Bash somebody upside the head with a quarterstaff, that'll mess them up. Do the same thing with a mace and they'll probably walk away just fine.
To be honest, I agree with this.
But I always RP this like this: to make sneak attacks you need to make precision strikes into critical points of the body of your enemies, so you cannot do it with all weapons: Axes, maces or warhammers do not cut it, too much contact surface. Greatswords, bastard sword and greataxes are too big; etc.
No reason why you can´t do it with a crosbow or a bow, though. Just make a headshot.
Newer versions of D&D addressed that in several ways.
That's the thing, though--a bastard sword is only slightly larger than a long sword! The 3E changes and Item Revisions' changes make more sense, changing multipliers to bonus sneak attack dice and offering scaling multiplier penalties for larger weapons, respectively.
To be honest, I agree with this.
But I always RP this like this: to make sneak attacks you need to make precision strikes into critical points of the body of your enemies, so you cannot do it with all weapons: Axes, maces or warhammers do not cut it, too much contact surface.
No reason why you can´t do it with a crosbow or a bow, though. Just make a headshot.
that would be great, at least from a RP point of view, but sadly if is very fun to play in other games like the elder scrolls ones with BG mechanics would be just OP.
and further more a thief can stab with some weapon types like ninja to or staff, but if it happens that the particular weapons use is restricted to some other class and the thief can use it trough UAI he is not able to stab with it.
a lot of things about stabbing and other thief abilities force us to a huge suspension of disbelief, like a hidden in shadows thief that walk right in front of an enemy in full light unnoticed, but with a timer to do it.
but even if it is a nonsense it has reasons, think what a thief could do as he become able to use the SoTM...
(roughly the same that he can actually do with a mislead scroll... ).
playing thieves force to that big suspension of disbelief and still i find it the most fun to play class, even more fun then the casters with their complex magic system.
To be honest, I agree with this.
But I always RP this like this: to make sneak attacks you need to make precision strikes into critical points of the body of your enemies, so you cannot do it with all weapons: Axes, maces or warhammers do not cut it, too much contact surface.
No reason why you can´t do it with a crosbow or a bow, though. Just make a headshot.
that would be great, at least from a RP point of view, but sadly if is very fun to play in other games like the elder scrolls ones with BG mechanics would be just OP.
and further more a thief can stab with some weapon types like ninja to or staff, but if it happens that the particular weapons use is restricted to some other class and the thief can use it trough UAI he is not able to stab with it.
a lot of things about stabbing and other thief abilities force us to a huge suspension of disbelief, like a hidden in shadows thief that walk right in front of an enemy in full light unnoticed, but with a timer to do it.
but even if it is a nonsense it has reasons, think what a thief could do as he become able to use the SoTM...
(roughly the same that he can actually do with a mislead scroll... ).
playing thieves force to that big suspension of disbelief and still i find it the most fun to play class, even more fun then the casters with their complex magic system.
"Dispel Invisibility" type spells will also undo a thief's stealth, so I think stealth might legit just be a form of invisibility in the game. It's not like some games where you're supposed to imagine that you're hidden behind a bush or something but they just haven't translated that properly into a gameplay mechanic. You're legit right in front of their face and using some kind of thiefy unmagic to be unseen anyway.
"Dispel Invisibility" type spells will also undo a thief's stealth, so I think stealth might legit just be a form of invisibility in the game. It's not like some games where you're supposed to imagine that you're hidden behind a bush or something but they just haven't translated that properly into a gameplay mechanic. You're legit right in front of their face and using some kind of thiefy unmagic to be unseen anyway.
This is why I can only use a shadow dancer for stealth.
"Dispel Invisibility" type spells will also undo a thief's stealth, so I think stealth might legit just be a form of invisibility in the game. It's not like some games where you're supposed to imagine that you're hidden behind a bush or something but they just haven't translated that properly into a gameplay mechanic. You're legit right in front of their face and using some kind of thiefy unmagic to be unseen anyway.
This is why I can only use a shadow dancer for stealth.
In Pen and Paper shadowdancers can only hide in plain sight if there are some shadows nearby. It makes sense because you're sort of wrapping the shadows around you and seamlessly disappearing.
Baldur's Gate didn't implement that, so it's a bit weird to picture you're just standing there in broad daylight, and then you wrap the shadows around yourself, but your shadowy form still very clearly stands out against the surrounding daylight. Enemies are like "Where'd you go?!"
"Dispel Invisibility" type spells will also undo a thief's stealth, so I think stealth might legit just be a form of invisibility in the game. It's not like some games where you're supposed to imagine that you're hidden behind a bush or something but they just haven't translated that properly into a gameplay mechanic. You're legit right in front of their face and using some kind of thiefy unmagic to be unseen anyway.
This is why I can only use a shadow dancer for stealth.
In Pen and Paper shadowdancers can only hide in plain sight if there are some shadows nearby. It makes sense because you're sort of wrapping the shadows around you and seamlessly disappearing.
Baldur's Gate didn't implement that, so it's a bit weird to picture you're just standing there in broad daylight, and then you wrap the shadows around yourself, but your shadowy form still very clearly stands out against the surrounding daylight. Enemies are like "Where'd you go?!"
Unless they are mages or clerics, because it seems they like to cast "true sight" every 5 minutes for unknown reasons. Just in case.
I suppose no matter your hide/move silently skill or invisibility status they can hear you anyway.
Unless they are mages or clerics, because it seems they like to cast "true sight" every 5 minutes for unknown reasons. Just in case.
I suppose no matter your hide/move silently skill or invisibility status they can hear you anyway.
This actually got changed in 3.X (not sure if it carried forward to later editions). True Sight in 3.X only reveals magically concealed items/creatures/objects. It would reveal a door hidden by an illusion, for instance, but not one that was cleverly painted to look like a wall. Likewise, while it would let you see an invisible wizard, it would not let you see the Thief that was hiding inside the wardrobe with a crossbow trained on you (and since a Thief's Hide skill is considered non-magical, it means that True Sight is useless against stealthed Thieves).
Yeah, IIRC Pixie dust and glitterdust and faerie fire reveal hidden thieves, though.
ed: Faerie fire makes you unable to go invisible, does not reveal =P
takes Thalantyr of High Hedge a good 50 some odd years to become a level 17 wizard
takes charname at best 1 year to get through; all of BG1 and going everywhere and doing everything and then also exploring the BG 2 area and doing everything and going everywhere, and the time you hit suldenesselar, its been less than a year since candlekeep and you are now the same level if not higher level than thalantyr,
and then don't worry, in another 100 days you will become even higher level than elminster himself, good thing that ONLY took him around 2000 years or so, shazam
My guess: the Bhaal's essence makes Charname capable of increasing his/her abilities at a faster rate, like learning quicker, becoming stronger and tougher with time etc. this also attracts greater opponents, that give more experience when you beat them (the more difficult your challenge is, the more you learn when you overcome it), so there is some sort of positive feedback, an exponential growth of difficulties and gains. Besides, that power irradiates and being close to Charname helps becoming powerful too.
Is seriously nobody going to explain to me the underground trees thing?
The only two things I can think that you might be talking about is either the Tree of Life in Suldanesselar which isn't underground because the entire city in hidden within the trees which are all above ground or the tree in the Underground River which is actually just the roots of the tree and not the actual tree part.
My guess: the Bhaal's essence makes Charname capable of increasing his/her abilities at a faster rate, like learning quicker, becoming stronger and tougher with time etc...
this is not the first time i hear this theory, but i disagree.
the reason is that the other party members, that lack of bhaal's essence gain xp and levels just as fast and to think that the essence has a so powerful effect that irradiates also on the people that live near charname seem to me very unlikely.
i prefer to think that the only reason why my charnames can go from 89k xp at the beginning of soa to 8M xp end game is that we players want to see a progress, a constant improvement. so our party, the enemies that we find and even the equipment are set to this completely not logical way.
completely not logical, but very fun to play, i accept it but don't try to build RP rationalizations for it.
My guess: the Bhaal's essence makes Charname capable of increasing his/her abilities at a faster rate, like learning quicker, becoming stronger and tougher with time etc...
this is not the first time i hear this theory, but i disagree.
the reason is that the other party members, that lack of bhaal's essence gain xp and levels just as fast and to think that the essence has a so powerful effect that irradiates also on the people that live near charname seem to me very unlikely.
i prefer to think that the only reason why my charnames can go from 89k xp at the beginning of soa to 8M xp end game is that we players want to see a progress, a constant improvement. so our party, the enemies that we find and even the equipment are set to this completely not logical way.
completely not logical, but very fun to play, i accept it but don't try to build RP rationalizations for it.
i would say this goes for any RPG really, you and your group of chums start off as lowly peasants and by the end of any RPG game your are basically killing some sort of god like entity, which realistically is exactly not that; realistic
but that is the reason why we play RPGs, growing up levels, destroying cool baddies, pickin up cewl items, perhaps even enjoying the story, so thats just a consequence for the genre
My guess: the Bhaal's essence makes Charname capable of increasing his/her abilities at a faster rate, like learning quicker, becoming stronger and tougher with time etc...
this is not the first time i hear this theory, but i disagree.
the reason is that the other party members, that lack of bhaal's essence gain xp and levels just as fast and to think that the essence has a so powerful effect that irradiates also on the people that live near charname seem to me very unlikely.
i prefer to think that the only reason why my charnames can go from 89k xp at the beginning of soa to 8M xp end game is that we players want to see a progress, a constant improvement. so our party, the enemies that we find and even the equipment are set to this completely not logical way.
completely not logical, but very fun to play, i accept it but don't try to build RP rationalizations for it.
If anything it's more of a Protagonist thing.
It doesn't make an interesting story to spend an eternity killing small safe mooks before you're ready to tackle the large exciting challenges.
Stories tend to escalate. So you'll deal with one threat, then you'll deal with a bigger threat, then a bigger one, each time finding conveniently that you've grown just strong enough to thwart this newer stronger villain.
While the rest of the world must train in unexciting ways for slow gradual growth, the player and their companions face theatrical challenges and the rapid growth will almost be an afterthought.
It's understood that Drizzt for example, has an inherent strength within him, so when they go into the backstory for how he became so cool, it'll mostly be a matter of bringing out the strength that was inside him all along. Allowing them to take various shortcuts without straining the reader's disbelief. Ie, he picked up the double scimitars and they just felt natural in his hands, as if he'd been born to wield them.
Baldur's Gate logic: giant hole explodes in highly populated area of the city; only gets the attention of two spectators.
That's some of what I was talking about with your fame in Siege of Dragonspear being weird.
Nowhere else in the series are your actions treated as quite as noteworthy as that. You and your companions escape from a dungeon under the city in a massive explosion that causes property damage all around, immediately get into a confrontation with an archmage that results in one of your companions being taken away by the authorities, and it's not like people don't notice. It catches the ears of the people who are interested in that sort of stuff. But it's not like every commoner going about their business thinks your particular hijinks are the most interesting thing to ever happen to the city.
This won't even be the only underground dungeon unearthed this week. Not a ten minute's walk from your escape Keldorn is already investigating The Cult of the Unseeing Eye and their massive underground lair built into the sewers.
Maybe the people just run away from the explosion, the mage´s battle with Irenicus or they want to stay away from Cowled mages´ business.
Or maybe they are just tired of seeing strange things. The bartenders are still serving, and the merchants seem unfazed too. When a giant sphere appears in the middle of the slums there are only a few people there, and one of them even tries to sell the sphere to you. It´s like "Yeah, yeah, another magical disruption, Just do not bother me unless infernal machines of Avernus appear, I need to finish this work before noon"
Some actual logic in that scene: the shadow thief who legs it the second he sees Irenicus turn his buddy into mush. He quite correctly deduced that sometimes the best place to be is anywhere but where you currently are.
Davaeorn, an extremely dangerous level 11 Mage with stupendous magical powers = 6000 XP
Greater Basilisk, a stupid looking lizardy thing that a level 1 Noober could kill using appropriate protection = 7000 XP
Total sense.
For what it's worth, I usually fight Davaeorn about the same way I fight basilisks, by chugging some manner of anti-magic potion and whacking him until he dies.
Davaeorn, an extremely dangerous level 11 Mage with stupendous magical powers = 6000 XP
Greater Basilisk, a stupid looking lizardy thing that a level 1 Noober could kill using appropriate protection = 7000 XP
Total sense.
For what it's worth, I usually fight Davaeorn about the same way I fight basilisks, by chugging some manner of anti-magic potion and whacking him until he dies.
Sometimes it's fun to stand still at the entrance and fire of fireballs to the area you think he will teleport to next. It kinda feels like playing tennis. Especially fun if one of your NPCs with boots of haste is running around after him trying to chuck him. Then it feels like a Benny Hill scene.
Sometimes it's fun to stand still at the entrance and fire of fireballs to the area you think he will teleport to next. It kinda feels like playing tennis. Especially fun if one of your NPCs with boots of haste is running around after him trying to chuck him. Then it feels like a Benny Hill scene.
Sometimes it's fun to stand still at the entrance and fire of fireballs to the area you think he will teleport to next. It kinda feels like playing tennis. Especially fun if one of your NPCs with boots of haste is running around after him trying to chuck him. Then it feels like a Benny Hill scene.
Remind me to never play tennis with you.
You never played tennis with a randomized timer bomb inside the ball?!
Comments
But I always RP this like this: to make sneak attacks you need to make precision strikes into critical points of the body of your enemies, so you cannot do it with all weapons: Axes, maces or warhammers do not cut it, too much contact surface. Greatswords, bastard sword and greataxes are too big; etc.
No reason why you can´t do it with a crosbow or a bow, though. Just make a headshot.
Newer versions of D&D addressed that in several ways.
and further more a thief can stab with some weapon types like ninja to or staff, but if it happens that the particular weapons use is restricted to some other class and the thief can use it trough UAI he is not able to stab with it.
a lot of things about stabbing and other thief abilities force us to a huge suspension of disbelief, like a hidden in shadows thief that walk right in front of an enemy in full light unnoticed, but with a timer to do it.
but even if it is a nonsense it has reasons, think what a thief could do as he become able to use the SoTM...
(roughly the same that he can actually do with a mislead scroll...
playing thieves force to that big suspension of disbelief and still i find it the most fun to play class, even more fun then the casters with their complex magic system.
"Dispel Invisibility" type spells will also undo a thief's stealth, so I think stealth might legit just be a form of invisibility in the game. It's not like some games where you're supposed to imagine that you're hidden behind a bush or something but they just haven't translated that properly into a gameplay mechanic. You're legit right in front of their face and using some kind of thiefy unmagic to be unseen anyway.
This is why I can only use a shadow dancer for stealth.
In Pen and Paper shadowdancers can only hide in plain sight if there are some shadows nearby. It makes sense because you're sort of wrapping the shadows around you and seamlessly disappearing.
Baldur's Gate didn't implement that, so it's a bit weird to picture you're just standing there in broad daylight, and then you wrap the shadows around yourself, but your shadowy form still very clearly stands out against the surrounding daylight. Enemies are like "Where'd you go?!"
Unless they are mages or clerics, because it seems they like to cast "true sight" every 5 minutes for unknown reasons. Just in case.
I suppose no matter your hide/move silently skill or invisibility status they can hear you anyway.
This actually got changed in 3.X (not sure if it carried forward to later editions). True Sight in 3.X only reveals magically concealed items/creatures/objects. It would reveal a door hidden by an illusion, for instance, but not one that was cleverly painted to look like a wall. Likewise, while it would let you see an invisible wizard, it would not let you see the Thief that was hiding inside the wardrobe with a crossbow trained on you (and since a Thief's Hide skill is considered non-magical, it means that True Sight is useless against stealthed Thieves).
ed: Faerie fire makes you unable to go invisible, does not reveal =P
My guess: the Bhaal's essence makes Charname capable of increasing his/her abilities at a faster rate, like learning quicker, becoming stronger and tougher with time etc. this also attracts greater opponents, that give more experience when you beat them (the more difficult your challenge is, the more you learn when you overcome it), so there is some sort of positive feedback, an exponential growth of difficulties and gains. Besides, that power irradiates and being close to Charname helps becoming powerful too.
The only two things I can think that you might be talking about is either the Tree of Life in Suldanesselar which isn't underground because the entire city in hidden within the trees which are all above ground or the tree in the Underground River which is actually just the roots of the tree and not the actual tree part.
the reason is that the other party members, that lack of bhaal's essence gain xp and levels just as fast and to think that the essence has a so powerful effect that irradiates also on the people that live near charname seem to me very unlikely.
i prefer to think that the only reason why my charnames can go from 89k xp at the beginning of soa to 8M xp end game is that we players want to see a progress, a constant improvement. so our party, the enemies that we find and even the equipment are set to this completely not logical way.
completely not logical, but very fun to play, i accept it but don't try to build RP rationalizations for it.
i would say this goes for any RPG really, you and your group of chums start off as lowly peasants and by the end of any RPG game your are basically killing some sort of god like entity, which realistically is exactly not that; realistic
but that is the reason why we play RPGs, growing up levels, destroying cool baddies, pickin up cewl items, perhaps even enjoying the story, so thats just a consequence for the genre
If anything it's more of a Protagonist thing.
It doesn't make an interesting story to spend an eternity killing small safe mooks before you're ready to tackle the large exciting challenges.
Stories tend to escalate. So you'll deal with one threat, then you'll deal with a bigger threat, then a bigger one, each time finding conveniently that you've grown just strong enough to thwart this newer stronger villain.
While the rest of the world must train in unexciting ways for slow gradual growth, the player and their companions face theatrical challenges and the rapid growth will almost be an afterthought.
It's understood that Drizzt for example, has an inherent strength within him, so when they go into the backstory for how he became so cool, it'll mostly be a matter of bringing out the strength that was inside him all along. Allowing them to take various shortcuts without straining the reader's disbelief. Ie, he picked up the double scimitars and they just felt natural in his hands, as if he'd been born to wield them.
That's some of what I was talking about with your fame in Siege of Dragonspear being weird.
Nowhere else in the series are your actions treated as quite as noteworthy as that. You and your companions escape from a dungeon under the city in a massive explosion that causes property damage all around, immediately get into a confrontation with an archmage that results in one of your companions being taken away by the authorities, and it's not like people don't notice. It catches the ears of the people who are interested in that sort of stuff. But it's not like every commoner going about their business thinks your particular hijinks are the most interesting thing to ever happen to the city.
This won't even be the only underground dungeon unearthed this week. Not a ten minute's walk from your escape Keldorn is already investigating The Cult of the Unseeing Eye and their massive underground lair built into the sewers.
Or maybe they are just tired of seeing strange things. The bartenders are still serving, and the merchants seem unfazed too. When a giant sphere appears in the middle of the slums there are only a few people there, and one of them even tries to sell the sphere to you. It´s like "Yeah, yeah, another magical disruption, Just do not bother me unless infernal machines of Avernus appear, I need to finish this work before noon"
Greater Basilisk, a stupid looking lizardy thing that a level 1 Noober could kill using appropriate protection = 7000 XP
Total sense.
For what it's worth, I usually fight Davaeorn about the same way I fight basilisks, by chugging some manner of anti-magic potion and whacking him until he dies.
Sometimes it's fun to stand still at the entrance and fire of fireballs to the area you think he will teleport to next. It kinda feels like playing tennis. Especially fun if one of your NPCs with boots of haste is running around after him trying to chuck him. Then it feels like a Benny Hill scene.
Remind me to never play tennis with you.
You never played tennis with a randomized timer bomb inside the ball?!