The great thing about multiplayer is that it lends itself well to experiments with the configuration of your party. You can have a party full of rangers or dwarves or other such revelry. You can also max out on human fighters and dual class them later for maximum powergaming. The downside is that the roleplaying elements and all the great NPC interaction is lost. You are reduced to pausing the game, putting on hand puppets, and trying to act out a meaningfull romance dialogue between your CHA 3 female CE Half-ogre barbarian and your male INT 4 male human paladin, severely straining your voice in the process (just try to act like a female half-orc that swoons over a compliment she just recieved, it will absolutely kill your throat).
Single player gaming with a full party has lots of great roleplay, sidequests, nifty npc interaction and of course romance. It is great to try different combinations of NPCs to either max out on NPC interaction or power. The downside is that not all classes are available through your NPCs, and you become restricted in what combinations you can use in your party. The only way you can have a wild mage, archer or barbarian (to name a few) in your party is to become one yourself. Or to switch to multi-player which becomes rather boring in the long run (IMHO).
Luckily Shadowkeeper has been created. It has prolonged my enjoyment of the game for over a year.
Instead of just using it to give your main character 25 in all stats and magically teleport in all the best weapons to Irenicus´dungeon, it can be used to make NPC Variants. Many of you have been doing this for years, surely. But I wanted to give my two cents worth anyway.
I have experimented a little with altering the classes of the NPCs I encounter along the way. You can basically approach this in two different ways;
The radical approach:
The NPC is reduced to an empty dialogue husk. Minsc can be changed to an INT 18 drow sorceror with 100% magic resistance. Roleplay is kept to a minimum. This is basically a powergaming version of multiplayer where you have free reign in character design, and still have the benefit of NPC interaction. I have tried it, but found it wierd to experience dialogue that was not ”in character”. I subsequently sat down and sifted through the npc dialogue and interaction and started on the second approach;
The conservative approach:
The NPC retains stats and alignment. The class can be altered, but should ideally be ”in character” with the background and spirit of the NPC.
Some examples of the conservative approach:
Aerie:
- Give one of her classes a kit, or change her to become a single class sorceror, mage-variant or cleric.
Korgan:
- Change his kit, or make him a barbarian
Valygar:
- Give him another ranger kit (to vary the ranger aspect) or make him a wizard slayer (to emphasize the magical skepticism). You could even dual class him to a mage, once his dialogue becomes less magic-skeptical.
Anomen:
- Make a pure figter and dual-class him once(if) he is knighted.
Cernd:
- Change the kit, or make him a ranger (or half-elven ranger/cleric)
Jan
- Wildmage anyone?
Edwin
- Would make a great sorceror
Yoshi:
- Change the kit, or change him to a fighter, then dual to thief.
Imoen & Nalia:
- Any pure or dual version of a thief and/or magic-user would be appropriate
Keldorn:
- Change kits, or make him a cleric.
Mazzy:
- Any fighter type, or even fighter/cleric (even though her weapons would become useless)
Haer´dalis:
- Would make a great fighter/mage or swashbuckler
Jaheira:
- Give her a fighter or druid kit or make her a pure druid.
Minsc:
- Would make an ideal berserker or barbarian (give him a ring of animal friendship to account for Boo)
- Viconia:
Could be any magic using single or multiclass, although the very conservative might want to have a clerical class somewhere in the mix.
The list above is by no means original or exhaustive, but I thought i would include it anyway.
My own current game includes:
- Magnus Ironbrow:
Human CN fighter/swashbuckler (dualed at lvl 2 in BG1) sporting valygars armour (it fits) and a 2-handed sword (and keeping a certain special 2 handed sword in the backpack for when UAI kicks in
)- Minsc:
Fighter (Berserker kit), ”Minsc will lead with blade and boot... Boo will take care of the details”
- Valygar:
Fighter (Wizard slayer kit). Sporting plate armour, shield, axes & hammers.
- Jaheira:
Fighter/totemic druid: The ultimate summoner/backup fighter.
- Aerie:
Unchanged. Might dedicate her to lathander. Primary cleric, secondary mage
Soon to include Jan Jansen the wildmage. (make sure not to carry areound too much cash at any one time. I never intend to reload beacuse of a catastrophic wild surge, those are the breaks.
Thanks for a great website and an inspiring forum
Regards
- mudded
