the main hand. Now if you want an extra attack with a crappy +2 scimitar, fine. But if the main hand has Crom Faeyr, Celestial Fury, Blackblood etc... see my point? Kundane (short sword in the planar prison) does the same. I ALWAYS have two char dual weilding to take advantage of these extra attack weapons. And of course, the scimitar is perfect for Jahiera.

Just my POWERGAME opinion though

-Jam

[Qilue]

Sorry to contradict you Jamski, but I tested the 'str bonus added to sling damage' quite extensively. It was in BG1 and BG2, but was removed by ToB.

Viconia vs Anomen. Viconia being evil, cannot destroy undead, only control temporarily when using turn undead ability.

Korgan or Jaheira vs cleric/ranger for dual weilding. A cleric/ranger whether dual or multi gets access to the entire priest spell list (both cleric and druid), 2 'free' stars in dual wielding as well as the previously mentioned turning ability as a bonus.

Something else that should be mentioned. For each magical weapon, the game sets two 'to-hit' stats. It's to-hit bonus for combat and it's rating for what it can hit. For example, a +2 sword has a +2 bonus to hit and is classed as a +2 weapon for determining what it can hit.

Certain special magical weapons have different values such as the 'upgraded' mace of disruption. While it only has +2 bonus to hit for combat, it is rated as a +5 weapon for what it can hit.

EDIT - typo

[Jamski]

Ah, you are right.
But we all have ToB

A Cleric/Ranger sucks at dual wielding because he cannot use Belm or Kundane, in my opinion. Loads of spells though, and fighter Thac0 is nice. The problem with druids is the 1,500,000 EXP gap at level 15, so at high levels a Cleric/Ranger actually overtakes a pure Druid.

And some weapons work the other way too. Daystar hits as a +2, even against Evil Undead.

-Jam

[duke o' york]

I'm confused by all this "funny talk" from Drogue and Jamski.

Jamski, I don't have ToB. Well, I've got a bad cough, but I don't think it's that serious yet.

And lotm, I think it may take me that long to play BG, if not longer. I took ages to complete FFVII, and that was with the guidebook and much more playing time than I'm now allowed. Still, I'll get along with it tonight.

[Jamski]

Why rush, its a game worth savoring

-Jam

[Drogue]

Exactly my thoughts. And don't listen to us, we're talking BGII

BTW: Just done the guarded compound in BGII, and now have the weapon I've been looking for Also got to spend 40,000 gold to spend (or rather, had )

[Qilue]

Originally posted by Jamski
Why rush, its a game worth savoring

-Jam

Very much so, especially if you do "The Epic". That is, play a character from level 1 in BG1, then at the end of that, import your character into BG2 and continue all the way to the end of ToB.

[Dis]

I was looking at the mod list in the Interplay forums for BG2

holy cow are there a lot of mods

I have no idea where to start.

I have never even done the Baldurash fix pak. I never felt the need. I have never noticed that many bugs.

I may bo the baldurash fix pak there is also something called unfinished business which has a few unfinished quests. I might do that one.

I'm not too interested in tactics, as I find the battles hard enough as it is.

What are some other good mods to get?

[Jamski]

Baldurdash is a MUST. It fixes some potential game breakers (like the wolfweres that sometimes regenerate 60 HP per round!!!)

Some "Ease of Use" components are a must too. They just make the game more fun.

"Item upgrade" is cheezy, but worth playing once. Celestial Fury +5 anyone? (Take CF, a demon's heart, 20,000 gold and a wand of lighting to the smith)

"Rogue Rebalancing" finally adds stuff like magical bucklers to the game, and fixes some high level abilities for Bards and Thiefs.

All the NPC mods are good. "Kelsey" and "Chloe" are generally thought the best.

Unfinished Business ties up a lot of loose ends. Like why all the NPCs have a quest except Minsc... it was //commented out and now its re-installed.

You can safely install any number of Weidu mods at the same time. So go do it

-Jam

[Dis]

60 hp/ round.

that is nothing. I can take them on

[Jamski]

Sure...?

I had 4 of these guys in Sparky's Dungeon eat every spell I had.

-Jam

[duke o' york]

Well I played a little bit more last night. Managed to survive the first battle with Imoen (), and got to the Friendly Arms with the two rubbishy evil characters. Left the fighter to be killed by the assassin who pops up just at the entrance to the inn (), but have kept the necromancer just for practising spells and for hoots really. I talked to everyone, got the two characters with the funny names, and did the quest with the ring and the hobgoblins. Is the ring worth keeping? Does it have any decent powers or should I just give it back and get the XP for it? I've also got a pair of natty gold keks, but have found nothing to do with them so I'm just going to give them back to the noble and claim I've washed them. I'm also tempted to go and stick the ogre, but should I ponce about the forest first so I can get some of the characters to level 2?
I can't play this evening so that's all I'll have until the weekend. Little progress made I'm afraid, but I'm getting the hang of the controls. I used one of the charges on Imoen's Magic Missile wand and it toasted a hobgoblin, which was cool, but I won't be using them too often as I reckon that the wand's quite useful and will be worth using later on. Does it tell you when all of the magic has been used, or could I end up carrying a useless wand around for ages? I realise that I can have it valued by a shopkeeper to work out roughly how many I've got left, but I'd still like to know.
Can the characters that are not directly under your control use items of their own accord when fighting? I was worried that Imoen might waste these missiles against foes that didn't deserve being toasted, but I'm sure that this can't happen - can it?

More questions to follow.

[Jamski]

I think all wands have 50 charges... but you can sell them and then buy/steal them back to get them recharged. Stealing can save you TONS.

KEEP THE GOLD PANTALOONS!!!!!!!!!!!

The ogre is weak to a ranged attack - not so fast, but hits you hard enough to kill a character with each blow. Wait 'till level 2 or stick it full of arrows and magic missiles.

Oh, and don't be afraid to use the wand of magic missiles. Its not really the best wand - just there to help you not get killed at level 1

-Jam

[duke o' york]

Would you care to elaborate as to why I should keep the gold pants, or will this mystery be cleared up later ion the game?

[Drogue]

Well, it will be cleared up later in the series. It's a thing put in by the game designers as a fun thing, and well worth it if you're intending to keep going through the series (BGII and ToB). It's a funny, but very worthwile thing