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I played SoA twice through and realized very quickly mages very useful for taking out a high level character and other difficult situations but not nearly as helpful as a fighter in 90% of the fights you encounter. I modeled this party after the equpiment available in the game and this knowledge.

Quershcen (ker-shen) -- A human Swashbuckler dualed to Fighter in the Underdark. I used dual wield and a pair of scimitars (i recommend belm) until I dual classed, then I took bastard swords ( jhor, blade of searing) and dual wield. This char. amassed a huge amount of XP for my party simply disarming and picking locks, but his fighting ability was also impressive. AC ended up being comparable to everyone else. I progressed to longswords in time to use blackrazor/equalizer at the end of the game.

Keldorn -- Carsomyr, end of discussion. He is a true badass with gauntlets of dex and Carsomyr. I made a halberd user out of him as well simply because dragons breath is so goddamn powerful and hurts almost anything. He still gets the 50% magic resistance with it cars. equipped regardless of whether he attacks with it.

Korgan -- Hardass Extraordanaire. He starts with 5 *s in axes so that makes him nasty early on. I used a shield of Balduran until I developed my 2 weapon style and eventually gave him crom faeyr. He solo'd the beholders in the game and was helpful in EVERY fight.

Valygar -- He comes with some nice armor and the second best katana, the best being Celestial Fury and that is easily acquirable. I gave him slots in flails so he ended up using Flail of ages at the end, making his opponent slow or stunned after a backstab. A great scout and very low maintenance. It is hard to reduce his AC very much because of the stalker restriction, so he is better off as a second wave if he doesnt go in first for the backstab.

Mazzy -- Yes, MAZZY!!! I tossed this around a while and decided I wanted her because she is a hot little halfling and I have 5 men in my group, and with a Tuigan bow she cleans house, peppering most enemies to 'badly injured' or better before they got close. Lots of decent short swords through out the game too, and she is pretty decent in hand to hand.

Edwin -- Duh. By far the most dominant mage in the game, he tops out with 4 level 8 and 5 or 6level 7 spells. Breach/warding whip and pierce magic are by far the best because once you take some resistances off your enemy your 5 fighters will rip that lich/irenicus/dragon/anything to pieces. I had trouble protecting him at times, so a ring of invis is nice to have when he gets in trouble (dont swap it with his ring of acuity or you have to keep re-binding the spells...grrrr) but when you acquire staff of the magi he really comes into his own and you have to worry a lot less about him.


Yep, thats it. No clerics, druids or other spellcasters. With 2 rings of regen, an ioun stone and a ring of gaxx I was able to keep all my people healthy. Since I used only 2-3 chars. per fight I just let the rest of them regen and swapped out when I needed to. 83.3% of my party worked HARD the whole game with edwin being the exception, although he is not terrible with a sling of avoreen. Let me know what you think and happy hunting

Well, you've certainly have the perfectly developed tank team!

I wouldn't be able to survive with that group, however. I rely on Anomen's healing spells and Jaheira's offensive abilties on a regular basis.

You do have quite the mix of alignment, so you may be a little restricted to simply "Nuetral". That's another reason as to why I prefer Nuetral over Good and Evil --they're more flexible. You just may want to be careful so you don't get anyone mad at eachother in the middle of a dungeon. Some of these people in BG2 go at eachother's throats faster than cheerleaders in a catfight.

By the way, welcome to the board!

If you're talking about power gaming I don't see why you don't use a custom multi-player party. The only npc who is better than any character you can generate is Edwin. For a multi-player party I think it's useful to have the original Baldur's Gate to be able to dual class early, perhaps depends on what you want.

My idea of the perfect party changes daily but I hope eventually to come to a conclusion. It's a topic that depends so much on your playing style it's only useful to discuss to get more ideas. In reference to your party I think someone else said it was fighter heavy, I'd have to agree. But if it works for you then power to you.

My party as of today is:
1) Ranger 2/ dualed to Cleric: This character looses almost no experience to the ranger class, has access to all divine spells, a racial enemy, is slightly better than a cleric in combat, and can turn undead at the same level as a cleric (well for 90 some percent of the time). Assuming one were to play throught the first with this char I think you can up your wisdom by two points. One more in tales of the Sword Coast (I think don't own that one so can't be sure). That makes for a possible 21 wisdom, that makes for two bonus spells a level through third level and one per level through 5th. All the cleric power one could possibly want.
2) Elven ranger archer kit- personal preference although these guys are great. I'm not sure if most people would make good use of this sort of character but I love the ranged power.
3) Gnomish illusionist- I do it because of the 19 int. I've found the two most frustrating spells to loose are spirit shield and horrid wilting. Ghost armor is nearly as useful as spirit shield anyway.
4) Half-orc/dwarf fighter type- ie. kensai, barbarian or straight fighter. The kensai does the most damage and but also takes the most and I sort of think of this as the fellow to take the damage so that does not appeal to me so much. The fighter is in the middle, dealing out and avoiding some damage. The barbarian cannot deal out as much as even the fighter as he lacks the weapon specialization but 12 hitpoints per level for the first 10 is 20 extra hitpoints, at high levels he has resistances to damage. I haven't given any equipment advice till this point but I can't resist. If you were to give the barbarian the flail with the physical resistances attached, the helm of balduran, the ring of regeneration, the ring of gaxx, and eventually the axe of the unyielding, this fellow would become the ultimate tank. Before the axe you can use the flail of ages.
5) The other essential character is the thief which I have come to no conclusion on. There are so many possibilities here. I think the swashbuckler and assassin classes are great so is the straight fighter. If one was to dual you get no racial adjustments to theiving skills for being a human, and if you multi-class you loose the ability of taking a kit and eventually your theiving skills go to waste. 215% is really no more useful than 150% which I don't think is more useful than 110% but I do think there is a difference between 100% and 110% (can anyone explain that). The advantage of multi-classing is you will eventually get the high level abilities. Once a thief has use any item it's a completely different story. I think mage robes in some cases beat out leather armor. Plus if the character was a fighter/thief the holy avenger Carsomyr is a beautiful thing. I really think a straight class thief is overkill except perhaps in the case of a swashbuckler, great combo of fighter and thief.

I think I would give the ranger/cleric ** in slings and try to get the strength up to use the sling of seeking. For the archer the short bow of gesen stacks the electrical damage with the damage from the arrow, that's real nice. The mage shouldn't be doing much in the way of weapons. The fighter is meant to get in the middle of things and get dirty.

There are these 5:
1) Thief - only need one and need not even be straight classed. Great to take assassin kit buff up on stealth to 100% and dual to fighter.
2) Mage
3) Cleric
4) Fighter - melee
5) Fighter - ranged

I'm not even going to try to say that there is no overlap here because most fighters are decent at both, kensai and cavalier excepted. Paladins are pseudo-clerics turn undead, Lay on hands, some spells. Lots of stuff like that so it's trying to get the most functionality, or just what you need out of as few characters as possible. I'd usually go for one more character, perhaps another melee fighter as the cleric can do a decent job for ranged. I'd think fighter/mage, kensai/mage or another straight fighter.

Power gaming is fun with an NPC party because you get to see how all the characters interact, I am well aware that 3 half orc berserkers a thief/fighter and a couple of mages would be best, but I am not really interested in making a Party that is entirely my own. The NPCs all have very excellent personalities and I thought that was worth the offset (I really crushed this game toward the end, I cant imagine it being that much easier. Thanks for the nice multi party suggestion though

Not enough spells IMO. I absolutely want two Mages, a Cleric and a Druid (multis and duals included) in every party. But then I don't mind resting every now and then to regain my spells, as I see no rush.

My last party did great with:
Me, Inquisitor (Carsomyr/Azuredge)
Minsc (Dragon breath or dual wield FoA/MoD)
Jaheira (blackblood/flail)
Valigar (dual wield katanas/l.swords and bows)
Imoen (SoM/s.bow)
Aerie (sling of everard/mace or club)

Two mages, a cleric, a druid, a NPC with thieving skills for find traps/pick locks (Imoen) and one (Valigar) for scouting/backstabbing, four good fighters!!!

Maybe such a party is perfect for you, and I hope you enjoy playing with them. But I always put more emphasis on role-playing than on "who's the most powerful". The truth is, you can play the game successfully with ANY group of characters. I should know--I once played all the way through the game with a party of (gasp) Bards. Not every party can give a player bragging rights ("my party is stronger than your party!" ), but as far as I'm concerned, all of them can be fun to play.

You realize that when your character acquired Blackrazor, he became evil, right? (If he wasn't already evil.) If you weren't playing him as an evil character before, I don't see how you're going to justify his new alignment. Of course, if you take the attitude, "I only did it so I could get a cool sword; I don't care about role-playing," then I guess it's pointless to discuss role-playing with you.

Also, do you realize that Keldorn, Valygar, and Mazzy can all cast spells? Keldorn has one of the best spells in the game: the Inquisitor's Dispel Magic. I'm surprised you didn't put that on the list.

If you ever play Throne of Bhaal (the expansion), you might reconsider your strategies when your characters acquire high level abilities. For example, Keldorn can get a new spell called Summon Deva, and IMO, it would be a shame if you never used it. I realize that you weren't talking about Throne of Bhaal, but the party you're talking about now DOES have a future if you want to follow it. And wait until you see the new NPC in Throne of Bhaal. You'll probably want him in your party.

I have to agree on MP being best for powergaming...

Human Ranger8/Cleric Hammers, flails, 2weapon style
Elf Sorcerer (flexible spells)
Gnome Illusionist (19 int + 1 spell per lesson)
Halfling Swashbuckler (high lvl thief abilities shortbows + c-bows)
Human Monk
Half-Orc Barbarian (2hwepon, longbows, q-staff, 2hsword)

None of the weapon proficiencies should go past 2 stars, the damage and THACO bonuses arent worth the flexibilty of more weapons.

Ahhh, yes, You can definetly tell a lot of things about a person by simple looking who's in thier party in our favorite RP games.

I like a nicely balanced group. Clerics and Druids are a must, but I tend to go easy on offencive mages. Fighters are a definate, even if they are dual or multi classed.

Example:

1. Jaheira - Multi Fighter/Druid with wicked spells. You can send her into combat until the point where she is injured badle then just have her heal herself instead of trying to get her away from enemies. Very good charactor.

2. Anomen -Dualed Fighter/Cleric that is in the same positon as Jaheira. He can heal himself and others in combat (with Mass Cure) without being slaughtered while waiting for another healer to run up and save him. He also has pretty good offensive spells in later levels, and his Turn Undead ability is a MUST HAVE. He works exeptionally well when he duals with Crom Faeyr and the Mace of Distruption, but I prefer a shield for defence.

3. Main Charactor -No matter what your class, I found it best to put your PC here. This way you have less of a chance to be attacked from behind, and if you're a spell caster you have easy access to those Point Blank spells and you can get emergency aid to your Front Liners. I played a Totemic Druid.

4. Yoshimo -Bounty Hunter with awesome shooting abilities. Like all thieves, keep him up in middle to max out on his range.You can replace this spot with Immie later.

5. Jan -Multi Thief/Illusionist. With his turnips and so forth, how can you go wrong with him? You gotta have Jan in your party!

6. Viconia -Cleric. I used shadow Keeper to change her alignment into Nuetral and made her a Priest of Helm, but that's cheating and I don't care. She's got pretty much the same spells as Anomen, but she's more restricted because she doesn't have and Fighter abilities. Instead of loading her up on defence spells, you may want to put a mix of both in just for that extra kick in the pants.

And this, my friends, in my Nuetral-based group. Flexible, and at the same time you get a lot of the best dialogues in the game (Anomen and Jan, Jan and Viconia, Yoshimo and Jan...see a pattern?) but however you want to play is your thing. I just love my Priests!

Powergaming with ToB installed:
Cavalier
Ranger/cleric multi
Fighter/thief multi (halfling)
Fighter/Illusionist multi
Blade
Sorceror

Playing with NPC's it is fun to try different combinations. I too noticed that melee heavy parties tend to be very easy.

@ Bruce; why not an undead hunter or inquisitor?

It could have been an Undead hunter instead of a cavalier I guess. I didn't want an Inquisitor because I wanted the Paladin to be able to turn undead since my multi r/c will level slowly. Also since I would be using a lot of magic the dispel from the Inquisitor would make it more difficult. Eventually the Blade will have a very potent remove magic which is better than dispel. I think the cavalier has better immunities than the undead hunter IMO so thats why.

When you start talking about characters that have over 4 million experience points, I find that a party of dual-class and single-class characters is more effective than a party of multi-class characters, mainly because of their advantage in level. You should make your party diverse and keep it well-balanced, but it's important for individual party members to specialize instead of being mediocre at everything.

Cavalier

@ Bruce:
I see - I take your point about the inquisitors dispel. I've never really looked at the Cav. kit properly before, looks very interesting...remove fear once per level would be really useful and they're immune to poison too...however not sure if the undead hunter's immunities don't have the edge though. Still, the cav's missile weapon ban is more in keeping with the traditional view of the paladin IMO.

It is a close call between them i agree. For me it is the resistances to elemental damage that gives the Cavalier the edge.
The reasoning behind my party is this.
In a party of six I want
A high level mage-- Sorceror
High level turn undead -- Cavalier
High level thief abilities -- F/T and Blade
Thieving skills -- F/T
Bard song -- Blade
And as many fighters as possible, in this Case 4 with fighter HLA.
Now a dual classed fighter/thief is no way near as good as a multiclass f/t IMO.
R/C and F/M is close but since the role I want to fill is the fighter role the multi is better.
In the game most of the encounters is handled best by melee and melee is handled best by fighters.
Well this is how I see it from a powergaming point of view.

Vondondu,

I modeled my party the way I did in anticipation of ToB, having my first couple of runs through SoA be not exactly what I wanted to carry over to ToB. As far as Inquisitor's spells are concerned, I totally agree and should have mentioned that Keldorn's dispel was one of my most used spells (4 @ lvl 16 +3 from carsomyr = 7 DISPELS!!!) and usually after 1 he starts to hit the mage and either casting failure or dispel effects from the sword occur. I am curious about the NPC in ToB because like I said Mazzy is my least favorite and the only one who seems to have conflicts with other party members.

In response to me being an evil char. after blackrazor, I have been lawful-evil since the getgo, so I figured I was roleplaying and I simply look at it like this -- Lawful evil means you try to benefit yourself first and foremost, so I take the badass people and let them earn me a truckload of money -- I think I finished with over 100K and most of my party had hit the exp. cap of 2.95 million. Anyone know how to take it off?

Anyone know how to take it off?

Install ToB. You can carry on SoA games as normal. A few items will have changed characteristics (and one in particular).

In response to me being an evil char. after blackrazor, I have been lawful-evil since the getgo, so I figured I was roleplaying and I simply look at it like this -- Lawful evil means you try to benefit yourself first and foremost,

To me, benefiting yourself at the expense of everything else describes neutral evil rather than lawful evil. IMO the lawful evil character's raison d'etre would be the advancement of evil institutions such as temples to dark gods, evil heads of state, my local gym etc. But I'm just being picky as the game doesn't really acknowledge differences within good and evil...infact within in the game there are really only two alignments - good and evil.

Querschen, you are obviously making intelligent choices and planning ahead, and I think it's great that you're playing the game your own way.

If you're playing an evil character, then you made the right choice when you acquired Blackrazor. But which party member did you sacrifice when you faced the Test of Selfishness? I couldn't tell what alignment you were by looking at your party. I'm surprised you didn't kill Valygar for the Cowled Wizards since your character is Lawful Evil. Of course, you would have had to kill Mazzy and Keldorn, too, if you did that.

It's easy to take the level cap off. TeamBG has a small file you can put in your override directly that sets the experience cap to something like -1, which effectively disables it. I don't have a link to it, but it shouldn't be hard to find if you use a search engine.

I'm glad you're curious about the new NPC in ToB, but I'm not going to spoil it for you. You'll meet him very early in the game. I think you and he will get along very well.

BTW, in ToB, no one will leave your party even if they complain about the path you're taking, and they won't try to kill each other even if they don't get along. I think they're afraid of making your main character angry.

@Bruce - I'm playing with a very similar party right now.
I have the Valen Mod installed, which gives me Valen and the AP kit.
The party:
Blade
Sorcerer
Ranger/Cleric (Multi)
Valen (Fighter/Thief Multi, a vampire )
Anti-Paladin
Archer

The only thing i miss is Turn-Undead...
And, BTW, do you think i should go for a dual R/C?