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In BG1/2, stats ultimately do not matter beyond meeting the minimum requirements on gear and other items, such as wands and scrolls that require 9 intelligence to use. Judge a character by 1: their class, 2: the special items and quests attached to them and 3: whether you can stand their personality not (for some people this is #1). Why don't they matter? Loads of items that boost them, for a long duration if not permanently. Buff items (potions, scrolls) and buff spells help waayyyy more than having a more base strength and dexterity, to the point the difference is negligible. When do minmaxed stats help? Against trash mobs you won't bother buffing for, I guess.
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Sep 6, 2023 00:11
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Constitution always matters, and Strength and Dex matter for characters likely to get into melee, and if you're a cleric or druid you get extra spell slots for high wisdom, and if you're a wizard and haven't disabled the possibility of failing to memorize a spell, having to chug a potion every time you want to memorize a spell would be really loving annoying. BG2 gives you a ring of Charisma pretty early so not that necessary, but it can be annoying to have to switch rings every time you want to sell something versus all of the other good rings.
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Sep 6, 2023 00:22
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Man what I wouldn't give for some kind of faithlful new Icewind Dale.
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Sep 6, 2023 00:45
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The Icewind Dale series makes me sad because they (specifically IWD 2) were the first games that made me really notice music in video games, to the point of me sometimes pausing the game to just soak in the music. Then I found out that Jeremy Soule is an amazingly lovely person. 
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Sep 6, 2023 00:49
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I'm guessing IWD should go on my list when I finish BG1/2?
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Sep 6, 2023 01:59
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SirSamVimes posted:I'm guessing IWD should go on my list when I finish BG1/2? Yes but only if you just really enjoy IE combat There is only a bare bones story. It's just a fun, adventurous romp through multiple dungeons. IMO it all plays like if the whole game was Durlags Tower or whatever. Some areas can be a lil tedious but ...IMO it's much, much more enjoyable than BG3
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Sep 6, 2023 02:33
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I think it’s misleading to compare IWD to Durlag’s Tower. Durlag’s Tower has tight corridors with frustrating pathfinding and an emphasis on puzzles, neither of which is a big thing in IWD. IWD is a dungeon crawling hack and slash, for sure, just not an annoying or opaque one for new players.
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Sep 6, 2023 03:18
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IWD 1 and 2 are gorgeous games though some of the more natural areas have an issue where it isn't very clear what you can walk on and what you cannot but I'm about half-way through my first playthrough of IWD EE and it's great. One thing I noticed is that, aside from a couple massive difficulty spikes (one of them is telegraphed, in fairness), the difficulty curve is extremely good and gentle. It's also a game where multiclassing is super powerful and lets you try them out. Only downsides are that it's pre-BG2 so the itemization is poo. For every one Club there are at least twenty Longswords. Also it has randomized loot and the attach loot tables are extremely uneven. Want a ring that gives you +1 to an ability but -1 to another or a +2 ring of protection? Want a +1 warham or a +2 warham that lets you cast extra priest spells? But beyond that, it's great. If you decide to create a Paladin character, Longswords are what you want for them. Edit: Optimal BG2 spell selection doesn't apply either. Looking back through my post history I complained about one of those difficulty spike fights but this time around I smoked them on my second try and only because I forgot that they (or one of their minions) casted Cloudkill and I couldn't see them to silence them. Jimbot fucked around with this message at 04:31 on Sep 6, 2023 |
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Sep 6, 2023 04:27
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Suspicious posted:In BG1/2, stats ultimately do not matter beyond meeting the minimum requirements on gear and other items, such as wands and scrolls that require 9 intelligence to use. This is mostly true, but I still wouldn't really recommend anyone do a Joe Average as their first romp through BG1, and this sort of extends to the companions as well. Although most companions available are serviceable, some are just more intuitive to use out of the box and without potion usage min-maxing.
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Sep 6, 2023 04:56
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Rappaport posted:This is mostly true, but I still wouldn't really recommend anyone do a Joe Average as their first romp through BG1, and this sort of extends to the companions as well. Although most companions available are serviceable, some are just more intuitive to use out of the box and without potion usage min-maxing. Yeah, I don't have interest in carrying around even MORE potions than I already do for the sake of buffing crappy stats, and doing even more inventory shuffling than I already do. I'd rather stuff Just Work.
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Sep 6, 2023 05:45
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Rappaport posted:This is mostly true, but I still wouldn't really recommend anyone do a Joe Average as their first romp through BG1, and this sort of extends to the companions as well. Although most companions available are serviceable, some are just more intuitive to use out of the box and without potion usage min-maxing. With the absolute minimum stat roll being 75 and most people rerolling until they have at least 80, no one is doing a Joe Average run (60) unless it's on purpose or they have weird ideas about archetypes, e.g. I'm a fighter, let's put everything in wisdom and charisma! What I want to avoid here is "poo poo I don't have 18/00 18 18 str dex con, I need to restart." No you don't. Potion usage min-maxing? lol. There are so many potions that you get for free and so many more you can buy with the ridiculous amount of gold you amass. I'm trying to think of counterintuitive NPCs... Aerie? Haer'dalis?
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Sep 6, 2023 06:24
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Stabbey_the_Clown posted:Yeah, I don't have interest in carrying around even MORE potions than I already do for the sake of buffing crappy stats, and doing even more inventory shuffling than I already do. I'd rather stuff Just Work. Once again I'm baffled by inventory woes in BG1/2. Don't you have a full party? Don't you use the consumables you find? Do you pick up literally everything? Even if you can get 2 gp for that silver necklace later, it's not worth it. Discriminate against loot like you do in Diablo. You don't need "even more potions" in a Joe Average run. Y'all have weird ideas about something you never tried.
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Sep 6, 2023 06:33
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Suspicious posted:Don't you use the consumables you find? But I might need them later.
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Sep 6, 2023 06:35
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Air Skwirl posted:But I might need them later. Unrelated to BG, but I was recently playing through the Quake 2 re-release and was pleasantly surprised at how the add-ons force you to use your stronger weapons and power-ups early on. Really did a lot to break this mindset when 30 strogg are gunning for you and you can't be picky about saving that double/quad damage and chaingun bullets. Suspicious posted:I'm trying to think of counterintuitive NPCs... Aerie? Haer'dalis? I always considered it counterintuitive to give Xan, a mage, such a cool looking sword because lol am I putting that miserable stick-elf into close combat.
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Sep 6, 2023 06:58
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DeadButDelicious posted:Unrelated to BG, but I was recently playing through the Quake 2 re-release and was pleasantly surprised at how the add-ons force you to use your stronger weapons and power-ups early on. Really did a lot to break this mindset when 30 strogg are gunning for you and you can't be picky about saving that double/quad damage and chaingun bullets. He uses it after holding persons or putting them to sleep
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Sep 6, 2023 07:10
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Suspicious posted:With the absolute minimum stat roll being 75 and most people rerolling until they have at least 80, no one is doing a Joe Average run (60) unless it's on purpose or they have weird ideas about archetypes, e.g. I'm a fighter, let's put everything in wisdom and charisma! I used Joe Average as a humorous example  I don't think anyone here was arguing for a straight Sarevok roll being a bare minimum. Sam's mage's stats looked fine and I said as much! It says on the tin that Shar-Teel, Khalid and Kagain are fighters. Obviously cultural osmosis has changed the situation since 1998, but my first idea as a kid was that fighter swing sword, make ogre bleed. These three NPCs have different levels of viability for this "tactic", which as you point out can be remedied by potions etc., but this is what I meant by "intuitive", sorry if this was a confusing usage of the term! DeadButDelicious posted:I always considered it counterintuitive to give Xan, a mage, such a cool looking sword because lol am I putting that miserable stick-elf into close combat. It's fine, Xan can put the baddies to nap-time and then bludgeon them to death with his laser sword  Of course, one has to figure out that Sleep is a good spell first, which again wasn't exactly easy for kid me 
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Sep 6, 2023 07:40
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Suspicious posted:Don't you use the consumables you find? no?!
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Sep 6, 2023 08:17
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Rappaport posted:It's fine, Xan can put the baddies to nap-time and then bludgeon them to death with his laser sword Hi five my fellow oblivious-as-a-child BG enjoyer! Let us revel in our youthful ignorance together! Back when all you needed was a spellbook full of identify and magic missile until you got fireball and what's crowd control for that won't cause damage which means things take longer to die!
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Sep 6, 2023 08:28
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I don’t think it’s fair to yell at people for keeping consumables for a rainy day in the infinity engine games, since common advice for many hard fights is literally “have saved this one kind of potion across the entire game for now.” It’s paradigmatically different from the ur-example of saving 100% hp heals in JRPGs, since the IE consumables are conditional immunities that do nothing in the wrong fights and therefore do need to be saved for the right problem.
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Sep 6, 2023 08:29
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I was so ready to feel like a badass for casting protection from petrification on my tank and keep him in the front for this entire screen after a previous visit got my entire party turned into statues, then I found out there's a ghoul who is willing to hang out with you and will happily tank the basilisks who can do nothing to it.
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Sep 6, 2023 08:31
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How come non-magical metal weapons break in BG1 but armour doesn't? Shouldn't the iron crisis also be affecting splintmail, chainmail and platemail to boot? Also in my last playthrough I discovered that there's a quest to fix it! How long has that been there?! You need to grab a sample of tainted ore and/or a bottle of the iron poison from the Nashkel mines and bring it to the Beregost smithy. After a few days he can make metal non-magical weapons that won't break.
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Sep 6, 2023 08:38
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DeadButDelicious posted:How come non-magical metal weapons break in BG1 but armour doesn't? Shouldn't the iron crisis also be affecting splintmail, chainmail and platemail to boot?[/spoiler] It was planned that they would but they didn't end up implementing it. Same with shields. Fun fact: katanas won't break because they're not made on Sword Coast!
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Sep 6, 2023 08:49
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Suspicious posted:With the absolute minimum stat roll being 75 and most people rerolling until they have at least 80, no one is doing a Joe Average run (60) unless it's on purpose or they have weird ideas about archetypes, e.g. I'm a fighter, let's put everything in wisdom and charisma! Aerie and HD having bad con is barely an issue because they can cast mage spells and are therefore practically invulnerable with their buffs up anyways. Vicky having low con is a problem (at least in vanilla - SCS adds some Cleric spells that greatly boost her survivability). As far as the PC goes I don't think it takes long at all to get a decent stat roll so no real reason not to do that. If it's a class that is harder to adjust the stats on (Paladins and their annoying minimum stat requirements) you can afford to go lower on like dex or whatever and compensate with gauntlets. But most classes are pretty easy. A Wizard literally just needs 16 con and maybe max int so you don't have to rely on potions all the time. Dex quickly becomes irrelevant once you get mirror image, stoneskin and other buffs. A Fighter just wants 18/18/18 str/dex/con and maybe whatever left over in int for Mind Flayers. Getting such a roll should take almost no time at all. Agree that obsessing over 18/00 is pointless when you're getting the str book and plenty of other str gear anyways. Waste of time rolling for that.
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Sep 6, 2023 09:17
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Obsessing over 18/00 is pointless, I agree. Just play half-orcs and have 19str out the gate and bypass the whole issue. 
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Sep 6, 2023 09:26
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DeadButDelicious posted:Obsessing over 18/00 is pointless, I agree. As someone playing a Half-Orc Kensai, I concur.
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Sep 6, 2023 10:12
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DeadButDelicious posted:How come non-magical metal weapons break in BG1 but armour doesn't? Shouldn't the iron crisis also be affecting splintmail, chainmail and platemail to boot? Also in my last playthrough I discovered that there's a quest to fix it! How long has that been there?! You need to grab a sample of tainted ore and/or a bottle of the iron poison from the Nashkel mines and bring it to the Beregost smithy. After a few days he can make metal non-magical weapons that won't break. One of tweak mods or UB turns on armour and shield breakage
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Sep 6, 2023 12:27
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goblin week posted:no?! 
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Sep 6, 2023 12:27
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Suspicious posted:Once again I'm baffled by inventory woes in BG1/2. Don't you have a full party? Don't you use the consumables you find? Do you pick up literally everything? Even if you can get 2 gp for that silver necklace later, it's not worth it. Discriminate against loot like you do in Diablo.  Breaking story just in on a truly shocking controversy: Different people have different playstyles. More at 11.And the potions and jewels/gems aren't even a problem, I have containers to hold those. It's largely scrolls and ammo, some of which I have eventually just sold or ditched after deciding I'll never use them.
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Sep 6, 2023 12:30
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Johnny Postnemonic posted:One of tweak mods or UB turns on armour and shield breakage Shield breakage is fair enough but armour is a bit much imo. Plate is expensive and full plate is both very expensive and limited in quantity. Magical armour exists but then you can't wear rings of protection so the best option in BG1 is usually mundane full plate, making that suddenly fail on a random die roll is painful.
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Sep 6, 2023 12:35
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Johnny Postnemonic posted:One of tweak mods or UB turns on armour and shield breakage Unfinished business also adds that quest to get Fuirim to make untainted weapons, which got rolled into the base BG:EE I think.
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Sep 6, 2023 12:38
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scrolls exist to dissolve uselessly into nothing when I fail to transcribe them also I was expecting to resent needing dynaheir around if I want minsc to do his ludicrous melee damage but it turns out when you're an enchanter, having someone who specialises in all those fun evocation spells you can't learn is actually pretty baller. she even has cloudkill waiting for her to gain access to level 5 spells!
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Sep 6, 2023 13:40
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SirSamVimes posted:scrolls exist to dissolve uselessly into nothing when I fail to transcribe them Look, if you think DRM is a motherfucker, just try Magical Rights Management.
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Sep 6, 2023 13:41
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SirSamVimes posted:I'm guessing IWD should go on my list when I finish BG1/2? The Temple of Elemental Evil with the latest Circle of 8 patch is a fine followup to IWD2. There's no plot of any consequence but the turn based d&d battling is great, no RTWP though.
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Sep 6, 2023 13:51
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sebzilla posted:Shield breakage is fair enough but armour is a bit much imo. Plate is expensive and full plate is both very expensive and limited in quantity. Can be fun tho, there was one mod called "hard times" i think, that never made its way over to EE but made the iron crisis a real economic problem and had shield and armour breakage, poo poo was insanely expensive and the ususal magic rings and diamonds were no longer in the usual places, whole economy was changed, very challenging in the early game but doable. I think it was super rare for armour to break tho and therenwere "fine weapons" too
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Sep 6, 2023 13:54
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v1ld posted:The Temple of Elemental Evil with the latest Circle of 8 patch is a fine followup to IWD2. There's no plot of any consequence but the turn based d&d battling is great, no RTWP though. I bought that at launch and ended up returning it after a day or two. Is it worth a retry 20+ years later?
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Sep 6, 2023 14:09
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Molybdenum posted:I bought that at launch and ended up returning it after a day or two. Is it worth a retry 20+ years later? yeah, as long as you patch it with the latest circle of 8 patch.
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Sep 6, 2023 14:53
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Is there a mod for Icewind Dale EE that replaces the vanilla item icons with ones from Baldur's Gate? Like the icons for the containers and the extra healing potions are ugly as sin. They're more appealing and distinct in the Baldur's Gate games.
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Sep 6, 2023 17:24
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Jimbot posted:Is there a mod for Icewind Dale EE that replaces the vanilla item icons with ones from Baldur's Gate? Like the icons for the containers and the extra healing potions are ugly as sin. They're more appealing and distinct in the Baldur's Gate games. The tweak pack might address that if anything does https://www.gibberlings3.net/mods/tweaks/tweaks/
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Sep 6, 2023 17:27
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Ah, I didn't realize the Tweak pack supported EE. Thanks for that!
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Sep 6, 2023 19:56
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Suspicious posted:What I want to avoid here is "poo poo I don't have 18/00 18 18 str dex con, I need to restart." No you don't.
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Sep 6, 2023 20:53
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