Beating the game with level caps?
ensbana
Member Posts: 80
Have anyone tried to impose a level cap throughout the game? I’m thinking of putting a level cap of 20 or 30 on my characters, and using EEKeeper to add one or two HLA’s (probably UAI and Improved Alacrity). I’m planning to play on Insane or LoB difficulty, and have SCS installed.
The reason I’m doing this is because the game is a bit too easy for my level 26-27 party, at chapter 6. I’m also thinking of starting over since my game has some issues with mods. Please give your opinion on whether this would be a reasonable challenge.
Also I’ve read some suggestions about self-imposing restrictions on spell use and such to make the game harder and I appreciate them all, but please just give your 2cents about the setup above if you can.
The reason I’m doing this is because the game is a bit too easy for my level 26-27 party, at chapter 6. I’m also thinking of starting over since my game has some issues with mods. Please give your opinion on whether this would be a reasonable challenge.
Also I’ve read some suggestions about self-imposing restrictions on spell use and such to make the game harder and I appreciate them all, but please just give your 2cents about the setup above if you can.
1
Comments
Or if you really need a challenge you could try to beat the game without leveling up at all: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/5459/bg2-low-level-challenge-completed/p1
Mind you I doubt that would be possible on Insane or LoB with SCS installed.
Personally, I find not being able to level up takes some of the fun and sense of achievement out of the game, so another thing you could consider is reducing the amount of XP you get for quests and killing creatures and maybe disabling it completely for learning spells, disarming traps and lock picking. That way you characters can still progress throughout the game but they will do so significantly more slowly than usual. There is an element in EET Tweaks (which is compatible with BG2EE) that allows you to choose the following options for the XP reward for killing creatures (and there is a similar one for quests):
Increase to 150%
Decrease to 75%
Decrease to 50%
Decrease to 25%
Decrease to 10%
Disable (no XP for killing creatures)
Custom value (type in integer percentage value)
https://rawgit.com/K4thos/EET_Tweaks/master/EET_Tweaks/readme-EET_Tweaks.html#components
IMHO the best approach would have been what Beamdog did with SoD compared to BGEE: you hit the original level cap in the base game and then you are free to get other XPs when you enter the expansion part. I think that things were made the way they are because, back in the days, Bioware allowed to explore the Watcher's Keep right from SoA: having a level cap enforced before ToB would have meant wasting tons an tons of XPs. But then, the idea itself of farming the Keep threw everything up in the sky, particularly if you explored the first levels on chapter 2, which made everything a cakewalk thanks to the powerful items, the XPs and the money you can get there. I only tried once in my life because I wanted to do that with Yoshimo, but then chapter 3 became so easy that all the immersion and atmosphere vanished. Bodhi who? Vampires? I was an unstoppable killing machine.
2. decreasing the xp rate in the way @Permidion_Stark suggests is a very good tool to delay HLA and high level spell slots. It is way more balanced then ramp up to lev 20 fast then basically stopping to progress.
3. choosing to don't get the maxed hp gain on level up makes the game harder, more then how it is perceived by who don't do it. Every time a toon with maxed hp reaches low health without it the party has to deal with a dead or maybe chunked NPC. It forces you to a more sound play style where it is better to avoid risky tactics.
4. starting the adventure in SoA and avoiding to go to WK from there also slows the level gaining, i would say that doing so a full party reaches the HLA and lev9 spells level a little before the last SoA battle.
5. for that battle, if having HLA and super high level spells make it too easy the Tactics mod component can be installed, then SCS + Tactics Irenicus + insane level is doable, but surely not easy to beat, with LoB i doubt that it is even possible for regular humans...
I’m sort of a semi-perfectionist, so what would be a reasonable decrease rate to choose? Also, would late-game content pose a reasonable challenge to a party with a level 20 or 30 level cap?