Is it just me, or is there a lack of evil NPC companions?

kodaCollider

Let me begin by saying that I'm not very far into the game yet, so I don't know what becomes available down the road, but I'm already having to crawl through dungeons and so this is presently an issue for me.

My PC is an Archer. Right now I'm accompanied by a low-level Cleric, Mage, and Sorceror. I played through BG with Kagain acting as my main damage soak, but it seems like he's not availble for SoD.

I've tried to get others such as Minsc, Rassad, and Safana to come along with me, but they instantly leave due to my alignment.

So right now I'm stuck with four squishies and no thief abilities, desperately looking for more diversity in the evil NPCs than seems to exist.

Am I missing something, or has this been a problem for others?

TheArtisan

You can recruit Dorn later on. He's the best you get for a frontline.

kodaCollider

Woof.

Did they just assume everyone would be playing good?

Oh well.

Zilber

There are 7 good characters, 4 neutral, 4 evil.

Playing evil is all about not taking the easiest way to rewards, evil is characterised by setting aside discomfort for the greater good. Oh wait, no, that is good, with the most NPC's, class options, cheapest items and ease of play.

Beamdog did add two very nice evil NPC's though, nothing wrong with Baeloth and Dorn.

kodaCollider

Baeloth and Dorn are both okay in my book. I like them.

I just want to at least have access to a fighter class that I can slap a fat tower shield onto and then a thief.

Is there an evil thief? I'm not sure whether Safana is neutral or good, but she won't follow someone with a -2 reputation, regardless, so she's not much use to me.

Fardragon

Safana is CN, but I think it's worthy of a bug report, given that it is extremly difficult to play without a thief.

BG2 had the same issue though, until Beamdog added Hexxat.

SoD does give you the option of creating custom party members, but it's not ideal.

Don't discount Viconia as a front-liner. Boost her strength and give her the fat tower shield.

kodaCollider

I might be missing something about Viconia. In BG2 I've had her pretty tanky with plate armor and tower shields, but so far in SoD I've been unable to equip anything above a Small Shield onto her. Even the Medium Shield was red and unusable.

I kind of just assumed it was some rule change between BG1 and BG2.

Edit: Ah, it might be her strength score, as you mentioned. I didn't even think to check that for some reason.

lunar

Some enchanted big shields in bg2 have lower str requirements. Because it is magic. The usual ones are pretty heavy and requires 13-14 or more str IIRC.

Mikey205

Its her strength score. Unfortunately jaheira and khalid had my str increasing items but I had some ankheg armor I was able to slap on her. I guess its a bit unfair having minsc right at the start for good and neutral parties and nothing really for evil parties. Ah well...

fkirenicus

Evil and Neutral is soooo 2000. We go with the good guys, because they have the correct morals. You know, it's all about roleplaying. (snicker)

Fardragon

Even if you don't have a strength boosting item (gauntlets of ogre power are in default party equipment) Viconia has spells that can boost her strength. Even a temporary boost will allow her to equip heavy armour and shields.

Dharius

Safana should be ok for an evil party with sense and panache - if your reputation is going down too far you're being a jerk: if that means no thief, then tough

Fardragon

Actually, it's very easy for your rep to go down without being a jerk - just try recruiting two dark elves, a goblin and a blackguard. Starting from 10, that would be enough to make either thief quit permanently.

It wouldn't be an issue if annoyed characters went back to the camp until your rep was more acceptable, but they don't.

batoor

Yeah Viconia is a good frontliner, she's always been to me. Assuming you just buff her str a bit.

I miss some more evil char as well though... Especially a neutral or evil bard, considering how much love bards got in the item department.

Juris

If you play evil charname needs to be a thief or multi thief else you must take Safana which is not ok. You still have at least one neutral in the party. I feel your pain that the evil party lacks tanks - you can't get Dorn until about halfway through the game. Jaheira has helped a lot though. And yes, you must occasionally do 'good' things to keep your rep around a respectable '5'

Dharius

Aw c'mon, do you walk into a room of strangers at work/college/school and get disappointed because all philosophies aren't represented? Of course you don't you just get on with it. So shall it be in SoD

Also I'd argue that if you choose to hang out with Dorn, Baeloth & Viconia you are being jerkish, in a very real sense (not M'Khiin, she's nice) and deserve to lose your only thief as a result, just as if you choose to bring along Edwin you deserve to lose Minsc. That's my opinion. Why have everything your own way?

Rathenau

The argument doesn't hold water though. As an expansion to Baldur's Gate you should be able to recruit a party of good or evil (Or you can stay in the grey area). Now the good side has seven characters, that's two more then you'd need for a full party. Team evil only has four and that means you're one short for a full team. That seems like a major oversight.

Trying to compare the game to ever day life is madness anyway. Do you go out in the wilderness to hunt for dragons? Perhaps break into a home to rob the inhabitants of everything that isn't bolted down or on fire? I'd be thoroughly impressed if you did. If so, my next question would be if you have a fan club already.

Things don't need to go a certain way but as Baldur's Gate was designed with an alignment system and has enough characters to make a party of a particular general alignment it only stands to reason an expansion would follow suit in said design. It seems to be a lack of judgement or the design was implemented on the basis of the new companions the designers wanted to include.

Dharius

Rathenau said:

As an expansion to Baldur's Gate you should be able to recruit a party of good or evil (Or you can stay in the grey area).

Yes, but...why? Whoever said you should expect that in this expansion? And is trying to compare a work of human art (such as a computer game) to real life an act of madness? I think not, after all where did it come from in the first place? In fact I'd argue that I complete quests, hunt dragons (perhaps not break into people's houses) and right wrongs every day, figuratively.

So I stand by my opinions, and I'm sorry you don't agree. Please change your mind I don't as yet have a fan club, apart from myself, but I will let you join if you like.Also, I'd say trying to cover all bases in this way in a computer game, so that everything is balanced completely, is not only madness, it's bland.

Would you ask for another hand if you were dealt one in a game of poker? (Sorry I'm digressing)

Sirdent

Yeah I originally had a blackguard as my evil character. It helped on damage soaking but I didnt like listening to Safana complain (and it looks like she was probably going to leave anyways based on rep comments). When the MP bugs occured I started again with a second evil team, this time with a fighter/thief. Although I dont like the lower hp its easier knowing I wont have to listen to safana for as long (shes gone once I get dorn). Though it seems either way you are stuck with at least one neutral character, so if so, do any of the neutrals not complain and leave at very low rep?

Zilber

I must disagree, having no thief (thief! of all the classes that have something bad in them) represented severely limits a tree of play style. If there was an evil thief and a good thief, every party would be able to have one, and not having a thief is severly limiting.

This was @Dharius

kodaCollider

Yeah. Regardless of how you argue it, from a gameplay standpoint it seems like a pretty massive oversight to say, 'If you want to be evil, you better have rolled a thief.'

I'm not saying that everything needs to be created equal, I'm fine missing out on certain characters, items, and plot points because I decided to play a certain way -- that's how it should be -- but in terms of design there should also be incentives for playing the opposite side and it shouldn't stick you in a position where "Welp, you picked evil so your experience is going to suck, deal with it!"

Choosing to be good or evil should not boil down to 'the best way to play the game' vs. 'the worst way to play the game.' Either one you choose should simply play out as 'YOUR way to play the game.'

Sirdent

Disagree with who? I think we were on the same page, I had to start back over because I severely disliked having to keep Safana. It was either keep her in complaint mode or switch to a thief that could give and take damage in melee.

Thinking of it, if this was a table top game I was joining, and I was told there was two arcane casters, a cleric who rolled horribly for constitution a paladin who will be joining us in a few months and the other guy isnt sure but is leaning towards making a flirting rogue or a goblin shaman, I probably wouldnt want to join that game because 1 I know that party balance is going to be horrible for at least the first month, 2 Im going to have to play some sort of melee and depending on the thief it may have to be some sort of rogue, playing an arcane caster is probably a bad idea for balance, playing a cleric might be a good idea but I will probably have to memorize removals and heals exclusively with the low hp until the tank arrives.

Zilber

Sorry, I should have tagged the person I was replying to.

rapsam2003

Really, everyone got the short stick. The default "neutral party" includes Dorn, a neutral evil NPC who (as we find out in BG2) goes on a murderous rampage at a wedding when his demonic patron forces him to do so. In other words, the guy who is all about murder and mayhem is the default tank in a neutral party that doesn't have a solid tank as the PC.

Fact is, Beamdog elected to limit the NPC choices in SoD so that player would have more incentive to play the new SoD NPCs. I don't see the issue with that. Other than our new skald friend, who was admitted to being cut short in terms of content due to time constraints, the SoD NPCs feel well done.

Dharius

@rapsam2003 and @Sirdent definitely - we can't just run a fully neutral party either, or indeed a party of six dwarves, if that takes our fancy.

@Zilber I still think that not all avenues can be covered, and certainly not all the ones you expect, otherwise the devs would be there forever trying to please everyone. Sadly for you, in this case, this involves a thief-evil imbalance - if you're evil, and want to act evilly and surround yourself with evil people, then no thief: that in itself is a new avenue/tree, just one you don't like and didn't want (but I might give it a try) - defined by limitations rather than opportunities (but this doesn't necessarily make it bad), in the same way that certain NPC combinations just don't work owing to personalities, but can be modded to override

The current ways forward are to fix it are to run a character/party as a thief, mod an existing NPC as a thief, try it out to the bitter end without one (and hopefully be pleasantly surprised), or start a pressure group.

IWDEE/IWD is possible to run as a full game without a thief, rather well in fact.

rapsam2003

Dharius said:

IWDEE/IWD is possible to run as a full game without a thief, rather well in fact.

Hell, some people would argue that you can technically finish BG1 or 2 with only a mage using "Knock". More sane people (who enjoy less punishment) would tell you that a mage/thief is a perfectly viable build and more than easily done as a PC.

OR you could just deal with the constraint in SoD that your reputation can't fall to 2. That actually makes sense, if you think about it in term of the story. You're essentially the forefront of an army. No one wants to hear that the guy/gal leading the charge is so villainous that guards attack him/her on sight!

Dharius

rapsam2003 said:

Dharius said:

IWDEE/IWD is possible to run as a full game without a thief, rather well in fact.

Hell, some people would argue that you can technically finish BG1 or 2 with only a mage using "Knock". More sane people (who enjoy less punishment) would tell you that a mage/thief is a perfectly viable build and more than easily done as a PC.

OR you could just deal with the constraint in SoD that your reputation can't fall to 2. That actually makes sense, if you think about it in term of the story. You're essentially the forefront of an army. No one wants to hear that the guy/gal leading the charge is so villainous that guards attack him/her on sight!

What can I say, I'm bonkers

Totally agree with you on the rep considerations, I thought the same thing as I was driving to work... playing with reputation below 5 in any of these games is (and should be) difficult.

Fardragon

But in SoD, starting with a rep of 10, as you would with a "clean" neutral character, you can quickly get to a rep of 2 simply by not being racist about who you let into your party.

And I didn't come across that many opportunities to improve reputation.

Escarche

About improving reputation, as a goody-two shoes you can easily get from neutral to heroic. Only once though, because after killing peasant or two for my little bad guys and starting from 9 again, I ended game with 11.

Sirdent

I think my main issue isnt so much the reputation building, I think its more I felt like Beamdog taunts evil players by starting you trying to recruit a cleric/thief and then gives a cleric/thief to the good guys. Just give us Tiax (another of group of much missing shorties). The Bhaal/Cyric feud has many ways it could play out in this expansion that could be entertaining

Juris

They should've given us Montaran and Xzar instead of Edwin;)

Sirdent said:

I think my main issue isnt so much the reputation building, I think its more I felt like Beamdog taunts evil players by starting you trying to recruit a cleric/thief and then gives a cleric/thief to the good guys. Just give us Tiax (another of group of much missing shorties). The Bhaal/Cyric feud has many ways it could play out in this expansion that could be entertaining