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Hello,

Years ago when I bought my first Baldur's Gate game, I started off with Shadow of Amn, without relizing it was the sequel to the original game. Some years later I bought the original BG, but I never actually played it through. This was mostly due to the fact that I had gotten accustomed to the graphics of SoA, and didn't like the graphics of BG1. Today I was doing some surfing and I came across the Baldur's Gate Trilogy-WeiDU mod, which apparently adds the graphics of SoA to the Original game and to the totsc expansion? This got me thinking I might give the game another try.

I'm planning to play through BG1 and it's expansion, aswell as ToB without any mods (except for the one I mentioned), as I've never played through any one of these. I'll probably try to play all of them on impossible though. As for SoA, I'll probably use the Tactics mod, as I've played it through so many times that it's nice with the new content. I'll probably have to play it through on core rules though, as I'm guessing impossible will simply be too difficult for me. With these things in mind, I planned the following parties:

Protagonist - Ranger/Cleric

BG1 & totsc :
Jaheira
Imoen
Khalid
Minsc
Dynaheir

SoA:
Jaheira
Imoen
Aerie
Cernd
Valygar

ToB:
Jaheira
Imoen
Aerie
Cernd
Sarevok

First of all I relize that these aren't exactly cookie cutter parties (except maybe the bg1 party, not sure), and that's what I'm aiming for aswell. I chose the party for BG1 simply because that seems to be the party that the protagonist supposedly journies with when he gets ambushed by irenicus, if I remember correctly. Also, to me it seems like a decent party for BG1, even if it lacks some spell power.

In SoA I pick Jaheira because I've never romanced her before, and I think she's a quite powerful party member. I take Imoen because she's pretty much the most powerful mage npc that I can get to join me that has a good alignment. Also, I'd like to have as much dialogue as possible, which should make her a good choise overall. I take Aerie because I want some more spellpower. Jan Jansen would've been another alternative, but I'm not sure if I want a multi-class thief when I've already got imoen to disarm traps and open locks. Being an illusionist, though, he would get more mage spells than Aerie. I take Cernd because I've never had him in my party for a long time, and I know shapeshifters can get very powerful. Ontop of that I'm guessing he and Jaheira will have some interesting dialogue during the game. As for Valygar, I picked him over the other melee characters because my protagonist is a ranger/cleric, which means he can't wield katanas, and Valygar seemed to be the best candidate for the Celestial Fury. Another thing I thought about was that I could replace Valygar with Jan Jansen, and have Jan wield the Celestial Fury and backstabbing people like crazy. He might be quite effective considering that he could cast invisibility and improved invisibility on himself, which could make him quite effective overall. Still, I'm not quite sure if like the idea of two thieves in my party, especially considering that this is supposedly a good party.

In ToB I'll replace Valygar with Sarevok. This is mainly because I remember reading that there's a lot of dialogue between Imoen and Sarevok if you have him join your party. This is also why I'm not willing to replace Imoen with Jan, because I don't want to miss her dialogue in neither SoA nor ToB.

I'd like to hear some opinions on the parties I've listed. I'm quite certain that these parties wont be able to compete in effectiveness with parties that contain Anomen, and especially Keldorn because of his imba dispel, but I'm hoping it will still have some potential to be effective. I'm not too worried about finishing the original game, as I'm quite sure it can be completed with pretty much any party setup. I am, however, a bit unsure whether or not my party will be able to complete SoA with Tactics mod installed, considering that earlier when I've played the Tactics mod, Keldorn's dispel has played a huge role in combat vs casters. Ontop of which he gets even more powerful when he gets his sword. The thing is though that I'm getting kind of sick of playing through the game using the same characters most of the time, and this is why I made this thread: to get answears to my questions. Thank you for your time.

All those parties are fine especially since you PC is a CL\RA. Remember though that Imoen is a thief in BG1 until you dual class her and when you do that with a full party you'll have a good bit of time fairly late in the game waiting for her theif skills to reactivate. Its still very do-able just something to keep in mind. In BGI since your PC is a tank and you'll have Minsc & Jaheira I'd use Khalid almost exclusively as an archer. Ranged weapons especially bows are very powerfull in BGI.

Jan is much more powerful and entertaining than Cernd IMO, plus since you'll be without Imoen for a long stretch in SoA Aerie would be your only Arkane caster. Just keep that in mind.

Jordoo wrote:All those parties are fine especially since you PC is a CL\RA. Remember though that Imoen is a thief in BG1 until you dual class her and when you do that with a full party you'll have a good bit of time fairly late in the game waiting for her theif skills to reactivate. Its still very do-able just something to keep in mind. In BGI since your PC is a tank and you'll have Minsc & Jaheira I'd use Khalid almost exclusively as an archer. Ranged weapons especially bows are very powerfull in BGI.

Jan is much more powerful and entertaining than Cernd IMO, plus since you'll be without Imoen for a long stretch in SoA Aerie would be your only Arkane caster. Just keep that in mind.

Thank you for the reply. I think that I won't dual-class Imoen in bg1, even though that might not be the best way to use her. Mainly because of the reason you stated: I don't like having a sub-par character for what could end up being roughly half of the game (bg1, that is). As for ranged weapons being effective in bg1, I noticed that aswell last time I tried the game. Infact, I had ranged weapons on all my characters at one point and had the enemies run around in circle, seemed to be quite effective in the beginning atleast. Like I stated in my first post though, I've never finished the game (or even gotten very far), so I don't know if that's a viable strategy later in the game. Besides, I guess some people consider it cheesy.

As for Jan being more effective than Cernd, I believe you, but I was kind of looking forward to having Cernd in my party. Do you think it would be viable to replace Valygar with Jan instead, and have him wield Celestial Fury instead (like I suggested in my first post)? I'd love having Jan in my party aswell, as I can't recall ever having him in my party (other than once by mistake), which would mean lots of completely new dialogue. Ontop of that I'd save so much time by taking Jan instead of Valygar, that I'd probably have time to do the harper quests before rescuing imoen, in order to get the jaheira romance going. I guess I'm just worried that the Celestial Fury might get wasted on Jan, considering that it can have quite a big impact in combat. What do you think?

EDIT: I forgout to ask one thing: Would Jan's chaotic neutral alignment be a problem in a good party?

Bows are very effective throughout BGI! Remember if you don't Dual Imoen Dynaheir is your only mage and since she is a speciallist mage (envoker, I beleive) she has limitations on certain spell schools. I think conjering is what she cannot do which will be miised in BGI.

As far as your SoA group I would bbase any party decision on one single weapon. There are way to many good weapons to use. You can beat the game with any party without too much trouble IMO. Basically there is no right or wrong just who you really want to play. Personally I always leave an empty party slot (usually 2) to pick up NPC's for certain quests and then get rid of them later on.

All three party's look fine to me, I've played throug both BG1 as BG2 and think that it is the most logical party. Do remember to dualclass imoen, otherwise you will lack magic quality when reaching the final chapter.

Thank you for the replies. I didn't relize Dynaheir is a specialist mage, looks like I'll have to dual-class imoen in any case, no can do. I think I will try to replace Valygar with Jan Jansen, and then replace Jan with Sarevok in ToB, as I just want to experience parts of the game that I haven't seen before. Thank you for the advice, it'll be interesting to see how effective the party will be in SoA with tactics mod.

I forgout to ask one thing: Would Jan's chaotic neutral alignment be a problem in a good party?

Neutral characters leave only if your reputation falls to 2 (or 1). They dont leave at high reps, even tho they complain when you're heroic

It seems that RP has more value for you in this run-through, so I can't help but wonder why you need Cernd. The guy's a douche, he has speech than most of the other NPCs and he neglected his family. I mean, who would want such a guy? Tomorrow he might just leave you behind. IMO, as a person, he's worse than Viconia.

Otherwise, back to BG 1, I would like to recommend you Dudleyville's NPC Mod, which (among other things) changes some of the NPC stats and weapon proficiencies for the sake of continuity Link (How come Jaheira's Dex improve so much in Irenicus' prison anyway?). Be warned, though, it'll make BG 1 somewhat easier.

i think it is a great idea to change valygar with jan, although I would take the sphere first. I find it very challenging to play with three mages because they are the strongest in this game, at least that is my opinion.

It's good to know that the neutral alignment of Jan won't cause too much problems. The reason I would like Cernd to join my party is because like Jan, I've pretty much never had him in my party. I wasn't expecting him to be a douche though. I'll have to think about it further, but I once played through SoA and some of ToB with a Shapeshifter protagonist, and thought he was very powerful. This is another reason why I'd like to have Cernd in my party, because I'm thinking that out of the non-evil characters that are left (keeping in mind that I don't want Anomen or Keldorn in this party), he's probably the most powerful melee character left.

I will need a decent party setup when playing Tactics mod, because I'm not an extremely experienced player, and I don't want to end up stuck in a certain encounter that I simply can't get past without being incradibly lucky, and ending up re-loading for hours and losing my nerves. I want a challenge, but I'm thinking I'll still need an effective party to play through SoA with the tactics mod installed and using core rules. As for the BG1 mod, I already started playing, so I think this will have to do for now.

I agree that mages are very powerful in Baldur's Gate. Still, I've never played a thief/mage before, so we'll see how it works out.

The combo of Jan and Imoen can be breathtaking. With the force of aerie as third mage you are very powerful against party's with alot of arcane or divine magic power!