Getting the most of your NPCs (minor spoilers)
sandmanCCL
Member Posts: 1,389
One of the biggest challenges in Baldur's Gate 1 (and BG2 to a lesser extent) is learning how to make the most of the characters you can use. It's been said there is no such thing as a bad NPC, only a bad player. After seeing people consistently rip a few of my favorite NPCs and puff up ones that I am not really a fan of, I just figured I would go NPC by NPC and help you get the most out of them.
So yes, there are spoilers if you considering knowing beforehand who you can recruit a spoiler. I am going to try to keep this as succinct as possible, too, aiming this for new players rather than hardened game veterans who should know better.
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BG1 - Good Aligned NPCs
Good aligned NPCs will bail on you if your reputation goes down too far. Don't go murdering people and that shouldn't be a problem.
- Imoen:
Imoen is one of the most versatile NPCs and thankfully joins you from the outset. She's a great thief, having both her dexterity maxed and high constitution. She also brings the ability to dual-class to mage to the table. Canonically, she dual-classes to mage out of thief at level 7 and I highly recommend doing so. Her only weakness is her low strength and therefore carry capacity but as she won't really be needing armor or and is best left using a bow or throwing daggers from a distance, this is not that big a deal.
-Khalid and Jaheira:
I am listing them as the pair that they are because outside of manipulating game mechanics, they are always in your party at the same time.
Khalid has pretty good stats for a fighter and Jaheira is a druid with better thac0 capable of wearing decent armor out of the gate. Khalid's biggest flaw is his skittishness (when he gets low on HP, he frequently suffers morale failure.) I'm told having a party leader with high charisma helps negate this somewhat but I haven't been able to confirm or deny this with hard facts. Regardless, you can either put him in your front lines to melee or leave him at a distance to rain arrows as he can be a very capable archer. If you have a mage in the party, you can bolster his strength for long periods of time with the level 2 spell "Strength." Eventually you can just give him a pair of gloves that sets his strength to a high value and he is very deadly in this case.
Jaheira doesn't do well in melee due to her poor agility and therefore poor armor class, but she is capable with darts and slings and can use heavy armors. She's the first divine spellcaster you get and therefore is pretty handy if for cure minor wounds alone. Once she gets up in levels, you may want to swap some of those heals out with Entangle, which is a fairly decent crowd control spell to whip out even if your guys get caught in it.
Side note: don't bring them along with Xzar and Montaron. The two parties come to blows.
-Ajantis:
The game's lone paladin, Ajantis is one of the four NPCs who naturally has bonus Thac0 and damage in melee due to his high strength. He's also got really good constitution and warrior-level HP rolls so he can take a hit. The biggest problem he's got is bad dexterity. Use his Protection from Evil ability whenever he's being attacked. PfE simply gives -2 AC against everything despite what the description of the spell may lead you to believe. Eventually you can give him gloves that set his dexterity to a high number and it makes him one of the most difficult NPCs to hit when coupled with PfE. Even without them, he is a deadly melee combatant and works well either with sword and board or with a two-handed sword.
-Kivan:
Kivan is one of the four NPCs who gains thac0/damage bonuses to melee and despite that is probably best used as an archer. His racial bonus to ogres is a huge boon early and effectively lets you hunt ogre and half-ogre enemies down early for large chunks of XP. His constitution doesn't grant him any bonuses to HP per level so it's inadvisable to rely on him as a main tank though he can do it in a pinch. If you decide to utilize him as pure archer, you may want to give him lighter armors and make use of Ranger stealth to scout out enemies. Attacking from stealth gives a huge bonus to hit, so there's that too.
-Minsc and Dynaheir:
Minsc bruises people. He's got the best strength of any NPC and can hulk out even more using his Berzerk ability. Just make sure if you decide to use it, keep the rest of your party out of melee range. Give him a two-handed sword and stand back as he dispenses justice.
Dynaheir is less awesome but still a capable mage. She's durable from a constitution standpoint. Her biggest weakness is that she can't cast conjurations (meaning no mage Armor spell so her AC sucks and she can't cast summon creature spells) and enchantments (no crowd control via Sleep and Hold Person). Utilize her large assortment of nasty damage spells and lots of Web as a 2nd level spell. Plus she can stop poisons so she is very handy to have in Cloakwood to take pressure off your divine spellcasters. A lot of her deficiencies can be covered up by wands, so if you want to spend the money on a Wand of Sleep or Wand of Paralysis, she's as capable as Xan who specializes in such things.
-Coran:
Coran breaks the game's rules by having more ranks in bows than should be allowed a multi-class fighter/thief. He's also got more dexterity than is naturally allowed although the only difference between 19 and 20 dexterity is bonuses to thieving skills. He's pretty straightforward: Give bow, launch arrows.
-Yeslick:
Yeslick joins really late in the game and without any gear on him. Once you do get him geared up, he's one of the best tanks in the game. High constitution means huge HP pool, capable strength means good armor, and fighter/cleric is naturally a great combo because of the high thac0 and cleric buff spells. Utilize the level 2 spell "Draw Upon Holy Might" and the gloves that boost dexterity to turn him into a killing machine. As an added bonus, he's a dwarf (gets good saving throws) and has Dispel Magic as an innate ability.
-Alora:
Alora joins super, super late and has her thief skill points already alloted for you. However, most of that is in stealth. If you use a mage to boost her strength via "Strength," she makes a pretty capable hit and run character. Plus, her lucky rabbit's foot gives her permanent "Luck" which basically equates to an extra thac0. She can't take much punishment from a raw HP standpoint but she does have super good saving throws (again bolstered by Luck as well as halfling saving throw bonus).
BG1 - Neutral Aligned NPCs
Neutral aligned NPCs start whining when you have really high reputation but will stick around. They still bail if you go on a murderous rampage.
-Garrick:
Garrick struggles to distinguish himself from most other NPCs but does do a couple things well. One, he's a bard. Even if you just have him run around and sing, it's a help. His intelligence is really low and therefore it's hard to reliably scribe spells but you can get around this once you start rolling around in money by purchasing and quaffing INT boosting potions before you settle down for an epic scribe fest. I highly recommend taking Armor as a level 1 spell and then loading up on disable spells like Sleep. He's a fairly capable archer and it's about the only thing he's good at. Keep him at range and have him fill in any voids your dedicated casters might have.
-Safana:
Safana wishes she was Imoen but that said, she's okay. Her Charm Animal ability helps big time while you're roaming around the countryside. There's nothing quite like making a bear do her bidding. She helps fill in as thief if you decide to dual-class Imoen. You can dual-class her if you decide to drop the item that permanently boosts intelligence, too, and it's hard to argue against more wizards.
-Branwen:
Branwen is the most capable raw cleric although only slightly more so than Viconia. She also joins really early and is invaluable for that alone. Plus, she can magically make a hammer at any time which is a pretty big boon early because non-enchanted weapons tend to break. Her biggest weakness is her inability to equip plate and full plate due to her low strength, but you can still use Ankheg Armor, obtainable through a quest and another is found in an Easter egg.
-Xan:
Everyone's favorite end-of-times doomsayer, Xan brings the ability to inflict melee punishment to a mage. He's an enchanter and therefore is very limited offensively from spell selection (no magic missiles and fireballs) but that doesn't play to his strengths anyway. He's a mage with a longsword +3 that also grants fire resistance and +1 AC bonus. Throw "Strength" on him, then blast away at enemies with crowd control spells like Sleep and Hold Person. Someone crippled in this manner automatically gets hit. The game doesn't even make a dice roll to hit; a sleeping opponent simply gets hit by anything thrown his way. Plus, there are a plethora of effective wands to deal damage. A wand of Fireballs almost single-handedly erases his only downside.
-Faldorn:
Faldorn gets the most divine spells per day of any NPC because she's a single class druid. Druids level up faster and further than clerics do in Baldur's Gate 1, eventually getting 5th level spells, something Clerics do not. Her stats are mediocre but her Wisdom is high. Use a sling/dart while in caster form and bounce in and out of shapeshifted forms when you want to melee. Shapeshifted forms simply have the physical stats of whatever form she takes so it doesn't matter than her default strength and constitution are low. Plus, she gets an amazing extra ability in her innate Summon Dread Wolf. If you use her 4th and 5th level spots on Summon Animal spells, she's a fantastic summoner.
-Quayle:
Quayle gets more total spells per day between his mage and cleric spells than any other caster. He doesn't have the greatest divine spell prowess but he still has access to them. Plus, he's got an innate Invisibility once per day that has the added bonus of being cast instantly. Give him a buckler/small shield and a sling, and then have fun blasting away with whatever spells you can get your hands on. Losing out on Necromancy ends up not being a particularly big deal. Though he can't gain drain spells, he can restore HP outright using his divine spells. The best necromancy spell in BG1 is Animate Dead and he can simply use the divine version of the spell for that, as well.
Evil Aligned NPCs:
Evil Aligned NPCs will bail on you if your reputation gets too high. What this means, go ahead and raid people's homes and kill them if they get too uppity. Ideally keep your reputation around 14 or so. Don't go higher without a plan for how you're going to lower it again, but don't go so low that stores charge you an arm and a leg for items.
-Xzar and Montaron:
Xzar and Montaron are both capable NPCs who join on the first map outside of Candlekeep. Montaron can either go tanky for you with a sword and shield and heavy armors, or you can utilize him more as an assassin with lighter armors and stealth to backstab.
Xzar might have bad HP but he is able to keep himself alive okay by copious uses of Larloch's Minor Drain. He has okay armor class for a mage too with his high dexterity. Give him a sling and keep him out of harm's way. He's a mage; he'll kill things with his spells when things really need to die. Unfortunately the best parts of Illusion are not easily replicated through items and wands. You might have potions of invisibility but unfortunately there is no wand of mirror image.
-Kagain:
Kagain is built to take a hit. His dexterity is very low so without the gauntlets of dexterity, he's going to get hit but he is so thick he can take the punishment. His absurd Constitution allows him to regenerate HP simply by sleeping. Give him the biggest armor you can and let him do his business. He's a good candidate for "Strength" from your mages, but even without it at least he gets a +1 damage bonus. Something most other NPCs wish they could do.
-Edwin:
Everyone's favorite sarcastic sardonic sycophant, Edwin is the game's best pure mage. You can't make a player-made NPC with as many spells as he can cast. Conjurer is great because you basically only lose the Identify spell throughout BG1. He's also as thick as a mage can get from a Constitution standpoint.
-Shar-Teel:
Shar-Teel is the evil equivalent of Minsc. She doesn't hit quite as hard but just barely, and while she'll have slightly worse HP per level, her dexterity is great. In fact, you can dual-class her to thief. If you choose to do that, I recommend going all the way to level 7 with fighter. Once you do finally regain those fighter levels, she'll be super strong and more dangerous pre-buffs from backstab than any other NPC. Alternatively, you can keep her as a raw fighter and either go full throttle with large swords or pick up bows to turn her into a capable archer.
-Viconia:
Low strength and constitution, Viconia is a cleric who likes to sit back and simply hurl rocks with a sling. She's also SUPER good at doing just that. Compared to Faldorn or Branwen, she's only short a single level 2 spell from Wisdom. As an added bonus, she resist magic spells every so often and that's pretty neat.
-Eldoth and Skie:
Eldoth is one of the few NPCs with a natural damage bonus from strength, but he's not really good in melee. Instead, I recommend giving him the gauntlets of dexterity or bracers of archery and let him utilize his Poison Arrows. They are killer against mages and clerics, the constant ticks of damage ruining their spell casts. Alternatively, you can create a whole bunch of them and then sell them for huge gobs of cash. Having a license to print money is always cool.
Skie is kind of bland. When she's in your party, you periodically gain money but that's all she really brings to the table. Physically, she's slightly more capable than Imoen simply because her carry weight isn't as restrictive but then again she is short an HP per level when you compare the two. She also can't dual-class. Still, thieves are inherently helpful to a party. Utilizing her and Eldoth as a ranged tandem is quite powerful.
-Tiax:
Tiax rules all. He has good dexterity and constitution, and his unique ability to summon a ghast ranks among the most powerful in the game. Boost his strength and let him backstab with a quarterstaff. Laugh as people bow before the rule of Tiax
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tl;dr Strength is the best spell in BG1. Also Sandman is really out of it this morning so I probably made typos and left out a lot. Yay edit buttons!
So yes, there are spoilers if you considering knowing beforehand who you can recruit a spoiler. I am going to try to keep this as succinct as possible, too, aiming this for new players rather than hardened game veterans who should know better.
---------------
BG1 - Good Aligned NPCs
Good aligned NPCs will bail on you if your reputation goes down too far. Don't go murdering people and that shouldn't be a problem.
- Imoen:
Imoen is one of the most versatile NPCs and thankfully joins you from the outset. She's a great thief, having both her dexterity maxed and high constitution. She also brings the ability to dual-class to mage to the table. Canonically, she dual-classes to mage out of thief at level 7 and I highly recommend doing so. Her only weakness is her low strength and therefore carry capacity but as she won't really be needing armor or and is best left using a bow or throwing daggers from a distance, this is not that big a deal.
-Khalid and Jaheira:
I am listing them as the pair that they are because outside of manipulating game mechanics, they are always in your party at the same time.
Khalid has pretty good stats for a fighter and Jaheira is a druid with better thac0 capable of wearing decent armor out of the gate. Khalid's biggest flaw is his skittishness (when he gets low on HP, he frequently suffers morale failure.) I'm told having a party leader with high charisma helps negate this somewhat but I haven't been able to confirm or deny this with hard facts. Regardless, you can either put him in your front lines to melee or leave him at a distance to rain arrows as he can be a very capable archer. If you have a mage in the party, you can bolster his strength for long periods of time with the level 2 spell "Strength." Eventually you can just give him a pair of gloves that sets his strength to a high value and he is very deadly in this case.
Jaheira doesn't do well in melee due to her poor agility and therefore poor armor class, but she is capable with darts and slings and can use heavy armors. She's the first divine spellcaster you get and therefore is pretty handy if for cure minor wounds alone. Once she gets up in levels, you may want to swap some of those heals out with Entangle, which is a fairly decent crowd control spell to whip out even if your guys get caught in it.
Side note: don't bring them along with Xzar and Montaron. The two parties come to blows.
-Ajantis:
The game's lone paladin, Ajantis is one of the four NPCs who naturally has bonus Thac0 and damage in melee due to his high strength. He's also got really good constitution and warrior-level HP rolls so he can take a hit. The biggest problem he's got is bad dexterity. Use his Protection from Evil ability whenever he's being attacked. PfE simply gives -2 AC against everything despite what the description of the spell may lead you to believe. Eventually you can give him gloves that set his dexterity to a high number and it makes him one of the most difficult NPCs to hit when coupled with PfE. Even without them, he is a deadly melee combatant and works well either with sword and board or with a two-handed sword.
-Kivan:
Kivan is one of the four NPCs who gains thac0/damage bonuses to melee and despite that is probably best used as an archer. His racial bonus to ogres is a huge boon early and effectively lets you hunt ogre and half-ogre enemies down early for large chunks of XP. His constitution doesn't grant him any bonuses to HP per level so it's inadvisable to rely on him as a main tank though he can do it in a pinch. If you decide to utilize him as pure archer, you may want to give him lighter armors and make use of Ranger stealth to scout out enemies. Attacking from stealth gives a huge bonus to hit, so there's that too.
-Minsc and Dynaheir:
Minsc bruises people. He's got the best strength of any NPC and can hulk out even more using his Berzerk ability. Just make sure if you decide to use it, keep the rest of your party out of melee range. Give him a two-handed sword and stand back as he dispenses justice.
Dynaheir is less awesome but still a capable mage. She's durable from a constitution standpoint. Her biggest weakness is that she can't cast conjurations (meaning no mage Armor spell so her AC sucks and she can't cast summon creature spells) and enchantments (no crowd control via Sleep and Hold Person). Utilize her large assortment of nasty damage spells and lots of Web as a 2nd level spell. Plus she can stop poisons so she is very handy to have in Cloakwood to take pressure off your divine spellcasters. A lot of her deficiencies can be covered up by wands, so if you want to spend the money on a Wand of Sleep or Wand of Paralysis, she's as capable as Xan who specializes in such things.
-Coran:
Coran breaks the game's rules by having more ranks in bows than should be allowed a multi-class fighter/thief. He's also got more dexterity than is naturally allowed although the only difference between 19 and 20 dexterity is bonuses to thieving skills. He's pretty straightforward: Give bow, launch arrows.
-Yeslick:
Yeslick joins really late in the game and without any gear on him. Once you do get him geared up, he's one of the best tanks in the game. High constitution means huge HP pool, capable strength means good armor, and fighter/cleric is naturally a great combo because of the high thac0 and cleric buff spells. Utilize the level 2 spell "Draw Upon Holy Might" and the gloves that boost dexterity to turn him into a killing machine. As an added bonus, he's a dwarf (gets good saving throws) and has Dispel Magic as an innate ability.
-Alora:
Alora joins super, super late and has her thief skill points already alloted for you. However, most of that is in stealth. If you use a mage to boost her strength via "Strength," she makes a pretty capable hit and run character. Plus, her lucky rabbit's foot gives her permanent "Luck" which basically equates to an extra thac0. She can't take much punishment from a raw HP standpoint but she does have super good saving throws (again bolstered by Luck as well as halfling saving throw bonus).
BG1 - Neutral Aligned NPCs
Neutral aligned NPCs start whining when you have really high reputation but will stick around. They still bail if you go on a murderous rampage.
-Garrick:
Garrick struggles to distinguish himself from most other NPCs but does do a couple things well. One, he's a bard. Even if you just have him run around and sing, it's a help. His intelligence is really low and therefore it's hard to reliably scribe spells but you can get around this once you start rolling around in money by purchasing and quaffing INT boosting potions before you settle down for an epic scribe fest. I highly recommend taking Armor as a level 1 spell and then loading up on disable spells like Sleep. He's a fairly capable archer and it's about the only thing he's good at. Keep him at range and have him fill in any voids your dedicated casters might have.
-Safana:
Safana wishes she was Imoen but that said, she's okay. Her Charm Animal ability helps big time while you're roaming around the countryside. There's nothing quite like making a bear do her bidding. She helps fill in as thief if you decide to dual-class Imoen. You can dual-class her if you decide to drop the item that permanently boosts intelligence, too, and it's hard to argue against more wizards.
-Branwen:
Branwen is the most capable raw cleric although only slightly more so than Viconia. She also joins really early and is invaluable for that alone. Plus, she can magically make a hammer at any time which is a pretty big boon early because non-enchanted weapons tend to break. Her biggest weakness is her inability to equip plate and full plate due to her low strength, but you can still use Ankheg Armor, obtainable through a quest and another is found in an Easter egg.
-Xan:
Everyone's favorite end-of-times doomsayer, Xan brings the ability to inflict melee punishment to a mage. He's an enchanter and therefore is very limited offensively from spell selection (no magic missiles and fireballs) but that doesn't play to his strengths anyway. He's a mage with a longsword +3 that also grants fire resistance and +1 AC bonus. Throw "Strength" on him, then blast away at enemies with crowd control spells like Sleep and Hold Person. Someone crippled in this manner automatically gets hit. The game doesn't even make a dice roll to hit; a sleeping opponent simply gets hit by anything thrown his way. Plus, there are a plethora of effective wands to deal damage. A wand of Fireballs almost single-handedly erases his only downside.
-Faldorn:
Faldorn gets the most divine spells per day of any NPC because she's a single class druid. Druids level up faster and further than clerics do in Baldur's Gate 1, eventually getting 5th level spells, something Clerics do not. Her stats are mediocre but her Wisdom is high. Use a sling/dart while in caster form and bounce in and out of shapeshifted forms when you want to melee. Shapeshifted forms simply have the physical stats of whatever form she takes so it doesn't matter than her default strength and constitution are low. Plus, she gets an amazing extra ability in her innate Summon Dread Wolf. If you use her 4th and 5th level spots on Summon Animal spells, she's a fantastic summoner.
-Quayle:
Quayle gets more total spells per day between his mage and cleric spells than any other caster. He doesn't have the greatest divine spell prowess but he still has access to them. Plus, he's got an innate Invisibility once per day that has the added bonus of being cast instantly. Give him a buckler/small shield and a sling, and then have fun blasting away with whatever spells you can get your hands on. Losing out on Necromancy ends up not being a particularly big deal. Though he can't gain drain spells, he can restore HP outright using his divine spells. The best necromancy spell in BG1 is Animate Dead and he can simply use the divine version of the spell for that, as well.
Evil Aligned NPCs:
Evil Aligned NPCs will bail on you if your reputation gets too high. What this means, go ahead and raid people's homes and kill them if they get too uppity. Ideally keep your reputation around 14 or so. Don't go higher without a plan for how you're going to lower it again, but don't go so low that stores charge you an arm and a leg for items.
-Xzar and Montaron:
Xzar and Montaron are both capable NPCs who join on the first map outside of Candlekeep. Montaron can either go tanky for you with a sword and shield and heavy armors, or you can utilize him more as an assassin with lighter armors and stealth to backstab.
Xzar might have bad HP but he is able to keep himself alive okay by copious uses of Larloch's Minor Drain. He has okay armor class for a mage too with his high dexterity. Give him a sling and keep him out of harm's way. He's a mage; he'll kill things with his spells when things really need to die. Unfortunately the best parts of Illusion are not easily replicated through items and wands. You might have potions of invisibility but unfortunately there is no wand of mirror image.
-Kagain:
Kagain is built to take a hit. His dexterity is very low so without the gauntlets of dexterity, he's going to get hit but he is so thick he can take the punishment. His absurd Constitution allows him to regenerate HP simply by sleeping. Give him the biggest armor you can and let him do his business. He's a good candidate for "Strength" from your mages, but even without it at least he gets a +1 damage bonus. Something most other NPCs wish they could do.
-Edwin:
Everyone's favorite sarcastic sardonic sycophant, Edwin is the game's best pure mage. You can't make a player-made NPC with as many spells as he can cast. Conjurer is great because you basically only lose the Identify spell throughout BG1. He's also as thick as a mage can get from a Constitution standpoint.
-Shar-Teel:
Shar-Teel is the evil equivalent of Minsc. She doesn't hit quite as hard but just barely, and while she'll have slightly worse HP per level, her dexterity is great. In fact, you can dual-class her to thief. If you choose to do that, I recommend going all the way to level 7 with fighter. Once you do finally regain those fighter levels, she'll be super strong and more dangerous pre-buffs from backstab than any other NPC. Alternatively, you can keep her as a raw fighter and either go full throttle with large swords or pick up bows to turn her into a capable archer.
-Viconia:
Low strength and constitution, Viconia is a cleric who likes to sit back and simply hurl rocks with a sling. She's also SUPER good at doing just that. Compared to Faldorn or Branwen, she's only short a single level 2 spell from Wisdom. As an added bonus, she resist magic spells every so often and that's pretty neat.
-Eldoth and Skie:
Eldoth is one of the few NPCs with a natural damage bonus from strength, but he's not really good in melee. Instead, I recommend giving him the gauntlets of dexterity or bracers of archery and let him utilize his Poison Arrows. They are killer against mages and clerics, the constant ticks of damage ruining their spell casts. Alternatively, you can create a whole bunch of them and then sell them for huge gobs of cash. Having a license to print money is always cool.
Skie is kind of bland. When she's in your party, you periodically gain money but that's all she really brings to the table. Physically, she's slightly more capable than Imoen simply because her carry weight isn't as restrictive but then again she is short an HP per level when you compare the two. She also can't dual-class. Still, thieves are inherently helpful to a party. Utilizing her and Eldoth as a ranged tandem is quite powerful.
-Tiax:
Tiax rules all. He has good dexterity and constitution, and his unique ability to summon a ghast ranks among the most powerful in the game. Boost his strength and let him backstab with a quarterstaff. Laugh as people bow before the rule of Tiax
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tl;dr Strength is the best spell in BG1. Also Sandman is really out of it this morning so I probably made typos and left out a lot. Yay edit buttons!
Post edited by sandmanCCL on
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