Intro and advice with party.

[galtzaiLe]

Hello! I hope there's still someone looking this forums!
It's been a long time since i stop playing IWD2, and here i am again... back to this wonderful game. Despite i don't know much of the game's mechanic, i love this game: amazin story and epic combats.

This time i want to make a party to play normal and capable to play HoF, but without getting too much into powergaming (ie i don't like to have 3 INT or such).

I'm planning something like this:

PC1: Rogue (Tiefling)
- Rogue (27) / Barbarian (1) / Fighter (1) / Ranger (1)
- Stats: High Dex, Con and some Int?
- Notes: I want this char to dual weild Daggers or Short Swords and use Bow as well. I really want a bow weilding char.

PC2: Cleric, Lathander (Human)
- Cleric (27) / Monk (3)
- Stats: High Con, Wis, mid Str, Cha and Dex?
- Notes: Secondary Cleric of the party

PC3: Cleric, Talos (Shield Dwarf)
- Cleric (25) / Barbarian (3) / Fighter (2)
- Stats: High Con, Wis, mid Str and Dex?
- Notes: Secondary Cleric of the party

PC4: Sorcerer (Human)
- Sorcerer (30)
- Stats: High Cha, Con and Dex?
- Notes: No, i won't do Pal (2) / Sorc (28)

PC5: Spellsword (Drow Elf)
- Rogue (3) / Barbarian (3) / Fighter (4) / Wizard (20)
- Stats: High Str, Int and Dex, mid Con?
- Notes: I never made a spellsword before, so i don't know much about them

PC6: Another arcane caster? A pure monk? A Paladin to weild Holy Avenger? Truly don't know what to do here.

I have a little problem with the alignments: if i have a Tiefling on my party, how can i justify the existence of an Aasimar as well? Mostly of my characters will have an evil alignment, so an Aasimar wouldn't fit that well.
I'm asking that because i have a stupid question regardin Holy Avenger: let's say my char have 2 levels of Paladin and the rest of Barbarian (just and example), would he be able to weild the Holy Avenger? So, if i'll make a Paladin, it would be an Aasimar.

Well, i hope anyone can give me some advice, thanks!!

PS: Sorry for my english.

[kmonster]

Hello and welcome to the forum !

Unless you cheat your characters won't reach more than level 26-27 at the end of HoF mode, so don't bother about how to distribute 30 levels.
How your characters are during the game is more important than how they are when the game is over.

PC1: Start with a rogue level for the extra skill points. I'd take stats like 18-18-16-12-8-6 and raise strength or con at level up. Take the rapid shot feat. If you don't want this character to wear armor you can raise dex even further, wearing (studded) leather you won't benefit from more than 22 (20) dex which is easily reached with 18 + cat's grace spell.

For your clerics make int and cha as low as you can bear. Put all skillpoints into concentration. Multiclassing casters weakens them a lot. You get nearly all benefits from 1 monk/fighter level, the rest just slows down the casting progression more. Pure clerics would even be stronger because of their superior casting power.

PC4: 10-14-18-8-8-18. I'd make this the party diplomat and put all the skillpoints at creation into diplomatic skills since they matter a lot in the prologue. Afterwards max out concentration and put the remaining skill points into spellcraft until you have 11 which allows taking the elemental feats.
I'd start with mercantile background, take only greater spell focusses and elemental feats afterwards. Raise only cha at level up.

PC5: Too complicated. Just a single warrior level is enough to allow a mage to use all weapons and play spellsword. The more mage levels you have, the more powerful this character will be. Strength is essential for doing damage in combat.

PC6: I'd take a bard. Their songs are extremely powerful and additional buffing and healing power doesn't hurt.

As for the holy avenger: It's overrated. You can only get it when the game is nearly over and you already have other powerful weapons.
1 paladin level is enough to wield it for any race. Give PC1 a paladin instead of barbarian level and he can use it for dualwielding. PC2 can also use it if he takes paladin levels.

I wouldn't worry about mixing tiefling with aasimar, both are half humans, it's even possible that they have the same father or mother. You'll find a fitting background story. It's harder to find a reason for a LG cleric of Lathander to travel with an evil group.

Barbarian rage is useless once you have enough strength spells, so don't take extra rage feats. Improved iniative doesn't work, so don't take it either.

[galtzaiLe]

Thanks a LOT for you response! It helped in so many ways. It's nice to see people still posting in this forum

I don't like to cheat or alter my chars in any way, so i'll plan the for lvl 25~ Also I will try a bard, i never played one before. May be i'll mix in some druids levels for a change, don't know yet.
One of the nicer things of the game, is that you can play it over and over everytime with a whole new party!

Well, thanks again kmonster for your welcome and helpful reply!

[Aerich]

Welcome, galtzaiLe.

A general comment to start off about spellcasters, in addition to kmonster's excellent advice. I like to take two divine casters per party, and make one of them more battle-oriented. For example, a Cleric[x]/Fighter[1] (for the normal game - it can go up to Fighter[4] in HoF, if you choose) with max Str and Con as the battle cleric, and another divine caster with more "normal" stats to cast from the back. I construct characters in my parties as a unit, making sure they each cover a role and have the flexibility to cover more than one.

Here's some suggestions. Don't feel bound by them. There's plenty of other ways to construct characters and parties.

PC1 - stat distribution is fine, but I'd try to poach a couple of points from somewhere to maximize your starting Dex. It's worth another +1 to your ranged attack, all game. I'd use this character more as a "slasher" (e.g. in and out of combat, not standing and fighting), so I'd skip the armor. I'd also try to get 14 Int, for the skill points. You might want to just make this character a Rogue[x]/Fighter[4]. You can achieve the dual-wielding feats with feats from your fighter levels, and I'm not a big fan of taking one Barb level - Rage is useless once you have access to lvl 2 spells because it doesn't stack with Bull's Strength, and you could just take the Dash feat for the movement - so essentially you'd be trading one extra fighter level and 2 extra HP for weapon specialization.

PC2 - Make this one your "conventional" cleric caster. Dump the monk level unless you want to maximize the AC bonus by also maxing Dex and make this into your battle cleric. A conventional cleric should have at least 14+ Str and Con, max Wis, no more than 12 Dex, and whatever else you want. I'd recommend a pureclass cleric as your conventional caster, with maybe one other level (monk or fighter) if you absolutely must.

PC3 - As it is, this character is trying to fill a few roles, but won't fill any of them as well as it could. Start as a cleric, take a lvl of fighter fairly early, and max Str and Con. Three Barb levels will throw this character right off because of the XP penalties. Either take it as a human (so your favoured class can be Cleric), or skip the Barb levels and up the Fighter levels to 4. Talos, Tempus, and Helm are all good battle clerics. A battle cleric can be the main frontline fighter of your party, particularly if it's a dwarf (extra HP, good saves).

PC4 - kmonster said it all. About the only thing I'd do is distribute the stats differently. I'd go 8-14-14-14-8-18. I can do without the high Con, since I believe that I should set up every battle so my sorcs aren't targeted. I like the good Int for skill points, as you will be distributing them between 5 skills (Concentration, Spellcraft, Bluff, Diplomacy, and Intimidate). If you need to, you could also take one other skill to take some of the identifying responsibilities off of another character (e.g. Alchemy).

PC5 - same as kmonster. High caster levels early are the keys to an easier normal game and the early stages of HoF. Save the multiclassing for later in HoF.

PC6 - bards are fine. If taking a bard, disregard my stat advice on the sorceror, increase the bard's Int (perhaps to 16) and make the bard your talker. I favour a Bard[11]/Wizard[x].

A character can't be a paladin and a barbarian. One must have a LG alignment, the other must be chaotic.

[galtzaiLe]

Thanks Aerich for your answer! Always is good to have another point of view

I read both replys and some other threads and guides around the net, and i remade my party. I like how my new party it's performing.

You have a good point about swaping the level of Barbarian for two levels of Fighter for the PC1. The only thing that made my doubt a bit was loosing 1D6 Sneak Attack, but oh well... now my bow does 2 more dmg

I'm enjoying this game so much, i love it.

Thanks for your advice guys, and sorry for the late reply! I'm not living on my own house right now and i don't have internet there.


PS: Sorry for my english