When to dual class CharName and Imoen?

miker60

I'm currently running through BGEE to get a party ready for SoD launch. (playing the canon BG2 starting party)
Charname is Human fighter will dual class him to mage. Imoen is obviously thief with intent to dual class to mage too. I used to dual Imoen during BG around level 7 and still would have enough XP left to get back her thief abilities before the game ends.

2 questions for those who know AD&D rules and experience tables better than I:
-(This one is looking ahead more than being relevant to anything with my current play though) With the new SoD experience cap does anyone know what is the maximum level I could dual a fighter to mage during SoD and still get back my fighter abilities before SoD ends?

-Assuming Imoen is going to be a playable NPC for SoD: With the new XP cap for her what level is the new safe maximum thief level to reach before you dual her over to mage to still get back her thief skills?

billbisco

@Miker60 Keep in mind that Imoen was turned into a quest NPC in the SoD Prologue, so it could be quite awhile (possibly never) that you get to play as her.

Take a look at the Experience Tables at: http://baldursgate.wikia.com/wiki/Experience_tables

XP Cap is most likely around 440,000K for a Level 12 Thief.

The most you could do would be a Level 9 Thief for 110,000 XP so you could get to a Level 10 Mage for 250,000 more XP. That would put you at 360,000 XP. She would never gain another Mage Level beyond that.

Arcanis

@miker60
Both is assuming a 440k xp cap, it could be a bit higher, but we no nothing for sure aside from
the fact that thiefs can get lvl 12 ^^'

DUAL IMOEN:
While you can get higher with thief then 7 for dual-purposes, it makes little sense actually.
It will take *much* longer to regain the abilities, and once you reach them the game is nearly over ^^'
So, you could either have a 9/10 thief/mage or a 7/11 thief/mage.
If you go to 9 thief you will have some hp more, another prof point (at lvl 8) and you get x4 instead of
x3 backstab and a Thac0 of 16 instead of 17.
If you try to reach 11 mage you will get better saving throws (11/7/9/11/8 vs 13/9/11/13/10)
and 1 more spell for the circles 3 & 4 & 5.
Level 7 thief is also enough to get lockpicking and traps high enough for everything up to ToB ^^

DUAL FIGHTER/MAGE:
that would be 8/10, or 9/10 if the cap is at 500k ^^
...which gives you 1d10 more hp and a thac0 reduction of ..1
so again, I advise staying lvl 7 for dual-purposes with lvl 7 you have 7d10hp, a thac0 of 14 and 1,5 apr
and a mage of 11 gives you better saving throws (11/7/9/11/8 vs 13/9/11/13/10) and 1 more spell for
the circles 3 & 4 & 5.

ALSO:
You can importort (and use) your ending party of BG to SoD. The only thing the devs have said about
availability of npcs is that they are not *alwayas* available, the rest is billbiscos speculation, so take that
with a grain of salt (no problems with the rest of his post tho =P)

billbisco

@Arcanis Um, Excuse you sir. There are opinions, and there are facts. Imoen was turned into a quest NPC for the prologue.

There's no telling how long she'll be unavailable for joining.

I generally recommend sooner than later. There's also no telling how SoD will handle her Magedom, but given her quest NPC status, it'll likely be forced that way. We may not get an option of when to Dual Imoen.

cmk24

billbisco said:

@Arcanis Um, Excuse you sir. There are opinions, and there are facts. Imoen was turned into a quest NPC for the prologue.

There's no telling how long she'll be unavailable for joining.

I generally recommend sooner than later. There's also no telling how SoD will handle her Magedom, but given her quest NPC status, it'll likely be forced that way. We may not get an option of when to Dual Imoen.

I just want to point out they she might only be an NPC if she is not actively in your party. The clip shown in the announcement steam is not proof the she can not be in your party. Also I don't think that clip was even from the prologue of the game, you start in the city of BG, so that clip is likely a chapter or two in.

miker60

Arcanis, That is some very helpful analysis. I know we have to wait and see for what the actual XP cap will be but at least I have a decent idea when to dual my fighter and Imoen.

Billbisco, I just don't think we have enough information to determine whether or for how long Imoen will be available as a playable NPC to start making blanket statements about either. I'm going to play my play through with the assumption she will be available for use. If I turn out wrong I'll be less disappointed than if I assume she's unavailable and it turns out she is and I could have tailored her to my specifications and import her in.

billbisco

cmk24 said:

billbisco said:

@Arcanis Um, Excuse you sir. There are opinions, and there are facts. Imoen was turned into a quest NPC for the prologue.

There's no telling how long she'll be unavailable for joining.

I generally recommend sooner than later. There's also no telling how SoD will handle her Magedom, but given her quest NPC status, it'll likely be forced that way. We may not get an option of when to Dual Imoen.

I just want to point out they she might only be an NPC if she is not actively in your party. The clip shown in the announcement steam is not proof the she can not be in your party. Also I don't think that clip was even from the prologue of the game, you start in the city of BG, so that clip is likely a chapter or two in.

@cmk24 That part of the game was definitely part of the Prologue. I'd tell you to rewatch the video but they removed it You can take a look at the image below. It's the quest you get immediately after talking to Imoen

Yes, it is possible that Imoen could possibly join you too, but that is highly unlikely. That would require them to code the quest differently (different versions of text depending on whether Imoen has joined or not). And it would require a different journal entry, one where Imoen is not staying behind protected by the Flaming Fist. That's a lot of work without a lot of benefit. The most likely answer is that Imoen is not available in the Prologue and given that the actual siege of Dragonspear shown later in the video doesn't have Imoen either, she likely isn't available for a long time ingame.

If you notice the reaction I got from this thread: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/42442/petition-for-dead-bgee-npcs-staying-dead-in-sod#latest

elminster said:

@Ardanis would love the scripting involved in this one I'm sure.

From that reaction and Ardanis's agreeing with elminster's quote The devs are unlikely to implement scripting to remove dead NPCs from SoD. They are similarly unlikely to implement scripting to have 2 versions of an NPC: 1 quest giver and 1 joining NPC at the same time.

@miker60 Do you you know who will definitely be available to play through BGEE and (all or a majority of) SoD that can Dual to Mage? Safana. Give her a Tome of Intelligence and play with her through the two games to your heart's content

cmk24

@billbisco my mistake, that was the prologue (I forgot they showed the journal entry at that time).

billbisco said:

... and given that the actual siege of Dragonspear shown later in the video doesn't have Imoen either, she isn't available for a long time ingame.

This is not evidence for whether Imoen is or is not available later in the game, it is only evidence that the person playing the demo did not have her in the party.

Arcanis

@billbisco ..that doesn't really sounds like much work since you could always make something like:
{journal stuff - jIP - more journal stuff;
jiP(if Imoen party = 0 (Imoen stays behind yada yada) ) } (yes, that is a inspired by C I admit it =P)

If you do it like this the journal will only show the single sentence that mentions Immy standing behind if
she is not in your party.

(I no basic-level of C but I keep getting distracted and thus have trouble moving on =(( )

billbisco

@cmk24 I edited my post to include the word likely to change that to "likely available". Omission on my part.

Yes, it is possible that Imoen is available by Chapter 3, but given that we don't see her there, Safana is a member of every starting party, and that Beamdog is probably forcing a change to Mage as a reason for her absence, are reasons that make it more likely that she is still unavailable by then.

Arcanis

@billbisco actually she isn't, the only reason both teams had her was ..that both players wanted her..
Anyways, you can *import your BG ending party* they would NOT do that if you would lose everyone
the moment the game begins. If that is early in the prologue, then I'm pretty sure you can have her with
you.

Also, unless you have more information than the rest of us (which would probably mean violating a
NDA) you can do nothing more than speculate. And the preference of two of Beamdogs employees
towards Safana is -surprisingly- no proof, not even an evidence.

Hudzy

I just hope it can acknowledge if she's already a dual class, since to be a level 7 thief dual, which is canon, that would likely have occurred already during BG1.

miker60

There's a pretty simple explanation for why the devs want to take Imoen out of your control for a period of time early in SoD: they want to force a dual class for players who haven't made that choice with her during a BG play through.
There is much story potential to mine with Imoen becoming a Mage and the devs want to take advantage of that potential by forcing the change, hence taking her out of your control for a period of time early in the game. After that I am guessing (since that's all we can do) that she will end up back in your control.

Imoen goes through some major changes and reveals in BG2 that aren't really set up in BG. SoD is the perfect chance to sow some storytelling seeds.

Fardragon

I have a hunch there may be parts of the game where you play as Imoen instead of CHARNAME.

GreenWarlock

Urgh! That would be dreadful. This is an RPG where I immerse myself in the role of Charname, not the immortal fragmented soul of some dead god. Jumping into another character to take over as PC kills that immersion - I am now playing a game, not a character. I think ME made the same mistake in ME2 where you switch characters for one critical mission near the end of the game, nice to see the action, but totally killed my immersion as Shepherd. This is what cut-scenes were invented for! (Which still lose immersion by adding out-of-character knowledge, but can play well as a flash-back when you catch up with NPC after the event.)

GreenWarlock

BTW, perhaps I should clarify - I am not against character jumping in general, but specifically not in the case of RPGs focussed on playing a specific character through the series. Character jumping is a great thing when an integral part of the game, e.g., it really sold in Day of the Tentacle, and I hear great things about the Resident Evil series doing this.

billbisco

Arcanis said:

@billbisco actually she isn't, the only reason both teams had her was ..that both players wanted her..

How do you come to that conclusion? In the starting parties thread @Avenger_teambg told us the defaulr party for neutral parties. He did not deny the starting parties listed for good and evil. The default starting parties were likely designed first and designed to minimize the total number of characters, hence a lot of repeats, notably Safana.

Arcanis said:

Anyways, you can *import your BG ending party* they would NOT do that if you would lose everyone
the moment the game begins. If that is early in the prologue, then I'm pretty sure you can have her with
you.

Dev statements are not always explicitly true, being able to import a party does not guarantee playability with all of them. We know that Imoen is very likely removed in the Prologue. It is likely the same with others.

Trent Oster said the level cap was 12 which is generally true but not explicitly so. Avenger_teambg confirmed the next day that it is actually an xp cap.

dockaboomski

Yo, let's do something cool: let's move all this Imoen banter into @billbisco's speculation thread here and talk about dual-classing here.

Fardragon

GreenWarlock said:

BTW, perhaps I should clarify - I am not against character jumping in general, but specifically not in the case of RPGs focussed on playing a specific character through the series. Character jumping is a great thing when an integral part of the game, e.g., it really sold in Day of the Tentacle, and I hear great things about the Resident Evil series doing this.

You wouldn't like Final Fantasy 7 then!

It's used a little in KotOR (effectively IMO), and overused (IMO) in KotOR2.

It connects to the length of cut-scenes. There is a limit to how long you can expect a player to watch without doing anything. I'm expecting SoD to feature a B plot where Imoen investigates Irenicus in Baldur's Gate, whist the protagonist is at Dragonspear Castle.

billbisco

@dockaboomski It's all related sir. The decision to dual is related to how long you have to wait to regain levels. We have evidence, not mere speculation, that Imoen has likely been removed from play at least while. That tips the recommendation is favor of Dualing earlier (if even given an option

dockaboomski

It's hasn't been confirmed. From the evidence you've given, she probably won't be. So why not err on the side of her existing as a party member for the sake of the thread? It's just killing time.

Arcanis

@billbisco You have your opinion, I have mine and the truth is hidden behind a NDA.
Discussing it with you is less fruitfull than discussing it with a brickwall, so I will do my best to
stay away from the temptation of reacting to your posts.
I just ask you to not claim that your theories are the truth, since you could confuse people who have not
read enough to have their own opinion.
Also, please ignore my comments (as I will try to ignore yours) since we seem to ..clash on this topic
without any way of resolving any discussion at this time. Have fun with Baldurs gate and have a nice week.


Sorry for getting a tad of topic everyone ^^'

miker60

Well my original questions on this thread have been answered. Let's all move along to other discussions.

OzzyBotkins

I duel Imoen at 6th levled her find traps and open lock are high enough by then
I have dueled her at 2nd level if I have my CHARNAME is thief
Fighter I go at 6th
Sometimes higher if I will be using the CHARNAME for BG2
13th level if the hightest level I duel at

Ithual

Arcanis said:

@miker60
Both is assuming a 440k xp cap, it could be a bit higher

@Dee confirmes that XP cap is 500,000

Ithual

Fardragon said:

I have a hunch there may be parts of the game where you play as Imoen instead of CHARNAME.

I'm not sure.... but I may like that. Adds a new element to the story. Imoen is rather a main character. As long as it is just for a single dungeon or something. Certainly I'd rather play as CHARNAME so Imoen would have to be for a minimum.

Rather, however, I'd prefer to have her as a companion.

Arthas

would you be able to import a save from 'classic' baldur's gate? Honestly I'm playing a trilogy mod run , and I was curious if I could import that savegame into Siege of dragonspear, when ending.