Thoughts on Shamans in SoA + ToB?

Thrasymachus

I'm playing a shaman right now in BG1 and quite enjoying it. (It helps that he's a dagger-throwing half-orc with 19 Strength...heh.)

Does anyone here have any experience with the class in BG2? Any thoughts or strategies to share? Is there a HLA ability that is particularly excellent or lame?

I'm looking forward to having him meet up with Wilson for a shaman+bear friendship.

Thanks!

Lord_Tansheron

From a powergaming perspective, Shamans don't really add anything all that useful. Their abilities are fairly weak compared to alternatives, particularly multi/dual class combinations.

From a non-PG perspective, play what you find fun. Shamans do have a lot of special gear added to drops in BG2, so they're fully supported.

Gallowglass

I haven't yet tried a full run with a Shaman protagonist (although I've got one rolled up and waiting to start!), so my comments are only theoretical.

As is well-known, the low-level Druidic spells are unimpressive, so I don't expect a Shaman to be strong in BG1ee, but the summoning powers might be the most useful feature at low levels. (I'm therefore quite reassured to hear that @Thrasymachus is nevertheless finding his Shaman satisfactory.)

As experience with M'Khiin demonstrates, a Shaman at SoD levels knows enough spells (especially a couple of the Shaman-only ones) to be quite useful as caster, although I've found M'Khiin's summoning powers quite feeble against SoD-level enemies.

In BG2ee, I'd expect a Shaman to be a little weak for much of SoA, as physical-combat abilities fall further behind the warrior classes, summons will remain outclassed by the enemies, and casting-power will improve only gradually.

However, for late-SoA and ToB, when the Shaman will be able to cast more of the high-level Druidic spells (which include several very good ones, unlike the low-level selection), I'd expect a Shaman to be a seriously useful caster.

(But as I said at the start, I haven't yet tested most of this, so I may well be wrong!)

argent77

I have just finished a complete EET run with a shaman. It's a nice class if a bit too balanced and therefore somewhat boring. (See here and there.)

In a nutshell, shamans are average fighters, the (druidic) spell selection in BG/BG2 is in large parts rather unimpressive compared to clerics or mages, and the spirits summoned by their Shamanic Dance become less useful as you progress in BG2-SoA (even more so in ToB). However, since they use a spell system similar to sorcerers you will have a lot of high-level spells available late in the game which helps a lot.

StefanO

Please have a look at the Will of Wisps - Shamanic Enhancements mod for BG2EE. The mod includes a shamanic stronghold and NPC.

Nuin

Druids spells are, in fact, pretty good otherwise mods like SCS wouldn't be nerfing them. The problem is that the druid spell selection caters to diversity since many of the spells have specific requirements (eg. Call Lightning, the animal spells) or become very powerful at different parts of the game (eg. Insect Plague, Call Woodland Beings).
The shaman suffers greatly from this lack of versatility, and the dance doesn't really make up for it. It's been repeatedly pointed out that the dance modal should just allow movement at higher levels, like the bard song.

That said, the class actually does very well in early BG1 because of Entangle and Charm Person or Mammal spammage. It starts to fall behind around mid-SoA, when your spells often end up either redundant or unnecessary because you can't really adapt. It takes a while for them to bounce back but after that they play a lot like just any other druid, which gets a ton of extra spell slots after beating their own XP wall.

Thrasymachus

StefanO said:

Please have a look at the Will of Wisps - Shamanic Enhancements mod for BG2EE. The mod includes a shamanic stronghold and NPC.

Reading about that mod is partially what motivated me to try out a shaman.

I also will be using the "improved shamanic dance" mod by Argent77 (I'm using an earlier version in BG1+SoD).

Thrasymachus

Nuin said:

...The shaman suffers greatly from this lack of versatility...

How much of a problem is this though? There are only a small number of druid spells per level that are really useful (IME), even 'situational' ones (like call lightning), so this does not strike me as a huge downside for the shaman. I've found the unique shaman spells to be pretty useful as well.

Nuin

It's a problem for a lot of the game. Like I said, the thing about the druid spell selection is that it caters to diversity. It's a mix of defensive/debuffing/offensive spells that, while powerful, are also much more situational compared to a wizard's/sorcerer's. As a result you have to change your tactics depending on what you're fighting.
Druid offensive spells are much, much more effective against humanoid targets, for example, and a druid can tackle some of the trickier humanoid fights as soon as you escape from Irenicus' Dungeon thanks to spells like Call Woodland Beings. Priest defensive spells, on the other hand, favor spell setups (Protection from Fire + fire spells on the tank, Free Action + Web and Entangle, Protection from Lightning + Wand of Lightning). This allows the druid to switch to a very effective complementary role against non-humanoids. And of course, we have the healing and summoning spells.

In the shaman's case, it's incredibly annoying when you basically have nothing but nymphs when you're fighting undead (vamps) or trolls, for example - in the same situation a druid can simply shift to a buffing/defensive role. It's a constant problem that only eases up as you get to higher levels, but like I said after the druid beats their own XP wall they start getting a ton of extra spell slots. They even get HLAs faster than any other class, for a while.

Arguably you can get over that mid-level hurdle by hiring a second divine caster to complement your shaman, so you only have to focus on spells that the other character cannot afford to cast repeatedly. This is what I did with my runs, and it had mixed results. On one hand , there were times when my shaman was incredibly effective at tackling things that were vulnerable to the types of spells I picked. On the other, there were times where I just stood there auto-attacking with a sling while waiting for one of my fire elementals to die so I could resummon a new one, or something.

The shaman spells are... nice. I would have gone for something like powerful but temporary party-wide effects myself (ala Defensive Harmony) but the ones you get are just OK.

WarChiefZeke

If you have nothing but vanilla BG2, shamans are underpowered.

I roll with the iwdification mod personally, and it makes them a lot more fun and viable at all levels. It basically brings in all the sweet druidic damage spells from Icewind Dale, among other things, but that's what I use it for.

Things like Static Charge do great damage over time without you having to recast and Whirlwind is a great disabler over time, so you can focus on your dancing.

Thrasymachus

@WarChiefZeke thanks for the suggestion regarding the IWDification mod. I'll think about it for the BG2 portion, but I worry that it may be overpowering.

I have installed the option from CDtweaks which gives druids -- and thus shamans -- the following cleric spells: Sanctuary, Chant, Zone of Sweet Air, Glyph of Warding, and Righteous Magic. Many of those obviously are quite helpful.