A Question About Divine Magic
![Apocrypha](https://forums.beamdog.com/applications/dashboard/design/images/defaulticon.png)
So I decided to pick up and dust off the Baldur's Gate series after a four-or-five-year hiatus (imagine my surprise when I learned about EE). Got through the first game no problem, planning my playthrough for the second, and I had a quick question.
Basically, here's my team for SoA:
Reya (my CHARNAME): Wild Mage, main offensive spellcaster
Yoshimo/Imoen: Bounty Hunter/Thief->Mage; both will handle traps, Imoen will become a secondary spellcaster
Minsc: Ranger, tank
Jaheira: Fighter/Druid, off-tank and offensive divine caster
Aerie: Cleric/Mage, defensive divine caster and summoner
Haer'Dalis: Blade, melee DPS, could tank if needed with Defensive Stance
That sixth slot is going to be rotated a lot so I can get all NPC quests done, but that's the final party. Going into TOB, I wanted to pick up Sarevok. Logically, I should drop Minsc for him since they fulfil the same roles, but RP-wise I have a hard time imagining him abandoning his new "witch", while I can think of a couple of reasons for Jaheira to leave. So she's the one I was planning to swap out.
My question is, will Aerie be able to handle all the healing herself? I'd imagine she would, being able to use Triggers and Contingencies and such to stack healing, buffs, and summons, but as I said, it's been a while since I played so my memory is a little shoddy, and I thought I'd get more opinions.
Basically, here's my team for SoA:
Reya (my CHARNAME): Wild Mage, main offensive spellcaster
Yoshimo/Imoen: Bounty Hunter/Thief->Mage; both will handle traps, Imoen will become a secondary spellcaster
Minsc: Ranger, tank
Jaheira: Fighter/Druid, off-tank and offensive divine caster
Aerie: Cleric/Mage, defensive divine caster and summoner
Haer'Dalis: Blade, melee DPS, could tank if needed with Defensive Stance
That sixth slot is going to be rotated a lot so I can get all NPC quests done, but that's the final party. Going into TOB, I wanted to pick up Sarevok. Logically, I should drop Minsc for him since they fulfil the same roles, but RP-wise I have a hard time imagining him abandoning his new "witch", while I can think of a couple of reasons for Jaheira to leave. So she's the one I was planning to swap out.
My question is, will Aerie be able to handle all the healing herself? I'd imagine she would, being able to use Triggers and Contingencies and such to stack healing, buffs, and summons, but as I said, it's been a while since I played so my memory is a little shoddy, and I thought I'd get more opinions.
0
Comments
The only drawback IMO of having Aerie cast healing spells, is that everytime she casts a divine spell, she can't cast arcane spells during one round. (Characters can only cast one spell per round until Improved Alacrity.) Generally arcane spells are more useful to end/win battles, so you might not be using Aerie optimally at all times. It's technically better to have Jaheira pause her fighting for a moment to cast a heal or other defensive spell, and continue fighting after that, all of this within the same round. (Attacking and casting a spell can be combined in one round.)
Drop Jaheira like a bad habit once you get to ToB - she and Sarevok both serve strikingly similar roles by that point anyway.
@Blackraven: I'm aware that using Aerie as mostly a divine caster means not using her to her best ability, but since I already have one pure mage and one part-mage, I thought I'd be settled in the arcane spellcasting department. I suppose HD technically counts as an arcane spellcaster, but as a Blade I'm not going to be pulling him out of melee too often for spells.
Thanks for the advice, everyone!
Really you can drop Aerie instead of Jaheira, Aerie won't be contributing much to the offensive abilities of your party. She can't cast enough Horrid wiltings or Comets or Dragon Breaths. She is an excellent defensive/buff character though. A planetar can subsitute for Aerie effectively when her buffs and heals are needed, plus a planetar can actually fight and kick some major butt. Aerie needs tons of buffs and special equipment to be a viable melee combater, and even then she will be lackluster in combat. And with the lowest hit points she is a liability to fall to a single horrid wilting, symbol:death and power words. She is always the first to fall when other characters are at %50 or more hp from an area effect.
Jaheira on the other hand, will have good hp and THAC0&AC, fighter hlas, will be able to use cool weapons like scimitars and spears, plus she has some nifty spells which Aerie won't get:Insect Plague, Creeping Doom, summon elemental prince, etc. Aerie can conjure up a deva but a planetar is better than a deva and you can not have both so..you can have Jaheira's elemental prince with your wild mage's planetar though.
Dropping Jaheira or Imoen doesn't make much sense from an RP standpoint either. You just went through all this effort to pick up Imoen only to dump her and (from a gaming standpoint) she basically only talks to NPC's (for the most part) in ToB so you are also missing out on most of her conversation. Alternatively you are dropping Jaheira (who like Minsc has been with you for thick and thin) in favour of the guy who killed your step father. That seems like a bit of a stretch. Minsc has some fun lines in ToB but I'd still drop him if I were faced with this situation.
From a powergaming standpoint Minsc is the best to get rid of. Jaheira just got access to level 7 spells. That means that while she can only cast 1 of them (for now) she can get elemental princes who are just awesome (among other things they have dispel on hit). She also has Iron Skins and Armor of Faith that make her particularly good in combat at this stage.
Aerie just got access to level 7 mage spells (spell sequencer for instance) and priest hlas (including Mass Raise Dead, which odd as it may seem is the best mass healing spell). She also will get some boost in terms of mage castings through her mage hla's (until she eventually gets the good stuff very late into the game).
Imoen will be behind everyone else from a total experience standpoint but she will eventually get Time Stop and other powerful spells. So dropping her wouldn't be good. Plus she is your only thief.
Once Sarevok has access to Greater Whirlwind he will do more damage than Minsc so I view Minsc as being the expendable one here.
@elminster: Yeah, my preference for RP is really restricting me here. Imoen is my best friend and sister, Jaheira and Minsc are old buddies, Aerie is a new friend, and HD is her boyfriend. Not a lot of room to wiggle with. I was gonna try to edit Jaheira out of my party after SOA was done and RP it as her wanting to make sure the Harper's little corruption problem hadn't extended past Athkatla and leaving to either check on other groups or report it to the "base" in Berdusk.
If worse came to worse I could try to get Minsc or Jaheira killed in the final fight with Irenicus, but that's coming too close to metagaming in my opinion. "Oh, your friend died, but hey, here's a new guy who can conveniently fulfill (or near-fulfill) the same role!"
On that basis, I'd recommend saying bye to Aerie.
Haer'Dalis:
+ Enhanced Bard Song
+ Use Any Item
+ Different Stances allow flexibility in his role
Jaheira:
+ Druid spells
+ Harper's Call
+ Second source of heals/buffs/summons
- Would come in later, thus being behind on XP
Thoughts?
Maybe the events of SoA have convinced Minsc to go back to Rashemen?