i think some multiclass fighters are better than duals (powergaming)
zur312
Member Posts: 1,366
the regular options
kensai13/thief
- !if! you have the mods better apr by 0,5 or 1
- kai
- +4 dmg
berserker13/thief
- while berserking +2 dmg +15 hp + immunities
- ! if ! you have the mods better apr by 0,5 or 1
f/t dwarfs elves orcs
bonuses of f/t multi
1)better tanking abilities (hardiness fighter hla=40% more)
2)critical hit hla = bigger backstabs because all are critical
3)if dwarf much better ST
4)if orcs better starting str
same with fighter/clerics
1)better tanking abilities (hardiness fighter hla=40% more)
2)critical hit hla = better damage
3)if dwarf much better ST
4)if orcs better starting str
_the only_ dual bettern than multi IMO are x/mages because mages don't need items for tanking everything in the game they will just go with pfmw
so multi have better
-tanking abilities
-better damage with crit hla
-better ST
unless kai is better than critical hit i see no point of going dual with those
kensai13/thief
- !if! you have the mods better apr by 0,5 or 1
- kai
- +4 dmg
berserker13/thief
- while berserking +2 dmg +15 hp + immunities
- ! if ! you have the mods better apr by 0,5 or 1
f/t dwarfs elves orcs
bonuses of f/t multi
1)better tanking abilities (hardiness fighter hla=40% more)
2)critical hit hla = bigger backstabs because all are critical
3)if dwarf much better ST
4)if orcs better starting str
same with fighter/clerics
1)better tanking abilities (hardiness fighter hla=40% more)
2)critical hit hla = better damage
3)if dwarf much better ST
4)if orcs better starting str
_the only_ dual bettern than multi IMO are x/mages because mages don't need items for tanking everything in the game they will just go with pfmw
so multi have better
-tanking abilities
-better damage with crit hla
-better ST
unless kai is better than critical hit i see no point of going dual with those
Post edited by zur312 on
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Comments
you quoted only half the post
Also it seems a bit odd how you compare things. A Kensai->Thief is not exactly what you would build to tank, for example. While it's definitely true that other combos tank better, the comparison doesn't make a lot of sense to me.
And where did the cleric come from all of a sudden? Where's the comparison between F/C and F->C, or R/C and R->C for that matter? Those are much more interesting to analyze than F->T vs. F/C which is a rather unhelpful comparison.
Much of what mages so good in duals also applies to clerics. You gain comparatively little from fighter levels beyond 13 vs. caster levels, which continue to scale well into the 30s.
Also, HLAs are really not class-specific in this comparison; rather it's an issue inherent to dual vs. multi, regardless of class.
Don't overrate Critical Strike, by the way. It's definitely great, don't get me wrong, but all relevant enemies are immune to criticals so it'll be "only" automatic hits for the duration. Depending on THAC0/AC values, other skills can easily catch up to that, Kai being the prime example.
Racials are also not that relevant. The biggest one is perhaps the Half-orc STR bonus, and shorty bonuses in BG1. In BG2 saves are good enough that it doesn't have much of an impact, not to mention that all the smart enemies use spells that don't care much about saves.
I think you also missed the biggest argument in the debate: party size. Multiclasses are entirely contigent on your available XP, which is directly proportional to party size and setup. Once you can get to high enough levels with your multis, the gap becomes smaller, but if XP are scarce, duals can easily be quite a ways ahead.
As Lord_Tansheron pointed out, all of the important enemies are immune to critical strike so it's not much use. Same with the backstab HLA. Dual wield + improved haste works well until you get dispelled (which enemies do a lot with SCSII installed).
Whirlwind attack = 10 attacks/round with a shield and no need to use a poor offhand weapon (belm/kundane) just for extra attacks. It also makes the extra 0.5 attacks from grandmastery irrelevant.
Oh, and multiclass characters aren't gimped for half the game. Plus thieves don't really gain anything for high levels anyway.
that is my point
duals are without hlas so they are weaker
@ambrennan
i think u did not get it so i will post this
multiclass
defender of eastheaven+jan's armor+hardiness fighter hla=80%
dualclass
defender of eastheaven+jan's armor=40%
is this clear?
As for berserker like I mentioned in the other thread I believe their generous immunities make them far more suited as tanks (or damage dealers for that matter) compared to pure class fighters, and that hardiness can't make up for that. Anyone who's played through the trilogy knows in how many ways you can get disabled by enemies. The only possible exception I can think of is the ToB Ascension end battle time stop + melee sessions (though using SCSII will fix that for you) - but even there 40% reduction on a fighter should be enough to survive.
but as we all know damage is good but surviving hits is more important so you can deal your hits
if kensai/thief dies it doesn't matter he is doing like 2 dmg more or use kai
and especially in moded instalations on insane high damage enemies are everywhere even stupid thiefs with invisibility potions
and berserker are good with immunities but they lose other things
As for the offhand, the damage isn't very relevant as you are capped at 1 offhand APR regardless (2 with Improved Haste, as it effectively doubles the round). The extra mainhand attack however will hit quite hard, given how good some of the mainhands are (FoA comes to mind). Even with a better offhand and lower APR, you'd end up doing less damage.
But even putting that aside, I think that HLAs in general are somewhat overrated. Many of them are outright useless, too! Arcane/divine spell HLAs aside, the useful ones are pretty much UAI, GWW, CS, and Hardiness (some fringe uses for others). UAI doesn't really matter as you rarely dual out of thief (but frequently into them). GWW is worse than IH for the above-mentioned reasons. CS is good, but as I pointed out earlier, it's not *too* good. That leaves Hardiness, which to be quite honest is very good indeed, it's true.
The question is, how much are you willing to sacrifice for it? Is defense such a crucial factor, and purely physical defense at that? In my opinion, no. The truly threatening damage is almost exclusively magical in nature, and Hardiness will do little to stop it. There's certainly something to be said for tanky characters, but at the end of the day this isn't a trinity game; you can't rely on tanks, and they'll get pounded by spells just the same anyway.
HLAs are a factor to be sure, but I think that in the light of party composition/size, they are a minor factor in deciding which route to go. Dual class is powerful for two reasons: kit bonuses, and uneven level distribution. The latter is of paramount importance when considering spell casters, while the former depends on the respective bonuses. I'd argue that both the Kensai and Berserker ones are well worth the sacrifice in many cases.
I think a lot of your problems with this issue, @zur312, stems from the fact that you are looking at thieves. They are a somewhat peculiar case in that they don't scale well with levels, but do gain something at high levels (UAI). Still, you have to ask yourself: what is that character supposed to be doing? And what does it need to excel at that?
actually i was only showing dual vs multi and the same is true for fighter/clerics
edited it so everyone should be happy now
For comparison, look at a F->C vs. F/C at 5m XP:
F->C: 13F/29C
F/C: 18F/19C
That's 50% more lvl5 spells, and 100% more lvl6/7 spells, not to mention more powerful spells (assuming you mod spell scaling past 20), and more powerful Turn Undead (I believe a 29C can already turn Liches and similar high-level undead). And what do you gain in exchange? A bit more HP/THAC0, and of course the HLAs. So you have to ask yourself: are fighter HLAs worth the diminished clerical powers? Is Hardiness or GWW or CS worth having less high level spells to work with?
Thieves, on the other hand, work very differently. Once you've put 100 in most thieving skills, additional points hardly matter. Even the stealth skills don't actually need that much to be effective (since you can't hide with enemies around anyway, and without them it's easy to find shadows). That means that higher thief levels bring almost nothing in terms of character progression, given how little use there is for their HLAs beyond UAI.
Of course, that's just looking at one particular XP value. Things become very different the higher you get - the gap between both options becomes smaller and smaller the higher you go, due to diminishing returns on level scaling. That's why party size and composition is such a crucial factor, as it determines just how much you have to sacrifice for those HLAs.
I'm not saying that dual is always better; it's not. Neither is multiclass for that matter. It depends on many factors, and while HLAs are certainly part of the equation, I don't think they are the most integral one.
well if you don't want a thief in your team you just don't get one
same for clerics or druids or paladins
there is no real reason for any character to play and everything is viable in completing the game unless insane ascension tactics scsii atweaks compilation that can be done only by mage is created
Granted that cleric spells are less spammable than mage ones, but I for one do make extensive use of Greater Restoration, Heal, and some of the other high level spells mid-fight.
And what's that about thieves? I'm not talking about thieves in general, I'm talking about high level ones. They don't scale well, so why would you want a multiclass thief? Why not go say T->F instead or something? Uneven levels is what dual is about, and I was using thief to illustrate the prime example of a class where you actually want that a lot.
mages are obviously the most important in bg2
thief-fighter will be pretty weak i think
if you dual at level 9thief you will have only 72hp
while 9fighter->thief will be at least 128 if i did math correctly and you know it actually because you did math earlier for other thief/x x/thief characters
and this is powergaming thread for dual vs multi in matter what is better
players are using different characters for thiefs clerics mages but they most of the time asks "what is the best ZXC" so saying that you don't need ZXC in party is not really an answer for questions "what is the best ZXC"
i think you point about f->c is a lot like my on f->m
you don't need fighters hlas for mage because he will be immortal anyway and fighter hla is not important for him and he will advance in mage class faster giving him more spells faster
for cleric i think the fast progression is nice but is not that big of a deal like for mages
and clerics are not not immortal gods
@zur312: I don't know where you get the idea that I was advocating dropping thief completely, because I never said that. It doesn't progress well at higher levels, but that doesn't translate to "don't use them".
do you go 9thief->fighter and have half hp of 9 levle fighter?
C/M superior to C>M or M>C.
At the end of the day, DC is better because caster levels scale much better than warrior/rogue levels. That is to say, fighter levels after 10 are questionable and after 13 are worthless. Once you hit that point, if you're a multi-class then half of your XP is going to waste, period. DC has the added advantage of being able to sneak in just a few levels - a classic example being a Thief with all points put into traps who duals over to Mage or Cleric at level 3 or 4. That leaves you with enough XP to hardly be behind the curve of pure spellcasters, while still being able to take care of nearly any trap in the game (and use bows!). MC doesn't offer that luxury - a Thief/Mage is committed for life.
However, in BG1 this hardly matters as much - the low(ish) level cap means that MCs aren't left too far behind DCs. It's far more noticeable later on, where MC'd spellcasters can often be two spell levels behind their pure/dual-classed peers. Being limited to a level 7 slot while your companions are tossing around level 9s isn't all that fun.
Of course, even in BG1 I would definitely take Xzar dualled to Cleric over Quayle, but that's mostly because Quayle's terrible stats make him intolerable.
and question stays will berserker13/cleric or someone like that survive more than f/c? not really