All Melee, All the Time -- Do spellcasters have a place in BG2??

[Xyx]

Ah, Kovi, there's a challenge for you: solo as Fighter without using items.

[Nuldaan]

I'm on my 3rd time through SoA. My second time through I used a melee heavy party.

Me (paladin)
Minsc
Keldorn
Mazzy
Jaheira
Imoen

A little light on the healing but overall, lots of melee damage.

This time through, I decided to try a mage-heavy party.

Me (mage)
Minsc
Keldorn
Aerie
Imoen
Jaheira

From my experience, the mage party is blowing everything away. It's MUCH easier than going through the game with the melees. 3 wizards give me so many options, I'm forced to limit myself to make the game challenging. No mass monster summoning spells (even then I try to avoid using summon elementals and demons), no pre-buffing, no wands, no offensive sequencers. And I still walk through almost every fight. There really isn't much in the game that can stand up to breach, pierce shield, lower resistance then a barrage of mage and cleric spells. Most of the fights, Minsc and Keldorn are just there to roadblock the monsters while the casters blast them into little piles of experience.

This is just my experience of course. Personal preference has a lot to do with it. (I'm more of a mage player than a melee player in most games.) Admittedly the mage group was a bit harder to start, but once it got up and running, it's damn near unstoppable.

[A Half-orc]

Lol yeah with uber items fighters will kill anything, but without all that stuff, mages are great at slaughtering things. A perfect example is User's Cheese Sorceror. Almost every cheese spell in the game.

[Bruce Lee]

Why not start two games, one solo sorceror and one solo kensai and see what you find easier. Solo kensai imo must be the toughest or atleast one of the toughest.