<b>Obsessive Compulsive BG Superpowers</b>

SkinnyD

I do not believe that exhibiting obsessive compulsive tendencies in playing Baldur's Gate (or any game of it's ilk) constitutes as being detrimental in any way. Far from it, in fact it would appear to be nothing short of advantageous in many ways. Hence why I will call it a superpower instead of a disorder, just so we're treading on extreme ends of the spectrum for fun.
I'll explain with a few habits I have developed over the years. "Obsessive Compulsive Superpower" shall be shortened to "OCS".

OCS - I have to talk to every single NPC in the entire game, even peasants and other "one-liner" characters.
Advantage? - Very occasionally I will hear something I had either forgotten or perhaps not heard before, adding to new and exciting gameplay immersion.

OCS - I cannot leave a single container unopened on any map or in any room. Even if I know they're empty.
Advantage? - I'll admit that opening empty containers is a waste of time, but sometimes they're not empty when I believed that they were. Therein lies the advantage.

OCS - When rolling for a non half-orc, strength based character (ie. a human fighter), it's 18/00 or bust. No exceptions.
Advantage? - It's 18/00 bitches.

OCS - Inventory management always works in the same way. Upper left slot is solely reserved for a bag of holding. Lower left is a gem bag. Next upper left is a scroll case for spells. Then beneath that is a scroll case for all other paper items like letters. Then a potion bag above an ammo belt. In that order, every time.
Advantage? - Glorious inventory efficiency.

Who else suffers from obsessive compulsive Baldur's Gate superpowers?

Arkin

Ditto on the inventory management. Sometimes, I let things stay messy for the first few hours, but once I've got a full party, my eyes start twitching until I clean house.

Another permutation of this obsession: I tend to assign individual characters inventory "roles." So, one character will be my "magic items to sell" character, another will be my "ranged ammo" character, etc...probably a bit unnecessary, but as you say: glorious inventory efficiency.

Tanthalas

Arkin said:

Another permutation of this obsession: I tend to assign individual characters inventory "roles." So, one character will be my "magic items to sell" character, another will be my "ranged ammo" character, etc...probably a bit unnecessary, but as you say: glorious inventory efficiency.

I actually do this too.

vindolandia

I always make Khalid the "girly man" giving him all the gems and jewelry

HeroicSpur

@Tanthalas, it's really the logical way to do it, it ensures maximum stacking and that you know exactly where to go when looking for an item of a certain type.

SkinnyD

Arkin said:

Another permutation of this obsession: I tend to assign individual characters inventory "roles." So, one character will be my "magic items to sell" character, another will be my "ranged ammo" character, etc...probably a bit unnecessary, but as you say: glorious inventory efficiency.

Exactly! Though their weight carry capacity limits their roles in this. Usually Minsc gets the armor, Kivan or Kaigan primarily carry weapons, Jaheira can carry potions to sell. Oh, and Imoen gets a pimp slap for not being able to carry anything except a paltry amount of healing potions and her stealth-defying pink leather body suit.

recklessheart

When an NPC joins my party, I do not alter their party position. By the end of the game, my protagonist is always leader (as s/he should be), followed then in order of which NPC joined the party first. If a character leaves the party and then rejoins (such as due to Jaheira or Nalia's sidequests, for example), they are not moved on the roster, and remain fixed last unless another NPC then joins after them.

It's of no particular benefit, but it's what must be done to preserve my sanity. :P

Also, in recent playthroughs I developed a habit of not changing NPC colours, and only changing the main PCs colours when importing them between BG1/BG2/ToB.

Of no benefit whatsoever, and I'll justify breaking it by treating BG:EE as though it were a totally new game.

So many, many, many others, I am sure. I'll report them as I remember them XD

Sirrion

pc must have maxed charisma, undebatable!

other than that, spam clicking boo every now and then ^^

elminster

SkinnyD said:

Arkin said:

Another permutation of this obsession: I tend to assign individual characters inventory "roles." So, one character will be my "magic items to sell" character, another will be my "ranged ammo" character, etc...probably a bit unnecessary, but as you say: glorious inventory efficiency.

Exactly! Though their weight carry capacity limits their roles in this. Usually Minsc gets the armor, Kivan or Kaigan primarily carry weapons, Jaheira can carry potions to sell. Oh, and Imoen gets a pimp slap for not being able to carry anything except a paltry amount of healing potions and her stealth-defying pink leather body suit.

I do that only with non-magical rings and gems. Otherwise I don't generally organise items, unless they are scrolls or arrows (I generally don't use other type of ranged weapon other than a bow). For weight carrying capacity I move items around to balance things out. Also my first character I generally leave with as few number of items in their inventory as possible.

Corvino

Absolutely agreed on designated carriers of types of object for maximum stackability & convenience. Is stackability even a word?

@skinnyD not sure I agree on 18/00 or bust though. I know exactly where the STR tome is and usually get there before doing all the ToTSC stuff, so 18/xx is fine for me. The rest of the statline is another story, that's got to be ridiculously high depending on char class, typically 3-4 18 stats and nothing less than 10.

odee

And to think that I am the only one with OCS , I even arrage items in my stash point before selling them . I am also a hoarder , wont sell things that are not ordinari . Read - magical .

mch202

Save before a conversation and reload in order to check each conversation path...

Bobby_Singer

I have to clear every little black spot off the maps before I can leave. I hate the little black spots that you can't clear because its blocked by rocks or a grove of trees or whatever.

On the other hand, I actually have ocd. lol

Cheesebelly

Stat rolls obviously. Total 92+ or no go XD
Other than that, when soloing BG1, I'll always reserve some special slots in my inventory :
Autograph from Larry Darryl Darryl, Note about the Armed Chair, Golden pantaloons, random potion which looks fancy.

Needless to say that I cheat the autograph into BG2 every single time. It's the item I love the most.
And I do understand that's not a superpower, that's rather poor inventory management XD

SkinnyD

Corvino said:

@skinnyD not sure I agree on 18/00 or bust though. I know exactly where the STR tome is and usually get there before doing all the ToTSC stuff, so 18/xx is fine for me.

I know where you're coming from, the tome makes rolling for 18/00 almost completely unnecessary. But I treat it like more of a cross between an achievement and superstition.

Bobby_Singer said:

I have to clear every little black spot off the maps before I can leave. I hate the little black spots that you can't clear because its blocked by rocks or a grove of trees or whatever.

Agreed, though if I have access to clairvoyance I use it after I have explored every accessible part of the map to ensure no "fog-of-war" areas remain.

odee

@SkinnyD

Hey I guess I not the only one who use clairvoyant spell to clear all fog of war in all areas and took screen shot of the map . I feel less strange already .

Drugar

1) Assign a person for an inventory task. Typicly, the warriors get the weapons/armour, the healer gets the potions, the wizard gets the scrolls and unidentified items and the thief gets the gems. All things get stored in their associated bags/cases. This makes selling and finding things much easier.
A friend of mine was playing BG, he showed me his game with his inventory completely cluttered, I literally recoiled in horror and confusion.

2) Fixed party formation. From top to bottom: Frontline fighter, Frontline Fighter, Tertiary Member of varying ability, Healer, Thief, Wizard. The tertiary member is something like Kivan (archer), a druid, or anyone who's not direct front-line material but better than the rogue and wizard.

3) Checking every box/closet/cupboard/body/etc. This is not so much OCD as it is pure greed. I will never let a single gold piece lie on the ground. Everything is sold for maximum profit. In Oblivion/Morrowind I eventually got very proficient in dungeon hauling with an immidiate weight/gold calculator in my head. If my character is not rolling around in cash within 2 hours of a game, I get cranky. Profit is what's important!

4) Exploration. Every square inch of every map must be explored. There could be monsters or quests or loot! Clairvoyance is not enough, I need to have been there to check!

In real life, I've hardly any compulsive tendencies but in games, especially BG...I want total control and order!

Majoca

1) - I always make sure my party is strategically placed depending on class and either use triangle formation for outdoors and the tight one for corridors and dungeons

2) always stick around near noober to get the xp for just letting him annoy you

3) have to have xzar and monty, if my party does not contain them I cant play they are just too funny

4) xzar spends majority of the beginning with chill touch as his only offensive because I hate Larloch minor life draint hingy. But still later in game I use chill touch.