/vr/ - Retro Games

Fagot

Half elf warrior/druid, can equip anhkheg plate, can use +3 staff from durlag tower, can summon bears/wolves, heal, and cast lightning when outside.

>>5736074
>Currently in our team we have a mage and a fighter/cleric. Myself and two other people are undecided.
>strong support
You could roll an Inquisitor; multiplayer games tend to be fairly relaxed and loose and most Mage players aren't the most proficient at Mage chess, so you can use your Dispel Magic (cats at 2x the paladin level) and True Seeing to make it much easier for your friends to simply blast away. Other kits are good too.
>barbarian
Best purely martial tank in the game with Hardiness and Defender of Easthaven, but you might be stepping on your Fighter/Cleric's toes if he chooses to do that (Armor of Faith + Hardiness + DoE is similar, although dispellable).
>Ranger
Archer is insane DPS throughout the entire game and takes all the bows that your party doesn't have a reason to use because Bows are generally slightly underpowered damage-wise, outside of BG1 -- UNLESS you are an Archer, in which case you're insanely broken the whole way through. The raw amount of physical power means easy fights with meatshields like the final bosses.
>Druid
Either go multi or dual-class yourself or play a Totemic Druid or Avenger if you want a more supportish class. Totemic Druid is an insane summon from BG1 start and later you have insane support with Insect Plague, elementals and Nature's Beauty.
>Sorcerer
Will either step on the Mage's toes or compliment him, depending on how good your Mage player is. All of the scrolls will go to the Mage nevertheless for farming XP. Sorcerers >>> single-classed Mages always. More arcane is never a bad idea, although early BG1 you guys might die a lot, co-op MP games aren't the most coordinated.
>Shaman
Don't. It's shit.
>Bard
Blades are stronger frontliners and Skalds are better supports. Your party is too small to utilize a Skald properly, and depending on what friend 4 picks you might have too few physical damage dealers to leverage it. Blade is plenty of support. Jester is fun to look at but not micro-intensive.

>>5736237
Also on the note of Bards - the Skald song is only good (really good in large, highly physical parties) until ToB, at which point Bards are compelled to take Enhanced Bard Song, which replaces the original song you had. This means Blade entirely erases his one con (his "bad" vanilla Bard song, although vanilla bard song is a horrible waste of time no matter what you do) while Skald sorta loses his most distinguishing feature.

Only Jester and Skald have any reason to sing, otherwise Bards are wand users and arcane support; Blade also has very strong frontline potential.

When you get the ability to use Vhailor's Helm, you can abuse your copy in order to sing while fighting, which means a maxed out Blade with Enhanced Bard Song is actually a strong support in ToB that is never forced to idle.

>>5736237
Alright I think I'm now deciding Paladin (Inq or Cavalier) vs Druid (Totemic or Shapeshifter

Q about Paladins: is Blackguard any good?

Q about Druids: who should I dual class from for extra abilities?

>>5736282
also, about Shapeshifters, is a warewolf/greater warewolf stronger than a 2h sword +5?

Started BG2 recently for the first time (played BG a long time ago). My party is as follows right now:
>Fighter Cleric
>Minsc
>Jaheira
>Yoshimo
>Nalia
>Aerie

I'd like to keep Aerie and Minsc, ans I'd also like to recruit Keldorn and Jan. Thinking about dropping Nalia and Yoshimo for those two. Jaheira seems quite useless since I have two clerics now, the only reason I'm keeping her is for her resurrect spell and her nymph summon. Should I get a specialist mage/sorcerer instead? Are bards good?

>>5736282
>Q about Paladins: is Blackguard any good?
They got nerfed, although the poison on a martial class is still nice, but overall, I think that Paladins are better, especially since the Blackguard equivalent to Carsomyr is not a fantastic weapon. They should be servicable.
>who to dual-class from
Berserkers, definitely. Also, remember that you need 15 str 17 wis 17 cha to qualify for a Berserker dual.
>>5736289
No. Werewolf form is bad in vanilla, and you need mods to fix it. It's nice in BG1, but its combat efficiency is nothing to write home about at all.
>>5736295
>Jaheira seems quite useless
Jaheira's entire job description until she reaches the late-game powerspike (which takes forever for her due to Druid levelling rules). Early on, she's a passable martial, and her utility is mostly for summoning the nymph and Insect Plague. When she passes like 6,000,000 XP she's a monster, but until then she's eh.
>Should I get a specialist mage/sorcerer instead?
Edwin is good but Evil.
>Are Bards good?
Yes, Haer'dalis is quite strong. Might steal Aerie from you ,so don't take him if you want to romance her. My writeup on Bards is above.

>>5736295
>>5736307
Sorry I had to finish this post very early so it's kinda incomplete.
Edwin is often said to be the best mage in the game, but he's Evil, so might not fit your party, and he's a no-go if you want to keep Minsc.
Nalia is actually a solid mage and a just-enough thief, because she advances solely in Mage. Her ring is kickass. She's a good NPC. Jan will advance slower than either her or Imoen, but he has a more rounded kit (and Thief HLAs are insane in ToB), though he hits his mage powerspikes slightly later.
EE gives you Neera. Wild Mage is quite powerful and abusable, but it's also likely to cause you some reloads. Wild Mages are good for a laugh, but you might feel like you're savescumming more than usual.
No Sorcerers in BG2, though they're a very strong class.
Otherwise, yeah, Arcane spellcasters of any flavor are always a good choice, since they're basically a tier 1 archetype.

>>5736351
>>5736307
Great response, thanks. I'm thinking that getting both both Aerie, Imoen and Jan might be overkill, but this is what I'm leaning towards now
>Fighter Cleric
>Minsc
>Keldorn
>Aerie
>Imoen
>Jan

Would you replace any of these casters with Haer'Dalis, or is it an OK party as it is?

Bard is fun and balanced, the rest are either OP or give you a bunch of options to recruit

>>5737027
>getting both both Aerie, Imoen and Jan might be overkill
Not really, high-arcane parties have a lot of utility and AoE damage, plus Imoen can carry the multiclassers a bit with her earlier spellslots and HLAs. Mages rock, and high-arcane parties are very fun, particularly if you enjoy managing and comboing spells.
This party is very much okay. Haer'dalis is great and would single-handedly shift the party to a more martial flavor (but still with a strong arcane presence) but you have to remember that if you're romancing Aerie, Haer'dalis either becomes her boyfriend or leaves the party forever, so pay attention to that if you care for this sort of thing.
HD could replace any of these casters and it's such a toss-up that I don't have any strong powergaming reasons to boot one over the other; maybe keep Imoen if you want someone to unlock the highest arcane powers fast; I usually tend to keep fairly low on divine casters and thieves as one tends to do all I need (and Imoen can do all the "minimal" Thief stuff like lockpicking and trapfinding), but it's only my personal preference. HD gets Thief HLAs, so he also gets epic traps later, which means he can fill Jan's role.
Aside from that the party is solid; there are no really "weak" NPCs in BG2, doubly so if you're just cruising on a journey through Core Rules; even Rasaad can be made to work, and he's as bad as it gets.

>>5736074
Jester, Blade or Stalker.

>Pick Pally
>Kill Red Dragon
>Take Carsomyr
>Motherfucking curbstomp everything in the game
>????
>Profit

In terms of raw fun, thief is tops. Combine with a fighter for mega-backstabs, or a mage for general trickery.

Takes a long time to get going in BG 1, though. Mostly a crappy archer till until cloakwood or so.

>still haven't finished a full sword coast stratagems run

>>5737185
Get to it. Get 'er done. Better yet, indulge yourself because SCS is hard, and make yourself a bullshit dual-class. Life is short, possible BG playthroughs are many. Get off 4chan and roll a 95+ stat point berserker.

>>5737127
You recruit so many thiefs along the way that that's the last class anybody should main as

>>5737361
Ironically, a lot of people complained that BG2 "lacks a good thief", but a lot of people don't realize that you only really need a few Thief levels to cap out on the bare minimum and that Jan learns everything any Thief enthusiast could ever need - and more! Hexxat was really unnecessary from a mechanical standpoint.

That said, MC thief is simply fun to play, esp. solo. Assassins have ranged poison and can play around with big backstabs, Bounty Hunters have great crowd control, and Swashies are warriors-lite who can later read scrolls. With Thief it's not about raw power at all, it's about pulling shenanigans out of your ass and being crafty. Takes a fuckton of micro to really leverage, though, and if you're in a full party with munchkin characters you might feel a bit overshadowed. It takes a special taste to truly enjoy them, but they can be very self-reliant.

>>5737361
All of them suck at playing the backstab game.

>>5737373
Not sure where that statement is coming from. The Thief/Mages can Mislead into Black Blade of Disaster with Improved Haste and do insane "backstab" shenanigans. Assassins don't scale "faster" at backstabbing, they simply get x6 and x7 really late in the game, as more and more enemies get backstab immunities. In BG1, any Thief, even Skie, can dispel Sarevok's haste with an arrow, drink their own oil of speed, and simply keep kiting and going invisible while delivering backstabs and never being hit.

Tiax can buff himself up to really high Strength and use Staff of Striking for maximizing backstab damage in BG1, Montaron gets fighter levels to be more damaging and accurate with his own backstabs, Shar-Teel can dual into Thief from Fighter and enjoy high levels of weapon proficiency, Alora's rabbit foot is supposed to give +2 to Luck which also increases damage rolls, etc.

>>5737373
Do they, I was able to backstab my way through the game pretty effortlessly with Montaron and one of the ones you get recruit later in the game was good at a it too (maybe the girl I forget which one its been years)

>>5737371
It's funny because in BG1 it seems like half of all the recruitable characters are thieves, especially towards the end of the game where you get like three or four thieves in succession (in addition to the others). I remember paladin, bard, and druid being the rarest classes, with druid completely useless anywhere indoors.

>>5736074
>shaman, sorcerer
buimdog is guilby pasta

>>5737385
I think the main reason thieves are so powerful is that they can just use all the win buttons that are included into the game like spellstrike wands/spells/fancy arrows, so you can just go pick up the win button and win.

why not just a full party of F/T M/T C/T+Paladin?

>>5738553
Sorcerer is a BG2 class added to BG1 by BGT/TuTu as well and not a Beamdog creation, memelord.
>>5738593
>thieves are so powerful
On their own, they lack sheer output as a 1 attack per round class whose utility is often tied to out-of-combat stuff and whose combat ability can be cumbersome to use (if this is a suggestion to OP, imagine coordinating three backstabbers at the same time, potentially with limited pause functionality in MP...) and there aren't that many on-use items that you would be able to convincingly outfit everyone in your party with through UAI. Setting up a Simulacrum to dupe your scrolls and wands so that you don't burn through your perishable supply instantly before every fight is time-consuming and there's only one Vhailor's Helm.

There's just no point to this redundancy, especially since most of the Thief powerspike comes at HLA levels. Meanwhile a ->Mage hybrid will afford you a much stronger mid-game because you will be able to tank, shield against spells, and cast powerful AoE at a way higher capacity than a Thief, and then late-game your resources are still much more accessible than a Thief's, even if Thief can technically go infinite. Thieves can hardly replicate stuff that a ->Cleric or ->Druid can do, such as Insect Plague.

If you want to abuse HLA traps, chances are a single party member with them will have you covered on that front. And if you play a Thief for these HLAs, chances are you might want to be a Bard instead and keep the arcane spellcasting curve with some additional utility while still keeping traps.

If you wanted to munchkin the hell out of the three roles you'd mix them with Fighter because Fighter levels give you great equipment and very strong single-target DPS whereas Thieves are a low DPS class outside of situational burst through traps or backstabs. If the enemy is not immune to these effects or doesn't alow you to set traps somehow, chances are a Fighter will kill it faster than a Thief would.

I'm running through BGT with SCS installed right now. They didn't fuck around with the call for help function.