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[Baldur's Gate] BG3 from Larian is on its way!
korodullin
What.SCRegistered User regular
What.SCRegistered User regular
After more than two years, it's finally time for a new BG thread!
http://www.baldursgate.com/ - Home of the BGEE
http://www.baldursgateii.com/ - Home of the BG2EE
Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition on Steam
Baldur's Gate I and II at GOG
Baldur's Gate I and II at Gamersgate
Dafuq is Baldur's Gate?
Baldur's Gate is a series of RPGs developed by BioWare and published by Interplay through their subsidiary, Black Isle Entertainment. Originally released in 1998, the first Baldur's Gate was a watershed game that helped usher in a new era of RPGs, taking a story deeper and more expansive than most RPGs of its day and layering it on top of beautifully-designed pre-rendered 2D environments (which still hold up well to this day) with quality voice work from a who's who of professional animation voice actors. Combined with the then-familiar AD&D ruleset and the rather elegant real-time-with-pause combat system seen not long before in Microprose's Darklands*, you had an RPG that had really never been seen before. Needless to say, it was quite the success.
Two years later, the bigger, badder sequel (and my personal favorite game of all time) hit. With a much greater variety in locales, new classes and customization kits for old classes, a memorable cast of motley NPCs, and a story that starts out strong and rarely lets up, BG2 set the bar so high that it (along with Planescape: Torment) is still a game other RPGs are judged by (and often found wanting), more than a decade later.
A year later, the BG2 expansion pack, Throne of Bhaal, was released and concluded the story. Opinions on ToB are mixed, though it's generally thought that it's a good-but-not-great follow-up. I tend to agree, and Shadows of Amn was a very tough act to follow.
Fast-forward eleven years, to March 2012. A group of folks at Overhaul Games announced enhanced ports of both Baldur's Gate games, the Enhanced Editions, and here we are today, with the first BGEE out the door.
Well... dafuq is BGEE?
After much ado and a few delays, Overhaul Games has released the Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition, porting the 14-year-old game to work natively on modern OSes and tablets. Some highlights include:
- Some of the most common "essential" mods baked into the standard game, including widescreen support, kits from BG2, the positively ancient fixes provided by the BG2 Fixpack and Baldurdash, some of Tutu's fixes, and some of 1 Pixel Production's mods as well.
- A retouched UI made more suitable for a tablet, with a zoom function, new color scheme, and some better-laid-out information on character sheets. If you don't like the color or find the new font hideous, it's pretty easily changed via mods that are already popping up.
- Native multiplayer support that actually works without several arcane rituals, Hamachi, and praying to dark gods.
- Three new characters: Rassad the Monk, Neera the Wild Mage, and Dorn Il-Khan the Blackguard. Note that Neera and Dorn are in-app purchases for the iPad version, but come standard with the PC version. Dorn also brings his Blackguard class into the game for you to play yourself.
- A new standalone game mode: The Black Pits. Basically a Horde Mode separate from the main game where you can try out your various broken custom party builds, with much loot to be had to keep you trucking along.
- A bunch of terrible redone cutscenes!
The PC version is $19.99, while the iPad version is $9.99 but with several things locked behind in-app purchases.
NOTE: The iPad version currently requires iOS6, and thus is NOT compatible with first-generation iPads! Overhaul says they're working on iPad1 compatibility, but with OSX and Android ports already on their plate, it may be a while before we see it.
That's great and all, but what about the originals?
Well thankfully both the original Baldur's Gate as well as Baldur's Gate II as well as their expansions work pretty much A-OK on modern OSes and are readily available from various digital distribution outfits like Gamersgate and GOG. For the price of the Enhanced Edition ($9.99 per game) you can get the whole series in a neat, tidy downloadable form and with an hour of modding you can get both games up to better-than-EE standards. Of course, they're both quite playable (if dated) without any modding whatsoever.
Well I bought the game and now I'm wandering in some woods but bears/wolves/gibberlings/chickens/Tarnesh/hobgoblins/ankhegs keep chewing my 4 HP Mage's face off! Help!
The first Baldur's Gate can be a pretty rough game! Early levels in AD&D can be very lethal, and level 1 characters are almost universally weak. A winning game begins at character creation, and there are a few things to keep in mind for a character.
Your Class: For a first-time Baldur's Gate player, some of the beefier melee types tend to be the easiest to build and play, and their naturally higher hit points tend to make them the safest classes early on in the game. Fighters, Rangers, Paladins, and Barbarians all make for a fairly easy-going early game. Pure Mages are very difficult (but not impossible!) to level, and some classes like the Monk don't even begin to shine until BG2. If magic is more your forté and you're dying to roll a spellcaster anyway, a multiclass is also a pretty good option. A Fighter/Mage, Fighter/Cleirc, or Ranger/Cleric makes for a very formidable protagonist. The Blade kit for the Bard as well as the Swashbuckler kit for the Thief are also quite powerful.
Also beware of the Kensai Fighter kit in BG1. You'll be extremely potent in melee fighting, but you have absolutely no armor and no way to engage in ranged combat.
Your Stats: Stats are one of the biggest components of a good character, and some of them can be a bit weird.
Strength: Boosts melee to-hit (THAC0) and damage while increasing your carry weight. Some weapons and armors also have base STR requirements. Naturally most useful for melee fighters, who want 16+ as much as possible. If your protagonist is going to be an up-close bruiser, you really want to shoot for 18. Mages and characters who plan to focus more on ranged combat can get away with less; as little as 10 for mages, but others may want 14-15.
Dexterity: Boosts ranged to-hit (THAC0), your Armor Class, your Reaction (how early in the 6-second Round you swing - vitally important for using backstab attacks as a Thief and for disrupting spellcasters but not much else), and provides a boost to thieving skills. Every class can make use of DEX, and more is always nice. Thieves and any ranged-focus class definitely want 18 DEX, and if you can spare it, try to get 16 or more for other classes.
Constitution: Provides bonuses to HP at higher values as well as bonuses to saving throws for Dwarves, Halflings, and Gnomes. If you're a Fighter, Ranger, or Paladin, you want 18 CON, no excuses. Everyone else maxes out in benefit at 16.
Intelligence: Determines the percentage chance for a Mage or Bard to successfully scribe spells into their spellbooks, the number of spells per spell level you can learn (but not your spells per day), and is half of what determines your Lore value. Mages and player Bards should gun for 18, no matter what. Everyone else should try to avoid going below 10; Mind Flayers in BG2 do Int damage per hit, and will kill you when you hit 0.
Wisdom: Determines how many bonus spells Divine spellcasters (Clerics and Druids) get per day and is half your lore. Only those two classes really need to worry about it. Paladins and Rangers gain no benefit. For the most part, it can be used as a dump stat, but Mages can benefit from up to 16 Wisdom for the Wish spell.
Charisma: Determines store prices at 15+ CHA. Otherwise does pretty much nothing. The classic dump stat.
Your Proficiencies: More or less self-explanatory, but it's very helpful to also have the ability to equip a ranged weapon with no penalties, especially in BG1, where bows rule the day. If you're using Tutu or BGT and don't have one of the various Exotic Weapons Packs installed, avoid katana and scimitar proficiencies. The dual-wield proficiencies are also kind of a liability very early on.
Your party: For the most part, a balanced party with a mix of classes that can support each other is the way to go. A high-HP, high-defense Fighter or Paladin meatshield, another high-damage close-range attacker, one or two magic-users, a healer, and a ranged support is a classic mix. A thief is a nigh-on necessity later on in BG1 and throughout the entirety of BG2 - there are just too many locked chests to break and frequently-deadly traps to disarm to go without. A dedicated arcane spellcaster is also a necessity as well, as enemy mages eventually begin deploying a variety of buffing spells that render them untouchable by your other damage-dealers until they've been disabled by one of your own spellcasters.
Try to diversify your equipment needs as well. Three platemail-wearing longsword swingers are going to quickly run out of gear to keep each other equipped with. This can be a big problem, especially in BG1 where there is much less magic loot in general compared to BG2.
Further Reading
There are a variety of good resources for more detailed and specific information about different areas of the game itself:
- Gamefaqs is a great resource, especially DSimpson's guides and rules FAQs. BG1 on Gamefaqs | BG2 on Gamefaqs
- GameBanshee is always good, with nice guides and a really nice item listing. BG1 on GameBanshee | BG2 on GameBanshee
- Dudleyville is a classic resource, mostly for its annotated area maps. It's a bit out of date, though, and the DudelyFixes have all been superceded by newer mods, mostly the BG2 Fixpack and BG1 NPC Project.
- Mike's RPG Center is also pretty good, but most of its information is found in other places as well, like GameBanshee. I still use it sometimes, though. BG1 | BG2
- The Play It Hardcore wiki page for Baldur's Gate (covers both games) is a pretty new resource, I believe maintained by some GA goons(?). Written with an eye for powergaming, its information is still very, very useful for all levels of play and is one of the places I go to first if I have to look up correct tables for things.
- The Sorcerer's Place BG2 Spells Reference. A little hidden gem on the place, it's a fantastic resource for learning how to use your Cleric, Druid, and Mage spells more effectively. The best part, though, is the chart showing what defensive each anti-magic spell will disable.
Last but not least, there is the classic utility Shadowkeeper that works for both separate Tutu and BG2 installs as well as a full BGT install. If you're interested in playing plain old non-Tutu/BGT Baldur's Gate (the very original release), the Gatekeeper utility designed for that is also on that site. Edits savegames and has a very detailed item and creature browser. Can be used very easily as a cheat, but is also an invaluable bug-fixing tool, as it can correct faulty triggers and flags in your saves to fix broken quests or characters. I have no idea if a similar utility exists for the BGEE yet.
- The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (2017, colorized)
A duck! on
+1
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Download the Widescreen mod. Run the .exe and point it at your BG1/BG2 install. Follow its instructions to set your resolution to whatever. If you're using BG1 vanilla, you'll probably want to install an alternate GUI to fix some scaling issues. Play.
That's it. Seriously. The original vanilla BG1 is still perfectly playable even today.
However, if you want to do all the fancy shit and play BG1 in the BG2 engine with all the kits and whatnot, you've got two options*: EasyTutu or the Baldur's Gate Trilogy (henceforth referred to as BGT). Tutu is the original "play BG1 in the BG2 engine" setup and has been pretty much considered finished for years, while BGT is newer and combines both games into one continuous adventure, with a new in-game cutscene bridging the gap between the two. BGT also has a lot more mod support, if that's what you're into. Tutu is a bit easier to get into, however, while BGT requires a little maintenance while you play, mostly in the transition from BG1 to Shadows of Amn.
For the purposes of this section, we'll assume you've purchased BG1 and 2 from either GOG or GamersGate, though if you're still rocking the old multi-CD installs of BG1 and 2 (like me), just be doubly sure you fully install everything from both games: All the movies from the BG1 install, the Full installation from BG2, etc.
If you are going to be running Tutu, you will want:
The Throne of Bhaal installer for Tutu
The Tutufix pack
Always check to make sure you have the most up-to-date versions from here.
If you are going to be running BGT, you will want:
The BGT installer
The BGT Tweak Pack
The BG2 Fixpack
You will also want the following whether you play Tutu or BGT:
Widescreen Mod
For Tutu:
1. Install both BG1 and BG2, then extract all the files from EasyTutu_ToB.zip somewhere convenient. 2. Run EasyTutuManager.exe and point it at the location of both your BG1 and BG2 installs, then choose a third location for Tutu to install itself to (it doesn't consume either BG install). 3. Extract the contents of Tutufix_v18.rar to your new Tutu install location and run setup-tutufix.exe. You only need to install "Core Fixes" and the "Water De-Greenifier". Everything else is optional. 4. Run widescreen-v3.05.exe, point it at your Tutu directory, and install. Follow the on-screen prompts, but make sure when setting your x and y resolutions that you don't set them to the exact same resolution of your desktop, or else it'll bug out and revert to 800x600. Repeat, except in your BG2 directory. 5. Go play.
For BGT:
1. Install both BG1 and BG2. 2. Run bg2fixpack-v9.exe and point it at your BG2 install. You only need to install "BG2 Fixpack (Core Fixes)" and "Game Text Update". Anything else is optional, but be aware that if you want to change anything in the Fixpack, you'll have to uninstall BGT, run the Fixpack setup again, make your changes, and then reinstall BGT. It won't hurt save games in progress to do this, but it can get time-consuming. 3. Extract the contents of BGT115-Install.rar to your BG2 directory and run setup-bgt.exe. When it asks if you want to biff your files, hit 0 for just some of them. 4. Extract the contents of BGTTweak_11.rar into your BG2 directory and run setup-bgttweak.exe. You'll want to install "Major locations explored upon visit", "Salk's Pen-and-Paper ruleset corrections", "Exotic weapons for Taerom", and "Reputation Resets at Beginning of BG2". The option further down, "Restore BG2 XP bonus for traps, locks, and scrolls" you WILL want to install either just before the transition to BG2 or immediately after regaining control in the starter BG2 dungeon. Everything else is completely optional, but "Bags of the Sword Coast" is worth considering, while "Altered Spawns" you may want to consider disabling or changing to the Tutu method. 5. Go to your BG2 install directory and run setup-bgtmusic.exe. Choose between either the Hybrid version, or the full BG1 music, making sure to remove it come BG2. 6. Run widescreen-v3.05.exe, point it at your BG2 directory, and install. Follow the on-screen prompts, but make sure when setting your x and y resolutions that you don't set them to the exact same resolution of your desktop, or else it'll bug out and revert to 800x600. 7. Go play.
*Technically you have a third option in the form of GemRB, but I: a.) Know next to nothing about it, and b.) It's not compatible with damn near any other mods, including fixpacks.
God damn that took forever! But now it's minutes/days/weeks/months later and the game is too easy/boring/lacking in underage Mary Sues to romance! What do I do now?!
(If you use BGEE, I don't know the first thing about the actual process of modding it, if it's any different from normal BG modding. That said, there is a mod compatibility thread on the BGEE forums that's constantly updated, showing what currently works with it, what commonly-used mods don't, and what is in the process of being updated to.)
Well good thing Baldur's Gate has an active modding community, then! Ever since the release of the first Baldur's Gate - and really picking up pace after Westley Weimer released his "Weimer Dialogue Utility", better known as WeiDU - modders have been releasing all sorts of nifty/creepy shit for both games. From simply fixing game bugs to adapting the games to be closer to the 2nd Edition AD&D source material (or even converting it to 3rd Edition, the madmen), to adding new quests, NPCs, items, or even merging the two games, if you can think of it, some enterprising modder has probably stuffed it into a WeiDU installer.
Of course, despite the surprisingly still active modding community, there's still a few problems. Chiefly, Baldur's Gate was never meant to be modded. The first game's scripting language is extremely limited and an absolute nightmare to deal with, while BG2's is only moderately better. This is why you'll almost never, ever see any mods that don't require either Tutu or BGT. This also means that mod installs beyond the absolute sheer basics tend to be held together by unicorn farts and the prayers of small children.
Compatibility and Install Order
Thus, the first thing you need to keep in mind is compatibility. The general rule of thumb on compatibility is, "If two mods alter the same general facet of the game, you probably shouldn't use them together." Some mods are fully compatible with each other. Some will not even let you run the installer if it detects certain other mods. Some mods are compatible with others, but only if one mod is installed before another, or if only certain components of a mod are installed, or if you install one component now, but exit and install another component after another mod, and it turns into a big fucking mess.
The other thing to keep in mind, install order, ties into compatibility. Some mods, which would otherwise not seem to really have anything to do with each other, can cause headaches and problems if they're installed in a certain way. The Baldur's Gate 2 Fixpack, for instance, is a near-requirement for any BG2 install and is one for BGT. But you install it at the beginning of your mod order. Why? Some of the minor things it fixes are expanded upon or changed by subsequent mods, and if you install the Fixpack after those, things won't be as you expect them to.
With all that said, there are actually some quite good resources for mod compatibility, install orders, and all that whatnot:
First off, if you're a Tutu user, you've got it easy. The Tutu Mod Compatibility and Install Order guide has you covered. If a mod you want to use isn't listed and its readme doesn't list any compatibility problems with either Tutu or another mod you want to use, you can usually suss out where it fits in the list by finding other mods that achieve similar goals.
BGT users, as usual, have it a bit rougher. The BiG World Project's install guide (WARNING: Enormous fucking .pdf) is actually a surprisingly decent resource for showing what's compatible with what and - if you take the time to parse it - can actually be useful for composing an install order. I personally avoid the BWP's installer and megamod installations in general though. Someone else can vouch for the ease of installation using BWP if they want; I'm not even touching that hornet's nest.
Another surprisingly helpful guide for both BGT and some things not listed in the Tutu mod install list is the compatibility guide/install order for Rogue Rebalancing. It gives a very solid start point for working out an install order (RR itself, even if you don't use it) because stuff that RR wants installed before itself typically also likes being installed before stuff installed after RR under other circumstances as well.
One very important thing. If you want to change a mod's settings after installing, or if you fucked up your load order and need to shuffle a mod around, DO NOT SIMPLY GO IN AND CHANGE SOMETHING. If you have to install a new mod earlier in your already-established load order, you must peel back your install order one mod at a time. Make a copy of the weidu.log file in your BG install folder and consult it as to what order to remove stuff in, starting from the bottom of the log file up to what you need to.
For example, if you have mods A, B, C, D, and E installed, and you want to install mod F, but mod F needs to go before mod C, you have to uninstall mod E, then mod D, then mod C, then install mod F, followed by reinstalling mods C, D, and E. It's a pain in the ass, but that's how it has to be done.
My personal rule of thumb for general mod priority (note that it's not gospel, and you will most certainly need to start using a more nuanced approach if you start using more than about 10 mods, especially if they modify similar things like HLAs):
Fixpacks (BG2 Fixpack or Tutufix) BGT (if using) Technical stuff (ToBEx) Quest-Related Mods (Check the Bodies, Unfinished Business, etc.) NPC mods Kit Mods (including things like Rogue Rebalancing) Item/Spell changes (Item Revisions, Spell Revisions/Divine Remix, etc.) Tactics mods (Ascension, Tactics, Sword Coast Stratagems I/II, Improved Anvil (ugh)) Tweaks (BG2 Tweak Pack, BGTTweaks, Level 1 NPCs, etc) Widescreen
When using BGT, anything that affects only the BG1 portion in a category should usually be installed before something that affects only BG2; SCS1 before SCS2, for instance.
The Mods
Wait, you're not scared off? Huh. Okay. First off, some of the more common mod resources:
Pocket Plane Group - Home of Tutu and most of its related mods. Mostly a lot of classic mods, several of them (mainly some NPCs) only work in Tutu... or at least, I don't know how to get them working in BGT. Unfinished Business and the BG2 Banter Pack are extremely widely-used, as is the Virtue mod. Ashes of Embers was (is?) quite popular in some circles as well.
The Gibberlings 3 - Home of the BG2 Fixpack, the BG1 NPC Project, Sword Coast Stratagems, Spell Revisions, Item Revisions, and much, much more. Most of the mods I personally use come from here.
Weimer's mods - Home to Ascension, Tactics, the NPCs Soulaufein and Valen, and some others. A lot of neat, groundbreaking (Weimer came before many others), and technically well-made mods... that are mostly cheesy and unbalanced to the point of being game-breaking (in the player's favor). Note that Ease-Of-Use has been superceded entirely by the BG2 Tweak Pack and shouldn't be used.
Infinity Engine Modlist - A searchable database of IE mods. I actually hesitate to link it here because while it was once (and still is, kind of) a very handy way to find mods that may not have been listed on the "big three" sites, it's recently become infested with spambots that create fake mods and change links in exiting ones to their websites. Use at your own risk.
So, what are some popular mods? In no particular order:
Ascension - Created by none other than David Gaider himself and later repackaged into WeiDU format by Weimer, Ascension drastically changes the boss fights (and the dialogues leading up to them) in Throne of Bhaal to be much more challenging and interesting. Gaider's always been quick to say that Ascension shouldn't be considered how ToB "should have been" but, well... pretty much everyone does anyway. The granddaddy of tactics mods, anyone who likes ToB owes it to themselves to play it through at least once with Ascension.
One Pixel Productions - A very popular mostly-cosmetic mod that changes a lot of art assets to BG1 ones while improving others. I don't personally use it, but many, many do. After a long hiatus, 1PP version 4 recently released, and the mod community is still scrambling to get everything to work with it fully. A nontrivial amount of 1PP work is used in BGEE to boot.
Throne of Bhaal Extender (ToBEx) - A fairly recent (as these things go) utility by Ascension64 that patches bgmain.exe with greatly expanded scripting power, throwing open the door to modding possibilities that were unthinkable five or six years ago. It's no coincidence that many of BGEE's codebase improvements bear a strong resemblance to what ToBEx does. Very, very handy, but not quite essential yet, otherwise I'd have listed it earlier with the Tutu/BGT installs.
Sword Coast Stratagems (and its [url=http://forums.gibberlings3.net/index.php?showforum=139[/url]) - Gaider's Ascension spawned the concept and Weimer's Tactics mod ran with it, but as far as my opinion matters, SCS does tactical mods the best. Where Tactics makes certain encounters harder on the player through cheating in the AI's favor and slathering enemies with a bunch of cheesy abilities, SCS makes the game on a whole more difficult through smart scripting, intelligent (but not prescient) targeting, and a generally more level playing field. Somewhat infamous for the "Improved Mages" taking ages to kill in BG2 due to their panoply of buff spells, but that's a small price to pay for an overall more interesting experience.
Note: Recently SCS2 has been discontinued, and its functionality rolled into the first SCS. You can still use SCS2 alongside an older version of SCS1 for BGT installs, and is probably recommended until DavidW gets all the kinks worked out from the new unified SCS.
Spell Revisions - Unlike its extremely divisive cousin Item Revisions, Spell Revisions has gotten much closer to universal praise. Fixes some broken spells, reins in a few of the more overpowering spells (without ruining their value), and gives a lot of really shitty spells some excellent love, especially in Divination. The worst that can be said about it is that it makes picking a specialist Mage kit much more difficult. Make sure you check the SR forums for hotfixes before installing.
Unfinished Business (and the BG2 original) - Both UBs restore cut/unfinished content in both BG titles, including tidying up some BG1 loose ends and restoring some charming quests in BG2. A classic staple of many, many installs and about the only quest mod I will recommend. As a general rule, I avoid them like the plague. Many are extremely poorly-written, even fewer are balanced to any degree, and if it uses new custom-made area assets, it'll probably be hideous.
BG1 NPC Project - Borderline necessary, this BG1 mod aims to flesh out the many NPC companions in the first game who, beyond the rare personality clash, never really said anything, and brings them more up to the standard set by the companions in BG2. It even adds romances and personal quests for several characters.
The BG2 Tweak Pack - Don't let the name fool you, it works in Tutu as well. Featuring a staggering number of options, including the always-popular ability to disable the hideous helmet graphics as well as adding the ability to wield bastard swords and katanas two-handed. Be careful, though, since some of its changes can duplicate/overwrite changes from other mods thanks to its late install order.
- The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (2017, colorized)
That's a pretty big hurdle to jump.
I bought the dvd collection a while ago and I never quite managed to actually play the game. Just picking the right mods is a daunting task, much less installing them without exploding my computer. There are so many! And they conflict with one another! My last hope was the EE version, but I've heard bad things about it and now that hope is dead.
And I do want some mods, which I've heard will significantly enhance the BG experience. So, which ones do I choose and how do I install them?
The thing is, no one is willing to give a straight answer, mostly because there are no straight answers. There are pros and cons to every choice and I won't have full understanding of those choices until I've been doing this for eight years.
Use these and nothing else. @korodullin can help you with install orders. EE version, btw, is being patched quite rapidly. It's quite playable right now. If they keep the pace up I imagine any reasonable issues will be sorted out by February.
The very first time I played around with BG modding was maybe three years ago, and I've only barely touched mods since then, as I prefer mostly a vanilla experience. The only content changing mod I've used at all is Ascension. I mention this only to stress that I am not some fucking IE Modding Sage.
It is an almost totally painless experience, provided you know roughly what you want. Knowing what you want doesn't involve indepth knowledge of the game or engine, it's pretty simple actually, "Do I want mods that fuck around with the game and add things, or do I just want the game in the BG2 engine. Do I want fan produced bug fixes." etc
I used this page when I first started mucking around with Tutu years ago, and it still looks perfectly serviceable at a glance,
http://usoutpost31.com/easytutu/
Do I? Do I want any of these things?
I don't know.
I have no baseline to compare anything to!
[EDIT] Yeah, I'll take another look at EE in February. That seems to be the path of least resistance.
But I mean if you are totally unwilling to do upward of ten whole minutes of reading a couple readme files, I don't know what else to say to you
3DS FC: 2148-8300-8608 WiiU: AgahnimD
Well, I think you're making the process out to be more simple that it actually is. In any event, I'm going to read the award-winning novel A Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin. I'm told it's a great book, and the best part is that it doesn't require you to take an entrance exam first, and there are no special instructions on how to handle the book, lest it falls apart in your hands.
3DS FC: 2148-8300-8608 WiiU: AgahnimD
Yes, I'm going to link to all that. I just got done and am working on the OP and such now.
- The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (2017, colorized)
Really, it just seems best to go the Easy Tutu route.
Anyway, OP and all is done. If anyone notices any glaring omissions or things I should add (I'm kind of running short on room, especially in the second post), let me know.
- The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (2017, colorized)
godfuckingdamnit.
http://www.shsforums.net/files/file/993-enkidas-portrait-pack/
images: http://fc07.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/063/9/7/bg2_bioware_npcs__portrait_pack_v2_by_enkida-d4p6ney.jpg
http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/046/f/f/bg2_portrait_pack_v2_mod_npcs_by_enkida-d4p6nxb.jpg
http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2012/063/6/b/bg2_portrait_pack_minor_npcs_by_enkida-d4p6o7s.jpg
some of them are for npc mods too which made me install a few (Angelo for instance) and i'm totally rocking that new look for minsc and xan.
i'm... im not sure what that particular portrait of a furry npc is all about. but you know, bg mods. the rest look fucking great though and keep with the bg style.
http://www.shsforums.net/topic/49994-release-game-over-only-on-party-dead-for-bg2-easytutu-and-bgt/
i just remembered which one bassilus was. make sure you have a ton of protection from stone scrolls and then he's childs play even in scs.
Bassilus is a cleric of Cyric with a bunch of undead around him. Are you thinking of a basilisk?
Bassilus is a pain in the ass in SCS (and he's even worse in BGT with Item Revisions, since his hammer can instagib your entire party), and unless you manage to get his skeletons aggroed before he does his conversation, they won't die if you do his little chat properly.
If you have it, the Blindness spell can really fuck his day up. If you have a mage of level 3 or higher, so will Deafness. As far as I know, he's got no spells to cure blindness, so if you manage to get it to stick, he can't wind up his Flamestrikes or Hold Persons on you unless he's actually standing directly adjacent to one of your party. So blind him and keep running him around while your characters pelt him with arrows (or do hit-and-fades with melee types, running out when he begins casting, since he'll fail due to being unable to see his target). If you use Spell Revisions, Jaheira's Sunscorch can blind him as well.
At worst, use Imoen's magic missile wand to interrupt some of the worst spells he can cast, usually Flamestrike.
- The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (2017, colorized)
I want to put points in Set Traps and maybe Open Locks.
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Edit: As far as thieving skills go, the formula for successfully hiding in shadows is [(Hide in Shadows + Move Silently) / 2]. 100 in each skill for a 100% chance to hide in perfect conditions (indoors, in the dark), but you ideally want around 150 in each after bonuses from gear, maybe more.
Detect Illusions, Set Traps, Open Locks, and Find Traps all max out in effectiveness at 100 points.
Pickpocket you can never get too much of; I've had Jan fail at stealing from stores with as much as 250 pickpocketing.
- The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (2017, colorized)
Open locks, find traps and detect illusion are the money thief skills; set traps I guess can be pretty good, but I never had the patience to really make use of them. You want enough points in hide to be competent at it (80-100 is a good target), but you don't need a ton of points in it because you can always use invisibility pots if you need a little boost.
pick pocket, eh. It's basically just a matter of how much time you want to spend stealing gold/gear from NPCs. Gold isn't a particularly limited resource though, so I don't much see the use of it.
Pluto was a planet and I'll never forget
Modded games (especially Rogue Rebalancing) close a lot of the loopholes for stealing everything from shopkeepers, while Item Revisions' Store Revisions outright removes the ability to steal from many BG2 shops which... kinda makes heavy investment in pickpocketing a largely wasted effort.
- The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (2017, colorized)
hmm yeah im getting confused, i always get those 3 bounty quests mixed up, theres brage, cyric bassilus who i am now remember with the undead family members or something and yeah the guy at the basilisk area is who i was thinking of.
@TeaSpoon I haven't done any mods. The game is fine with the Bioware published patches (which the DVDs have). I just finished looking over the fix pack in the OP for BG2... Most of those fixes are for edge cases, in my opinion. I remember running into one of the listed issues in my second play through and I just reloaded a save and the problem went away.
I think BG1 is stuck in 640x480, but it's not pushing millions of polygons, so just run it in fullscreen mode. The game is great, although I remember getting sick of the endless spawns in TotSC (too many werewolves, perhaps?)
Why bother with pickpocketing? Just get 65535 <gem> and sell them. If you don't know how to do this with the first gem you pick up, you fail at powergaming.
I have never even heard of this.
Edit: Googling around, apparently this is an item duping bug that only seems to have worked on original, unpatched copies of the first Baldur's Gate. I can't even get it to work on my 3-disc copy of BG1 that I got eight years ago.
- The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (2017, colorized)
Ugh... should I reload then? I made an extra save back at Kensai level 9 just in case, but really 13 just gets you the extra Proficiency point and extra attack, right? I have the True Grand Mastery tweak installed so you get BG1's proficiency bonuses instead of vanilla BG2's. All out of curiosity really. I would rather not have to do questing and killing a 100 enemies again just to do things "properly".
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If you've already progressed a ways ahead, it's not really worth reloading. Level 10 Kensai vs. level 13 Kensai is a difference of 3 THAC0, +1 proficiency point, and half an attack per round. You'll be slightly less effective, but it's hardly game-ruining or anything.
- The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (2017, colorized)
Yeah. One thing I don't like about dual-classing is the down time. It just seems to take FOREVER. When I started my Fighter/Cleric, I dual'd immediately at level 7, which was enough to get 6 proficiency points and not worry about spell levels so much, but it took me FOREVER to get those levels back as a level 1 Cleric on up. Of course the pay out was worth it to be competent with Cleric weapons by the time I got my Fighter levels back.
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I dualed my Berserker to Cleric at level 9. I could've actually taken him all the way to 12 and still reached level 39 as a Cleric (and probably should have; it would've given me an extra use of Enrage along with the other bonuses), but I got impatient (and it also fit my Fighter's character, getting religion after traveling with Yeslick so much in BG1). Callic still ended up being ridiculously powerful.
So really, it's not that big a deal if you dual-class too early; at worst it's a wash. Even Nalia in BG2 isn't bad as long as you treat her like a Mage (and she's a pretty good Mage!) who can use shortbows rather than an actual Thief/Mage like she's supposed to be.
- The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (2017, colorized)
- The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (2017, colorized)
Thieves can also do that to a smaller extent in BG2 with locks/traps. The thieves' guild quest is good for this.