Kivan build: Two weapon fighting - Short swords or scimitars?

Terhid

Which is better: short swords or scimitars for him?
Scimitars' damage is 1 point higher on the average. On the other hand Kivan has +1 to thac0 with short swords, but not with scimitars. Tough choice.

AFAIK there is one +2 short sword (and one +3, but it's at the very end, so it doesn't matter much), while there are 2 +2 scimitars (Durlag and Cloakwood), not taking into account Drizzt's weapons. Am I right?

thelovebat

Well you have the option of either short swords or long swords really due to the thaco bonus and the high availability of magical swords for those two weapons. I don't think you get enough skill points to specialize in both, but if you're having someone else perhaps dual wield long swords then short swords for Kivan is fine. If you were to have someone dual wield scimitars, it would be Minsc since he's not an elf and has super high strength for even more additional damage.

Depending how you want to spend his skill points you could also put points into two handed style and use a halberd to deal extra damage and have the extra critical chance (halberds also don't overlap with anyone else's weapon choices). Halberds are also convenient to switch out with bows if going for a high damage strategy and using the long reach of his weapon to slide behind your fighters with higher HP and attack enemies on the other side, short swords would require you getting in close with their reach.

Terhid

@thelovebat thanks for comment. I don't want to specialize him in longs swords as both Khalid and Coran already use those.
Chesley Crusher is a good halberd, but limiting APR to 1 hurts. Is there any other magical halberd?

thelovebat

Terhid said:

@thelovebat thanks for comment. I don't want to specialize him in longs swords as both Khalid and Coran already use those.
Chesley Crusher is a good halberd, but limiting APR to 1 hurts. Is there any other magical halberd?

I know there's at least one +1 halberd out there you can find. There could also be a late game halberd I don't know about but they could be difficult to acquire. The Chesley Crusher does enough damage I think to offset the lower attack per round, that downside would be more a pain for a fighter class looking to put a bunch of points into halberds and get extra attacks per round from their fighter levels on top of that. Specialization isn't the worst though for that downside, though ideally a bard would use a weapon like that since they wouldn't worry about the extra attacks.

rede9

In my current run I have given to Kivan Chesley Crusher + one point Two-Handed Weapon Style; next long swords (Harrower + Varscona). Has it been a waste of proficiency slots?

OrlonKronsteen

@Terhid One advantage of choosing scimitars over short swords is that you get both piercing and slashing weapons with one proficiency style. You can use the scimitars for slashing and wakazashis for piercing.

@rede9 No, not a waste at all. There are good halberds in the game and THWS will increase his crit range. You still have one point to give him - maybe then give him something he can use with a shield (like long swords) for better armour class? Maybe a blunt weapon? There are many good ways to build Kivan, though it's generally agreed that his greatest strength is as an archer.

sarevok57

there is a +2 halberd in chapter 5:

when you go to the iron throne building to "investigate" whats going on there, on the top level there is a fight with 7 baddies, one of them is using a halberd +2

it's too bad you aren't going to be using Drizzt's scimitars, there AMAZING weapons, being +3 with a nice +2 AC bonus but anyways, here is my 3 cents:

short swords deal piercing damage, which some enemies are straight up immune to ( like jellies ) plus it won't be until chapter 7 before you get the shortsword +3

for the 2 scimitars +2 you can get the first one as early chapter 2 ( from durlag's tower ) nothing that some invisibility/protection from petrification can't handle, and the 2nd one is found early chapter 4, plus they deal slashing damage instead ( so they will hurt jellies ) and on average the damage is higher ( 1d6+2,1d6+3 over 1d8+2 x2)

but on average your to hit would be better with the short swords, so it comes down to this:

more damage: scimitars +2
more to hit: short swords

Terhid

@sarevok57 I'd like to use Drizzt's weapons, but killing him is out of the question (good playthrough). I've tried stealing them, but I can't get my pickpocket high enough. Is it even possible? I know it was possible to steal one of the scimitars in the original version, but I pretty sure they changed pickpocket mechanics in BGEE.

Quartz

@Terhid If I recall correctly, they patched the pickpocketing of the scimitars.

Remember, 255 is max thieving skill, if you go higher than that it loops around and ends up being godawful low.

sarevok57

Terhid said:

@sarevok57 I'd like to use Drizzt's weapons, but killing him is out of the question (good playthrough). I've tried stealing them, but I can't get my pickpocket high enough. Is it even possible? I know it was possible to steal one of the scimitars in the original version, but I pretty sure they changed pickpocket mechanics in BGEE.

i've played thousands of good play throughs and i still found a way to get his scimitars, and usually at level 1

ThacoBell

Quartz said:

@Terhid If I recall correctly, they patched the pickpocketing of the scimitars.

Remember, 255 is max thieving skill, if you go higher than that it loops around and ends up being godawful low.

I think that has been fixed as of 2.0, but going higher than 255 doesn't add an extra benefit regardless.

Terhid

@Quartz I tried picpocketing him using Alora + potion of skill mastery (or whatever is the name), which gives me 190 pickpocket, but still I get "The target has no items that can be stolen by a cutpurse of your skill". Do I need to go even higher?

sarevok57

Terhid said:

@Quartz I tried picpocketing him using Alora + potion of skill mastery (or whatever is the name), which gives me 190 pickpocket, but still I get "The target has no items that can be stolen by a cutpurse of your skill". Do I need to go even higher?

if you cannot succeed at 190 then you will never succeed, i believe when it comes to pick pocketing NPCs it only requires 95 to pick pocket weapons, but there could be some crazy thing placed on Drizzt so you can't pick pocket his weapons

ThacoBell

Yup, pickpocketing Drizzt is out. You have to kill him now to get anything off of him.

xscott71x

With Archers, I take a bit of poetic license; I feel an Archer would not train in 2 weapon style when they must become so proficient is using both hands on a bow, so I reassign the 2 pips in 2 weapon style and move them to 2 handed style, and primarily use the staff for melee. I prefer the staff because it isn't made of iron, so it won't won't break in combat. Plus enchanted staffs are pretty easy to find, and are faster weapons than 2h sword or halberds.

Raduziel

The two pips on Two-Weapon Fighting Style are a Ranger feature, not proficiencies the character earns from leveling up - therefore, reassigning it is a way of cheating.

Nothing against it (it's your game, after all), just to clarify.