soloing the saga in the first run

[ymar]

Hi. I've never soloed any of the parts of the game and I want to try in a near future. However, it got me thinking.

Soloing the game when you already know every detail seems a bit unfaithful to the idea of RPG. When I was reading the descriptions of people's walkthroughs, I got the impression that they depended critically on their knowledge of both the future events of the game and the mechanics of the game.

At the beginning of the game Charname is just a kid -- the people in Candlekeep recognize this fact and try to teach them some basic stuff. Obviously, the kid has lived in this world for some time and probably knows what a kobold is. But how can they know how tough an opponent it is? An experienced player knows exactly what kind of tactics to use when attacked by a 15 gibberlings at level 1. And I saw them win such a fight. I don't think a kid who has lived all their life within the peaceful walls of Candlekeep could do this.

This is why I thought it would be a nice thing to see if it was possible to

1. Go through the whole saga without any previous knowledge of the storyline and only a vague idea of the game's mechanics? (Without saving the game other than to take a break.)

2. Solo through the saga on the same conditions?

[Garriath]

Regarding the second point, I think the main issue with that is, frankly, the NPCs, their interactions, and their quests constitutes a very large part of what makes the Baldur's Gate series as good as it is. After you've played the game a couple of times and are dying for a challenge, soloing makes sense, but on a first runthrough, you'll just be missing out on so much, it really can't possibly be worth it.

[ymar]

You're right, I didn't think of that. Still, I wonder if it's possible. What about point 1?

[AvatarOfLight]

I think point 1 is valid. You will have a harder time since you don't know many of the mechanics and item locations. It will likely be too hard to be fun, but if you manage it, it'll be quite an achievement.

The thing is there are better games for such a challenge such as Icewind Dale, where you'll hardly miss out on anything else without a party. IMHO: The Baldur's Gate Saga has decent gameplay, but it's the NPCs that make it truly great, don't miss out

[ymar]

I think point 1 is valid. You will have a harder time since you don't know many of the mechanics and item locations. It will likely be too hard to be fun, but if you manage it, it'll be quite an achievement.

I think it would be extremely difficult. There's a number of places in the games where you get surprised but an irregular event. When I first played Baldur's Gate I, with saves, it turned out I had to load a save from a very long time before, after I returned from the werewolf island. I had no idea I was infected with lycanthropy (or I did have an idea and didn't know what it meant for the gameplay). I came back with all my party members heavily wounded and had to fight the two werewolves whose names I don't remember. It turned out to be an impossible task without taking a rest. But resting killed all of my party members.

You'd have to know not to draw a card from the Deck of Many Things. You'd have to know at what party level to go into which level of Watcher's Keep, because too weak a party won't get out of there alive and you can get in there immediately after leaving Irenicus' dungeons. Beating Sarevok, Irenicus and Melissan in the first attempts seems very difficult to me too. And what about meeting some creatures for the first time? I took me a long time to kill my first Sirine without losing any party members.

[Stworca]

Both are possible. It's only a matter of time. You only need the know-where and know-who in the first game, as it's less hand-holding.
In the second it's very difficult to not know what to do, with exceptions of : Getting out of Twisted Rune (Throwing a beholder eye into a pool of blood.. really?!) and so on.

But it's the mechanics that are the difficulty for the newcomers. Variety of spells that protect and remove protections sometimes proves to be too complex even for the "veterans".
Then again : It's still possible, with the right amount of time at your disposal.

Now, doing an Ironman solo run, blindly, is not a likely scenario.

Still, if someone played the hell out of Icewind Dale before jumping into BG2, and has a grasp of AD&D, AND picked a spellcasting class or a dual/multi, then it is possible.
Not very likely, but possible.

Lastly, it all can come down to cheese. The most difficult, optional SoA fights are a joke, when you just use I-WIN tactics / items / abilities.

[oogle_spliggit]

I dont know about soloing, but I completed this game without a walkthorugh the first time round, back when it came out.

I was about 12 at the time, i missed loads of cool items, mini quests etc...but i completed each chapter and ultimately beat sarevok.

I didn't even know what a walkthrough was back then.

I've redone since, refering to walkthroughs for the cool items, and i agree with you, part of the fun is having to work it out, not knowing what the map looks like until youve explored it yourself etc.

[ymar]

I dont know about soloing, but I completed this game without a walkthorugh the first time round, back when it came out.

But the task is to do it without a walkthough and without saving!

[Daynov]

It's a bit unlikely. Trying to get one of my friends into the Baldur's Gate saga he was getting one-shotted frequently by wolves in the beginning. He had some experience with AD&D but ultimately didn't get past Tarnesh and unfortunately uninstalled the game. Talking about rage quit...

[kmonster]

Even with a party you can't ironman the BG games in an unspoiled first run, they're far too unbalanced and unfair, the developers probably wanted you to metagame.

A solo character can be far easier than a party.