Divine Warriors
Glidderdust
Member Posts: 70
I decided to come back to BG2EE last night and was testing out some ideas. I was thinking of playing through with a paladin, ranger/cleric, or a fighter/cleric. Those are some pretty uninteresting and powerful characters depending on how experienced you are but I've never played the the R/C or F/C. Also, the first time I ever beat BG2 was with an Inquisitor well over a decade ago so I thought it would be fun to relive that. I also think a divine warrior fits the whole "child of a god" character.
Guess I'm at a loss as for what I should choose.
1) Paladin. I know a lot of people claim the Cavalier is the best tank but I'm not sure when that kicks in during the game. With my testing I learned that a paladin's casting level is character level -8. So while I can see the eventual payoff with spells like AoF and DuHM, it will take a long time to get there. It looks like a Cavalier would need to reach 6 million xp to max out AoF. The F/C levels faster at first but eventually evens out. Inquisitor doesn't get the self buffs but gets the best dispel and also a true sight that has a 0 casting speed. Looks like it's the overall utility of Inquisitor through the entire game vs. the power of Cavalier towards the end. Tough choice between Cavalier and Inquisitor.
2) Ranger/Cleric. I've always read how powerful these guys are but never had the patience to play one all the way through. They seem like they level slowly but I can definitely see how they can be over powered later in the game. Do people usually take another divine caster in the party? It seems like the slow leveling would leave the party without helpful spells like chaotic commands and true sight, especially if the R/C is using level five spells for iron skins. Also, I changed the .ini file to give the R/C all of her druid spells like the original but it strangely feels like cheating now. I'm guessing pre buffs of AoF, DuHM, and iron skins make this character a beast at some point.
3) Fighter/Cleric. Similar to the F/C but without iron skins, insect plague, and summoning. The dwarf version gets great saves and 19 constitution. The half orc gets 19 strength and constitution. The human will eventually be a much better version of Anomen. Is the multi-class variation going to level quick enough to be the party's only divine caster? Is there any reason to pick a F/C over the R/C?
I'm not sure what party make up I'm going to go with. I'll probably have my character be the main tank and divine caster with a mage, Yoshimo, and one other person depending on what class I choose.
So those were the arguments I was making for myself between Inquisitor, Cavalier, R/C, and F/C. Did I leave anything out? What would you do?
Guess I'm at a loss as for what I should choose.
1) Paladin. I know a lot of people claim the Cavalier is the best tank but I'm not sure when that kicks in during the game. With my testing I learned that a paladin's casting level is character level -8. So while I can see the eventual payoff with spells like AoF and DuHM, it will take a long time to get there. It looks like a Cavalier would need to reach 6 million xp to max out AoF. The F/C levels faster at first but eventually evens out. Inquisitor doesn't get the self buffs but gets the best dispel and also a true sight that has a 0 casting speed. Looks like it's the overall utility of Inquisitor through the entire game vs. the power of Cavalier towards the end. Tough choice between Cavalier and Inquisitor.
2) Ranger/Cleric. I've always read how powerful these guys are but never had the patience to play one all the way through. They seem like they level slowly but I can definitely see how they can be over powered later in the game. Do people usually take another divine caster in the party? It seems like the slow leveling would leave the party without helpful spells like chaotic commands and true sight, especially if the R/C is using level five spells for iron skins. Also, I changed the .ini file to give the R/C all of her druid spells like the original but it strangely feels like cheating now. I'm guessing pre buffs of AoF, DuHM, and iron skins make this character a beast at some point.
3) Fighter/Cleric. Similar to the F/C but without iron skins, insect plague, and summoning. The dwarf version gets great saves and 19 constitution. The half orc gets 19 strength and constitution. The human will eventually be a much better version of Anomen. Is the multi-class variation going to level quick enough to be the party's only divine caster? Is there any reason to pick a F/C over the R/C?
I'm not sure what party make up I'm going to go with. I'll probably have my character be the main tank and divine caster with a mage, Yoshimo, and one other person depending on what class I choose.
So those were the arguments I was making for myself between Inquisitor, Cavalier, R/C, and F/C. Did I leave anything out? What would you do?
2
Comments
I think a monk might be too squishy through most of chapter two if she's the only one that goes in for close combat.
I guess my idea last night was to have a tank leading the small group without going down the fighter/mage or barbarian road.
Also, if I want to use divine spells and turn undead, why not just choose R/C or F/C?
If I had more time I'd start a game with all four characters and see what one I liked the most but I don't have time for that.
btw, i threw you an "insightful" for no other reason than having a Weekend at Bernie's picture.
Carsomyr is awesome though.
Just not sure if Cavalier or a cleric variation would be more fun over Inquisitor. I'm actually leaning toward R/C right now.
Main Hand:Purifier (30% MR)
Offhand: Defender of Easthaven (20% physical resistance)
Spells: AOF (25% physical resistance) and Divine Might (physical stat boost)
Hell Trials: 10% MR, +20% fire/electricity/cold resistance
Cavalier: +20% fire/acid resistance
Red Dragon Scale Armor: 50% fire resistance
Dragon Helm: +25% fire/cold/electricity resistance
Boots of Grounding: +50% electricity resistance
Ring of Gax/Amulet of Seldarine: +20% magic resistance
Lum the Mad: +5% Magic resistance
Total:
115% fire resistance
100% poison resistance
65% magic resistance
70% electricity resistance
45% cold resistance
45% physical resistance
20% acid resistance
Immune to Fear
Those are some really nice resistances. It doesn't really matter what the enemy is throwing at you, that Cavalier is going to take it on the chin and will just keep coming. You can then have Keldorn tag along with him, who will have Carmosyr and the amulet of 10% MR. That'd give Keldorn a nice 60% MR as well, meaning both of your front line paladins will be able to shrug off spells like a boss.
I feel like I keep talking myself out of taking a Cavalier even though those numbers are impressive.
End game power isn't that important to me since every character will be powerful one way or another by that time in a game without mods. That's probably why I always prefer to dual a level 9 Kensai to mage or thief instead of dualing at level 13 or taking a multi-class character. Multi-class characters are probably more powerful at the end of ToB but what about the journey from the start of SoA to the end?
Having said that, we're in the BG2 forum, and inquisitor is the unchallenged king of the paladin kits in BG2. Yeah, cavalier tanks well, and blackguard dishes out the damage, but nothing trivializes 2/3rds of the game's hardest fights quite like the inquisitor's dispel.
EDIT: Okay, my tanking assertion was ridiculous. Mage, sorcerers, druids, and bards all tank better than any warrior class in the game, once they get their defensive spells going. Cavalier is merely the best tank among the warrior classes.
For me, barbarian vs cavalier comes down to the rage vs using carsomyr. I might actually give the nod to a half orc barbarian due to the rage and faster leveling.
I loved the idea of dwarven defender when I read about it. Then I got the game and played one and hated it in practice. The way the character slows down when defensive stance is active drove me nuts. It wasn't that big of a deal when the DD is surrounded but I like the option of moving around if I have to.
OT: I want to give a little love to the F-C: human fighter 7-9 to cleric. Anomen is good, but a charname is always better than a NPC (maybe excluding Edwin). Pick any blunt weapon, flails being the obvious choice(FoA, DoE), but also warhammers (for optional ranged) if you want to exclude slings. You will level fast, you can dual at the start of BG2 at level 7 or wait a little longer, but the downtime will be short either way. With revised GM, your F-C will dish out very good damage with good APR. You will more quickly have higher level AoF and all other juicy clerical buffs (like DUHM, HP, Righteous Magic etc). Being single classed cleric allows you to take the divine spot yourself and you can happily remove other divine caster NPC's if you want to (although I prefer to keep a MC diviner around to get some overlapping, like Jaheira) and add in Keldorn, Minsc, Korgan, or any other tank to complement your Charname in the frontlines.
In fact, a blackguard dual wielding foebane and DoE (with the OP armor you get from Dorn quest as well in ToB) would basically be unkillable:
AoF+DoE+ Armor that heals you by two HP every time you are dealt damage + Ring of Gaxx + Foebane is too much tankiness/regen.
You would not get access to purifier, but Foebane is overall better and available earlier, and on the other hand you would have access to the armor I was talking about (which is not equipable by good-aligned characters).
The only downside compared to cavalier would be fire and acid resistance. And a bit of magic resistance as well (though not so much with the 15% from the armor I mentioned) if you go for purifier (which is more roleplay than a sword that casts Larloch Minor Drain on hit on a paladin).
But that comes with either increased regen (compared to cavalier if the cavalier goes for purifier) or Magic resistance ( compared to cavalier if the cavalier goes for Foebane), and still a huge advantage: Poison weapon
@Grum: in fact it would be even better than that because AoF actually gives 25% resistance against all damage.
Wow wow first of all, the buffs like DuhM and armor of faith help a lot, then doom and command is kinda useful as well. Blackguard is amazing, the poison is very powerful and i think it stacks with itself. Also, nice debuff ability.
My picks as best tanks would Blackguard on one hand (because they can equip that armor from Dorn's quest that makes them virtually invulnerable, and cavalier, though they resist a little better to fire and acid, cannot, because they are lawful good) and neutral/evil multi fighter cleric, for the exact same reason as Blackguard, except these got lvl 5+ priest spells, and these are really good, the most noticeable being of course chaotic commands which also gives them immunity to most status effects.