Gearing up for my first playthrough of EE and having trouble settling on a class

Mitchell

Hey guys, so I know that class discussions such as this come up a fair amount, so apologies for adding to that. I've been searching this forum and others for some discussion about the classes to help me choose one, but none of them really helped, so I thought I'd make my own.

To start off, let me just say that I think I've narrowed it down to a small selection of four options, with a few variations. I'm also going to say that I have no issue using EEKeeper to add kits to multi-class should I choose to go that route.

So my shortlist is the Assassin, Shadowdancer, Ranger/Cleric, or a Kensai. I've read good things about each of these, and I think they could potentially lead to a really fun experience. At the moment, I'm leaning towards the Shadowdancer because the stealth aspect interests me and the HLAs look really fun, but I also think that the Assassin could be a great experience. If I were to choose Ranger/Cleric multiclass, I'd modify the character to be a Stalker/Cleric, I think, just for that added flavour. And with regards to the Kensai, I'd probably look at doing an interesting variation on the norm, and try to focus on thrown weapons to see what that would be like.

And now, some questions.

- If I were to go with the Shadowdancer or Assassin, would it be worth it to dual or multi with a fighter for improved combat capabilities? And if so, do you think I'd be better off going with fighter and dualling to one of the thief kits after a few levels (obviously using EEkeeper to assign the kit), or would I be better off going with multiclass?
- Has anyone played through with a Stalker/Cleric, and if so, how did you find it? I think with the ability to backstab it looks like it'd be a fun alternative to play a stealthy character, and the druid and cleric spells would make things interesting.
- If I were to go with a ranged Kensai build, should I play single, dual or multiclass? And if I were to dual or multiclass, do you think I'd get more out of thief or mage?

And if it helps, I plan to build my party around the new NPCs in the EEs, so Dorn, Neera, Rasaad and Hexxat would all be coming along so that I could get the most out of the new content. I'd also probably bring Viconia, since she's one of my favourite characters from the games. I'm not sure who I would choose to fill out the last slot in BGEE...

I also haven't settled on races yet, but I think I'd lean towards Halfling if I were to choose one of the thief options, and probably Half-orc for the Kensai (for the extra strength). Would you have any other suggestions for race (once again, this is something I don't mind using EEkeeper for to work around class/race restrictions).

Wow, that was a lot longer than I expected. Thanks for reading, and thanks in advance for any advice...

jackjack

The best advice I can give you is to start 4(!) new games, one for each class/kit combo you have listed. Play through a little bit with each setup and you may find you prefer one over the others.

nano

I think the EEkeepered Fighter/Assassin or Fighter/Shadowdancer will be both strong and fun, and my vote is for those. Both dual and multiclass are viable but I would lean slightly towards multi here.

jackjack

Yeah I'm doing an alternate play through with Jarrol, a Halfling Fighter/Shadowdancer and he's a blast. He needs a strength belt, but that's the only drawback I've found, and it's unrelated to his class.

shawne

@Mitchell: I suggest using the Black Pits to test classes/kits/builds - it'll give you a solid idea of what it's like to play specific types of characters.

nano

@jackjack Did you get to try the HLAs? Do you still get UAI or are is everything replaced by the shadowdancer HLAs?

jackjack

@nano - I'm not quite there yet, but I could always take a look with some more (…) experiments.

Mitchell

Thanks for the answers, guys! I decided to go ahead and roll two characters; a multiclass Chaotic Good Half-Orc Stalker/Cleric, and a multiclass Neutral Evil Halfling Fighter/Shadowdancer. I figured that I'll eventually want to do at least two playthroughs anyway, one to romance Neera (my Half-Orc), and one to romance Hexxat (my Halfling). I think I'm actually going to start with the Stalker/Cleric at this point.

However, I'd still very much appreciate any input to my original questions! I'm sure sometime down the line I'll want to try out a ranged Kensai build, or an Assassin, so the information will be useful.

Frond

Just a warning about Stalker/Clerics for you: You can't backstab with any of the better weapons like hmers, flails, or maces. You'll have to use quarterstaffs and get the Staff Spear to do any backstabbing. I learned that the hard way.

Eudaemonium

@Frond: You can backstab with Clubs. Can clerics use clubs?

As for the original, I have just reached ToB with my Fighter(7)>Assassin dual and she 's been loads of fun. Maybe a bit OP with the staff grandmastery and x7 backstab but certainly a helluva ton of fun. I found that the combo synergies well in early levels since the 15% thieving points means you're more of a combat thief with poison. I specialised mainly in things like Detect Illusions and Stealth and had another thief for traps and locks. I guess in many ways the F/A is quite similar to a Blackguard but with slightly different strengths and weaknesses.

Mungri

Quarterstaffs are the best backstab weapon in the game though.

Because Staff of the Ram.

Mostly when people make stalker / clerics, or thief / clerics, they do that just to backstab with staffs. And with the latter it condenses both the healer and trapper into one character, which means you can make the remaining 5 full offensive builds.

Mitchell

@Frond: Thank you for the reminder! Guess I better update his proficiencies in EEKeeper. I gave him stars in Flails and Warhammers...

Out of curiosity, how does backstabbing work with dualwielding? Does it take both weapons into account, or is it only the main hand weapon that is counted? What happens if you're wielding one weapon that can backstab (a club), and one weapon that can't (like a warhammer or flail)?

Felspawn

Main hand only