Fighter/Mage multi tactics

Effortlessdepths

Hello all, I'm looking for tactics advice for a Fighter/Mage multi. Always played fighter kits and fighter/thieves, but I wanted to try my hand at a fighter/mage multi. I just finished BG1EE with a berserker, and though I found it boring, I did it primarily to just get through the game and beat it since I always got to baldur's gate city as a 12 year old kid and never went farther. Just wanted to finish the storyline, and I intended on starting a different character for SoD and finish the rest of the series from there. I did roll a 95 for the zerker so my stats were legitimately high, plus gave him all 8 tomes. So I decided to carry over/redistribute his high stats to SoD, and Keepered him up moderately, as if I played a F/M for all of BG1. Charname is: Elf Fighter/Mage 7/7, Str 19 Dex 20 Con 16 Int 18 Wis 14 Cha 16, Longsword ** Scim/Wak/Ninjato ** Dual Wield **.

So here's the bit. I've never gotten into magic a whole lot. I beat BG2 and ToB way back in the day, and I always had an NPC mage around to deal with other mages (you have to, duh) with all the contingencies, spell thrusting and disarming other mages, etc. But I never really GOT INTO the magic of the game, or played a magic user. My vision for this character is to be a frontliner, DPS tank, who can also ALMOST be the primary mage (I will have Neera as my primary mage in SOD, and will have another NPC mage for BG2 and ToB). Mostly using magic and melee to be frontline, but also capable of disabling mages, debuffing etc. I basically want him to be able to do a lot.

I need suggestion on tactics. How would you play this character? What spells would you utilize and when.... how do you play a fighter/mage? I really wanna spellsword it up this time around. Any suggestions are welcome, and sorry for the long post.

ThacoBell

If you want to do a melee tank, its gonna be buff and smash tactics for you. The armor spell (later ghost armor), blur, and mirror image are the essential basics. After you find caster armor (I think there's 1 suit in SoD) you can skip the armor spells. At higher levels, stoneskin should basically always be up and fireshield is a fantastic spell for dealing with other melee attackers. Haste is great pretty much always.

Mixing in some debuffs is also recommended. Haste+Slow is EXTREMEMLY powerful in SoD. Sleep is still somewhat useful through pre-endgame.

jsaving

@ThacoBell covered your staple spells perfectly but you will want to keep in mind that your caster level won't be competitive with a pure mage at higher levels. That means spells like dispel magic, skull trap, and eventually ADHW will be quite a bit weaker than you're used to seeing on your previous mage characters. But fighter/mages are still the strongest characters in the game because they can leverage mage buffs with high APR to dish out high melee DPS while being almost invulnerable to damage.

ThacoBell

Correct, your scaling damage spells won't be *as* useful late game. Which is fine, a melee fighter mage needs more buffs than pure mages anyway. Save the artillery spells for your pure caster.