Fighters feel really overpowered
Question2
Member Posts: 74
Ive done multiple playthroughs of BG 1 EE at this point...and in every playthrough, having a fighter in the party is simply the superior choice and makes most encounters trivial. Infact, the game becomes extremely easy if you have a fighter/thief and a fighter/cleric as well, as they get the 2 point proficiency bonus, the ability to use longbows (for thieves, this is pretty huge) as well as better THACO/HP.
For most encounters, just having your fighter with some decent gear run in is enough to murder everything. The extra weapon proficiency points are way better than the abilities paladins/rangers get...compare a 9th level blackguard to a 9th level fighter for example. Even with aura of despair, the fighter does more damage. Immunity to level drain is cool, but that can be achieved via other means.
The cleric, mage and thief are basically just there for utility. In my last SOD playthrough, I had a fighter kill the green dragon in two rounds just by throwing some simple buffs on him (haste, chant, etc) and using breach to take down stoneskin. 112 hp doesnt last long when you have a fighter with 4 attacks averaging 18 damage per hit, which you can achieve easily by the end of the first game (19 str with the tome, no half orc needed). Enemy mages die instantly unless they cast stoneskin/mirror image immediately and even that only maybe 2-3 rounds of time max.
The fact that you can have a dwarven fighter with a +7 bonus to 3 different saves at level 1 (if im reading the race description correctly) is also quite silly. By level 9, you have a fighter that is pretty much immune to any spells that let you have a saving throw...without even using potions or buffs.
Theres literally no reason for me to use most of the options in the game because one fighter just slaughters everything. For example, why risk backstabbing with a squishy thief (which requires you to spam invisibility) when a fighter can just run in and kill everything? Its just way easier to give the thief a bow (hence the fighter/thief multiclass) and have the thief around mainly for open locks and find traps.
Its also hard to justify use of damage spells because the fighter makes them largely redundant...unless you just want to delete a dozen low level enemies with a single click. Like...why bother with melf's acid arrow when the fighter can kill the same target in one round?
Even taking out the entire crusader army stationed at bridgefort or dragonspear castle is pretty easy. You may need to pause occasionally to cast chaos but you can pretty much just watch your fighter chunk everything with ease.
For most encounters, just having your fighter with some decent gear run in is enough to murder everything. The extra weapon proficiency points are way better than the abilities paladins/rangers get...compare a 9th level blackguard to a 9th level fighter for example. Even with aura of despair, the fighter does more damage. Immunity to level drain is cool, but that can be achieved via other means.
The cleric, mage and thief are basically just there for utility. In my last SOD playthrough, I had a fighter kill the green dragon in two rounds just by throwing some simple buffs on him (haste, chant, etc) and using breach to take down stoneskin. 112 hp doesnt last long when you have a fighter with 4 attacks averaging 18 damage per hit, which you can achieve easily by the end of the first game (19 str with the tome, no half orc needed). Enemy mages die instantly unless they cast stoneskin/mirror image immediately and even that only maybe 2-3 rounds of time max.
The fact that you can have a dwarven fighter with a +7 bonus to 3 different saves at level 1 (if im reading the race description correctly) is also quite silly. By level 9, you have a fighter that is pretty much immune to any spells that let you have a saving throw...without even using potions or buffs.
Theres literally no reason for me to use most of the options in the game because one fighter just slaughters everything. For example, why risk backstabbing with a squishy thief (which requires you to spam invisibility) when a fighter can just run in and kill everything? Its just way easier to give the thief a bow (hence the fighter/thief multiclass) and have the thief around mainly for open locks and find traps.
Its also hard to justify use of damage spells because the fighter makes them largely redundant...unless you just want to delete a dozen low level enemies with a single click. Like...why bother with melf's acid arrow when the fighter can kill the same target in one round?
Even taking out the entire crusader army stationed at bridgefort or dragonspear castle is pretty easy. You may need to pause occasionally to cast chaos but you can pretty much just watch your fighter chunk everything with ease.
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Comments
In your examples showing the power of fighters, I noticed that part of the reason your fighter was so good was because you had other non-fighter characters buffing the fighter ("haste, chant, etc") or disabling enemies (e.g. Chaos). It's not all because of the fighter.
Furthermore, even if a fighter with decent gear can just murder everything, you have to get that decent gear first. For example, you can't obtain the Strength manual until very late in Baldur's Gate 1.
Mages suck in the beginning, Warriors rock.
In BG2 Mages become godlike and warriors take a back seat.
It's the same with Monks.
Don't make a Monk in BG1, they're terrible.
But in BG2 and ToB? Very very powerful.
Fighters are good at hitting stuff. A simple ability that shines in simple battles. As you progress through the trilogy, the battles become more and more complicated, and you become more and more reliant on your mages and their evergrowing bag of tricks.
Dwarven Berserker/Barbarian tackles it from both ends. Complete immunity to many harmful effects like Charm and Hold, and strong saving throws for everything else.
Wizard Slayer, despite its severe drawbacks, I hear is quite an unstoppable force at high levels too. In the Throne of Bhaal levels they start gaining Magic Resistance very rapidly, which in some ways offers more complete protection than Saving Throws or Rage, but it's quite a trek getting to those levels.
I think why most are turned off to low level mages is due to the fact that in all the bg(s) there is allot of trivial mobs that you don't want to waste your spells on. (Unless of course you don't mind spam sleeping)
But as I've seen it posted before and it is completely true; A level 9 mage (using no consumables) can kill Sarevok solo within 7 to 8 rounds with him wailing on you. No other pure class can do that... unless maybe you super kite him in a small radius with a ranged weapon using class, but that's just ridiculous.
If you take post BG:EE trilogy mage vs. fighter, my bet is on the mage. I seriously think that there is nothing a fighter can do after mage passes certain point in his/her exp.
I think that IN ALL of EE games (if not IN ALL RPG games) mages are FAR superior to any other class.
Of course, it is my personal, highly biased opinion, but it is what it is.
A thief, for example is another thing. Good backstab solves a lot of things.
Kensai are poorly designed...if you dont dual class them to a mage, they dont have the AC to survive. Try playing a pure kensai through BG 1 if you want to see what its like.
Wizard slayers are really really bad. You can get 50% MR just from drinking a potion, not to mention potions that cut all incoming magical damage by half AND lets you auto succeed saving throws. Not being able to use magical rings and cloaks is also a massive drawback...and you cant drink strength potions to buff yourself up to 24 strength. The spell failure chance is pointless...if a fighter is hitting a mage, hes going to die anyway, why bother inflicting spell failure on him? I just killed Ramazith earlier...he didnt even get a single spell off before the fighter chunked him.
Its not all about the fighter, but the rest of the party feels like they are just around for utility. For most encounters, I dont even need to buff the party at all, the fighter slaughters everything on his own.
You can get decent gear VERY early in BG 1. You get plate mail on the road to Nashkel from the flaming fist enforcers, and you can buy a longsword +1 in Beregost. Theres ankeg plate in Nashkel for free to boot. You dont even need to go crazy looting houses either...its very easy to get gold in the game. Bassilus gets you 5k gold and if you can interrupt his hold person spells, he cant hurt you. I killed him with a 3 person party at level 2.
There are basically only 2 spells in BG 1 that can help the mage to survive : mirror image and stoneskin. Anything that modifies AC wont do much for a pure mage since a fighter's THACO will be more than sufficient to guarantee a hit anyway.
If the mage can survive long enough to get off a "save or lose" spell such as horror, hold person or confusion...great.
I think part of the problem in BG 1 is that stuff like contigency spells came later and the BG 1 enemies dont have them. But you can only get minor spell sequencer in BG 1 anyway.
Monks are another example of badly designed. They have too many gimmicky abilities...what good is the ability to detect traps if you cant disarm them? May as well bring a thief. And magical fists at level 9 just comes too late, when you can easily get +1 weapons by level 3...
Part of the issue from a design perspective is that fighters stop getting anything interesting after level 13, while mages keep getting access to more and higher level spells.
Backstab is cool, but the problem is you are exposing a lightly armored thief to a ton of enemies. Oh sure you do lots of damage on the backstab...which is cool...or...you can just get the fighter to do the same amount of damage per round...without needing to setup the backstab.
In the BG 1 campaign, you are better off putting points to max out open locks/find traps as soon as possible, for obvious reasons. Hide in shadows/move silently being two different skills makes it really point intensive, and you can only do it once per combat since you cant hide in plain sight. You can spam invisibility pots to get multiple backstabs...but you still run into the same problem : a fighter does the same or higher damage per round on auto pilot without needing any micro management at all.
I cant recall a single encounter in BG 1 or SOD where having backstab would make a difference, except for the special ones where you are trying to get maximum XP by killing a NPC scripted to teleport away.
I like the Pillars of Eternity style where the game doesn't let you prebuff so it can be designed around all buffs being an opportunity cost versus other actions. in theory, at least, it lets buffs be even stronger relative to other kinds of spells. not sure if that pans out, but it does, at least, stop the hesitant "how many Tenser's Transformations and Stoneskins and Improved Hastes and Improved Invisibilities will I need" that BG2 can suffer from when you're overthinkin it.
Im not even bothering to cast any spells in battles, my fighter just slaughters everything, Firkaarg died in 2 rounds...
The only thing that doesnt die fast are admantanium golems with their 90% resist, but they cant hurt my fighter so its just a matter of waiting till it dies.
A warrior is what you need to kill most creatures in the game, especially weaklings. They strike endlessly and easily which is great if you have, for instance, waves of gibberlings charging you at the same time.
The big downside of a mage is that his spells are limited. Once he's used them, he becomes defenseless unless he's very high-level. Because of that, you don't want to use those limited spells for second-rate opponents. Let the fighter take care of those.
But a mage has also MUCH MORE firepower than a standard fighter when he does decide to cast. When facing a truly strong foe, swinging swords and using bows might not cut it if you're playing on the hardest difficulty settings. That's when the mage truly comes in. He's going to buff your warrior, disable another caster, trap some enemies, deal some incredible damage and so on.
I'm not saying that a group of warriors could not beat the game, but it's going to be WAY MORE difficult if you show no interest in magic. Proper items - which will be magical, ironically - will be mandatory for those warriors and if you don't have those, you're dead.
It's my belief that those who see warriors as OP focus on how easily they deal damage to the weakest of ennemies, and that's their purpose, really. If you focus on that, you'll no doubt see the mage as a frail party member. But it's forgetting how mages are super strong when fully prepared, they'll shred any warrior because they're meant to deal insane damage and counter any other class in a very short period of time. It's not because they can do that only twice before needing to sleep that they're weak.
So yes, mages are situational.. especially at the beginning of BG1. You're going to use them when you're in a dire situation and let them rot in the back the rest of the time. You could argue that they don't have enough hit points, suck at Thaco and AC but imagine for a second if they didn't. What would be the purpose of a warrior if a mage could do his job and cast as well ? He would be rendered useless.
So no, warriors are not OP. They just have a different role than mages and both were smartly designed to be complementary.
What is OP, however, is the fighter/mage that destroys this smart division of labour with almost no downside.
Install SCS and you will quickly find out what makes mages so deadly. As your fighter whiffs pathetically against Protection From Magic Weapons, Mirror Image, Stoneskin, and double fire shields while eating triple skull trap sequencers and getting smacked around by Mord’s Swords.
Fighters are easy to play, they run in and hit stuff. The efficacy of mages is entirely dependent on their spell selection and tactics. Without mods, most mages in the BG series are basically free exp. With SCS, you quickly learn that fighters are mild annoyances that stand between you and the real threat—enemy mages.
That said, I don't agree with OP that fighters are generally overpowered compared to mages. While I agree that fighters are much better at dealing damage and that the "blaster" mage is pretty awful in BGEE, an asleep, unconscious, held, panicked, or confused enemy is in most cases not meaningfully different from a dead enemy, and mages can cause all of these effects in party-friendly AoE. And this isn't even getting into buffs like Haste, which I suppose is "simple" in its effect but a massive power boost regardless.
As for thieves, they are indeed mostly there for utility; but I can't imagine how miserable it would be to do, say, Durlag's Tower without one.