I know this could be considered spamming, and I hate spamming as well , but I think this one is on topic.
For those who are interested, the folks at Gamespot have posted a gameguide for Baldur's Gate II. If you want to go there, click this link: [url="http://www.zdnet.com/gamespot/guides/pc/baldurs_2/"]http://www.zdnet.com/gamespot/guides/pc/baldurs_2/[/url]
Not a bad write-up. Most of the info is from the manual though and they missed some things. Since I can't resist commenting this is pretty long and probably more than anyone cares to read, but here goes:
Barbarians: Faster, weaker fighters? I don't think so: these guys are monsters. They can absorb more punishment than any other class and are almost as good at dealing it out.
Throwing Axes: Damage the same as a bow and arrow but you only get 1 attack instead of 2...not really...axes get the Str bonus so one hit can be much more damaging. They also go to 3/2 with proficiencies while bows do not get the bonus attack thers and, since they use the same proficiencies as melee weapons you get double use out of them. Hammers are the better choice for dwarves though.
Crushing Weapons in General: The biggest advantage of all crushing weapons is they effectively get bonuses to hit heavily armorer opponents. Any opponent with Chain armor or better will be more easily hit with crushing weapon slashing or piercing. This is why my BG1 gladiator character used Ashideena.
Halberds: These give combined slashing/piercing damage, not slashing/crushing.
Find Familiar: More or less ignores the ability to get the hp bonus then store the familiar in your backpack which is probably the best use of this spell.
Identify: I find it odd that they think use of this spell is cheesy...but maybe that's why they like bards so much. Even more odd they then suggest the cheesy strategy of turning on group infravision to make the Infravision spell useless (which it nearly is anyway).
Larloch's Minor Drain: This is a missile damage spell, not a touch damage spell. Still not real useful.
Clairvoyance: Two problems with this spell. First is that most of the game is indoors making it unusable. Second is that I use the unexplored blackness to make sure I've explored everywhere.
Dispel Magic: Only Inquisitors, not all paladins get to use this.
Flame Arrow: This is THE most damaging single target spell in the game.
Melf's Minute Meteors: These are +5 weapons, not +3 weapons...huge difference.
Skull Trap: If this is cast directly at enemies it will go off immediately just like a fireball...but I think it actually has a higher max damage.
Enchanted Weapon: Nice early on until you get better weapons. It's a pain replacing the weapon every day though.
Fireshield: Blue is cold. Red is fire. Not vice versa.
Greater Malaison: This helps with saves, not resistances.
Minor Globe of Invulnerability (vs Globe of Invulnerability): How many level 4 spells actually deal out damage?
Remove Curse: Importance should be low to none -- just don't use items you're not sure about.
Spirit Armor vs Ghost Armor: These are almost the same, the extra AC of Spirit being generally made up for by the damage it inflicts. I prefer Ghost, but neither should be high importance
Cone of Cold: Since the damage area starts at the caster and spreads out from there, I find it is harder, not easier to target effectively that area damage spells like fireball.
Carrion Summons: My opinion of this spell matched theirs until I actually tried it. Mutated Crawlers would clean the floor with Carrion Crawlers. They have multiple attacks, good Thac0 and each attack CAN STUN their victims...just use them to help your fighters or other summonings rather than by themselves.
Death Fog: This works similarly to CLOUD KILL, not STINKING CLOUD.
Improved Haste: Maybe it's because my parties tend to have one nearly invincible fighter, but I find this spell rocks the house and don't mind much that it only affects one character while I hate the fatigue from normal Haste. They have it as Moderate with Haste as Vital but I would reverse those.
Protection from Magical Energy: This reduces damage from magic by 50% (magical damage resist) rather than granting 50% magic resist -- huge difference. Errors like this make me wonder if the writer actually played the game.
Summon Nishruu: Often you won't want to use this spell as it can destroy magic items the victim is carrying.
Delayed Blast Fireball: Again, if you fire this directly at enemies it works basically like a fireball.
Mordekainen's Sword: Since this is a +4 weapon that is highly magic resistant and basically immune to many forms of damage it is useful in many situations.
Power Word - Stun: The more hit points the target has, the SHORTER it will be stunned, not the other way around!
Prismatic Spray: An upgraded color spray?!? I wonder if they actually used this spell. It's great if you don't mind the possibility of disintegrating your opponents and destroying their equipment. Its area of effect is similar to Cone of Cold, but here they complain it's hard to use (which I would agree with) rather than saying it works better like they did there.
Ruby Ray of Reversal vs Secret Word: They have Secret word as moderate and Ruby Ray of Reversal as Vital. Given their levels (4 vs 7) Secret Word is generally the better option. Only against level 9 spells (Spell Trap, Absolute Immunity, etc) is there any difference between these spells.
Spell Sequencers: It is worth mentioning that you can have 1 sequencer OF EACH TYPE functional ie. Spell Trigger, Spell Sequencer, Minor Spell Sequencer.
Summon Efreeti/Djinni: I haven't noticed a duration difference between these two, but I could have missed it.
Summon Hakeashar: These are immune to magic, not weapons, do not have good physical attacks, and have the same drawbacks as the Nishruu.
Khelben's Warding Whip: This works for 3 rounds not , "until dispelled."
Incendiary Cloud: Great with Fire Elementals since they are immune.
Pierce Shield: How can Ruby Ray of Reversal and Lower Resistance both be Vital, but this does what both of them combined do but is only Moderate? This is a very good spell, but there are better level 8 spells out there.
Simulacrum: See my strategy on why this is the most powerful spell in the game.
Freedom: "I recommend not having this memorized..." Imprisonment: "Carry it in your memory..." Similarly with none of the level 9 spells is there any suggestion that you can't actually learn them in the game making me really wonder whether they actually played the game.
Wail of the Banshee: "We killed 2 monsters in 6 casts." See above. I guess they used every Wail of the Banshee scroll in the game...if they'd done it with Simulacrum surely they would have mentioned something on the Simulacrum spell. Also, I wonder what monsters they were using it on, my results have been much better.
Magical Stone: Heh, they seem to like this better than Larloch's Minor drain: both are almost useless but Larloch's gives you bonus hp.
Barkskin: The AC portion of this spell is almost useless. The bonus to saves can be nice but it doesn't affect spells.
Animate Dead: "Letting more undead be summoned with each level, this spell becomes quite powerful, especially when used with hindrance spells. " Now I understand, they're reading the wrong book -- this isn't BG1 anymore but the Skeletal Warriors they get at level 15+ nice.
Summon Insects: This spell is far better than they give it credit for. The damage from it effectively creates 100% casting failure unless the mage has stoneskins which it quickly gets rid of. A save doesn't stop the spell, it just cuts the duration which is plenty long enough. Probably the worst thing about this spell is that spell turning WILL send it back. However, Insect Plague is FAR better.
Cause Serious Wounds: In the 2 rounds it takes to cast then hit with this spell my clerics can generally do a lot more than 17 damage.
Lesser Restoration (Low)/Negative Plane Protection (High): I would put both of these high. Lesser Restoration is needed when you didn't get NPP in place, but NPP is what will keep your characters alive fighting Bohdi (5 levels/hit) and other vampiers. Unlike the author I can generally control who the vampires attack.
Poison: Spells aren't easier or harder to resist, but they do use different types of saves. In this case, it is a save vs...Poison. Spell casters generally are weak on this save but strong on save vs spells.
Magic Resistance: "One good strategy is to cast this spell on a fighter that already has a good magic resistance." Now I wonder if they even read the book. Magic Resistance will lower the resitance of a fighter with good magic resistance.
Mass Cure: Interesting how much better they think this is that Call Woodland Beings given that the nymphs can cast it.
Repulse Undead: I saw this before and didn't say anything, but it's bugging me now: the cleric ability is TURN undead, not WARD undead.
Conjure Fire Elemental (druid): Druid elementals don't turn on you and the casting time is therefore not that long. Also, protection from evil stops fiends from turning on you, not elementals.
Wondrous Recall: This is 2 spells lower than 6th level not 6th or lower. Very critical point since you can't Wondrous Recall Wondrous Recalls... It isn't something for nothing, it's a trade of of quantity or quality.
Beholders: Only Elder Orbs cast Imprisonments so just watch out for them and the Cloak of Mirroring will make you invulnerable to the rest.
Elementals: Actually, they are pretty magic resistant and immune to a lot of spells. They're great against blind priests and beholders (;
Illithid: No mention of illithid is complete without saying something about Chaotic Commands which renders their powers useless...even then the unmentioned in the article 'intelligence drain' is still nasty.
Liches: "There's only one demilich in the game, though, and most players will probably never beat him. Kangaxx is his name, and he dwells underneath the Cult of the Unseeing Eye in Athkatla. ... His repertoire is similar to a lich, with power word: kill and wail of the banshee being his killer spells in the early going." ROTFLMOA! At least they got the name right!
Myconids: They confuse, not charm.
Otyugh: Immune to missiles, not that it matters much.
Raksasha: I've only seen cloudkills from them and generally you don't have space to send in horde of summoned creatures before engaging them. Beyond that, using area attacks on them while they're mixed in with your summoned creatures is silly. Just hit them hard and fast with melee attacks from magical weapons.
Slime: Some slime can insta-kill, but it doesn't happen often.
From the Trolls section: "Immediately cast a Melf's minute meteor spell (which creates 20 throwable meteors) and attack them once." Ok, so who edited their mages to level 20 rather than actually playing the game?
Wolves: Greater Wolfwere regeneration rates deserve some mention here I think...
Yuan-Ti: Not many of these have magic...
I guess that's more than enough. Far more. If you actually read to the bottom here...I wonder if there is any money in writing this type of thing, I think I could do a lot better!
Yea, that write up has quite a few errors, but at least they fixed Greater Malison. Oh, and I TOTALLY agree that invisible stalker is by far one of the most useful summoning spells before you hit level 15 and get those skeleton warriors. They just kick ass vs. the kinds of monsters that make you want to run away in terror from. Beholders, Gauths, Mind Flayers, Umber Hulks. Say hello to my little friend!
It is not the first Gameguide from Gamespot that has (a significant number of) errors.
I also read the Tiberian Sun Gameguide and the Icewind Dale Gameguide - both contained errors; some even pretty annoying for those who REALLY know the game...
, but I think this one is on topic.