What is the funnest way to play the game?
Fubby
Member Posts: 189
Preferably focusing around party members and character creations. What do you guys think is the funnest party combinations, and funnest class?
Also only 6 party runs. Imo less makes it less fun and and in some cases too easy.
Also only 6 party runs. Imo less makes it less fun and and in some cases too easy.
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However, I think that this was one of my favorite companion setups:
1: Elven Chaotic Neutral Fighter/Mage CHARNAME: Versatile and powerful enough to live up to his/her heritage. The vast amount of spells on offer means that this character can be as easy as you want it to be, and all you have to do to weaken him is use spells you normally wouldn't consider using.
2: Neera: Wild Mages make everything more fun. FACT. Also, she has a personal quest and the dialogue expansion mod made by Kaeloree adds more to her character.
3: Dorn Il-Khan: Blackguard is interesting and versatile, he has the most content of any companion questwise. Khalid has this spot pre-Dorn/
4: Viconia: Token Drow, adds more racial diversity! Jaheira has this slot pre-Viconia.
5: Imoen: I actually don't like Imoen in BG1 that much, but my soft heart prevents me from ditching her, especially as she only came out of Candlekeep to help you.
6: I give this slot to Ajantis at first, when Dorn comes the now open slot goes to Rasaad/ If Rasaad is too weak for you, wait for Yeslick.
Variety of personalities and alignments, racial diversity and as a whole the party is strong enough and varied enough to handle anything.
For a Fighter-Mage, the Robe of Vecna provides all the relevant protection, and some serious utility on top of it (reduced casting time? Yes please!)
I'd also be wary of trying to roll overpowered stats, since I've come to see them as making the game far less fun, especially if you're playing an overpowered build. I rolled a 95 on my planned Fighter>Thief Dual. I'm now re-doing the character with an 85 instead, and most of those 10 points have actually come off the 'core' stats (Str, Con), in order to make her more interesting for me.
When bgee comes out for android someday (...), i think my first pc will be a dart using fighter, since i never gave the darn things a fair chance. Heck, maybe even a blackguard, just for the high apr and poison.
Once i have familiarized myselfna bit, im planning a stupid evil halfling female, likely barbarian. Dual wielding daggers. Really never tried a low rep run (low enough to trigger those traps sometimes... plan to depopulate swathes of the realms. Ive been looking forward to this for awhile now. Not sure how many she will travel with, but imagine the kids dorn and her will churn out! Or dont. Really.
Try running something 'weird', like a druid. Avengers are pretty amazing in bg. Try a bard! Tons of fun after you get spells, uh, something else until then. Blade is strong, but be a man and do a solo skald! Erm, rely on summoning wand.
As such, it is near impossible to get any specific answer that will lead to what YOU enjoy the most simply by asking what THEY enjoy the most.
What I would suggest is considering the things that YOU already enjoy in the game and expanding on that.
Restricting companions to those with interesting personalities... doesn't narrow it down much.
I love magic myself. Sending a whole pack of gibberlings into a coma with one spell tickles my innards. That doesn't mean I don't enjoy playing other kinds of characters. Because what I really love... is coming up with a fun character and party concept and running with it.
xDDD
Garrick is, like, a million times less annoying than Imoen. Sure, a low level bard isn't quite as useful as a low level thief, but the voice makes all the difference. Imoen sounds like she's 5 years old and confused me with the kindergarden teacher (if there is such a thing in the realms). Garrick quotes Monty Python. That makes him a very clear winner to me.
Heck, males have 4 support characters i am ignoring... the shorties! Oh dear, it just got worse, didnt it? I mean, quayle barely counts, seeing as hes about as wise as one of Jans turnips and is basicly a self-nerfed illusionist. Tiax is... well, his support is comedic relief, which seems especially inappropriate. Hes a bad cleric and kinda useless as a thief. But yeslick is awesome! But not at all support, dude is clearly goods best tank by far and wide... leaving us montaron! Uh, does being a 1 dimensional backstabber count as support? Cuz yeah, monty is more melee than a true thief. Left out Coran, didnt i? Well, ignoring his womanizing ways and irresponsibilities, hes a decent thief if you dont mind ignoring some thief skills, but everyone knows you bring coran cuz hes 'teh elfan ercher ermagawd' and is probably the best npc in bg1 vanilla. He might open some locks, but you want that longbow.
Total coincidence that the only single class clerics are women, while the little people clerics serve either as primarily a fighter or as comedic relief due to being inept. Luckily bgee gives us 4 new npcs to fix this glaring disparity... by giving two more male characters that are the very best at their fields (damage dealing via melee AND spellcasting), and a second female mage, whos nothing to write home about capabilitywise (but at least shes cute). And rasaad... i actually have no real complaint, but it might have been interesting to get another combat oriented female... atm jah and shar seems a bit thin compared to, uh, the overwhelming supply of male warrior characters.
But wait! I hear it gets better in bg2ee... when we get another female thief. I would be impresed if that female thief was a dwarf btw... even a gnome. Both are excellent mechanically oriented thieves.
For clarification, i am not saying the original developers did a bad job, let alone the reworking crew; i loved bg, bg2 and even found enjoyment in tob. I just wonder if looking at the game from a social justice lens is 'fun' to anyone else. Didnt ACTUALLY expect to find that much right under the surface
I didnt even mention the only black character in bg1 is evil, right? note, i loved that the big strong black warrior in bg2 is on the run from the law. At least this is kinda realistic. Americathla!
But seriously, it does make the game more fun to be aware of the stereotypes being unconciously included.
Installing SCS made the game even more fun all over again, really great tactical battles developed out of it.
Over the years some standout games for me have been:
- a party comprised mostly of specialist mages (MP mode, created all of them) in which four specialist mages strictly cast only their own school's spells; the party was rounded out by a mage-thief and a pure class cleric who only cast spells
- an Arthurian Knights party using the Dark Side of the Sword Coast mod (again MP mode, created all of them) consisting mostly of paladins: Arthur, Gwain, Lancelot, and Bors (each specializing in various weapons types of course), and, naturally, also Merlin the wizard; Percival was a Fighter/Cleric half-elf that I Shadowkeepered to human
- the one and only solo game I tried, which was using a very cunning 'smart evil' NE Cleric/Mage; the game was tactically a lot more fun and interesting than I expected
- another MP mode game featuring a husband and wife Druid and Bard acting as joint main characters; honestly can't remember anymore which NPCs joined them, but the game was fun
- a NG half-orc Cleric/Thief that I imagined as very good hearted and behaved prosocially etc.; I enjoyed him so much that I started a NPC mod for him; can no longer remember who else was in his party
- a BGT party led by a Wild Mage using SCS and the excellent Wild Mage Additions mod in which the PC assembled a party of Chaotic companions; IIRC the party included Xzar, Minsc, Tiax, and Safana; Shar-Teel as well? (can't remember); Tiax can be relocated to Beregost in SCS; I think I had Finch in there too for a while because she was such a misfit/non-adventurer it seemed to fit the theme of Chaos
- I've played a lot of games in which I have intentionally taken comparatively 'weak' classes or kits, and assembled the less popular NPCs, and then enjoyed the challenge of finding ways to beat the game with them
- the current 'Let the Fates Decide' gaming experiment I'm chronicling in another thread; I don't intend to journal such games in the future as I'm doing now (doing it now for fun and to illustrate the method), but I think the replayability of the game opens up tremendously through this technique
I'm sure there's more types of games that I found very enjoyable, but if so I've forgotten. (Via EE I came back to BG this fall after a five year hiatus from it.) But anyway, there's many ways to enjoy the game!
I usually liked to down-size the group to 3-4ppl only. (That does not neccessarily make the game harder)
Or, which is much better-try playing a theme, which gimps yourself a bit and you will have to search for new ways to complete encounters and survive. Like...
"Arcane casters only" (and struggle with healing done mainly via Larolchs Minor Drain and Vampiric Touch)
"3 Casters only" (be a druid, get a cleric(Vicky), mage (Edwin) and try to survive with summons)
"All thief stealth run" (what healing? bad Thac0, but a lot of fun with traps and backstabs)
"Swiss Army Kife Protagonist" one particular run, I've tried with a T/M/C protagonist, and 3 single-class warriors/rangers (your protagonist will feel like a token utility teammate) ...now try the same with a bard...
"Musical group on the road" - CHARNAME a blade + Garrick and Eldoth...
"Power of nature" - druids all the way!
"Magic? What magic?" - only fighters/rangers and thieves allowed. One token multiclassed/dualclassed cleric allowed. Paladins possible...
Rule: no multiplayer custom characters. Only the NPCs found in the game.
(I don't claim I have finished the game with all these setups, but I played a portion of the first game (most at least till BG) with all. Finished some of them.)
As for what makes the game more fun to play: Roleplay!
I also like playing with various difficulty-increasing mods, like SCS - mods which challenge you but within the games ruleset.
Or hey, maybe he likes seeing her beat up men for him?