Spellcasters: Spellbooks and scrolls who, what, where, why, how?

BaldursCat

Game: Baldur's Gate II (IIRC certain spells work differently in each game so this information may be of use) & Charname & the NPCs are currently around Level 6 spellcasters.

What I want to know from the more experienced spellcasters is:

1. What spells do you always learn?
2. What are your favourite / most effective spell combos (especially of those spells which seem to do a number of similar things?)
3. What spells do you not bother to learn and cast from a scroll instead?
4. What scrolls are utterly useless in terms of the game and can be flogged for cold hard cash at the nearest magical emporium?

I know there are lots of guides out there for magic users but as this is basic tips I'm looking for more "hit me with your best shot" answers. I'm currently running around with a bit of a hit and hope mentality and that really doesn't suit my poor bard's 18 int score. (Also we got our asses royally kicked by the Cowled Enforcers, why they appeared I don't know as no magic was cast).

(If anyone wants to make suggestions for priest spells that'd be great too).

Heindrich

Hello fellow noobie. I'm currently in my first BG 2 run as well, and just got my ass handed to me by... actually I don't wanna spoil u when u get there.

Anyways I do have 3 Arcane casters and 3 Divine casters in my party, so although I'm not 'experienced', I think I can answer some of your questions, at least for the early-mid game.

1) Thankfully the most important spells in the game are not difficult to obtain.

Your best friend is 'Breach'. In BG 2 almost every notable enemy has an array of magical protections that make them a nightmare to kill unless you take them down. Thankfully 'Breach' does exactly that, and has been effective against almost every enemy I've come across thus far.

If you have Jaheira in your party, she will have 'Summon Fire Elemental' (lv 6 spell) fairly early on. Unlike the Mage equivalent, her Fire Elemental never turns hostile (unless you attack it), and doesn't require her full concentration to control it. It was invaluable for my survival in the early game.

Chaotic Commands (lv 4 Cleric/Druid Spell) prevents all sorts of nasty incoming disabling (Horror, Chaos, Confusion etc) spells, which all sorts of enemies love to throw at you. A single cast only protects 1 character at a time, but thankfully it lasts a long time, so usually I just protect my front-line fighters, who tend to take the brunt of incoming spells anyway. When I get more spell slots, I'll try to keep everybody protected.

True Sight is pretty essential to deal with all sorts of enemies that use illusions or invisibility.

Haste was useful in BG 1, it's still very useful in BG 2. Same goes for Minute Meteors.

2) Well... one of the great things about BG 2 magic is that there's all sorts of interesting and viable magical strategies. The main 'combos' I use involve Web. Either Web followed by Cloudkill/Fireballs to deal with a large pack of enemies. Or throw down a Web and cast 'Free Movement' on a few melee warriors and let them go to town on an incapacitated enemy.

I am supposed to throw a 'Greater Mallison' to enhance the effectiveness of Web and Cloudkill, but I usually forget, lol.

3) With 3 Arcane casters, I'm not short of characters to learn spells. Also Charname has 19 for Intelligence, so I pretty much learn every scroll I come across, even if I never plan to use it.

That said, because Aerie has 16 Int and Imoen has 17, I limit them to 11 spells per level and 14 spells per level (even though you can cheat around that with potions). So for them I've planned ahead and picked spells I want and spells I'll sell.

4) If I had free spell slots, I usually just learn the scrolls anyway, since xp is more useful than gold. (In my opinion.) I only sell scrolls I know to be useless (or that I don't like) if I already have it memorised on at least Charname.

So scrolls I sell are:
... Actually this is a pretty long list. May I refer you to the following guides.

http://www.gamefaqs.com/pc/258273-baldurs-gate-ii-shadows-of-amn/faqs/11334
http://www.gamefaqs.com/pc/258273-baldurs-gate-ii-shadows-of-amn/faqs/13870

It is a lot of reading, which is why I do it level by level as my casters reach them. Also bear in mind it's just a guy's opinion. I think he greatly overestimates and underestimates certain spells.

God

Personally, I find Conjuration spells useless. On the other hand, many claim that Conjuration spells are the most potent ones.

ZanathKariashi

I rarely bother with any direct damage...there are just too many easily available wands in both games to ever waste space on them. Only horrid wilting and some of the 10th level spells really have a place since there's not much competition. You need Robe of Cheese and IA to make spell spam at all viable, and it's still extremely cheesy due to lack of rest limits.

Meteor's is nice for killing golems or other magic resistant enemies, when +3 and higher weapons are rare.


I usually load up on buffs, CC, and debuffs exclusively. They're generally very efficient use of slots, which with my imposed resting limits, that is THE most important factor. If you don't really care, and are fine with resting after every fight, immersion be damned, by all means load up on DD and go to town. (though you could've just used wands for your DD and had plenty of effects that aren't as easily replicated).

Conjuration spells generally suck. The elemental summons and woodlands call for druids are ok, and the plantear/devas are nice, but in general summons are glorified spell sponges (the mage elemental/demon summons should never, ever under any circumstance be used...EVER). A few exceptions like Skeleton warriors from Animate Dead and Mord's sword exist, due to being good anti-magic with decent melee or impervious to melee (handy for tying up Fire giants and other things you'd REALLY not want to be in melee range of) but all in all, the rest're weak. don't deal much damage, and tend to be best suited for taking enemy spells. (though some like Carrion Crawlers or Wyverns can be used to great effect if you don't mind some extra micro-management, and spider spawn synergizes nicely with Web).


Basically, just read the descriptions and decide for yourself what you want to do. There are very few genuinely useless spells (Infravision, detect/know spells (paladin have 1 case where it's needed, but they can detect evil as a class feature, so you never need to actually memorize it), Non-detection, Mage-Elemental Summons, being off the top of my head).

Dexter

Every player has its own favourite combos and more importantly, its own game set up (ie if your game is modded then useless spells in vanilla BG2 can take huge importance - secret word anyone?).
Nonetheless you should read all descriptions cause knowing how to counter an enemy spell is as important as knowing how to use a spell against them

Since no one has mention yet, i like arcane slow and protection from magic weapons and divine insect plague

Wisp

Some good spells that are perhaps not obviously useful to someone less familiar with the game (with focus on BG2):
Invisibility (Wizard, level 2) and Invisibility 10' Radius (Wizard, level 3) - last 24 hours (great when travelling, though more so in BG1).
Skull Trap (Wizard, level 3) - scales up to level 20, unlike most other damage spells. Unless you have the tweak to shorten the triggering delay, it's harder to use, however.
Minor Globe of Invulnerability (Wizard, level 4) - being completely immune to any spell less than level 4 should not be underestimated.
Teleport Field (Wizard, level 4) - no save and bypasses MR. Seriously useful when you are a mage or archer against melee opponents (it's less useful when you need to be within melee range yourself).
Sunfire (Wizard, level 5) - it's practically an exploit, but due to the technicalities of the game, it bypasses MR.
Mislead (Wizard, level 6) - it's super-cheesy (and I hasten to add that I never use it), but if you stash the clone somewhere safe you are under invisibility that cannot be broken or dispelled.
Armor of Faith (Priest, level 1) - may be weaksauce at low levels, but is really good at high levels.
Fire Storm (Priest, level 8) - bypasses MR (and no save).

General advice:
Single-target save-or-else spells are generally a waste of time (in BG2).
Greater Malison and Chaos is a great combo. They need to have some seriously good saves to stand a good chance against a -8 save penalty.
3 Skull Traps (or Flame Arrows) in a Sequencer deal mean damage.
Scrolls generally cast at level 10, so spells that don't scale past that point, or that don't scale at all are fine candidates for being cast from scrolls.

Aside:
Chaotic Commands does not protect you from fear (Horror).
Wands don't go past 8–6D6 damage, so they become decreasingly useful substitutes past BG1.
Melf's Acid Arrow, Flame Arrow and Power Word: Stun/Blind are all great conjuration spells.

ZanathKariashi

Most commonly spammed spells also cap at 10, so 6d6, instantly, without taking up space for other spells you CAN'T get wands of, is ALWAYS better. Hence why DD is worthless from an efficiency standpoint. (also a wand of cloudkill is every bit as useful as the spell itself, and due to by-passing most forms of protection also eliminates the need for several types of spells (risky to use when you're level 6 or under, but nice for 7 and above. Also a surprising amount of enemies are 6 HD or less (as in 3/4 of generic creatures), even up to ToB).

Acid arrow is only good when it can stack (it's worthless for spell disruption because enemies have like 70% chance to ignore disruption per hit, and the damage just takes too long to apply, you'll likely kill the target before the 2nd tick in pretty much every case), which depending on which patch you're playing in and which game it is, may or may not. Vanilla BG1, it could, with TotSC it couldn't, with unmodded BG2 it can't, in EE...I think someone said it could now.

Tresset

Cone of Cold isn't bad. Good damage cone spell that caps at 20. Can destroy loot though...

Melf's mini meteors is pretty good. +5 enhancement and 5 APR.

Mordenkainen's sword is almost impossible to kill without deathspell. Nishruu and Hakaeshar are very good at mage killing as long as there is no deathspell again.

If you face an enemy that likes to summon a ton of crap Death Fog is better than deathspell for cleaning them out because it lingers in the area.