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More NPC Slots - The one thing that would make me buy the Enhanced Edition

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  • bob_vengbob_veng Member Posts: 2,308
    edited October 2012
    scripts don't cut it on higher difficulties

    btw, you're pretty much supposed to play all the characters at once, that tactical feature is a major part of the experience
  • VortakaVortaka Member Posts: 173
    Always putting the game on pause isn't really my type of game... So, I'll just keep playing table top D&D then! :)
  • kamuizinkamuizin Member Posts: 3,704
    @Bob_Veng, 20 charisma is something epic, my numbers are a suggestions, but anyway, to reach that you need to start with 18 charisma (no race give racial bonus to charisma stats in character creation) and make at least 2 of the following 3 quests (that give permanent charisma points) in the game to get charisma 20:

    Book of charisma in Gnoll Stronghold (BG), Machine of Lum the mad (4° level of watcher's keep in BG II) and Good path in the sarevok wrath tear of Bhaal.

    So technically, either you play the game from BG start and rush wacher's keep to be able to get 20 charisma in the begin of SoA, or you will only reach this number in the begin of ToB, what is pretty reasonable to have this huge number in the end of the game (especially because you need an extra slot for Sarevok when you reach ToB, XD!).

    The devs need just to make sure that only original charisma points are taken into account for the NPC party number, otherwise we can expect a lot of game bugs and breaks.


    @Vortaka, some time ago i made this suggestion by a feature request:

    Baldur's Gate Gamble/Tactics

    Maybe you find it interesting and even want to add there.
  • VortakaVortaka Member Posts: 173
    Yep, tactic are a good idea... (But I would put them better then DA2... I had so much pain dealing with them! I know, scripting is even harder, but I had less headaches! :) One thing, though, would be to be able to save/export/import them... But the idea is good!
  • bigdogchrisbigdogchris Member Posts: 1,336
    I'm not sure if this has been covered yet or not but the only, and I mean only way that I would be OK with more character slots, is if those character slots were for summoned or charmed NPC's.

    A party of 6 is already overpowered for most of the game.
  • kamuizinkamuizin Member Posts: 3,704
    The problem isn't the number of party members but the challenge of the enemies. Baldur's Gate is an easy game in most of it, some battles are hardcore as demonknight, Sarevok's final battle if not cheesed (fight them all together instead of call one by one). The hard and impossible options are just too unreal for a D&D rpg, to double damage taken is just a lazy way to raise difficult.

    I believe that the most difficult option should make enemies leveling up with the character, i don't like this game style (really dislike this in skyrim and oblivion) but it's an option for hardcore games. The main problem anyway is the ingame content, not the configurations, bad AI, many cheese tactics (fake talks for example) among other stuff make the game a bit easy.

    8 party members will share the XP in an way that level up will become something hard to get. Solo games aren't so difficult after all.

    Ps: the game control some of the random enemies of the game based in the number of party members, i checked this in my last solo game.
  • sarevok57sarevok57 Member Posts: 6,002
    i think for spite they should raise the party limit to 20 and add a new playable class called "bandit" then i would name all 20 of my guys bandit and be the bandit class, so then "I" can wayalay enemies and they will have to DEFEND themselves, it would be quite epic to take my 20 bandit team and get way alayed by that other grossly huge bandit team, ARROWS EVERYWHERE, it would be quite the lovely gongshow
  • HadarHadar Member Posts: 171
    edited October 2012
    bob_veng said:

    kamuizin said:

    I believe that the amount of NPCs you can carry should be based on your base charisma (ignoring any buffs to avoid engine bugs), like main char +:

    3-6 charisma: 2 persons.
    7-9 charisma: 3 persons.
    10-13 charisma: 4 persons
    14-17 charisma: 5 persons
    18-19 charisma: 6 persons
    20+ charisma: 7 persons

    It's just an example, doesn't need to be exactly like this. So, it's a good idea?

    seems pretty reasonable, i vote yes
    except an 8 character party being a bit too much in terms of the amount of orders you have to give out, 6 is a lot already.

    edit: there's also a rule table on number of henchmen depending on CHA in the books, but that's probably not so relevant to this


    Here you have AD&D Charisma Attributes Chart: http://www.ancientscrossroads.com/adnd_tools/cha_table.htm

    I think that up to 16 charisma book table is reasonable... But we can do as the book says, and escalate the team conflicts which would make party members to leave very often.

    If there should be some limit to party size, make it dozen (with the protagonist)...
  • LugeLuge Member Posts: 90
    Please refer to my posts on page 4. Computer game RPGs will never be balanced; a party of six stealthed rogues will backstab everything in the game without a problem, and is completely legal. Try not to think about the balance issues and concentrate on the opportunities to play with the great NPCs that Black Isle and Overhaul made.

    L.
  • ARKdeEREHARKdeEREH Member Posts: 531
    sarevok57 said:

    i think for spite they should raise the party limit to 20 and add a new playable class called "bandit" then i would name all 20 of my guys bandit and be the bandit class, so then "I" can wayalay enemies and they will have to DEFEND themselves, it would be quite epic to take my 20 bandit team and get way alayed by that other grossly huge bandit team, ARROWS EVERYWHERE, it would be quite the lovely gongshow

    Or imagine 20 clerics and/or mages all using the energy blades spell at the same time? Those things can take down dragons in a few seconds if sent from 6 directions at once. Imagine from 20!
  • sarevok57sarevok57 Member Posts: 6,002
    does energy blades stack with improved haste? 18 attacks per round with 20 casters, dAmMmMmMmN even the ravager could be taken down in seconds
  • kamuizinkamuizin Member Posts: 3,704
    ARKdeEREH said:

    sarevok57 said:

    i think for spite they should raise the party limit to 20 and add a new playable class called "bandit" then i would name all 20 of my guys bandit and be the bandit class, so then "I" can wayalay enemies and they will have to DEFEND themselves, it would be quite epic to take my 20 bandit team and get way alayed by that other grossly huge bandit team, ARROWS EVERYWHERE, it would be quite the lovely gongshow

    Or imagine 20 clerics and/or mages all using the energy blades spell at the same time? Those things can take down dragons in a few seconds if sent from 6 directions at once. Imagine from 20!
    With 20 clerics/mages sharing experience points, if you reach 9° circle arcane spells or 7° circle divine spells with any of them i will be surprised. The more party members, the hard is to level up.

    By the way @sarevok57 is obvious making a joke @ARKdeEREH.
  • ARKdeEREHARKdeEREH Member Posts: 531
    kamuizin said:

    ARKdeEREH said:

    sarevok57 said:

    i think for spite they should raise the party limit to 20 and add a new playable class called "bandit" then i would name all 20 of my guys bandit and be the bandit class, so then "I" can wayalay enemies and they will have to DEFEND themselves, it would be quite epic to take my 20 bandit team and get way alayed by that other grossly huge bandit team, ARROWS EVERYWHERE, it would be quite the lovely gongshow

    Or imagine 20 clerics and/or mages all using the energy blades spell at the same time? Those things can take down dragons in a few seconds if sent from 6 directions at once. Imagine from 20!
    With 20 clerics/mages sharing experience points, if you reach 9° circle arcane spells or 7° circle divine spells with any of them i will be surprised. The more party members, the hard is to level up.

    By the way @sarevok57 is obvious making a joke @ARKdeEREH.
    With a party of 20, you're right that it would take a long time to level them up that high, but I'm sure some determined person will do it. My idea was essentially a joke too. I wasn't seriously thinking of doing that myself, but I it seemed like a funny scenario that increasing the party size to 20 would enable and it might be amusing to try some time just to see what would happen.

    I've had a party of six all have energy blades before. I would position them on all sides of a dragon and have them all attack at once. The dragon would keep trying to turn to face whoever threw the last blade, but they would come so quickly from other directions that the dragon would almost never be able to move fast enough to actually engage anyone before someone else damaged it. If it did, I would have my NPC run away while everyone else kept throwing. Since the Energy Blades spell also casts Improved Haste on the caster, it is rare that a dragon can catch someone. With six people, dragons usually die in a few seconds. I prefer a smaller party size of 2-3 characters, which can still use Energy Blades well, but it is much more difficult and I have often had people get cornered/killed by dragons in such circumstances.

  • kamuizinkamuizin Member Posts: 3,704
    Nice tactics those, but that was based on bad AI. I hope Beamdog fix that, if all the NPCs are far from the Dragon the first thing he should do is breath in someone.

    As i said before, i think that we not only need more NPCs slots but less NPCs slots also. NPC maximum quantity should reflect with the Main Char natural Charisma Bonus (from a minimum of 2 NPCs to a maximum of 6 or 7 for Charisma status that bypass the commom value, like 19+). I made an suggestive table into a previous post for it, but all this discussion has no sense unless the improved Infinite Engine comes to be able to support more than 6 characters in a party.
  • DiscoCatDiscoCat Member Posts: 73
    Luge said:


    I'd like twenty NPC slots, please. Especially now you're introducing three new characters to bring along. I'd be happy with a dozen or so, at a push, but I'd rather have all I can get. Feel free to scale the difficulty to the number of players in my party - In fact, I'd prefer it, since I like a challenge.

    You're either a colossal idiot or a troll. I can't imagine a person with a functioning brain would write something like this.
  • bob_vengbob_veng Member Posts: 2,308
    it doesn't make a sense that a small army of followers would fight for you, it just doesn't feel right.
  • JalilyJalily Member Posts: 4,681
    edited October 2012
    bob_veng said:

    it doesn't make a sense that a small army of followers would fight for you, it just doesn't feel right.

    I can see where you're coming from, but all joinable NPCs are already willing to fight and die for you—just not when you have 5 others for some reason, regardless of your Charisma. That doesn't feel right to me either.

    It's more about banters for me, anyway. I'm fine with the other NPCs only being InParty() for dialogue purposes and being able to switch these talky characters into the combat party only at inns (and when they first join). In fact, I'd prefer it that way because the devs wouldn't have to change combat scripts, deal with extra pathfinding issues, or rebalance the game.

    Does anyone know if this could be done?
    Post edited by Jalily on
  • kamuizinkamuizin Member Posts: 3,704
    Probally but i prefer the choose whom gonna be carried kind of game, the actual NPC system raise a lot the replayability of the game. I still enforce the idea of more NPCs (1 or 2) and also diminish the maximum NPCs slots based in low charisma.
  • jamoecwjamoecw Member Posts: 41
    basing it on charisma probably isn't the best idea balance wise, sorcs and bards are pretty powerful as is, paladins also get some of the best gear in the game, which use charisma quite a bit.

    personally i'd just like the npc's to be able to do their own thing when not in the party. imagine xzar and mont actually running off after dropping them off in naskel to meet the mayor, as they have business with him (the same as with jaheira and khalid, though they don't mention it before hand i believe), then finding them in the mine and have the fight happen there (when you have actually built rapport with the two good ones). or have minsc take you to the gnoll stronghold (traveling with you there and helping with random encounters without your direct control) and fight along side your party to free dynaheir, without needing him to be in your party.

    i'd like them to return to someplace when they are done, and having them do this sort of thing can be done with the infinite engine, not to mention it would help out with party limit issues and having upteen NPCs trying to join your party.
  • kamuizinkamuizin Member Posts: 3,704
    @jamoecw, based on "natural" Charisma, item/spell charisma buff should not be used on this at the risk of many probable bugs and cheese tactics. Want a large group? Buy charisma in the character creation. People is asking for p&p wisdom/inteligence bonus (immunity to enchantment/illusion spells if i'm not wrong) so a charsima relevant bonus would be largely nice also.

    The blue circled NPCs acts as you expose are nice ok (never witnessed any of them) but at my opinion, at least, another variant where you can get more or less followers based on your charisma is better.
  • disgruntledgamerdisgruntledgamer Member Posts: 13
    Don't know why people are against this since leveling up would be a lot slower, which would help balance things not to mention it's optional how many NPCs you take with you. It would also give you a chance to see NPC interactions you normally wouldn't see from NPC options.
  • kamuizinkamuizin Member Posts: 3,704
    @disgruntledgamer, not only that, in BG the quest experience points pratticaly don't exist (when a quest give individually an set amount of XP for each character in the party). Quest experience points are a more strong feature in BG II. so to each NPC added in BG parties, the more XP will be shared on that party.
  • ARKdeEREHARKdeEREH Member Posts: 531
    edited November 2012
    bob_veng said:

    it doesn't make a sense that a small army of followers would fight for you, it just doesn't feel right.

    Maybe you could hire some as mercenaries? That would create a reason for them to fight for you. If you ran out of money or didn't find enough loot quickly enough maybe some of them would turn on you. It could add an interesting element to the game. It could also help explain why evil characters would follow a party with lots of good characters in it, since a party with 20 or so people in it would likely include NPCs of every alignment.

  • kamuizinkamuizin Member Posts: 3,704
    The reasonable people here are asking 1 or at a maximum, 2 new NPC slots. 20 NPC slots is a joke made by the guy @ARKdeEREH, just a friendly troll act.
  • ARKdeEREHARKdeEREH Member Posts: 531
    kamuizin said:

    The reasonable people here are asking 1 or at a maximum, 2 new NPC slots. 20 NPC slots is a joke made by the guy @ARKdeEREH, just a friendly troll act.

    I mentioned 20 NPCs because an earlier poster mentioned having 20-25 NPCs in a party at once and I agree with the idea of not limiting party size. It relates to my general idea of not limiting what the game has to offer since everyone has different ideas on how it should be played. Personally, I would prefer no more than 8 or 9 party members at once.

    The earlier post was:
    Luge said:

    I really don't want to have to replay the game seven times in order to see the banter between Neera and the other twenty-five NPCs - I'd prefer to have them altogether.

    It's impractical to have any combination of NPCs that you want in your party. Generally, you need at least one thief to deal with traps, and at least one cleric for support and a mage for dealing with certain enemies that need magical attention. This is less of a problem in BG1, but is definately true of BG2. You CAN run a party of six fighters to see what it would be like to have Minsc, Shar-Teel, Kagain, Khalid and Ajantis together, but it's a very different experience.

    I'm not saying that you should always have twenty NPCs with you, but I'd certainly like the option.

    L.

  • HadarHadar Member Posts: 171
    I have watched the game play and the biggest party contained six people... So maybe in DLC the number of NPCs' slots will be expanded?
  • HeinrichHeinrich Member Posts: 188
    edited December 2012
    Now that the game is out and modders have access to the game files, does this idea seem more possible?
    Post edited by Heinrich on
  • JalilyJalily Member Posts: 4,681
    No.
  • AaronGRAaronGR Member Posts: 2
    Jalily said:

    No.

    Are you replying to the statement made by Heinrich? or are you just boosting your post count with one word post?

  • iankirtsiankirts Member Posts: 17
    Can you guys possibly increase the party size for Baldur's gate Enhanced Edition, to seven or eight please!!

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