Challenging playthrough and my fear of restartitis.

Vano

Hi, this is my first post here, although I am reading this forum for a long time.

I have been playing BG1, BG2, PST and IWD2 for about 20 years, but always missed out IWD1. About 2 months back I bought it on GOG and what should I say... it is awesome. I have one comeplete playthrough with a party of six on core rules with 18 rolls in the three main stats and max hp roll.

I started a new run this evening after being hit multiple times by restartitis. To have a challenge I gave me some restrictions: Max 5 rerolls at character creation and only redistributing 2 points. Game mode is insane without higher dmg and no exp bonus and random hp rolls.

My evil team consist of a Black Guard, Kensai, Priest of Talos, Bounty Hunter, Druid and a Sorc.
The stats are OK I do not have a main stat below 10 and I had a good luck with HP rolls.

Now I am in the Vail of Shadows in the room before Kresselack. Actually the playthrough was doing a lot of fun and I like my team. But I feel it might get a little bit too challenging... Usually I try to avoid resting too often, but this time it is necessary... Probably it is a bit harder because I do not have a strong range weapon user but this is the way I want it. Also the ACs are pretty bad due to no min/maxing Dexterty.

Now my main question is - do you think it will help to enable higher exp with insane mode, or will it make the play through too easy later on?

I am afraid of restartitis hitting me again and want to find the perfect balance in difficulty ;-).

Thanks for your help/suggestions!

sarevok57

that extra XP will make the game way too easy at least in my opinion

i always play on insane with double damage and always have the extra XP turned off, with that extra XP turned on you just grow up levels way to quickly and the game really does become easy

insane difficulty with extra XP turned off, is right in the niche for when it comes to balanced difficulty

and dont feel too bad if you have to rest often to win some battles, because your characters wont mind, and in fact they may be more grateful for it because being alive is better than being dead

Vano

OK. Thanks for your opinion. I think the place is probably getting on my nerves because the Kensai uses scimitars and it takes pretty long to take down the skellys with the Black Guard (12 Str - meh) and Cleric (18 str - yay).

Btw. I have a team of 5 female chars and 1 male. My Kensai is male and has an arabic style portrait. It kinda looks like a pasha is traveling with his harem through the north ... wasn't intended but I had to laugh thinking about it.

O_Bruce

I also agree that you should turn additional experience off, because you'll be outleveling the game soon enough and that would defeat the purpose of challenge.

Kenji

Embrace the restart, fire all of your mercenaries and regroup another Warband!

I believe I complete about 1 run of IWD for every 10 ready-to-go parties I made.

Just don't get dragged into the whole "lvl1 HoF" thing, it's exciting for the first time, maybe, then it just gets tedious.

The insane difficulty with bonus XP turned off is a more immersive experience (no more single goblin soaking up fifty bolts and arrows and there are hordes of them). Not that you need to min/max in order to play Lvl1 HoF, but playing suboptimal characters you want rather than having to min/max is a far more enjoyable experience. For me anyway!

Vano

Your suggestions to go on without bonus XP, was very helpful!

Now I am in Lower Dorns Deep, only Ilmadia and the Illmater priest room with the hordes of undead is left.
I probably head off to the expension now and will finish the little rest later.

It is a great run, much more interesting than the first one with optimized chars. You have to work around problems which usually are not encountered. My Black Guards STR is only 12 so she actually cannot equip any good armor or shields, I always have to buff her with Sorc lvl2 spell. And after resting she cannot move cause the equipment is too heavy . The Kensai although 14/15/14 is a killing machine now, especially buffed. And the Sorc has 18x lvl 1 and 2 spells... So here we have the two over powered chars.

I expected it with Sorc but would not have thought so about the Kensai.
In BG2 I actually had a complete playthrough (my only once!) with TOB with a pure Kensai and he kicked butts hard. But due to enemy hordes I thought he won't be too strong in IWD ... well I was wrong .

IWD is great! How could I miss out this gem... But at least I have something to play now. I am not very fond with the nowadays games and play always my old ones , but thats another topic.

This run will be finished for sure. Probably I will use this group for a BG1/2 playthrough, with my Sorc as main. I am thinking about a story to connect both games (ye I know time line but who cares ... after killing Bhelifet the chars were thrown in different locations / timezones and met in candle keep, while Sorc lady was thrown exactly there and lost her memory... haha who knows).

Thank you once again for help guys!

sarevok57

do note, that if you head off to the expansion ( but talking with hjollder ) you will not be able to come back to the IWD areas and you will be forever stuck in HoW

so with that being said, it is advised that you just beat IWD normally ( because you will get more XP and the blade of ahonem - or whatever it is called and that weapon can be upgraded further in HoW - ) and then just import your characters when you make a new game in HoW

Vano

OK I will do so, thanks for the info! ... damn as I am evil I do not have his blade, tricked him an threw away the broken weapon I was supposed to give to him.

sarevok57

Vano said:

OK I will do so, thanks for the info! ... damn as I am evil I do not have his blade, tricked him an threw away the broken weapon I was supposed to give to him.

unfortunate, when you get back to easthaven and when he gives you the upgraded version ( non broken one ) its worth like 500 000+ XP are something like that

but if you didn't give him the broken one in chapter 1 then you ain't getting squat

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sarevok57

subtledoctor said:

sarevok57 said:

do note, that if you head off to the expansion ( but talking with hjollder ) you will not be able to come back to the IWD areas and you will be forever stuck in HoW

That's not true. You can get Hjollder to take you back. (Might gave to play through most of the expansion first - or maybe even all of it. I usually play all of HOW between Upper Dorn's Deep and Lower Dorn's Deep, then go back and finish the main quest.)

i've never seen the option for him to take you back, are you playing with a mod of some kind?

Iamdorf

No it's not a mod sarevok57. You can have him take you back (Spoiler!)

when you find him on the isle of the dead. (Don't ask him what to do next just say you want to go back.) Also after you expose the dragon you can go back.