My current play through is with a shadowdancer I'm loving it. I have almost all my points in stealth but I'm way above 100 for both stealth and move silently so I'm now branching out into the other skills available. I do have to augment my party with another thief however.
What about the better thieving bonuses and shorty saves that halfings get. Are they worth it at all?
Halflings +10% and +15% to HiD and SM. (+40% overall bonuses) Elves +15% and +15% to HiD and SM
I assume you mean Move Silently (MS) and not SM.
Anyways, I take it you are reading this from the game descriptions in-game? Yea...they are wrong on some of them because they aren't factoring in the base benefits for some races while including it in others (its a known issue).
Half Elf should state the following:
+10% Open Locks, +5% Find Traps, +25% Pick Pockets, +10% Move Silently, +10% Hide in Shadows.
Halfling should state the following:
+15% Open Locks, +10% Find Traps, +20% Pick Pockets, +20% Move Silently, +20% Hide in Shadows.
Half-Orc should state the following:
+10% Open Locks, +5% Find Traps, +15% Pick Pockets, +10% Move Silently, +5% Hide in Shadows.
Basically from a thieving skill standpoint Halflings get better than elves in every category (they don't get the Detect Illusion and Set Trap bonuses that Gnomes and Dwarves get though).
@cbarchuk - Gosh, a name is really difficult to suggest - it's such a personal decision. I'm not ashamed to admit that I've spent many minutes, (all together, perhaps hours), picking namesakes for my PCs. What, after all, is in a name?
@jackjack - Yea I agree. I won't be able to get into a character unless I like their name. I haven't played many halflings before so that's where my difficulty comes into play
It's the best one I've found... no other generator has as wide a selection. Some of them are out there but you always get something good sooner or later.
Since both shadow and sin get their final backstab upgrade at lvl 14 dual class at 15 to fighter and if you want dual wield you will get multiple times to do fatal damage you won't even need poison.
The only advantage shadow has over sin but a big one is the ability to go stealthy while enemies are looking at you, granted it takes a second or two to reestablish stealth but just get them out of harms way go invis and back stab again, though if do fighter at 14 doubt if they survive the encounter, if you go mage use improved invisibility and back stab until they are dead or until you are spotted. Make your father proud after all he started out as an assassin.
The only advantage shadow has over sin but a big one is the ability to go stealthy while enemies are looking at you, granted it takes a second or two to reestablish stealth but just get them out of harms way go invis and back stab again, though if do fighter at 14 doubt if they survive the encounter, if you go mage use improved invisibility and back stab until they are dead or until you are spotted. Make your father proud after all he started out as an assassin.
Shadowdancer starts out with 30 skill points to distribute, +10 points in hide in shadows/move silently, and gets 20 points/level. So those would be the other advantages.
Shadowdancer works better in smaller parties in my opinion, since more micromanagement is likely involved with it. Personally I would have preferred to see the time it takes for it to enter back into stealth to be reduced as it gains levels (or for them to at least somehow externalize this)
I think it would have made the kit much more focused on this idea of magic and illusion, and less about big damage backstabs.
I've found though that the script (Thief Controlled) that you can set to make your character auto-enter stealth to be a so handy for the kit. So that at least is an option since it will work pretty consistently (though it won't work when enemies are in your line of sight so that is a bit of a shame).
Comments
@cbarchuk this is my name suggestion for you btw (a revised take based on the assassin's origin name irl, the Hashashin
Anyways, I take it you are reading this from the game descriptions in-game? Yea...they are wrong on some of them because they aren't factoring in the base benefits for some races while including it in others (its a known issue).
Half Elf should state the following:
+10% Open Locks, +5% Find Traps, +25% Pick Pockets, +10% Move Silently, +10% Hide in Shadows.
Halfling should state the following:
+15% Open Locks, +10% Find Traps, +20% Pick Pockets, +20% Move Silently, +20% Hide in Shadows.
Half-Orc should state the following:
+10% Open Locks, +5% Find Traps, +15% Pick Pockets, +10% Move Silently, +5% Hide in Shadows.
Basically from a thieving skill standpoint Halflings get better than elves in every category (they don't get the Detect Illusion and Set Trap bonuses that Gnomes and Dwarves get though).
http://www.behindthename.com/random/
It's the best one I've found... no other generator has as wide a selection. Some of them are out there but you always get something good sooner or later.
Shadowdancer works better in smaller parties in my opinion, since more micromanagement is likely involved with it. Personally I would have preferred to see the time it takes for it to enter back into stealth to be reduced as it gains levels (or for them to at least somehow externalize this)
http://forum.baldursgate.com/discussion/32840/externalize-the-cooldown-timer-to-activate-stealth-hide-in-shadows-again
I think it would have made the kit much more focused on this idea of magic and illusion, and less about big damage backstabs.
I've found though that the script (Thief Controlled) that you can set to make your character auto-enter stealth to be a so handy for the kit. So that at least is an option since it will work pretty consistently (though it won't work when enemies are in your line of sight so that is a bit of a shame).