Your opinion on overpowering and nerfing
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Fear the nerf.
But that's what you get when the younger generation of players get introduced to RPG genre through MMOs such as WOW. They bring all that baggage and the terminology to other games even when it doesn't make any sense.
-- not necessarily ... underpowered kits should be buffed / fixed however, in case of overpowered kits, it might make some sense, because the protagonist is a child of Bhaal after all
If you think - for example - Algernon's Cloak is too mighty to be used - why do you use it in the first place?
-- personally I try to avoid using anything that's overpowered ... this is also the reason I avoid kits, I feel many are too powerful in the original BG
D) Has original Baldur's Gate 1 ever been truly balanced?
-- it's never been, there were always some underpowered classes for example, in the end it's very hard to balance a game with so many variables anyway and it's not that big a deal for a single player game
F) Can't balancing work the other way around? Instead of nerfing items you could make enemies stronger!
-- could be an interesting approach, but that might cause many underpowered classes / kits to become even worse
H) What does "Overpowering" (overpowered item/chars/abilities) mean personally for you?
-- game becomes too cheesy, which makes the gameplay boring
I) When is nerfing down needed and who is to say to which extend?
-- i've read that there's a druid kit that can 1-shot Sarevok with Chromatic Orb at the final fight, cases like that might need some rebalancing I think, the last fight should be epic
J) Is the difficulty setting of any revelance in relation to overpowering and nerfing?
-- definitely, perhaps that's the best way to balance the game with regards to the strength of the protagonist class / kit, though it relies on the player
As for nerfing... does +12 hp from a familiar really make a difference? Cast it on bg2, then .
Magic is ridiculously overpowered? It should be - mages are just normal people without it.
Kits are overpowered? I don't think so.
I know that some people are more methodical than others, and they rely on rules and systems because it makes them feel more secure about something. These people will want everything to suit the ruleset (I've seen people complain that Kagain and Coran have illegal attributes!) , but you know, it is much better when you have autonomy to ignore or adjust certain things , instead of making it part of the rules.
What would be good is a tool like Shadowkeeper where items and spells could easily be modified, then noone could complain about anything being overpowered.
I find that the term 'overpowered' is thrown around far too often. I see quite a few people saying for example that the Cavalier is overpowered when in fact in plays 95% the same as a vanilla paladin or Undead Hunter and very similar as well to rangers and F/Cs in late BG2. Or R/Cs being overpowered because they have full druid spells, when compared to a F/C this generally amounts to Ironskins and Insect Plague at the cost of limiting your race to something without shorty saves.
When arcane casters can cast Stoneskin, PfMW, Imp. Invis, SI:A and SI:D I find it funny to call anything non-arcane overpowered.
C) I'm waiting until after finals to start BG:EE, but based on my experience in BG1 and in Tutu I think the games are already balanced enough in terms of items, maybe there should be a few that are more powerful than presently available, but certainly not the other way around!
D) Original Baldur's Gate had too few good items. Luckily Tutu existed to correct this by importing from BG2!
E) Maybe mods could handle this, but I think it might be a good idea to allow users to customize the options of what appears in their game, as is currently the case in many other games such as Civilization IV and Age of Mythology.
F) I definitely agree that enemies should be made stronger. If so, they should provide correspondingly better loot!
G) I agree that nerfing may lead to more nerfing. Hopefully the opposite is also true in that if they had tougher enemies, that will lead to the creation of even tougher enemies and so forth.
H) I've read a lot of posts where people say that items, XP amounts, etc. will somehow unbalance the game, but this has not been my experience. I personally have yet to play a game where I could get through without a character dying at some point or my PC getting into a situation where I needed to use every ounce of skill just to survive, despite my characters being through multiple playthroughs and being very far in excess of the level cap. If at some point my characters can get through an entire game on the hardest skill level without encountering any problems, then I'll say that they're overpowered and will build new ones, but after five playthroughs with now over 400HP each, +5 weapons for all party members, complete immunity to all normal weapons for all party members, multiple ways to regenerate HP, etc. that hasn't happened yet and they still run into problems throughout the game.
Something is overpowered when it is like Tethtoril who will simply not die and will insta-kill characters no matter how much HP they have. He killed my entire 5th playthrough BG2 party multiple times without much effort. Tethtoril has 981 HP and immunity to all magic and 100% resistance to just about any form of attack. I was able to do 2 damage to him once using the Flail of Ages +5, but he insta-killed me a second later. I used ctrl q on him, used Shadowkeeper to lower his health to one and then sent him off into the world to attack everything to see if anything could kill him. He could just slaughter everything that came near him and no one could do even one damage to him. If by some chance you do kill him, (such as by lowering his HP to 1 with Shadowkeeper and then doing 2 damage to him with the Flail of Ages) you get the XP for killing him and then a couple seconds later the game insta-kills your whole party for no apparent reason. To me, that is overpowered.
I) In my opinion, items should not be nerfed down. Opponents should be nerfed down to the point where they cannot insta-kill characters. If they do a set amount of damage that's fine, but they shouldn't just be able to arbitrarily kill you because the game developers didn't want you fighting them for whatever reason. It should be possible to eventually defeat them once you become powerful enough.
J) Yes, definitely. Weapons that may seem overpowered in easy skill levels seem horribly inadequate on higher ones. For example, my BG2 party has Crom Faeyre and several +5 weapons. On insane with SCS Tactics there are many opponents that can easily slaughter my entire party without my being able to damage them if I rely on those weapons alone. I have to use ranged attacks and spells in order to win, because attempting to use melee is the equivalent of suicide against certain opponents, even though I could easily squash those same opponents with those same weapons if I were playing on an easier skill level.
From my point of view i usually just take a party of four,including myself.Easy for micro-manegement and pathfinding.Now early game they are quite underpowered and can be easily caught out. By midgame game though,because of earlier levelling,they can be a bit OP but it's how i like to play.Everyone to their own at the end of the day.
Some characters, such as Tethtoril are unkillable for plot reasons. I don't think he's a valid example of an overpowered enemy, as this isn't a game where every person and creature is coded to be killed.
Most stuff in Baldur's Gate isn't "overpowered", it all follows very spesific rules based on luck. Luck being determined by dice rolls. You can improve your luck by modifiers to the dice rolls, but at the end of the day, if the enemy makes his saving throw then the spell is wasted or at least "nerfed" and if you keep missing for 75% of your attacks before the barbarian/berserker rage wears out leaving you winded then the "overpowering" effect it had doesn't seem to mean much.
If people really think something is so horribly overpowered though, they're welcome to show some self-restraint and not use it. Why should everyone be penalized with watered-down items and abilities because a select few find a way to powergame and then realize they don't like it being possible? Nay, let them form a modding community where they can inflict nerf upon nerf on themselves and leave the rest of us out of it.
Should Overhaul for any ridiculous reason start nerfing things left and right, I hope it will be in the patch notes so I can opt out of that nonsense.
Everything in BG:EE needs to be nerfed, except gnomes. Gnomes need more boots.
You can fight against your friends, but since it is supposed to be a party cooperative game mostly (since there are specific classes with a role), the game is not designed around this feature.
(If you don't think so, lets try a duel mage vs warrior => the mage time stop then polymorph into a mindflayer and eats your intelligence +> you are dead => overpowered => go nerf ... LOL).
Furthermore, it is the same for the kits or thing like this : I'd like to say, yes, I have finished the game with A Cavalier because it was easier to do so.
Next walkthrough will be another class that will offer different advantages (and probably weaknesses).
Let people play the way they want. If you want to struggle, struggle then !
Do not force people in your stupid will to struggle, suffer and reload.
Do not call for nerf in a solo game or a multiplayer game with no competitives goals.
You are angry at people that did not choose to struggle because that had opportunity to do so (max authorized rolls per characters, good classes/kits).
I'm currently having fun with my warrior (Cleric in one level !), let people play with what they feel appropriate and do not call for nerf in a solo game.
Thanks !
If there is any balance to be had, it is within the framework of a single class, or item. Each class has their role, and each kit should work out approximately equal to the class without a kit. In turn, each item should perform within a bell curve of effectiveness, should have no effect attached superior to a level X spell, where X about equal to the expected level range of the party that the item is to be useful in. In a game of such a sandbox nature, this does mean some items will be "useless" to the replayer or the dedicated explorer, who knows or finds where the items with utility for levels much higher than their own are, but such is the price of non-linearity.
Most important, and simplest, is to ensure that the content follows the rules, at least within tolerances. The fact that Coran is "overpowered" compared to any other BG1 NPC is because he breaks the rules of weapon mastery and the rules of maximum stats. Edwin is "overpowered", again, because he breaks the rules and gets more spells than anyone else. Same with Tethtoril and Shandalar and so on; they do not follow the same rules you follow. If multiclass grand mastery were allowed then Coran would be accordingly less powerful.
If you maintain the same framework and keep them within this framework balance, as far as it exists in ADnD, is maintained, whilst examples that break the rules can be done so intentionally and carefully limits to give interesting variety, unusual challenges and intentionally overpowered characters.
Unless Difficulty gives different items, then all balance should be handled based on Core difficulty. Higher difficulties do not warrant better items to compensate.
In comparative short:
Classes within a particular role, and their respective kits, should perform their role roughly on par with one another. Classes should not be attempted to be balanced against classes outside of their role.
Multiclass and mid-role characters (Bards, essentially) should not perform any of the roles they cover better than a pure class equivalent at equal Exp.
Combining spellcasting and anything else is a balance nightmare, ignore it and file it under "Magic shenanigans".
Dual classing is an inherently flawed, gamey concept that will never balance correctly, ignore it and file it under "Humans are retarded".
Items should be at most equivalent to spell level effects equal to their intended level of utility.
Whilst exceptions are fine, and help develop a feeling of a living world rather than artificial game setting, they should conform closely to the game rules where possible.