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Dual Class question

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cbarchuk
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Dual Class question

Post by cbarchuk »

I want to try another dual class character. I've only tried one so far and that was a kensai/thief and I didn't like it at all. See my kensai/thief post for details. Anyways I was wondering does anyone ever just dual a plain fighter to a thief? I guess that's probably not a great idea since one of the advantages of dual class is using a kit. I dunno. Just trying to brainstorm some ideas since I haven't found a dual class I enjoy.
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galraen
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Post by galraen »

Anyone tried an Assassin dualled into a Cleric out of interest?
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Dante2377
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Post by Dante2377 »

Rangers and Fighters dual-ed to Clerics are strong characters, including Berserker -> Cleric.

Doing a better Imoen or Nalia (thief -> Mage) gives you all the thieving you need (i.e. not much) without wasting half a multiclass, plus when your Mage runs out of spells or would rather not use them they can use Tuigan Bow.

Basically a Fighter or Berserker to a casting class (Mage, Cleric, Druid) gives you a spellcaster who has

- a ton more HP
- specialization and grand mastery (if you use True Grandmastery) in a weapon or ability to dual-wield, giving extra attacks and in the case of dual-wield the ability to have two weapons with good equipped properties.
- ability to wear good helms (Balduran, Charm Protection, elemental protection) and shields (Shield of Harmony, reflection, etc) in the case of Mages

If you go the Berserker route and plan on being more casting focused, as opposed to melee+spells focused, the Berserker rage is perfect since it makes you immune to almost every bad effect except death magic and if you're in the back casting spells, the effect when the Rage wears off won't affect you as much.

Even just dualing right at lvl7 (starting level fighter for BG2) will only cost you 89k experience to get all the good benefits above, if you're going to play a straight (no kit) Mage, Druid, or Cleric. A F7 -> Cleric is prob a stronger character than a kitted single class Cleric.

Same goes for a single-class thief - if you're not doing a kit, there's almost no reason not to go F7 -> thief
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cbarchuk
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Post by cbarchuk »

Thanks Dante for the reponse. Yea that's what I thought. I'll definitely try out one of your suggestions, as they sound pretty interesting, and just stick to an assassin or multi-class fighter/thief for my rogue needs. Now I know the whole kensai/mage combination is popular as well as powerful so I may try that out at some point too. I've also heard that a Berzerker -> Thief is a good dual combo. Yea the rage is pretty cool for sure. Thanks again Dante.
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cbarchuk
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Post by cbarchuk »

galraen wrote:Anyone tried an Assassin dualled into a Cleric out of interest?
I haven't Galraen though, for a solo character, I hear it's pretty nasty and has the absolute highest backstab you can ever hope to obtain. :D
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Post by Dante2377 »

Kensai->Mage is popular and powerful, but is a little over-hyped. My thoughts have always been that the Berserker benefits outweigh the Kensai benefits in the HARD fights (i.e. where it really matters). The berserker rage has always been far more helpful during difficult fights than the Kensai's extra damage/Kai, but I believe that the most powerful Fighter to Mage dual involves being a caster first and a melee character second, not a well-buffed melee character. If that's the route you want to go, a multi-class is probably more powerful with Fighter HLAs as well (assuming you're dual-classing somewhere between 7 and 13, not some ridiculous Fighter 27-> Mage 32 character).
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