New adventure advice

Atocha

Hello all!

After completing IWE:EE and HOW (not ToTLM) I would like to start again and play other classes and work on mistakes I had made. I played the game with the default party (please see: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/86527/adventuring-party-is-doomed# ).

Along the way, I was wondering how a UD was different from a paladin? Is lay on hands useful and has more Paladin flavor. I'm very glad my F/T was muliclassed because I didn't use the thief kit much besides detect trap, disarm trap and stealthing occasionally. My beserker, I didn't use beserk once... so what's the point of having one? And I felt I really didn't use the bard to it's potential. I found that the mage spells were not great, harmed my party also which is sad. Again, maybe I didn't use it to it's potential.

So I'd like to plan out my characters this time, maybe get new portraits, really enjoy things. I could make a smaller party perhaps.

Is there a easy-to-follow guide on rolling characters and what to rolls to achieve? Is it really ok to have low intelligence on a Paladin? If you're rolling a F/M you want high str and int, but not constitution, wisdom, CHR? How would dialog progress? Low HP. I don't know a lot about character and group building.

It's a lot of asking, but anything would be helpful.

nuther1

I always use the Undead Hunter in favor of the straight Paladin. I dont miss LOH. The plus 3 he gets on hit and damage vs undead makes up for it.

Here is my ideal party b/c you can get the level 30 achievements if you stick with it.

Undead Hunter - dual wield
Ranger/Cleric - dual wield - skeletal undead
Fighter/Druid - dual or multi class - DW scimitars for flavor
F/M/T - Bows
Fighter - 2 hand sword 5 pips
Bard - just sings, female - has spells like grease and web

You can get all the dialog with this party. Its actually close to the default party.

I like to have high ability score on all my characters, but it is not essential. My reasoning is that it reduces total play time because I dont have to rest as much. So, I will often spend hours just rolling scores until I get what I like. High armor class and hit points are important. I try to get 18s on dex and con for everyone but the Bard. The Bard needs INT and CHA. 18 str is not as important because there are spells and potions to boost it when needed. I dont like to have below 10 INT on people except for a roll playing reason.

Danacm

Fighters are strong here, so with a paladin (your flavor) and fighters are fine.
Arcane and divine magic also not essential but some fire weapon good to have early stages, and a cure light wounds is needed to not sleep 16000 days per rest until healed (which is only stupid roleplay wise, technically this not cause any problem).
My team should be:
Fighter with sword and shield (but not the style)
Fighter with two weapons (mace, warhammer, lobg sword)
Thief-fighter dual at lvl 6 (if you only needed the thief to open lock/find traps at maximum but otherwise dont want a thief- ofc you can use swashbuckler to dual from, but if not interested duals just use fighter/thief multi) with bows
Fighter with bows and two handed swords or an archer ranger
Undead hunter/ paladin / fighter/cleric multi
Shaman or totemic druid for flavor or maybe sorcerer oor another fighter

jmerry

Lay On Hands: A lot of healing, once per day, quick to cast so it's useful in combat. Once you get a few levels, anyway. It's pretty weak at level 1 or 2. Overall, it's a solid ability, but not a game-breaker.

In compensation for losing that, the Undead Hunter gets immunity to hold/paralysis and level drain (abilities common among undead such as ghouls and vampires) and a substantial bonus to attack and damage against undead. There are a lot of undead in Icewind Dale, from what I've heard.

Berserker rage is a very good ability; immunity to an enormous range of status effects and an attack/damage bonus, lasting ten rounds. It's hard to go wrong just activating it at the beginning of a fight. The drawback only comes in if you let the fight drag on for more than ten rounds, and the berserker gets the "winded" status - penalty to attack and damage lasting five rounds, can't activate rage during that time.

Mage spells hurting your own people ... yes, fireballs are iconic. And blowing up your own people with them is also iconic. Then again, you have options. Some attack spells are single-target - those won't have friendly fire problems. Some other attack spells are party-friendly; they only affect enemies in their area. Or you could use summoning spells, or buff spells. If you're not satisfied with what a spell does, try a different spell.
Also, "save or lose" spells are good. The mage's job isn't necessarily to deal damage or directly kill enemies; disabling enemies so that your warriors can clean them up easily also works very well.
If you really want to go with the indiscriminate area damage spells, use them at range so your party doesn't get affected. Or protect your party. I did a run of the Baldur's Gate series themed around this - indiscriminate fire spells with a fireproof party.

The usefulness of stats:
Strength grants bonuses to melee attack and damage and to carrying capacity, and some amounts are required to use . It's good for melee attackers and anyone who needs heavy equipment like plate armor or composite longbows. Warriors get the extra benefit of exceptional strength; if they start with 18 strength, that becomes 18/xx for bigger melee attack and damage bonuses.
Dexterity grants bonuses to ranged attacks and AC. Everyone can use as much as possible of it. Though if you can't afford more than 14 Dex, you might as well dump it down to average levels and have 10 or so.
Constitution grants more hit points, and better saves for the short races. It's good for everyone. Warriors and shorties should go for as much as possible, while non-warriors of the tall races don't get any real benefit past 16.
Intelligence improves arcane spell learning and lore scores - the ability to identify items without spending an "Identify" spell. 9 Int is also required to use scrolls and wands at all. Arcane spellcasters need a lot, while basically everyone else can afford to dump this. Lore only matters for whichever party member has the highest score, after all (Bards: base 10 per level, half that if a Blade. Thieves and mages: base 3 per level. Everyone else: base 1 per level).
Wisdom grants more spell slots to clerics and druids, and bonuses to lore. It's great for priests, and certain classes require a lot of it. Anyone else can just dump it, though whoever's going for the best lore should have at least 10 so as to not take a penalty.
Charisma improves your "reaction score", which many dialogues use. And ... does it affect store prices in IWD? In any case, it should only matter for whoever's interacting with the NPC. Your party "face" wants as much charisma as possible, and everyone else can dump it aside from class requirements.

There may be dialogues that key off other stats. But this comes down to how the dialogues are written, which I don't know anything about in IWD.

So, for example, you asked about paladins dumping Int? They need the physical stats because they're warriors. They have high Wis and Cha requirements. And they don't have any real use for Int, unless there are priest scrolls to use. It's about the only stat they can dump effectively.

Atocha

Thank you very much for all the info!!