How would you do a four man party?
Sloty1984
Member Posts: 152
I am undecided between this game and Icewind Dale.
If you would do a four man party with one CHARNAME and three npcs how would you do it?
If you would do a four man party with one CHARNAME and three npcs how would you do it?
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To your question a lot depends on what you want to play for yourself. Your class and alignment choices will greatly affect who you’ll want on your team.
Alignment wise either an all good or all evil team should be okay, but some neutral npcs could fit in there too.
I want four because of the challenge mostly.
If your main character is a thief/mage you don't actually *need* Imoen, and adding Keldorn or Anomen while keeping Minsc and Jaheira might be interesting. (Although for story reasons I would never go without Imoen).
I'll also mention that Sorcerer is always a bad choice. First, its highly problematic if you've not played before because you choose spells at level-up and are locked in to choices. Its easy to make a mistake and have a permanently weak character. Second, its a promotional gimmick that breaks the AD&D magic system (if you know what you're doing it is *very* gamey, cheating).
I am not qualified to comment on evil parties.
Typically reduced parties don't really increase challenge much, in fact I often feel its just the opposite. The game does scale encounters *some*. So the very thing (surprise encounters) that might add the biggest challenge to a reduced party, handicaps itself instead. Even bigger thing, you will likely gain levels somewhat faster (probably not as much as you think. Apart from the scaling issues, most quest experience is awarded by set amounts per character. So that will be the same regardless of party size). But you will gain experience a little faster due to much experience being awarded to the party and split equally between characters. This makes a huge difference at lower and middle levels. A party of four 10-11 level characters will likely be MORE powerful than six 8-9 level characters. This difference will diminish late game, four 35 level characters will be less powerful than six 30 level characters. But that is only a small, late part of the game (just ToB).
Which five NPCs would you then take along with a CHARNAME Blade or Fighter/Mage?
Also who do you think is more fun, a Blade or F/M?
I do lean towards melee heavy groups. That would mean three warriors (or fighter/cleric or fighter/druid), a blade might count as one of the warriors except at lower levels they won’t be a great tank (a character with a lot of hit points, high constitution, probably a high dexterity, who wears heavy armor). You’ll want at least one tank to put on point.
The whole team needs to include at least one priest (cleric or Druid), one rogue and probably two arcane casters (one of these can be a bard). An archer of some sort is optional but often useful.
Of course in this game an arcane caster cannot wear armor. So you may find a fighter/mage best suited as a bow specialist and caster. Melee only when you’ve had time to put up a lot of buffing spells. A blade might be similar (although they have an easier time switching to melee).
I’d also suggest you would be better off starting with BG1. That is a much better game for learning a new system. You will start low level and grow into all your powers. It will be much easier to keep up. BG2 can get tough in hurry. The so called canon party is an excellent, balanced team all the way through the first game fora good aligned party. And it assumed you at least know all of them at the start of BG2. This means Imoen, Khalid, Jaheira, Minsc and Dynaheir. It is already a balanced team and will let you slot in with main character you wish to play.
F/M CHARNAME
Korgan
Dorn
Viconia
Edwin
Jan
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