-Recovered the Scepter of Halueth Never for Nasher -Defeated the corrupted shadow druids of the Mere and failed to secure a druid alliance. -Obtained a lizardman alliance. -Recovered the Belt and Hammer of Ironfist for Khelgar, and obtained a dwarven alliance. We avoided fighting Tholaxyz for the belt. I always avoid killing dragons if I don't have to. I find it tragic to destroy ancient creatures who took centuries to become the forces of nature that they are. As a druid, I find it especially loathsome to kill dragons, whom I believe to be focuses of balance. As a druidic character, I don't find taking their treasure hoards to ever be necessary to win any game scenarios. This includes Firkraag and Carsomyr in BG. Avoiding the fight with Tholaxyz required a very hard to make diplomacy check, since she wanted very badly to enjoy the entertainment of fighting us, and to keep the belt, as well as everything else on the volcanic mountain. Succeeding at that diplomacy check, by convincing her that one puny belt was not worth the risk of the guaranteed injuries she would suffer by fighting us, even though she would likely win, made me very happy about having kept the diplomacy skill maxed throughout my character building. I remember Tholaxyz from my last run as being the hardest fight in the entire game. I am not sorry to have missed that fight in this run, but rather, I am very, very satisfied that I have avoided killing her. May she rule over her volcano and kill any and all fire giants who ever try to return there, forever and ever, amen. Khelgar will use the gloves, belt, and hammer of Ironfist for the rest of the run. He is now a Thor-like juggernaut of melee destruction, and even better, just as tough as Thor against damage (AC 35+).
-Tried to gain a wendersnaven alliance through Grobnar, found a book of knowledge instead. I'm not sure yet what good that will do, but I have no doubt it will do something. It certainly can't hurt.
-Obtained the true names of the Reavers. Had Zhjaeve use them to gain one last power shard. Zhjaeve thinks we can reconstruct the Silver Sword now.
-Jerro informs us that we must seek the knowledge of an ancient dragon, guarded by swarms of younger red dragons, to be able to reform the Silver Sword. This is where we will pick up next play session.
-My keep and my Greycloaks appear to be maxed out in their development. We have all structures built, the best possible weapons, armor, and training, and morale at "very high". I am especially proud that I never taxed the area farmers a single copper to achieve this. Why would I ever tax them, when I gain unlimited fortunes upon fortunes of gold and wealth just by killing monsters and taking back what they have stolen? I have invested my recovered fortunes into Crossroad Keep and its people. What would I have spent it on otherwise? One man can only consume a small amount of Chauntea's vast resources. Trying to horde more than I need would corrupt Chauntea's Balance.
Build: Druid 7/Stormlord 10 TPKs/Reloads: 0 Time played: 61 hours
[Spoiler] The Ashwood is now free of taint. I transferred some of my essence to the Wood Man and the area has been restored! I've been pretty good to everyone. I'm also shipping GannxPiro hardcore. He's keeping her in high spirits in the hard times. She also treats Okku like a cousin due to their heritage and such. I also got tricked for real but Nadaj's scheme. I kind of saw it coming but she seemed nice enough of a person @_@ [/spoiler]
[Spoiler] The Ashwood is now free of taint. I transferred some of my essence to the Wood Man and the area has been restored! I've been pretty good to everyone. I'm also shipping GannxPiro hardcore. He's keeping her in high spirits in the hard times. She also treats Okku like a cousin due to their heritage and such. I also got tricked for real but Nadaj's scheme. I kind of saw it coming but she seemed nice enough of a person @_@ [/spoiler]
Oh, she got me the first time I played through, you can go tell her superior what is going on your next play-through and have a different experience.
OHHHH Raiding Myrkul's temple. I didn't know Kaji could be used as a thief XD I got two new weapons for my Bard. Reaper's Despair and Fingerbone's name. A sickle and a shortsword that can cast ANIMATE DEAD. I have a cloak that grants finger of death 2/day and a mask that can cast finger of death 1/day.
Items are making Piro into an excellent Necro-Bard!
Edit: I re-made the Seelie Summer Sword and Unseelie Umbral Usher butttt these weapons are much better statistically and the necro-flavor is aawwessooommee!
Side-note. I got my friend NWN2 as an early Christmas present and another friend bought the game. We plan to do an SoZ multiplayer run n_n. After that I want us to try some of the pseudo-MMO servers the game offers.
I'm playing a Drow Bard (eventually Drow/Blackguard). Killerkitten (one friend's username) is playing a Druid because she played a Druid in WoW and LOOVVVESS Dragons and so the Dragon form appeals to her. Heno (other friend) is playing a Tiefling Hexblade since we all have Tony K's AI, Kaedrin's PRC, and a hair/face mod.
Yeah, we may either lower the difficulty if things get too tough or pick up some NPCs. That's the plan, anyway. I'm letting Heno the Hexblade be the face of the party since I already know the story and don't want to spoil anything.
The game was pretty fun, but I thought the last act dragged on for too long. The final dungeon was more irritating than fun for me. It was challenging mostly because of resting restrictions, which I thought was a cheap tactic, and I had to reload a couple or three times trying to succeed at resting. Without any rest, the numbers of monsters would eventually wear us down (spells expended, healing supplies exhausted, hit points low) before we could get to the final battle.
I would up lowering the difficulty slider to minimum, just because I wanted it to be over with. I did the same thing the last and only time I ever fought Melissan in ToB.
I had trouble with the penultimate battle with three reavers, because I couldn't get Zhjaeve or Amon to read their scrolls reliably. I'd click for them to start, and then they'd just stand there with the scroll showing in their action queue, and then a few seconds later, it would wink out. It usually took three or four tries to get one of them to finally start reading the ritual. I finally got it to work, though.
The final battle was fairly well constructed, I thought. It reminded me of the battle with Melissan at the end of ToB.
The ending was very disappointing, as
neither your main character nor any of your party NPCs gets a satisfying epilog. This ending is actually mentioned on TV Tropes under "Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies", and it's pretty universally criticized by fans. I'm not sure what their writers were thinking. Many players feel very cheated by the ending.
Overall, I had a lot of fun replaying the OC, and I agree that it's better than most people say. It's definitely not perfectly written, though, and there are gameplay problems to work around, so I can also understand why so many people have a negative opinion.
I give it a mixed review, probably about a 7.5 or an 8, a relatively high score because of its many positive features and its Baldur's Gate like NPC's, story, and party management, but significantly lower than a 10 because of its many flaws, problems, and inconsistencies in gameplay
@BelgarathMTH - I think your impressions of the final area(s) are fairly universal. Most posts that I have seen all complain about the limited rest (and it being a relatively cheap tactic), leading to unnecessary difficulty. I also remember quite a lot of trouble getting the scrolls to be read reliably, even if you turned your companions into bots. I suspect that it was an issue with the code rather than anything else.
Thanks very much for sharing your run. I've enjoyed reading up on your progress. Glad you enjoyed yourself.
I myself took the plunge this weekend and started a new character. I decided on a Ranger/FB just to see how that went. It is by no means a 'Power' build and I am basically taking feats that 'seem good at the time' with a general direction of getting FB at some point before level 12 or so. I hope I don't bork myself, but expect to have fun with it either way.
Not that you will have much of a choice with feats either way. Without fighter levels you will only have 7 (8 for humans and halflings) to play with in a level 20 environment, 3 of those being used for FB prereqs, 1 for IPA, and ideally a few for Improved Favoured Enemy and/or Favoured Power Attack. Blind Fight is very important on non-casters too, but it's available on an item (although you lose it in MotB).
@BelgarathMTH 1. there is evil ending in which you can do something else 2. the story does not end there you now continue to MOTB and finish the story with epic epilogue at the end.
overall NWN2 is more about the long road you travel rather then 5 minutes ending and final area is loads of fun if you think about it.
Nice to hear you finished it! n_n I'm going to be away from home for a few days and so I cannot continue my NWN2 adventures until Wednesday. Piro I believe is currently 27.
[Spoiler] Before I left she just got to the academy in Thay [/spoiler]
I'm inclined to agree with @iKrivetko that Ranger/FB isn't a particularly good combination.
A couple of other reasons:
* both classes get Toughness "for free" - redundancy; * FB is better with 2H weapons, whilst the ranger is better duel wielding; * SoZ adds a couple of fun animal companion upgrade feats which make pure ranger more interesting; * FB does a horrible cringe animation every time their self-damage power ticks that makes them look like a wuss; * The Barbarian specific ability in MotB doesn't work with FB; * Survival skill is fairly useless apart from in SoZ.
I never said that it "isn't a particularly good combination", quite the opposite. However generally you just want 1, maybe 5 levels of Ranger just for the Favoured Power Attack(s). It's legit and actually quite strong in settings where most of your enemies belong to some particular type, which is true for both OC and MotB.
Also, Ranger isn't "better" dual-wielding, they just get it for free. Aaand the "barbarian-specific ability" doesn't really work with anyone in an epic setting as it's a natural AC bonus that doesn't stack with others. Safiya can persist Spiderskin from the very start of MotB, +5 amulets are common as dirt and Gann has Tortoise Shell.
No ability is really "for free". You always get it in place of something else, so getting abilities you don't use (or are duplicated) means not getting abilities you could use.
This is kind of negated by the lack of class balance, but still.
Now getting Safiya to cast persistant Spiderskin on everyone might be optimal, but it is also an extremely boring way to play. Which is the other drawback of the FB - it's as boring as hell. A straight ranger with a tooled up companion and duel wielding might be less optimal, but it makes the game more fun (or the Lion of Whatsits from Kaedrin's PRC pack, which lets you add shapechange to your ranger's skills), as does any build with weak combat but good interpersonal skills.
Fun is quite a subjective thing as some people find controlling extra units fun, some people find triple digits of damage fun, some people draw fun from their character's concept et cetera, so I see no point in discussing that part of the question whatsoever. Objectively speaking, Ranger/FB is a class combo that deals a lot of damage to certain types of units, it's strong in PvM and is predominantly rest-independent, which makes it a good combo for OC/MotB.
FB = click mouse button and all monsters within 5 feat die instantly. Move and repeat. It's hard to see how anyone could find fun in that, especially in a game which, like everything Obsidian does, is focused on conversation and story and has lousy combat.
So thanks everyone for chiming in on my character choice. Unfortunately I am already entrenched enough in the game that I'm not going back and change. I'll just have to suffer with my choices.
As far as it goes, I found a combination that I found on nwn2db that I quite like and, although I am not following it to the letter, it seems to work out thus far. I am going Archery style for my ranger, but also focusing on Greatsword. This gives me fairly good hand to hand along with decent ranged combat. Thus far I am really enjoying "Clicking and everything in range dying" style of play, so that works for me.
I kinda like Intimidate skill in the OC, but I usually play as something roguish, since otherwise I have to play with the sound off so I can't hear Neeshka's awful voice.
Well, it's not a particularly well-optimised build. Power critical is a rather weak feat, especially in a crit-immune setting, especially when you can pick Favoured Power Attack instead. Improved critical scythe is arguably useless as you will generally have an arcane caster that can cast keen. It also delays FB for no apparent reason and it's generally best to take at least the first two FB levels asap. Otherwise it's passable.
So, I am not following the letter of the concept (not even close) but the general feel. For instance, I am going great sword instead of scythe simply for concept reasons. I am also playing it fast and loose with the feat selections particularly because of the crit immune monsters, but also because of the lack of the high Crit weapon. And I am not doing Fighter levels but will bring in FB much earlier to make use of the extra hit points and the Zerk ability sooner rather than later. And I am focusing on traps early on so that I can throw that into the mix.
I am not a power builder/player of any description and don't generally play 'Builds'. What I did like about the concept (note I use the term concept instead of build) was a ranger who was quite good at range but also could mix things up at close range with big damage. Within tolerances, this build should get me there without a lot of worries about sticking close to any sort of 'Build', but generally just going Ranger, Ranger, Ranger.... FB.... Ranger.
Effectively, the character came around because I liked the feel of the build, not because I had any illusions or intentions of actually building 'That character'.
Yeah, for my OC run I didn't really plan to go Shadowdancer and meant to take TWF much sooner but due to the cool trickstery nature of the Shadowdancer I ended up taking SD levels at 18/19. I also didn't get TWF until the early 20s in MotB. I could have managed the build much better but I just wanted to play a tricksy support character they took the Fey Heritage Feats. I'm lucky there was the dagger and sword in the OC that provided TWF.
When I play Val'myr as a Bard/Blackguard I plan to actually go to the NWN database and construct a planned build.
NWN2 campaign ain't hard. it got the usual bioware style companions which cover every possible role in the game so you can play what ever you want.
example, in my goodie goodie campaign back then I played Paladin\Neverwinter Nine. As evil playthgrough I played rogue \ Assassin \ Shadow thief of amn and iirc I tossed in there also Shadowdancer level for HiPs.
There are cheesy builds like 2 levels paladin and then only sorcerer levels so your charisma is added to your saving throws. Paladin \ Cleric always imba class.
Bard\fighter\Dragon Disciple is death incarnate and can annihilate anything in moments.
iirc pretty much any cleric can wreak havoc and destroy everything solo with his imba spells in this game.
Monks... pff don't let me start on those.
and iirc druids can cast spells while in animal form in this game and iirc you can take feats to improve their animal \ elemental forms.
Another noteworthy class (thinking about it nwn 2 got loads of classes and builds it's pretty amazing) Doomguide. for OC and MOTB you will face many undeads and plane creature, a mix of cleric(plane turning)\paladin(2 levls for saving throws) and Doomguide will allow you to do some amazing things in the game.
For the mage\rogue ones teh arcane trickster is pretty awesome and for pure mages you got the Arcane Scholar of candelkeep is pretty straightforward. for evil mages rp wise the intersting choice is playing bloody RED WIZARD prc. that's just epic.
I will also note an hanrd to master class which is the Warlock and PRC called hellfire warlock. The kink is you get limited, very limited amounts of spells which are modification to basic "Eldritch blast" which is basicly a demonic magic. you can shape it in whatever form you want and can cast... UNLIMITED amounts of spells. You can guess the cheesy stuff you can do with it. Hellfire PRC adds some stuff to this class like weird version og "Gate" spell without the "protection from evil" spell so the demon always attacks you. then each time you use your unique hellfire blast with extra damage you lose 1 constitution point so better use it while you sure it will do you good.
consider most enemies in the campaign immune to sneak attack but mostly I made the rogue like build to get rid of neeshka... wanted someone which can handle traps etc...
but that are some fun builds like fighter\weapon master\black guard with giant sword... makes you go into muhahahahahhaha mode.
Comments
-Recovered the Scepter of Halueth Never for Nasher
-Defeated the corrupted shadow druids of the Mere and failed to secure a druid alliance.
-Obtained a lizardman alliance.
-Recovered the Belt and Hammer of Ironfist for Khelgar, and obtained a dwarven alliance.
We avoided fighting Tholaxyz for the belt. I always avoid killing dragons if I don't have to. I find it tragic to destroy ancient creatures who took centuries to become the forces of nature that they are. As a druid, I find it especially loathsome to kill dragons, whom I believe to be focuses of balance. As a druidic character, I don't find taking their treasure hoards to ever be necessary to win any game scenarios. This includes Firkraag and Carsomyr in BG.
Avoiding the fight with Tholaxyz required a very hard to make diplomacy check, since she wanted very badly to enjoy the entertainment of fighting us, and to keep the belt, as well as everything else on the volcanic mountain. Succeeding at that diplomacy check, by convincing her that one puny belt was not worth the risk of the guaranteed injuries she would suffer by fighting us, even though she would likely win, made me very happy about having kept the diplomacy skill maxed throughout my character building.
I remember Tholaxyz from my last run as being the hardest fight in the entire game. I am not sorry to have missed that fight in this run, but rather, I am very, very satisfied that I have avoided killing her. May she rule over her volcano and kill any and all fire giants who ever try to return there, forever and ever, amen.
Khelgar will use the gloves, belt, and hammer of Ironfist for the rest of the run. He is now a Thor-like juggernaut of melee destruction, and even better, just as tough as Thor against damage (AC 35+).
-Tried to gain a wendersnaven alliance through Grobnar, found a book of knowledge instead. I'm not sure yet what good that will do, but I have no doubt it will do something. It certainly can't hurt.
-Obtained the true names of the Reavers. Had Zhjaeve use them to gain one last power shard. Zhjaeve thinks we can reconstruct the Silver Sword now.
-Jerro informs us that we must seek the knowledge of an ancient dragon, guarded by swarms of younger red dragons, to be able to reform the Silver Sword. This is where we will pick up next play session.
-My keep and my Greycloaks appear to be maxed out in their development. We have all structures built, the best possible weapons, armor, and training, and morale at "very high". I am especially proud that I never taxed the area farmers a single copper to achieve this. Why would I ever tax them, when I gain unlimited fortunes upon fortunes of gold and wealth just by killing monsters and taking back what they have stolen? I have invested my recovered fortunes into Crossroad Keep and its people. What would I have spent it on otherwise? One man can only consume a small amount of Chauntea's vast resources. Trying to horde more than I need would corrupt Chauntea's Balance.
Build: Druid 7/Stormlord 10
TPKs/Reloads: 0
Time played: 61 hours
Raiding Myrkul's temple. I didn't know Kaji could be used as a thief XD
I got two new weapons for my Bard. Reaper's Despair and Fingerbone's name. A sickle and a shortsword that can cast ANIMATE DEAD. I have a cloak that grants finger of death 2/day and a mask that can cast finger of death 1/day.
Items are making Piro into an excellent Necro-Bard!
Edit: I re-made the Seelie Summer Sword and Unseelie Umbral Usher butttt these weapons are much better statistically and the necro-flavor is aawwessooommee!
I'm playing a Drow Bard (eventually Drow/Blackguard). Killerkitten (one friend's username) is playing a Druid because she played a Druid in WoW and LOOVVVESS Dragons and so the Dragon form appeals to her. Heno (other friend) is playing a Tiefling Hexblade since we all have Tony K's AI, Kaedrin's PRC, and a hair/face mod.
The game was pretty fun, but I thought the last act dragged on for too long. The final dungeon was more irritating than fun for me. It was challenging mostly because of resting restrictions, which I thought was a cheap tactic, and I had to reload a couple or three times trying to succeed at resting. Without any rest, the numbers of monsters would eventually wear us down (spells expended, healing supplies exhausted, hit points low) before we could get to the final battle.
I would up lowering the difficulty slider to minimum, just because I wanted it to be over with. I did the same thing the last and only time I ever fought Melissan in ToB.
I had trouble with the penultimate battle with three reavers, because I couldn't get Zhjaeve or Amon to read their scrolls reliably. I'd click for them to start, and then they'd just stand there with the scroll showing in their action queue, and then a few seconds later, it would wink out. It usually took three or four tries to get one of them to finally start reading the ritual. I finally got it to work, though.
The final battle was fairly well constructed, I thought. It reminded me of the battle with Melissan at the end of ToB.
The ending was very disappointing, as
Overall, I had a lot of fun replaying the OC, and I agree that it's better than most people say. It's definitely not perfectly written, though, and there are gameplay problems to work around, so I can also understand why so many people have a negative opinion.
I give it a mixed review, probably about a 7.5 or an 8, a relatively high score because of its many positive features and its Baldur's Gate like NPC's, story, and party management, but significantly lower than a 10 because of its many flaws, problems, and inconsistencies in gameplay
Thanks very much for sharing your run. I've enjoyed reading up on your progress. Glad you enjoyed yourself.
I myself took the plunge this weekend and started a new character. I decided on a Ranger/FB just to see how that went. It is by no means a 'Power' build and I am basically taking feats that 'seem good at the time' with a general direction of getting FB at some point before level 12 or so. I hope I don't bork myself, but expect to have fun with it either way.
1. there is evil ending in which you can do something else
2. the story does not end there you now continue to MOTB and finish the story with epic epilogue at the end.
overall NWN2 is more about the long road you travel rather then 5 minutes ending and final area is loads of fun if you think about it.
I'm going to be away from home for a few days and so I cannot continue my NWN2 adventures until Wednesday. Piro I believe is currently 27.
[Spoiler] Before I left she just got to the academy in Thay [/spoiler]
A couple of other reasons:
* both classes get Toughness "for free" - redundancy;
* FB is better with 2H weapons, whilst the ranger is better duel wielding;
* SoZ adds a couple of fun animal companion upgrade feats which make pure ranger more interesting;
* FB does a horrible cringe animation every time their self-damage power ticks that makes them look like a wuss;
* The Barbarian specific ability in MotB doesn't work with FB;
* Survival skill is fairly useless apart from in SoZ.
Also, Ranger isn't "better" dual-wielding, they just get it for free. Aaand the "barbarian-specific ability" doesn't really work with anyone in an epic setting as it's a natural AC bonus that doesn't stack with others. Safiya can persist Spiderskin from the very start of MotB, +5 amulets are common as dirt and Gann has Tortoise Shell.
This is kind of negated by the lack of class balance, but still.
Now getting Safiya to cast persistant Spiderskin on everyone might be optimal, but it is also an extremely boring way to play. Which is the other drawback of the FB - it's as boring as hell. A straight ranger with a tooled up companion and duel wielding might be less optimal, but it makes the game more fun (or the Lion of Whatsits from Kaedrin's PRC pack, which lets you add shapechange to your ranger's skills), as does any build with weak combat but good interpersonal skills.
As far as it goes, I found a combination that I found on nwn2db that I quite like and, although I am not following it to the letter, it seems to work out thus far. I am going Archery style for my ranger, but also focusing on Greatsword. This gives me fairly good hand to hand along with decent ranged combat. Thus far I am really enjoying "Clicking and everything in range dying" style of play, so that works for me.
I kinda like Intimidate skill in the OC, but I usually play as something roguish, since otherwise I have to play with the sound off so I can't hear Neeshka's awful voice.
1)eath's Messenger (presumably Death's).
Again, I am not following the actual construction so much as the general concept.
I am not a power builder/player of any description and don't generally play 'Builds'. What I did like about the concept (note I use the term concept instead of build) was a ranger who was quite good at range but also could mix things up at close range with big damage. Within tolerances, this build should get me there without a lot of worries about sticking close to any sort of 'Build', but generally just going Ranger, Ranger, Ranger.... FB.... Ranger.
Effectively, the character came around because I liked the feel of the build, not because I had any illusions or intentions of actually building 'That character'.
When I play Val'myr as a Bard/Blackguard I plan to actually go to the NWN database and construct a planned build.
example,
in my goodie goodie campaign back then I played Paladin\Neverwinter Nine.
As evil playthgrough I played rogue \ Assassin \ Shadow thief of amn and iirc I tossed in there also Shadowdancer level for HiPs.
There are cheesy builds like 2 levels paladin and then only sorcerer levels so your charisma is added to your saving throws.
Paladin \ Cleric always imba class.
Bard\fighter\Dragon Disciple is death incarnate and can annihilate anything in moments.
iirc pretty much any cleric can wreak havoc and destroy everything solo with his imba spells in this game.
Monks... pff don't let me start on those.
and iirc druids can cast spells while in animal form in this game and iirc you can take feats to improve their animal \ elemental forms.
Another noteworthy class (thinking about it nwn 2 got loads of classes and builds it's pretty amazing) Doomguide. for OC and MOTB you will face many undeads and plane creature, a mix of cleric(plane turning)\paladin(2 levls for saving throws) and Doomguide will allow you to do some amazing things in the game.
For the mage\rogue ones teh arcane trickster is pretty awesome and for pure mages you got the Arcane Scholar of candelkeep is pretty straightforward. for evil mages rp wise the intersting choice is playing bloody RED WIZARD prc. that's just epic.
I will also note an hanrd to master class which is the Warlock and PRC called hellfire warlock.
The kink is you get limited, very limited amounts of spells which are modification to basic "Eldritch blast" which is basicly a demonic magic. you can shape it in whatever form you want and can cast... UNLIMITED amounts of spells.
You can guess the cheesy stuff you can do with it.
Hellfire PRC adds some stuff to this class like weird version og "Gate" spell without the "protection from evil" spell so the demon always attacks you.
then each time you use your unique hellfire blast with extra damage you lose 1 constitution point so better use it while you sure it will do you good.
>Toss in SD for HiPS
That's daft.
but mostly I made the rogue like build to get rid of neeshka... wanted someone which can handle traps etc...
but that are some fun builds like fighter\weapon master\black guard with giant sword... makes you go into muhahahahahhaha mode.