New to the community, looking for a bit of discussion =D

Thayd

Hello everyone. I have never been apart of any Baldur's Gate type community, but I am in no way new to the game. BG and BG2 are by far my favorite games of all time. I simply fell in love with them from the moment I found myself in Candlekeep. While I have always loved the game, I have never really experimented much outside of strictly 1 role type classes. For example, I have played through several times as a fighter, and a couple as a sorc. I constantly see people mixing up the classes but for myself, I always saw this as somewhat of a hinderance. Besides the Kensai/Mage which I'm a tad ashamed of playing, BUT ONLY 1 TIME I SWEAR, what are your experiences with the different paths? Which mixtures to you find most effective and why? I'm definately interested in learning a bit more about the combinations and how you felt it may have changed the content for you.

Alderic

Hi there There are a lot of discussions on class dual and multi options on these forums. If you look a bit into the threads you should find them.

Effective options that come to mind are fighter/cleric for the awesome bonuses of priest self-enchancing spells to the fighter's raw combat skill and ranger/cleric for the (arguably overpowered) access to both cleric and druidic spells all combined with the ranger's overal fighter status.

rufus_hobart

Hiya @Thayd, and welcome.

To be honest, I'm probably not going to be too much help to you here, as I tend to get far more enjoyment out of playing single class characters then dual/multi-classing...nothing against those who swear by them, just doesn't suit my personal style of play...you definitely get a lot more abilities rolled into one character, at the expense of taking longer to level up, but that can be worth it to some people, particularly from a power gaming perspective. But yeah, from my limited experience and from those of others who love it, dualling fighters with mage, cleric or thief can be very handy, particularly in early stages of BG. As Alderic said, the ranger/cleric is also highly effective for a whole lot of spellpwer combined with fighting prowess

Have fun and experiment!

shawne

Rule #1 of RPGs: Play the character you want to play. Personally, I've always felt more of an affinity towards mage classes (since that tends to require a bit more strategy than just rushing the bad guys and mowing them down) so my first BG character, and the one I had the most fun with, was a Sorceress. But everyone has their own preference - both from gameplay and story perspectives - so, in the end, just do what you want to do.

Philhelm

I think I prefer pure classes, but I did a run as a thief/wizard, which was pretty fun. A lot of utility and interaction with the gaming environment, not to mention fireballs and backstabbing.

NWN_babaYaga

I´m a pure class player myself, I play Rangers and rogues the most time and the challenge to keep my rogues alive is an experience itself;)

loganultima

I play pure sorc...

trinit

wizards/sorc, thief, monk, cleric, fighter is my order of preference. i almost never use multiclass but i like dual classing a lot. still feels like focused character but with neat extra perks.

and i like the idea of character that started out as one thing and later found what really interests him.

Mungri

Theres no shame in playing an uber Kensai / MAge, the only shame is any expectation that every class should be evenly balanced.

Having soloed the game on 3 characters - Kensai / Mage, Cleric / Illusionist, and Swashbuckler / Mage, I can guarantee you that the Kensai / Mage is no more powerful than the other two, and IMO the Swashbuckler /Mage was the best as it didnt require traps, locks and secret door removals via mods like the other two did.

Pantalion

Fighter/Cleric or Druid: Tanking magic slinging armoured monstrosity.

Ranger/Cleric: Sort of like Fighter/Cleric, except even tankier and a serious Mage-killer with Creeping Doom. Full Druid + Cleric casting makes them one of the better non-mage classes in the game without time stop shenanigans.

Fighter/Thief: Lightly armoured fighter, backstab monkey, with pretty much all the benefits of being a pure thief as well. Think Stalker for overall tankiness, with more stealth utility and no spells.

Fighter/Mage/Thief: Do everything, just two levels lower than a pure class.

Mage/Cleric: Absolute spellcasting domination. Pretty well as squishy as anything, but can wear helmets and shields. Which is nice.

Fighter/Mage: Less brokenhax than the Kensai > Mage. Mage though, so still brokenhax. Instead of armour, uses combat buffs for melee survival.

Mage/Thief: Sneak around, unleash glorious death, resume sneaking around, save thief skill points from never having to pick a lock. Not ideal for frontline combat unless you're rocking a Swashbuckler kit in there.

Fighter/Mage/Cleric: Like a Mage/Cleric, except much worse unless you remove the XP cap and power level. Hard.

Cleric/Thief: Lightly armoured sneaky healer that backstabs with staves of striking for full glorious effect.

Did I miss any?

Incidentally, I don't single class unless it's a Wildmage, Sorcerer, or Bard (kit). I always feel like I'm missing out on more things I could be doing without significantly losing anything from my other role(s).

BelgarathMTH

@Thayd, welcome to the forums! You've come to the right place to discuss all matters related to BG. This community is awesome!

I often play both single-classed and multi-classed characters. I like the flexibility of the multi-class, but I usually start to really miss that extra spell level for all the different phases of the game. That is, throughout most of the game, if you are a multi-class caster, you are going to be one spell level behind what you would have had access to if you were a single-class. So my preference is single-class characters.

I don't like to dual class. I know a lot of people swear by it, but I can't stand that huge swath of game material where you are essentially back to level one and have lost all your former powers. Some people play for the end game, but I like to have a fun, balanced experience throughout. Plus, I kind of prefer lower level play anyway. All that bizarre planes-hopping and fighting demons, dragons, and elder orbs, just isn't as much fun for me as good old travelling the beautiful countryside, securing it from goblins, kobolds, orcs, hobgoblins, gnolls, and ogres.

Oxford_Guy

I'm not a fan of dual-classing, except sometimes to add 3 levels of fighter at the start to help some builds, though I think it depends on which game you're starting with. I think a lot of comments on other forums assume you're starting in BG2, so you don't have the whole tedium of playing BG1 with a class that is horrible to play in BG1 (e.g. Kensai) or which at best, is not the class you really want to be (I experienced this when playing a Swashie in BG1, just so I could be a Swashie>Mage in BG2, when what I really wanted to do was to cast spells without being to squishie in combat). I also don't like much the idea of having to stop in one class.

The last long game I played (from BG1 into the first half of BG2) was as a pure-class (halfling) Assassin, it was fun and challenging, but by BG2 was starting to get annoying going Swish-Swish alot and not being able to hit anything... Pure class (or even kit) thieves I think are quite hard to play at higher levels, and I would be tempted to multi-class a thief if playing one again.

One of my most fun games (only though part of BG1, though, using BGT) was as an evil halfling cleric of Talos, I didn't enter melee much, focused on ranged spells and my sling. I'd consider running that class again, or perhaps a Dwarf Fighter/Cleric or half-elf Ranger/Cleric (maybe restricting myself to <Level 4 Druid spells). I also much prefer Viconia (a pure-class Cleric) than Jaheira (a fighter/druid) as an NPC, partly because I prefer the range and number of spells Viccy has, but its also down to personality.

I like arcane magic, though, and elves, so am going to play my first proper run through BGEE (and hopefully through to BG2EE) with a female evil elf fighter/mage multi class, which I've spent some time thinking about. I'm also interested, though, in having a go with a gnome or half-orc cleric/thief, as I think this multiclass looks interesting, but not OP. There's been a thread on this recently.

Thayd

Mungri said:

Having soloed the game on 3 characters - Kensai / Mage, Cleric / Illusionist, and Swashbuckler / Mage, I can guarantee you that the Kensai / Mage is no more powerful than the other two, and IMO the Swashbuckler /Mage was the best as it didnt require traps, locks and secret door removals via mods like the other two did.

I really enjoy the idea of the solo playthrough, although I've only done it one time. I think that swashbuckler mage sounds like a plan, I'll have to give that a whirl.

Thanks everyone for all of your feedback.