This sums up my disappointment with the BGEE pretty well. The mods available do 1000x more to enhance the game, for free. You can have Minsc as a Berserker, Ajantis as an Inquisitor just like his old mentor Keldorn and you can even get mods to give them banters and personalities.
I just need to rage a little bit. Minsc was a ranger in BG because the rules used didn't have a Berserker kit.
Somebody must have thought of overhauling his original kit, is there any particular reason he was kept as is? With the BG2 rules he's just plain goofy, not to mention that his extremely low mental stats kind of make his saving throws suck, with or without his shoehorned rage skill.
Dorn outclasses the guy in every way, shape, and form, and I'm even starting to realize just how much better Khalid is(was).
A ranger? Really?
Yes! Minsc is a Rashemen Ranger, and all Rashemi rangers are berzerkers! just as (FOR10 Warriors and Priests of the Realms) states!
~~~~~~ Rashemen
While these are not the elite Fang berserkers, each Rashemaar warrior can enter a mild berserker rage once per day. It lasts for five rounds or until all enemies are slain, whichever comes first. While in this rage, all at- tack, damage, and saving throw rolls gain a +1 bonus, and a -1 bonus on initiative rolls.
Good enough, However, later on in the section: ~~~~~~~~ Each Fang must have a minimum Constitution and Dexterity of 12, and a Wisdom of 10.
It explains why the guy sticks around throughout the series, he's too stupid for anyone from Rashemen to want him back.
I just need to rage a little bit. Minsc was a ranger in BG because the rules used didn't have a Berserker kit.
Somebody must have thought of overhauling his original kit, is there any particular reason he was kept as is?
Yes...Minsc has a pet or companion animal (however you would like to call it). That's usually a trait of rangers (Not very implemented in the game though) Fighters don't get a companion animal. And what would be Minsc without Boo?
And your complaint about Dorn being better than Minsc - think of the setup of the game. The NPCs are not min-maxed powerhouse machines. The NPCs are created with their strengths and weaknesses. And history (Minsc's low wisdom = blow to the head). Especially the good aligned ones. The game is set in a way, that it favors good-aligned parties. One way how to make up for it, was to boost up the evil ones. (Edwin best mage, Vicky best cleric, Korgan best warrior...not talking about Sarevok - BG2 examples)
Anyway, would you want to play with generic min-maxed characters or rather with interesting chars? Wouldn't it be a bit boring to have everyone with 3-4 stats on 18? Not everyone is a hardcore powergamer. Besides - if you want to roll a perfect power-party, you can start a multiplayer game and pimp out every toon in your squad.
A Kensai or a Monk could keep a cricket in a box and I doubt anyone would be insisting that they're animal companions and therefore the character must be a ranger.
@Southpaw A Kensai or a Monk could keep a cricket in a box and I doubt anyone would be insisting that they're animal companions and therefore the character must be a ranger.
That made me smile :-) Still, it was the developer's decision to make Minsc a powerful-yet flawed character. His rangerness is part of his history and we can either roll with it or change him in shadowkeeper.
btw - that complaint about Minsc having 2 pips in 2handers and 2 pips in two-weapon fighting : rangers get 2 pips in 2-weapon-fighting automatically. luckily/regrettably. However, after you get him into your party on lvl 1-2, you can make him follow whichever path you have chosen.
This sums up my disappointment with the BGEE pretty well. The mods available do 1000x more to enhance the game, for free. You can have Minsc as a Berserker, Ajantis as an Inquisitor just like his old mentor Keldorn and you can even get mods to give them banters and personalities.
Don't forget that most mods will be re-fitted for BG:EE with it's new WeiDU. Some now abandoned mods may not (if no one in the modding community cares to update them), but the ones that still have someone actively working on them will.
Minsc is dumb as a rock (INT 8/WIS 6). I think that he believes, with all his heart, that he is a ranger and that his rage is Ranger Rage. Yes, he is a berserker. But he doesn't know that.
That's how I reason it. I don't really play with any of his ranger abilities, so it works.
@Nukenin Scrimshander. That's what the Realms calls it.
@Reedmilfam Actually, 8 is only slightly less that the normal human standard of 9-12 in AD&D 2e. It's his wisdom that's the bad thing. I mean, okay, he's slightly slow, but his impulse control is shot to hell- that's one of the implications of low Wisdom- they do things without thinking, get in bad situations, and never learn from the experience. And honestly, that's Minsc to a "T". Probably part of what makes his berserker rage so powerful.
To me, being a non-ranger Ranger is part of Minsc's personality. Boo is his animal companion, after all.
Yeah, his stats don't really give him the ability to be a Ranger, but a lot of NPCs break the rules. Just because he can go berserk doesn't mean he was meant to be a Berserker. As others have pointed out, plenty of NPCs have abilities that they shouldn't. That's one of the great things about BG, at least in my opinion. It gives these otherwise seemingly flat characters some depth. Maybe you don't get to talk to Minsc that much, but you get a really good sense of who he is based on his stats, his class, and some of his banters.
Anyway, he learns spells in BG 2, so he's a Ranger.
Kagain went berserk on my own party once. Should he also become a Berserker? I don't believe that berserking in its everyday sense, Rashemen berserkers and the BG berserker class are the same thing. But yeah, others have pointed out why Minsc is the way he is.
And please, don't talk about "fixing" it. It's neither an oversight nor a bug. It's intentional. Everybody is free to tune their NPCs up and "fix" their HP to three digits in BG1, but it has nothing to do with actual fixing.
I'd like to point out that if Minsc was meant to be a barbarian or berserker, they would have changed his class in BG2, as he was in that game, and those classes existed. That being said, I fully support modding him to one of those classes.
Since when do you need an incredibly high intelligence to be a ranger? Minsc is a ranger as he loves animals and fights for nature. He isn't just a mindless barbarian with rage issues.
ITT: a lot of people who think Minsc can't be what he is, or should be something else on one side, and a couple of people who actually know something about D&D
Despite Khalid not getting the F/M class he was meant to get, he's still one of the best archers: he's definitely better than unmodded Kivan because he can reach Mastery.
Comments
Then Minsc would've been a fighter "with wilderness skills". End of story!
I'm sure there'd been some other minor changes. *glances over at Quayle and Tiax, suppressing a guffaw*
~~~~~~
Rashemen
While these are not the elite Fang berserkers, each
Rashemaar warrior can enter a mild berserker rage once
per day. It lasts for five rounds or until all enemies are
slain, whichever comes first. While in this rage, all at-
tack, damage, and saving throw rolls gain a +1 bonus,
and a -1 bonus on initiative rolls.
Good enough, However, later on in the section:
~~~~~~~~
Each Fang must have a minimum Constitution and
Dexterity of 12, and a Wisdom of 10.
It explains why the guy sticks around throughout the series, he's too stupid for anyone from Rashemen to want him back.
AMIRITE?
3RD EDITION HUMOR!
And what would be Minsc without Boo?
And your complaint about Dorn being better than Minsc - think of the setup of the game. The NPCs are not min-maxed powerhouse machines. The NPCs are created with their strengths and weaknesses. And history (Minsc's low wisdom = blow to the head). Especially the good aligned ones.
The game is set in a way, that it favors good-aligned parties. One way how to make up for it, was to boost up the evil ones. (Edwin best mage, Vicky best cleric, Korgan best warrior...not talking about Sarevok - BG2 examples)
Anyway, would you want to play with generic min-maxed characters or rather with interesting chars? Wouldn't it be a bit boring to have everyone with 3-4 stats on 18? Not everyone is a hardcore powergamer. Besides - if you want to roll a perfect power-party, you can start a multiplayer game and pimp out every toon in your squad.
A Kensai or a Monk could keep a cricket in a box and I doubt anyone would be insisting that they're animal companions and therefore the character must be a ranger.
Still, it was the developer's decision to make Minsc a powerful-yet flawed character. His rangerness is part of his history and we can either roll with it or change him in shadowkeeper.
btw - that complaint about Minsc having 2 pips in 2handers and 2 pips in two-weapon fighting : rangers get 2 pips in 2-weapon-fighting automatically. luckily/regrettably. However, after you get him into your party on lvl 1-2, you can make him follow whichever path you have chosen.
That's how I reason it. I don't really play with any of his ranger abilities, so it works.
@Reedmilfam Actually, 8 is only slightly less that the normal human standard of 9-12 in AD&D 2e. It's his wisdom that's the bad thing. I mean, okay, he's slightly slow, but his impulse control is shot to hell- that's one of the implications of low Wisdom- they do things without thinking, get in bad situations, and never learn from the experience. And honestly, that's Minsc to a "T". Probably part of what makes his berserker rage so powerful.
Yeah, his stats don't really give him the ability to be a Ranger, but a lot of NPCs break the rules. Just because he can go berserk doesn't mean he was meant to be a Berserker. As others have pointed out, plenty of NPCs have abilities that they shouldn't. That's one of the great things about BG, at least in my opinion. It gives these otherwise seemingly flat characters some depth. Maybe you don't get to talk to Minsc that much, but you get a really good sense of who he is based on his stats, his class, and some of his banters.
Anyway, he learns spells in BG 2, so he's a Ranger.
And please, don't talk about "fixing" it. It's neither an oversight nor a bug. It's intentional. Everybody is free to tune their NPCs up and "fix" their HP to three digits in BG1, but it has nothing to do with actual fixing.
Considering how often I've played Icewind Dale (and IWD2) and/or read about it…
Thanks! Anyway, yeah, BG1 should end with everyone moving up to Icewind Dale to fish for knucklehead trout and dual-class to scrimshander.
*bleep* Irenicus. Go back to torturin' Picard, you crazy elf.
@Space_hamster Not intelligence, but I believe Ranger requires some minimum in wisdom that Minsc does that meet.