@EnterHaerDalis Hate to say it, but that's an old BG1 chart. BG:EE is running the BGII engine so you have to pay out your ass now. A shame.
I tried raising my reputation so that I could get low prices without hunting for boring reputation increasing quests. I'm pretty sure his chart is correct. At least it's identical to the one I used, and I was able to get up to 16 reputation without spending very much money. I feel very confident in saying that the BG2 chart for donations is not used.
Sure, a heavily armed group goes upstairs. So does that Warrior in the bar, whom the Loon in question was being paranoid about, quite loudly and to anyone who would listen. Wouldn't he be a more reasonable suspect? Also, it's a BAR. Most of the patrons are so sozzled that they can't speak to you. And the Jovial Juggler doesn't seem the most salubrious of places. Do you get the feeling that people pay close attention to what others get up too?
Add to that the fact that Silkie can get killed in broad daylight where everyone can see the "Murder" yet no one gets bent out of shape. I'd say not to many people are actually looking too hard in that town. And you get attacked in at least one of the other taverns (and again in Naskal and in the Friendly Arm Inn and Three separate times in Candlekeep) while the entire bar watches and does nothing. I'd say killers pretty much walk around freely.
And so EVEN if some industrious drunken sod puts two and two together, would he report it? And is it proof enough to crucify an entire party of potential innocents without trial or proof? Given that there are other opportune suspects? And to stretch that and to say that this increasingly nosy would-be sleuth then tells everyone in Bergost, Naskal, The Friendly Arm Inn and Baldur's gate in the time it takes the adventurers to travel there, seems a bit much in my book.
I take your point about the Drow. However, who says she shows her face? And are you proposing that the environment is so racist that seeing her alone makes me KOS in all of these places? Because the reputation hit for having her on board isn't enough to do that alone. And I can pick her up and not do the other stuff and no problem. And I can also dump her off anywhere and still have the bad reputation. So, kind of problem there.
But after all of this, there is the game mechanic to contend with, which is the main problem. Being good lays zero restriction on you at all. You aren't restricted on quests. In fact you get more of them. You aren't losing experience. If you play the evil road (Smart or stupid), you miss out on some experience. Being good never leads you to being persona-non-Grata. You never Have to do evil things to survive. Being Evil, smart or dumb, it is a constant struggle. More so than it should logically be. And I think therein lies the truth of the matter.
Don't get me wrong. I have found ways around the system. Plus, you don't need to even play alignment if you so choose. I personally take it very serious, but no one says you have too. And I am sure that you can play "Evil". just it seems the game mechanic is bent against it.
If it were me, if a heavily armed group of killers walked into my shop, they would hands down get the lowest discount I could afford (probably free). I wouldn't make them mad. I wouldn't say nice things about them behind their backs, but i wouldn't upset them needlessly.
You can see it as evil, someone else can see it as just plain stupid. You're in a never-ending argument because you're twisting every point to suit yourself.
Personally, I don't see why you would kill some poor patron with a mental illness. That's not evil; that's just plain mindless. I can get his stuff by thieving them, too - and not leaving any evidence behind.
I see evil as a lot more complex than you're making it out to be. Case-in-point, Professor Moriarty. Known as Holmes's arch-nemesis, he's not just some random murderer - he's big shot bad guy. You're supposed to be a child of Bhaal - are you mindless and dumb, or are you intelligent, conniving and sadistic? You should be doing whatever it takes - helpful or otherwise - to benefit yourself and your greater goals. Do a little good to do a lot of evil? Sounds perfectly diabolical to me.
But then I play a character with a high intelligence. It sounds like you're role-playing some sort of Chaotic Evil fighter with a sub-par intelligence - of course you're going to screw up, do stupid acts and get attacked by the "good guys." I don't see any character with low intelligence befitting of a child of Bhaal.
If you don't want to use your imagination to push the limits of evil above and beyond your standard thief with a knife, then that's your choice. But don't blame the devs for your lack of imagination.
What do you think Sarevok's reputation was when he was working his way up to his coronation? Clearly he was well thought of, despite being wholly evil.
You can see it as evil, someone else can see it as just plain stupid. You're in a never-ending argument because you're twisting every point to suit yourself.
Personally, I don't see why you would kill some poor patron with a mental illness. That's not evil; that's just plain mindless. I can get his stuff by thieving them, too - and not leaving any evidence behind.
I see evil as a lot more complex than you're making it out to be. Case-in-point, Professor Moriarty. Known as Holmes's arch-nemesis, he's not just some random murderer - he's big shot bad guy. You're supposed to be a child of Bhaal - are you mindless and dumb, or are you intelligent, conniving and sadistic? You should be doing whatever it takes - helpful or otherwise - to benefit yourself and your greater goals. Do a little good to do a lot of evil? Sounds perfectly diabolical to me.
But then I play a character with a high intelligence. It sounds like you're role-playing some sort of Chaotic Evil fighter with a sub-par intelligence - of course you're going to screw up, do stupid acts and get attacked by the "good guys." I don't see any character with low intelligence befitting of a child of Bhaal.
If you don't want to use your imagination to push the limits of evil above and beyond your standard thief with a knife, then that's your choice. But don't blame the devs for your lack of imagination.
What do you think Sarevok's reputation was when he was working his way up to his coronation? Clearly he was well thought of, despite being wholly evil.
You have missed the point entirely. Or just plain ignored it. Who cares what the "Evil" act is, they were merely examples. My main point was that the game mechanics require that you either play good or do 10X the micro-management to play evil. It is ingrained in the game mechanic.
Good players do every quest, do the right thing, get the maximum experience and a goodly percent of the money. They also get a discount on prices. Their henchmen (on the good or neutral side) don't require that you keep a restricted range of Reputation. Basically the higher your Rep is the better as far as they are concerned. So, anythng from an 8-20+ is just fine with them. Evil, you HAVE to keep your reputation down. Only if it goes too far down, you become KOS. And if it goes too high, the evil companions leave. So lets call it 5-10. See the disparity yet?
Here is the reason for evil character to do good things. Revenge and profit. Revenge cuz your foster father was killed there are assassins at every door trying to kill you and you want the ones responsible not to face justice but to suffer and die a horrible horrible death. And profit cuz people want other people dead and will pay you for it. I play a neutral evil assassin and have no problem roll playing like this. Also if I start getting to goody goody I satisfy my sadistic side and go into a random house at night and torcher and kill a poor family
Lol spyder I had to create this account just to post. These people are arguing about what they are thinking inside their heads as they play, while you are making very good points about how the CODING of the game is clearly in favor of a good aligned party.
We get that you guys like to roleplay and think you are slick willy evil, manipulating people and pulling the wool over Faerun's collective eyes. But the point Spyder makes so eloquently is that if you wanna play evil and not be gimped, even if it is "marginally", you HAVE to rp the evil in your mind, because if you try to act it out in game you are punished for it by the MECHANICS. Sometimes its fun to play a brute melee as "stupid" evil, considering I clearly dont have the stats for anything else!
Something concrete... In High Hedge, you can only buy robes for the good and neutral arch magi. Pretty neat if you happen to get 2 evil mages as potential party members before going there. I'd probably understand a bit if it was meant as a way to balance Edwin's superduper powers and constitution, but he isn't the only evil mage. Charname could be one and wouldn't have a chance to get the best robe in the game, based entirely on alignment. Xzar is almost as fragile as Xan. Xan can get a robe, Xzar can't.
Something concrete... In High Hedge, you can only buy robes for the good and neutral arch magi. Pretty neat if you happen to get 2 evil mages as potential party members before going there. I'd probably understand a bit if it was meant as a way to balance Edwin's superduper powers and constitution, but he isn't the only evil mage. Charname could be one and wouldn't have a chance to get the best robe in the game, based entirely on alignment. Xzar is almost as fragile as Xan. Xan can get a robe, Xzar can't.
Yes but you can find an evil archmagi robe for free in the main questline, while you have to buy the good and neutral ones for quite a lot of money.
True, but you can basically go to High Hedge any time you want and if you stole enough, i.e. diamond in Candlekeep, you can buy the robes early. I found the first Evil robe in the very last fight of chapter 4. That is a long time, especially for a fragile mage like Xzar.
True, but you can basically go to High Hedge any time you want and if you stole enough, i.e. diamond in Candlekeep, you can buy the robes early. I found the first Evil robe in the very last fight of chapter 4. That is a long time, especially for a fragile mage like Xzar.
Basically, if you aren't keeping your mages out of combat, that is your own look out. My current play through, my primary is a Wizard. He (RP) personally doesn't agree with the Ethos of any of his Theologically inclined companions but keeps them around for effectively guards. And so he doesn't allow them to heal him and relies upon his own abilities and potions for that. He really hasn't had that much trouble. And he stays well out of combat unless he has no other choice. it isn't THAT hard to do.
@Guildnstern. Exactly. I am glad that someone gets it. Yes, you can come up with any reason what so ever, any JUSTIFICATION for good acts. That isn't the point, nor is it my problem. My problem is that the game mechanics are such that unless you meta-game 'Evil', you VERY QUICKLY end up KOS in towns and cities. Not so with the good path.
In my personal opinion there are better ways to handle "Evil". I had always thought that a three fold approach was most appropriate. Your reactions from others should be based on how well liked you are, how well respected you are and how much you are feared. A really pleasant and congenial person could be not very well respected or feared due to being a bumbling incompetent. Someone who was gruff and obnoxious but otherwise noble Knight could still be well respected even if no one actually likes him. And if an evil high level necromancer came into a shop, do you really think that the shop owner would risk the wrath of such a powerful wizard, merely because they were evil? I think they would actually discount the prices as much as they could to keep from being turned into anything "Unnatural". And even a high level Paladin with a reputation of being very rigid might not be liked and might even be feared because of how black and white that she sees the world.
@KidCarnival: That makes sense in the context of the world, though. Faerun is like any fictional realm - heroes have an easier time of it than villains. BG's innovation isn't that you can play good or evil equally, it's that you can play evil at all; a more challenging approach, certainly (though the diminished exp/gold is offset by having the most powerful NPCs suited for evil playthroughs) but one that the game allows you to RP through to the very end of the series.
OK, on Joias flamedance ring, it really doesn't make any sense for the classical self-serving evil person. The fact that you get reputation from it doesn't work as intelligent reward seeking, because a) your character has no way to predict this, and b) your character does not understand the reputation mechanic, and thus has no way to know "fetch this ring and I get get away with one murder scott-free!"
Evil doesn't have to be as one dimensional as this though! Being evil just means there are some things or issues for which you are willing to do despicable acts. Good characters must be good in all things; one murder a decade still makes you pretty evil.
A Lawful Evil character, though, could value social norms, helping make a more ordered community, ect. They just might also be willing to commit a few murders along the way. Kagain, for example, is clearly an evil dwarf who will kill for cash, but I also suspect that he is a man of his word, and that as a mercantile type he personally values keeping trade routes open, fighting bandits ect in itself. An evil character can even, say, selflessly want to rescue any child in danger- evil does not have to mean never being altruistic ever.
Of course, such a character is less likely to take 5 evil NPCs and will probably be a less classically evil experience; a truly self-serving evil run through is heavily penalised, but there are certainly types of evil you can roleplay acceptably well. Although I suppose there is a point at which you are a villan, and a point at which you are an anti-hero.
Sure it makes sense if you put it that way. It's the whole point of this topic - playing evil is more challenging. The arch magi robe is just one example where it shows that no, playing evil is not the same as good/neutral just with a few other flavor dialogue options.
There is actually a lack in that department. If my character is evil, he would likely get along with other evil characters and not consider them as "bad", just as "ah, finally, normal people with my values". Yet many dialogue options with Dorn still make me question his actions, where a truly evil character would likely admire him for his ruthless behavior. Or a chaotic evil character would only take offense in how structured and premeditated his plans are, and recommend him to be even more ruthless and uncontrolled.
The first encounter with Xzar and Montaron is how evil-NPC should react to evil-PC: by offering help and teaming up. But alas, they react the same to good and neutral PCs. Even if it would really suck that early in the game, I'd find it more fitting if they'd give a good character a placebo or poisoned potion, the normal potion to evil characters and neutral has a 50/50 chance to get real or poisoned to reflect Xzar's chaotic behavior. Other than wanting to steal elven eyes, what makes Xzar seem evil (rather than "very very insane and confused") even to good or neutral characters? He and Montaron help. They don't backstab, they don't insult, they don't have a quest that forces the PC to do anything evil in order to keep them. (Neera is more evil in that; even if you tell the wizards they can have her and you don't know that woman, they turn hostile and you have to kill them.) Another not-quite-sane evil character would probably find Xzar insightful, not crazy, and wonder why everyone else (i.e. Nashkell mayor) refers to him as "bad company". There are no dialogue options to defend Xzar, and that's what a likeminded evil character would do.
Edwin's re-join party dialogue has 2 options; reject again or accept by saying "you're a jerk, but yeah, come with us". Now, why would another evil caster say that? To such a character, Edwin is the paragon of everything; the ultimate rolemodel. A fellow evil caster would likely find his arrogance justified (because he has the spellpower to back his words up) and aspire to be like that one day. It's also out of character for another arrogant evil class with high charisma and/or intelligence, i.e. bard or swashbuckler. Such characters would probably regard the permanent insults as friendly banter or only apply them to the rest of the party because they are SO FREAKING AWESOME in their own mind, Edwin can't possibly be talking about them. "In fact, it's very refreshing to meet someone who recognizes MY awesomeness and how poorly the rest of the stupid yes-men/woman following me around compares to us smarties."
"Evil" doesn't mean that you hate everyone. What I miss are the dialogue options to back up my fellow evil party members or reinforce their views.
First, Evil - as defined by the D&D alignment system - is a bit more rigid and specific than we as roleplayers might prefer. For example, I've been told that there's no such thing as "evil love" in D&D: whether you're lawful, neutral or chaotic, it's just not an emotion your character can comprehend, let alone express. By the same token, an evil Charname wouldn't be too quick to defend Xzar or praise Edwin, because that implies camaraderie and respect, perhaps even friendship.
But setting that aside, the larger issue is that BG is a fifteen-year-old game. From a purely technical point of view, it predates the era of multiple dialogue branches expressing different variations of the same idea: the mechanism of choice is in its infancy here, represented by the fact that you can choose from several courses of action which have different results, but each choice is represented by one line of dialogue which may or may not be in character for you.
The "no evil love" is already out because Eldoth is evil and loyal to Skie. She may not be evil, but Eldoth leaves all the same if you kick her out. Xzar and Montaron may hate each other, but are also loyalty bound. In BG2, evil Viconia is a romance option. So I really don't see the "no evil love/friendship" thing.
Yes, Eldoth has other motives beyond love, and Xzar and Montaron aren't really friends. But they are loyal. And there is no way to frame Viconia's romance option as anything else. Same for Dorn now.
From that point of view, there is no reason another insane character would not see Xzar as a genius, or Edwin as a role model or something like that. After all, it is a very young, inexperienced character who just lost a father and mentor. Being easily impressed by the next best father/mentor figure would make sense.
I also don't mind that there are no different answers leading to the same result. I just wish the existing options were a bit more neutral since they have to fit all alignments.
Eldoth doesn't really love Skie, he is just manipulating her. Xzar and Montarons loyalty is organisational. However, there are fluff characters (such as two of the leaders of Thay) who are evil and in love. Viconia clearly can also be evil and in love. Sarevok loved Tamoko (he also saw his love as relatively unimportant until TOB).
Being evil may mean you like evil NPCs but it doesn't mean so automatically. I mean clearly a strongly Lawful evil type would probably hate Korgan (see: the blood war).
The problem isn't being able to construct character concepts, the problem is being able to play them in a game; you can't really, but thats not a whole lot less true of creating a complex good character.
Well, not neccessarily. I installed BG2 yesterday and played a bit around. In the intro dungeon, you actually do have "different choice of words, same outcome" options with Imoen. So there is hope for BG2EE.
I always play good characters because its a pain in the ass to worry about rep and annoying to not get quest rewards. I would play evil if it wasn't a pain to do so.
@kidcarnival Well, playing an evil party will be the largely the same in BG2:EE as in BG2, since they can't change any or the original content.
Unlike in BG1 or good good/neutral types in BG2, though, the addition of an extra evil NPC will probably improve people who want to play evils experience, especially as there aren't that many great evil NPC mods.
Oh, from what I remember, the dialogue options don't need to change. For example, in the first intro dungeon, Imoen wants to move on and you have 3 or 4 options to reply, ranging from "yes, you are right" to "quit whining, brat, we go when I say we go". I haven't played through in a while, but I think there were also replies to tell Anomen he's full of himself, Aerie to stop being such a pussy and trying to cheer up Edwina. Being evil doesn't equal being a jerk, so I'm also ok with friendly options that show up in conversations with evil NPCs.
Trying to be evil in Baldur's Gate feels kind of stupid in my opinion, since essentially you are saving the place from the Iron Throne and Sarevok, that's all a good deed no matter how you twist it.
I like my villains or anti-heroes to do "the right thing for the wrong reasons". So I don't have a problem with that. It's roleplay. In my character's head are all the evil schemes that take place after the Iron Throne is defeated... even if they never happen in the game.
Also don't forget, hunting down Sarevok and the Iron throne can be a very personal thing for CHARNAME regardless of alignment and saving the Sword Coast is just a side effect. Even my LG Paladin was quick to judge and execute the leaders of the Iron Throne in Candlekeep due to how upset he was over the multiple attempts on his life.
Trying to be evil in Baldur's Gate feels kind of stupid in my opinion, since essentially you are saving the place from the Iron Throne and Sarevok, that's all a good deed no matter how you twist it.
I like my villains or anti-heroes to do "the right thing for the wrong reasons". So I don't have a problem with that. It's roleplay. In my character's head are all the evil schemes that take place after the Iron Throne is defeated... even if they never happen in the game.
Exactly, a side effect. In another roleplay, I had a character who bragged with his heroic achievement of freeing a world (scifi) from slavery, while in reality, he was annoyed by the occupying force and didn't even know they enslaved another race. He only learned about that after whiping them out (and then posing as "liberator", morally pressuring the former slaves into financially "showing their gratitude"). Freeing slaves in itself is certainly a "good" deed. If you didn't know there are slaves to begin with and only killed their master because he looked at you the wrong way, not really.
In the descriptions, the game seems to imply that chaos = stupid or at least really bad decision making (since Int is technically a stat). Only a chaos evil character would go around demanding money and killing anyone who got in the way. Neutral characters are in between and take advantage of obvious opportunities at the expense of others while not overtly alerting the law. Lawful evil characters follow all the laws but are greedy and selfish in a straightforward manner. (Evil Tyrant, greedy shopkeeper).
The examples it gives for Chaotic evil are bloodthirsty buccaneer and predatory animal/creature. Neutral were like greedy theives.
So following this, only a Chaotic evil led party person should have less than 6 rep, and only once they are strong enough to wipe out guards consistently. I had little trouble with the guards using my level 2 mostly average stat fighter (avg as in close to 9 in every stat) with a +1 longsword, shield and splint mail.
Xzar and Mont-whatever are chaos and neutral respectively, explaining why they complain whenever you behave yourself. They stupid.
IMO the whole alignment system is very naive to begin with. There is no such thing as evil. There is selfish, there is stupid, there are people who are bitter because other people don't follow their own personal moral code. Even the Rwandan genocides are motivated by stupid, selfish tribalism.
It would be nice if your rep was not affected if no one KNOWS you did it...whether evil or good. Another game, Oblivion handles it well...as an assassin, you never suffer from committing assassinations unless you get caught...but they specifically wrote an entire evil path for that. And even if no one else knew about your deeds, YOU still knew. (Which in my case was to complete the assassin storyline, and just never go back to get more assignments...that way, no one ever died at the behest of the Hand again, basically shutting down the entire crime family, which is actually very good, though it is situational morals since many innoncent people died at your own hand.)
Now, in BG, two things prevent the evil route from being legit: 1. The infinite number of guards who meet you as you enter a town. IRL, if you are badass enough to take out the local guard, sure, more will come. But if you keep killing, the town will run out of people who are willing to needlessly die for a town who would just as well settle for you as the new group in charge. Think of The Cowboys in the movie Tombstone.
Instead, in BG, when you leave, the guard gets replenished. It's like the USA. If you eliminate the local law enforcement in the USA, the government will first send in the state troopers. If you dispatch them, the FBI gets involved, and the National Guard comes in to re-establish law and order. And if you somehow can maintain control at that point, the President declares war and brings in 600,000 marines, or Seal Team 6, to eliminate every bad guy involved. (This also annoys me about some FPS games...you kill every nazi in a certain area, and decide to go back to a previous section to pick up enough health to survive one more attack, only to see a fresh group from where you just painted the walls nazi blood red. Medal of Honor does this. Return to Castle Wolfenstein, however, once dead always dead.)
2. While certain evil individuals will respond favorably to your party, most encounters are programmed to fight you. Soem are understandible, such as kobolds. They are dumb humanoid pack animals that see attack as the first idea to deal with what isn't part of their pack. Some are not. At least one hobgoblin will talk with you, so if you are bad mofos whose reputation is so well known that Flaming Fist attack you on sight, then maybe a reasonable hobgoblin would befriend you instead of forcing a dialog that says, "You either attack to more the story along, or drop the whole thing right there."
Myself, I remember playing evil 10 years ago in BG. It was a nice change from the 20 prevous games completing the story as a good (I have found myself playing Robin-Hood-ish CG, because then I can do good to progress the story, but disregard laws so I can take advantage of my thief's skills.) I never finished it since by the time I got to the mine, I was KOS and that got boring real fast.
I'm playing an evil party at the moment. As a Neutral Evil character, I make my choices based on personal gain. This includes some force attacks on quest-givers after I've slaved about and done their handiwork.
Example (spoiler alert): Look at the Silke quest at the beginning of the game. If you go the evil route, you kill the innocent men, collect their jewels, and net 300 gold with some 'meh' experience. The good route gives you 400 gold, Silke's items and more sizeable experience that comes from killing her. As an evil character I chose the evil route, said goodbye to Garrick, and then turned around and force attacked my former employer. Win-win.
I also killed that Firebeard pansy after netting the rewards from doing his quest. There's nothing wrong with working for the man and then discarding the trash once he's outlasted his usefulness. On the contrary, being evil can be quite profitable with some short-cut gains. That being said, the effects of a low reputation is just the sad facts of life. No one said there wouldn't be consequences.
Comments
Personally, I don't see why you would kill some poor patron with a mental illness. That's not evil; that's just plain mindless. I can get his stuff by thieving them, too - and not leaving any evidence behind.
I see evil as a lot more complex than you're making it out to be. Case-in-point, Professor Moriarty. Known as Holmes's arch-nemesis, he's not just some random murderer - he's big shot bad guy. You're supposed to be a child of Bhaal - are you mindless and dumb, or are you intelligent, conniving and sadistic? You should be doing whatever it takes - helpful or otherwise - to benefit yourself and your greater goals. Do a little good to do a lot of evil? Sounds perfectly diabolical to me.
But then I play a character with a high intelligence. It sounds like you're role-playing some sort of Chaotic Evil fighter with a sub-par intelligence - of course you're going to screw up, do stupid acts and get attacked by the "good guys." I don't see any character with low intelligence befitting of a child of Bhaal.
If you don't want to use your imagination to push the limits of evil above and beyond your standard thief with a knife, then that's your choice. But don't blame the devs for your lack of imagination.
What do you think Sarevok's reputation was when he was working his way up to his coronation? Clearly he was well thought of, despite being wholly evil.
Thanks for your concern though
Good players do every quest, do the right thing, get the maximum experience and a goodly percent of the money. They also get a discount on prices. Their henchmen (on the good or neutral side) don't require that you keep a restricted range of Reputation. Basically the higher your Rep is the better as far as they are concerned. So, anythng from an 8-20+ is just fine with them. Evil, you HAVE to keep your reputation down. Only if it goes too far down, you become KOS. And if it goes too high, the evil companions leave. So lets call it 5-10. See the disparity yet?
We get that you guys like to roleplay and think you are slick willy evil, manipulating people and pulling the wool over Faerun's collective eyes. But the point Spyder makes so eloquently is that if you wanna play evil and not be gimped, even if it is "marginally", you HAVE to rp the evil in your mind, because if you try to act it out in game you are punished for it by the MECHANICS. Sometimes its fun to play a brute melee as "stupid" evil, considering I clearly dont have the stats for anything else!
@Guildnstern. Exactly. I am glad that someone gets it. Yes, you can come up with any reason what so ever, any JUSTIFICATION for good acts. That isn't the point, nor is it my problem. My problem is that the game mechanics are such that unless you meta-game 'Evil', you VERY QUICKLY end up KOS in towns and cities. Not so with the good path.
In my personal opinion there are better ways to handle "Evil". I had always thought that a three fold approach was most appropriate. Your reactions from others should be based on how well liked you are, how well respected you are and how much you are feared. A really pleasant and congenial person could be not very well respected or feared due to being a bumbling incompetent. Someone who was gruff and obnoxious but otherwise noble Knight could still be well respected even if no one actually likes him. And if an evil high level necromancer came into a shop, do you really think that the shop owner would risk the wrath of such a powerful wizard, merely because they were evil? I think they would actually discount the prices as much as they could to keep from being turned into anything "Unnatural". And even a high level Paladin with a reputation of being very rigid might not be liked and might even be feared because of how black and white that she sees the world.
Just my two cents.
Evil doesn't have to be as one dimensional as this though! Being evil just means there are some things or issues for which you are willing to do despicable acts. Good characters must be good in all things; one murder a decade still makes you pretty evil.
A Lawful Evil character, though, could value social norms, helping make a more ordered community, ect. They just might also be willing to commit a few murders along the way. Kagain, for example, is clearly an evil dwarf who will kill for cash, but I also suspect that he is a man of his word, and that as a mercantile type he personally values keeping trade routes open, fighting bandits ect in itself. An evil character can even, say, selflessly want to rescue any child in danger- evil does not have to mean never being altruistic ever.
Of course, such a character is less likely to take 5 evil NPCs and will probably be a less classically evil experience; a truly self-serving evil run through is heavily penalised, but there are certainly types of evil you can roleplay acceptably well. Although I suppose there is a point at which you are a villan, and a point at which you are an anti-hero.
There is actually a lack in that department. If my character is evil, he would likely get along with other evil characters and not consider them as "bad", just as "ah, finally, normal people with my values". Yet many dialogue options with Dorn still make me question his actions, where a truly evil character would likely admire him for his ruthless behavior. Or a chaotic evil character would only take offense in how structured and premeditated his plans are, and recommend him to be even more ruthless and uncontrolled.
The first encounter with Xzar and Montaron is how evil-NPC should react to evil-PC: by offering help and teaming up. But alas, they react the same to good and neutral PCs. Even if it would really suck that early in the game, I'd find it more fitting if they'd give a good character a placebo or poisoned potion, the normal potion to evil characters and neutral has a 50/50 chance to get real or poisoned to reflect Xzar's chaotic behavior. Other than wanting to steal elven eyes, what makes Xzar seem evil (rather than "very very insane and confused") even to good or neutral characters? He and Montaron help. They don't backstab, they don't insult, they don't have a quest that forces the PC to do anything evil in order to keep them. (Neera is more evil in that; even if you tell the wizards they can have her and you don't know that woman, they turn hostile and you have to kill them.) Another not-quite-sane evil character would probably find Xzar insightful, not crazy, and wonder why everyone else (i.e. Nashkell mayor) refers to him as "bad company". There are no dialogue options to defend Xzar, and that's what a likeminded evil character would do.
Edwin's re-join party dialogue has 2 options; reject again or accept by saying "you're a jerk, but yeah, come with us". Now, why would another evil caster say that? To such a character, Edwin is the paragon of everything; the ultimate rolemodel. A fellow evil caster would likely find his arrogance justified (because he has the spellpower to back his words up) and aspire to be like that one day. It's also out of character for another arrogant evil class with high charisma and/or intelligence, i.e. bard or swashbuckler. Such characters would probably regard the permanent insults as friendly banter or only apply them to the rest of the party because they are SO FREAKING AWESOME in their own mind, Edwin can't possibly be talking about them. "In fact, it's very refreshing to meet someone who recognizes MY awesomeness and how poorly the rest of the stupid yes-men/woman following me around compares to us smarties."
"Evil" doesn't mean that you hate everyone. What I miss are the dialogue options to back up my fellow evil party members or reinforce their views.
First, Evil - as defined by the D&D alignment system - is a bit more rigid and specific than we as roleplayers might prefer. For example, I've been told that there's no such thing as "evil love" in D&D: whether you're lawful, neutral or chaotic, it's just not an emotion your character can comprehend, let alone express. By the same token, an evil Charname wouldn't be too quick to defend Xzar or praise Edwin, because that implies camaraderie and respect, perhaps even friendship.
But setting that aside, the larger issue is that BG is a fifteen-year-old game. From a purely technical point of view, it predates the era of multiple dialogue branches expressing different variations of the same idea: the mechanism of choice is in its infancy here, represented by the fact that you can choose from several courses of action which have different results, but each choice is represented by one line of dialogue which may or may not be in character for you.
Yes, Eldoth has other motives beyond love, and Xzar and Montaron aren't really friends. But they are loyal. And there is no way to frame Viconia's romance option as anything else. Same for Dorn now.
From that point of view, there is no reason another insane character would not see Xzar as a genius, or Edwin as a role model or something like that. After all, it is a very young, inexperienced character who just lost a father and mentor. Being easily impressed by the next best father/mentor figure would make sense.
I also don't mind that there are no different answers leading to the same result. I just wish the existing options were a bit more neutral since they have to fit all alignments.
Being evil may mean you like evil NPCs but it doesn't mean so automatically. I mean clearly a strongly Lawful evil type would probably hate Korgan (see: the blood war).
The problem isn't being able to construct character concepts, the problem is being able to play them in a game; you can't really, but thats not a whole lot less true of creating a complex good character.
Unlike in BG1 or good good/neutral types in BG2, though, the addition of an extra evil NPC will probably improve people who want to play evils experience, especially as there aren't that many great evil NPC mods.
I can't play evil though, I get too sad
The examples it gives for Chaotic evil are bloodthirsty buccaneer and predatory animal/creature. Neutral were like greedy theives.
So following this, only a Chaotic evil led party person should have less than 6 rep, and only once they are strong enough to wipe out guards consistently. I had little trouble with the guards using my level 2 mostly average stat fighter (avg as in close to 9 in every stat) with a +1 longsword, shield and splint mail.
Xzar and Mont-whatever are chaos and neutral respectively, explaining why they complain whenever you behave yourself. They stupid.
IMO the whole alignment system is very naive to begin with. There is no such thing as evil. There is selfish, there is stupid, there are people who are bitter because other people don't follow their own personal moral code. Even the Rwandan genocides are motivated by stupid, selfish tribalism.
Now, in BG, two things prevent the evil route from being legit:
1. The infinite number of guards who meet you as you enter a town. IRL, if you are badass enough to take out the local guard, sure, more will come. But if you keep killing, the town will run out of people who are willing to needlessly die for a town who would just as well settle for you as the new group in charge. Think of The Cowboys in the movie Tombstone.
Instead, in BG, when you leave, the guard gets replenished. It's like the USA. If you eliminate the local law enforcement in the USA, the government will first send in the state troopers. If you dispatch them, the FBI gets involved, and the National Guard comes in to re-establish law and order. And if you somehow can maintain control at that point, the President declares war and brings in 600,000 marines, or Seal Team 6, to eliminate every bad guy involved. (This also annoys me about some FPS games...you kill every nazi in a certain area, and decide to go back to a previous section to pick up enough health to survive one more attack, only to see a fresh group from where you just painted the walls nazi blood red. Medal of Honor does this. Return to Castle Wolfenstein, however, once dead always dead.)
2. While certain evil individuals will respond favorably to your party, most encounters are programmed to fight you. Soem are understandible, such as kobolds. They are dumb humanoid pack animals that see attack as the first idea to deal with what isn't part of their pack. Some are not. At least one hobgoblin will talk with you, so if you are bad mofos whose reputation is so well known that Flaming Fist attack you on sight, then maybe a reasonable hobgoblin would befriend you instead of forcing a dialog that says, "You either attack to more the story along, or drop the whole thing right there."
Myself, I remember playing evil 10 years ago in BG. It was a nice change from the 20 prevous games completing the story as a good (I have found myself playing Robin-Hood-ish CG, because then I can do good to progress the story, but disregard laws so I can take advantage of my thief's skills.) I never finished it since by the time I got to the mine, I was KOS and that got boring real fast.
Example (spoiler alert): Look at the Silke quest at the beginning of the game. If you go the evil route, you kill the innocent men, collect their jewels, and net 300 gold with some 'meh' experience. The good route gives you 400 gold, Silke's items and more sizeable experience that comes from killing her. As an evil character I chose the evil route, said goodbye to Garrick, and then turned around and force attacked my former employer. Win-win.
I also killed that Firebeard pansy after netting the rewards from doing his quest. There's nothing wrong with working for the man and then discarding the trash once he's outlasted his usefulness. On the contrary, being evil can be quite profitable with some short-cut gains. That being said, the effects of a low reputation is just the sad facts of life. No one said there wouldn't be consequences.