Most useless NPC?

ThorinOakensfield · Post by **ThorinOakensfield** » Fri May 25, 2001 8:08 pm

Imoen was pretty bad. I dropped Jaheria for her. Edwin does the mage bit better, and Jan does the theif bit better. She never reached the xp cap anway in my game. She couldn't even cast 7th level spells.

fable · Post by **fable** » Fri May 25, 2001 8:36 pm

Nalia may be the weakest character--perhaps. I've yet to see anybody adequately defend her role in a party. Jan's a far better thief, and both Aerie and Imoen are better mages. But I do think it's good that you should be offered a selection of characters, including weak ones, to make choices. I'd rather have twelve varied characters than just five or six guaranteed strong ones. It gives me a greater sense of control over my party.

StormBringer · Post by **StormBringer** » Sat May 26, 2001 8:42 pm

LOL, I think this kind of Post just proves that it is all RELATIVE! There are so many factors in the game. Everything is dependent on your style of play at the particular time, coupled with the SYNERGY of all your party members with respect to one another. I say LOL at the beginning of my reply because I am now just exiting the UNDERDARK, and Nalia is now level 16, and is one of the STRONGEST members of my party!

I mean, it all just matters how you play it. For instance, have you been playing with mostly just 3 characters, or 4, or 5, or 6? the whole game. Did you have Nalia memorize all the good scrolls you found? or did you let Aerie memorize them because you feared Nalia would leave you one day, because of something you picked up on some long-forgoten post you once read that mentioned something about her being Kidknapped? The same can be said about Yoshimo....I've never even met JAN, to my knowledge! The examples are endless.... The fact is, this is a DYNAMIC game....soo many possibilities and outcomes are possible!

I think we each tend to play the game in a certain fashion that is (if even unconsciously) molded by our personal beliefs, prejudices, etc. for the moment. For me, in the game mentioned above, Nalia kicks A**. And the rest of you say she Sucks!? I have her outfitted with the greatest of equipment, etc. that I've found so far. And she's got an unstoppable spell-book! However, for me, she was the most logical mage to "work-on". Aerie started off with a wimpy spell-book, and her HP sucks. My party is GOOD aligned, and my protagonist is a Ranger. Blah, blah, blah,......I could go on and on....the point is, IT ALL JUST DEPENDS..............

Fatale · Post by **Fatale** » Sat May 26, 2001 10:58 pm

Stormbringer, no offense, but I think most of us like to argue here (well, at least, I do), so I think I'll drag this topic on a bit more ...

Nalia ain't the weakest. She's the next one I pick up after Aerie (which makes her the second character I pick up after the Irenicus dungeon).

Give Aerie good wands, spells, protection, and weapons and she is Death in elven disguise. Ditto for Nalia. Nalia works best with the super short bows they have around Amn (like the Tasheron Bow and Gesen Bow). She can get up to 15 damage points in one shot.

If you got both girls in your party, the experience you get from learning spells are tremendous, especially if you have them regularly gulping potions of genius to boost their learning abilities.

Not only that, once you learnt all the spells, these two mages are deadly in battle with their area and summoning spells.

And Nalia can pick any lock that matters, and once you bring her through the underdark, she is one mean mage to contend with.

To answer the question of this topic, I think Imoen would be the most useless. Even though I gave her all the good spells and equipment I can give, I check her stats after the underdark, and the most powerful she vanquished was a goblin! Eeek! I really thought her better than that!

Or maybe it's just me ...

StormBringer · Post by **StormBringer** » Sun May 27, 2001 10:01 pm

fatale...no offense taken. Actually, after reading my reply/post, I was surprised at how strong my opinion seemed to come across, as typed. I didn't intend for it to, I should have proof-read it before posting. I probably shouldn't have used CAPITALS like that. No big deal to me about everyone's opinions...that what the original post was asking for anyway. I just got a little bit carried away. I just wanted to point out that any character has potential, if focused on.

Loredweller · Post by **Loredweller** » Mon May 28, 2001 12:35 am

Originally posted by tRiKzTaR:
...It turned out that in all the time Imoen had been in my party, she had only killed 5 (!) enemies - ...

What's of it? My Jaheira (no parties without her) never is very bright in killing, neither is Jan. Altogether, lot of enemies perished through Jaheira's insect plaque and fire elementals or Jan's brush mates. First thing my spellcasters cast is Chaos or Confusion, if applicable. They never have large number of kills, if only above level 12 with Chromatic Orb on weak opponents. It's the team work, and does it really matter who makes the final blow?
L.

[ 05-28-2001: Message edited by: Loredweller ]

leeho730 · Post by **leeho730** » Mon May 28, 2001 1:34 am

all npc mages whose int is lower than 18... They won't be able to memorize lv9 spells...

Mr. Sprinkles · Post by **Mr. Sprinkles** » Mon May 28, 2001 10:05 am

Wisdom draining? i thought Haery's sword only drained Dexterity.

aVENGER2k · Post by **aVENGER2k** » Tue May 29, 2001 1:12 am

@Mr. Sprinkles:

Yes,you are right,the Chaos Blade drains 2 points of DEX,while Kachiko's Wakizashi drains wisdom...I guess I got those two mixed up a bit,but anyway,HD's sword is much better cause there is NO save to the DEX loss,and it lasts around 30 sec so you can easily kill some monsters that have low DEX simply by draining it to 0.

Ben_Albright · Post by **Ben_Albright** » Tue May 29, 2001 6:15 pm

I have to agree with most of the idea that parties match playing styles. I only got insulted when someone said that Nalia is better than Imoen. Both can be 17th level mages with the XP cap and Imoen has more theif levels and theirfore hitpoints and theiveing skills than Nalia. Spellbooks are what you make them. It is therefore impossible for Imoen to be Weaker than Nalia unless one has better equipment than the other.

Nightmare · Post by **Nightmare** » Tue May 29, 2001 6:31 pm

You people are crazy. Imoen is a VERY powerful mage, IMHO. Sure she won't get alot of kills, if you keep her in the back with a bow and spells. I always pick up Imoen, both as a mage and for the plot.

Loredweller · Post by **Loredweller** » Wed May 30, 2001 11:51 am

Originally posted by leeho730:
all npc mages whose int is lower than 18... They won't be able to memorize lv9 spells...

They cannot learn ... save but after drinking some potion. Since they have them in the spellbook they can also cast them. IMO ToB won't change this or none save Edwin would be able cast spells above level 8.
L.

Tigerin · Post by **Tigerin** » Thu May 31, 2001 1:03 am

I had the same thing with imoen but....
I (not the vampires!!!) killed Drizzt, got imoen to use one of his swords(the +5 one). after killing the last dragon you find a plate on him. don't know why, but imoen could use it and her spells were on... that was nice.. then i just gave here some belt of power and she managed to kill a hell of a lot more... and use her spells!!!!!!!!!

Vehemence · Post by **Vehemence** » Thu May 31, 2001 1:10 am

Tigerin: There are certain types of armour that allow multiclass/dualclass mages to cast spells while wearing armour.

The one you speak of is the Bladesinger Chain +4. It, like several others, including:

Drow Chainmail;
Elven chainmail; and
Melodic Chain +3 (usable by bards)

can all be worn and spells can still be cast.

velvetfreak · Post by **velvetfreak** » Thu May 31, 2001 1:57 am

OMG... is that right?

And my Fighter/Mage passed up the Bladesinger Chain for the Boots of Speed! D'oh!

Well I'm only in Sahuagin City... guess it wouldn't hurt to go back...

Astafas · Post by **Astafas** » Thu May 31, 2001 2:30 am

Originally posted by velvetfreak:
OMG... is that right?

And my Fighter/Mage passed up the Bladesinger Chain for the Boots of Speed! D'oh!

Well I'm only in Sahuagin City... guess it wouldn't hurt to go back...

Aren't you thinking of the Jester's Chain here? That one doesn't allow you to cast spells.

Regarding Naila:

One of the advantages with Nalia, which seems to be forgotten by most, is her low AC. High Dex gives her maximal bonus and then you add her family ring (which also gives Fire Res). So Nalia is the mage with the best AC of all, she's able to use thief weapons and you get her right at the beginning. How could she be bad? Extra spells isn't everything, IMO.

Vehemence · Post by **Vehemence** » Thu May 31, 2001 3:36 am

I agree with Astafas. Give her either Tansheron's Bow or the Short bow of Gesen and she can fire from the back lines and fire off some spells too. Plus, unlike Edwin, she isn't restricted in the spells she can use (since edwin can't use divination spells).

Still, I have to admit, 9 times out of 10, I pick Edwin

Gotta love that sense of humour

Vehemence · Post by **Vehemence** » Thu May 31, 2001 3:37 am

Originally posted by velvetfreak:
Well I'm only in Sahuagin City... guess it wouldn't hurt to go back...

By the way, you can't go back anyway. Once you leave Spellhold, you can only go forward...

Brink · Post by **Brink** » Thu May 31, 2001 3:42 am

The Jester's Chain looks funky

(btw,getting the Boots of Speed is much better than getting it,since it's only good for the way it makes your character look cool

)

velvetfreak · Post by **velvetfreak** » Thu May 31, 2001 5:03 am

Oh confusticate it you're right, I got them mixed up. Still that took the decision out of that one, Boots of Speed is a no-brainer.

What I meant by "go back" was re-load from an earlier save. Yeesh. That would have been a drag.