Advice for a new player?
Mysterious_Traveler
Member Posts: 9
My first time playing BG, and I intend to play BG2 and all of the dlc between the two.
I started as a Berserker. I'm a few hours into my playthrough and I realised that I wanna duel class into either a mage (so I can cast cool spells) or thief (so I can steal and sneak). Problem is, I'm level 2 right now and my stats are as follows:
STR 18
DEX 12
CON 18
INT 11
WIS 11
CHA 18
Am I screwed and unable to duel class unless I restart? From what I understand I can only do that if I have 17 in INT or DEX respectively.
I also sorta wanna solo the game or have a small party, any recommendations or advise for a new player? I know it may be better to have a big party, but I sorta am really chaotic when I play so I work better alone haha. That and from what I've read party members don't add too much. I just wanna experience the game so many people love and have a good time. I like being overpowered and tend to be evil sometimes too.
Thanks!
I started as a Berserker. I'm a few hours into my playthrough and I realised that I wanna duel class into either a mage (so I can cast cool spells) or thief (so I can steal and sneak). Problem is, I'm level 2 right now and my stats are as follows:
STR 18
DEX 12
CON 18
INT 11
WIS 11
CHA 18
Am I screwed and unable to duel class unless I restart? From what I understand I can only do that if I have 17 in INT or DEX respectively.
I also sorta wanna solo the game or have a small party, any recommendations or advise for a new player? I know it may be better to have a big party, but I sorta am really chaotic when I play so I work better alone haha. That and from what I've read party members don't add too much. I just wanna experience the game so many people love and have a good time. I like being overpowered and tend to be evil sometimes too.
Thanks!
Post edited by NaturalBornKieler on
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Comments
https://the-eye.eu/public/Books/rpg.rem.uz/Dungeons & Dragons/AD&D 2nd Edition/Core/
Thanks for the advise too! I'm thinking a Berserker Mage for sure now. What evil characters do you recommend for the party?
I sorta like playing as a lone wolf character but I like the idea of party interactions sometimes. But I want all the EXP to myself haha.
- You must be human.
- Your primary stat for the original class must be at least 15.
- Your primary stat for the new class must be at least 17.
- Only "natural" stats suffice. Temporary boosts from equipment and spells don't help you qualify.
- Some kits are not allowed to dual-class, and only class combinations that exist as a multiclass for some race can be done as dual classes.
- Other requirements such as alignment for the new class must be met.
So, for a human fighter (berserker) to dual-class:
- You would need at least 15 strength. You're good on this.
- To dual-class into Thief, you would need at least 17 dexterity and an alignment that isn't Lawful Good. There's one Dex-increasing tome out there, so you could get away with 16 Dex to start with.
- To dual-class into Mage, you would need at least 17 intelligence. There's one Int-increasing tome out there, so you could get away with 16 Int to start with.
- To dual-class into Cleric, you would need at least 17 wisdom. There are three Wis-increasing tomes out there, so you could get away with 14 Wis to start with.
- To dual-class into Druid, you would need at least 17 wisdom, 17 Charisma, and a True Neutral alignment. There are three Wis-increasing tomes and one Cha-increasing tome out there, so you could get away with 14 Wis and 16 Cha to start with.
With 12 Dex, 11 Int, and 11 Wis, no dual class is possible with that character or ever will be.
On aligning your party ... the game is easier, on the whole, with a party of neutral and/or good characters. Evil options aren't really implemented well; if you want to play evil, you have to go out of your way to do things like kill innocent bystanders. There are a few special characters out there that you can get good stuff from that way, but mostly you'll just make things harder on yourself. Including shopping - high-reputation parties get substantial discounts.
Good characters, with the exception of Imoen, will abandon you if your reputation drops down to 2 or less. Paladins and rangers will fall and lose their special abilities before that.
Neutral characters will abandon you if your reputation drops down to 1.
Evil characters will abandon you if your reputation goes up to 19 or more. And there are a lot of quests that reward you with reputation gains; managing your reputation is always a concern if you're trying to keep evil party members around.
Some characters have interpersonal conflicts, but it's pretty much always a case of evil characters and non-evil characters not getting along. The blackguard Dorn won't work with paladin Ajantis or lawful good fighter/cleric Yeslick. Minsc wants to save Dynaheir and Edwin wants to kill Dynaheir. That sort of thing.
On getting Dorn to join you ... if you've talked to him in the Friendly Arm, he'll show up when you travel to the Nashkel mines. You can have him join then if you have an open party slot, or you can let him head back to the Friendly Arm where he will be open to joining later. Having Dorn in your party is a 2-point reputation penalty, which is refunded when he leaves.
One tip on a hybrid style - if you go solo at first, then recruit a party later, new characters will join you at higher XP values. This goes up to 32000 XP; if your protagonist has 32K or more XP, any newly recruited character will join with 32K XP. On the other hand, the game is a lot deadlier when you're alone - failing a save against a simple Charm spell is game over when you're playing solo. A full party can reach the experience cap in this game without too much trouble if you just do all the content, so it's not like your solo character even ends up more powerful than the character in a party.
Fighters receive permanent increases in their attacks-per-round at levels 7 and 13. For that reason, those are common dualing points for the impatient (7) or patient (13) player. For a middle ground you can dual at 9, when you are first able to put five pips in your preferred weapon.
As an alternative, you could go with a multiclass fighter/mage, fighter/thief, or fighter/mage/thief. There are two main reasons to consider this route. The first is that you can use all of your abilities from the start instead of having to patiently wait for them. The second is that there comes a point in BG2 when you begin receiving high-level abilities for your active classes. The fighter selections are quite strong but you're not eligible to select them as a dual-class character, because you've chosen to forever stop learning new things as a fighter.
But the bottom line is that any mix of fighter, mage, and thief is really strong in BG/SoD/BG2. You won't go wrong no matter what you choose. Best wishes and good luck!
@Allanon81 Oh that's cool to hear! One thing I've noticed is sometimes I get a lot of EXP for killing some guards sent to kill me so that's neat. I'm for sure thinking Dorn and Viconia from what I've heard. I don't know Edwin but if I see him in my travels I'll check him out Yeah I agree, I love discovering things. Every so often I need to ask a few questions so I don't get stuck resetting the game and actually get to playing it haha XD
That multiclass idea is tempting, and I like the idea of having both abilities, but I think for my first playthrough I'll stay as a human just from a role-playing perspective as my character. I will remember multi classing for repeat playthroughs though- thanks!
Hmm- what if I wait to duel class until I get the advanced fighter skills in BG2? You think that would be worth it or viable?
As for evil companions: I enjoyed the duo of Xzar and Montaron pretty much, that's the two guys you can meet right in the first forest map. Xzar is a necromancer, not quite as powerful a mage as Edwin, but he's just hilarious. Montaron is a multiclass fighter/thief, so he can deal with picking locks and disarming traps and is better at fighting than a singleclass thief. The dwarf Kagain can also be found in Bereghost and is an awesome tank. Viconia is a great cleric, so good for healing and buffs (can find her in the area east of the Friendly Arm Inn). Dorn in BG1 is indeed very strong and can deal lots of damage. You should speak to him first at the Friendly Arm Inn and then you'll meet him later when traveling from Nashkel to the mines. That's the party I used on my evil playthrough and I enjoyed it very much. There are of course lots of other companions out there, you can just check out a list online (like here https://baldursgate.fandom.com/wiki/Companions ) to see who's available and where to find them.
If you dual at 7 or 9, you're making a minimal caster-level sacrifice in exchange for substantial melee power. Waiting until 13 imposes a substantially larger caster-level sacrifice in exchange for somewhat more melee power. But waiting all the way until 3 million XP imposes such a large caster-level sacrifice for such a small melee gain that it would almost never be worthwhile.
You can reach lvl 13 only in BG2, and for plot reasons, you won't be able to keep your scrolls between each game (but you can get plenty of scrolls in early BG2 anyway).
So either you dual at lvl7/9 in BG1/sod and you keep your scrolls, or you use them for Edwin or sell them and get a good gold boost.
@jsaving Ah I see, in that case I may go for Duel Classing at lvl 7, just so I don't have to worry about it later.
@Noon Oh I appreciate you letting me know about that!
I have one final question for now. As much as I wanna do an small party evil playthrough, should I do a full party good playthrough first to get the more genuine story the first time? Man this game makes me wanna restart and try different things all the time haha
Ah I see Restartitis Anonymous will get a new member soon. We meet every Tuesday in the cellar below your local comic book store where we discuss new characters, min-maxing and the ever crushing desire to start over again. And again.
Welp. Hope I see you there!
To your final (or not ) question: yes you're right, if you're not absolutely dead set on playing evil, then taking a rather good or at least neutral approach might be favorable for a very first playthrough to see most of the story. It's more rewarding that way most of the time, the story and most of the side quests make a bit more sense if you're more of a hero kinda guy instead of a villain. And it's often even plain and simple easier, for example if you're good with a high reputation you get discounts at stores, but if you're evil with low reputation you have to pay extra for your items...
To be honest for a first playthrough I'd personally even advise against dual-classing and maybe rather go for multiclassing because it's not so complicated and you can enjoy the abilities of your class combination right from the start. But if you're absolutely willing to go dual and/or human then of course go for it, it's not like you haven't gotten a lot of great advice on that yet
And one last thing concerning containers: yes these things are absolutely great when it comes to inventory management. With the scroll case mentioned above and the gem bag you already found in Neera's inventory, just to complete the list: in High Hedge, the area west of Bereghost, there's a big building with a guy named Thalantyr inside. He sells a potion case that can store 100 potions. I think these 3 containers should be all in BG1EE (anyone correct me if I'm wrong here?) and should spare you a lot of item juggling hassle.
I will be there. I've waited 700 years for someone to come and find the holy grail perfect combination of race/class/kit/stats
That extra container is helping a ton as well so I appreciate the tip!
@Skatan Your goal is admirable, I hope I can help put your quest to rest after such a long trial of patience
You could edit your character's stats using EEKeeper so you can have the dual-class you want.