Minsc just gets a new person he'll go berserk for if she falls. He still has plenty of interactions with the others as well; he and Aerie that slightly special relationship if they're together. Similarly, Mazzy names Valygar her squire if they're together. I would be all for giving Minsc and other characters a quest even if it's nothing to do with his witch. I think that's because the EE npc's make the originals who are lacking in extra content stand out more.
Fifty/fifty with the current run through of male half-orc "Paladin" fighter/cleric, Anomen, Rasaad, Viconia, Imoen and Neera. Although that will most likely change when I get to Mazzy.
I really don't mean to do it... it just kinda happens like all the time. As I said before, I am a True Neutral omnipresent authority figure when it comes to NPC gender.
@KidCarnival: Minsc has plenty of interjections and banters in general, though (see: the way he gets you into Spellhold) - it's not like he's a cipher just because he doesn't have a quest. And if it's that important, well...
As for the romances, it's somewhat inaccurate to claim that "everyone and their mother" hits on the PC. There's a grand total of eight romances in BG2 - four for women (Hexxat, Rasaad, Dorn, Anomen) and five for men (Dorn, Viconia, Aerie, Neera and Jaheira). Then you have racial parameters set: Viconia will romance half-orcs but not elves, Aerie will romance gnomes but not dwarves, etc. And finally, disabling a romance in-game is as simple as saying "Sorry, not interested" - hardly "unavoidable", even for a character like Dorn who's down for anything.
It depends a lot on my Charname. I try to keep a gender-balance, but so far my female Charnames like to be followed by other female characters (a 4/2 ratio, sometimes 5/1), and my male Charnames like to be followed by...other female characters. Hm, maybe I just enjoy the content of the female characters more. *shrugs*
And then there's my evil!Charname, whose party can be broken down like so...
Viconia: Eye-candy. Hexxat: Eye-candy. Edwin: If we're using his BG1 portrait, eye-candy. Edwina: Eye-candy. Dorn: Eye-candy Lover. Korgan: Not eye-candy, but really good at killing stuff.
For him, it doesn't matter what gender you are--if you're in the party, you're part of the harem. He accepted you in for a reason... (except Korgan, of course.)
About Minsc: The other NPCs have a quest, and that's not only for "more content". It also shows more about their character. Anomen's quest shows why he grew up to be a jerk, for example. If all he had were his interactions with Keldorn, he would probably not be considered "well written" that much. No matter how you turn it, Minsc just has less than other NPCs and for no reason. (Unlike Imoen, she has the "excuse" that she was an afterthought and planned to die.)
@fitscotgaymer Sure, it would be nice if at least one or two romances were ok, but I'd like friendship/friendly rivalry/mentor paths even better. With romances, you'll only see one per playthrough. Friendships would add more since you could have as many as you have party members.
Currently going reverse harem. So my female charname is surrounded by hot men, ooo yeah~. Well no, as BG doesn't have hot men. The closest thing constituting said "hot man" is currently Rasaad. Then I have Anomen, Keldorn and Jan...*sigh* oh well, its all angst and turnips from here on out.
I don't really care about the issue, except that the fairly balanced way Bioware planned out the characters tends to result in a pretty balanced party. I guess I do care a little; ALL guys or ALL women sounds very boring to me. It is funny though in IWD, I tend to design my party around related groups of friends and family that I have used in PNP. And that usually means a couple or two, which again means something like balance.
In IWD I usually have themed parties. All characters from another video game or TV show or something like that. When I first played there was a Soul Calibur themed party, because I was into fighting games at the time... the swords in IWD just aren't big enough though.
My last IWD party consisted of me using the decision decider and picking BECMI D&D classes with it, and then genders.
Meh, aside from one time years ago when I thought it might be fun to have an all-girls team, I really don't care. I pick up a mix of characters I think might give me banters I haven't seen before, and that's really my only consideration these days.
(Also, once I picked up all the characters I felt were most whiny and obnoxious and pretended to myself that I was whipping them into shape over time. But that was just annoying and I gave up.)
In BG (1&2) I take who works best within the party, but in IWD\BP I generally have roughly 4 males and 2 females. I prefer it to be more even, but still predominantly male, as it makes sense in my head that it'd be easier to find adventuring males than females.
As us ladies tend to erm...*cough* synchronise after a while, there will be a certain 3-7 days per month where it will be 24/7 berserker stance. And at *that* point an all-girl people would be more than slightly lethal I think.
I don't see an option that really matches what I do, which is that there's usually a concept that guides the playthrough with no thought to gender. So the gender mix is distributed accordingly, but it varies based on the concept behind the game.
Comments
I did say AFTER the "will you be my witch, Aerie?" conversation dude lol.
It happens pretty soon as well, sadly.
@KidCarnival
It's kind of a shame that the romances all pretty much suck. Makes me sad.
As for the romances, it's somewhat inaccurate to claim that "everyone and their mother" hits on the PC. There's a grand total of eight romances in BG2 - four for women (Hexxat, Rasaad, Dorn, Anomen) and five for men (Dorn, Viconia, Aerie, Neera and Jaheira). Then you have racial parameters set: Viconia will romance half-orcs but not elves, Aerie will romance gnomes but not dwarves, etc. And finally, disabling a romance in-game is as simple as saying "Sorry, not interested" - hardly "unavoidable", even for a character like Dorn who's down for anything.
And then there's my evil!Charname, whose party can be broken down like so...
Viconia: Eye-candy.
Hexxat: Eye-candy.
Edwin: If we're using his BG1 portrait, eye-candy.
Edwina: Eye-candy.
Dorn: Eye-candy Lover.
Korgan: Not eye-candy, but really good at killing stuff.
For him, it doesn't matter what gender you are--if you're in the party, you're part of the harem. He accepted you in for a reason... (except Korgan, of course.)
@fitscotgaymer Sure, it would be nice if at least one or two romances were ok, but I'd like friendship/friendly rivalry/mentor paths even better. With romances, you'll only see one per playthrough. Friendships would add more since you could have as many as you have party members.
(Also, once I picked up all the characters I felt were most whiny and obnoxious and pretended to myself that I was whipping them into shape over time. But that was just annoying and I gave up.)
But in practice, my party ends up being CHARNAME, one other gal, and four guys looking to romance her.
I blame romance mods. I do.