Want to try a small party and need help

Sloty1984

Hi at all!
I am doing a bg2ee walkthrough with three people at the moment. After that I want to try a small party in iwdee.
Can you suggest me a strong party and how many people I should take along?

ineth

One option I like for IWD:

• Berkerker or Dwarven Defender or Undead Hunter etc. (heavy-armored tank and heavy hitter)
• Fighter/Druid multiclass (heavy-armored tank, healer, and crowd controller)
• Fighter/Thief or Fighter/Mage/Thief multiclass (trap/lock disabler, bow wielder)

Another one, albeit a bit more squishy, so will rely more on summoned creatures and scouting/backstabbing:

• Berkerker or Dwarven Defender or Undead Hunter etc. (heavy-armored tank and melee heavy hitter)
• Fighter/Thief multiclass (backstabber, light-armored versatile melee and ranged warrior, and trap/lock disabler)
• Cleric/Mage mutlticlass (summoner, crowd-controller, and healer)

Some general considerations:

• You should have at least one (more convenient if two) heavy-armored front-line warriors, who can always stand against the hordes of monsters you face without relying on per-day resources like spells.
• Unless you plan on backing out of dungeons to rest-spam a lot, you better include a healer.
• You pretty much need a thief in some form, to disable traps and open locks. In theory, there are also mage spells for that, but it's too frustrating to rely fully on that, especially if you don't already know where all the locks/traps are.
• You can actually go completely without any arcane casters if that fits your play style. There are no BG2-style mage duels where you absolutely must cast Breach or Pierce Magic.
• Single-class Mages and Bards are not a good fit for small IWD parties, because it will be pointless to gain higher spell levels faster while not having any scrolls to scribe into them. (Spell scrolls are scarce in this game and deliberately placed with the level progression of a 6-person-party in mind.)
• A Sorcerer (or its kits) is the most effective arcane caster, and doesn't suffer from the spell scroll scarcity, but can be difficult to fit into a small party if you want many different roles covered.
• A Fighter/Mage multiclass actually makes for an even better tank for boss fights than a heavy-armored warrior, once you find a scroll of Mirror Image (chapter 1) and Stoneskin (late chapter 3). However, it will be tougher in the early game (especially the prologue), and unless you rest-spam, you won't have enough of those spells to also tank all the hordes of trash mobs in between boss fights.
• Unlike in BG2, there is no per-party-member quest XP - all experience rewards are awarded to the party as a lump sum and then divided. This means that a 3-person party really gains XP twice as fast as a 6-person party.
• Playing on higher difficulty levels increases all XP rewards in this game even further (+50% on Hard, +100% on Insane). If you combine this with a small party, then triple-classes like Fighter/Mage/Thief really start to shine.

Sloty1984

Whats a good smaller party that includes a sorcerer?

ineth

You could add the Sorcerer to my first suggestion, to get a 4-person party:

1. Berkerker or Dwarven Defender or Undead Hunter etc. (heavy-armored tank and heavy hitter)
2. Fighter/Druid or Fighter/Cleric multiclass (heavy-armored tank, healer, summoner, and crowd controller or buffer)
3. Fighter/Thief multiclass (trap/lock disabler, bow wielder, scout, and backstabber)
4. Sorcerer (summoner, crowd controller, nuker)

Both arcane casters and Druids have some crowd-control spells (slowing/immobilizing/damaging groups of enemies), so if you have the Sorcerer, you could replace the Druid multiclass with a Cleric one.
Clerics are more focused on combat buffs and healing.
(Not that there would be anything wrong with having both a Sorcerer and a Druid, either. I do find Druid spells more interesting in IWD than in BG2 - so it's up to preference!)

To get back down to 3 characters, you could kick A (the pure front-line warrior), but may find your melee damage output lacking in the early game.
You could just try it, and if the Orc cave near the starting village in the prologue is too difficult without the extra warrior, you could use the multi-player trick to retroactively add him.

If you're feeling experimental, you could also try combining the "healer" and "trap/lock disabler" roles into one character, by replacing B and C with a single Cleric/Thief multiclass.
But that's a bit of a weird class which I have so far avoided, so I can't give any practical advise for it.
It's restricted to Cleric weapons, which don't have much overlap with weapons hat a Thief can use for backstabbing. And also can't perform Thieving skills (like Hide in Shadows) while wearing armor, so is effectively restricted to Thief armor.
But you can probably find guides out there that explain how to make such a character work.

Sloty1984

Thanks!
Is dual wielding as good as it is in BG2?

Because I think there are no plus attacks weapons in iwdee.

ineth

Yes, dual-wielding is very effective in IWD:EE, it's probably the highest-damage-output weapon style for front-line warriors.

Long Swords are the melee weapon type with the best item placement - you'll probably have a Long Sword +2 before even finding a +1 version of most other weapons, etc.
Short Swords, Maces, Flails also have decent availability as far as I remember.

Sloty1984

Which are the most important arcane spells(if I take a sorcerer)?

What are the advantages of a fighter/druid to a fighter/cleric?

Which are the best ranged weapons?

Sloty1984

Please help

dzyngis

Sloty1984 wrote: »

.....

What are the advantages of a fighter/druid to a fighter/cleric?

Which are the best ranged weapons?

Fighter/cleric is better. Mostly because his skill of turning undeads.
Best ranged weapon for who?
Bows are most universal. No particular one like Gessen in BG2.

Sloty1984

I want a 3 to 4 man party.
Want all roles covered(Tank, semie thief for locks,traps and pickpocketing, healer with dd potential and an arcane dd)
Good if one could be a ranged force too.

Yigor

Sloty1984 wrote: »

What are the advantages of a fighter/druid to a fighter/cleric?

At higher levels fighter/druid can summon elementals, who are quite helpful in massive IWD fights. ⚔️

Sloty1984

But cant a f/c buff himself signicantly better than a f/d ?
Which are the best weapons to use in the game?

Should I give all members a ranged weapon?

Yigor

Sloty1984 wrote: »

Which are the most important arcane spells(if I take a sorcerer)?

Level 1: Chromatic Orb, Find Familiar (for protagonist), Magic Missiles, Protection from Evil, Shield.
Level 2: Blur, Detect Invisibility, Horror, Invisibility, Knock, Mirror Image, Web.
Level 3: Detect Illusion, Fireball, Ghost Armor, Haste, Lightning Bolt, Skull Trap, Slow.

The list is not exhaustive. 😉

Sloty1984

you seem to know what you are saying and you have good knowledge of the game.
Can you give me answers to my other questions?

Yigor

Sloty1984 wrote: »

But cant a f/c buff himself signicantly better than a f/d ?

On Heart of Fury difficulty F/D will be stronger, cuz of strong summons. The melee on HoF will be complicated anyway and U need AC=-15 or better. On other difficulty levels, both will work, it would depend on your tactics. 😎

Yigor

Sloty1984 wrote: »

Should I give all members a ranged weapon?

If U wanna play on Insane or HoF, then yes, absolutely! 👈 The easiest tactics is to use summons at the front line, while bombarding monsters with ranged weapons. (Contrary to BG, there are big hordes of monsters in IWD). 😉

Yigor

Sloty1984 wrote: »

Which are the best weapons to use in the game?

The most important imho is the Three White Doves +3 mace (available in Lonelywood). It makes double damage against undead and outer planar creatures +5% chance of instakill. 😎

Sloty1984

at Yigor: which is your best 3-4 man party?

At which level would you start heart of fury mode?

Yigor

Sloty1984 wrote: »

at Yigor: which is your best 3-4 man party?

At which level would you start heart of fury mode?

Here is my last HoF trio (not yet finished, I'm planning to continue it in the near future): https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/82679/hof-trio-berserker-cleric-kensai-thief-and-wizard-slayer-mage

In principle, it's possible to start HoF mode even at level 1 in Easthaven (there are tons of XP on HoF with very quick level progression), but the beginning is very tedious without summoning spellcasters. 😼

Sloty1984

I dont like the dual classing philosophie. Do you have some other reccomendations?

But I find the hof from level one interesting.
How would you skill a four person party that is able to succeed in level one heart of fury from the beginning?
Are there some special tactics to succeed in playing hof from level one?

Balrog99

Thieves suck in IWD. You can get by pretty well without one if you take an arcane caster who is true neutral. Their familiar is the rabbit, which is really good at finding/removing traps. It's abilities can be augmented with the Luck spell and Tymora's Melody (if you have a bard). The only place that has traps that it can't disable is at Dragon Eye.

Yigor

Balrog99 wrote: »

Thieves suck in IWD. You can get by pretty well without one if you take an arcane caster who is true neutral. Their familiar is the rabbit, which is really good at finding/removing traps. It's abilities can be augmented with the Luck spell and Tymora's Melody (if you have a bard). The only place that has traps that it can't disable is at Dragon Eye.

Wow, really interesting idea about a rabbit detecting and disabling traps! 🐇😹

Yigor

Sloty1984 wrote: »

I dont like the dual classing philosophie. Do you have some other reccomendations?

But I find the hof from level one interesting.
How would you skill a four person party that is able to succeed in level one heart of fury from the beginning?
Are there some special tactics to succeed in playing hof from level one?

I'd suggest to add a Totemic Druid to your party, which has the Summon Spirit Animal ability starting from level 1.

Tactics: summon something and try to attract goblins/orcs/wolves 1 by 1. Keep your summoned minion(s) in the front line, while all your chars bombard monsters with ranged weapons. IIRC a killed goblin gives 2000 XP on HoF. 😹 Sleep (to reactivate your summon abilities) and repeat. 😉

Yigor

Sloty1984 wrote: »

I dont like the dual classing philosophie. Do you have some other reccomendations?

But a dual-classed Fighter/X can be significantly stronger than a multi-classed Fighter/X, since you can put grand mastery in any admissible weapon! ⚔️

Yigor

Sloty1984 wrote: »

Do you have some other recomendations?

Here my other trio, where I started on HoF from scratch. 👈

https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/82705/archer-stalker-cleric-and-beast-master-cleric-dual-classing-and-weapon-issues

Sloty1984

What do you think about using the triple classes?

Yigor

Sloty1984 wrote: »

What do you think about using the triple classes?

Both F/M/C and F/M/T are great in IWD and U can reach the level 30/30/30!

Sloty1984

What would you make a small party with F/M/C or F/M/T or both?

I am sorry, english is not my mother tongue

Yigor

Sloty1984 wrote: »

What would you make a small party with F/M/C or F/M/T or both?

I am sorry, english is not my mother tongue

Combining our discussion with the idea of @Balrog99 , I'd suggest the following party:

1. True neutral F/M/C with a rabbit familiar 🐇, useful to detect/disable traps (so, U don't need a thief, largely useless in IWD). Also, IIRC, neutral clerics have few additional spells, hitting creatures with good/evil alignment.
2. Dwarven Defender as the best tank in IWD (I soloed it on HoF from scratch up to level 30).
3. Totemic Druid for a Spirit Animal, starting from level 1 (+ summoning of Invisible Stalker and Elementals at higher levels). 😎

Yigor

If U still wanna a Thief, I'd suggest a Bounty Hunter, who can set Special Traps. 🪤

Balrog99

Yigor wrote: »

If U still wanna a Thief, I'd suggest a Bounty Hunter, who can set Special Traps. 🪤

I agree. A Bounty Hunter is the best thief if you really want one. Swashbuckler doesn't suck too bad either (especially with darts or a shortbow). Backstabbing isn't helpful much in IWD anyway.