Has anyone done this to Safana.....

dracostrike

Made her use her charm on a Xvart?

...True Story actually, ironically it actually saved vs her kiss XD

What I actually want to ask is has anyone turned Safana into Mage using the intelligence tome and played with her a thief/mage through BG and SoD? I would imagine it would be quite fun considering Imoen is out of the question for this part of the saga.

moody_mage

I think @bengoshi did this.

Zilber

I did have her try and charm a gibberling. I EEkeepered her into a bard, which is sort of a thief mage.

EDITed to say why: Safana, to me, had an air of a film noir night club singer, Jessica Rabbit or some such. A regular bard keeps enough pickpocket to keep her kleptomanic self intact.

scriver

[Obligatory sleazy that's-not-what-I'd-do-to-Safana post]

rapsam2003

scriver said:

[Obligatory sleazy that's-not-what-I'd-do-to-Safana post]

jsaving

Single-class thieves aren't great melee combatants in SoD due to their low hit points and don't bring much to the table ranged-wise either. On the other hand, dual-classed thief/mages are much better than pure mages and are generally considered to be among the strongest characters in the game, even granting that the wizard's knock spell makes lockpicking somewhat obsolete. So yes, dual-classing her to mage in BG1 is very helpful if you want to travel with her in SoD.

JuliusBorisov

decado said:

I think @bengoshi did this.

Thanks for tagging me here

Indeed, I first met Safana when my cleric/thief was lvl 1, so that she never levelled up without my influence. Then I dropped her and played till the BG city without her. Then I took the INT tome and returned to Safana. Levelled her to the 4th level, putting all possible points into Disarm Traps (so that my character didn't develop this skill, focusing on other abilities).

Then I levelled her to a mage and played through all BG1 and TotSC quests. The result:

Safana covers the Disarm Traps skill in my party, uses the Army Scythe and is able to cast Chaos right at the start of SoD.

So far, it was probably the best option for my party, considering my charname is partially a thief.

CLsdlt80

I dual classed

Sarevok into a thief in ToB many years ago, not even playing in the EEs

just for fun backstabbing madness with him.

knas

How come so many people find thief/mage dual to be good? Cuz you only need so many points in thief skills?

JuliusBorisov

You're always short on thieving points before mid SoA. Besides disarm traps and open locks you need setting traps, dispelling illusions, not even talking about a scout hiding in shadows.

It's not only about thieving points, though.

You get an access to bows and crossbows, with all their awesome arrows and bolts. Poison from those arrows and bolts can win fights on its own.

Queegon

knas said:

How come so many people find thief/mage dual to be good? Cuz you only need so many points in thief skills?

Precisely, unless you fancy yourself some trap laying or stabbing people in the back, you are fine with a thief lvl 6-7 with 100 in disarm and picklocks. The rest is gravy. If you have spare, toss it in detect illusion. Anything above is an overkill and doesn't make the thief better.
That's why pure thiefs are garbage unless you are an assassin with a stash full of invisipotions.

jsaving

There are a couple of reasons why people find thief mage duals to be strong. First, they're strictly better than singleclass mages because you have more hit points and better weapon proficiencies without sacrificing much casting ability. Second, mage spells like stoneskin, spirit armor, absolute immunity, etc have strong synergies with melee combat. Third, you'll have enough casts of invisibility that you can repeatedly backstab without needing to put any points in hiding/shadows (and once you get the BG2 staff that makes you invisible whenever it is equipped, you have unlimited backstabs). Finally, you have a much better selection of missile weapons including crossbows (important not because vanilla crossbows are strong but because there's a decent selection of overpowered crossbows in BG2).

There are also a couple of reasons why people find singleclass thieves to be weak. First, their hit points are low and their armor selection is limited, making them much squishier than the fighter/ranger/paladin in combat. Second, they're largely unable to re-stealth (and re-backstab) during melee, which gives them undesirably low DPS. Third and perhaps most importantly, their lockpicking ability is made redundant once mages reach third level and learn the knock spell, reducing the need to have a thief in the party despite the conventional wisdom that says they're essential.

Put all of that together, and it says that an 8th-10th level thief dualed to mage essentially gets free 100s in lockpicking, move silently, and hide in shadows without needing to invest any points in them. That means you can max trap disarming (100), backstab whenever you like, and have plenty of points left over for "optional but nice" skills like pickpocketing or even detecting illusions (which is stronger than it's sometimes given credit for being).

Juris

Dual Fi-Thieves are great too - you get grand mastery, fighter hit points, thief HLAs in ToB which are just awesome. The backstab potential is insane. You're a front line fighter most of the time but when you feel like micromanaging you can solo-kill almost anything (sneak, backstab, run away, sneak, backstab, run away, repeat). Boots of speed and the cloak of non-detection are required for this. Just dual to thief after lvl 7 fighter.

Abi_Dalzim

Juris said:

Dual Fi-Thieves are great too - you get grand mastery, fighter hit points, thief HLAs in ToB which are just awesome. The backstab potential is insane. You're a front line fighter most of the time but when you feel like micromanaging you can solo-kill almost anything (sneak, backstab, run away, sneak, backstab, run away, repeat). Boots of speed and the cloak of non-detection are required for this. Just dual to thief after lvl 7 fighter.

That used to be my favorite build in the world...I have no idea why I haven't used a dual fighter/thief in so long.

Fardragon

Any combo is better than a pure thief.

sera4

I played through BG1 and SoD with a dual-classed Theif/Mage Safana! I did it because I wanted a playthrough with her in and wanted her to be more useful. My own Fighter/thief did not need the intelligence tome anyways

abacus

I'm not convinced that Knock truly replaces lock picking... Sure it's effective, but there are some great spells at level 2 that you need to ignore in order to have knock available.

I suppose if you don't mind resting every other time you open a door it'd be fine, but I'd rather invest a few more points and give myself another Web or Mirror Image.