/vr/ - Retro Games

bump. How much more powerful can you start off BG2 if you play through BG1 first?

Fighter to Thief dual at level 9 in BG2.

Yay or Nay? Being stuck as a fighter kinda suck, desu. Plan on keeping him on the front whenever he gets his full abilities back.

>>4936683
I heard swashbuckler is a good class to play in BG2. I haven't tried it but I can say that speed is really important near the end of the game because you really need to take out the spellcasters before they can do their damage.

>>4936085
Bg1 is my favorite. Its a little tough at first but its low level D&D. The walking isnt really that slow. And idk about you but i played the original version from GoG and it loads quick as hell as in there basically is no loading. (On a literal toaster).

And i just played it a couple months ago for the first time.

>>4936085
Also if youre that bad at bg1 theres a difficulty slider :). Also boots of speed. Or just do inventory management while walking.

>>4936721
I was referring to back in the day with the disc version. My point is that even in the modern day without all that stuff, the game still feels tedious as fuck.

>>4936820
Idk i felt like it was pretty fluid and i actually had fun to where i kept thinking about it and kept playing in 2018. Only problem i had with it was the dumbass pathfinding.

>>4936085
You can change the movement speed.

You can change the difficult.

This was the first RPG I ended, I was 14 yo and almost retarded. I didn't know you could reroll stats or anything about CA, GAC0 or D&D, I ended the game in two weeks while doing homework and trying not to shit in my pants.
First thing I did in the game was to try to reach the big city in the north (Baldur's Gate) because it looked cool and after some reloads I succeed.
Why everyone treats this game like is some sort of super hard isometric Wizardry IV-tier shit. What's wrong with you.

Did the pathing get worse in BG2 EE? Coming from BG EE, my characters keep getting stuck into each other. Shit is infuriating. Modifying "Path Search Nodes" doesn't seem to help much.

If you don't like BG1 I doubt you'll like BG2. BG1 was more enjoyable than BG2 to me, BG2 felt unfocused and meandering.

>>4938016

Nvm, missed the first line, lol. Don't understand that opinion though, there's nothing special about BG2.

>>4936443
Way, way more powerful, especially if you're a wisdom-based class. If I recall, it's possible to raise all of your stats by 1 in BG1, but wisdom by 3.

>tfw I can't play an evil character or just an edgy faggot rogue mercenary because I don't have the power to be mean to my waifu Aribeth

Jesus Christ. What do? I kind of want to dip into each girls' honeypot.

>>4938137
The thing with these games is that you don't actually have sex with these characters in real life, and you're just clicking dialogue choices with your dick in your hand. My suggestion is formatting your hard drive.

>>4936085
You are already playing an easier version and with faster movement speed. But yes, it gets better. Read a strategy guide if it gives you such trouble, there's no shame in it.

>tfw first time playing with an Athlon that has 3DNow!

>>4936443
If you roll a new char you'll start with 89k exp. If you import you'll start with 161k. If that difference seems huge to you then remember experience tables are exponential, so in real terms that's rarely more than one level. A drop in the bucket when the cap is 8 million. The real benefit is in starting with your dual class combos active, and the with all the of tome stat buffs. An extra point in dexterity means you're harder to hit, and an extra three! points in wisdom means more divine spells.

There's also a famous glitch that allows you to keep your imported inventory by pausing right at the start which you might feel justified in using(like maybe you could pretend it was hidden up your asshole), but most things you could import become obsolete quickly, and the option was taken out Enhanced edition completely.
>>4936683
Yes. A CHARNAME fighter with 19 dex and 19 con is probably the strongest tank you could get in the first game. Then after it's imported at 8, you can give it a prestige a class, wait only a single level before switching over thief. Conveniently skipping the need for an npc one just when Imoen buggers off. Then yadda, yadda, yadda, one shotting everything with backtsabs while "Use Any Item" makes your class restrictions meaningless.

>>4936085
>slow load times and walking speeds
Protip: Click on config, up game speed by 50%.

>>4940158
>(like maybe you could pretend it was hidden up your asshole)
Squeak?

>>4938930
The internet existed, but we didn't have it at home, so clickable dialogue was the best porn available.

>>4940205
Normally it would hurt to smuggle a scimitar in your rectum, but the one you get off Drizzt gives -2 AC so it all balances out.

>>4938137
Aerie is codependent, and Jaheira is both incestuous and barren. Best grill is Sticky Vicky.

>>4938137
>>4940259
But to answer your question, 2. She's a moe waifu caricature written for nerdy teenagers with zero dating experience so answer all questions accordingly.

Just finished Durlag's, great dungeon. Probably better than Watcher's Keep. Did we ever find out who that Demon Knight was working for?

The first BG is much more unforgiving than the second. Just quick save all the time since combat can be so random, especially if you are just trying to play it for the story and not trying to really challenge yourself. Even with constant saving, certain dungeons will still be difficult on your first try.

To level up a newbie party, stay to the inner areas since the places on the borders of the map are tougher.

>>4938018
>there's nothing special about BG2.
It's just highly overrated and made it's mark as an over the top epic fantasy crpg, there's other games that are better.
If we're sticking with the terrible RTwP then I'd prefer IWD

>>4938137
>Jesus Christ. What do?
let her die and play the proper way by making your own custom party instead of suffering through Bioware's party

>>4940313
Did that with Pillar of Eternity because the party members were shit. I actually like the characters of BG1&2.

>>4940319
I couldn't stand 2's characters, but that's probably a side effect of trying to play it after going through a ton of games where you have full party creation as a standard

Can I necrobump this thread to ask a question about Baldur's Gate 2?

>>4941363
Since you already necrobumped the thread, you may as well ask now.

>>4941370
Nalia didn't offer my muli-class F/M De'arnise Keep. I didn't know she was supposed to as soon as we walked outside after killing TorGal. Roanals took the place and she asked to join me on the road. That was about fifteen hours ago so I can't exactly revert my save, so I've turned it inside-out with Shadowkeeper trying to find a workaround.

>>4941389
It's been a long time myself, but I'm pretty sure that if you play a multiclass character, while you get offered all of the strongholds of your constituent classes, you can only accept one. Did you already take the planar sphere?

>>4941440
I didn't take it, but I went back to it to talk to the Knights (I managed to get the leader of the Radiant Heart to agrre to take them in, without even having started the quest), and when I stepped in to it, the Coweled Wizard appeared and offered it to me, which prompted me to go read up on strongholds in general, which is when I found out I'd missed De'arnise.

I'd gotten De'arnise before without issue as a F/M/T back in '05, so I don't know why F/M went like it did.
I found a few beamdog threads where berserker/x Dual Classes didn't get it, so maybe it's a problem with F/x Duals and Multis.

I guess it's not a big deal. I'm considering dropping the save into the MP Save folder, loading it up with a Fighter protag, deleting the TorGal killed flag, respawning Nalia, and replacing the TorGal killed flag, since I know doing that will at least let me have the post-quest conversation again.

Problem with all that is that importing protags after using Find Familiar seems to bug my HP, so I'm really loathe to do it, and there's no promise it'll even work, being so many Nalia- and Roanel-related quest flags in my save at this point.

I'm hoping there's a single flag I can add to my save to just force the De'arnise Stronghold quest to start, but I haven't found it yet.

>>4936085
Baldur's Gate gives you all the tools you need to beat every encounter. Except possibly the surrounded by bandits random encounter. But even that one only spawns in certain areas, you can hit level 3 before going into areas that can trigger it.

Use your imagination, use your spells, use your items. And remember this isn't a fucking mmo, you don't need to tank enemies.

>>4936085
Glad you liked BG2, it's on of my all-time favorites but you really should have played it in order. The difficult fights at the beginning set a great accent to the late-game of BG2 where you're basically an all destroying fuckmachine. You were set for an epic but took a short cut instead. You did it wrong.

Play the Enhanced Edition if you really can't stomach the slowness of the game, which basically ports the game to the BG2 engine. The battles won't be any easier but they're hardly unwinnable if you prepare properly and know how to use the character classes.

Just finished M&M 3 and had a great time, and while it explained a lot from the past 2 games I still have some questions.

-Did the ancients have access to magic, or were they a straight up sci fi civilization?

- What happened to CRON and VARN? How were they related to terra?

-What happened to the other parties that shooed off sheltem? Sheltem did directly say at the beginning that we passed his "other tests", is this the same party the entire time?

Unrelated to all of that, how exactly should I play M&M 4 and 5? I know there's World of Xeem, is that the best way to play it? What the hell is "Swords of Xeem"?

>>4941837
That one is probably one of the most bullshit ones in the game, since the complete circle means that some will zero in on your low AC twigs and kill them.

>>4941837
well yeah now that I've hit level 3 I can to back and beat that encounter, but at the time I was doing that quest (which was given to me at the Friendly Arms inn mind you) where my characters were level 1 and there was pretty much no way to do it. They had 33HP each, 19 strength and an archer with poison arrows who immediatly goes for the MC (who's a bard) so even entangling them didn't do shit.

There was no way of knowing that they were that powerful as normal hobgoblins are super easy. The game just plopped them down there in the middle of the starting area, so you have to go around them which you find out after dying 5-10 times trying to fight them.

I stand by what I said earlier that if you had a DM that pulled this shit you would want to punch them in the throat. Not to mention how fucking stingy the game is with XP, that 50 minute quest you did to bring back my [insert dumb item here] 200xp. Thanks asshole.

>playing BG2
>get to Chapter 3
>going through vampire lair
>Tenova
>she immediately casts Spell Turning, Protection from Magical Weapons, Simalcrum, Mislead and Mirror Image
>she then casts Symbol Stun, Maze, and Chain Lightning
>"I'm level 11 and what is this?"
>wipe

>read up on the spells she cast
>"Spell Turning returns to caster 12 spell levels"
>okay, I'll throw one level 5 from three mages (no good direct-target level 4s) and then Breach her PfMW
>nothing pulls down her Spell Turning; just get "spell ineffective"
>wipe

>check online
>no one even mentions her Spell Turning; they just say "Breach and melee"
>try it
>Breach breaks her PfMW and Stoneskin right through Spell Turning
>melee her down so fast she doesn't even get to mist/bat form to flee
Magic is confusing.

>>4941859

Enhanced Edition lacks adjustable frame rate. I've always played BG at 60 fps so it was faster, but in EE they discarded this option which made me hate this fucking game. I still love the original though.

>>4942430
OP here. It still has adjustable framerate, just not in game. you have to go into the baldur.lua file and change it in there (Line 18 to be exact)

I agree. The game is borderline unplayable in anything less than 60. ESPECIALLY BG1, I played BG2 on 45 I think.

>>4942438

This method never worked for me. Did they patch it or something lately? I'm pretty sure changing the value in file didn't affect the game at all approximately 2 years ago.

>>4942429
Spell defenses and counter-defenses is the most tedious part of combat in BG2.

>>4942460
I just don't understand why Breach bypassed Spell Turning (or why hitting it with well over 20 levels worth of spells didn't exhaust it). Makes no sense and I never would have figured it out if I hadn't gone outside the game to find out, which bothers me immensely.

>>4942506
But spell turning had a similar limit to spell trap? It sure as hell doesn't deflect forever. Unless we're talking Kangaxx whose spell turning was infinite and put into an invisible item you couldn't take off.

>>4942665
Spell Turning says in its description that it will deflect 12 levels of spells. I would assume after that it would go away, along with its visible particle effect, like any other spell.
Tenova's didn't -- I hit her with three Lower Resistance, two Hold Person, one or two Spell Thrust, a Magic Missile, a Malison, and several Priest spells, and nothing got through.
And yet I could hit her with Breach and start meleeing her before casting anything else. My whole game's buggy as hell, though. I really prefer BGtutu to BG2...

>>4942015
ancients are straight up scifi lad
World of Xeen is the best way to do 4/5

>>4942701
I think Tenova is EE exclusive garbage honestly? The only NPC I remember having scripted Spell Turning was Kangaxx. Irenicus has infinite Magic Missile without cooldown, but will never use it unless he runs out of higher level spells.

Overall BG2 is notorious for boosting mobs with scripted protections (Tattoo of Power when Athkatlan wizard defenders spawn, all the wizards with instant protections, etc.). Sometimes it's invisible items that straight up disable specific spells cast on them among other things. Just gotta deal with it - if there's no animation or something it just means there's scripted stuff going on.

I can't get past the bad voice acting and script in BG. It irks me to no end.

>>4942731
I'm playing original SoA/ToB. Wouldn't touch EE.
Neat. I love it when enemies don't play by the rules.
This whole game's been buggy as shit. Way more buggy than I remember. At the moment I can't finish Bodhi's lair, because at the end of the fight she just stops attacking and gets wailed on forever. If I tell everyone to stop, Jaheira very curiously will cast a Heal spell on Bodhi, and that will get her to start attacking again. The two times it's happened now both ended with her subsequently wiping me, though.

Really sick of this game's shit.

>>4942717
..So what the hell are the elmental lords? Did they have access to magic or not?

I did do a bit more exploration of the main sector and got some more answers, but that question is still unanswered

Anyways, started world of Xeem, how the hell do they keep making these games better? I absolutely love the cheesy ass voice acting.

>decide to run through BG2
>absolutely burned out by the end of chapter 3
I think it's the combination of high level D&D and the RTwP system that's murdering my interest. It's just not clicking for me and making it a chore to play.

>>4942665
Demiliches are "Fuck You: The Monster", but Kangaxx' unlimited spell turning is unique to him. As the previous anon said, Baldur's Gate likes to break the rules for the sake of fun.

>>4942731
The instant casting is to simulate pre-casting which isn't possible or feasible for the engine.

>>4942776
>So what the hell are the elmental lords?
different dimensions/planes. Really just depends on how you're gonna define magic.

>>4942805
I'm not really concerned about if the ancients have magic inasmuch as how the terrans/xeemers got it. I can understand the fantasy races (evolution blah blah) but is magic supposed to be nanobots or something? Psionics? How does raising the undead work? I'll live with elementals (people form the elemental planes/dimensions 'ported in) and stuff like dragons or orcs (same reason as races), but what about vampires? Pixies?

>>4942854
they never go into that much depth lad, make up your own theory about how it works

>>4942858
Okay, just wanted to know if it was answered or not, thanks for the answers. MM1 did have a "Psychic shield", and I just generally really like psychic shit, so for now I'm saying magic is all psionics

Speaking of psychic shit, what CRPG'S do you guys reccomend that have psychic classes or whatever, besides Dark Sun and Fallout(Kind of)

>>4938137
>not homomaning the orc dude
What are you, straight?

About to go crazy and install EET and all that jazz. Is Big World still the thing to use? My main goal is to make the game more challenging with Ascension and Sword Coast Stratagems and add high quality content (and only high quality content) into the game. Any particular quest mods y'all are fond of? I will be getting Unfinished Business and the NPC Project and all that stuff, I'm mainly just wondering what new content mods are actually worth my time.

>>4942904
I forgot to add: new NPCs as well as kits and so on are more than welcome! As long as it isn't gonna have me rolling my eyes and throw me out of the experience.

Anyone here play Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magicka Obscura?

I have the game on GOG. I was struggling with trying to get the game running in Windowed mode, because playing the game by itself forces my resolution to 800x600. This is unacceptable but I'm not having much luck and I have given up on that.

I am installing a russian made mod of the game called Arcanum Multiverse Edition I found in this RPG Codex thread:
http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/index.php?threads/arcanum-multiverse-edition.114150/

Has anyone here used this? If so, can you tell me if how I can use this with the GOG version?

>>4943027
Actually, forget this post.

This Arcanum Multiverse Edition appears to be it own version of the game that is stand alone.


So, I'll ask something else. Anyone here play Arcanum and likes it? What's a great build for this game?

>>4943150
It's a classic, one of the Troika gems
if you want an easy first go through do a human mage since magic is much easier than tech

So, I'm in the middle of the sewers and I have to make a choice between Jaheira and Aerie. While I'm tempted to go with the old hag, I heard her route is glitchy as fuck, even with EE.

>>4936085
>ee
kys

>>4943601
as annoying as Aerie is, she's objectively one of the better companions due to her rule breaking classes and turns into a powerhouse

This game seems cool and I want to try it.

The only ARPG I've ever played is Diablo 3, I'm not even sure if this is even close to that. Is this a good game to start on?

>>4943776
>Is this a good game to start on?
it's okay, I think Icewind Dale is easier to get into if you're deadset on infinity engine and you won't give a shit about a lot of the BG2 characters that are carry overs from the first game.
This isn't an arpg by any means so you need to read the manual and have a basic grasp of ad&d terms and rules

Just remember to get better taste and play the gold box games, ultima, darklands and Dark Sun

>>4942460
combat as a whole is tedious

>>4943793
I'm not deadest on the infinity engine, I don't even know what it is.

What game should I start on than anon? Ultima 1?

>>4943796
>Ultima 1?
you can skip the first 3, 4 through 7 is what you want

I'd probably start with fallout or icewind dale though, especially if you're not used to playing games from that era

>>4943808
Thanks friendly boomer anon.
I wonder if I'll ever be on a "retro" gamer forum when I'm older for games I played when I was young.

>>4943796
Ultima 6 is the most user friendly of the Ultima games I found. When I first played it all I did was waste civillians and arrange their corpses in the middle of Lord British's garden, then I read up on the ultima series and realized that's not what it's about.

Icewind dale is a fucking awesome game. It's probably my favorite infinity engine game to be honest. Baldurs Gate was always too tryhard. Icewind Dale is more combat oriented but the dungeon design, game balance and general aesthetic is top notch (the soundtrack is on a completely different level than BG)

Haven't played Planescape yet.

>>4943843
I tried getting into Baldur's Gate 1 but I dont really like Infinity Engine it seems. I've always preferred turn based CRPGs like Fallout. Do you think that Icewind Dale might change my mind? My main issue with BG was that its really kind of boring with a combat engine where I feel like have zero control of position, fighting always devolves into chaos.

>>4943852
Icewind dale is ALL about combat, so that probably won't resolve your problemd there. But how did you not have control of position? Making sure your characters weren't eneveloped in fireballs is like, half the challenge of baldurs gate

>>4943864
>But how did you not have control of position?
I dunno, I was feeling pretty brainlet about it and since the game hadn't hooked me, I wasnt compelled to bother learning.

If Icewind Dale has fighting and dungeon-crawling almost right away, then that would at least make it more exciting for me.

>>4943868
>If Icewind Dale has fighting and dungeon-crawling almost right away, then that would at least make it more exciting for me.
It really does. You have a short town segment with some starter fights (cellar rats, local gobbos etc.) and basically right away you're thrust into dungeon after dungeon

If you thought baldurs gate was too story heavy and wished you were doing a more traditional dungeon crawlin adventure, Icewind Dale is for you

>>4943869
>If you thought baldurs gate was too story heavy and wished you were doing a more traditional dungeon crawlin adventure, Icewind Dale is for you
Based. That's exactly how I felt. I'm definitely giving ID a shot.
Is GOG the place to go for it? I'd assume they'd have it set up for modern systems

>>4942015
Might and magic was such a great series. 2 was amazing 3 was great 4/5 world of xeen was the pinnacle of the series.

>>4942771
That literally doesn't happen. Your installation is fucked up or you're experiencin some kind of incompatibility with modern systems

>>4943776
Yes, you just have to pick the right character.

Anyone else played Avernum: Escape from the Pit?

I'm just getting started. What am I in for?

>Have tried to play played BG1+2+PoE multiple times.
>Still hate and suck at RTWP
What do I do.

>>4943852
Icewind Dale has much better terrain to take advantage of. Instead of fighting 5 or 6 huge enemies it has you fighting 30 smaller enemies, you have to take advantage of choke points and utilize ranged combat effectively.

It will teach you how to effectively fight in infinity engine games. There's no reason not to play it. It's just fun.

>>4944485
Yeah, well, it literally did happen, about half a dozen times.
Game would auto-pause as her dialog ended, I'd queue up all my attacks and spells, unpause, she'd attack once or twice then just give up and stand still at Near Death indefinitely. Not even ctrl+y would sort her out.
Finally I guessed I was either killing her too fast or Feeblemind was keeping her from initiating her retreat dialog or shapechange, so I held off untill she'd attacked several times and didn't cast any spells on her, and, sure enough, the sequence played out correctly.

>>4944768
What's RTWP?

>>4944794
Real-Time With Pause

>>4944797
Oh. How does a person suck at that? Pausing is indescribably useful.

>>4944805
It's the real-time that fucks with me, not to mention trying to manage AoE attacks, which I end up almost never using becuase I always injure my own guys.

It just makes me go full retard. I end up needing to enable maximum autopausing.

>>4944787
Sounds fuckin' sick to be honest, dude.
I just want a pure dungeon crawling experience and to not have to dawdle about like in BG1. I want just go in purge monsters while navigating a labyrinth.

>>4944808
There's nothing wrong with using all the auto-pause options. It's what they're there for.
They annoy me if I use too many so I just use Enemy Spotted, Character Hit, and Spell Cast.

AoEs are ok but you can mostly do without them. If there's a couple you really like just plan ahead: in BG1 Stinking Cloud is really good but your guys can't stand in it, so only use it if you have archers/mages. In BG2 Stinking Cloud is pretty useless, so use Web instead. Use a Cleric to give your best fighter Free Action, and let them mop up, even if you accidentaly Web some of your own guys. Malison+Hold Persoh/Monster is a killer AoE combo and can't affect your guys. If you want to use AoE spells like Fireball and Ice Storm, just load your best Fighter up with the appropriate "Resist" and "Protection from" spells, it'll add up to 110% resist and will actually heal them.
Etc.

>>4944750
I never played the avernum remakes, but I played Exile, the original game. I'm honestly not sure how much they changed, but I can pontificate about E:EftP if you want.

>>4944876
I'm totally unfamiliar with the series. This is actually the only one I was aware of until recently.

What CRPGs have the best choice-and-consequence and roleplaying?

>>4944805
Not him but the RTWP can be rather awkward in Baldur's Gate. The underlying system is designed to be strictly turn-based, and you control up to 6 characters at once. Pausing for each individual turn is tedious as fuck, so you usually configure auto-pausing rules that never quite align with what you really need and it can be really easy to forget about your mage or healer for a round after they finish casting a buff or something.

I mean, it's not THAT bad, in my experience most battles in BG are determined in the first round or two, but I can totally see why someone would find it difficult to use effectively.

>>4944889
They're mostly exploration games, almost sandboxy. You have a huge, very open world you can explore, with only soft limits on where you can go for 95% of it. You might not be able to survive the wandering encounters, but you can trek straight from Fort Exile to the Abyss right at level 1 if you wanted to for some reason.

Dialog is fairly basic but gets the job done. You won't see epic literature here, but you'll get enough to have characterization of both individuals and the society down in the pit, and there's a bit of humor from time to time.

The world is EXTENSIVE and will require a lot of backtracking because you'll find out in some dungeon a scrap of a clue that means you need to talk to someone back near the start.

Combat is frequent but not very difficult. You will need to have some idea of how to build characters, but at least for Exile (Avernum did change the combat system, and while I played A4-6, I didn't for 1-3, so I'm not sure how things work exactly), the main limits that drive the combat engine are action ones. Winning the slow/haste curse/bless wars are the key to winning most fights. Stock up on energy potions before tackling any difficult dungeon, SP is your main limiting factor when you get to endurance matches. Most dungeons have a random spawn counter, which means you can never truly wipe out all the monsters. Get in, grab what you came to get, and get out.

They are a lot of fun, and I recommend E1-3 to just about everyone.

>>4944906
Baldur's Gate because if you choose not to play it the consequence is that you're a faggot.

>>4944986
hahaha fuck you

>>4944906

For me it's Fallout 1 and 2.

>>4944789
Oh, yeah feeblemind will do that.

Don't be too discouraged - old games having all these little things in them is what makes them so much more charming than sterile, aggressively beta tested games like the newest patch of Pillars for example.

I'm surprised feeblemind works on Bodhi at all, though. The chance for it to work has to be minuscule.

>>4943893
>Is GOG the place to go for it?
they only have the EE
I'd just pirate it

>>4943869
hilariously enough, IWD's story is pretty good for what it is too and gives a better excuse for hitting all the dungeons that BG gave
That and the art and soundtrack were top tier, probably only second to ToEE

>>4944768
accept that you have superior taste, RTwP has always been a shitty system

>>4944906
Arcanum takes the cake for that

>>4945697
What's wrong with enhanced edition?

I actually did just pirate the complete edition, cause I'm broke right now.

All this talk about Icewind Dale is making me want to give it a try. Any suggestions where to pick it up? GoG only has EE.

>>4946037
I'd just pirate it at this point. Also, the EE isn't as bad as the BG EEs because there's no shoehorned content. It's just a tad too easy if you know how to abuse the character kits.

Also, wait a few months. It's a great winter game.

Does Icewind Dale not have the Cavalier class, like in Baldur's Gate 1?

>>4946196
Only the EE, like only BG1 EE has cavaliers.

About to wrap up my first playthrough of Icewind Dale, nearing the end of HoW

Loved the game, very different feel and focus from BG, not sure if I want to go straight to II next or take a break from the raw dungeon crawling and finally get around to playing NWN1

I was wondering, what happens in the tower if you murder Pomab in his shop during the prologue?

>>4946504
What was your favorite part of Icewind Dale, anon?

>>4946542
Gonna have to go with the Severed Hand chapter, that place was so much fun to explore

Chapter 6 is runner up though, that place was a very good example of a funhouse dungeon, I liked the variety of scenery and enemies in there, even though the umber hulks gave me PTSD

>>4945697
>they only have the EE
classic comes bundled with it

Any good mods for Icewind Dale EE? Gonna be playing soon for the first time while I wait for the Baldur’s Gate mods to get their shit together with the new 2.5.

>>4946156
That's what I mean by 'pick it up'. I haven't pirated a game in years; no idea where to look, what sites to trust.

>>4946504
What's HoW?

>>4947026
Classic IWD comes with GoG's IWD:EE?

Wizardry 6-8 are the only ones connected by plot, right? How much would I be missing by playing only those 3? I hate to skip so many games but my time is limited and I've also struggled to get into Wizardry 1 in the past.

>>4947074
Yes, all of the enhanced editions of these games come with the original complete editions on GOG

>finally get around to playing Fallout
>it's great, lots of fun and I'm closing in on the ending
>get the forcefield bug

>>4947225
Wizardry games have practically no plot at all.
You can carry over your characters from older games but it's not recommended as it breaks the balancing.

>>4942429

Install the mod Sword Coast Stratagems which makes it easier against overpowered mages.

>>4947070
Goodolddownloads.com (directdownload perfectly legit gog installer)
Do not ever buy a game from beamdog.
Also terminatorfan's torrents on thepiratebay are fine and just the gog installer.

>>4942427
In BG2 the quests give reasonable exp In BG1 it's far more time efficient to just kill a bunch of monsters. For example a single asilisk gies 2000, and a Greater Basilisk gives 4000. Also neither will do anything at all to you if your frontline is protected from petrification and there's any easy to get to zone that's full of them.

>>4943601
Jaheira's comapanion quest is neat, so keep her around for that if you haven't completed it already, but Aerie's endgame is way too stronk to pass up in the long run.

>>4943796
The Infinity Engine games are aldur's Gate Iewind Dale and Planesape Torment.

Planesape is mostly talking, reading, roleplaying, etc with very little to any challenging combat.Just the prologue alone has more text in it than most New York Times best sellers.

Icewind Dale is almost entirely party based combat with little of anything else. As the name implies it's set in a grueling arctic so they designed it so you'd feel as old and desperate as possible.

Baldur's Gate is the middle ground between them.

>>4947289
I dunno what mod it was I installed but one added a duo called Tristan and Isolde after the literary characters and Isolde had a fuck-you throwing dagger of returning +diediedie and Tristan had a sword that inflicted Hold Person.

Some difficulty mods for BG do not fuck around.

>>4947070
"Heart of Winter".
Icewind Dale's new game plus hard mode where every little monsters has hitpoints in the hundreds and is pretty much immune to all the strongest spells.

>>4947401
No that's Heart of Fury, Heart of Winter is the expansion pack that adds a new (albeit shorter) campaign after the end of the game

So I bought IWDII Complete from GoG. Do people tend to like it? It doesn't seem to have the mod/custom soundset support of BG/BG2/IWD.

>>4947306
Cool, thank you. I'll check those out. I don't mind at all paying 10$ for IWDII, but I don't want to play 20$ for IWDEE, and my CD drive is fucked, otherwise I'd just buy the IWD 3-in-1 from Amazon.

>>4948450
It's sorta the black sheep of the Infinity Engine games and the one I see discussed the least, one thing is that they switched to 3E rules instead of 2.5 for it, but some features of 3E were omitted because they couldn't get them to work in the janky old engine, so it's like a half-baked 3E ruleset, and 3E is already generally considered a bit of a mess that wasn't fixed until 3.5

I've heard despite that it's still really good though, actually about to play it for the first time myself once I finish up this BGII+ToB playthrough

>>4948512
Ah, I see. I'm a 3.5 fanboy, although I really game to like 2 thanks to BG, so that was my main draw. I heard IWD2 actually used 3.5.
I see there's no Weapon Finesse feat for not-Small Swords, so that's a bummer. Guess 20 Dex chars would be too ohpee.

>>4948512
Was NWN 3E or 3.5? It confused me a little from being used to baldurs gate

>>4948540
IIRC, NWN1 is 3E, NWN2 is 3.5E

>>4948450
I really dislike IWD2. It's got a serious problem with making you fight enemies with far too much HP, the class balance is as shit as you'd expect it to be in a 3E game, and HoF is all about buff and AI abuse rather than genuinely engaging with the game. It's just not fun at all compared to IWD1.

>>4948656
Maybe I just suck but my strategy for IWD1 is already to cast Hope, Courage, Haste, Bless, and some self buffs before every fight

>>4948560
thanks

>>4947225
1-5 have a really, really loose plot connection. 1 and 2 use the same characters, in 3 you play as their descendants, in 4 you play as the bad guy from 1, i'm not sure who you are in 5 but it takes place in Llylgamyn. The plots are basically nonsense garbage.

The plots of 6-8 are also pretty dumb. They're just excuses to explore weird and cool dungeons that have vampire love triangles and space rhinos.

Does anyone know whete Pool pf Radiance and Eye of the Beholder fit in on the Forgotten Realms timeline?

>tfw no proper wild west crpg
>tfw no deadlands crpg

>>4948450
It's a hate it or love it style of game for a good variety of reasons including rule mishmash and how fast it got produced

>>4949334
Thank god Wild West is just as bad as cyberpunk.
Keep it high fantasy please

>>4944750
>Thread still alive
Dope.

I would highly recommend Avernum to any of you dudes. I've been enjoying the open-ended nature of it so far. Combat has been, frankly, a breeze. Even the toughest fights usually just mean my priest is doing all support work instead of helping out my Berserker.

I've been keeping pen and paper notes on special encounters that don't end up in the Quest Journal, trainers, my boat location, etc which is just the best feeling.

I'm looking forward to what C&C is in this game, I'm just starting to develop my reputation. I tend to play Neutral Good while still safely grabbing everything valuable that isn't nailed down.

I'm playing fallout 2 and have just returned the holy geck to the starting village. Now I have to go south. The ridiculous amount of random encounters is really annoying. Also, a lot of these encounters are insane.

I've played through most of the villages. 2 of my chars are wearing combat armor. But if I ran into some stupid random encounter with supermutants I'm dead. And sometimes I get three random encounters in 2 squares.

Were there so many random encounters in the original game? Is there something wrong with the encounter rate that I can fix easily? I have the steam version.

>>4949874
Also, my main char is level 19 but it doesn't matter against hordes of 300 hp deathclaws or supermutants.

>>4949874
Outdoorsman skill will let you choose whether or not you engage with random encounters when you come across them

>>4949334
The world map makes it look really small, and I hate the UI and new soundsets. Not very impressed so far, but, I'm still in the prologue.

What cRPGs have the best riddles?

>>4949897
I know. I have that at 48 and am carrying a motion sensor which is supposed to give +20 for a total of 68. Still, I don't get to choose half of the encounters. Seems like I would have to invest a lot of skill points to make it reasonable.
Do you happen to know if the skill has a linear progression? A max value I should aim for? And what's the best source of scout skill books in the game. I've done the big circle and so far I've only found about 3 or so of those. That's includes bartering for every skill book I've ran into on merchants. Found a lot more first aid and science ones.

>>4949950
BG2 has -a lot-, but I don't know if they're the best.

>>4949963
Yeah I'm talking "break out the pen and paper", not "solve the Tower of Hanoi for the 6000th time"

>>4949974
What is the tower of Hanoi?

>>4949996
This dumb shit

>>4949963
>I don't know if they're the best.
they're not, they're usually pretty stupid

>>4949950
probably in a blobber

>>4949950
Arena has some decent ones

>>4950065
It's cell 1, right?

The first statement is a lie ("knowing that all that is said cannot be true"), and the second and third statement both stay consistent if Cell 1 has the gold key

>>4949728
You have convinced me, can you play it in modern screens?

>>4950085
I don't know what you mean by "modern screens". I have the Steam version which runs great on my Win10 box or through Wine on my Ubuntu laptop at whatever resolution, and the UI doesn't look too shrimpy even at 4K.

>>4949950
Planescape Torment
Might and Magic World of Xeen has a shitton of riddles

Most underrated party member coming through

>>4949974
The only one liable to make you break out pen and paper is the one math riddle at the beginning of the game, so, yeah.

>>4950141
He looks like a greasy power bottom and his voice is annoying as fuck.

>>4950161
But he becomes the truest bro if you do his quest and turn him to LG

>>4950141

He is also annoying as fuck and not the best cleric in the game, no reason to keep him around other than his quest.

Baldur's Gate series companion ranking

Top tier:
>Keldorn
>Korgan
>Kagain
>Mazzy
>Coran
>Yeslick
>Xan
>Edwin
>Haer'dalis
>Minsc
>Xzar and Montaron
>Viconia
>Imoen
>Jan
>Kivan
>Sarevok

OK tier:
>Anomen
>Branwen
>Alora
>Tiax
>Shar-teel
>Ajantis
>Garrick
>Nalia
>Safana
>Yoshimo

Shit tier:
>Khalid and Jaheira
>Dynaheir
>Cernd
>Valygar
>Quayle
>Aerie
>Faldorn
>Eldoth and Skie

>>4950190
I like how Montaron is just the most irredeemably nasty person in either game even among all the evil characters

>>4950202
I honestly hate Bioware for not putting him in BG2, he would have been the perfect evil thief, because there are none, and they even killed him
Also they should have put Kivan in, instead of Valygar

>>4950204
Valygar's a good character sans affirmive action, but yeah I would've definitely liked to kill shit with Kivan some more.

>>4950141
Feel so bad for the fems that had him as their only romance option.

>>4950204
The only ranger they needed in either game was Minsc.

>>4950268
Minsc as a ranger made zero sense.

>>4950204
They really wanted people to use Yoshimo and then Imoen for plot reasons.
Adding another thief would have ruined everything.

Man, I'm having a really hard time creating a party for IWD2. Not being familiar with 3E it's hard to know what classes are good, and I'm finding it impossible to be invested in the party I make since the characters have no personality.

I guess I need at least a Fighter, a Cleric, and a Wizard?
In BGTutu/BG2 I ran a F/M who dual-weilded longswords or katana, but doing that in 3E seems really difficult. I can't decide between Fighter/Wizard, Fighter/Sorc, or Ranger/Wizard, Ranger/Sorc, or which class to start as and which to dual to.

>>4950508
Clerics are better than Fighter in every way. You can safely make your Clerics half-orcs with 1 charisma and 1 intellect. Get 19 wisdom by level 16 (there is no point in getting higher wisdom) and as much strength as possible .

If you an easy time just play with 2 pure Clerics and 1 pure Sorcerer. A smaller party lets you level faster and the crappy pathfinding will not fuck you over.

>>4950523
I've been really thinking about trying to either solo or two- or three-character party it, because that's about as many good portrait/soundset combos I can find.

>>4950508
You want at least one character with charisma for that start off with an Aasimar Paladin, but straight away dualclass it to a Sorceror. The paladin level was mostly for the saving throw bonusues.Not much point in going beyond Sorceror 18 though, so park her there for a while until she can finish off the rest of her level is bard.

Second you'll want something to deal with traps and locks, etc, so for that you want a Deep Gnome Rogue with a high intelligence score.Rogues suck at everything else though, so turn it into an Illusionist ASAP.

Next you'll want a frontline tank that's super hard to hit, and for this game, there are few better tanks than Monks with max dex and max wisdom. Because monks convert extra wisdom into armor. You only need a single point in Monk though, you do well before this by levelling up as a Deep Gnome Cleric.

Finally... no finally. That will get you through fine. The rest of your party can be anything you want.If you plan on being cheesy though you can fill the rest of your slots with level 1 pack mules. Experience gain is based on your party's average level in relation to monsters. So keeping it artificially low will keep the gains high. At least until you're ready to boom them all way up to 30 in one click.

>>4950585
Different guy here, you think I'd have much trouble if I made a party of 4 dwarves, and went like, 2 clerics, a rogue and a sorc? Getting tired of full sized, diverse parties and want to play through the next game I play with a fun gimmick party

>>4950617
Not at all. Minmaxing is only strongly recommended if you care about the end game hard mode.

>>4950585
Half-orc Clerics... Monks... Gnomes... all stuff I don't want to use at all.
Well, maybe a gnome could be interesting.

I think my main will just be a Ranger/Conjurer, and I'll get the thieving skills from a Tiefling. I'm not really intested in powergaming, but if I hit a snag I'll be sure to remember those.

>>4950692
Yeah, the Deep Gnomes are mostly just a powergaming thing since they start with extra dexterity and wisdom, which equates to extra armor. That, and Illusionist as a favored class makes it easy to dabble without taking on huge penalties.

>>4950508
>Not being familiar with 3E it's hard to know what classes are good
Cleric, Druid, Wizard, Bard, Sorcerer. Sorc is in a unique position in IWD2 in that they're usually ahead of the Wizard in spell level because you don't get free spells and the scroll progression is slow as fuck while the Sorcerer gets their spells known on schedule.

>>4949874
Look at this crap. When approaching Navarro base, you can't cross more than 2 squares without running into one of these. Then hope your outdoorsman skill triggers or you're dead, guaranteed. Who designed these?

Just got into Navarro by savescumming all the way from New Reno to Navarro. Skipping 1 encounter with deathclaws, 1 with floaters, running from another floater encounter, 4 with fire geckos and 3 with enclave patrol.
I really hope the steam version does something wrong with the encounter timer otherwise it's godawful game design.

>>4949974
Baldur's gate 2 has about 20 or 30 litteral riddles. Someone asks you a riddle and you have to choose the correct answer from a list of 6 or 7 answers. Then there's also a riddle/puzzle where you get 10 or so riddles with a chest in front of each riddle. You also get 10 items representing all the correct answers and have to put each into the corresponding chest.

Not sure if this is the kind you're looking for. As far as breaking out the pen and paper. Off the top of my head I recall 3 riddles in BG2 (plus expansion) where you have to do some calculating (on a piece of paper) to give the correct answer.

>>4951143
The idea was you wouldn't go wandering that far west until you had power armor mk1 and they actually cranked it up in a late patch to discourage cheeseeers that would head straight to Navarro after the game started to get all the new gear at the start.

>>4951143
>otherwise it's godawful game design.

Then what is a good game design? Oblivion and being able to explore any part of the map at lvl 1?

>>4943150
Arcanum is fucking great. I prefer it to the Fallout games.
Magic is way better than Tech. Melee and Dodge build is good too.

>>4951179
Then they messed up in my opinion. At Arroyo the elder told me the other villagers got taken south in vertibirds. This adds Navarro to the map. It is only here in Navarro that this Chris guy tells me to go south to San fransisco. (Without adding it to my map).

They should have made Hakunin send me to San fran then if I'm supposed to go there first.

I do like the game though. Despite this random encounter crap and some enemy vs player damage chenanigans. I really enjoyed all the questing in the settlements and cracking some tough parts (for that time of the game) like the gecko cave and raider camp.

It's just that at this stage of the game they make you travel looong distances and the encounter stuff really starts to wear on my nerves.

Didn't have this problem in fallout 1.

>>4951192
I'm not level 1. I'm level 19. I've done all the villages of the circle completely except redding and new reno. I've got bridge keeper robes (combat armor) and my companions have combat armor. I am not going to "any part of the map". I'm going to the part they send me to at this point of the game. Even in the early part of the game I got far too many random encounters in too short a distance. Like being dropped in the middle of a pack of 12 radscorpions. The screenshot I posted is an encounter with 6 enclave soldiers. I couldn't even win that wearing enclave armor and a plasma rifle.

Good game design is like in fallout 1, where you get the occasional random encounter and where overpowered encounters are only in those parts of the game where you stand a chance against them. If you meet creatures that are too powerful, like the deathclaws, you get a chance to turn back where you came from. As opposed to being dropped in the middle of an encounter map with a dozen of them right next to you.
New Vegas and plenty of other games do it right too. Don't pretend level 1 going everywhere OR getting gangbanged every step you take are the only 2 possibilities to design a game around.

>>4951204
At that level you should be able to defeat them, or to run from them without trouble. I don't remember having any trouble with random encounters in any Fallout, never. Maybe it's some shit they added in Restoration or something like that?

>>4951197
This picture (just taken) is the other issue I've been having during the game , that I also can't figure out. The damage rolls in this game always seem against me. When I burst fire the combat shotgun or 10mm thingie against enemies wearing leather armor I do 7 or so damage. When they use those against me wearing bridge keeper robes (combat armor) they do 15 damage or higher.
Here in this screenshot I'm wearing the power armor I just got from Navarro. Plasma defense is 15/60%. The enemy shoots at me with a plasma gun. I checked, I just picked it off his corpse. damage range = 15-35

15-35 minus 15 is 0-20 then reduced by 60% is 0-8. Yet he shoots me twice for 17 damage each. No crits involved.

They seem to be wearing the same armor, I shoot at them with my plasma rifle 30-65 (reduced to 6-20 with that armour) yet all my hits keep landing in the 6-9 range.

Difficulty and combat difficulty settings are normal. I have no idea what's going on and didn't have this issue in fallout 1.

Searched online several day ago and found someone asking around with the same problem but no solutions/answers forthcoming.

>>4951206
I'm not using restoration, just vanilla steam fallout 1 and 2. With the encounter rate I keep wondering if it's somehow related to cpu speed or something. But I don't remember this happening in fallout 1.

>>At that level you should be able to defeat them, or to run from them without trouble
See pic in >>4951213 that's an encounter with only 3 of them. Not 6. I got their armor now and a plasma rifle. I can win against 3 though sulik already died in that screen and they reduced my hp from max to near death because of lopsided damage rolls. I can win that. That encounter with 6 however, I have to run from. With max agility and 3 extra movement points from feats however I still need at least 2 turns to leave the map leaving me and my companions open to at least 12 shots doing about 15 damage average each.

>>4951218
I don't remember happening in Fallout 2 and I played it some months ago.

>>4951220
I'm only having these issues now. I played the original fallout 2 looong ago when I was young and don't remember these two things happening then.

>>4950190
>Cuckdorn

>>4951218
>I don't remember this happening in fallout 1.
that's because the pacing and overall design of fallout 1 was way tighter and just better than the rushed development of fallout 2

>>4950186
He is the only descent cleric in the game so that's that.

>>4951218
I'm absolutely baffled how one could make it so far into the game and still be unable to handle a few enclaves soldiers in less than a round. Not criticising you, just marvelling at the iq spread among gamers.

>>4951434
Fallout 1 is such a perfect little game. 2 is just proof that more isn't always better.

Gonna replay IWD1 with.

Half-Orc Barbarian, two-handed sword+longbow
Halfling Fighter/Thief, longsword+shield+sling
Human Berserker 7/Cleric, flail dual wield
Half-Elf Avenger, spear+sling
Elf Skald, shortbow
Human Wild Mage, sling

Playing through ToB now and beginning to hate how every boss battle boils down to "Land Ruby Ray and Breach so you can actually do anything because they all get to cast 8 different defense buffs before the fight starts"

Am I really going to have to have my wizard run Time Stop+Alacrity to effectively kill these fuckers

>>4951637
>>and still be unable to handle a few enclaves soldiers in less than a round.
You tell me. I've posted the screenshot here>>4951213
You can see the numbers. You can see what weapon and armor I have. Please tell me how I should be dealing with these in less than a round.

The fight in the screenshot has been 2 rounds. In those rounds I was able to score 2 crits, a miss and 1 normal hit. That's what took the one guy down. Meanwhile they took my hp down from max to near death and killed Sulik. Please enlighten me.

>>4952180
It's not really that different from late game SoA fights...... But yeah, pretty much.

>>4952273
The Sendai fight was actually really fun, took a few tries but I got the rhythm and strategy down and managed to kill her without anyone dying

Went to the next lair though and I'm getting my ass kicked by Draconis, this fight is just cancer and I'm sure his dad will be worse

Also I'm playing EE (started it in BG1 EE when it was new and before hearing about EE's problems) and it turns out they made most of the late game ToB bosses including Draconis immune to Time Stop so fuck me I guess

>>4949728
>Thread STILL alive
I fucking love /vg/

So I started over with a new party, I wanted to break out of the default roles and try a harder difficulty. Since cheesing town gates for respawns/heals is a thing, I figure I might as well need them.

New roles:
>Hellion (basically a berserker with a focus on polearms instead of blades)
>Ninja (a rogue with focus on melee and 1 point in throwing instead of bow-focused)
>White Mage (a priest with a bow instead of thrown/melee)
And a default Sorcerer.

Does anyone know if any generic junk items are used in encounters in this game? I know Avernum has no weight limits, but should I bother lugging around things like rope?

>>4949728
>Thread STILL alive
I fucking love /vr/

So I started over with a new party, I wanted to break out of the default roles and try a harder difficulty. Since cheesing town gates for respawns/heals is a thing, I figure I might as well need them.

New roles:
>Hellion (basically a berserker with a focus on polearms instead of blades)
>Ninja (a rogue with focus on melee and 1 point in throwing instead of bow-focused)
>White Mage (a priest with a bow instead of thrown/melee)
And a default Sorcerer.

Does anyone know if any generic junk items are used in encounters in this game? I know Avernum has no weight limits, but should I bother lugging around things like rope?

>>4951213
You're calculating player damage, enemy damage is based on the difficulty setting.
Get a real gun, plasma sucks.
Or just pop some drugs and you'll do fine.

Played Fallout 1 for the first time a couple of months ago. It was alright I guess, but even after sleeping on it many nights it still failed to leave a strong impression on me, positive or negative.

Should I even bother with FO2 if the only tring I genuinely loved about 1 was the time limit? Everything related to it was pure brilliance, Necropolis, the Water Merchants, and every time the game gave you a clue to investigate that went nowhere and only wasted your time, these were really memorable game design. But the rest kinda fell flat for me.

>>4952684
FO2 is much sillier than FO1.

It's a bigger game, by far. You get much more content and a gorillion times more memes xd, but it's a great game.

If you liked the literal-post-apocalypse feel of FO1 then... eh, I dunno. I love the way the games play, I think the writing is great and I enjoy how it lets your builds flourish, but if you want to pass and try something else, maybe a bit more open ended, then that makes sense.

I really don't understand IWD2.

I've got a Moon Elf (who are supposed to get a free proficieny with longswords), who is a Ranger (who are supposed to get free Ambidexterity and Two-Weapon Fighting when wearing medium or lighter armor), wearing mage robes, with two ranks in Martial Weapon, Large Sword, dual-weilding longswords, and both swords are taking a -3 Proficiency on their to-hit rolls. The hell, man?

>>4952720
>FO2 is much sillier than FO1.
>If you liked the literal-post-apocalypse feel of FO1

Waitwaitwait what? Did we play the same game? Chrissake, first thing the game threw at me after the rat tunnel was a frickin' space ship with an Elvis picture. I never got the feeling the game took itself seriously, the atmosphere was more like Space Quest if it was a post-apocalyptic rpg.

>>4952736
>first thing the game threw at me after the rat tunnel was a frickin' space ship with an Elvis picture.
Wew you got that right away? That's a relatively rare easter egg.

Yeah the setting is sci-fi post-futurist, I was talking about the tone of the game which is much more grim and with less comedy relief than FO2 has.

If you had fun with FO1 then by all means play 2. They didn't change the graphics at all, it's on the same engine, just a bigger and sillier version of the same game.

>>4952740
>relatively rare easter egg
Oh. Well. That may have impacted my first impression of the game's tone a bit.

But I'll maintain that it felt silly all the way through, and even most of the grimness got played as dark comedy, rarely straight. Brotherhood guards laughing their asses off as they send you off to The Glow? Any conversation with a mutant? Breaking into Thieves Guild which drops any pretense of seriousness the second Irish guy starts talking?

The holodisk loredumps were the rare exceptions that almost completely lacked humor, but those were just that, rare exceptions.

Alright, complete newfag to the genre. I've played jrpgs most of my life but as I've grown tired of the genre. I still really enjoy the genre but it's reliance on troupes and cliches today just makes most of the genre unbearable for me.

I want to gett into crpgs as they seem more interesting. I decided to start with the Wizardry series as I've played a few first person dungeon crawler jrpgs like the SMT series and really enjoyed those. I'm playing the ps1 version as it seems to be the best version of the first three games. Any suggestions for these games? the one thing that has always kind of scarred me about these games is situations were the player puts themself into a unwinnable situation and must start over. Is there anything like that to be cautious of?

I've been playing Planescape Torment and I've just gotten Fall-From-Grace.

Only after I spent time reading some books did I understand the writing quality of PS:T and how writing could make a difference in a game, I saw the differences in tone from FO2 and FO1 once I opened up FO1 today to replay it, and I just notice the difference between good and bad roleplaying dialogue options anymore, I only like games like CRPGS at this point

>>4952860
It gets shitted on a lot for being a VN, but Torment is one of the few games I can think of where I actually enjoyed reading the walls of text and engaging as the character.

It was just well written.

>>4952736
FO2 is considerable more full of "silliness" and pop culture stuff than 1 is.

>>4952978
I'll add my two cents and confirm what these people are saying. Even the easter egg special random encounters in fallout 2 go way more overboard than those in fallout 1.
You found a crashed spaceship in fallout 1? In fallout 2 you can find a literal crashed shuttlecraft from star trek with a phaser. In fallout 1 you find a telephone booth that might be a reference to Dr Who? In fallout 2 you can stumble upon a time portal that sends you back to the past into vault 13 where you accidentally break the water chip before you return.

But in fallout 2 these silly things are also in the real game. Raiders standing around in a raider base will say things like: "I feel like I'm just standing here waiting until someone shows up." "I would really like to be on another map sometime". etc....

This is not to say the game has no serious parts or no serious story. But there is definitely without a doubt far more humor and silly stuff in 2 than in 1.

>>4952728
what's your strength brainlet
if you are doing finesse i don't think longswords apply to that
(finesse uses dexterity modifiers for weapons like short swords or daggers)

>fallout 1 is better than fallout 2
uhh
>New Reno
>The Den
>Modoc
>Vault City
>Redding
>Broken Hills
>NCR
>Gecko
the only location that is kinda bad in the game is San Fran
also companions in fallout 2
>Marcus
>Sulik
>Goris
>Skynet
>Myron
so
>the weapons and combat are better
>the companions are better
>the cities and locations are better
FALLOUT 2 is better than fallout 1, which feels very unfinished most of the time
a great game but not as good as the second

>>4952728
TWF inflicts a -2 penalty minimum and because longswords aren't a light weapon, that penalty is -4, which is bumped up to -3 from Weapon Focus.

>>4953660
Yeah, the Feat descriptions are just misleading as fuck. Ambidexterity says it removes "all penalties from dual-wielding" and TWF just says it removes -2 from both hands' penalties. The fact that would be redundant as hell should have sent up a red flag.
Oh well.

>>4953645
Isn't Modoc just a bunch of pop culture references? I remember nothing from this place other than Gooonies and Funny Farm jokes.

>>4953685
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzMHvvBqVuY

>>4953645
>New Reno
>good

>>4953849
t.

>>4950202
My favorite thing about Baldur's Gate is the companions. There are so many insane companions in the game that I pick over actually useful people because they're way more interesting. Like not even evil, straight up insane. Shar-teel, Xzar and Montaron, Tiax, Faldorn, Quayle. Then there are weirdos who don't give a shit about anything and just want to have fun adventuring like Eldoth, Skie, Safana, Coran, Alora. It really makes you realize that the kind of people who become adventurers aren't right in the head. They're basically just violent homeless people.

What happened to these people? Why did they make the companions in Baldur's Gate II so boring and self-important? The only characters who I found interesting were Korgan, who just wants to get rich, and Yoshimo, who gets killed. I don't want to listen to characters whine about their tragic pasts, and I don't want to hang around with a bunch of goody two-shoes. I want to kill skeletons in crypts with mentally ill homeless wizards.

>>4954016
the only characters that whine about their past are jaheira, viconia,imoen,anomen,aerie
even though keldorn,mazzy and nalia are just goody two-shoes they're just a bunch of people that want to kill evil shit

Never read a single "Forgotten Realms" book. Any of those connected to BG/IWD plots/characters?

>>4954053
That's 5 out of 16 characters. That's almost 1/3rd. IIRC, Cernd's a whiner too and Minsc whines about Dynaheir. I really don't remember a whole lot. I'm not your god damn shrink, Jaheira.

>>4954107
no, there's some easter eggs but that's it

Alright, dual-wielding's not quite as bad as I thought. At first I was getting +1/+1 on my to-hit rolls, and that was just trash since the same character would shoot straight to +7 on to-hit only holding one longsword.
I found a +2 dagger and now my to-hits are +6/+5, vs. +7 with one sword/sword-and-board. That seems much more fair.

I'm feeling that this game is just a long series of ambush set-pieces, though. I'm not at the point where I want to stop playing yet, but my opinion of the game seems to only be dropping.
I need to look into IWD, but I'm starting to think Baldur's Gate's going to stay the best FR game in my opinion.

>>4952978
>>4953221
Cheers, I think I get it now. So basically while Fallout is most of the time post-apocalyptic comedy/parody, 2 veers deep into meta-jokes and pop culture references.

Yeah, that's shittier, even though I didn't care much for 1's writing either. But like I've first said the thing that I'm concerned about is the time limit. From what I've heard 2 doesn't have it. But does it at least have 1's quest design where majority of the quests contribute to the main quest one way or another?

>>4952860
Get a load of this nigger never read no books

>baldur's gate EE is full of SJW shit!
Well, not always.

>In the classic game's version Silence's creature file gender and animation are male, while the soundset, the voice is a female one. In the Enhanced Edition Silence was changed to be purely female.
http://baldursgate.wikia.com/wiki/Silence

>>4954834
>>But does it at least have 1's quest design where majority of the quests contribute to the main quest one way or another?
Absolutely not. They send you searching for the macguffin, just like the waterchip in 1. This quest just brings you from questhub to questhub where you can do all sorts of sidequests that have nothing to do with the main quest. Though I would argue that aside from hiring a water caravan in the hub, it's quite similar in 1. killing radscorpions or raiders, rescuing tandy, helping a poisoned guy all in Aradesh, has nothing to do with your water chip.
I felt this was far more pronounced in fallout 2. Where there are a lot more villages and even forks in the roads to entire towns you don't need to be. Only the very last town in the game is again main-quest-related.

>>4955053
Didn't notice SJW shit in bg EE or bg2EE. Though I didn't spend much time with the new characters. Noticed the poorly written trans character with cringy dialogue in dragonspear. (BG EE expansion for those not in the know)

>>4942427
The 6 character party cap is a newbie trap. It dilutes your xp gain to nearly nothing. Highly recommend you use 4 characters for most of the game.

>>4955152
It's tough to build a well-rounded 4 man party with the presets. I would probably go with Charname Fighter/mage, Xzar, Montaron, Branwen and then switch Branwen for Yeslick later.

>>4954386
TWF isn't very good in 3E unless you have lots of bonus damage from your class(ie: rogue). Between the off-hand getting half your STR bonus, needing two different good enchanted weapons, and two handed weapons doing more damage per swing thanks to them getting STRx1.5 to damage and thus benefiting from Haste a hell of a lot more than TWF does, it's just not a great combat style.

Planning to do a mod install soon for BG:EE (just high quality stuff, no lore unfriendly), but have to wait until they finally update BG1 to 2.5 to match 2. Anyone else stuck in update purgatory?

>>4955478
Yeah, I read a lot of discussion about it in a few forums, but, I have to take the rp option. I'm getting rekt in the Goblin Warrens with a four-person party, but I don't think I've hit a wall yet. If I get to a point where I can't progess I'll swap out the TWF for greatsword proficiency with Dalekeeper.

>>4952859
I don't really know much about Wizardry 1 on PSX but Wizardry 1 is mostly a game where 1/3 of the way damn near everything can one shot you and it just gets worse from there. Don't know how it handles saving since most Wizardry games I know of save after every finish action (Step, end of combat, ect.) which meant the moment anything goes south (and it will) hit the reset button. If you are emulating maybe save state before every time you enter the dungeon just in case. Since you can fuck yourself in a way you can never recover and have to start over.

>>4955312
You don't need to stick with it, but you should definitely do the beginning of the game, through the mines, with 4 or less to get your base level up. Then you can expand to 5. I only pick up the 6th at the endgame. 6 is clunky to maneuver and really hurts your xp.

>>4954107
Some characters in BG1 and 2 are from the FR books, but you don't need knowledge of them to play the games.

Elminster and Drizzt come to mind.

>>4952337
Weren't they immune beforehand? I know at least that the last boss is. Either way it's a decision I approve of. The spell is so powerful that in any other game you'd think it was an unintentional exploit.

>>4953673
Offhands are for stat sticks anyway. Same as in real life, you just usually want a shield more.

>>4954016
Yeah, Coran is an odd one. You look at his bio and it tells you he's (Chaotic?) Good so you take it for granted. Then you do some city quests later and it turns out he's a deadbeat that was mostly just fucking around in Cloakwood to avoid responsibility.

I've had Icewind Dale sitting in my library for a long time and never played it, I'd like to but before I do are there any essential community patches or mods I need to/should get?

>>4957071
Enhanced Edition is unironically perfect, mainly because it adds all those classes for replay value.

Try something cool like Dragon Disciple, Dwarf Defender, Beast Master or even Archer.

>>4957091
A cool combo I was just thinking about.

Priest of Helm level 11 dualed to a Thief, using the Seeking Sword +4 Thac0 bonus to backstab.

Swashbuckler level 3 (maxed find traps) dualed to a Mage.

You have a bit of a Cleric there that transitions to a Thief and an early Thief that handles traps till you get the other Thief in action.

As much as I still enjoy CRPGs, one thing they lack really puts me off them nowadays- AI. All of them except for maybe Arcanum feel as though the NPCs are just waiting for you to talk to them 24/7, standing in the same spot doing absolutely nothing and not reacting to their environment. And it's not as though it was unheard of technology back then- Ultima did it right, but no other game even tried to. For that reason I actually find modern TES more immersive than classic CRPGs, even though the latter have far superior role playing.

>>4957297
This could be mitigated by making the NPCs talk to themselves while they are walking around. You know when sometimes they got those subtitles over their models.

>>4953645
Fallout feels like a more concise story with an unfinished world, while Fallout 2 feels like a mess of a story with a more fleshed out world.

>>4957297
Go check out the Falling Stars scenario from Blades of Exile.

>>4957297
>Elder scrolls npcs
>have a couple paths they follow
>a couple lines they say to one another
Its not that much different.

>>4936085
Looking to get into CRPG's. Plan on playing Heroes of Might and Magic 3, UFO defense, and Ultima Underworld. What are some other absolute essentials? Anyone got a list or Picture?

>>4958912

What are some of the best First Person Dungeon Crawler? Been meaning to play more but the only one I really played was the SMT and Etrian Odyssey game.

>>4958912
>What are some other absolute essentials?
MM4-7
the Gold Box games from Pool of Radiance all the way through Buck Rogers
Dark Sun
Fallout

There's a fuckload anon and some of them will be real hit or miss for you

>>4958932
Wizardry 6, 7, and 8

>>4958947
Seem 6 and 7 doesn't have automapping. But seem there a mod that puts one in so I'll take a look at it.

>>4958923
>>4958912
Play from bottom up. RPGs are amazing even bad ones are decent.

>>4958932
Since youre a weeb play Dark Spire and thank me later.

Also Legend of Grimrock 1 &2

>>4958947

>>4958932
It isn't really retro, but Strange Journey (Redux especially) will satisfy that FPS dungeon itch. Gameplay is more akin to the SNES games.

What are the best retro action RPGs? Fuck this turn based, pause button RTS shit.

>>4958923
Divine Divinity
Nox
Baldurs Gate
Icewind Dale
Gothic 1 and 2
Neverwinter Nights

Not retro but Grimdawn and Torchlight 2

>>4953645
Fallout 2 has higher peaks (New Reno, Vault City, parts of San Francisco), but Fallout 1 is the more consistent experience. Fallout 2 also feels too long for its own good.

>>4936443
the same amount as if you got a complete bg1 playthrough save online. ;)

>>4936940
its not hard. its hard to play.

real time combat that is impossible to control unless you pause?

fucking trash.

>>4958032
Cheers, I will.

>>4958903
>Fallout NPCs
>Stand there
>Stand there
>Twirl gun on finger
>Stand there

A basic daily routine script is far less immersion breaking for me. Even better if it has some degree of freedom, like in STALKER.

>>4957297
Just imagine they're doing nothing that your character pays attention to.
>>4958912
Heroes and Might and Magic is a turn based city management and army combat game. It's only an RPG in that you can choose between one of two randomly selected passive skill bonuses whenever one your main hero units levels up.It's a spinoff from a different series that is an RPG though.

In BG1 is there any point at all in doing the Wereewolf Island quests if you're already max level? From what I remember it didn't have any essential loot, and this playthrough is starting to wear on me to where I just want to be done with it.

>>4958932
Arx Fatalis.

>>4958903
You mean just morrowind, right? Even then alot of npcs did have routines. Daggerfall npcs wander about all over the place, besides a few static ones in establishments. Arena npcs also were just roaming, but if you try to talk to anybody in a tavern.... then onlivions npcs were a little more a out and about than morrowinds, but still a few static ones. Skyrim has people doing daily life stuff and its pretty cool.

>>4959580
Fallout 1 and 2 has npcs that walk around, but mostly, important npcs stay in the same spot. They definitley are not as well mapped out as tes npcs. F03 and mv obviously have similar a.i. to oblivion.


Both of your childish rantings are just lazy half truths trying to hurt the others fee fees. /v/ is truly cancer.

>>4958923
>god tier
>deus ex, diablo 2, fallout series, nwn2, vtmb
I think 00's edgelord kid made this list

>>4959604
I'm not trying to hurt 'fee fees', I'm just stating my opinion in the chance that somebody might agree. If you don't agree with my entirely subjective opinions then just ignore them, don't allow your 'fee fees' to be hurt.

>>4959607
>>4959607
Deus Ex took the the number 1 spot in every Greatest Game Ever list for like five years running after, and Diablo 2 left such a matk on the ARPG genre that it almost took two decades before Path of Exile surpassed it.

>>4959661
>path of exile surpassed it

>>4958923
Wizardry 8 and Arcanum should be lower way lower. They're both ambitious projects with fundamental flaws. Torchlight 2 and Jade Empire should be way higher.They both succeeded in exactly what they set out to.

>>4959643
Fuck, how horrible does your reading comprehension have to be, to think, im the one who has my feelings hurt. Youre pissin me off a bit, by acting a fool. I was ending your shit opinion war with other anon, because both fallout and tes have fair a.i. for the time. you guys being dumb about the reality of things is why i replied.

>>4959681
>because both fallout and tes have fair a.i for the time
>For the time

Apparently you have horrible reading comprehension. Note how I said 'Ultima did it right but no other game did', and more importantly Ultima 6 was released years before FO, BG and so on.

There's no objective right or wrong in the matter anyway. I don't like the static NPCs of old CRPGs, and if somebody else thinks otherwise then fine.

>>4959683
I dont disagree with you on the ultima thing... i never said anything about that. I was just trying to get you and the other anon to shut up about fallout and tes having bad a.i. wtf man, you dumbass!

>>4959664
There's some things the games do differently that come down to subjective preference. Like but POE's creative lore,deeper lore, higher skill cap, barter economy, and enormous plethora of viable builds and playstyles that are actually somewhat needed to face all its different challenges lets it win out out in the end. Heck even the little touches, like how rips only move your characters to the pussy leagues are nice.

>>4958923
If you liked jagged alliance 2 then you should like fallout tactics too...

I hated fallout tactics for it not being fallout2 but it is still good tactic game

>>4959114
and if we're mentioning non-retro, Elimage Gothic

>>4959661
>Deus Ex
so you wear literally nostalgia goggles

>Diablo 2
Diablo 2 is mediocre hack and slash(or cookie clicker, more actually). it's just for casual normalfags who don't even understand what """RPG""" is. muh quests and dungeons, shitty character and skill development system, and few interactions with objects, etc.

>>4959729
Secret of Mana is a better example for ARPG than Dark Souls. Hell there are probably a dozen Japanese ARPGs that are are more appropriate example of an RPG with action combat than Dark Souls, which is almost entirely an action game with a light sprinkling of RPG elements.

>>4959729
Also Diablo is Hack and Slash and Wizardry is a Dungeon Crawler.

>>4959591
Theres an island of werewolves in BG1 ?
I missed that.

>>4959729
Diablo wasnt meant to be an RPG but thanks to Diablo RPGs were allowed to be made again.

also its fun and your average normie probably hasnt played it. Diablo 3 maybe

>>4959160
Played Strange Journey on the DS. That's what I meant by SMT.
>>4959114
I'll look into it but for some reason I don't really enjoy emulating DS games. Just feel off with the dual screens.

As for Grimrock been looking into it but don't really know about the whole active combat. While I don't hate FF for doing it I just never really enjoyed ATB combat like others do.

>>4959729
>kings field
>dark spire
>crpg
Lol what

>dark souls
>jrpg
No


>diablo
>clicker
Just because you dont like it doesnt mean its not an ARPG. Also literally every game on the computer you click....so...

>>4959661
>Path of Exile
I wish I could enjoy that game but fuck having the first 20 or so nods just being +5 to whatever stat you are going for.

>>4959819
Not in the vanilla game. It's part of the Tales of the Sword Coast expansion along with Durlag's Tower and that shitty Shandalr dungeon. Though spoilers: It's actually an island with werewolves AND wolfweres, with the factions at war.

>>4959827
Yeah it's kinda slow and janky to start with when your character is limited to using normals skill gems..Things don't really get rolling until you've gotten your first five link. I'm skilled enough at it now that I can make it to maps with 90+ skill nodes in just a couple hours but obviously that isn't the new player experience.

>>4959729
>No Titan Quest under clicker

BAKA

In Baldur's Gate do I need only one pip in two-handed weapons if grand mastery and one pip reduces the speed factor to zero anyway?

Since Big World's unmaintained for original version of the bg1 and bg2 (which is bs), should I settle with manually installing mods?

>>4964730
I always manually install mods. Here's an example of a list.

>>4936085
I think you are just a retard.
-t. Finished BG1 for the first time as a sorcerer this summer.

>>4959729
what the hell is your problem?!
do eat shit for dinner or something?

>walk into Fell Wood
>immediately get rushed by six greater ice trolls, five of which were off-screen, who all target my rogue and sorcerer
I'm so fucking tired of this game.

>>4964751
Where you get these ? Nexus didnt seem to have any

>>4965501
There was no Sorcerer class in BG1.
It was added in BG2 to hype up D&D 3rd edition.

>>4966821
Sorcs are in BG:EE.

>>4954107
You should read Homeland tbqh.

>>4954107
Maybe it's me but the only D&D books I could get into was the Dragonlance books Dragon of Autumn Twilight. Mostly because it reads like a bunch of D&D players just kept getting drunk and doing the dumbest thing possible every so often like any good D&D game for no good reason.

I'm playing Icewind Dale EE. Never played it originally but have beaten Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 which are easily in my top list.

Since I can, I'm running 2 sorcerers, a paladin, fighter/cleric, bard and a thief. Haven't gotten very far yet but I will play more tonight. I expect to have fun, since I always preferred combat to story and exploring.

>>4967727
well if you're playing icewind dale EE you should know that the balancing is fucked, because kits are op as shit
also sorcerers are op as shit so you'll have an easy time with the game if you take one

>>4968069
I'm aware of all this shit but I'm not a purist by any means. And yes I have two sorcerers.

>>4968069
What in the fuck are kits, anyway?

>>4968191
Subclasses under classes, best way to describe it. For example, you have base Bard or you can choose Blade/Jester instead which is basically a bard with emphasis on different aspects of the class. These were not in the original game but added in EE, and contrary to what has been posted not all kits are OP, some are downright shitty

>>4966656
BG mods come from a few different sites.
Try Gibberlings 3 and Spellhold Studios for starters.

>>4968832
What are done examples of the trap options? Bounty Hunter, the anti-wizard fighter, and what else?

>>4940259
>Best grill is Sticky Vicky
>Not Imoen

>>4947378
>Tristan and Isolde
Looking it up it was apparently some mod called Dark Horizon.

>>4950476
I think it was for the Animal Companion.

>>4964751
>>4964730
>>4968874
Speaking of quest mods, are the Big packs any good? Dark Horizons, The Dark Days, Shadow of Soubar, The Never Ending Journey?
I'm considering a replay and trying to decide whether I want to go EE Trilogy or the original Trilogy, and trying to figure out which mods are worth it. Something big sounds like it might be good for a new experience, unless they're trash.

>>4968897
If you don't have it patched to be unnerfed, the Shapeshifter is trash.
I don't care for beast master rangers either.

>>4942429
Wizard bosses in BG are the culmination of Bullshit.

>>4951179
Even with the OG power armor, surviving Enclave patrols is a fucking pain

>>4968897
Blade is pretty shitty. No real reason to run a Blade over a Bard as far as I can tell.

>>4969348
>>4968897
That's ridiculously bad advice, Blades are amazing. Offensive and Defensive spins are incredibly powerful. Their pickpocket and lore skills still become amazing. The non-progress bard song doesn't even matter because the HLA enhanced bard song replaces it anyway.
They also get Thief HLA Traps and Use Any Item. A Blade is a bit like a KenSage that also gets use any item and levels up quickly, they're pretty solid all around.

>>4969348
This, but the opposite. Pickpocket will still be maxed without any effort, and gain access to a full powered "Enhanced Bard Song" at exactly the same level. In the meanwhile defensive stance will easily transform them into unmovable brick walls.

See also why Haer'Dalis the Blade made >>4950190 Top Tier despite his garbage stat and unrelenting faggotry whereas the NPC Bards scored much much lower.

It's very annoying how little info for IWD2 there is out there. Game doesn't even seem to have a wiki.
Trying to find out whether Nym reappears after Chapter 3 and there's no character page for him anywhere. If it were BG or BG2 I could find his equipment, his wares, his Pickpocket drops, quest involvement, and dialog trees.
Really a shame.

>>4969481
>unmovable brick walls
Don't forget to use Free Action so that they can move freely if they want even during Defensive Spin.

So am I just retarded or is Big World Setup hot fucking garbage? Because I have been fighting with this shit all day and am just about to get back to doing it fucking manually because at least doing it fucking manually will work.

>>4969537
I don't even know what that is. Where do you even get mods/portraits/sounds for these games that isn't sorcerers.net or gibberlings3?

>>4969543
>I don't even know what that is.
It's basically a mod manager that downloads all the mods for you, sorts them in the correct installation/load order, and then installs them all for you with whatever caveats you lay out beforehand (you can pick and choose what parts of whatever mod you want to install for example). It sounds great but so far it's just been a nightmare.

Also, most mods have been moving to github, because of this fucking Big World Setup shit.

>>4969549
Huh. Heard about that site but've never been there.

Won't help, but posts like >>4964730, >>4964751 make it sound like it's not worth the effort to use that.

>>4969537
>>4969549
I downloaded and looked over it yesterday, but it does look like a fucking nightmare.
The pdf guide by the same guy does look useful though.

>>4969470
spins don't stack with haste so no, fuck that lol

>>4969812
Stacks with potions of quickness though.
And it does max damage every hit for 4 rounds and gives a damage and to hit bonus.

Is she the most overlooked NPC? She is a monster even before her buffs.

>>4969865
The only way people would overlook her is physically, I see people tend to give her glowing responses.
If she had a built in romance, I bet most parties would include her too.

>>4951242
Keldorn comes specced to use Carosmyr. Keldorn with Carosmyr is so fucking ridiculous that not even Saerileth, with all her infamous OP Mary Sue Paladin bullshit, can keep up with him.

>>4966595
Told you IWD2 sucks. It's like a constant barrage of annoying high HP enemies on normal and it just gets worse in HoF.

>>4969927
That doesn’t make Keldorn great necessarily though, it just makes Carsomyr great. You can make a better Paladin.

>>4969939
"Not as good as a Paladin CHARNAME" isn't exactly the most damning criticism.

>>4969951
Keldorn has sucky stats. He's only OP because of Carosmyr and his Kit.

>>4969865
>>4969951
Modding Mazzy to be a Paladin makes her a better paladin than Keldorn.
>Shorty Saves
>Actual reasonable Dex
>Low strength but Keldorn needs a belt there anyway so it doesn't matter

>>4969951
Well, other characters have unique gear or stats you can’t replicate. Keldorn has a unique armor that gives Free Action, which is nice, but it’s not the kind of thing you’ll want to take into mid-late game. Gauntlets of Dexterity are basically mandatory, which isn’t a huge problem because the hand slot doesn’t have many other amazing items, but it does mean he requires extra maintenance.

Basically I’ll never feel like I need to make a Cleric, Mage, or Fighter in BG2, but I might make a Paladin.

>>4969956
In AD&D, a Paladin's top three stats are STR, CON, and CHA, which Keldorn's is 17, 17, and 18. If we're going by stat total, the only party members who have him beat are Dorn and Sarevok.

I will grant that his DEX is really fucking bad though.
>>4969965
Well if we're including mods then that's a different story. Modded Mazzy will rip through most everything.

>>4969980
>In AD&D, a Paladin's top three stats are STR, CON, and CHA
>CHA
Is that why Dorn's Charisma is so fucking high despite him being a genocidal half-orc blackguard?

>>4969980
The difference between 17 and 18xx is/can be huge, though.

>>4969980
17 is good for tabletop 2e, but bad for BG2 where most frontline fighters are expected to have 18/xx. Luckily there are belts and such to help that.

>>4969937
It's been really up-and-down.

Chapter 1 was fine; Chapter 2 was fine until the area just before the Goblin Warrens, where every encounter contained half a dozen Warg Riders, who get WAY too many attacks per round, and two to four more Riders who literally teleport into your ranks for reasons; the rest of the Warrens was pretty cool -- being able to incite the captive spiders and otyugh againt the orcs and goblins, etc. Most of Chapter 3 was good, except the Ice Palace goes on for way too long and Oria bugged out. Aside from the stupidly huge pods of Ice Trolls and the three Death's Candles, the rest of the Wood was fine.
Goddamn game's way too linear, though.

>>4969939
Not really that great an argument when you can make a better CHARNAME everything.

>>4969978
Three reasons why a CHARNAME clericc is a pretty solid choice:
1. For tough fights when some chars die you might want a raise dead user,so you might as well have it be one the one whose death is an instant gameover.
2. Even starting off with 18 wisdom is a lot of bonus spells, and even beyond that, an import from the first game can start with 21.
3. A ranger dualled to cleric gains druid spells as well. Ones you normally wouldn't see since both Jaheira are especially Cernd are subpar, and since late game Druid progression in 2nd Edition is completely FUBAR.

Reasons to not start off as a cleric: You might want your character to stick his dick into one of the three pubescent jerk-off fantasies. All of which are also Divine spellcasters.

>>4970000
What part of Enhanced Edition is shit are people still not getting? Their OC Donut Steel being a retardedly OP Gary Stu is just par for the course.

>>4970002
It makes no difference at all when the game is filled with belts that raise STR to 20+

>>4969483
Checked an autists site for you, that has all the infinity engine games info. Except that. Weird

>>4970000
Bllackgaurds are min 14 so probably.
But then, rangers are min 14 wisdom and Minsc...

>>4970060
I think it's pretty obvious that BG2 is kind of shoehorning you into being a thief (probably an assassin,) it is by far the one thing that has the least consistency in your party, and nobody else who you can actually keep does it full time.

>>4970473
BG2 has a lack of thieves, likely for the reason that they REALLY wanted you to use Yoshimo and Imoen.

>>4970031
Once you get to the Yuan-Ti temple and see the laziest level design ever (a circle of identical looking rooms), you'll probably quit just like I did.

>>4970794
After I cleared Fell Wood I went back to the Ice Temple to try to finish out the Battle Square... I think that's going to be what makes me put the game down.

>>4943150
If it's your first time playing the game I recommend just having fun experimenting around with magic and tech.
Just make sure that you recruit Dog and maybe Sogg if you want.
Then the next playthrough is a dumb half-orc.

>>4950190
Aerie and nalia are top tier, khalid is as well.

>>4944906
Arcanum.
The amount of choices it gives you, and even the one's you're not aware of is staggering.

>want to get out of first village
>bridge blocked by hooligans
>can fight them
>can plant bomb or set traps
>can bribe them
>can do a quest for them
>can convince them that you're from the thieves' guild

>have to go to an important npc to give you next step in main quest
>can talk to them to lead you to the next step
>can sneak and check around house for more information
>killed them? summon their souls and force them to talk

>1st playthrough
>get the 'retrieve the stolen painting quest'
>have no clue what to do
>get to some shady guy asking me to deliver a message, but says that I shouldn't open it.
>I opened it, and got confused as to where I'm delivering the message
>accidentally go to where the stolen painting is stored
>fight goons
>complete quest

>2nd playthrough
>decide to automatically get the stolen painting from the beginning
>return painting
>quest giver accuses you of stealing the painting and returning it for the reward money

>>4972138
Think I'm going to pick this up tomorrow. I see there's a way to import custom character portraits, but how about soundsets?

>>4958923
this list is fucking trash

Raise Dead only works on people who died relatively cleanly. That's why if a character gets gibbed or disintegrated, you can't bring them back. But that's pretty rare. I don't understand why death is treated as being so final in most regards. The vast majority of characters you watch die are, for the most part, not that mutilated.

When you find Khalid's body in the Irenicus dungeon, Jaheira talks about how he's beyond this sort of magic. I would assume this means Irenicus probably fried most of his innards beyond recognition or something to that effect, but the body seems basically like a normal dead body. I guess you're just supposed to take it on good faith that the body is worse off than the graphic actually portrays, like maybe the head is mostly severed or something.

But take Gorion for example. Sarevok just cuts him down. What's stopping anyone from just bringing him back? Am I supposed to assume that it's a given that most of the time in Fae'run whenever anyone kills anyone else, they go the extra mile to ruin the body? Where is the line here? I don't get it.

>>4972353
Raise Dead is a 5th level spell, you need to be at least level 9 for that. Despite what Baldur's Gate 2 and ToB might make you think that's actually very high level for typical people.

>>4972384
I get that it's not exactly a cantrip, but conceivably you could just carry the body to a temple, couldn't you?

>>4971235
IWD2 is legit a bad game. The only Infinity Engine game I'd say that about.

The dungeons are simply pure garbage.

>>4972396
RAW, it's a very expensive spell for normal people or even kings. The local cleric probably cant cast it either unless you're in a city the size of BG or sigil.

The target also has to want to come back from the afterlife.

>>4966821
I used BGT with some other cool mods.

>>4972353
>What's stopping anyone from just bringing (Gorion, Khalid) back?
The suppreme deity PLOT has forbidden it.

(DnD-wise, you need a 10000 GP worth diamond, which are very rare)

>>4972667
Which ones?

>>4973008
>(DnD-wise, you need a 10000 GP worth diamond, which are very rare)
>TFW inflation will eventually make resurrections cheap and plentiful in DnD

>>4949728
I loved Avernum (played the old version) it was one of those playthroughs that you keep in your heart forever. I went with Barbarian, Rebel, Cleric and Wizard.

>>4972353
>But take Gorion for example. Sarevok just cuts him down. What's stopping anyone from just bringing him back?
Who would do it? CHARNAME runs away and doesn't have Gorion's body.

>Am I supposed to assume that it's a given that most of the time in Fae'run whenever anyone kills anyone else, they go the extra mile to ruin the body? Where is the line here? I don't get it.
I think the line should really go the opposite direction. The question isn't why isn't Gorion easily raised, the question is why is it so easy to raise someone (eg a party member) by just bringing them to a temple? And I think in this case the answer is probably that they tried to make it convenient enough to complete with savescumming (and in that I think they mostly failed).

>>4958923
I'm thinking about makin my own recommendations list, this one's shit.

I own a million CRPGs and RPGs in general, and I don't know to start. :(

>>4973218
Under no circumstances play multiple RPGs at the same time. Play an RPG for a few hours and if it strikes you as interesting, continue. If you're bored, drop it. If you end up liking an RPG, ask around for games that are similar.

How do you use custom portraits in Arcanum? Shit is convoluted as fuck.

>>4973174
In this setting when you die your alignment and path in life determines the destination of your soul, where it will live on in a different plane, and when you die there, your soul disperses and becomes part of the universal material or something

Khalid is probably in neutral good heaven or wherever and Jaheira likely regards any resurrection of him to be some sort of profane necromancy. He could definitely cross the planes back to the mortal realm but dying in that state would be horrible.

>>4969481
haer'dalis is actually a cool guy, i didn't rank them based on meta shit

>>4936085
Hey faggots, I'm at chapter 4 of BG1, and I feel like a retard in relation to party members at this point, I'm a Dwarf fighter/cleric. Current guys are Kagain, Garrick, Xan, Kivan and Imoen. But I used Branwen, Xzar and the half elves at least prior, haven't rotated since the mines. Are there any good members to pick and replace later down the road? I'm just worried about scrolls and shit for mages since High Ledge doesn't have much of the good stuff or party composition since the different type of mages + bards, dual classing characters, good fighers, how pplayer class choice affects this in the end, exp etc
I fucked up getting Minsc's quest though, he won't speak to me (keeps repeating his battle lines or something) and I'm sort of new to CRPG stuff so I didn't know to reload and try with higher charisma or reps no matter what I do.

>>4974198
Huh. No kidding. I guess it's kinda neat how he gives everyone cool bird names.
>>4974756
-Did you yous pass up Coran in Cloakwood already? In my experience he's almost a strictlysuperior version of Kivan. Especially if you want someone to deal with locks n shit while Imeon is dual classing (though hold off on that until after the mines since there's some particularly particularly nasty traps near the end of it.)
-Yeslick, the Dwarven Fighter/Cleri with a bonus suped up dispel is solid as well, though possibly redundant considering your comp.
-Finally Alora, available in the city, is fun as heck as well. Like Imoen but on steroids. If you want a pure thief that is.
-Tiax, Quayle, and Skie are all meme character s only.
-There's a shop that spells all of the relevant spell at the start of Chapter 5 so don't worry about that part.
-Also wouldn't worry about fucking up with Minsc since Dynaheir's Invoker class means she misses out on all the strongest crowd control.
-On the other hand though Xan misses out on the Magic Missiles you'll want to spam the shit out of later, so again, strongly consider the dual class Imoen strat.
-The game has enough spare exp in it that you'll eventually cap out no matter what you do.
-There's also enough spare money in the game that you never need to scrape for every discount either.

>>4975029
Thanks anon, I'll probably keep Kagain throughout unless any of the fighter based party members from ch 3/2 outclass him as a front line, he seems ok with CHARNAME. Would've had Montaron too if he wasn't partnered
I haven't reached cloakwood yet, just came back from the bandit camp (by mines I meant the Nashkel ones).
Thanks for the tip, I'll go replace Kivan and maybe pick up Alora during the time Imoen's dual classing. What level is good for dual classing Imoen, I think she's lv 4 now and I got 50/50 in the find traps/lock picking. Might give her some good offensive spells and kick Garrick to the wayside then and find somone else for magic missile spam or use her, would've stuck with Xzar but he's too frail. Xan probably has some other spells I can find for him or I'll just give him a wand of fire.
Who's good with crowd control? I use the MC so far with entangle/hold person(since I got lv 2 spells now)/command
I heard there was some guy called Edwin in Nashkel, he any good?

>>4975454
-Yeah, nobody but CHARNAME beats Kagain as a tank once you give him dexterity gauntlets.That auto regening 20 constitution tho.
-Imeon can still rach the maximum mage level if she duals at six - which will probably work out for you now if you put all her reamining points in traps. Coran comes with points in locks so he can handle those.
-Sleep, web, horror, confusion, emotion, and chaos are the spells to look out for on the crowd control front, and Xan being an Encahnter makes his version even stronger.
-Edwin is a Conjurer which is widely regarded as the game's strongest mage that comes with an amulet that doubles his tier 1 spells. So yeah, he's pretty sick. Just assumed he might have been locked to you since he has the opposite personal quest as Minsc. To kll Dynaheir instead of saving her.

>>4976315
I thought edwin's amulet gave him bonus spells at every level.

>>4976342
Yeah, I think he's thinking of the ring you can pull out of the rock outside Friendly Arm Inn.

>>4975029
>Quayle and Tiax
>meme characters
No, not really. Tiax's Summon Ghast is really useful in a game that really loves its summons, and Tiax's class, Thief/Cleric, boasts the highest possible backstab damage (with Cleric buffs and Staff of Striking, you are looking at extremely large backstab values). Quayle is a ridiculously good companion - 10 Wisdom doesn't actually stop him from casting any of his Cleric spells, and being a massive spellbook contained into a single character is just a really useful trait. With the amount of cleric and mage buffs available, he's superbly versatile. I prefer Quayle over Edwin, powergaming wise.

>>4976342
>>4976364
You're both correct sirs.

>>4976389
>Cleric buffed staff striking backstabs
>not a meme

>start Arcanum
>specialize in summoning
>obliterale the first act of the game
>new character
>specialize in firearms
>can't get passed the three thugs in Shrouded Hills

>>4976720
Yes, tech is somewhat underwealming. I used a mod that buffed guns.

>>4950190
Valygar is the shit. Backstabbing + Celestial Fury

>>4976720
http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/index.php?threads/arcanum-rebalance-mod.86669/
get this mod if you want to make guns better

How do I get good at backstabbing

>>4976682
The capability to wipe out damage sponges in one hit is certainly not a meme
also Cleric/Thief remains just an useful toolbox character, since he pretty much packs all the utility you might ever need - from buffs to healing to locksmith/trapfinding. You can free up the remaining 5 slots for something useful in BG1, like, say, 5 archers.

>>4976734
>>4977480
I guess I will. I did every availabe quest, got to level 5, built the repeater rifle, and they're still completely impossible.

If you lure them back to town the guards literally run away, despite being level 14, the constable being level 5, and their being perfectly willing to attack you if you call him a coward. There's not even a way to get Doc to help, despite him being level 30.
Really shitty oversight in what's otherwise been a great game.

>>4978009
If you drop railroad spikes by the ogres, they'll pick them up and equip them since they don't have weapons. The spikes are much weaker than their ogre fists though.
It's really an exploit though and doesn't fix the core issue with them.

>>4978395
It seems like a widespread design problem in games in general -- things that wouldn't be good in real life, like punching a guy wearing armor, get buffed for things like Fatigue Damage/knockout power, until they can actually be better than the raw damage option. Monk classes and stun grenades come to mind most often, as if getting hit in the face with a six-pound sword, or having a fragmentation grenade go off next you, imparts no concussive force. But, "balance".

Thanks, I'll keep that in mind. I wound up just setting the game on easy and savescumming for a best-case-scenario fight.
Got bored and went back to my mage anyway, heh. I like that how powerful magic is is sort of balanced by the hit to your quality of life.

>>4978430
>things that wouldn't be good in real life, like punching a guy wearing armor, get buffed for things like Fatigue Damage/knockout power, until they can actually be better than the raw damage option. Monk classes and stun grenades come to mind most often, as if getting hit in the face with a six-pound sword, or having a fragmentation grenade go off next you, imparts no concussive force. But, "balance".

Well, it's funny since in Arcanum hitting someone with a weapon does damage their fatigue as well as their hitpoints, so you can knock someone out as you beat them to death with most weapons.
Half Ogres are just monstrous bastards when it comes to their fists since their fists are the size of someone's torso. Still overkill though.
Did you have any persuasion? You can talk your way past him and even get information on the thieves' underground organization from him at the same time.

>>4978443
Yeah, I did notice, and appreciate, that about Arcanum. It crrates a nice balance where you have to decide how much FT you want to spend on your turn, since you lose more by getting hit. Good risk-reward system.

I was trying a Firearms purist, so I didn't have points in anything besides Firearms and firearm crafting. And I talked myself into a corner by telling Owens I'd kill them before I tried to sabotage the other bridge.

I'd hate to doublepost, but, can anyone tell me why sometimes I can summon two Familiars and sometimes I can only summon one?

>>4978759
The amount of spells you can have maintained at once is based on your intelligence. Those little empty squares.
That might be what is doing it.

>>4978769
Nah, it's not that -- Familar works irrespective of max maintainable spells.

>>4978802
Oh, my bad. I never really bothered with summons.
Time Magic was my think.
>tfw over 70 action points and halving all the enemies too

>>4978803
Nice. Yeah, magic has been super fun. Gettin to summon two level 30 beatsticks at level 15 really let me get into some areas I can't imagine gettinto otherwise, and I just unlocked teleport, so no more 300-gold train tickets.

>>4978812
>let me get into some areas I can't imagine gettinto otherwise, and I just unlocked teleport

Teleport's fun. Once you get the Master quest for Throwing, it marks a location on your map on the other side of the mountains. With Teleport, you can teleport to it right away and skip the normal process.
You can get there without following the story or teleport, but it's a chore. Still nice to head to that city by the sea early to get the robot spider and things before you've even met GB

anyone got a download link for Darklands?

>>4950508
If you're playing any game titled "icewind dale", you can easily blow through the game with a cleric/fighter/rogue/wizard (or fighter/thief, if IWD1). Completely steamrolled IWD1 with the classic party.

In general, you shouldn't multiclass in IWD2 except for short dips (like 1-2 levels).

Most recently, I was playing with
>human bard, focused on ranged with crossbows
>human cleric of lathander, with a single level of paladin (or 2?)
>dwarf fighter, 1 level of cleric of tempus, 1 level of barbarian, axes, either axe + shield + combat expertise for defense or 2h axe + power attack for offense
>elf mage, used bows; dont remember the specifics of the build
>halfling rogue, 1 level of ranger, 1 level of monk, TWF/finesse
>human druid

I had a bit of every base class except sorcerer, and I was steamrolling everything. I stopped because I fucked up and made the blue wizard architect mad, which means I would miss a quest later in the game. I didn't have a save to rectify it and it bummed me out.

>>4969483
he doesn't. I personally think he should have; theres a drow merchant right before the last boss; should have been him IMO.

and yeah, IWD2 just wasn't as popular. Everybody was still jizzing their pants over bg2.

>>4970031
I didnt have problems with worg riders, but the ice palace is my main replay barrier, the woods are the 2nd barrier, and the fucking dragons eye is the third. I dont like the marshes with the barbs/trolls/spiders either, and I really don't care for the monastery. Everything else is great, especially chapter 1.

>>4970465
he should have just been a berserker

>>4970496
probably this
EE has the best evil party; you play a blade, then pick up korgan, vic, edwin, dorn (high str blackguard with greatsword) and a vampire thief (very high str/dex, charm powers)

>>4971235
I feel the game is better if you pretend battle square doesnt exist. It does give you something to use all those excess potions on however.

ok i bought Darklands and Realms of Arkania 1-3 off GoG
any tips, i know nothing about these games, kinda havin a hard time

>>4980753
>he doesn't
I thought so. Glad I shanked him, then. Read his character bio while I was looking for an answer; really want to play IWD1.

The Warg Riders went down fast enough once I realized what the jig was, but the fact that they literally teleport into your ranks is just beyond defensible IMO.

After I arbitrated in a custom-built Cleric for it, Battle Square went mostly okay. Still wound up ctrl+y-ing a lot of shit, though. Mostly demons, because the fact that they would teleport into the room that segregated my party and cost ME the fight was infuriatingly stupid; and remorhaz, because fuck anything that gets three APR that can each do 75+15 blunt/fire.

I got through the first White Dragon encounter, and just haven't felt the desire to play since.

>>4976389
Yes, Quayle is an excellent companion with an extremely versatile spellbook. He's given a bad wrap because of his bad wisdom stat, but all it translates to is a lack of bonus spells. He rounds out a group with another cleric and mage very well.

Shs forums is down.
Can't download mods for BG2

>>4981915
Again? Seems to happen pretty often

>>4980863
>any tips
you need to actually sit down and read the manual
Also find a guide

skip RoA 1 and go straight to Star Trail, it's way better

>>4951218
>With the encounter rate I keep wondering if it's somehow related to cpu speed or something.
iirc that's actually the case, unless you patch it.

>>4952630
which avernum is that?

well just unironically spent 5 hours in darklands character creation screen and still didn't manage to make a party
fuck this piece of shit game for retarded gay-ass boomers

>>4981915
It's been days. Figures I would choose now to reinstall.