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Jan is hilarious

I just got this dialog with Jan. I just got to the Shadow Thieves guildhall and talked to Renal there to start the guild questline. Jan interjected this:

"Heh heh... especially not with that extra guild out there on the streets, eh, Bloodscalp? Come to think of it, that's quite the moniker you got yourself there. How did that come about? Severe dandruff problems? If that's the case, Ma Jensen has the most wonderful turnip salve that will clear that right up, quick as you please. You might want to think about it... People might be tempted to give you a nicer nickname if you had a pleasant head of hair."

He said that to Renal Bloodscalp. I literally laughed out loud reading that dialog. It's not often that RPG characters made you laugh with humor. I think I'm going to have to keep Jan in my party and see more of that silly humor.

Anyone have funny Jan stuff to share?
JLeeJuliusBorisovgorgonzolaThacoBellZaghoulLudwig_IIsarevok57BelgarathMTHlolienmlnevesekansasbarbarian

Comments

  • gorgonzolagorgonzola Member Posts: 3,864
    why spoil you? is much fun if you discover it yourself in game...
    i love jan, both for his funny banter and mechanically, if used properly is super strong.
    lolien
  • VeristekVeristek Member Posts: 114
    Gotcha. I was wondering if you guys think he's funny, and if I have more fun dialogue to look forward to.

    I still chuckle at him asking Renal Bloodscalp if he has his name from severe dandruff. I don't think I've seen a funny NPC or party member like that in a long time.
  • MaurvirMaurvir Member Posts: 1,090
    Jan is right up there with my favorites. I don't know why I didn't take him on my earlier runs, because the banters are amazing. He almost makes me want to try turnip tea. Almost...
    gorgonzola
  • ThacoBellThacoBell Member Posts: 12,235
    Minsc + Jan is golden. There is also a special spoiler npc that can join you early into Throne of Bhaal. Jan has a FIELDDAY with this character.
    gorgonzolasarevok57lolien
  • gorgonzolagorgonzola Member Posts: 3,864
    i don't know if also for ee is possible to have the mod that restores some aspects of the game that was planned and never implemented, if i am not wrong it is named unfinished business.
    with that mod the interaction between jan and minsc is even better...
    jan likes very much boo and manage to steal it from the ranger :D
  • O_BruceO_Bruce Member Posts: 2,790
    I remember summoning Pit Fiend close to him once. That was pretty funny.
    gorgonzola
  • gorgonzolagorgonzola Member Posts: 3,864
    edited April 2019
    i have to try it. normally i never summon pit fiends or other demons/devils (i am never sure about if a summon belongs to the former or the latter :) ), don't suit well with my playstyle and with my way to rp, that is always good oriented even if i use also neutral charnames.
    but i surely have to try it.
    i love both the jan personality and the minsc one. for me the ranger is, from a certain point of view, the most wise npc, wise like a child can be, not for a deep understanding result of intelligence and experience, but cause his spirit is pure and not corrupted (by logic and experience) like the one of a child, that sometimes with the simplicity of his words can knock you out of your feet and reveal all the sophisticated reasoning behind you opinion as the fancy ornament that it is.
  • Humanoid_TaifunHumanoid_Taifun Member Posts: 1,055
    I find the cliche of children posing great questions to be really irritating, because I cannot see it reflected in reality at all. It is right up there with "there are no stupid questions", which is also blatantly false. I would also ask you to explain how exactly you think logic might "corrupt" people.

    Wisdom is a matter of experience. Both in the meaning of the word (which describes the ability to employ knowledge and experience in an insightful manner) and in the way that it is implemented into DnD: people get wiser with age (which ironically means that as a person grows old, their hearing and eyesight improve).

    DnD Rangers are based on Aragorn who is over 90 years old during the events of the Lord of the Ring and who also received an extensive education from the elves. He is certainly not childlike. The most natural and uneducated characters would probably be the barbarians (to whose number I would count Minsc as well).
  • gorgonzolagorgonzola Member Posts: 3,864
    edited April 2019
    @Humanoid_Taifun aragorn is not only old, he is the last in a lineage of kings, that origins from numenor, and that matters a lot in the tolkien's universe lore. the fr ranger can be inspired by aragorn, but is certainly not based on him, is not supposed to live centuries or to be inherently superior to the common human beings.
    and this is probably going ot...

    back to the topic i was not implying at all that logic corrupt people, as logic if correctly applied on certain premises bring logic results, don't corrupt people or consciences.
    what i was implying is that is extremely difficult for an human being to be perfectly true with himself and perfectly objective in judging and observing himself. as well as the other people. things that does not matter with logic, like feeling sympathetic or not with a person, the amount of emotional investment and other can affect the premises of our logic. as well the fact that is not easy at all being completely objective about ourselves and to recognize some of our defects and limitations.
    i would say that almost every person but few exceptional human beings, to some extent fools himself.
    and logic, or something that can appear as logic, but is not logic as starts from false biased premises, is often used to build alibi, excuses, to avoid to have the image that we have of ourselves ans the ones we love crash, to justify things that we do or don't do.
    a child lacks of the complexity of an adult mind so sometimes is able to pierce trough the superstructure of logic used on false premises and intellectual superstructures that we adult people use to maintain biased conviction or to hide to ourselves or others our parts we are not proud of and knock us out of our feet with a very simple and straight phrase, like the one "the king is naked".
    EDIT while an other adult probably would try to counter the biased logic ending in an endless argumentation between the 2 EMD OF EDIT

    i had the luck to witness it more then one time, being the adult me or an other person.
    if you had never witnessed it, is perfectly possible, you have missed a very interesting experience, even if can sting a lot when you are the one knocked.

    and this does not imply that the childs are always pure, wise, good and the rest at all. it is not so. and the last generation of childs seems to me, that am 2 generations older being a grandfather, much more smart and less naive then my own generation, but much less respectful, much more arrogant and spoiled then the childs of my generation or to some extent to the generation in between. the society change with the generations passing, and i don't want to fall into both the cliche of "old times was better" and "childs are always good and pure".

    i like to rp minsc in a way that is somehow similar to the way a child behave, most of the times very naive and needing to be somehow babysit (boo is there for that very purpose), but sometimes capable of telling things like "the king is naked", or in its case "what are we thinking about? why to waste time on quibble, he is evil, let's go to kick his butt...".
    Post edited by gorgonzola on
    lolien
  • DinoDinDinoDin Member Posts: 1,567
    Yep, Jan is one of the best in the series. They sort of took the annoying nature of Quayle from the original but then added a lot of charm and backstory to it. Worked beautifully.

    Also helps that he can end up being one of the strongest NPC's in the game, especially late. His backstab or critical hit audio is great too. At high levels, he's arguably the best mage NPC available, once the multiclass penalty no longer matters in terms of spell progression. And even at low levels, his starting gear is outstanding.
    gorgonzolaThacoBell
  • gorgonzolagorgonzola Member Posts: 3,864
    @DinoDin i certainly agree about him being very strong, his starting gear make almost not feel at the beginning, thief wise, that he is a multi, combined with the other thief boosting items in the game. late game he is still very strong as npc, but as a mage i would say that nalia and imoen are better, much more levels so more slots, 4 lev 9 slots instead of 3, without having a magic school barred. neera is even better as she has 2 lev 9 slots more then him and there are ways to use her to cast dwehomers in a reliable way as she has a high level enough. in my last run with neera i used intensively the dwehomers having 0 reloads caused by surges with disastrous consequences and minimum backfire. a cap level neera's pi can cast 11 lev 9 spells, 6 of them have not to be memorized but can be freely chosen from all the ones she knows. jan can not be compared with this, the only thing that can be compared is a sorcerer, that is less powerful then neera, but more reliable.
    DinoDin
  • megamike15megamike15 Member Posts: 2,666
    i do plan on using jan my next run of bg2 as i still have no yet.
    ThacoBell
  • gorgonzolagorgonzola Member Posts: 3,864
    you will have fun :)
    ThacoBell
  • lunarlunar Member Posts: 3,460
    Besides, he is a very powerful and extremely useful npc if used to full potential. A m/t can be the cheesiest, the most overpowered character ever quite easily. They are spoiled for possibilities. Hexxat can not compare and Yoshi does not count so he is also the best thief in the game.
    gorgonzola
  • gorgonzolagorgonzola Member Posts: 3,864
    @lunar i argue that the best thief in the game is MY charname FMT (the only reason why in some runs i don't recruit jan...), but i agree that in YOUR game jan is the best. :D
    lunar
  • lunarlunar Member Posts: 3,460
    edited April 2019
    Yeah, his comments and interjections are long-winded but quite funny. However,
    I hate his npc quest. It is long, requires you to travel to a few places back and forth, is not exciting, and is a chore. It also breaks character of Jan, I think. He is suddenly very serious and angry in that quest. I plan to ctrl+y the messenger (which starts the quest by telling Jan his ex girlfriend is in trouble) when he spawns in my current game. Will it work to block his personal quest?
    gorgonzola
  • gorgonzolagorgonzola Member Posts: 3,864
    edited April 2019
    @lunar put the quest stuff of your last post under a spoiler before the OP has a chance to read it, he is at his very first run with jan...
    by the way feeblemind and flash to stone are more elegant ways to break scripts then ctrl-y, if you have the needed scrolls.

    lunarlolienThacoBell
  • ThacoBellThacoBell Member Posts: 12,235
    lunar wrote: »
    Yeah, his comments and interjections are long-winded but quite funny. However,
    I hate his npc quest. It is long, requires you to travel to a few places back and forth, is not exciting, and is a chore. It also breaks character of Jan, I think. He is suddenly very serious and angry in that quest. I plan to ctrl+y the messenger (which starts the quest by telling Jan his ex girlfriend is in trouble) when he spawns in my current game. Will it work to block his personal quest?

    I disagree. It shows us how Jan is like when he takes something seriously. In real life, people aren't one note, and this quest gives Jan some much needed depth.
    gorgonzolalunar
  • gorgonzolagorgonzola Member Posts: 3,864
    @ThacoBell
    i agree with you.
    also his tob ending
    let us know how important was for him that gnome lady
    and gives us more insight about who really is jan jansen, bejond his funny stories about turnips and uncles.
    ThacoBell
  • DinoDinDinoDin Member Posts: 1,567
    Late game, I don't think the extra spell slots matter all that much. Yes, he is hurt by losing some spell types. However, neither downside matters as much as being able to max out nearly all the thief abilities. Combined with his higher base Thac0 and hit points, I think Jan easily outclasses Imoen by the time you're doing ToB and WK.
    gorgonzola
  • gorgonzolagorgonzola Member Posts: 3,864
    @DinoDin i was talking about him not being the best mage npc intended as mage, as overall strength i agree that he is really strong, as imo aerie is very strong having much more mlee potential then jan, even if he in some battles is superior as he can cast mislead and backstab like crazy.
    jan and aerie are 2 of my favorite nps to play, each of the 2 add in his own way tons of utility to the party and are extremely versatile.

    the extra slot can matter or not, it depend on the tactics a player is using and on the party composition.
    but the moment a mage reach the first lev 9 spell is very important, as it mean planetar, dragon breath, spellstrike or improved alacrity. imoen has them at little more then 3M, jan at 6M. late game the more lev 9 slots you have the more lev 9 spells each PI can cast. a pi that after the improved alacrity summon a planetar, cast a spellstrike on the enemy boss and then has still a lev 9 slot for a dragon breath or whatever needed is much more effective then one with less high level slots.
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