Newbie question about Dual-Classing
GammaPhase
Member Posts: 27
Greetings, new to the Baldur's Gate series.
I think I understand how dual-classing functions, after reading posts.
You can only be human, and your new class abilities don't kick in until it surpasses your old class in level. Then you simply keep progressing in your new class retaining your benefits from the old class. If that's incorrect please correct me.
Now, in the threads I see discussions about certain dual-classes, and when to dual. I'll see something like this:
"It's better to dual at 9 than at 13 because..."
It's not clear in my newbie brain what "at 9" precisely means.
Does it mean:
When your character is at level 8 and ready to level up to 9, dual into your new class.
Or...
When your character is at level 9 and is ready to level up to 10, dual into your new class.
Thanks!
I think I understand how dual-classing functions, after reading posts.
You can only be human, and your new class abilities don't kick in until it surpasses your old class in level. Then you simply keep progressing in your new class retaining your benefits from the old class. If that's incorrect please correct me.
Now, in the threads I see discussions about certain dual-classes, and when to dual. I'll see something like this:
"It's better to dual at 9 than at 13 because..."
It's not clear in my newbie brain what "at 9" precisely means.
Does it mean:
When your character is at level 8 and ready to level up to 9, dual into your new class.
Or...
When your character is at level 9 and is ready to level up to 10, dual into your new class.
Thanks!
0
Comments
Plus, downtime is boring.
Dualing at 9 just means that you dual when you are level 9. You may want to do it fairly early since all the exp you gain after the point you should dual, is basically thrown away if you don't do it right away. This level 9 point is for fighters btw.
You CAN do the dual class at any time, if your stats are good enough for any of the other classes. The button in your character sheet over the level up button should be highlighted if you can dual-class at all. Fe. if you are a fighter, and want to dual into a mage, your Intelligence needs to be high enough for the dual to be possible. I think 16 Int is the minimum.
Btw, the dualing classes are:
Fighter, Thief, Mage and Cleric.
You can mix and match them whichever way ticks your fancy. If you are unsure of what to do, ask advice from this forum. We're pretty friendly, and a lot of people here have tons of experience in this game.
Dualing classes which special rules apply to:
Ranger and Druid. Rangers can only dual as clerics, and druids can only dual as fighters. And vice versa.
Clerics and druids (single, multi or dual class) won't ever be able to use many weapons.
I.e. if you're planning a fighhter / cleric, don't specialize the fighter in long sword, two handed sword etc. etc.
So that's 15 strength if you're a fighter wanting to dual or 17 strength if you are another class and wanting to become a fighter.
Fighter: strength
Cleric: wisdom
Druid: wisdom and charisma
Mage: intelligence
Thief: dexterity
Shadowdancer: strength, dexterity and charisma
Why 9 and 13? The reason is twofold. One is the APR breakpoints. Fighter-types receive +1/2 base APR at both lvl 7 and lvl 13. That means you could add lvl 7 to the mix, too - however, this is where the second reason comes in. XP in Baldur's Gate jumps tremendously around lvl 10 or so. You need as much XP to get from lvl 1 to lvl 9 as you need from lvl 9 to lvl 10 as a fighter! Consequently, getting from lvl 7 to lvl 9 isn't that big a deal. For that investment, you gain extra THAC0, saves, and, most importantly, an extra weapon proficiency point - incidentally your 7th, meaning the one where you can get Grand Mastery in a weapon assuming you put ** into it during character creation at lvl 1 (or **** if you created in BG2 at a higher level). You also gain an extra use of a kit ability if you're a Fighter kit, such as Berserker (Berserker Rage) or Kensai (Kai). The low (by BG2 standards) XP requirement combined with the decent rewards means it is almost always worth it to dual at 9 over 7.
So what about 13? This is a different story altogether. Because XP jumps so much after lvl 9, you need quite a lot of it to get to higher levels. Lvl 13 requires a total XP of 1,250,000 for a Fighter. That is already a hefty sum, even in BG2 - and then you need even more XP to regain your levels in your new class! For that you get +1/2 APR, some THAC0/saves, another weapon proficiency point, and another use of your kit ability. That sounds pretty much exactly like what you get for 7->9, except at a MUCH higher cost. And if that wasn't enough, the extra proficiency point isn't even all that good. You already have 7, meaning 5 for Grand Mastery in a chosen weapon, and 2 in a chosen weapon style. That is pretty much enough already to get you through most of the game if you plan it well. Yes extra points can be useful, but not nearly as useful (and consequently: valuable) as those first 7 points. So, you not only get effectively LESS than you got before, you also get it at a HIGHER cost.
That is not to say however that you do not get anything for dualing at 13. You do. APR is the biggest source of damage in this game, and more is better. Same with THAC0 and saves - more is better. The issue lies entirely with the COST of the things, not the benefit. You get something useful for sure, but it tends to be so expensive that it is hardly worth getting. The only scenarios where I personally consider dualing at 13 are solo and very-small-group play. There you effectively gain more XP as it is divided among less characters, making it easier to dual at higher levels. It is still quite the chore, don't get me wrong, but slightly less so. If you do not know the game inside and out and know how to metagame XP gains effectively, I generally do not recommend you try dualing at 13.
PART 2
So this was all about FIGHTER duals (the most common choice to dual from). But what about OTHER dual-class combinations? Well, those are fairly rare for several reasons. One is that Fighters tend to peak early in their growth, and then not gain a lot from subsequent levels. Other classes however, spellcasters in particular, tend to grow well into their late levels, and gain access to their most powerful abilities at quite advanced levels. For example, a mage needs lvl 18 to gain 9th Level spells. As we've seen before, XP values increase dramatically past lvl 10 or so for most classes, which means it is quite hard to dual at higher levels.
That is however not to say that it is entirely unviable. There are a few combinations that make sense. One involves Thieves. Thieves require fairly little XP to level (the least of all classes) and similar to fighters, they peak fairly early (any point beyond 100 in pick lock, find traps, detect illusion is redundant for example). That means that you can fairly easily dual a thief into something else without much of a loss.
When you dual a Thief however is far less obvious than it is with fighters. There are many factors to consider, like what thieving skills you value how highly, and whether you are a Thief kit with special breakpoints. One of my personal favorites for example is the Swashbuckler 10 -> Fighter dual, essentially giving you a Fighter with 100 in pick lock, find traps, and detect illusions, as well as some nice AC/THAC0/damage bonuses from the Swashbuckler kit. I chose lvl 10 for that reason, as a Swashbuckler gains those bonuses ever 5 levels. Another fan-favorite is Assassin->Mage, which can be dualed at a variety of breakpoints, often centered around the backstab progression table.
Caster duals are rarer, but also not unheard of. As casters gain a fair amount from levels for a long time, arresting their level development is an unconventional strategy. However, you can use it to simply add some small or medium bonuses to your second class. In BG1 one popular strategy was Mage 2 -> Fighter, essentially giving your Fighter some minor spells but more importantly the ability to cast from scrolls and use wands. In BG2, an idea that I find intriguing is dualing a Priest of Lathander -> Fighter. This gives you a fighter with access to several useful buffs, such as the kit-specific Boon of Lathander (adds +1/2 APR) and most importantly Draw Upon Holy Might. When you dual this depends on how you value your spell levels, and anything from 9 to 12 can be argued fairly reasonably.
There are definitely other possible combinations out there. However, in many those cases the breakpoints are not clear-cut and difficult to assess. If you want to experiment, I encourage you to do so. See what works for you and your setup, and maybe you'll have a cool story to share with the rest of us!
*NOTE: It is almost never worth it to dual a Ranger. As they cannot attain Grand Mastery to begin with, they lose practically nothing from going multiclass Ranger/Cleric, which is what 99.99% of Rangers would dual into anyway. Ranger->Mage is possible, but unconventional and quite rare.
Ranger 2 => Cleric makes sense to me.
We have a unkitted cleric (with the cleric level progression) with ** in specializations and all the druidic spells available.
In BG2 there's HLAs to consider which throw everything off. Also note that to retain druid spell progression on a dualed R->C you need to edit the .ini file, otherwise it will stop druid spells at where the Ranger was when it dualed.
@FinneousPJ For correcting my misunderstanding.
@Arunsun For information about XP I didn't know.
@Yannir For the overview, much appreciated.
@Lord_Tansheron For the extra information.
You answered questions I didn't even know I had, I appreciate it!
Anyway, I forgot they change the r/c druidic spell thing. So, unless you modify the .ini, there's no reason at all to dual the ranger to cleric
I am on mobile and I could simply not see the end of your comment... Everytime I finished reading a paragraph and scrolled down there was another 3 of them.
You are totally welcome @GammaPhase
Dualing to mage is definitely the most prevalent choice in BG2, to no one's surprise. You could probably squeeze in a mage anywhere and improve it :P