Honestly, I was caught off guard be the whole Hexxat story. I kind of thought Clara was a ghost or spirit and not a mind control slave to Hexxat. Though I would like to have an option to save Clara instead of Hexxat. All the mystery about her past life and new place in the world would keep me hooked.
Though when I put Hexxat back into to my party to confirm her vampire status and abilities. My Undead Hunter devised a plan to slay her. First I left Hexxat with the rest of my party in a tavern as I took her coffin and placed it in a random crate/barrel/chest out on the street. As I join up with the rest of the party I convinced her to take off her cool cloak. The me and my party procceeded to kill her. We then left her in her gas form and went to a far away place and ditched her cloak in a random spot. With that I was satisfied. Maybe my Blackguard will be able to tolerate her more.
I think what puts a lot of people off or on hexxat is her personality for truly evil rping character she's awsome but for the more neutral she's okay. Stats means nothing in a game where you can mod them(eekeeper does work for bg2ee it seems \o/) so it comes down more to her character.
@Schneidend Her STR score doesn't mean jack in a game where any melee fighter practically requires at least 1 arcane spellcaster to strip away enemy protections. A medium-level SCS mage will dismember her in under 30 seconds, while she herself can't do anything to touch them. But that's not important - what *is*, is the fact that her stats, inflated as they are, still don't help her because she's just a HUMAN THIEF with no special abilities like level drain. She's a tiny little kitten compared to the likes of Edwin (arcane bombardment) and Korgan (bloody myhem). Unkitted thieves are terrible, regardless of stats. And that goes double when you play with SCS. She cannot hold her own against enemies unless you give her 5,000 invisibility potions
I don't play with SCS, nor would I judge part of the game by a mod I happen to like if I did.
I just wanted to second this. Actually, SCS (on core) ought to be doable with any reasonably balanced party - but even if not, if there is a conflict between my mod and the core game, it's a problem for SCS, not the core game. You can't reasonably expect the designers to assume any give mod.
(Also, while we're considering the tactical advantage of a single-class thief, don't forget about Detect Illusions, which by all accounts is very useful in SCS.)
Well what turns me off, is she's the only lesbian romance option, which is what I really wanted to do. So if that's what you want your stuck with her. She's fine for evil characters, but I just can't justify her for a good or neutral group. On top of that I find her annoying (don't like her voice or most of her dialog), and I don't like her mechanics (the whole cloak thing), or that she's a vampire (overdone). Nothing for me to like, but I can see why evil parties would take her. Honestly, I wished Beamdog would have gone with Neera or even a different (new) character for the lesbian romance route. Nuff said what's done is done.
Wow, a whole 7 pages of discussion about the initial 5 minutes of the Clara/Hexxat quest line. Some people seem to find Hexxat boring and bland, and to be honest I can't understand that. Yeah OK, she doesn't have a super-amazing story line that would put even Irenicus story to shame, but which NPC has? Minsc has no quest line what-so-ever. Keldorn? Go to the government district and hand him back to his wife. Anomen? Please.
OK, I don't think Hexxat is by far the best NPC out there but to say she's bland and boring is quite harsh. On the other hand, I can sort of understand why people get all riled up because of this. The amount of hype around Hexxat before the release was insane, and then Overhaul goes and pull the rabbit out of a hat and "replace" the NPC a whole community had identified as Hexxat (by the portrait) with someone else... yeah, I can understand why people feel a bit cheated.
The only part that I really disliked about her was the fact that : - The reasons for helping her are pretty vague (Treasure... must get... treasure) and could have done with a slightly better dialog - The part where Clara disappears and is replaced by Hexxatreally needs to be slithgly improved, as it is it's basically "Hey, a vampire just killed that girl. Let's take her into the group". - A minute after "Hey, she's asking for a cloak. Let's give it to her" - And three minute later... "Hey, she just gave me complete control over her by giving me her coffin. Wee, I guess she's one crazy confident vampire"
A point already mentioned on page no. 1 which I would like to highlight again is, that by implementing a decision between Hexxat and Clara the game would get a tremendous replayvalue. If the player is forced to decide whether he goes with Clara or Hexxat I would feel the need to play the game again to get to know the other companion. While the game offers some conflicts between some companions so that the player is not able to have them both in the party at the same time a decision whether a.) Clara or b.) Hexxat would be a totally new game-mechanic. I find it hard to believe that those who like Hexxat more than the (hypothetical) Clara wouldn't give the game a second run to see Clara nevertheless. This would work also the other way around!
Given the amount of time that the devs at Beamdog put into making this game what it is, I can understand if there is no desire to add the ability to save Clara to the game core (after all, debugging new scripts, probably having to drag the voice actress back in to do more dialogue, beta-testing, etc). That said, I'd actually like to see the ability to save Clara in some form, but not to make it too complicated so that the devs could bang this out in a quick patch and then move onto other things (like fixing bugs and whatnot).
Quick bullet list: - Meet real Hexxat, Clara gets killed, but not exploded. - Fight real Hexxat if desired w/o Clara's help (otherwise, Clara stays dead, Hexxat joins). - After fight, take Clara's body back to a temple to be re-raised. - Clara has no clear memory of her family or origins. - Several small, simple side-quests that reveals a small backstory throughout Ch 2 - Ch 4. - Trends toward chaotic good, is a Robin-hood-like thief, and remains a "lesser" character overall. - No romance option (let the modders take care of that, reduces time needed for changes).
Regardless of whatever the devs do, I obviously need to make a backup of my last real save file just in case. I only play these games once through usually. Just not enough time to do multiple play throughs, since I've other games to play, as well as other errands.
it's true that an option could be done that, IF YOU KILL HEXXAT, and only if you kill her, you can take Clara's body back to Illmater's temple to be raised. Then, she would just thank you and wander off.
And you'd get, say, some XP and an increase in reputation - that would be a suitable ending for a good party.
Don't fret, guys, we'll never get Clara as a real, fleshed out NPC... but loose ends and approximative dialogs can - and should be - improved
PS, It doesn't seem you can inform Burich that Dragomir and Hexxat are dealt with and he is free to rest. At an utter minimum, that should probably be put in for the good-aligned parties to give him some closure. Poor sod is just going to stand there for another few eternities it looks.
To be honest, the more that I use Hexxat the more she bugs me. Between micromanaging her cloak and the way her story arc pans out, I'm pretty sure that I'm not going to use her again for awhile.
What I think the game really needed was "just" a neutral thief (that could undergo an alignment shift to evil in order to accommodate evil parties) and that was pretty much it. The dual Clara / Hexxat thing and the vampire thing made the character WAY more complicated than it needed to be.
While the ideas brought up by @Disgruntler and @Aranthys are ideas that would make the lack of a decision "better" I don't think it would be "great". Because no amount of xp or item could compensate the lack of a companion which you inevitably lose. A really "great" approach for good parties to this would still be Clara as full companion with all the stuff this means.
Oh, and @Aranthys please don't be so pessimistic. Maybe we will get Clara as an full companion. Beamdog listens to their fans, right? Right? :-)
Did I enjoy Hexxat as a character? Sort of. I wasn't thrilled but it's all fine. Just don't see it as very plausible to be in cohorts with a vampire that just kills off my cute girl.
I mean.. even my stark raving mad eeevul warrior sees it as more prudent to kill the vampire on sight instead of talking to it.
Clara was the better option tbh.
Let us keep the pretty one with a full version soundset and just a liiittle bit of story to her and I'm good! Oh and neutral please.
While the ideas brought up by @Disgruntler and @Aranthys are ideas that would make the lack of a decision "better" I don't think it would be "great". Because no amount of xp or item could compensate the lack of a companion which you inevitably lose. A really "great" approach for good parties to this would still be Clara as full companion with all the stuff this means.
Oh, and @Aranthys please don't be so pessimistic. Maybe we will get Clara as an full companion. Beamdog listens to their fans, right? Right? :-)
I really don't think it would be good to provide Clara as a companion option, actually. The twist they provided was good and actually welcome, but the execution of it was kinda lacking and I think this is the only part that needs to be improved. She was meant to die, so be it. Edit.: I'd rather them to be working on another NPC entirely than spend time adding Clara as a NPC.
While the ideas brought up by @Disgruntler and @Aranthys are ideas that would make the lack of a decision "better" I don't think it would be "great". Because no amount of xp or item could compensate the lack of a companion which you inevitably lose. A really "great" approach for good parties to this would still be Clara as full companion with all the stuff this means.
Oh, and @Aranthys please don't be so pessimistic. Maybe we will get Clara as an full companion. Beamdog listens to their fans, right? Right? :-)
I really don't think it would be good to provide Clara as a companion option, actually. The twist they provided was good and actually welcome, but the execution of it was kinda lacking and I think this is the only part that needs to be improved. She was meant to die, so be it. Edit.: I'd rather them to be working on another NPC entirely than spend time adding Clara as a NPC.
That's fair. I'd like to see them expand on Clara, but I could understand why you'd want a new npc. My issue is it still needs to be a pure thief because many of us posting here feel like we still don't have a pure thief option, since we can't justify taking Hexxat.
While the ideas brought up by @Disgruntler and @Aranthys are ideas that would make the lack of a decision "better" I don't think it would be "great". Because no amount of xp or item could compensate the lack of a companion which you inevitably lose. A really "great" approach for good parties to this would still be Clara as full companion with all the stuff this means.
Oh, and @Aranthys please don't be so pessimistic. Maybe we will get Clara as an full companion. Beamdog listens to their fans, right? Right? :-)
I really don't think it would be good to provide Clara as a companion option, actually. The twist they provided was good and actually welcome, but the execution of it was kinda lacking and I think this is the only part that needs to be improved. She was meant to die, so be it. Edit.: I'd rather them to be working on another NPC entirely than spend time adding Clara as a NPC.
That's fair. I'd like to see them expand on Clara, but I could understand why you'd want a new npc. My issue is it still needs to be a pure thief because many of us posting here feel like we still don't have a pure thief option, since we can't justify taking Hexxat.
That's probably another discussion entirely, hell, there are no "pure druid" option for me either (Cernd sucks !), but that's the way it is.
Hexxat is still pretty fine as a pure thief, even with her cloak on (She does the job just fine, I mean), it's then a matter of preference... but it's hard to satisfy everyone's liking when it's a matter of taste.
Well, that I don't really understand what people mean by saying "She was meant to die, so be it" and her death is "set in stone" have I already mentioned on page no. 2. So I don't see any need to comment on that again. But if you don't like Clara and therefor don't mind her death and you would like a totally new character (for the expense of killing Hexxat for killing Clara) then I could be fine with that (given the point that her death has something redeeming to offer, like with the death of Yoshimo and his heart). But I would think that putting her aside in favor of a totally new character would be waste. Why not expand on something rather than building something new?
Edit: Just an idea (so don't go crazy about the details) I would be fine with but still cant think of a reason why the developers should pursue this over Clara: You bring Clara to the tomb, she gets killed by Hexxat, therefor you kill Hexxat and after you leave the tomb Clara's brother/sister shows up in search of Clara, who could be your companion. You have a "good" way of solving the quest and don't lose a companion.
Well, that I don't really understand what people mean by saying "She was meant to die, so be it" and her death is "set in stone" have I already mentioned on page no. 2. So I don't see any need to comment on that again. But if you don't like Clara and therefor don't mind her death and you would like a totally new character (for the expense of killing Hexxat for killing Clara) then I could be fine with that (given the point that her death has something redeeming to offer, like with the death of Yoshimo and his heart). But I would think that putting her aside in favor of a totally new character would be waste. Why not expand on something rather than building something new?
it's not that I don't like it. It's just that Clara's death is part of Hexxat's storyline just as much as Khalid or Dynaheir death are part of Minsc or Jaheira storyline in baldur's gate II. The only difference is you get to see her a bit before she becomes the lamb that gets sacrified to wake the sleeper.
My personal opinion. I play only Lawfull-evil or chaotic-neutral charname. My party consist mostly from evil characters. BUT. There is several things which made difference. 1) I hate vampires. All of them. I never trust them and consider them mostly as parasites. (So i don't need a vampire in my party and it is matter not that her characteristics is better). 2) I just need human/evil/thief - just at least one who will not run away from me if my reputation drop to zero. Iomen (only one good character who i respect in D&D games) is not an option in this case. In BG2 she will leave party (not permanetly but i was in the begining of underdark at that moment). And neutral Yoshimo will become traitor and die. (If he was not with you in asylym he could be ressurected by the way). So what is my option? There is just no evil or neutral (pure) Thief. 3) I have one rule - nobody can kill anyone in my party without my premission. 4) True Hexxat is not a normal vampire. As far as i remember in D&D vampire is UNDEAD creature. But what have we here? Just never working suck blood ability - which fails in my playthrough in 100% of all cases. Wolves summoning spell (Children of night or smt. like this)? Seriously?! Wolves?! Not a vampiric or ghostly but just pack of 4 wolves? No level drain or at least immunity to it? All spells and poisons work at her as the do with living creature? 5) Why developers just do not allow me to resurect false Hexxat in the few seconds after she is being killed? Realy we are not in neverwinter games where spells is so broken and useless. Seriously - i can ressurect fallen ones with full HP, i can summon planetars, i could slay almost everything that moves on earth, fly in the skyes or crawl underground but can't ressurect someone who was recently killed? (Party member by the way, not random NPC). Or dispell mind controll or anything that was casted on her? How it is possible Hexxat not even a mage who can lay powerfull spells. I have happy about aquiring false Hexxat in my party and very disappointed when she was replaced by some generic vampire (with broken mechanic) who speak about sacrifises that is needed.
So all above could prove that even in evil party there could be a reason to interfere and deny true Hexxat her dinner. I do not need any romance with false one. No additional quests. And like one nymph in BG1 sayed humans have tendency to do good things with evil intentions. Even in very evil party who do not care about life of others could be just cold-blooded premeditation to have (for example) not-that-good thief who owe you her's life and much more reliable than any vampire. That is all. Right to choose is all i want.
It seems to me that some of the negative reaction could have been avoided by keeping the barrier up until after Hexxat has done her thing, justifying the party's inaction when a vampire attacked a member of the party.
I like her interactions with the other good aligned characters. She does well to fit in and not offend them. I am actually digging Hexxat some.
It absolutely SUCKS that the cloak has such a -dex. Wth, I have a thief with lower dex than Viconia the cleric?! That is pretty worthless. I can understand the deductions with the cloak, but a thief should NEVER have 16 dex. Might as well just use my cleric for a thief with her find traps and knock....
I was very surprised there wasn't an option to choose between Hexxat and Clara. It seemed like a very BG thing to do, and a bloody obvious plot point.
I would love to see that interaction be changed in the future, and Clara introduced as a full-fledged party member with dialogue, banter, quests, etc - Hell, I'd even pay for it as a DLC - The alternative, though, of just a quick patch to let you keep Clara... pass.
The alternative, though, of just a quick patch to let you keep Clara... pass.
An option to keep Clara would at least make it easier for modders to create banters, dialogues, even a romance for her. Quests would probably take more work, so all in all, a full fledged DLC would still be the BEST option here. Especially since I loved Clara's voice and it would be a shame to not get any more dialogue to hear.
The alternative, though, of just a quick patch to let you keep Clara... pass.
An option to keep Clara would at least make it easier for modders to create banters, dialogues, even a romance for her. Quests would probably take more work, so all in all, a full fledged DLC would still be the BEST option here. Especially since I loved Clara's voice and it would be a shame to not get any more dialogue to hear.
The existing voice work for Clara is inadequate, even if you are just considering her as a 'one day NPC'. Her command soundset would be inappropriate for someone who is no longer a thrall. I love the modding community, and they do great work - but this is a great opportunity for the folks with the resources to integrate the content fully to actually do that.
@enneract The "folks with the resources" made their decision already, and that's why Hexxat functions as she does. You're much better off betting on the modding community than hoping Overhaul changes the entire scenario they wrote.
Comments
Though when I put Hexxat back into to my party to confirm her vampire status and abilities. My Undead Hunter devised a plan to slay her. First I left Hexxat with the rest of my party in a tavern as I took her coffin and placed it in a random crate/barrel/chest out on the street. As I join up with the rest of the party I convinced her to take off her cool cloak. The me and my party procceeded to kill her. We then left her in her gas form and went to a far away place and ditched her cloak in a random spot. With that I was satisfied. Maybe my Blackguard will be able to tolerate her more.
(Also, while we're considering the tactical advantage of a single-class thief, don't forget about Detect Illusions, which by all accounts is very useful in SCS.)
OK, I don't think Hexxat is by far the best NPC out there but to say she's bland and boring is quite harsh. On the other hand, I can sort of understand why people get all riled up because of this. The amount of hype around Hexxat before the release was insane, and then Overhaul goes and pull the rabbit out of a hat and "replace" the NPC a whole community had identified as Hexxat (by the portrait) with someone else... yeah, I can understand why people feel a bit cheated.
- The reasons for helping her are pretty vague (Treasure... must get... treasure) and could have done with a slightly better dialog
- The part where Clara disappears and is replaced by Hexxatreally needs to be slithgly improved, as it is it's basically "Hey, a vampire just killed that girl. Let's take her into the group".
- A minute after "Hey, she's asking for a cloak. Let's give it to her"
- And three minute later... "Hey, she just gave me complete control over her by giving me her coffin. Wee, I guess she's one crazy confident vampire"
These items really didn't feel right.
Otherwise, so long Clara, too bad for you.
Quick bullet list:
- Meet real Hexxat, Clara gets killed, but not exploded.
- Fight real Hexxat if desired w/o Clara's help (otherwise, Clara stays dead, Hexxat joins).
- After fight, take Clara's body back to a temple to be re-raised.
- Clara has no clear memory of her family or origins.
- Several small, simple side-quests that reveals a small backstory throughout Ch 2 - Ch 4.
- Trends toward chaotic good, is a Robin-hood-like thief, and remains a "lesser" character overall.
- No romance option (let the modders take care of that, reduces time needed for changes).
Regardless of whatever the devs do, I obviously need to make a backup of my last real save file just in case. I only play these games once through usually. Just not enough time to do multiple play throughs, since I've other games to play, as well as other errands.
Then, she would just thank you and wander off.
And you'd get, say, some XP and an increase in reputation - that would be a suitable ending for a good party.
Don't fret, guys, we'll never get Clara as a real, fleshed out NPC... but loose ends and approximative dialogs can - and should be - improved
What I think the game really needed was "just" a neutral thief (that could undergo an alignment shift to evil in order to accommodate evil parties) and that was pretty much it. The dual Clara / Hexxat thing and the vampire thing made the character WAY more complicated than it needed to be.
Oh, and @Aranthys please don't be so pessimistic. Maybe we will get Clara as an full companion. Beamdog listens to their fans, right? Right? :-)
Did I enjoy Hexxat as a character? Sort of. I wasn't thrilled but it's all fine.
Just don't see it as very plausible to be in cohorts with a vampire that just kills off my cute girl.
I mean.. even my stark raving mad eeevul warrior sees it as more prudent to kill the vampire on sight instead of talking to it.
Clara was the better option tbh.
Let us keep the pretty one with a full version soundset and just a liiittle bit of story to her and I'm good!
Oh and neutral please.
Edit.: I'd rather them to be working on another NPC entirely than spend time adding Clara as a NPC.
Hexxat is still pretty fine as a pure thief, even with her cloak on (She does the job just fine, I mean), it's then a matter of preference... but it's hard to satisfy everyone's liking when it's a matter of taste.
Edit: Just an idea (so don't go crazy about the details) I would be fine with but still cant think of a reason why the developers should pursue this over Clara: You bring Clara to the tomb, she gets killed by Hexxat, therefor you kill Hexxat and after you leave the tomb Clara's brother/sister shows up in search of Clara, who could be your companion. You have a "good" way of solving the quest and don't lose a companion.
I have happy about aquiring false Hexxat in my party and very disappointed when she was replaced by some generic vampire (with broken mechanic) who speak about sacrifises that is needed.
So all above could prove that even in evil party there could be a reason to interfere and deny true Hexxat her dinner. I do not need any romance with false one. No additional quests. And like one nymph in BG1 sayed humans have tendency to do good things with evil intentions. Even in very evil party who do not care about life of others could be just cold-blooded premeditation to have (for example) not-that-good thief who owe you her's life and much more reliable than any vampire. That is all. Right to choose is all i want.
It absolutely SUCKS that the cloak has such a -dex. Wth, I have a thief with lower dex than Viconia the cleric?! That is pretty worthless. I can understand the deductions with the cloak, but a thief should NEVER have 16 dex. Might as well just use my cleric for a thief with her find traps and knock....
I would love to see that interaction be changed in the future, and Clara introduced as a full-fledged party member with dialogue, banter, quests, etc - Hell, I'd even pay for it as a DLC - The alternative, though, of just a quick patch to let you keep Clara... pass.
The "folks with the resources" made their decision already, and that's why Hexxat functions as she does. You're much better off betting on the modding community than hoping Overhaul changes the entire scenario they wrote.