It's a morass of story that's built on gaping plot holes, deus ex machina twists, and poor characterization. for something that was intended to be the capstone to a series built on startling levels of immersion it ended up being closer to a betrayal. in my opinion it is still a decent game by objective standards, but BG fans were expecting so much more and it was definitely not delivered.
Haha. "Plot holes." I love how RPG gamers manage to throw that term around. Care to enumerate them?
The protagonist is stated to have been concieved in the Time of Troubles, which would have both made Bhaal alive when the attempted sacrifice to ressurect him took place and would make CHARNAME roughly 10 years old at the time of the events of ToB.
I've played through SoA and ToB many times over (I've lost count) and I enjoy both on their own merits. SoA is a masterfully told intricate and immersive story. ToB is me being a badass, wrecking face and ultimately becoming the lord of murder WOOOO!!!!
This is it really. No matter what class your are, in TOB you BECOME a living GOD, powergamer of powergamers. Foes are eviscerated by raising your pinky finger. Whole legion fall before your might as you will hellish meteor storms into existence and cause the bowels of the earth to crack beneath. You are death, destroyer of worlds; mortal progeny and successor to the lord of murder.
Yup, this is what TOB is to me and why I enjoy it.
I thought that the Bhaalspawns that fought for the Throne of Bhaal would become part of corruptive systems, manipulating governments, wage war on each other, have plot twists since you never know who is your friend or your enemy, it was a bit forced into justs fights between them a la Highlander, till one remains.
SoA was cut off, and there was not real "exploration", it was linear from Ilassera, then to Yaga Shura, then to Sendai, then Abazigal, then Balthazar, and then Amelissan. If i remember correctly after all this time.
Anyway it was not bad per se, just after a point i was tired of kicking ass. That Sendai lair, oh my god, if i hear another "the drow rule supreme", Drizzt is gonna get it on BG:EE (again )
I found the ending of Throne of Bhaal to be extremely satisfying, which to me was the main point of the expansion. The character write ups at the end were pure gold (especially Minsc's).
The antagonist didn't quite compare to Sarevok and Irenicus, which was its only glaring flaw, in my opinion. I do agree that after awhile the combat got a bit tiresome, but I think that may have been the result of my strong desire to see the conclusion to hundreds of hours of epic gaming goodness.
The protagonist is stated to have been concieved in the Time of Troubles, which would have both made Bhaal alive when the attempted sacrifice to ressurect him took place and would make CHARNAME roughly 10 years old at the time of the events of ToB.
Wasn't Bhaal killed during the Time of Troubles? How, exactly, would he be alive? That was the point, he made a bunch of bastards just before he died so he could store his energy elsewhere.
The protagonist is stated to have been concieved in the Time of Troubles, which would have both made Bhaal alive when the attempted sacrifice to ressurect him took place and would make CHARNAME roughly 10 years old at the time of the events of ToB.
Wasn't Bhaal killed during the Time of Troubles? How, exactly, would he be alive? That was the point, he made a bunch of bastards just before he died so he could store his energy elsewhere.
The protagonist is 21 years old at the time of ToB, which takes place in 1369. The attempted sacrifice took place while he was an infant, i.e. late 1340s. Bhaal died over 10 years after that, meaning that either the cult attempted the sacrifice while Bhaal was alive and well or the protagonist of the game is 10 years old. The infant temple sacrifice thing simply does not make sense. The flashback implies that the protagonist was concieved in the Time of Troubles, which also implies that the protagonist is less than 10 years old.
I didn't enjoy ToB as much as SoA because, as far as I remember, you couldn't 'free roam' to the same extent as in SoA. Side quests were scarce. Also, there was that pressure on you to go on (cities under siege). I did complete the game nevertheless, obviously, it just wasn't as enjoyable as the previous game.
Although, frankly, I hardly remember anything from that game... it didn't engrain itself in my memory as well as SoA did.
The protagonist is 21 years old at the time of ToB, which takes place in 1369. The attempted sacrifice took place while he was an infant, i.e. late 1340s. Bhaal died over 10 years after that, meaning that either the cult attempted the sacrifice while Bhaal was alive and well or the protagonist of the game is 10 years old. The infant temple sacrifice thing simply does not make sense. The flashback implies that the protagonist was concieved in the Time of Troubles, which also implies that the protagonist is less than 10 years old.
Given that ToB doesn't throw any of these dates at the player, that's not really a plot hole. An inconsistency with the FR timeline isn't a plot hole. The work would have to contradict itself, internally, to be a plot hole.
I didn't hate it, but would have preferred an expansion that more fully fleshed out Watcher's Keep and its surroundings, followed up by "Baldur's Gate 3: The Throne of Bhaal."
I really enjoyed Sarevok in ToB but that was mostly it. D&D as never been properly geared or balanced for epic level play (level 21+) and it kind of shows in the game too. Whilst the rulesets and handbooks do exist for epic play it's generally not terribly enjoyable. As earlier posts mention: you're essentially a living god. That's great if the story says you are the embodiment of a go... oh, yeah. But in terms of gameplay and balance it's really hard to make it genuinely fun to actually play the combat anymore. Your wizards can tear down entire countries with a single spell, your fighters can pretty much one hit kill everything without magical protection and an artifically inflated max HP and your clerics can raise your entire party back to life with full hp every round.
The only way to challenge a party this powerful is to throw something more powerful at it, repeatedly, Thus engages the russian roulette of instant death from both sides. As others have previously mentioned this makes an absolute mockery of what should have been extremely powerful characters from the previous games, such as Kangaxx and Irenicus. If the average bandit is more powerful than someone who terrorised an entire region, and they are only a few weeks of travel away, why weren't they sent to deal with it rather than your level 10 party? It was entirely justified that charname got more and more powerful due to the Bhaalspawn plot and essence, however it didn't make sense for your entire unbhaalspawn party to be just as powerful as you as well. Sarevok was justified in being stronger than the other fighters - which he was for certain - but that's about it. When everyone is level 30 or 40 and feels like a god it kinda stops you from feeling like a god too; it just doesn't feel right to play.
Also yeah, plot holes, linear, short etc etc.
I think the game would have been more fun if it was just charname getting stronger and your party struggling to keep up with you, being stuck at the cap of level 20. Then they could have toned down the average difficulty of each enemy and encounter and made the bosses people that only charname could defeat, though balancing this for all classes (looking at you, bards) would have been a challenge. Then again you have the slayer for people using classes that sucked in direct combat so the facility was already there. A few 1v1 Bhaalspawn duels in general would have added a little more flavour at the very least.
Story and ending was great but got hurt a bit from the linearity and lack of free roam. Not sure if it was the god mode I didn't like about the combat or if there was some other reason behind it. My main gripe with it would be that most character mods just never seem'd to get updated for the ToB part of the game. Which is probably a good sign that people did not like that part as much and that there was little to work with for the modders. Personally I think it's safe to say that I gone trough BG2 well over a hundred times while ToB is probably around twenty. Of course with more mods for ToB that number would easily break 50 since you want to know how it all ends and ToB goes pretty fast to clear.
If I recall correctly, at the time TOB was revolutionary as one of the greatest expansion packs for an RPG ever. People were used to having a few quests, items and monsters tacked on (think TOTSC), and so this was something else entirely. While it wasn't nearly as good as the other two BG games, I think it does deserve some credit for that. The only other expansion pack I can think of that rivals it in terms of quality is Lord of Destruction.
So, as the conclusion to the trilogy? Underwhelming. As a rush-job expansion pack to an RPG? Pretty impressive.
The protagonist is 21 years old at the time of ToB, which takes place in 1369. The attempted sacrifice took place while he was an infant, i.e. late 1340s. Bhaal died over 10 years after that, meaning that either the cult attempted the sacrifice while Bhaal was alive and well or the protagonist of the game is 10 years old. The infant temple sacrifice thing simply does not make sense. The flashback implies that the protagonist was concieved in the Time of Troubles, which also implies that the protagonist is less than 10 years old.
Given that ToB doesn't throw any of these dates at the player, that's not really a plot hole. An inconsistency with the FR timeline isn't a plot hole. The work would have to contradict itself, internally, to be a plot hole.
Uh, what? Baldur's Gate is set in the Forgotten Realms and uses its lore extensively, the Time of Troubles is frequently referenced and in order for the game's story to be consistent we have to use the standard FR lore. If a game set in the Forgotten Realms which revolves around an event that happened in the Forgotten Realms is inconsistent about the date of that event then it seems like a plot hole to me.
Uh, what? Baldur's Gate is set in the Forgotten Realms and uses its lore extensively, the Time of Troubles is frequently referenced and in order for the game's story to be consistent we have to use the standard FR lore. If a game set in the Forgotten Realms which revolves around an event that happened in the Forgotten Realms is inconsistent about the date of that event then it seems like a plot hole to me.
I was going to say that inconsistencies with multi-author continuities are not actually plot holes, but according to TvTropes I'm wrong. Carry on!
This plothole doesn't matter to me because they never make the date of Time of Troubles obvious or relevant. Once upon a time a long time ago Gorion saved you from being the dessert.
Sure they should edit the 'place in time' of ToB a bit to fix that problem but it makes no difference unless you go and find out when it took place.
I still don't see the problem with the game, I think it was fantastic and it could be greatly polished. You people are complaining about little things like "OOOOO I knew Mellisan would betray me. It was obvious the guys at Watcher's Keep would betray you too. Oh Watcher's Keep was boring. Oh people blamed ME for the destruction of Saradush and I couldn't CHA my way out of it."
I'm not asking anyone to like it but as far as I'm concerned most of the reasons for not enjoying it seem very little here.
Frankly, I'm surprised at the ToB hate -completely-.
It was merely "inferior", by no means bad. Its biggest problems were obvious: It was just rushed. As a result, it was cramped, and overly linear. And short.
I did not notice a drop in the writting. Call me stupid, I didn't even expect Melissan to betray me.
I just enjoyed it, it was a good closure, and the only thing I -wished- is that they did what they REALLY wanted to do with it: BG3. I wish it was made bigger, longer, like it was supposed to be. That is its only real "flaw" to me.
And as such, I'd love to see it get special attention.
I thought that the Bhaalspawns that fought for the Throne of Bhaal would become part of corruptive systems, manipulating governments, wage war on each other, have plot twists since you never know who is your friend or your enemy, it was a bit forced into justs fights between them a la Highlander, till one remains.
To be fair, that's not their plan, it's Amelyssan's. She's the one who interrupts Bhaal's original design so she can steal his power - who knows what the Bhaalspawn would have done otherwise?
Was there really a ToB hate? I have never encountered anyone completely hate that expansion pack. Sure it was a bit lineer and we became god-like beings but it was an expansion pack and gave the game its justified closure. Even for our tests at pocket plane that exp.pack is still worth it.
Not hate by me, just disappointment. It seems like it was hastily rushed together and pit on the market. Limited places to explore, limited story, uninteresting characters.
I think @ScarsUnseen hits the nail on the head here. Many here are complaining that ToB is too linear: rushed gameplay, short story, no exploration, dull characters and of course plot holes*. All of this made it feel too far from the previous games. A BG3 - ToB game would have fixed this, IMHO. Don't get me wrong, I'm not bashing ToB: I enjoyed some of its parts (even the HLA abilities), which I have already listed here, but still it could have been much better if it wouldn't have been squeezed in a tight EP, but a full BG3 game.
That is what I believe the big disappointment is: once we finally get into the Bhaalspawn thing (we're getting serious here, right?), we ended up with playing a short and rushed story, unlike BG1 which you had to deal with only one Bhaalspawn (Sarevok), and BG2 - SoA that barely covered any of the main issues of the story. That was very unexpected. When I heard ToB was an EP to BG2, I didn't expect it to be "The Final Chapter", much more like TotSC. I was expecting BG3 would have been next, but sadly, BW had a different plan.
Personally, as for BG2EE, I would like some more expansion to the original BG2 SoA part, and BG3 to be a longer, more polished version of ToB. I don't think this is what Overhaul have on their mind, but can a man dream?
I thought ToB was really good! Yes there were small inconsistencies such as the 'Mother Unknown' dilemma, but I felt that from the beginning it did feel quite epic and final. Did nobody else think the opening animation which talks about the time of the prophecy being fulfilled and the persecution of the Bhaalspawn was suitably mood-setting, epic and climactic? I still love it, after I've played through the equally stunning BG1 and BG:SoA campaigns to get to ToB. I do understand that it's short compared to the other two, but it /was/ an expansion pack, not a stand-alone game. That said, it plays as a stand-alone game better than most expansion packs, aside from maybe DA:Awakening (which wasn't even as good, anyway). Look at it this way: ToB is an incredibly satisfactory ending to a trilogy of epic games when one considers it in relativity to most modern RPGs /and/ how the Mass Effect trilogy ended. Right? I think whether you love or hate ToB, 95% of people have to agree with that verdict, don't they? :P
There is no way they could have done ToB as a full sequel. The power creep factor was just too high. It has been pointed out in the thread that D&D just doesn't play nearly as well at ridiculously high levels. I couldn't imagine trying to balance an entire game the size of the first two entries in the series if the levels are BEGINNING in the twenties. Leveling up is the highlight for many of us when we play. There just wouldn't be enough there unless you ended up going to Sigil and laying the smack down on the Lady of Pain herself! Maybe they should of used this game as the ending for 2nd Edition and had the character whack out Vecna on the way. Or, maybe they ended the story the right way after all. BG3 would be much better served with a new character starting at level one.
@Treyolen In my imaginary perfect trilogy, BG would have taken Charname to level 8, BG2 would have covered up until level 15, and BG3 would have finished things off by 20. I think that one of the things that Bioware did great in the first game(and never figured out how to do in any game after) was to pace themselves on the power curve.
Picture a modern day Bioware trying to make Baldur's Gate. Charname would hit level 20 by the end of the first game, and then you'd be playing his childhood friend(who was never mentioned in the first game) from level 1 in the second. Maybe in the third game, Charname could get amnesia so you could level him again from 1.
I had no idea anyone disliked TOB either. I mean now I'm older and I question things a little more carefully; I had noticed that the areas were not quite as well thought out/ had the time spent on them as SOA but as the closing chapter to the bhaalspawn saga I thought it was perfect.
After investing so many hours into the game and its story, the pacing is just right so that when you really are a force to be feared in TOB it has been earned. Especially when you have spent a long time being under someone else's boot. They knew it too, such as Imoen's pride on being an archmage.
I find it has less re playability than the rest (simply because I can play so much of the rest of the game and then get disinterested and drop it before some of the final parts of TOB) and while I didn't think too much of the final fight (Irenicus and Bhodi better for sure), I thought Amylissan (sp) was a great antagonist. I loved her character art too.
Also won't start a game without Sarevok in my party, he's just too cool. I can't hear Kevin Michael Richardson's voice in anything now without his crazy Sarevok laugh even after all these years lol
@ScarsUnseen Haha! I do think your idea would be great for true roleplayers. But power gamers love leveling up their character and wouldn't like those caps. Level cap removers are usually one of the first mods made for any game. I count myself among this crowd as I find video games are best suited to my power gaming. I prefer my real role playing to be pen and paper.
I do like your idea though. My idea for BG3 would be to have the transition to godhood happen after an epic battle in the first chapter or two. The result being a complete corruption of spirit creating a true successor to the god of murder. Then a new character named "Charname" as an inside joke would be created to complete a game every bit as long as BG2 in a different part of Toril. This gives you some high level munchkin action and the rush of leveling up at least a dozen times.
I really enjoyed Sarevok in ToB but that was mostly it. D&D as never been properly geared or balanced for epic level play (level 21+) and it kind of shows in the game too. Whilst the rulesets and handbooks do exist for epic play it's generally not terribly enjoyable. As earlier posts mention: you're essentially a living god. That's great if the story says you are the embodiment of a go... oh, yeah. But in terms of gameplay and balance it's really hard to make it genuinely fun to actually play the combat anymore. Your wizards can tear down entire countries with a single spell, your fighters can pretty much one hit kill everything without magical protection and an artifically inflated max HP and your clerics can raise your entire party back to life with full hp every round.
these, exactly these. ToB was a dungeon crawl, from one area to the next. that's nice, but IWD and IWD2 did it way better, in part because of what kraed said. ToB was horribly imbalanced. it was ridiculously gleeful for the first half hour but then every battle devolves into:
1) all fighters use whirlwind 2) any mage goes into a time stop-improved alacrity mayhem or 3) get a bard with enhanced bard song 4) prepare for the fight by setting spike traps
gets really old really fast. add to that the fact that epic level mage/cleric abilities was _really_ poorly thought out. all you get are new level 9/7 spells? but no new level 9/7 spell slots? so really after two or three epic levels you no longer need (or want) those characters to level up (unless, as a priest, you are really dying to be able to cast Cure Light Wounds and Slow Poison a bajillion times). and for fighters, it's pretty much just the same thing over and over (another rank of whirlwind, maybe summon deva if you're a paladin). thieves and bards were the only ones with slightly interesting epic level progression, but that was only until you discovered that spike traps were horribly broken (for crying out loud you can destroy the demilich with them). plus, god forbid you had a kit you really liked -- the epic levels pretty much obliterated any hint of uniqueness or balance amongst kits (particularly bad with the Bard kits - Skald and Jester get their main differentiator wiped out, and Blades get an abusively strong upgrade).
I think the game would have been more fun if it was just charname getting stronger and your party struggling to keep up with you, being stuck at the cap of level 20. Then they could have toned down the average difficulty of each enemy and encounter and made the bosses people that only charname could defeat[...]
Earthbound for the super nintendo did exactly this. Ness eventually gets a super upgrade while the rest of your characters stay mundane. It makes you feel like you achieved something great, it doesn't imbalance the game (since it's just one character out of 4), and Ness actually feels like a hero... instead of just barely keeping up with every enemy's increasing difficulty.
and in a way, BG1 and BG2 both did this. In BG1 you get up to 6 special spells to cast at-will; nothing too powerful, but enough to make CHARNAME feel special. In BG2 you eventually get slayer form - powerful, though balanced out by reputation loss and the risk of dying if you stay too long. In ToB, every epic NPC is better than slayer.
also - IIRC, characters in AD&D are suppossed to be level-capped, except for humans. the fact that they removed this from BG2/ToB is itself really imbalancing.
Comments
SoA was cut off, and there was not real "exploration", it was linear from Ilassera, then to Yaga Shura, then to Sendai, then Abazigal, then Balthazar, and then Amelissan. If i remember correctly after all this time.
Anyway it was not bad per se, just after a point i was tired of kicking ass. That Sendai lair, oh my god, if i hear another "the drow rule supreme", Drizzt is gonna get it on BG:EE (again
The antagonist didn't quite compare to Sarevok and Irenicus, which was its only glaring flaw, in my opinion. I do agree that after awhile the combat got a bit tiresome, but I think that may have been the result of my strong desire to see the conclusion to hundreds of hours of epic gaming goodness.
Although, frankly, I hardly remember anything from that game... it didn't engrain itself in my memory as well as SoA did.
The only way to challenge a party this powerful is to throw something more powerful at it, repeatedly, Thus engages the russian roulette of instant death from both sides. As others have previously mentioned this makes an absolute mockery of what should have been extremely powerful characters from the previous games, such as Kangaxx and Irenicus. If the average bandit is more powerful than someone who terrorised an entire region, and they are only a few weeks of travel away, why weren't they sent to deal with it rather than your level 10 party? It was entirely justified that charname got more and more powerful due to the Bhaalspawn plot and essence, however it didn't make sense for your entire unbhaalspawn party to be just as powerful as you as well. Sarevok was justified in being stronger than the other fighters - which he was for certain - but that's about it. When everyone is level 30 or 40 and feels like a god it kinda stops you from feeling like a god too; it just doesn't feel right to play.
Also yeah, plot holes, linear, short etc etc.
I think the game would have been more fun if it was just charname getting stronger and your party struggling to keep up with you, being stuck at the cap of level 20. Then they could have toned down the average difficulty of each enemy and encounter and made the bosses people that only charname could defeat, though balancing this for all classes (looking at you, bards) would have been a challenge. Then again you have the slayer for people using classes that sucked in direct combat so the facility was already there. A few 1v1 Bhaalspawn duels in general would have added a little more flavour at the very least.
Not sure if it was the god mode I didn't like about the combat or if there was some other reason behind it.
My main gripe with it would be that most character mods just never seem'd to get updated for the ToB part of the game. Which is probably a good sign that people did not like that part as much and that there was little to work with for the modders.
Personally I think it's safe to say that I gone trough BG2 well over a hundred times while ToB is probably around twenty. Of course with more mods for ToB that number would easily break 50 since you want to know how it all ends and ToB goes pretty fast to clear.
So, as the conclusion to the trilogy? Underwhelming. As a rush-job expansion pack to an RPG? Pretty impressive.
@Schneidend
This plothole doesn't matter to me because they never make the date of Time of Troubles obvious or relevant. Once upon a time a long time ago Gorion saved you from being the dessert.
Sure they should edit the 'place in time' of ToB a bit to fix that problem but it makes no difference unless you go and find out when it took place.
I still don't see the problem with the game, I think it was fantastic and it could be greatly polished. You people are complaining about little things like "OOOOO I knew Mellisan would betray me. It was obvious the guys at Watcher's Keep would betray you too. Oh Watcher's Keep was boring. Oh people blamed ME for the destruction of Saradush and I couldn't CHA my way out of it."
I'm not asking anyone to like it but as far as I'm concerned most of the reasons for not enjoying it seem very little here.
It was merely "inferior", by no means bad. Its biggest problems were obvious: It was just rushed. As a result, it was cramped, and overly linear. And short.
I did not notice a drop in the writting. Call me stupid, I didn't even expect Melissan to betray me.
I just enjoyed it, it was a good closure, and the only thing I -wished- is that they did what they REALLY wanted to do with it: BG3. I wish it was made bigger, longer, like it was supposed to be. That is its only real "flaw" to me.
And as such, I'd love to see it get special attention.
I only disliked HLAs, I think their introduction felt a bit forced. Also, there are too many powerful items, making SoA's epic items less epic.
Even for our tests at pocket plane that exp.pack is still worth it.
That is what I believe the big disappointment is: once we finally get into the Bhaalspawn thing (we're getting serious here, right?), we ended up with playing a short and rushed story, unlike BG1 which you had to deal with only one Bhaalspawn (Sarevok), and BG2 - SoA that barely covered any of the main issues of the story. That was very unexpected. When I heard ToB was an EP to BG2, I didn't expect it to be "The Final Chapter", much more like TotSC. I was expecting BG3 would have been next, but sadly, BW had a different plan.
Personally, as for BG2EE, I would like some more expansion to the original BG2 SoA part, and BG3 to be a longer, more polished version of ToB. I don't think this is what Overhaul have on their mind, but can a man dream?
*as for plot holes and other things, as @Schneidend suggested, take a look at this: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Headscratchers/BaldursGate
I do understand that it's short compared to the other two, but it /was/ an expansion pack, not a stand-alone game. That said, it plays as a stand-alone game better than most expansion packs, aside from maybe DA:Awakening (which wasn't even as good, anyway).
Look at it this way: ToB is an incredibly satisfactory ending to a trilogy of epic games when one considers it in relativity to most modern RPGs /and/ how the Mass Effect trilogy ended. Right? I think whether you love or hate ToB, 95% of people have to agree with that verdict, don't they? :P
Picture a modern day Bioware trying to make Baldur's Gate. Charname would hit level 20 by the end of the first game, and then you'd be playing his childhood friend(who was never mentioned in the first game) from level 1 in the second. Maybe in the third game, Charname could get amnesia so you could level him again from 1.
After investing so many hours into the game and its story, the pacing is just right so that when you really are a force to be feared in TOB it has been earned. Especially when you have spent a long time being under someone else's boot. They knew it too, such as Imoen's pride on being an archmage.
I find it has less re playability than the rest (simply because I can play so much of the rest of the game and then get disinterested and drop it before some of the final parts of TOB) and while I didn't think too much of the final fight (Irenicus and Bhodi better for sure), I thought Amylissan (sp) was a great antagonist. I loved her character art too.
Also won't start a game without Sarevok in my party, he's just too cool. I can't hear Kevin Michael Richardson's voice in anything now without his crazy Sarevok laugh even after all these years lol
I do like your idea though. My idea for BG3 would be to have the transition to godhood happen after an epic battle in the first chapter or two. The result being a complete corruption of spirit creating a true successor to the god of murder. Then a new character named "Charname" as an inside joke would be created to complete a game every bit as long as BG2 in a different part of Toril. This gives you some high level munchkin action and the rush of leveling up at least a dozen times.
1) all fighters use whirlwind
2) any mage goes into a time stop-improved alacrity mayhem
or
3) get a bard with enhanced bard song
4) prepare for the fight by setting spike traps
gets really old really fast. add to that the fact that epic level mage/cleric abilities was _really_ poorly thought out. all you get are new level 9/7 spells? but no new level 9/7 spell slots? so really after two or three epic levels you no longer need (or want) those characters to level up (unless, as a priest, you are really dying to be able to cast Cure Light Wounds and Slow Poison a bajillion times). and for fighters, it's pretty much just the same thing over and over (another rank of whirlwind, maybe summon deva if you're a paladin). thieves and bards were the only ones with slightly interesting epic level progression, but that was only until you discovered that spike traps were horribly broken (for crying out loud you can destroy the demilich with them). plus, god forbid you had a kit you really liked -- the epic levels pretty much obliterated any hint of uniqueness or balance amongst kits (particularly bad with the Bard kits - Skald and Jester get their main differentiator wiped out, and Blades get an abusively strong upgrade).
EDIT: also, this: Earthbound for the super nintendo did exactly this. Ness eventually gets a super upgrade while the rest of your characters stay mundane. It makes you feel like you achieved something great, it doesn't imbalance the game (since it's just one character out of 4), and Ness actually feels like a hero... instead of just barely keeping up with every enemy's increasing difficulty.
and in a way, BG1 and BG2 both did this. In BG1 you get up to 6 special spells to cast at-will; nothing too powerful, but enough to make CHARNAME feel special. In BG2 you eventually get slayer form - powerful, though balanced out by reputation loss and the risk of dying if you stay too long. In ToB, every epic NPC is better than slayer.
also - IIRC, characters in AD&D are suppossed to be level-capped, except for humans. the fact that they removed this from BG2/ToB is itself really imbalancing.