Bounty Hunter next weapon proficiency?

Aerakar

I have a level 12 bounty hunter dwarf with 19 strength/18 dexterity in Siege of Dragonspear and plan to carry him over to BG2 for a full run-through. I am contemplating my upcoming weapon slots and am somewhat torn on which direction to go next. I am playing a small party of 2-3.

As an experiment, I built him as a dagger-chucker in BG 1 and he has proficiencies currently in Dagger, SWS, Quarterstaff, and THS. He used mainly Dagger of Venom/throwing daggers and Aule's +3 Staff/Staff of Striking in BG and thus far in Siege. Throwing daggers were great after the strength tome and are excellent in SoD with the magic/poisoned ones, but one thing I missed and am missing are ranged elemental damage options.

For his level 12 proficiency I am torn on taking either katana (for Celestial Fury later), short bow (adds elemental options coupled which compliments the great BG2 returning/poisoned throwing daggers), or even short sword or scimitar for speed-weapons and eventual dual-wielding (note: I use Rogue Rebalancing which allows TWF for all thieves).

How would you build him out further going into BG2/ToB?

Aerakar

Also, I could consider darts. I was thinking to take them already in SoD for Biter and then Crimson Dart later to compliment his throwing daggers. I am using Biter to finish trolls without proficiency now.

I have never played with darts in Bg2, so this could be an entertaining change versus Tuigan.

sarevok57

well thieves have very fast level progression, so technically even if you miss out on a proficiency now, it won't take that long to wait for that other point

in SoA conservatively your thief will hit level 20, so there's 2 more proficiency points you are going to gain there, and in ToB you will probably hit around level 36, so there's 4 more proficiency points there as well

also, even if you use a weapon in which you do not have proficiency in, I believe rogues only get a 3 point penalty ( actually it might be 4 ) to the attack roll, so not really the end of the world per se

but for your next point, it is based on how you play your bounty hunter, personally I like using ranged weapons that don't require ammo, and you can get a couple of them before you hit spell hold ( boomerang dagger +2 and tansheron bow +3 )

but, if you more into melee, one option could be scimitar ( and perhaps short sword as well ) so you can use those +1 attack per round weapons dual wield both so then you can get 4 attacks per round, and then when you need a +3 weapon for the odd enemy that can't get hit by a +2, you can just use celestial fury for said baddie

Aerakar

Thanks @sarevok57 , you framed your answer to my question better than I did in my own head , i.e. do I play my bounty hunter with more of a melee or ranged focus?

With this particular charname, frankly he has been much more of a melee thief: setting-up ambushes, scouting, and using hit and fade for backstabs regularly before leading very tough groups back to the party support to finish off. He regularly has jumped into the fray supporting Kagain/Minsc up front (and has paid for it sometimes!). I feel his weapon set-up for BG1 supported this approach, with dagger of venom and quarterstaff for both poisoned and hard-hitting backstabs and general melee.

With throwing daggers, and after he reached 19 strength, I have not really felt the lack of another ranged weapon offering elemental damage until the troll-fest that is the beginning/middle of SoD. Of course there are some elemental daggers in Siege and I guess I could continue also to use Biter to finish off trolls for now, which seems to work given the high ROF even without proficiency as you noted.

I think I will continue leaning towards a melee focus with this character and just stick to throwing daggers for my main ranged option for BG2/ToB. I think I will take scimitars for my level 12 pip in preparation for Belm/SNT and then throw in either TWF and/or Celestial Fury in BG2.