Just came back to report that I’m on my first playthrough of BG2 and didn’t even recognize the name “Koshi” when I fought him, or notice any red katanas. I did look up the name on the wiki later to see where he was in the game and discovered that he was already dead; only then did I remember him.
His fate was to immediately fail his save against Chaos and run stupidly down the hall while my party killed all his buddies. He never had time to hit anything and I didn’t have to reload on that battle.
Which really does kind of illustrate in part why mages are so good in BG2...
well chaos does come with a pretty gnarly -4 penalty to the save, and save vs spell is the weakest save of enemies, so there can be times where you will luck out and hit a lot of dudes in one go with that spell
It depends. With meta game knowledge comes greater understanding of how to maximize classes like thief, cleric and mage.
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.
With are and Prot from Magic Scrolls it's 100% doable. Skull traps in the center of Bhaal's insignia more or less do all the work but that requires a measure of meta-knowledge.
The cold hard truth for BG1 is : the -4 AC from 18 dex is overpowered on fighters. That's the real game breaker. It's what allows them to be invincible vs 90% opponents throughout the entire game.
do a fighter with 9 dex with no shield use and you're in for a ride. It feels exactly how bioware meant it to be.
The whole old system is goes toward the high heroic ability scores, because low scores dont add any benefits. There were no such things like heavy armor dex penalty for strong but low dex fighters. Yeah, if you have leather armor and 18 dex, your ac is 3. The same if you have 9 dex and plate mail. But plate with 18 dex is ridiculus, -1 ac.
And don't forget about the AC modifiers like slashing, piercing, etc... that go with a plate mail. A fully optimized fighter can tank Sarevok.
Still I wouldn't call them overpowered. Bards or Mage/Thieves are significantly more powerful for one simple reason: wands. There's only one thing in BG1 wands cannot trivialize: Drizzt. That's all. Even Aec'Letec will fall quickly to the right wand. And they're plentiful! M/T also have the advantage of being able to backstab, which will fell tougher foes like Sarevok quickly.
I don't think the problem is with the rules about AC modifiers. Those rules were written for the PnP game where rolling an 18 was extremely rare because those same rules specified that 3 x d6 dice should be used to generate the ability score with no redistribution of points.
If the game was rigidly faithful to 2ed rules our characters wouldn't end up being built like superheroes and wouldn't get all the ott benefits that skew the gameplay.
Edit: For example, I've just rolled a character the PnP way with d6s and got stats of 7,7,12,11,15,8.
I don't think the problem is with the rules about AC modifiers. Those rules were written for the PnP game where rolling an 18 was extremely rare because those same rules specified that 3 x d6 dice should be used to generate the ability score with no redistribution of points.
If the game was rigidly faithful to 2ed rules our characters wouldn't end up being built like superheroes and wouldn't get all the ott benefits that skew the gameplay.
Edit: For example, I've just rolled a character the PnP way with d6s and got stats of 7,7,12,11,15,8.
I don't think that's the issue either.
They were totally capable of scaling encounters to be challenging for characters with high stats if they wanted to. There's no rule in the playbook that says you have to fight Xvarts and stuff in the early levels.
I think the game's just a bit easier than you'd like it to be.
The real problem is that stat increases scale really, really badly in 2nd edition AD&D. Taking your DEX from 10 to 14 has little effect but going from 14 to 18 buys you a whopping 4 points to AC. Taking your CON from 10 to 14 has little effect but going from 14 to 18 buys you a whopping 4 hit points per level. And taking your STR from 10 to 14 has little effect but going from 14 to 18/00 buys you a whopping +3 to hit and +6 damage every time you attack.
In that kind of ruleset, players who "munchkin" their fighters are inevitably going to find the game easy. Some people enjoy that, but those who don't should just avail themselves of one of the game's many solutions, like raising the difficulty level.
I'll be honest, I only skimmed MOST of the 70 responses, but I will say this in terms of a fighter being better than a mage in BGEE.
This is to be expected levels 1-9/13 is where fighters really shine. Most encounters you're going to be facing at this level can be beaten with weapons etc, and if mages are taking their defensive protection spells, they don't really have enough spell levels or slots to put into both defensive spells and offensive spells.
By the time Wizards are starting to hit level 9 though, that balance starts to tip in their favor. Suddenly, they have a wide option of spell levels available for offensive and defensive magic.
Thus, levels 9-13 are usually some of the most balanced overall in game.
After that, mages start to pull ahead again, because the 7th, 8th and 9th level spells are fantastic.
This is also why you see the common fighter duals around 9 and 13. You get GrandMastery (nerfed but still nice) and/or an extra attack. And realistically, until GWW, your fighter isn't going to have much more. And when you look at the experience you gain for the benefits you're looking to get, it makes the trade-off worth it.
I'll be honest, I only skimmed MOST of the 70 responses, but I will say this in terms of a fighter being better than a mage in BGEE.
This is to be expected levels 1-9/13 is where fighters really shine. Most encounters you're going to be facing at this level can be beaten with weapons etc, and if mages are taking their defensive protection spells, they don't really have enough spell levels or slots to put into both defensive spells and offensive spells.
By the time Wizards are starting to hit level 9 though, that balance starts to tip in their favor. Suddenly, they have a wide option of spell levels available for offensive and defensive magic.
Thus, levels 9-13 are usually some of the most balanced overall in game.
After that, mages start to pull ahead again, because the 7th, 8th and 9th level spells are fantastic.
This is also why you see the common fighter duals around 9 and 13. You get GrandMastery (nerfed but still nice) and/or an extra attack. And realistically, until GWW, your fighter isn't going to have much more. And when you look at the experience you gain for the benefits you're looking to get, it makes the trade-off worth it.
You couldn't know this just by reading this thread, but the OP did later make a similar thread in the BG2 subforum, when they were farther in the trilogy.
Their viewpoint on fighters in general seemed to be heavily influenced by the fact that they were playing a berserker or barbarian, forget which, and that allowed them to bulldose through a lot of encounters without need for magical intervention.
I have a simple rule to make mage fighting more even: don't ever target enemy mages with ranged weapons. That's all it takes to make them nicely relevant in the fight once again.
I have a simple rule to make mage fighting more even: don't ever target enemy mages with ranged weapons. That's all it takes to make them nicely relevant in the fight once again.
I have a simple rule to make mage fighting more even: don't ever target enemy spellcasters with ranged weapons. That's all it takes to make them nicely relevant in the fight once again.
I have a simple rule to make mage fighting more even: don't ever target enemy spellcasters with ranged weapons. That's all it takes to make them nicely relevant in the fight once again.
I have a simple rule to make mage fighting more even: don't ever target enemy spellcasters with ranged weapons. That's all it takes to make them nicely relevant in the fight once again.
Hm??? You posted that yesterday.
Changed "mages" to "spellcasters", so I think he was broadening his definition to include the divine casters.
Yes I thought so too; then the day after I saw the comment field still with my text in it. Thinking 'Didn't I post this yesterday??' I then corrected the text and posted it (again.. apparently)
Comments
His fate was to immediately fail his save against Chaos and run stupidly
down the hall while my party killed all his buddies. He never had time to hit anything and I didn’t have to reload on that battle.
Which really does kind of illustrate in part why mages are so good in BG2...
do a fighter with 9 dex with no shield use and you're in for a ride. It feels exactly how bioware meant it to be.
Yeah, if you have leather armor and 18 dex, your ac is 3. The same if you have 9 dex and plate mail. But plate with 18 dex is ridiculus, -1 ac.
Still I wouldn't call them overpowered. Bards or Mage/Thieves are significantly more powerful for one simple reason: wands. There's only one thing in BG1 wands cannot trivialize: Drizzt. That's all. Even Aec'Letec will fall quickly to the right wand. And they're plentiful! M/T also have the advantage of being able to backstab, which will fell tougher foes like Sarevok quickly.
If the game was rigidly faithful to 2ed rules our characters wouldn't end up being built like superheroes and wouldn't get all the ott benefits that skew the gameplay.
Edit: For example, I've just rolled a character the PnP way with d6s and got stats of 7,7,12,11,15,8.
They were totally capable of scaling encounters to be challenging for characters with high stats if they wanted to. There's no rule in the playbook that says you have to fight Xvarts and stuff in the early levels.
I think the game's just a bit easier than you'd like it to be.
In that kind of ruleset, players who "munchkin" their fighters are inevitably going to find the game easy. Some people enjoy that, but those who don't should just avail themselves of one of the game's many solutions, like raising the difficulty level.
This is to be expected levels 1-9/13 is where fighters really shine. Most encounters you're going to be facing at this level can be beaten with weapons etc, and if mages are taking their defensive protection spells, they don't really have enough spell levels or slots to put into both defensive spells and offensive spells.
By the time Wizards are starting to hit level 9 though, that balance starts to tip in their favor. Suddenly, they have a wide option of spell levels available for offensive and defensive magic.
Thus, levels 9-13 are usually some of the most balanced overall in game.
After that, mages start to pull ahead again, because the 7th, 8th and 9th level spells are fantastic.
This is also why you see the common fighter duals around 9 and 13. You get GrandMastery (nerfed but still nice) and/or an extra attack. And realistically, until GWW, your fighter isn't going to have much more. And when you look at the experience you gain for the benefits you're looking to get, it makes the trade-off worth it.
Their viewpoint on fighters in general seemed to be heavily influenced by the fact that they were playing a berserker or barbarian, forget which, and that allowed them to bulldose through a lot of encounters without need for magical intervention.
Edit: Link to the thread