Your path through chapter 2 of BG2
vyvexthorne
Member Posts: 58
Has anyone ever discovered a smooth path through chapter 2? It always ends up such a jumbled mess for me. I'm a person who likes to do everything I can in a game. Pick up all the companions, do their side quests, explore all areas, loot all buildings. No matter how many times I've played this game I can never get a pace down for this chapter. So many random happenings, So many people approaching and throwing quests at you, companions starting to complain if you dont' get on with their quest.
I always think I should start with Nalia. She's pretty simple.. Go here, do that.. but then after you do that you have to travel back to the city. Since you've now taken some time doing her quest and probably rested a bit, by the time you get back to the city quests start flying at you. Each area people run up to you and expect you to go do something.. and to make matters worse by that point I've usually somehow gotten 15,000 in cash and the main quest takes off again.
I always want to take my time, explore each area, take up quests at leisure.. or just feel like I have a grasp of what I should be doing but every time I get confused and forget to go do something before I do something else and end up having to back track or rush something. Just can't get a handle on it.
I always think I should start with Nalia. She's pretty simple.. Go here, do that.. but then after you do that you have to travel back to the city. Since you've now taken some time doing her quest and probably rested a bit, by the time you get back to the city quests start flying at you. Each area people run up to you and expect you to go do something.. and to make matters worse by that point I've usually somehow gotten 15,000 in cash and the main quest takes off again.
I always want to take my time, explore each area, take up quests at leisure.. or just feel like I have a grasp of what I should be doing but every time I get confused and forget to go do something before I do something else and end up having to back track or rush something. Just can't get a handle on it.
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Comments
I'd also say to delay the main quest. Go buy something shiny with that first 15k, save the rush to chapter 3 for later.
I have a basic pattern but it doesn't feel perfect. Having it modded to get all the strongholds probably doesn't help. I've played this game at least once a year since it came out along with BG1 so it's not like I'm confused as what to do.
I was just wondering what path others take. How do you do it. Do you take on quests right as they arrive and kind of skip around the whole maps as one whole unit or do you take each map one at a time and do everything there is to do and then move on? Are there companions you hold off on getting until last or do you just take ones you want and entirely ignore the others? Those types of questions.
It is one of the few complaints I have about the game, everything does come at you fast and it all seems pretty urgent. But general rule of thumb, if no actual deadline is given, it can wait. Arguably, when you get back you'll still be in a huge hurry. But I always feel more relaxed once Immy is back with us.
generally I do my class stronghold quest first so that has a chance to finish before the end, then do whatever I want. depending on what quest that is I might want to do Athkatla quests for exp first, as some quests could really use some exp before starting. other than that general rule is that I do planar sphere, unseeing eye, and windspear hills as the last quests, in no particular order. these are all harder quests, although I imagine unseeing eye would be easier if I didn't try to hard to not use the shield of balduraan.
http://forum.baldursgate.com/discussion/comment/463715#Comment_463715
My main final party usually ends up Anomen, (sometimes Keldorn) Aiere, Haer'Dalis, Jaheira (I feel I need a druid and Cernd's limited shapeshift ability, although it's a good form just doesn't cut it.. There was also something buggy about shapshifting back in the day but I can't remember what it was.) and Imoen/Yoshimo.
atcDave is correct.. the game is much easier once you have Imoen back. (dependent on party build and main char class) Usually is for me since I like to play a swashbuckler and I'm in need of healers and magic users. I never really thought of trying to get her back as quickly as possible. I'll have to do some walkthrough reading as I'm pretty sure there are some quests that can only be done during chapter 2.
There is one thing I've mostly skipped in my playthroughs.. Romances. I just don't like them as a gaming aspect. Maybe if they tried to make it harder and didn't throw romances in your face I'd like them more. I usually play female characters anyway and that limits the romance options. Romancing Anomen is kind of a sickening idea anyhoo.
I also realized there's absolutely no way to go area to area, cleaning it as you go. I always seem to forget about those liches. This is one game that you have to treat the entire map as one entity and just kind of meander through as best you can.
It's not so bad though. I feel I have a good order to picking up companions although I forgot the difficulty in starting Anomen's sidequest if you are a female. The global stats immediately set you to '1' if you are a female, putting you in a romance state even if you don't want to be just by picking the guy up. This always seems to bug out.. delaying any sort of conversations for a crazy long time. I waited 15 in game days before I thought to check the global. I set it it to '0' (not available for romance) and reloaded previous to to my 15 day wait and the quest popped right up. Just so silly.
This mainly because you have so much freedom and you HAVE to do some backtracking
I hate games where you just get to a new map, clear everything and then moves to another map.
Anyway, here is what i do, mostly to have the easiest possible playthrough (since i play no reload).
A- easy quests
1- circus
2- copper coronet
3- get ambushed by sua seni
4- skinner quest in bridge district
5- the harper ambush (save the poisonned guy)
6- harper quests
7- free market quests (animal attack, genies, noble families, skinner)
8- thieves guild quest (if you really want to avoid backtracking you can do it right after the harper's quest)
9- start of main quest (side with thieves guild)
B- medium difficulty
9- Da'rnise hold
10- Umar hills village quest
11- Umar dungeon
C-hard difficulty
12- fierkraag dungeon
13- astral prison
14- planar sphere
15- false cult
16- lich killing and gaax.
17- twisted rune
item 16 can be done immediately after leaving chateau irenicus just by using a prot from undead scroll.
item 17 can also be done much sooner if you are willing to use traps (thief or skull trap) to kill the beholder and a prot from undead scroll to kill shangalar and the vampire (layenne and the monk are not too dangerous).
Playing solo, doing all that, you will reach 3mxp (which will basically break the rest of SOA). Some quests can even be skipped while reaching 3mxp in chapter 2 (i often skip the planar sphere and the false cult).
As for NPC quests, i am quite sure you can make them fit it that planning.
1. Free Hendak
2. Get a thief and a caster (if you don't have them already).
3. Buy/Steal potions of Master Thievery
4. Pickpocket/Steal from everyone and every shop you can in the Promenade and in The Slums, especially spells. Memorize everything you can for EXP and be sure to get the Ring of Regeneration to cut down on resting time.
5. Government District, pickpocket Ring of Ram, as well as fix up a complete party of 6.
6. Raid the Graveyards (can do Korgan's and Hexxat's quests here if you want as well).
7. Go to the Temple District, raid the building that ends up getting you the Celestial Fury (be sure to check for traps during the second battle).
8. At a shop you can steal from, sell them every single item you can, then steal all the useful ones back for yourself.
9. Buy everything you need from the Adventure Mart and be sure to get the Shield of Balduran as well.
10. Do the Cult of the Unseeing Eye quest and rescue Haer'Dalis.
11. At this point, you should be "strong" enough to do everything else in chapter 2 and gain all of the powerful items. I suggest going for the Ring of Gaxx next, as it's the best item in the game (IMO). You can then proceed to do everyone's story quest, and you should only be a few in-game hours/days into the game (if you managed your spells and resting), so the timing won't have been long enough for your party members to get mad at you for not doing their quests.
Also, your path is very dependant on abusing pickpocket which IMO should be avoided as it can spoil your gaming experience.
But it's single player game, so if it works for you...
It should be avoided??!!
And ??
Where exactly is the cheating happening?
Stealing is not cheating. It is in the game for a purpose. If Bioware didn't want anyone to steal, then it would simply not be possible to steal from vendors, and there wouldn't be a need for black market fences.
Stocking up on spells after being imprisoned by a MAGE seems rather reasonable to me, personally.
Pickpocketing things also seems to be a pretty reasonable thing to do for my Rogue that has already stole every vendor blind - in this case Yoshi.
As he has connections to the Shadow Thieves, it is pretty easy to get information on who and what is where and when. So locating items that might be "easy" to get are not a real problem.
So why is the "gaming experience" here being spoiled, and where is the cheating?
Now, if he was consoling stuff in, and changing stuff in EEKeeper, one might have a better argument, but using ingame resources and then getting accused of such...man, just man.
Good thing BG is SP. Get out of my game!
If you want to do that, fine, but it just makes the game too easy.
But what is possible within the mechanics of the game is not cheating, not by any definition thereof.
And since it is not only possible, but made to be done possible (with all those potions of Master Thievery lying about, and the option to "click on steal" in the vendor inventory, plus black market fences to sell to, it seems painfully obvious that stealing the dickens out of vendors was meant to be possible).
You will notice that SOME vendors cannot be stole from. For them, you need to purchase what they offer with gold. So you need gold. Lots of it. See above.
I fail to see how it makes the game "too easy". The game is already "too easy" - due to ridiculous abilities like Traps, or Protection from Undead scrolls, etc. Due to early access to Watcher's Keep, and other areas. Due to leveling up. Whatever.
If one is jumping through all the hoops to steal the vendors blind, then resell to the Black Market fences, then re-steal, great! Let them enjoy their ill-earned loot, because they earned them!
It takes a lot of time and effort, really. Have you actually tried it? Building up enough money and items to be worthwhile takes awhile, not to mention the activity involved.
You get pains in your wrist and fingers from clicking. Yup.
Now, in one way it does tend to make the game easier - I don't have to keep travelling back to a vendor somewhere to get expendables all the time (like magical arrows, etc). Because I have stole them all! They are always right there in my bags of holding. Port-a-vendor, yup.
And to be honest - and everyone should be about this :
With one noteable exception (Baldaran), the items that you can buy are nowhere near as powerful as those you get from adventuring. And after losing just about everything you have worked long and hard for in BG, I think that getting some decent gear back (especially for your level) is not out of the question.
Even from a game point of view, it is warranted. You, stranger in a strange land, with no gear, facing a foe that seems all-powerful, you need allies and gear quick. Stealing it may be seedy, but it is quick, and you are rather hard-pressed for time (if you consider things honestly here).
Your need is really greater, IMHO.
As such, there should be a script that controls that, and makes sure there is only one in Inventory at one time (same with Carsomir, FoA, etc).
The Ring of the Ram is not unique, so perhaps there really was two on the holder.
However, stealing something and then fencing it is a very valid action - otherwise one would not have Theives, hmmm?
Though perhaps you mean stealing and re-selling to the same fence? I tend to think that it is a "condensed time" thing - meaning that you steal, then come back sometime later, and sell. It is just all condensed into one moment to save time.
What I do think is that with unique items, if you sell them and then steal them back, you should have a hard time re-selling them...especially in the case of a fence. In that case, the whole faction of the fence should go hostile, as obviously you have stolen goods from them (assuming you stole it back from them, then tried to sell it to them again)!
As you can steal from them, the exploit is to sell, steal and resell them items
Because that is what one would do, of course. One would sell massive amounts to one, steal it back, and then go to the other, and re-sell them. Rinse, repeat.
As I said, the only real problem is in the case of unique items. It would be pretty obvious if a fence saw a unique item that they had bought before (and was stolen) come across their table again...
"Where did you get this?" glares suspiciously at Charname.
"Let me see...", glances at other party members, "Was it in the sewers, or was it in the *insert area here*? I honestly can't remember. Why do you ask?" innocent look.
grumbles, grudgingly pays out to Charname.
Even in the case of a unique item, there is a way to "explain" how it came into your possession. Finders keepers, and all that.
If you mean to counter this idea with the spell Identify, then the question is: how can they cast it all the time? If you then say that they have an item that allows it, then the question is: why can't we steal that item, and why does it never appear anywhere outside shops?
So, any way you look at it, the system doesn't hold. I still regard the "steal and re-sell" trick as blatant and shameless cheating, but of course I'm not telling anybody what they should do with their games. It would certainly ruin mine.
True, they only work 3/day, but most Merchants would have a high Lore, anyway, due to their business (those working in the magic item business, that is). So IDing mundane things would be Lore, and unusual things Glasses and Scrolls.
After all, there is a REASON that there is a price to ID.
I rather suspect that those Merchants probably have at least one pair of those glasses, and probably a back-up or two...incase one gets...stolen? Hehe...ok, that was funny!
C'mon, it was!
You have 2 main points :
- its realistic to do it. That's just plain wrong. Selling/sealing/selling will make you very quickly flagged by all fences and you would end up dead or anyway with nobody wanting to deal with you
- the game allows it. Come on. The games allows you to summon 10 planetars using project image. Is that a good way to play the game?
Anyway, to each one his own way of playing. I gladly agree with you on that one.
My point (and monty's) was to warn the OP that playing this way can ruin your game. And it certainly can for some players.
There is nothing really that you can steal that "breaks" the game! Or somehow advances you to the end, game over, you win.
So how is it "ruining" a game? On the contrary, it can make a game even more enjoyable - for those who like playing a thieving Rogue type.
Now, as to the mechanic :
It is realistic, to a degree. It should be possible to steal from Merchants, and possible to fence it. It should also be possible to steal from fences (this all happens in real life, btw). Not that fantasy is real life...
What could be implemented for some wealthy Merchants (we had this on some of our PWs in NWN) is for allowing the hiring of Mages to create a Contingency vs Stealing. Or some other type of magical warding.
Now, since it is available ingame, one does have to justify how it works instead of slamming it with a "broke" label. Of course, in your game, you may play it however you choose (so ignore me in that case).
But perhaps you can expand on how it is "ruining a game"? Because I don't see it doing that.