GameBanshee Forums

Hi everyone!

A friend of mine and I are planning on playing Icewind Dale. Now I'm wondering how fast paced the game is. I mean, does it take really long till a mage actually becomes useful, or does it take really long till dual classing makes sense? I played the Baldur's gate series, but can barely remember the first one. I played a fighter back then, so level ups weren't too important.

Is it worth playing ID, or should we just start with ID II?

Thanks for your responses!

It's worth playing IWD. Do you only have the original game or do you also have the expansions ?
Do you want to play with only 1 character or will everyone control more than 1 character ?
What characters do have in mind ?

Hi! We do have the expansion. We are going to be playing with a full party, each controlling 3 characters. I have a dual/multiclass Fighter/Mage and Fighter/thief and a pure fighter in mind. My friend is thus going to have a cleric of course, and what else he likes to play. (Btw, is dual or multiclass better for Fighter/Mage and Fighter/Thief, and if dual, at which level?)

Thanks!

In a party of 6 having the party mage pure or dualed mage is preferable to a multiclassed one, you have 6 characters who can fight, whether they get 11 or 11.5 attacks per round total won't help as much as access to more and higher level spells at higher casting level.

I recommend dualclassing after fighter level 3 so you can put a 3rd proficiency point into your preferred weapon type. Waiting longer isn't worth it, you'll have to endure long periods of imperfectness and additional XP spent for fighter levels will slow down the mage progression.

Thieves are best multiclassed. You still get more than enough thieving and have the thievery options available all the time.

Weapon proficiencies do make the difference in combat so choose them wisely. Everyone should have both a ranged and melee option. Spread weapon proficiencies among your party members so you can use the different weapon types you'll find.


Bows get an extra attack per round are the most damaging ranged weapon type from the beginning.
Unless you get a very lucky random drop it will take very long until you find a crossbow which is as good as a non-magical composite bow. It's not worth having more than one party member using one.
Slings get a strength bonus to damage and can be used with a shield.

Your fighter won't be able to put 5 proficiency points into more than 1 weapon type so I recommend axes which can be used both in melee and ranged. Normal throwing axes are expensive and very heavy you might want to to put the remaining 2 proficiency points into slings and use them for ranged until you find a returning throwing axe.

Your dualclass fighter/mage won't be able to specialize in more than two weapon types, bow and 2-handed melee does more damage while sling and 1-handed melee allows using a shield.
When dualing don't start with a proficiency already spent as fighter or it will be lost.

The multiclass fighter/thief will be able to will be able to specialize in a 3rd and eventually fourth weapon type with the extra proficiency points gained at level 3,6,9 and 12.
Only melee weapons pure class thieves can use can be used for backstabbing. For ranged you can use bow for more damage or a sling for using a shield.

Make sure your characters have very high strength for speeding up combat and comfortable carrying capacity.

Thanks for your thourough reply! What I am wondering now if I should put points in "Two-wepaon style" or something like that as a fighter/mage, and if yes, in what style? Will the fighter/mage be more of a front-liner or a ranged fighter?

Thanks a lot!

The most powerful choice for your 3 characters is getting bow specialization for everyone and shooting everything down from the distance with composite long bows, 2.5 attacks per round for 5-10 damage with a bonus to hit is hard to beat in the beginning while shields only offer a little AC bonus.

Whether you want to use your fighter3/mage mainly for tanking or ranged is your decision.

For melee you'll need a lot of micromanaging before battle (will your friend just stand there and wait until you've finished all the spells ?) and spell slots are limited.
Sending a pure warrior with more HP in heavy armor forward or just shooting the monsters before they get close will be more comfortable in most situations.

I'd master bows and specialize in greatswords before dualclassing, but any ranged/melee combo works.


Spread the weapon proficiencies around the 6 characters, the second best of one melee weapon type is usually worse than the best of the others, only large swords are frequent enough to accept a second user.

I'd start the fighter/thief with large sword specialization.

Thanks you so much! You helped a lot.

Some excellent responses from kmonster, and I shall just add a few cents on top.

For Icewind Dale you can't have two weapon fighting, but in Icewind Dale II you can

Having all characters use bows is ok in the early stages of the game, but once monsters start requiring enchanted weapons to hit, it's likely there wont be enough enchanted arrows for the job and you'll receive the 'weapon ineffective' message a lot. To solve this I specialise a couple in bows and a couple in bullets.

Also, depending on how much of a hoarder you are, inventory space is at a premium and lugging around an inventory or two full of arrows can be very irritating. Once your main tanks have awesome AC and you have sturdy summonses it's normally cheaper and more efficient to just hack them up rather than expend 1000s of GP on arrows.

Weapon and clothe drops are also notoriously rare and awkward and it's unlikely there will be enough of anything to fully equip too many of any type of character to equal AC and firepower.

In the game I've just completed for example I had zero Club drops the ENTIRE game, but several spears, only one Halberd (a paltry +1), two or three Great Swords, a couple of Short Swords but oodles of Long Swords, one Flail and several Maces. Only one decent Crossbow drop but about three or four Bows and three Slings. Axes and Hammers are always a safe bet along with Long Swords as the Axes proficiency covers both one and two handed and there are always going to be Hammer drops as the game wants you to use them against the 4 Golems in the game.

My Bard ended the game virtually naked other than some Bracers, a Necklace and a Ring, But my main tank had one of everything, except a Ring!

Unlike Kmonster I really do prioritise AC and I find the extra two or three AC from a shield tends to put a character quickly at the stage when they are invulnerable to everything except arrows and magic and criticals, a big bonus for a game which likes to swarm monster attacks.


Also, there are two ways to play Icewind Dale I and it's expansion.

Method 1 - load Icewind Dale I, play through it, then add the expansion and play that. This method will make battles easier as monsters do not attack unless they are in immediate view, ie: a certain distance from a character. Downside is less spells.

Method 2 - load both and play through Icewind Dale 1 with the expansion set from the beginning. This will cancel the 'fog of war' and make the monsters have a 'call to arms' whereby you will encounter more swarms and be in less control of your battles. Upside, more spells.

Icewind Dale II is the same game but with completely different rules to I, but watch out as some of the Feats don't work and it's a known bug. There's probably a link to them somewhere.

Quote by LastDanceSaloon:

In the game I've just completed for example I had zero Club drops the ENTIRE game, but several spears, only one Halberd (a paltry +1), two or three Great Swords, a couple of Short Swords but oodles of Long Swords, one Flail and several Maces. Only one decent Crossbow drop

I've had similar experiences in some games, but I "think" that the parties' weapons proficiencies may have an influence on some of the random drops. I often have 1 or 2 characters proficient in crossbows and usually find 3 to 4 decent to quite good crossbows every game. Heavy Crossbow of Accuracy, Crossbow of Speed are 2 of them. A while back I had a character with a Halberd proficienty and definitely found a +2 halberd as well as a couple of others (might have been some better ones, but that run through was a long time ago).

Yes, I've often wondered about that. The cunning of the AI does go a bit deeper than just how the monsters move in battle and I think you're right, I think, over the course of the game, it will make sure you have adequate weaponry. However, I think it also performs little moments of classic AI irritation as well, for example, if you're umming and areing about whether to put your next point in maces or flails and decide to put it in maces then I seem to, every game, then immediately find a nice flail, and visa-versa (in the short-term).

Quote by LastDanceSaloon:

if you're umming and areing about whether to put your next point in maces or flails and decide to put it in maces then I seem to, every game, then immediately find a nice flail, and visa-versa (in the short-term).

LOL! :laugh:
Yep, been there too, I feel your pain.