jaheira and level 2 spells
Kneller
Member Posts: 438
What do you use her level 2 spell slots for? I can't find much of a good use for any of them.
Barkskin - short duration and her AC is always better than the spell anyway
Charm Person - not terrible, but pretty situational, and eventually becomes almost obsolete
Find Traps - really?
Flame Blade - not really any better than Shillelagh, especially since it's considered non-magical
Good Berry - the only thing weaker than healing potions and a waste of inventory space, too
Know Aligment - I don't care
Resist Fire/Cold - worth it when I can start sling fireballs, but I only need one or two of these, tops
Slow Poison - I have antidotes (that I never even use up) for that
Barkskin - short duration and her AC is always better than the spell anyway
Charm Person - not terrible, but pretty situational, and eventually becomes almost obsolete
Find Traps - really?
Flame Blade - not really any better than Shillelagh, especially since it's considered non-magical
Good Berry - the only thing weaker than healing potions and a waste of inventory space, too
Know Aligment - I don't care
Resist Fire/Cold - worth it when I can start sling fireballs, but I only need one or two of these, tops
Slow Poison - I have antidotes (that I never even use up) for that
0
Comments
Slow Poison = Jaheira loses a round to cast it rather than the person using the potion
Charm Person or Mammal = Much better to have with her than to use a 1st/3rd/5th level mage slot (or a 4th level cleric slot). Useful if you just want to get additional charm dialogue out of NPC's.
Slow Poison - Jah is more popularly played as a tank (as is how I'm playing her). 2e D&D has never been kind to combat casters, so I rarely have her cast spells in the thick of battle. Also, if anyone is getting poisoned, it's her, because she's the tank. Poison interrupts spellcasting, but not potion quaffing.
Charm Person or Mammal - I can see this being of some value. Throw it out at the start of a fight. If it sticks, cool. If not, then you wasted the round your enemies spent closing the gap. No big deal. But, with a +3 save, you're probably wasting your time.
So far, I've just been stocking up on Good Berries. I can always dump them if I need the inventory space. When I get some wands of fire to play with, I'll throw resist fire/cold into the mix. Added to the fire resist ring, she'll barely take a scratch from a fireball. Still, it seems like a pretty lackluster level.
http://www.gibberlings3.net/iwdification/
It adds some nice spells for druids. Here's some of the level 2 spells druids get (clerics also get the last one).
Alicorn Lance (ranged attack): 3d6 damage, -2 AC to target for 3 rounds
Beast Claw (melee attack): 18/72 STR, 2d4+STR bonus damage, +2 to hit, 2 attacks per round
Cure Moderate Wounds (healer): 11 hp healing
Barkskin is rubbish. Flame blade is for times if you have no other fire/acid available and you need to kill a troll. You should never fight trolls without ample fire or acid arrows/spells at your disposal! Good berries can help to conserve healing potions at low levels, or when you just take a scratch for 1-2 damage, popping one or two berries help. Still too much effort and work for very little gain.
Anyway, just that I'm here let me summarize 2nd lvl druid spells in the current build:
Barkskin - it improves AC instead of setting it. It's a +2 bonus at 3rd lvl, +3 AC at 9th lvl and +4 AC bonus at 15th caster lvl.
Charm Person or Animal - the target no longer gets vanilla's +3 bonus to save, making this spell much more effective.
Find Traps - unchanged.
Flame Blade - hugely improved as it now deals 2d6+x fire dmg on hit, enchantment lvl improves with lvl up to +3 at 9th caster lvl (which means additional +3 thac0 bonus and +3 fire dmg). Do not allow STR dmg bonus but it is considered "incorporeal" and thus gets +4 thac0 bonus to "bypass armors".
Resist Fire/Cold - unchanged for now, but I'm open to suggestions to improve it a bit (e.g. faster casting time with lower duration, and/or lower % res extended to all elements).
Slow Poison - unchanged.
Fire Trap (new druid-only spell) - imagine a Skull Trap spell which deals fire dmg. Nasty eh?
Regenerate Moderate Wounds (new druid-only spell) - within SRV4 druids no longer get Cure Wound spells but Regenerate Wound variants. RMW grants 1hp every 3 sec for 1 turn + 1round/lvl (up to 3 turns at 10th lvl).
Gust of Wind (new spell) - disperse cloud spells as vanilla's Zone of Sweet Air. Enemies close to the caster must save vs. breath or be knocked back unconscious for 1 round.
The official release may contain Alicorn Lance too, albeit 1st lvl Faerie Fire kinda outperforms it imo.
@subtledoctor your tweak can potentially screw the AI because casting Barkskin after Stoneskin will remove all the latter's skins (up to 10!) and replace them with a single one. In theory you could even use your Barkskin to "Breach" an enemy Stoneskin.
I also like the find traps spell, because it works over a larger area than thief skill. I often use it to move my whole party forward slowly in a dungeon, so the thief doesn't have to go out alone. If I need a scout, the thief can still do her thing, but there are times when it's more convenient to move everybody together.
I don't think it hurts to have an extra slow poison or two on hand, either, just in case. It could be Charname who's poisoned and maybe also held (unable to use potion), and your druid or cleric with slow poison could save the day. Sometimes your tanks can't pull all the aggro - they could be blocked by ogre berserkers while a squad of elite hobgoblin archers fires poison arrows straight at Charname. Or maybe you're surrounded by wyverns, and must defend yourself.
The AC values of Barkskin are pretty terrible. I wish it could be used like Strength to actually nerf someone's AC.
For now, I guess I'm going to go with Fire protections and goodberries.
That's why there are so many mods to change the situation.
And true the remove traps skill is tied to the detect traps skill so you still want to put points in it. But you don't need to put as many because there are other ways of dealing with traps once you know they are there. Plus, if you encounter a trap that you can't disarm, pop a potion of thievery (or Perception???). hey, presto, all of the sudden you can. that only helps once you have detected it though, which the spell can do for you. So you can put very few points in that skill and still be EXTREMELY effective as a trap remover. You missed my point. Shillelagh is a level 1 spell. There aren't enough Level 1 slots for all of the useful goodness there. So even if FlameBlade is not as good a spell, why not use it "Because you have the free level 2 slots"? Who says it has to be 'Better'? It simply has to be useful since you aren't using the spell slots anyway. so it works like this. Let Jaheira use her slow poison spells on anyone "Else" who gets poisoned and save the potions for her. It's an extra level of protection. Since you aren't using the slots otherwise, why not have it there? You aren't using the slots by your own admission. Her is a way to make them less useless.
At the end of the day, you asked for what to do with the slots. You've got it. What you do with that advice is totally up to you.
@subtledoctor making Barkskin self only would not completely remove the chance of screwing Stonekin (e.g. players would have to remember to never cast Barkskin after Stoneskin and AI druids should be scripted to do so). Anyway, you can probably do fine with it for your self modded install, whereas for a public mod like SR I cannot accept tweaks with "flaws".
@Ardul I don't know if I can find a bam creator before V4 release, but I'm sure sooner or later I will.
Flame blade is useful in BG2 against trolls and such.
I've used jaheira's charm person or mammal countless times against enemy humanoids.
I don't remember using any other 2nd level spells ...
However, the trick is to make the most use of what IS there and that's what we provided. It is up to them to see what is being offered for the value that it is.
Also, Web isn't as uber as you might think. It's only uber if you have a regular source of free action (e.g. spider's bane), but considering that Jah can't use it, and I have Minsc focusing on DW weapons as a striker, I don't get a lot of use out of it. I only keep one web spell on hand for a situation where I'm better off having ranged attackers take care of things. With my C/WM, I'm going to get more use out of stinking cloud and animate dead. I'm not saying it doesn't have it's uses. In IWD, I did a run with a character (cleric/thief) that got a lot of use out of it. I'm just saying that in BG, with my party and playstyle, it doesn't do much for me.
That, and in BG1, dex is much more powerful for missiles than strength for swords. You sure about that? I know I've been able to sneak about and disarm, hell I've even opened doors! ow else am I gonna feed canines to Umberhulks? Maybe vanilla BG1 is different.
As far as hiding while detecting, it is SORT OF true. If you hit "hide in shadows" (assuming you succeed), you fade. If you then click 'Find traps', your Hide in Shadows will cancel (unless they changed that in EE??). Technically, your Hide will stay in effect for a short time, but not long. You can't 'click them both on' and go wandering about.
@Kneller - fair enough. What was being suggested were some (semi) advanced tactics. But they aren't necessary to play/win/have fun in the game. They are merely tactics that may allow you to excel at it. But not required. Play and have fun the way YOU enjoy.
Not that web isn't useful, but if I used it here and he made his save, I'd have been pretty well shafted and the fight would have drawn out. It would have created a hazard zone that I would have to avoid, limiting my mobility while he's DDing all over the place. As was, nobody even took a hit.
It might have been handy for the trouble I had with the battle horrors at DT, though. I was under-leveled for that, I think, and I barely could kept anyone from dying by going press gang on the mobs. Still, I think I've only used the spell twice so far this run. Once for the double vamp wolves and friends east of the Beregost Temple and once on that massive band of ogres and whatnot (north of the lighthouse?) near where you meet The Surgeon. I don't know if I'd call spamming web and plinking that advanced. Speaking of advanced tactics though, isn't there some mod or something that beefs up the AI? I think it might only be for BG2, but I recall hearing something about that.
http://www.gibberlings3.net/scs/