Stuck as a Dual-Classed Solo Kensai/Thief (Currently Only a Thief)..Help!
wraith5641
Member Posts: 500
OK. So I completed the first Baldur's Gate with no problems at all as a solo Kensai. I was actually amazed at how easy it was, especially as I play on "Hard" difficulty. I imported my character over into the second one and completed the first dungeon as a Kensai to get to level 13. Once I reached level 13, I dual-classed into a Thief just before I left the dungeon. Once I left, I got to level 6 straight away and I thought "Ah, great! Should be plenty of quests to get those levels up quickly!"
This is where the game became insanely hard. I quickly learned that A. I can't wear any armor, even as a pure Thief without the Kensai part, B. My THAC0 is TERRIBLE, C. I can't use short bows to make battles even a tiny bit easier for my woeful Thief, and D. There are very few non-violent quests to at least pick up some experience and avoid having to send my Thief into certain death against powerful warriors.
Can someone offer me some tips here? What advice can you give to someone using a solo Thief in this game? I know I'm going to be an absolute beast once I get my Kensai back, but the Thief part is painful. That's putting it lightly.
This is where the game became insanely hard. I quickly learned that A. I can't wear any armor, even as a pure Thief without the Kensai part, B. My THAC0 is TERRIBLE, C. I can't use short bows to make battles even a tiny bit easier for my woeful Thief, and D. There are very few non-violent quests to at least pick up some experience and avoid having to send my Thief into certain death against powerful warriors.
Can someone offer me some tips here? What advice can you give to someone using a solo Thief in this game? I know I'm going to be an absolute beast once I get my Kensai back, but the Thief part is painful. That's putting it lightly.
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As far as your lack of armor goes, you can buy a Potion of Defense from a white-haired lady in the west end of the Bridge District that sets your AC to 0 (it's expensive, but you may well need it). And if you can sneak around the many enemies of the De'Arnise Hold, you should also be able to grab a Shield Amulet from the bottom floor, which is almost as good. There's also a Ring of Earth Control on the first level, for another +1 to your AC.
As far as XP goes, aside from gathering XP from disarming traps and opening locks, there are some select quests that you can resolve with minimal violence. I'll list as many as I can think of.
In the Slums, it's possible to beat Bregg and Cohrvale with repeated uses of the Ring of Human Influence (run away, hide, and rest if it doesn't work), if you've managed to get the ring from the circus, though you'll still have to fight one of them.
The Lilarcor quest beneath the Copper Coronet can be solved without fighting, but you'll need to sneak past some critters. A Potion of Invisibility may be helpful if you can't sneak very well.
The Bridge District offers the skinner quest, which requires only one fight. It's a tough one for a character you describe, but you might be able to set some traps on the second floor of the tanner house and get the enemies to follow you upstairs onto them. Or, you might not fight them at all, and report to Aegisfield after confronting the culprit (but not before you confront the culprit--otherwise Aegisfield dies). There's also a house north of Rampah with some traps you can disarm.
The Graveyard District offers a simple fetch quest. Go at night and talk to the little boy named Wellyn. You can fetch his bear for some safe XP. The Graveyard District also offers Tirdir's quest (the culprit is also in the Bridge District, conveniently enough), which can be completed without any fighting at all.
The spiders beneath the Graveyard District might be a bit tough, but you can get the Black Spider Figurine from a nice lady in the middle of the map. Bring a Potion of Explosions or Oil of Fiery Burning. Failing that, there are also a few traps to disarm, if you don't want to fight spiders.
At the Temple District, you can start the Unseeing Eye quest, and there are some minor fights that get tougher with time. You can also kill a troll for Roger in the sewers, but if that's too much, then you can talk to Guardian Telwyn in the Temple of Helm (or another guy in another temple, depending on who talks to you after you meet Gaal), who will offer you the Sir Sarles quest, which also only has one fight in it. But you need to spend 1000 gold to complete it, which you only get back at the end. The sewers also contain a hidden door to Mekrath's lair, which has some loot and some mephits, along with some Yuan-ti and Mekrath himself, who will probably be too dangerous for your current level.
The Government District has a minor skirmish as well with Viconia. It also has Delon, whom you should talk to. If you speak with Jan, you'll also get some experience, though I think you might have to let him join you to get the XP. You can boot him right afterward, anyway.
Seek out Renal Bloodscalp in the Shadow Thief headquarters in the Docks. You can start the Mae'Var questline, which begins with a simple pilfering, before the quests get temporarily very violent.
Trademeet has a simple side quest for 1000 gold and 1000 XP. Drink a Potion of Insight and talk to the armored guy in a tent to the west side of the map. Meet Cernd and tell him to go on ahead without you.
In the Druid Grove itself, you can sneak all the way around the map, fighting nothing, and talk to Cernd, who will fight Faldorn and kill her without fail. You can then either lay traps around Adratha in the Druid Grove, or lay traps around the djinn in Trademeet, for an easy kill and the completion of the Druid Grove questline. There's also a minor optional fight available right after reporting your success to Guildmistress Busya and Lord Logan Coprith, and if you've solved the skinner quest from before, there's another short quest with another small fight.
In the Umar Hills, you can fight a Mimic (drink a Potion of Freedom, or just save against its glue attack) and help kill a golem for a guy named Jermien. You get Ilbratha, too, which will be a huge boost to your survivability, since it can cast Mirror Image. If you lay traps, you can kill some rangers who are trying to guard Valygar. Valygar, too, should go down with traps. Also visit Merella's cabin for some XP and the path to the Temple Ruins.
The Temple Ruins have a fair amount of tough encounters, but you may be able to sneak around the place and finish part of it without too much risk. You can always come back later.
The Windspear Hills open with a big fight with some heavy melee hitters, but you may opt to drink a Potion of Invisibility to escape the fight, and find your way to the southeast end of the map to free Irenicus' dryads. I believe you can come back to the fight again, and the rest of the quest should trigger normally.
Finally, you can get some nice loot and disarm a couple traps in Watcher's Keep before you ever fight anything.
Do all or most of these, and you should be on your way to completing the bigger challenges.
In sum @wraith5641, you'll want to resolve every non-violent quest and every puzzle. (For the puzzles stealth and perhaps the Ring of Air Control, as an emergency stealth option, are invaluable. An example: solving the riddles regarding the Amanautar rituals in the Umar Hills will net you 45,000 XP alone, but you'll need stealth to get there.)
You could also consider buying and quaffing a couple of potions of master thievery (the effects stack), to steal everything in Athkatla that can be of use, such as potions, including explosives, green scrolls, weaponry, Ribald's regeneration ring and Tolgerias' Ring of the Ram, and in Trademeet an Efreeti bottle from the Genie outside the Genie tent. You can even steal less useful but valuable items and sell them to fences to generate gold so you can buy things at shops that cannot be stolen from.
Besides the safe Trademeet Druids quest, I think the Temple Ruins should be safe for your Thief to negotiate. All you need is, say, 4 green scrolls of Protection from Undead and an enchanted weapon. Use one scroll inside the temple, and 2 or 3 (depending on how fast you are) when dealing with the Shade Lord, Shadow Patrick and the Altar).
The Skinner murder quest doesn't strictly require you to fight. Just go downstairs, let Vellin Dahn threaten you, and rush back upstairs and out of the building to report to Lieutenant Aegisfield.
These quests and all the non-violent ones (in addition to those mentioned by semiticgod, you could do the Sir Sarles quest in the Gov district, and the Paladin/orphan quest in the Graveyard District) will yield your characters a few hundred thousand XP. Not enough to get your Kensai levels back, but a very good basis for your Thief to be able to hold their own.
1: Buy potions of master thievery and potions of insight.
2: Add one arcane user, like Jan, who needs no quest or fights to join.
3: Steal every scroll in Athkathla.
4: Let Jan read scrolls 'til you reach your desired level.
5: Kick Jan, rule the world.
Not sure if this is still valid in the newer patches, correct me if I am wrong.
Yeah, I guess using potions of MT would benefit me hugely. However, there aren't an infinite number of those, so I don't want to waste every potion I have right away. I'll probably go to a particular location and set about unlocking locks and disarming traps for some easy XP. As for pick-pocketing, Ribald would be definitely be my main focus.
I will start off by getting that shield amulet, as I remember it being a Godsend for my Kensai in the first game. I will wander around a couple of dungeons with invisibility and see what useful items and potions I can find, and set about disarming some of those traps too.
Once I have gained a couple of levels (Up to level 9), I will attempt the Copper Coronet quest where you expose Lehtinan. If I get to level 10 by the time the quest is over, I will attempt to fight those warriors at the inn in Waukeen's Promenade. It will be tough, but with some efficient kiting and trap-using, I should be OK. IIRC, one of those warriors has a ring of invisibility on him. Very useful piece of gear.
After that, I will gradually complete the quests in Athkatla, going from easiest - hardest. I should find that I get my levels back fairly quickly. Once I have my Kensai back, I'm going after Kangaxx for that lovely ring of his. I have a question, though: Can I still pick-pocket him for two rings like you used to be able to?
Potions are certainly useful, but if you don't have the Ring of Invisibility, I strongly recommend getting the RoAC. Unlike Potions of Invisibility, it recharges, allowing you to use it much more freely, without worrying about the supply. But if you don't have much cash, you are in fact better off saving your money for potions, yes. The RoAC is pretty pricy, and you may be better off saving up for it later.
I would still spend the money to get the true illithium which will upgrade a useful weapon that you can use once you get your Kensai levels back.
I stopped playing the game for a while, because after I beat Firkraag, I decided that it was so difficult that anything else would pale in comparison challenge-wise. I thought about what I had left to do, and I couldn't see where it would get any harder. That kind of ruined it for me. Maybe there would have been more challenges, but nothing where it would take me 20 reloads like it did Firkraag.
I half gave up on my solo, and decided to play some new games. I want to start a new multiplayer BG2 playthrough, though.
-Djinn bottle in Trademeet (steal it from the Djinn at the entrance of the Dao's tent.
-Horn of Vahalla: Upgrade it with an Diamond and a Beljuril in Waukeen Promenade.
-Black spider figurine from Pai'na in the graveyard district under the tombs (use a potion of explosion there to get rid of the abundant pesky spiders).
-Stone Golem tome (wacher's keep level 1, you can sneak your way to it i believe)
-Ring of human influence (for charm) in the circus quest in waukeen's promenade.
-Nimph's cloak (steal from the merchant on Mae'var guild) for another charm item.
Also, as a kensai, while you can't equip ranged weapons normally, you can equip any weapon that can be both melee and ranged normally (with some exeptions normally related when the weapon receive the thrower name on it if i'm not wrong). By this i believe you can equip the Azuredge axe (good alignment only purchable in copper coronet). I don't know if you can equip the Hangard's Axe or Rifthome Axe however. I also believe you can equip "The Brick", an +2 war hammer throwable from Neera's quest line (you don't have to put her in party for this i'm pretty sure).
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Why dual to thief! Why not dual to mage as all the power games!
XD! Just kidding!