Help me pick my team?

[Revi]

Just finished my gazillionth BG2 SoA + ToB solo run, now planning a new playthrough of the entire saga. On my last run I noticed I'm starting to miss the party banter a lot, as well as missing the laidback, low level experience of the first game. So this time I'd like to run the entire saga with the same protagonist and a team of NPCs who have a lot to talk about (even more with the Pocketplane Banter Packs in BG2). This run is going to be heavy on the roleplaying and low on the cheese. To enrich the roleplaying, it would be best if most of the NPCs I have with me in BG1 carry over to my BG2 team.

I plan to play as a Sorc. She will be a fitting prodigy of Candlekeep and my main arcane nuker. I'm trying to make up my mind about the rest of my team now. So far I have:

PC - Chaotic Good Human Sorcerer, typical child prodigy of Candlekeep with a strange innate ability to perform magic (I wonder where that comes from, a divine heritage perhaps? hmm..... )
Imoen - an absolute must in a roleplay-heavy playthrough and a useful thief (equally useful thief/mage in BG2).
Minsc - one of the most reliable and cool people you meet, a great friend and a good fighter. Too bad about his Wis.

I would like some help picking the rest of the team, though... my dilemma is that the obvious choice of cookie-cutter NPCs who carry over to BG2 are Jaheira and Khalid, but I am one of the people who cannot stand Jaheira as a character, so really the only reasons I would bring her are that she fits perfectly into the main quest and is one of the most powerful characters in the game.

As you can see I have 3 slots left, though the fewer of those slots I fill, the higher the maximum spell level my protagonist can attain quickly. What I need is a tank and divine magic mostly... Viconia perhaps? What do you guys think?

[kmonster]

Just rush to chapter 4 and get Yeslick. This way you can have 20 reputation without complaints. Faldorn is also an interesting character.

[Blomdor]

I'd suggest picking up a divine caster. Viconia has the advantage of being recruitable in BG2 instead of being one of the NPCs who are killed off or ignored. I have always hated the way BG2 forces the same three NPCs on you regardless of alignment or choices made in the first game - it almost killed off any desire I had to bother roleplaying. At least you can ignore all three and pick up Edwin and Viconia if you intend to play through the trilogy as an evil character, but it hurts the flow of the experience IMO.

Since you are running a good-aligned team, though, I would get Branwen or Yeslick for your cleric needs. With the addition of one of them, you will have the core warrior/thief/cleric/wizard combo and all your bases will be covered. After that, pick up whoever you want to hear the banters for or who fits your playstyle. Heck, you can beat the game without a cleric, but I like having one along in BG1 personally because your party isn't the DnD equivalent of the Justice League yet and the 8 hp heals really help early on.

[Revi]

Agree, Yeslick.

[Corlupi]

In BG1, Ive found that archers provide a valuable asset to any party. So if youre ditching Khalid, consider NPCs like Kivan or Coran. Kivan can be recruited fairly quickly, so Id go with him.

[roller1234]

rushing chapters breaks immersion. And once the damage is done, the magic is gone, game becomes boring hack&slash.