Favorite BG 1 NPC you wish was in BG 2

disgruntledgamer

Also includes NPCs that were in BG 1 that were in BG 2 just not playable like Coran, Xzar & Safana

IchigoRXC

Tiax and Xan. Both of which say the funniest of things

Koson

Xan & Kivan

Btw there is a similar thread at http://forum.baldursgate.com/discussion/4536/favourite-bg1-npcs-to-appear-in-bg2-the-poll/p1 , guess they should be merged.

Jaxsbudgie

Dayum you Koson!

LadyEibhilinRhett

Xan. I'd love him to be playable in BG2, like in a professional-like way, not just modded in. Though at the same time I'm actually glad he wasn't originally included as a major playable character in BG2, because then they would have done a new portrait for him, and it probably would have looked ridiculous. He'd have like scars and earrings and ten gajillion doodads in his hair, just like the rest of the BG2 crew, and I just wouldn't be able to take him seriously at all.

salieri

Hmmmm, well I had a glimmer of hope that Xzar was going to join when I did his quest at the harper hold, but then remembered that he wasn't n the manual so couldn't possibly. That would have been fun. I think revealing who the npcs are before you even start kind of takes the fun out of recruitment. You already know someone is joinable as soon as you meet them.

Also Quayle.

Permidion_Stark

The short answer is all of them.

I felt totally cheated when I found that characters had either died off-screen (Khalid, Dyanheir, Montaron); disappeared altogether (Alora, Eldoth, Skie); or become bit-part players (Garrick, Ajantis, Safana, Xzar).

Baldur's Gate was a classic. BG2 pissed on it from a great height.

Shin

Dynaheir I guess, though her end makes her romance very special. Many of the BG1 NPCs are brought into BG2 in very well-crafted ways through mods, too.

Kitteh_On_A_Cloud

I had hoped I could recruit Xzar again, as he's one of my favourite characters and I always let him join my party in BG 1. I thought his backstory was interesting and always wanted to know why exactly the Nashkel mines interested him and Monty so much. They could've deepened his personality that way too. Oh well, not the end of the world for me.
@Permidion_Stark: With all due respect and understanding, I think calling BG 2 'pissing on BG 1' is a HUGE generalization and not fair at all just because you couldn't recruit all of BG 1's characters again. It would have made the story too complicated and there would have been too many loose ends anyway. Therefore I just make up the reasons for certain characters 'leaving the party' at the end of BG 1's story myself. Besides, BG 2 had new characters which also interested me, although, I admit, they lacked a bit of the charm the BG 1 characters had. Still, Baldur's Gate 2 had so much more to offer, such as an intruiging story and beautiful new locations.

HaHaCharade

Kagain being replaced by his roided up cousin/brother/clone, Korgan still bothers me. I liked the greedy, gold-hungry Dwarven merchant. It was like they tried to upgrade an already fine NPC.

HaHaCharade

Kitteh_On_A_Cloud said:

I had hoped I could recruit Xzar again, as he's one of my favourite characters and I always let him join my party in BG 1. I thought his backstory was interesting and always wanted to know why exactly the Nashkel mines interested him and Monty so much. been too many loose ends aThey could've deepened his personality that way too. Oh well, not the end of the world for me.

I loved Xzar too and both he and Monty's fate in BG2 was sad to me.

I did think it was adequately explained that Xzar and Monty were interested in the Nashkel mines because their employers were. They worked for the Zhentarim and were assigned to find out what was going on and how it would impact that evil organization's plans for the region. As a general rule of thumb, if the Zhents aren't behind it, they want to know who is.

Shin

Actually they were sent by the Zhentarim because Sarevok - through Tazok - had told all the mercenaries and bandits working for them to claim zhentish allegiance when caught, to avoid blame falling on the Iron Throne. When word of this got back to Zhentil Keep they obviously wanted to know what was going on, and sent someone to investigate.

I also don't feel BG2 was worse than (and certainly not pissing on) BG. I usually see BG as a great introduction to the trilogy, but BG2 is where I feel things really get serious.

Permidion_Stark

Kitteh_On_A_Cloud said:

I had hoped I could recruit Xzar again, as he's one of my favourite characters and I always let him join my party in BG 1. I thought his backstory was interesting and always wanted to know why exactly the Nashkel mines interested him and Monty so much. They could've deepened his personality that way too. Oh well, not the end of the world for me.
@Permidion_Stark: With all due respect and understanding, I think calling BG 2 'pissing on BG 1' is a HUGE generalization and not fair at all just because you couldn't recruit all of BG 1's characters again. It would have made the story too complicated and there would have been too many loose ends anyway. Therefore I just make up the reasons for certain characters 'leaving the party' at the end of BG 1's story myself. Besides, BG 2 had new characters which also interested me, although, I admit, they lacked a bit of the charm the BG 1 characters had. Still, Baldur's Gate 2 had so much more to offer, such as an intruiging story and beautiful new locations.

I don't think it is a huge generalisation: I think it is pretty gosh-darned specific. We're in the middle of a trilogy and suddenly we find a bunch of the major characters have either died or disappeared somewhere between volume one and volume two. It annoyed me when Cormac McCarthy and the Coen Brothers did it in 'No Country For Old Men' - but they were trying to be avant garde; when it was done in Baldur's Gate 2 it just smacked of ineptitude.

Mungri

I'll have to say montaron and coran simply because there aren't enough thieves in BG2.

Jaxsbudgie

I can't choose one, I can however choose four - Eldoth, Skie, Shar-Teel and Xzar.

Eldoth & Skie would have been ace (pretty sure I've said this countless times before), but I enjoyed partnered NPCs, added a small glimmer of role-playing, plus I love the relationship between these two. Eldoth's stats could do with a slight boost, mostly intelligence and dexterity, Skie on the other hand has totally fine stats, they'd both be very useful additions to any party. The chauvinistic Bard and his noble Thief girlfriend, stuff of legends.

Shar-Teel simply because she's evil, a very competent Fighter and has the scope to be an even more competent Thief. I also liked her involvement with the late-game story and she is definitely unlike any character I've ever encountered.

Xzar because ... well, I'm sure I don't need to mention why. I always wanted to know and hear more from him, BG1 only whetted my appetite. It'd be nice if his wisdom was bumped up by 1 point, giving players the option of dualling him over to Cleric. I think his stats are fine as they are.

Archaos

Montaron.

Want me to elaborate? Neutral Evil, Fighter/Thief, great stats, great personality and quotes. Exactly what we need for an evil party.

Xzar would be redundant with Edwin, just like he was in BG1, even though I LOVE his quotes and portrait.
Tiax would be redundant also. Another crazy multiclass gnome Thief? We already have a clone with Nalia.
Maybe Shar-Teel. We could dual her to Thief also. Unfortunately, anything she does, Sarevok does better.
Maybe Safana as a Swashbuckler. She would replace Yoshimo.
Kivan would be awesome as an Archer Ranger, also.

Most of the others have nothing special about them or have died.

Quartz

HaHaCharade said:

Kagain being replaced by his roided up cousin/brother/clone, Korgan still bothers me. I liked the greedy, gold-hungry Dwarven merchant. It was like they tried to upgrade an already fine NPC.

You sir get an Insightful for that. Korgan is the one thing that bothers me the absolute most about BGII. They just took Kagain, and blatantly REPLACED him, and it was disgraceful and disgusting. Whoever's idea that was, should be shot.

Also @Permidion_Stark, props for great posts in this thread. Keep rockin'.

elminster

Alora. Most players probably have never even used her. I will admit I never have, because unless you are playing hardcore with no resurrections of any kind, or at a difficulty where your party members are being killed on critical hits and as such resurrections aren't an option, its pretty difficult to not run into a thief you can use in that game before you can get her. Heck, you are more likely to get access to Tiax before you get her. Thats not even including people you can always dual class into a thief as needed (Shar-Teel comes to mind).

Then of course by the time you get Alora her stats are decided for you, and not in a way that is going to be what you want out of your main thief. So basically, I'd love to see her included in BG2 somehow.