Creating Artemis Entreri

cbarchuk · Post by **cbarchuk** » Mon Sep 05, 2011 8:39 pm

I know there's not an easy way to do this, but Artemis Entreri is one of my favorite characters from the Drizzt series and I would love to create him from scratch and play him through the game along with Jarlaxle. I'm just not sure what class he would be. I figured he would be a fighter/thief of some sort. Should I just make him a generic dual-class fighter/thief? If so, what level should I dual him? I kind of imagined him dual wielding a longsword and dagger.
Now with Jarlaxle I thought I would go with a swashbuckler. I think that fits him nicely. Your thoughts?

wise grimwald · Post by **wise grimwald** » Mon Sep 05, 2011 11:53 pm

Afraid I can't answer your question, as I've forgotten what armour etc. they carry, but you should be able to work out the details from such items. Copy the game over to multiplayer save after defeating them. Then create the characters you want and see if the equipment is useable by the characters you have created.

I thought that Jarlaxle wore plate, but my memory is a bit hazy on the subject.

Artemis had a short sword and leather armour so you're probably on the right lines there. Are you sure that they are human? I would have to play the game again to find out.

If you use Shadowkeeper to give your creations amazing stats, say 25 in everything, you may be able to find out what Jarlaxle was by seeing if your character can wear his boots. Certainly you used to be able to use Xan's sword if your stats were high enough and you were an elf of the correct alignment.

Cherrypopper · Post by **Cherrypopper** » Tue Sep 06, 2011 2:43 am

I'd go with human assasin for sure. The problem is he stands hand to hand with Drizzt and I think he uses 2-weapon style so Fighter/thief sounds ok too because normal thief (assasin) would suck in melee apart from crazy backstabs.

cbarchuk · Post by **cbarchuk** » Tue Sep 06, 2011 7:03 am

I summoned him in game so I could see his stats and he's a plain thief BUT has grandmastery in small and large swords as well as full dual wielding. I can't recreate this unless I cheat...lol. A multiclass fighter/thief sounds the closest but he's human. I could go dual class thief/fighter but I think that experience would suck. The assassin route sounds good too though your right is basic fighting skills would suck. I could use the rogue rebalancing mod which allows all thieves to have dual wield. Man, I didn't realize how difficult this would be. Yikes!

wise grimwald · Post by **wise grimwald** » Tue Sep 06, 2011 9:15 pm

How about using Shadowkeeper?
You could create a halfling fighter/thief and then change his race afterwards.
If he was the second member of your party, I think that Level 1 NPCs could help you. To get grandmastery in two weapons, you'd have to cheat I think, but surely grandmastery in one weapon is enough? Unless you have rogue rebalancing or a similar mod that makes short swords better for thieves, I'd go for grandmastery in long swords.

Rancid Sushi · Post by **Rancid Sushi** » Tue Sep 06, 2011 9:37 pm

IIRC Shadowkeeper has a file for Artemis, he just never shows up in the game.

cbarchuk · Post by **cbarchuk** » Tue Sep 06, 2011 9:48 pm

Yea I think I'll just do what you said Grim and make a multi-class fighter/thief and then change him to human. I'll also use that component in the G3 tweak pack that allows grandmastery for multi-class. So yea I have to cheat but I can't see any other way to do it. Do you think the character would be way overpowered? Also is there anyway to get the voice set of Artemis from the game? When I summoned him, he had a cool voice set. I would love to use that for my character. Also what about portraits? Has anyone noticed any baldur's gate enteri pics anywhere?

wise grimwald · Post by **wise grimwald** » Tue Sep 06, 2011 10:21 pm

I've just had a go at creating him.
Already had BG2 Tweaks installed so had multiclass grandmastery and weapon styles for all.
Gave him **** in short swords.
Then went into Shadowkeeper to make him a human assassin and give him the assassin's innate ability of poison weapon. Then changed his appearance to be human.
If you're worried about him being over-powered, I thought that was the idea!
He will certainly be more powerful than he should be.

However there are plenty of difficulty increasing mods, and you can of course just change the difficulty settings of the game.

I don't know the answer to your other questions.

Whilst in Shadowkeeper, you can tweak his stats to be whatever they should be.

cbarchuk · Post by **cbarchuk** » Tue Sep 06, 2011 10:23 pm

Did you just make him a pure assassin or fighter/assassin? If do that, do I need to level him to 1 and then add in experience afterwards?

Rancid Sushi · Post by **Rancid Sushi** » Wed Sep 07, 2011 12:36 am

Image from forgotten realms wiki:

[ATTACH]4436.vB[/ATTACH]

wise grimwald · Post by **wise grimwald** » Wed Sep 07, 2011 2:47 am

cbarchuk wrote:Did you just make him a pure assassin or fighter/assassin? If do that, do I need to level him to 1 and then add in experience afterwards?

I actually made him in Tutu with zero experience. If you want to start him in BG2, then just add whatever experience you want, level him up, and import into BG2. I made him into a pure assassin, but that's your choice.

At least you've got a good picture to make his portraits.

Rancid Sushi · Post by **Rancid Sushi** » Wed Sep 07, 2011 5:34 am

It seems like he should be a thief dualed to a fighter, seeing as how he can go one-on-one with Drizzt the buzzsaw.

cbarchuk · Post by **cbarchuk** » Wed Sep 07, 2011 9:33 am

Guys, thanks a bunch for the help. Question: How would I convert the image of Artemis to be used in the game? Also does anyone know where I can get the voice set for Artemis that's used in the game?

EDIT: I figured out how to do the portraits so I'm set there. All I need to do now is find how to get his voice set(which is sweet) and then decide between a human fighter/thief multi-class or start out as a thief and dual him over to fighter at 13 or something like that. That route would suck a bit but would be more legit.

Rancid Sushi · Post by **Rancid Sushi** » Wed Sep 07, 2011 3:05 pm

I don't see why you would need that many thief levels. You start out at level 8, which means you get skills slightly better than Imoen's which is good enough through SOA and TOB. There is also a lot of equipment in the game that enhances thief skills.

cbarchuk · Post by **cbarchuk** » Wed Sep 07, 2011 5:07 pm

Well I thought 13 since that would be when you would get a x5 backstab multiplier. The other bad thing about starting as a thief and you only start with an 18 STR and THACO for dual wielding would suck ass big time. I dunno, its more legit but the whole idea of this character not coming into his own for a while kind of stinks. I'm leaning more towards the fighter/thief multi class even though its cheating.

Rancid Sushi · Post by **Rancid Sushi** » Thu Sep 08, 2011 12:00 am

Backstabbing is overrated. Nearly all the major bosses cannot be backstabbed, or it's extremely difficult because they have so many magical protections. I also feel like the Vampiric Dagger should be more powerful than what Shadowkeeper has it as. It also sucks that you can't get Nightmare or Charon's Claw unless there's some mod I'm not aware of. Speaking of mods, I seem to recall that The Darkest Day featured Artemis Entreri in a major side quest. You might try to find out what they did with him, even if that means having to sit through another install (it's a big mod).

cbarchuk · Post by **cbarchuk** » Thu Sep 08, 2011 7:48 am

It might be but I use it alot. Monsters like mindflayers, Umberhulks, countless undead and other level draining monters, enemy mages, or other npcs are much much easier to just backstab as opposed to just going toe to toe. The other nice benefit is the idea that you can attack something before it can attack you or react. You'll have to fight through many backstabble(Don't think this is a word) enemies before you get to these bosses. I would rather make the trip there easy as well. Besides I also use the rogue rebalancing mod which changes the thief kits around a bit and changes their high level abilities. I recently went all the way through with the new and improved assassin. With the mod, they get death attack which works on all the dragons and other backstab-immune enemies in the game. Now by ToB, you'll eventually come across enemies immune to death attack as well cause this would make the encounters at this point wayyyyyy toooo easy. But, thieves get crippling strike which reduces the opponents STR to 10 or maybe its less...I can't remember. At any rate, this ability works on EVERYTHING. At any rate, the rogue rebalancing mod really adds some nice changes to the thief class and kits.
Anyways, got off topic there. Yea I heard of the darkest day mod as well. I wonder if its pretty good or not.I guess I'll have to find out. But Charon's Claw would be sweet too. Not sure how it would be implemented but cool nonetheless.

Rancid Sushi · Post by **Rancid Sushi** » Thu Sep 08, 2011 1:52 pm

Never tried the rogue rebalancing mod for some reason. Rogues have become my favorite type of character, so I think it's long overdue. I'm playing one right now, so would I have to restart the game for the changes to take effect?

The Darkest Day is a good mod overall because it adds a lot of everything: side quests, spells, items, class kits, and playable NPCs. The quests are a bit more combat heavy with a bit less story. IIRC the mod adds 17 additional hours to the game. I also just remembered that BG2 has "horse" listed as a creature in the game. Maybe you could copy the file and modify it to make it as Nightmare with Shadowkeeper. Artemis won't be able to ride it, but you could give it some nice combat stats.

cbarchuk · Post by **cbarchuk** » Thu Sep 08, 2011 9:53 pm

Dude, your missing out if you love rogues/thieves. Here ya go:

Rogue Rebalancing v4.45 released - Spellhold Studios

Best decision you ever made...:laugh:

Make sure to check out the read me for all the details but this is one of the best written mods out there and they still update it to this day.

wise grimwald · Post by **wise grimwald** » Thu Sep 08, 2011 11:09 pm

I personally would start him as a fighter in BG1. I would either use the Frabjous re-roller or roll until I got good stats. Then play solo getting lots of experience. Just before you dual get a party to deal with those you can't deal with as a low level thief. Get all the tomes so that you have even better stats. You could have 19 in all the important ones. remember that even Drizzt must have been weak at some stage.