I used a Bardic spell (STR) that allowed Viconia to equip a shield, at the end of the Buff, the shield turned red, but I still equipped it and giving the bonus (Apparently)! I loved this because it allows her to have shields or equipment that she could not, just snorting once (I do not have the Ogre's gauntlet yet, this is a slash twist)! What do you guys think about that?
I do not know if I could do something similar to compensate for the lack of Dexterity of others and things like that without having to wait until the end of the game.
For years I was a confirmed Viconia fan - mainly because saving her gives me an excuse to kill one of the Flaming Fist - but these days I tend to opt for Branwen because I think she has a nice voice.
I'm in Tiax' corner. Branwen is prolly the better cleric, Yeslick most definately is the better combatant, Viccy is boring and because everyone else love her I can't stop myself from disliking her. Quale (I've still never learned to spell that douche's name) is best for utility. But Tiax is the best character, and BG is so easy anyways, you don't even need a cleric.
Beef him up with STR, staffmace +2, ring of invisibility and some nice cleric buffs on top, then unleash him upon the world and let him reap!
(...and then cast sanctuary and summon a ghast if he gets in over his head! Tiax can run the world from the shadows as well.)
Can you pick up the Elven chain Mail? I took the dorn and killed a druid, now he wants to get another guy, but I do not know if he has to get there fast just to kill and get the reward.
One issue a couple of people have mentioned is that the multiclass cleric NPCs all appear fairly late in the game, which means you have to make your party balance decisions at a point when only Branwen and Viconia are viable options. I would gladly take Yeslick if he were available from the start but usually just make do with Jaheira, who doesn't quite have the spellcasting breadth of a cleric but is the best druid in the game as she can wear full plate and cast a couple of cleric-only spells (including raise dead).
One issue a couple of people have mentioned is that the multiclass cleric NPCs all appear fairly late in the game, which means you have to make your party balance decisions at a point when only Branwen and Viconia are viable options. I would gladly take Yeslick if he were available from the start but usually just make do with Jaheira, who doesn't quite have the spellcasting breadth of a cleric but is the best druid in the game as she can wear full plate and cast a couple of cleric-only spells (including raise dead).
if i choose to take yeslick on my runs, i will just use branwen and when i hit the cloakwood mines, boot her out and bring yeslick in
although usually if i go for yeslick i will run straight to the cloakwood mines to get him as soon as possible, sometimes i will even get to the cloakwood mines before i even hit 8000 XP per character
I mean for me much like sarevok, I *rush* to cloakwood if I want Yeslick, which gives me a reason to take Coran too since I'll be rushing to him too along the way
My vote is for Quayle though - you can mod him into the carnival which is a lovely spot to pick him up and give yourself an extra arcane caster + healbot.
One run I specifically went there as fast as humanly possible just to get the whole gang of NPCs you can find in the cloakwood - Yeslick, Coran, Faldorn, and Eldoth lol. Made for an interesting team.
I don;t usually include a cleric, but when I do I prefer Tiax. Mostly because the majority of my characters are played with some serious mental issues going on, in one form or another, and think other NPC's with borderline insanity issues have a special insight into things. Gnome C/T's have been a favorite of mine in the past as well. Between Tiax's banter and his ghast which can be buffed quite nicely, esp. with SR's, he's the usual choice for temporary jaunts about the lands. I only wish I could rescue him from Spellhold the few times I made it into BG2. With so much Cyric business going on in SoD, I've thought he would have had some interesting banter there.
i think the real downside of viconia is that you can't have a REP of 20 with her in your team, now in all reality you don't need 20 REP to finish the game ( hell you don't even need to hit 10 ) but just for convenient sake having to arbitrarily lower your REP so she stays around, oiugh
You can keep her and a 20 rep if ya finish Durlags
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=g1Xc09wr98U In Vanilla you could get it by killing the Demon knight at the ground level (you had to be quick about it), and it wasnt at the bottom. In the EE its just at the bottom as far as I know
I used to pick Branwen, but recently switched to Yelsick. With Gauntlets of Dexterity and Big-Fisted Belt he is pretty good fighter. The only problem is playing with 5 characters for half of the game.
He is also the only not evil dwarf companion (not counting Arkanis) in both games.
branwen's wisdom is one point higher than viconia's, so branwen will have one more level 2 spell
Magic Resistance of 50% causes Viconia to evade "Fire and Ice Magic" damage?
No. Magic Resistance completely negates the effect of a spell, not damage. It is designed to work on on-target spells like Magic Missile or the damage effects of AoE spells like Fireball. She can be hit by the spell in either case and entirely negate it, 50% chance. It's like a saving throw to negate, in practice.
But if she were to actually take fire or cold damage from any source, she does not have it reduced by 50% of the damage -- she still takes the full amount. So if she has a Fireball cast at her, she can resist it entirely, or not and take the the full fire damage (and try to save against it like normal).
branwen's wisdom is one point higher than viconia's, so branwen will have one more level 2 spell
And what about effects like killer and stinking cloud, or the shaman's ice cloud, more often than other players?
Cloudkill and Stinking Cloud ignore MR in the original versions of BG1 and BG2. Tweaks to BG2 then made it so only the Wand of Cloudkill could bypass MR, and G3 pack may have tweaked that out as well by now. No idea what the EEs have done.
Other cloud spells that do damage (Death Fog, Incendiary Cloud) can be resisted with MR.
The original mechanic was that all of these spells were supposed to ignore MR (being clouds of vapor over the area that are breathed in) and so a spell like Minor Globe was the proper/only counter. That got changed though.
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I do not know if I could do something similar to compensate for the lack of Dexterity of others and things like that without having to wait until the end of the game.
Beef him up with STR, staffmace +2, ring of invisibility and some nice cleric buffs on top, then unleash him upon the world and let him reap!
(...and then cast sanctuary and summon a ghast if he gets in over his head! Tiax can run the world from the shadows as well.)
I took the dorn and killed a druid, now he wants to get another guy, but I do not know if he has to get there fast just to kill and get the reward.
You can't finish that part of the quest before:
although usually if i go for yeslick i will run straight to the cloakwood mines to get him as soon as possible, sometimes i will even get to the cloakwood mines before i even hit 8000 XP per character
My vote is for Quayle though - you can mod him into the carnival which is a lovely spot to pick him up and give yourself an extra arcane caster + healbot.
One run I specifically went there as fast as humanly possible just to get the whole gang of NPCs you can find in the cloakwood - Yeslick, Coran, Faldorn, and Eldoth lol. Made for an interesting team.
In Vanilla you could get it by killing the Demon knight at the ground level (you had to be quick about it), and it wasnt at the bottom. In the EE its just at the bottom as far as I know
Sad she never made a cameo in BG2. Was hoping Beamdog would rectify that with SoD but she got no love (or even Cameos) there either.
He is also the only not evil dwarf companion (not counting Arkanis) in both games.
But if she were to actually take fire or cold damage from any source, she does not have it reduced by 50% of the damage -- she still takes the full amount. So if she has a Fireball cast at her, she can resist it entirely, or not and take the the full fire damage (and try to save against it like normal). Cloudkill and Stinking Cloud ignore MR in the original versions of BG1 and BG2. Tweaks to BG2 then made it so only the Wand of Cloudkill could bypass MR, and G3 pack may have tweaked that out as well by now. No idea what the EEs have done.
Other cloud spells that do damage (Death Fog, Incendiary Cloud) can be resisted with MR.
The original mechanic was that all of these spells were supposed to ignore MR (being clouds of vapor over the area that are breathed in) and so a spell like Minor Globe was the proper/only counter. That got changed though.