Powergaming Party - Who do you really need?

Lord Tansheron · Post by **Lord Tansheron** » Thu May 26, 2005 3:00 pm

I know, this is "Yet Another Uber-Party Thread". Still, I tried most of my time perfecting my play and trying to beat BG in the best possible way.

As for the circumstances: I'm using most of the common mods out there. Tactics, Ascension, etc... And I AM using SK, but only to "fix" the single-player NPCs into what I'd like them to be and for Kit-multis.

The main question I have is, how many people do you REALLY need? I know that one can indeed solo through BG (done it a few times) but some of the tougher battles simply require NPCs (namely Solaufein, against the dark guys). Also, Ascension is rather tough to beat in Solo-Mode.

First, I was thinking of having a party of only two, PC + Solaufein. Probably Kensai/Mage/Thief (Katana) and Berserker/Cleric (Flail/Hammer). That sounds sufficient to me, but I'm not sure whether one or two additional NPCs might further increase the power-level of the party.

Another option I was thinking about was the following party:

Kensai/Mage
Ranger/Cleric
Assassin/Mage
Archer/Mage

I'm not sure whether this party is stronger than my initial gang of two. I found the Archer/Mage to be quite ridiculous, as well as the Assassin/Mage. Using Mislead for backstabbing is just too tempting (especially using Staff of the Magi / Staff of the Ram). I don't think there's need to discuss the power-levels of Kensai/Mage and Ranger/Cleric.

As for the equipment, I'd head for the most retarded stuff I can find. And there's my next question:

Celestial Fury+5/Belm+2 vs. Celestial Fury+5/Sanchuudoku+4 - which is better? It's common knowledge that CF/Belm is powerful, but I find the Sanchuudoku to be equally ridiculous, if not better. I basically get 2 CF/1 Belm attacks opposed to 1 CF/1 Sanchuudoku attacks (counting 1 attack/round). But we can leave Belm aside, since it's both a rather weak weapon and it probably won't fit the proficiency anyway. Plus, you SHOULD get more attacks with Sanchuudoku as well later, since you have Grand Mastery. So I think the damage is higher and Sanchuudoku's special effects are also quite nice.

In case you wonder, the rest of my party would use Flail of the Ages +5/Crom Faeyr, Staff of the Magi/Staff of the Ram and Bow of Gesen/Tuigan Bow. By the way, do you really need an alternative melee weapon for the archer? I guess it's no problem adding some spare proficiencies for Halberd (Wave) or Spear (Ixil's) or the likes, but do you really need it?

So, is that party stronger than my two-man group? Or are THREE guys better? Or something else? I'm looking forward to suggestions, experiences and ideas!

Also, to prevent you from asking

, here's my definition of "best party": A party that can beat the game plus most of the "make the game tougher"-mods on a high difficulty, without having to reload every 10 seconds and with reasonable play; this includes "cheese" such as massive Spike Traps, Time Stop/Alacricy and the likes. However, I don't want to use those on any random fiend I encounter (if you did that, you could probably beat the game with a 5 x Avenger / 1 Sorceror party). In other words, this party is meant to kick ass. Badly. No "I want to roleplay"-stuff, no "Cheese is bad", nothing like that. I do enjoy a fun party and I play the game with those most of the time, but THIS time, I want to prove I'm worthy of being the next God of Murder!

SP101 · Post by **SP101** » Thu May 26, 2005 6:53 pm

I would go with this :

- Cleric/Ranger (healer, tank - dual-wielding blunts weapons)
- Archer/Mage (Ranged fighter, caster - Using short bows and halberds)
- Kensai/Thief (tank, rogue - Using any bladed weapons... or staves)

If you want, you can scrap the Kensai/Thief and use a Kensai/Mage plus a Wizard Slayer/Thief instead! It would look like this :

- Cleric/Ranger (healer, tank - dual-wielding blunts weapons)
- Archer/Mage (Ranged fighter, caster - Using short bows and halberds)
- Wizard Slayer/Thief (tank, rogue - Using any bladed weapons, dual-wielding)
- Kensai/Mage (Caster, Tank - Using Staves & Slings)

Phantom Lord · Post by **Phantom Lord** » Fri May 27, 2005 1:48 am

You should cover thieving and mage skills. You don't need cleric skills - regeneration items and a summoned Planetar here and then do the job.

Therefore:

- F/T
- Arcane spellcaster (F/M, Wizard or Sorc)
- Tank(s)

lompo · Post by **lompo** » Fri May 27, 2005 3:13 am

Most powerful char is Sorcerer, so if you really want powergame you shouldn't exclude one. the rest of the party is icing on the cake.
Exemple:
4 member party
Sorcerer
C/R (for druidic spells and FoA/Crom combo)
F/M
F/T

3 member party
Sorcerer
C/R
T/M

The C/R could be sobstitute by a F/D

So for a 3 member party I would go for NPC (sorc.) + Imoen (swashie) + Jaheira (or take a sorc. NPC, and make yourself a Berserker->druid)
For a 4 member party go for NPC (sorc.) + Sola + Jaheira + Imoen (or take a NPC sorc. and make yourself a F/T).

But ther eare a full lot of very powerful char that could fit in "the most powerful party", so whichever you take in Tob they will do well.

Thrifalas · Post by **Thrifalas** » Fri May 27, 2005 1:52 pm

Where's the fun in being strong if you're cheating? Please enlighten me...

Coot · Post by **Coot** » Sat May 28, 2005 5:23 am

Fun is different for everyone. You have powergamers and role-players. Why judge?

fable · Post by **fable** » Sat May 28, 2005 6:30 am

Verdad. That being the case, let's allow the powergamers to get on with their thread, okay?

krunchyfrogg · Post by **krunchyfrogg** » Sat May 28, 2005 6:30 am

Power two person party:

Ranger/Cleric multi (better than Berserker/Cleric because of Ironskin)
F/M/T multiclass

You've got every base covered and should breeze through the game. You don't need to cheat at all. If you want to cheat a little bit, mod Jaheira into your Cleric/Ranger for the chatter/romance.

Phantom Lord · Post by **Phantom Lord** » Sat May 28, 2005 8:14 am

My current two-member party in ToB (with Tactics, no XP cap):

F/M/T (soloed through SoA with Tactics) & my little brother. Needless to say that my kid brother levels very fast and already overtook me as far as fighter levels concerned (he's F35 now). Powergaming? Uhm, yeah.

Lord Tansheron · Post by **Lord Tansheron** » Sun May 29, 2005 12:15 pm

First of all, thanks for your support and great ideas.

@SP101: I don't really get the Wizard Slayer thing. Not an exceptional class, imho, Antipaladin/Thief would be much better I think. Also, K/T isn't the best tank, both because of the armor restriction and because you rather want to backstab than fight with your thief.

@Phantom Lord: It's not the healing I want the Cleric for, but I get your point. I'm just not sure whether I really want to miss all the buffs, especially when going R/C. I guess a F/M would do the trick as well...
Also, your 2-man party is very strong indeed. But the point is, I want to know whether another combination might be even STRONGER.

@lompo: Yes, Sorceror is powerful indeed. However, in such a small party, he simply won't do enough. You need very versatile characters and a pure, physically weak caster isn't going to do the trick.

@Thrifalas: When using Mods that alter the game to be even HARDER, I see no Problem enhancing my characters as well. After all, I do this because I want the game to be challenging, if I wanted a party that will stomp any resistance I might as well set all the stats to 25, use only the most uber items, etc... The way I see it, my play is challenging and fair, no problem there.

I'd also like to share some of the results my testing has yielded so far:

- Archer/Mage is powerful! Casters like the back best anyway, and MiniMete/E-Blades are I.N.S.A.N.E. when combined with Called Shots.
- Antipaladin is great! The Antipaladin is a huge class and truely terrifying when combined with another, both AP/C or AP/M are very strong!
- Scrap healing. You want to heal with Potions anyway, the spells are mostly useless. This reduces clerics/druids to being buff-casters only and time will tell whether this is really needed. (Righteous/Draw are very good though)
- F/M/T, with dual Katana is probably the most powerful class EVER. Especially Kensai/M/T

I'd also like to remind you of my "CF/Belm vs. CF/Sanchuu" dilemma. Any thoughts on that?

Thanks again for your ideas!

Phantom Lord · Post by **Phantom Lord** » Sun May 29, 2005 3:01 pm

To be honest, my PC is probably heavily "underplayed". At the current level, I use mainly item buffs and besides that act as a fighter (which means use of Greater Whirlwind in the frist place).

The best weapons for a F/M/T are probably staves of Magi and Ram in combination. In certain situations (if I need AC) I may use a shield and Blackrazor or BBoD.

lompo · Post by **lompo** » Mon May 30, 2005 4:22 am

[QUOTE=Lord Tansheron]
@lompo: Yes, Sorceror is powerful indeed. However, in such a small party, he simply won't do enough. You need very versatile characters and a pure, physically weak caster isn't going to do the trick.

[/QUOTE]

The fact that a sorc. is physically weak isn't important as long as he is ironskinned/mirrored image/protected from whatever you like, actually intouchable. On the contrary being the best pure caster you can get means that he is able to deal the most damage in the fastest way that any other possible char.: chain cont -> 3 AdhW, I.A.-> time stop and then thermonuclear war, a pack of Planetars and all that in the same battle!!! all done while you F/M is still unable to cast 9th lev. spell.
Well everybody has his own opinion, but for me the most powerful party is a sorc. stop! You can add a thief for helping in certain occasion and the rest of the party is just for having some friends to chat with during the long travel or to take care of the lesser foe you are too bored to deal with.
Ok I'm exagerating a bit (but not much), I always play with a team and I love char that can melee, but I have to admit that the sorc. is the one that can really turn to your side the very difficoult fights and is the only one able to finish at the sight of the enemy the medium/easy fights.

Lord Tansheron · Post by **Lord Tansheron** » Mon May 30, 2005 11:07 am

@lompo: It's true that Sorceror's can cast insane combinations much faster than regular mages. However, do you really NEED those early in the game? When playing a 2-3 man partx, your mages will be almost as good once you reach the tougher fights. In small parties, the sorceror is even at a DISADVANTAGE. You can't afford to spend all your spells on the random fiends you encounter, that's what I mean by versatility. In a large party, the sorceror can easily stay in the back while your fighters plow through all the Trolls and whatnot. Summoning won't do here, because they're both limited and WAY weaker than actual fighter chars. On a high difficulty, when playing mods, about the only summons that do something are M-Swords and Planetars - and do you really want to waste those on critters all the time? I'd rather have a decent, versatile F/M/T than a sorceror any time when playing less than 4 people in a party. Smashing big bad bosses with ease is all nice, but not when it comes at the cost of not doing much during 90% of the daily battles.

More results:

- I'm currently testing Kensai/M/T + AP/M. Very satisfying so far, they charge through basically everything. AP also removes the need for SoM/Carsomyr
- Backstab is one of the best abilities in the game. I didn't really use backstab most of the time until know. How could I live without my 90+ dmg I wonder...

lompo · Post by **lompo** » Tue May 31, 2005 2:06 am

I don't understand why you can't have a F/M/T and a sorc..
You are not tolking about soloing or even dualling the game, but of forming a party of 4 (or 3) member, so you can have both.
I agree that in the beginning a sorc. (as all pure arcane spellcasters) are weaker than fighters, but they become way more powerfull than anybody later (you can't even compare with normal mage), right when you start to fight the biggest battles (with mods) and the fighters alone start to bit the dust.
I'm actually playing with a party of four: Tashia, Jaheira (C/R), Sola and PC H/orc F/T and definetly I don't regret to have Tashia with me, because I've already a lot of muscle and could handle a lot of fight without the maximum effort from Tashia, but the most difficoult fights where won specially because Tashia was in the group.
but as I stated in a previous answer, there isn't a "most powerful group" in absolute, there are many "powerful group" and depending on your playing style of the moment a group fits better, thus seems more powerful.

Lord Tansheron · Post by **Lord Tansheron** » Tue May 31, 2005 10:52 am

@lompo: Well that's exactly my question. How many people offer the highest power-level? The more people you have, the slower you levelup, the less people you have, the less diverse are your skills.

So far, my K/M/T + AP/M party has turned out very powerful. I had no problem even beating tougher enemies early in the game (such as the Shadow Dragon or Kangaxx) and I didn't need to reload EVER. All I need to see now is how they do in the REALLY tough battles (improved Irenicus, Pontifex, the Darkness guys).

Nimiety · Post by **Nimiety** » Fri Jun 03, 2005 8:14 am

@Lord Tansheron, well, I wanted to comment on your katana debate. I've usually given katanas to mages / bards, etc so I can use dakkon's zerth blade, which is a pain, since there are two prime katanas (CF and San.). Dual wielding them both would be the ideal use - you have a +5 and +4 combo, plus super-fast regeneration, the acid retribution, etc. Plus, you dump all your prof's into a single weapon to get GM very quickly.

About your team idea, I have a multi c/r, and find the spells to include great mage and group disabling spells (the insect swarms), buffing (righteous magic and iron skins) and sumonning (fire elementals). They come in handy. I also have an inquisitor (since I've never played a paladin before) and a swashy dualled to mage at 10. They seem to be a very good mix of backstabbing(with the improved sword of backstabbing or one of the daggers which add to your multiplier), offensive magic, and ass-kicking - I love seeing hits at 50+ damage regularly from the paladin!

G'luck!
N...

Thrifalas · Post by **Thrifalas** » Mon Jun 06, 2005 5:53 pm

[QUOTE=Nimiety]there are two prime katanas (CF and San.). Dual wielding them both would be the ideal use - you have a +5 and +4 combo[/QUOTE]

CF and San? +5 and +4? Katanas? I'm terrible sorry if this is considered too off-topic, but would you mind telling me what katanas this is? CF must be Celestial Fury - but isn't that just a +3 weapon? And San what?

krunchyfrogg · Post by **krunchyfrogg** » Mon Jun 06, 2005 8:46 pm

[QUOTE=Thrifalas]CF and San? +5 and +4? Katanas? I'm terrible sorry if this is considered too off-topic, but would you mind telling me what katanas this is? CF must be Celestial Fury - but isn't that just a +3 weapon? And San what?

[/QUOTE]
There's some cheesey mod to make your overpowered weapons even more overpowered.

fable · Post by **fable** » Tue Jun 07, 2005 6:11 am

Please, let's stay on topic. Thanks.

UserUnfriendly · Post by **UserUnfriendly** » Sat Jun 11, 2005 2:26 am

archer/mage
anti paladin/thief
cleric ranger multi
sorc

that's all you need. sure, the sorc is going to be weak, but he/she will level up as fast as single class mage, and will provide major firepower later...

you might toss in cleric mage multi and berserker cleric just for grins.

frankly, i prefer to use store bought npcs...

aerie
jan
keldorn
jaheira
korgan

are the powergamer npcs.