Musings about Classes & Playstyles [Newbie Perspective]
Volatile
Member Posts: 81
Hey!
So, I've recently started Baldur's Gate 2 for the first time (importing my character from Baldur's Gate 1) and I'm still kinda unsatisfied with my choice of character. He is a human Paladin, not at all very interesting to roleplay, and I find myself thinking a lot about how many different characters I could've made.
After a bit of research on classes, races, multiclassing, dual-classing (dual-classing sounds like a lot of hard work, plus the downtime between classes seems awful long) etc, I'm still unsure how "viable" some of these classes are according to my own playstyle. Roleplaying should take priority over 'mechanical' thinking.
For instance, I read a lot about how ungodly powerful mages can be - and yeah, I had a lot of fun with both Neera and Xan -, but it seems like mages are not very reliable in a dungeon or a long series of fights as the number of spells are very limited even after attaining higher levels, meaning I'd have to set up camp and rest after almost every fight OR have my PC mage character just sit in the back for the most part (which is what I did with Neera and Xan unless it was a major fight) and let the brawlers take care of business. This doesn't sound like a whole lot of fun if your character, the hero or anti-hero, is a mage. The Paladin felt like a gimped fighter - with poor roleplaying choices on top of that -, but at least he is active in the fore front and doesn't requite a lot of sleep to keep going between minor fights and/or an entire dungeon, assuming it's not a multi-level structure like Durlag's.
Fighter/mages on the other hand seem a lot more reliable assuming you have a second mage for offensive spells like fireball etc, and then have the vast majority of your F/M's spells focused on self buffs like Shield, Blur, Mirror Image, Ghost armor etc. Most of these spells last a long enough time to be useful in a series of fights, and I did a test character in Baldur's Gate 2 to see it for myself. To put it mildly, I was shocked at how easy it was for me to push the Fighter/Mage AC all the way to -5 without wearing any armor. This is nuts. Combined with the elf racial bonus to longswords - not to mention the resistance to charm and sleep -, and my test F/M character was already WAY AHEAD of my Paladin. Much better AC, better Thac0, better versatility, a much more interesting character overall.
A pure mage - or any other specialist mage for that matter - benefits from more spells and faster levelling, sure, but how do you deal with the limited amount of spells? You need both defensive and offensive spells seeing as melee is not a viable choice. Thac0 is just awful and weapon skills are lacking. I imagine these people who say mages/sorcerers are OP don't really mind resting after every 1-2 fights, but I don't like "over resting" as it feels wrong and the roleplayer in me can't see how a group of people would choose to sleep in a dark, damp dungeon unless it was absolutely necessary. What is even more aggravating is that it feels "gamey" and mechanical to quicksave / rest numerous times in the course of a quest. Mages are powerful yet dependant on NPCs to do their fighting 80-90% of the time, assuming you don't want to waste your spells on every engagement and just sit back.
Fighter/Mage/Thief is an odd choice of character, imho. From what I've researched, F/M/T is a versatile, powerful multiclass early on, but falls short in the mid to long run. It takes too long to have a decent amount of spells to cast, meaning you won't be a very good mage for most of the early and mid content. You miss on the better upper level spells, too. Maybe I'm not seeing it for what it really is, but to me F/M/T is not a very good choice of character.
And then we come to brawlers. A melee focused character like a pure fighter is a very simple class yet extremely reliable character. I don't know yet if you can push the AC to the same levels a Fighter/Mage can, but fighters are persistent tanks with great AC and the best thac0 in the game. Almost no downtime as you don't need to make camp just for the sake of replenishing spells. The dwarven defender looks to me the most interesting of the fighter kits, but I also liked the Berserker and the Barbarian kits. A dual-wielding dwarf with great resists must be a powerhouse in his own right. The only disadvantages I can think of is the dependancy on potions and/or mages & clerics/druids for buffs and magic protection AND the fact pure melee characters can be boring after a while. I know this because I'm bored to death of just point & clicking my way through brawls in Baldur's Gate 1. There's very little variety to it. The most fun I had in my party was controlling Xan to disable large groups of enemies with spells like Sleep and charm. Neera was mostly offensive spells like fireball, but I rarely used her for fear of wasting her spells too quickly.
What do you think? Am I missing something in my initial assessment of these classes? Do you have any suggestions? Should I just stick to the human Paladin until I'm finished with my first run of the series?
So, I've recently started Baldur's Gate 2 for the first time (importing my character from Baldur's Gate 1) and I'm still kinda unsatisfied with my choice of character. He is a human Paladin, not at all very interesting to roleplay, and I find myself thinking a lot about how many different characters I could've made.
After a bit of research on classes, races, multiclassing, dual-classing (dual-classing sounds like a lot of hard work, plus the downtime between classes seems awful long) etc, I'm still unsure how "viable" some of these classes are according to my own playstyle. Roleplaying should take priority over 'mechanical' thinking.
For instance, I read a lot about how ungodly powerful mages can be - and yeah, I had a lot of fun with both Neera and Xan -, but it seems like mages are not very reliable in a dungeon or a long series of fights as the number of spells are very limited even after attaining higher levels, meaning I'd have to set up camp and rest after almost every fight OR have my PC mage character just sit in the back for the most part (which is what I did with Neera and Xan unless it was a major fight) and let the brawlers take care of business. This doesn't sound like a whole lot of fun if your character, the hero or anti-hero, is a mage. The Paladin felt like a gimped fighter - with poor roleplaying choices on top of that -, but at least he is active in the fore front and doesn't requite a lot of sleep to keep going between minor fights and/or an entire dungeon, assuming it's not a multi-level structure like Durlag's.
Fighter/mages on the other hand seem a lot more reliable assuming you have a second mage for offensive spells like fireball etc, and then have the vast majority of your F/M's spells focused on self buffs like Shield, Blur, Mirror Image, Ghost armor etc. Most of these spells last a long enough time to be useful in a series of fights, and I did a test character in Baldur's Gate 2 to see it for myself. To put it mildly, I was shocked at how easy it was for me to push the Fighter/Mage AC all the way to -5 without wearing any armor. This is nuts. Combined with the elf racial bonus to longswords - not to mention the resistance to charm and sleep -, and my test F/M character was already WAY AHEAD of my Paladin. Much better AC, better Thac0, better versatility, a much more interesting character overall.
A pure mage - or any other specialist mage for that matter - benefits from more spells and faster levelling, sure, but how do you deal with the limited amount of spells? You need both defensive and offensive spells seeing as melee is not a viable choice. Thac0 is just awful and weapon skills are lacking. I imagine these people who say mages/sorcerers are OP don't really mind resting after every 1-2 fights, but I don't like "over resting" as it feels wrong and the roleplayer in me can't see how a group of people would choose to sleep in a dark, damp dungeon unless it was absolutely necessary. What is even more aggravating is that it feels "gamey" and mechanical to quicksave / rest numerous times in the course of a quest. Mages are powerful yet dependant on NPCs to do their fighting 80-90% of the time, assuming you don't want to waste your spells on every engagement and just sit back.
Fighter/Mage/Thief is an odd choice of character, imho. From what I've researched, F/M/T is a versatile, powerful multiclass early on, but falls short in the mid to long run. It takes too long to have a decent amount of spells to cast, meaning you won't be a very good mage for most of the early and mid content. You miss on the better upper level spells, too. Maybe I'm not seeing it for what it really is, but to me F/M/T is not a very good choice of character.
And then we come to brawlers. A melee focused character like a pure fighter is a very simple class yet extremely reliable character. I don't know yet if you can push the AC to the same levels a Fighter/Mage can, but fighters are persistent tanks with great AC and the best thac0 in the game. Almost no downtime as you don't need to make camp just for the sake of replenishing spells. The dwarven defender looks to me the most interesting of the fighter kits, but I also liked the Berserker and the Barbarian kits. A dual-wielding dwarf with great resists must be a powerhouse in his own right. The only disadvantages I can think of is the dependancy on potions and/or mages & clerics/druids for buffs and magic protection AND the fact pure melee characters can be boring after a while. I know this because I'm bored to death of just point & clicking my way through brawls in Baldur's Gate 1. There's very little variety to it. The most fun I had in my party was controlling Xan to disable large groups of enemies with spells like Sleep and charm. Neera was mostly offensive spells like fireball, but I rarely used her for fear of wasting her spells too quickly.
What do you think? Am I missing something in my initial assessment of these classes? Do you have any suggestions? Should I just stick to the human Paladin until I'm finished with my first run of the series?
4
Comments
That being said, I always see the straight paladin as stronger than a straight fighter or straight ranger. Those bonus skills (protection from evil, lay on hands) are useful. Detect evil can be damn handy on your first playthrough. The cleric spells you get starting at level 9, while not gamebreakers, are useful. (Never underestimate Bless.) I also like the paladin stronghold quests. Paladins and their kits are probably the best fighters in the game, overall, so give them a chance.
But then I’ve had a bad case of restartitis lately, so who am I to say?
You don't really need straight up damaging spells either. Disablers and buffs (for me at least) are far more effective.
I am convinced a Fighter / Mage can eat ANY of the fighter classes/kits for breakfast any day. Insane armor class, regular fighter thac0, a few offensive spells and debuffs to boot. Nuts.
The more I think of it, the more I feel like starting over from scratch.
Add in wands and items, not quite seeing why you have to rest so much that mages feel a bit inadequate.
The higher level spells can wipe out whole groups, so how many do you need?
You mention playing with Xan, and you used 1 spell to disable the whole group. If your party is working efficiently, then 1 or 2 of those disabling spells is all you will use in most fights. Inbetween you use a sling or a dagger, or summon something to fight for you (from the mage point of view).
And wands, never forget wands.
(Mind you, I always use Edwin so TBH, me talking about having more than enough spells is a bit cheeky)
If I make a Fighter/Mage for the long run (Throne of Bhaal), will I still reach the level cap - I believe it's F 24 / M 20 - with a party of six or should I scale down on the party size?
This is how I see it so far:
Elf vs Half-Elf: better dexterity, better resists, better thac0 for my choice of weapon (longswords).
F/M vs F/M/T: A Fighter/Mage can theoretically reach the full potential of both classes, assuming there's enough experience in one playthrough for a full party. I rarely ever use backstabbing anyway, so Find Traps and Open Locks should cover my basic needs for a thief. I don't think it's worth sacrificing my character's progression (by making a F/M/T triple class) just for these two thief skills.
The Dwarven Defender sounds really cool still. Usually, when I imagine an unstoppable force in a D&D setting, a dwarf duel-wielding hammers - or axes - come to mind rather than a Conan-style barbarian in loincloth. It's a matter of personal taste, tho. Dwarves are awesome. However, after playing a pure melee character for so long, I'm afraid the Dwarven Defender won't be a much different experience: maybe have an NPC cleric / druid buff him if it's a tough fight; maybe hit the defensive stance for the same reason as before; left-click the enemy once and watch the fight without much further input. With a Fighter/Mage, I feel like there's so much more versatility and improvising. The more spells a F/M has, the more diversified his tactics for each engagement can be.
I don't mind replaying Baldur's Gate 1 EE one bit. In fact, now that I actually understand how most of the lower spells / potions / cleric buffs / disabilities work, the better I can handle the challenge ahead. Plus I get to do all the quests in Baldur's Gate city that I had to pass because it felt weird to do unlawful quests with a Paladin.
Also, his spell slots are necessarily filled with defensive spells and buffs at all times, creating a need for a dedicated mage to handle Breach and Lower Resistance, which become critical spells in BG2 against mages and dragons. One also needs a cleric or druid to cast Chaotic Commands, because the Fighter-Mage is vulnerable to mind-affecting spells.
Reaching level 24 as a Fighter means you're guaranteed the best possible saving throws, thac0 and a fair amount of weapon proficiency points. You don't miss out on much by giving up on the next 16 levels. So yeah, Grandmastery is pretty much the only thing you'll miss. An Improved Haste spell alone can compensate for it.
For the Mage part, you would stop levelling at 20. Again, you're given the best possible bonuses, and you're missing out on 11 levels that would give you an additional 7 - yes, only seven more - spells. A pure mage can cast a couple more level 9th spells per day, but have a much lower HP pool, horrible thac0, and worse saving throws.
To sum it up: a Fighter/Mage is giving up Grandmastery for the ability to cast spells; a Fighter/Mage is giving up 2-3 additional level 9th spells for an impressive thac0, great saving throws, and more Hit Points. The game is extremely partial to multiclasses, methinks.
To answer your question at the beginning though: try whatever you want besides Shaman and Sorcerer. You can get into trouble late game with a bad spell selection, and if you mess up it's harder to fix those classes vs any other.
Smaller parties can help with experience, but not as much as you might think. A lot of the quest experience is granted like "45,500 experience per character," so it doesn't hurt to have multiple characters then. With a 6-man that skipped 3 stronghold quests, I reached 1.5 million exp by Chapter 4 of BG2.
If this is your first time playing through, I'd definitely recommend a full 6-man party, since as fun as mechanics are, the NPCs were what made BG2 shine in the first place. My previous post was simply that multiclasses are incredibly strong in both the early and lategame, but they're comparatively weaker through the middlegame. Not that they're bad, or not even still ahead of pure-classes... But they're not ahead as much during this time rather than the others.
Unless you're a F/D multi. That 6m experience necessary to be really useful kinda sucks.
Besides, in almost no sense can FM reach the full potential of the mage class. Sure, an FM can eventually cast his first 9th level spell toward the end of Throne of Bhaal, but his damage-per-spell will be much lower than a singleclass mage and in fact will have been substantially lower than a singleclass mage from the moment BG2 begins. The good news is that FMs aren't generally casting the spells a pure mage would use, but are instead mainly using buffs like stoneskin that don't depend on caster level. Basically, you should think about FMs (and FMTs for that matter) as being nigh-invulnerable fighter kits rather than as substitutes for a pure mage. If you do that, and then play them that way, you'll likely find them to be among the strongest choices in the game.
Personally I prefer the dual class over the multi for fighter / mages... You get enough from the Fighter class you make you able to deal damage with weapons and have a lot of hit points while getting access to high level spells earlier and more slots than the multiclass can.
I know it seems like a pain to have that downtime, but if you do it just right, it really isn't all that bad..
You can start out as a Berserker, a ridiculously overpowered Fighter kit with an enrage that gives immunities to things like fear and hold.. And play through all of Baldur's Gate 1 like this where fighters tend to be stronger than mages anyways, since mages don't really outshine other classes until they reach godlike levels.
Then during SoD, if you bother to play this expansion, you can dual to mage at level 9, then play through most of SoD as a decent enough mage.. And reach level 10 mage to complete the dual cast at the SoD xp cap and play the entirety of BG2 as a Berserker/Mage.
Or if you skip BG1 and/or SoD you can simply make a Berserker at the start of the game and either dual class immediately (at level 7) and quickly gain enough xp to get to level 8 mage, or again just wait til level 9 for that extra prof point (Grandmastery) and an extra half-attack before dualing and easily get enough xp to get to 10 (especially if you wait before picking up many party members and use all the gold you can to buy and scribe scrolls for XP).
Alternatively, you can also just dual at level 7 in BG1 and reach level 8 in mage before completing BG1 and play through SoD as a Berserker/Mage. Or you could play through BG1 and SoD as a Berserker and then dual at the beginning of BG2.
Dual-classing isn't all that bad downtime wise, unless you go with ridiculously high levels for your first class.
The Blade is also a very fun class that I highly recommend as well.
Paladins in Baldur's Gate with the leveling from 1 to 9 iirc doesn't offer you much really. But in BG2 that changes greatly, eventually you will be given cleric spells that you can cast and will help you better as a frontline fighter. And that's what your paladin should be (a frontline warrior or tank) with a two handed sword is great. Not to mention if you are using 2 handed swords, you'll have a chance to wield Carsomyr. And Carsomyr is a weapon of destruction which could be upgraded to a 6+ weapon in ToB which is crazy. (And only paladins can wield Carsomyr.)
Also the paladin stronghold quests are well done and very rewarding, and I very well enjoyed it. I think you should give it a shot in BG2, because paladins are a ton better than in BG1 by far.
Lay on hands is great, bless is good to have, fear protections and the ever lovely Armor of Faith (though it becomes more of a novelty once you get HLA)..
F/M might have all the bells and whistles, but when you get hit by silences, dispells and all the other nasties out there, you can depend on a paladin to get the job done without too much fuss.
Get'im Carsomyr, some decent plate, use the right buffs, summon celestials to heal and buff him even more, and let loose that crazy zealot hellbent on bringing
"democracy and freedom"Law to every cornerthe worldof Faerûn.. by means of liberally dispensing buttkicks of justice, as his less than clever friend would say.while dispelling magic on every hit, nothing more shocking for a mage then his spells do nothing and you gently strip him of his protections hit by hit.
mages in this game are just so godly for the almost no restrictions on rests. as you already said you could rest every second fight and end the game with 10000 days played, the fact that the exp in the end caps so high gives not much of a drawback to throw in thief or fighter beforehand in dual-classes , specially if you start at BG2.
what you totally seem to have ignored by now is the Cleric, they got the second best Thac0 progression in game and aside the no bladed weapon restriction can almost do all a fighter can.
simple Dualclasses like a lvl 2Fighter/Cleric can become a powerhouse by having like no dualing time. (but still getting grandmastery+dual weapon fighting boosting their good cleric fighting powers even more)
or the most crazy spell slinger of them all the Cleric/Mage Multi! (go gnome for illusionist/cleric for even more spells!) having the mage spell list and cleric spell list in one character is just insane , once you get the robes of vecna and a few other mage specific goodies all your spells will come with no cast time what so ever.. and you have tons of them, the mage provides the armor spells equal to plate armor and some stoneskins , the cleric throws in huge group buffs and protections , and all mage spells you got left can be used for devastation. if you ever decide to stop casting you still can stand in the second line using a sling/throwing hammer with a pretty decent chance to hit.
But that's not the point here, which is that even if I gave my CHARNAME most of the best items, Korgan being SC berserker was just as good. Fighters get enough AC, most of the time they are better than F/Ms since they start at AC0 instead of at AC5, and with +2 from ring, +1 from helmet, +X from dex, +2-3 from shield, +3-4 from belt vs X, +5 vs piercing on boots, +2 from drizzt's scimi, +1 from cloak, +1 from ring, etc etc... point being, a fighter is always ready for combat without fancy magics and with enough AC through most of BG1/SoD/BG2 to require crits to be hit. Only in ToB do you even have to bother about being hit but then you will start to get enough hardiness HLA's to browse through anyways. Being a berzerker you get the single most versatile and strongest kit buff there is. I'd argue 'berzerk' is ridiculously strong, to the point of making the cleric levels of a F/C almost redundant since leveling as a SC berzerker makes you as good without buffs as a F/C gets after buffing (almost.. ).
I know most ppl prefer F/Ms to F/Cs, but to me, F/Cs has the best choice of class available; dwarves. Dwarfes +5 to saves mean you get into negative saves already in BG1. This makes you nigh unstoppable since no enemy can really stop you. In Bg2 it takes longer since it's harder to get the best items, so you need some items to help you as a pure fighter; a sword that gives you mirror image, a ring with improved haste, a gem for true seeing, shield of harmony for mental defence, etc etc.
I'm not sure I am making sense here, but my point is that leveling as a sc fighter is just pure awesomeness. I never play it myself since I think it's too boring (click attack, go to sleep), but compairing Korgan to Keldorn, I'd take Korgan 7 times out of 10, and IMHO inquisitors is the only Paladin that rivals berserkers or F/Cs (except in IWD where the UD is king, but I am talking BG here).
F/Ms are amazing ofc (F/I gnomes are even better since they get +saves and +spell slots), but they are not better than F/C or berserker dwarves or inquisitors IMHO. Unless you play minimal party and/or solo of course, that changes everything.
nobody says your F/M cant wear that full plate armor , i actually do until i get to lvl 3 spells and can use Ghost Armor..and later Spirit armor, treating that F/M as a slower progressing fighter who takes utility spells so the real mages can load up more Hurt in their daily package.
as for BG1 you actually just one level below a SC fighter and 2 below a SC mage , losing out on a lvl 5 spell and a 1 Thac0 improvement. but for that you are worth 2 Group slots. and at the moment you get Stoneskin, Ghostarmor and Mirror image your plain old SC Fighter is left behind , they might have the same AC but the F/M can take a couple hits without losing actual life. and it gets even better the longer the game goes on.
the F/M gets even better since SC Fighter stop really progressing after lvl13 aside Thac0 improvement...but that should do it for now.
Don't get me wrong , i like me a good fighter, but almost every Multi class version is somewhat preferable.
While they can also make themselves into walking avatars of destruction when necessary, going nova is typically neither necessary or recommended for regular fights.
Also, excluding keepering in kits, Gnomes are the true ubermensches, with Illusionist/Thief and Illusionist/Cleric being great "do it all" types and some of the strongest potential characters there are while offering a lot for you to do, in and out of combat.
Edit: While I'm at it:
Fighter multiclasses should probably never be compared to Mages, Mage/Cleric, or Mage/Thief, only to Fighters. You're definitely not going to make a Mage better or more versatile by adding "Fighter", you're making Fighters better and more versatile by adding Mage.
F/M/T are best be compared to the Bard, with which they are best comparable, and strictly superior long term in every respect except magnitude and dispelling. They make amazing boss tanks, most regular enemies will not require them to be use their best buff spells in general combat, and long term buffs will still leave them with a huge advantage over Fighter classes without ever being really behind, especially since Wand access is a huge deal in BG.