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Suspicious posted:What low level cleric buff(s) will give her more hit points? Aid.
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Nov 3, 2016 07:36
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Good point. That should help a little.
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Nov 3, 2016 07:37
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Arivia posted:Aid. Or I get Branwen who's a much better tank out of the box.
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Nov 3, 2016 08:05
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I ran Viconia as a tank in my SCS BG1 run and it worked fine. Innate magic resistance, high dexterity plus anhkeg plate and boots of avoidance made her quite survivable despite the low hp.
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Nov 3, 2016 08:44
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Radio Talmudist posted:Holding down the mouse button...but drat, have I been doing something so basic incorrectly all this time? The EEs do have inventory lag for some people since the latest update(s), but it's usually a 2-3 second thing. The item comparison thing they added is causing it and they're aware of it, but it doesn't sound like a new patch will be anytime soon.
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Nov 3, 2016 10:05
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Suspicious posted:A couple of crits and she's dead.  Viconia gets utter poo poo for HP by default iirc, but if you pick her up early that's not going to be a problem in the long run (unless she rolls poorly). Her low strength isn't ideal, but as Llamadeus said you can partially make up for that with Ankheg armor. Of course, Jaheira and Yeslick will always do better in that role, but it's not like Viconia is entirely hopeless.
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Nov 3, 2016 12:46
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Arivia posted:Aid. Do people actually use that spell? The duration is so short at low levels I've never found it useful as an HP buff
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Nov 4, 2016 11:51
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bike tory posted:Do people actually use that spell? The duration is so short at low levels I've never found it useful as an HP buff Not me. (Well okay, I used it in my last pen and paper session to buff a cleric boss.) I just pointed it out to make the point that yes, there are low-level health buffs Viconia has access to in BG1. I just keep her in the back lines with a sling and ankheg plate or the Mail of the Dead, as Bioware intended.
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Nov 4, 2016 13:24
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I've never really used Viconia as a melee type, but making her sound so frail is rather odd to me. She doesn't have a penalty to HP, she just doesn't have a bonus. HP rolls are random and all, but next to a cleric with a +2 hp/level from having a 16 con, she only loses 18-20 hit points over the course of leveling up since fixed HP gains kick in at level 9 or 10 for clerics. That is a significant amount, but not a huge amount. She does have low strength, but there is the Ankheg plate and other ways around that. Her high Dex does help her AC quite a bit also without having to resort to giving her the precious Gauntlets of Dexterity, which frees up a slot for something else like a Str-booster. She's hardly an ideal front-liner (nobody is, apart from actual warriors), but she's reasonably sturdy.
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Nov 4, 2016 15:00
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Not only that, but in general buffing AC is 100x better than buffing HP. Hell, for a bulk of both games if a 18-19 dex character that's capable of wearing heavy armor has more than a 5% chance of getting hit by the acerage enemy, you're undergeared. End of story. HP honestly means so little in the grand scheme of things.
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Nov 4, 2016 15:39
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HP means a lot because crits will go through AC no matter how low it is. In BG1 Jaheira is usually my tank and even at -9 AC I frequently have to pull her back to heal.
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Nov 4, 2016 16:54
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Yeah I'm not saying HP is useless, but you're arguing that perfection is necessary because of things that have a 5% chance of happening. Mathematically that just doesn't make sense. Unless the game actually does have some coded in bias towards drawing 20s on the RNG but that hasn't been my experience.
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Nov 4, 2016 17:13
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I think the issue comes up in places like the Bandit Camp, where you might have 7 or 8 dudes making 2 attacks a round with their bows. In this case, 20s can add up fast.
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Nov 4, 2016 17:18
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Where am I arguing for perfection? From experience I know that "HP honestly means so little in the grand scheme of things." is completely wrong in BG1. HP matters a lot. I replayed through BG1 a couple of weeks ago and I had to heal my tank all the time even with the bracers of dexterity and the best AC gear equipped. Some of it was magic damage, which Viconia has a decent chance of ignoring, but a lot of it was physical damage, from cits or from enemies whose THAC0 is so low they can still land hits without needing crits.
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Nov 4, 2016 17:20
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Suspicious posted:HP means a lot because crits will go through AC no matter how low it is. In BG1 Jaheira is usually my tank and even at -9 AC I frequently have to pull her back to heal. Put on a helmet and then quit worrying about crits.
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Nov 4, 2016 19:02
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When was the last time you played the game? Helmets prevent double damage, they don't stop the base damage from going through.
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Nov 4, 2016 19:10
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Yeah helmets are nice but even taking normal damage off crits is enough to require regular healing. Unless you're resting a lot and spending lots of spells, your tanks absorb a lot of attacks in this game. It's not a huge issue, health potions are plentiful and healing magic's not hard to come by, but for a low-hp character like Viconia even a helmet won't protect you from the serious danger of a short string of lucky crits.
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Nov 4, 2016 19:12
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https://www.gog.com/game/baldurs_gate_2_enhanced_edition Not sure if this was posted, but the EE editions of BG and BG2 (and Icewind Dale as well, IIRC) are being sold at a huge discount right now. I'm seeing like 6$ USD from where I am.
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Nov 4, 2016 19:19
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Smiling Knight posted:I think the issue comes up in places like the Bandit Camp, where you might have 7 or 8 dudes making 2 attacks a round with their bows. In this case, 20s can add up fast. See if you're letting that happen then you probably aren't using CC as well as the game expects you to. BG's gameplay is all about minimizing enemy opportunities while maximizing your own. If you're letting 7 or 8 enemy attack rolls happen in the first place you have bigger problems than your tank's AC or HP.
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Nov 4, 2016 20:02
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Suspicious posted:When was the last time you played the game? Helmets prevent double damage, they don't stop the base damage from going through.
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Nov 4, 2016 20:24
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^^^ Fair enough.Head Hit Keyboard posted:See if you're letting that happen then you probably aren't using CC as well as the game expects you to. BG's gameplay is all about minimizing enemy opportunities while maximizing your own. If you're letting 7 or 8 enemy attack rolls happen in the first place you have bigger problems than your tank's AC or HP. Not everything goes according to plan though, or your approach could be suboptimal, or you might be misremembering some details, or you might not know what's ahead in the first place if this is your first time playing. It's nice to have a tank that can take some hits before dying to fall back on.
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Nov 4, 2016 20:59
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It's been a little while since I've played chapter 2 of BG2, but I'm getting the feeling I should do planar sphere/unseeing eye quests last. My party is around level 11, would I be able to do either or should I tackle other side quests first? So I asked Jaheria to leave my party because I wanted to try Viconia. Jaheria seems pissed and now I'm wondering if her relationship with the bhaalspawn is permanantly strained...mechanically, is it possible for them to mend their relationship, or does asking her to leave mean a romance is now impossible? Radio Talmudist fucked around with this message at 22:07 on Nov 4, 2016 |
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Nov 4, 2016 21:56
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Radio Talmudist posted:It's been a little while since I've played chapter 2 of BG2, but I'm getting the feeling I should do planar sphere/unseeing eye quests last. My party is around level 11, would I be able to do either or should I tackle other side quests first? Both should be doable
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Nov 4, 2016 22:10
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The Unseeing Eye level-scales and arguably gets harder the later you do it (Gauths get upgraded to Beholders iirc, and you get a level-dependent undead spawn which, if you do it late enough, means Lich + Greater Mummies + Bone Golem or something like that). Planar Sphere doesn't level-scale and would be hard at your current level, depending on gear. All romances end when you kick Charname's love interest out of the party unless you mod that behavior away.
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Nov 4, 2016 23:19
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If the romance is already considered "complete", it continues- at least that was my experience with Aerie.
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Nov 4, 2016 23:31
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Thank you! Another question; if I dismiss an NPC and then take them back, do they recoup the XP they didn't earn while I was adventuring with other NPCs, or stay where they where when I dismissed them? And if I dismiss Valgyar, where does he go if I want to get him back?
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Nov 5, 2016 03:41
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Radio Talmudist posted:Thank you! Another question; if I dismiss an NPC and then take them back, do they recoup the XP they didn't earn while I was adventuring with other NPCs, or stay where they where when I dismissed them? And if I dismiss Valgyar, where does he go if I want to get him back? No xp gain while not in party. They tell you where they're headed, I think you can force them to stay way they are or send them to bar you meet Naila and Amoen in. Save the game and try it.
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Nov 5, 2016 03:46
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Skwirl posted:No xp gain while not in party. They tell you where they're headed, I think you can force them to stay way they are or send them to bar you meet Naila and Amoen in. Save the game and try it. Ah okay, thank you. I've also noticed my bhalspawn is like 1-2 levels higher than nearly all the NPCs I've recruited - like I'm level 11 and my NPCs are all around the level 9 range, except for yoshimo. Is that typical? I used the dungeon-be-gone mod which awards the xp you would have won at the start of the dungeon. I'm wondering if something is wonky. EDIT: Just realized that each npc has a different value for when their next level would hit. I guess that's an AD&D/multiclass thing. Radio Talmudist fucked around with this message at 04:00 on Nov 5, 2016 |
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Nov 5, 2016 03:58
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Radio Talmudist posted:Ah okay, thank you. I've also noticed my bhalspawn is like 1-2 levels higher than nearly all the NPCs I've recruited - like I'm level 11 and my NPCs are all around the level 9 range, except for yoshimo. Is that typical? I used the dungeon-be-gone mod which awards the xp you would have won at the start of the dungeon. I'm wondering if something is wonky. Different classes need different amounts of XP to level up, and it doesn't automatically give NPCs the same amount of XP, there's like 6 versions of each NPC and depending on what range of levels you are when you recruit them, you recruit a one close in level, if you're at the bottom of the appropriate range they might be slightly higher level than you, if you're at the top they'll be lower level.
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Nov 5, 2016 04:03
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Skwirl posted:Different classes need different amounts of XP to level up, and it doesn't automatically give NPCs the same amount of XP, there's like 6 versions of each NPC and depending on what range of levels you are when you recruit them, you recruit a one close in level, if you're at the bottom of the appropriate range they might be slightly higher level than you, if you're at the top they'll be lower level. This can also result in you recruiting weirdly high level NPCs. I often end up getting the level 16 Anomen really early for whatever reason.
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Nov 5, 2016 05:36
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Wizard Styles posted:The Unseeing Eye level-scales and arguably gets harder the later you do it (Gauths get upgraded to Beholders iirc, and you get a level-dependent undead spawn which, if you do it late enough, means Lich + Greater Mummies + Bone Golem or something like that). Counterpoint, do level scaling encounters last so that you get the most XP. But yeah doing that one first is vastly easier than doing it last. Planar sphere is probably the hardest one so doing it last is a good call. Easier to even do firkraag before that one imo. Washout fucked around with this message at 08:30 on Nov 5, 2016 |
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Nov 5, 2016 08:28
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I always do my quests depending on what npcs I want to grab, but usually I do the thief stronghold quest first, it's relatively easy and give tons of xp and money.
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Nov 5, 2016 12:12
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Skwirl posted:No xp gain while not in party. They tell you where they're headed, I think you can force them to stay way they are or send them to bar you meet Naila and Amoen in. Save the game and try it. Most of the good/neutral ones have the option to "stay here, I'll be back" with a couple of exceptions. Jaheira always fucks off to Harper HQ, and Mazzy heads home to Trademeet. Pretty much the rest of them can be left in the wilderness somewhere, which I know for a fact because I've collected them and dumped them on the front lawn in front of my Ranger stronghold for safe keeping. Stupidly I can't leave them IN the stronghold, so they just hang out on my lawn instead.  Before I went into Chapter Three I let anyone with someplace to go (Keldorn to his family, Cernd to his son, Rasaad to rebuild his temple) wander off, and left the rest to "watch my stronghold". I know its technically suboptimal to keep rotating people in and out all the time, but this let me do everyone's personal quest, and it felt right to have Minsc and Jaheira along to rescue Imoen despite them having spent the most time on the lawn.
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Nov 6, 2016 08:05
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Unless you have a mod of some kind, Jaheira will straight up disappear forever if you kick her out after her personal quest is far enough along. Also never kick out someone equipped with the Staff of the Magi or you will have to dive into NearInfinity to toggle its invisibility long enough to get your person back. I did this twice.  :
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Nov 6, 2016 08:41
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jng2058 posted:Most of the good/neutral ones have the option to "stay here, I'll be back" with a couple of exceptions. Jaheira always fucks off to Harper HQ, and Mazzy heads home to Trademeet. Pretty much the rest of them can be left in the wilderness somewhere, which I know for a fact because I've collected them and dumped them on the front lawn in front of my Ranger stronghold for safe keeping. Stupidly I can't leave them IN the stronghold, so they just hang out on my lawn instead. As a completionist type, I totally understand you. What I wish the game would do, since the main character is always in the party and can't die without forcing a reload, is keep all of your NPC companions at the exact same experience total as you. If you bring someone back in after you've accumulated a lot of experience in the meantime, you can level them up. I wish that you could do this for NPCs the first time you meet them as well. If there's a mod like this, somebody let me know because I've wanted one for ages.
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Nov 6, 2016 16:14
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Washout posted:Counterpoint, do level scaling encounters last so that you get the most XP. But yeah doing that one first is vastly easier than doing it last. Planar sphere is probably the hardest one so doing it last is a good call. Easier to even do firkraag before that one imo. I just finished the Firekraag questline, though I opted to just kill the wizard because I was getting my rear end handed to me. For Firekraag and other Dragons is it better to come back at like, chapter 6 and take them on? I can't find any scrolls of lower resistance, which I hear is really useful for stopping him. Could I technically also do planar sphere after chapter 2, or will I lose access to it if I progress in the main story? Should I do because I need as much XP as possible for the later chapters?
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Nov 6, 2016 16:26
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JustJeff88 posted:As a completionist type, I totally understand you. What I wish the game would do, since the main character is always in the party and can't die without forcing a reload, is keep all of your NPC companions at the exact same experience total as you. If you bring someone back in after you've accumulated a lot of experience in the meantime, you can level them up. I wish that you could do this for NPCs the first time you meet them as well. http://www.gibberlings3.net/readmes/readme-level1npcs.html, especially the Joinable NPCs more closely match the PC's experience option
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Nov 6, 2016 16:52
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Radio Talmudist posted:I just finished the Firekraag questline, though I opted to just kill the wizard because I was getting my rear end handed to me. For Firekraag and other Dragons is it better to come back at like, chapter 6 and take them on?
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Nov 6, 2016 17:52
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Smol posted:http://www.gibberlings3.net/readmes/readme-level1npcs.html, especially the Joinable NPCs more closely match the PC's experience option Much obliged.
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Nov 6, 2016 18:22
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Thank you for this. Another question for the thread; I've noticed that despite memorizing stoneskin, and being able to use it before, it's darked out in my spellbook and I can't use it after rests. Any idea what might be happening? Radio Talmudist fucked around with this message at 18:57 on Nov 6, 2016 |
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Nov 6, 2016 18:37
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