Xzar&Monty vs Safana&Neera

Delvarian

For my evil play through who should I Choose? What in your mind makes one combo better than the other?

Oxford_Guy

Delvarian said:

For my evil play through who should I Choose? What in your mind makes one combo better than the other?

There's also at least one other option: Shar-teel (dualed to thief at level 3) and Edwin - probably the strongest pair from a powergaming perspective, though I prefer Monty's personality to Shar-Teel's

In my last full party playthrough with an evil CHARNAME fighter/mage I had Monty and Edwin *and* Imoen. I made Xzar do the "Bassilisk Walk" to separate him from Monty, and had Monty focused on stealth (for scouting and backstabs) and pickpockets, with Imoen on Open Locks/Find Traps/Set Traps. Worked well for me.

Schneidend

Safana is sexy. The choice is obvious.

Delvarian

I don't really like Edwin, reason being one of my mages jobs is to identify items. I hate lugging things back to town and paying 100 gold. Edwin though a powerhouse of a spell caster can't identify. Silly reason not to take him, probably. I suppose I could also take Xan or Baeloth as well, Neera worries me a bit.

Safana is sexy, but she hasn't got the fighting ability Monty does, and she uses darts! I mean come on who uses darts?! I suppose I could duel her to fighter, is she any good in that aspect?

Schneidend

Once you start getting (or are rich enough to routinely buy) Darts of Wounding and Darts of Paralyzation, you may change your tune. More times than I can count, Safana turned a fight greatly in my favor with a lucky attack roll.

Delvarian

I really want to like Safana, but I haven't been able to utilize her in game. She tends to hang in the back and die often. I will help her raid the treasure from the cave though, least I can do.

FrozenCells

Xzar and Montaron because they're not as out of the way as Safana, it's just more convenient. And F/T trumps vanilla thief for me. Actually I'd take Montaron and Neera or Mr B

Freche

Delvarian said:

I don't really like Edwin, reason being one of my mages jobs is to identify items. I hate lugging things back to town and paying 100 gold. Edwin though a powerhouse of a spell caster can't identify. Silly reason not to take him, probably. I suppose I could also take Xan or Baeloth as well, Neera worries me a bit.

Safana is sexy, but she hasn't got the fighting ability Monty does, and she uses darts! I mean come on who uses darts?! I suppose I could duel her to fighter, is she any good in that aspect?

This ofc depends on how/if you roleplay but you get full effect from all items even if they are not identified, only thing iirc you don't get access to is abilities granted by an item.
(You still have to pay the 100g once you do want to identify them but at least you don't have to rush back to town once you find some stuff)

Oxford_Guy

Delvarian said:

I really want to like Safana, but I haven't been able to utilize her in game. She tends to hang in the back and die often. I will help her raid the treasure from the cave though, least I can do.

She has proficiency in Scimitars, so can wield Drizzt's +3 Icing Death Scimitar (which also gices 50% Fire Resistance), if you pick-pocket that (though is the wrong alignment for Twinkle, but you can sell that for 5,500 gold), and her Charm Person ability is nice, though not as good as the ability from Algernon's Cloak, which gets a -1 to Saves. Also, she can be dualled to a Thuef>Mage if you give her the Int tome.

Oxford_Guy

Delvarian said:

I don't really like Edwin, reason being one of my mages jobs is to identify items. I hate lugging things back to town and paying 100 gold. Edwin though a powerhouse of a spell caster can't identify. Silly reason not to take him, probably.

That's one of the reasons why having a Bard can be useful ;-)

Delvarian

I have never been able to steal from Drizzt or kill him until very late in the game, at which time my party is already pretty well established. Perhaps if I had a werebear in the party....

I like bards, and often have them take the place of mages altogether. They don't get the high end spells mages do, but they are a bit more versatile. This is one of the reasons I install the Keto mod in BG2.

KidCarnival

Xzar and Monty are the obvious choice because neither Safana nor Neera is evil. For an evil run, I'd stick to evil NPCs.

I like dualing Xzar to cleric with the tome from Durlag's upper level, and still take Edwin along. Dualing Xzar gives me the Identify on lower levels (his lore becomes way better than any other mage's - high INT and WIS, so he starts to identify things without spells/scrolls fairly soon - not as efficient as a bard, but it's enough for stuff you likely just want to sell anyway, i.e. Long Sword +1) and opens up the cleric slot. So I can still take Edwin as a full mage. Monty is way more versatile than Safana as a thief and he can do very well on the frontline, too. With Kagain as tank, Monty can easily be the damage dealer; all he needs is a weapon proficiency that offers better items than Short Swords. But since you get him very early, that's no problem at all.

Shar-Teel is a close second; almost the same deal as Monty. It depends on how much her weapon profs bother you. But Dagger and Long Sword isn't the worst she could have, I just often "waste" the dual wielding and keep her mostly ranged except for backstabs. Safana is certainly the weakest in terms of frontlining, but she can do very well with darts. I like darts a lot and often use them for charname - High Hedge has magical darts other than +1. The only downside is that you find way more magical arrows, but then - neither Shar-Teel nor Monty has a bow proficiency either, so it comes out as the same; you need to buy ammo anyway.

Delvarian

I currently have Monty, Xzar, Shar-Teel, Kaigan, Viconia and me rolling around the coast.

KidCarnival

Delvarian said:

I have never been able to steal from Drizzt or kill him until very late in the game, at which time my party is already pretty well established. Perhaps if I had a werebear in the party....

I think testing has established that you need 165 in Pickpocket to steal from Drizzt. I have been successful with Alora/110 pickpocket (not sure if her lucky charm thingy was factored in though), so it's possible with less, but 165 should be enough to not depend on your lucky day. If you have a bard anyway, you don't need to waste the pickpocket points on the thief (whichever you take; I think Alora is the only one that has decent pickpocket when you first meet her, all others are meh).

SirK8

I think testing has established that werebears are the most effective method of dealing with Drizzt. They would probably make excellent thieves too...

KidCarnival said:

Delvarian said:

I have never been able to steal from Drizzt or kill him until very late in the game, at which time my party is already pretty well established. Perhaps if I had a werebear in the party....

I think testing has established that you need 165 in Pickpocket to steal from Drizzt. I have been successful with Alora/110 pickpocket (not sure if her lucky charm thingy was factored in though), so it's possible with less, but 165 should be enough to not depend on your lucky day. If you have a bard anyway, you don't need to waste the pickpocket points on the thief (whichever you take; I think Alora is the only one that has decent pickpocket when you first meet her, all others are meh).

Delvarian

I shadowkeeper my werebears to be Kensai/thief with 215 pickpocket 175 stealth

Xavioria

I kinda modded Safana to what I believe her rightful class SHOULD be... which is a swashbuckler.
I think at early levels they are quite a decent addition to a party... granted they can't backstab, but there's like a million and one thieves in BG I figure why not put in some options

Fardragon

Delvarian said:

Neera worries me a bit.

Only a bit? Shortly after she joined the party I had her cast Shield before going to clear the house of spiders, and she gated in a Pit Fiend that proceeded to massacre the population of Beregost.