Tahia or Kelsey

Stilgar · Post by **Stilgar** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 8:46 am

Both are sorcerer NPC's wich one gives the most fun to play?

SP101 · Post by **SP101** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 8:49 am

Tashia as a REALLY powerfull pet, and Kelsey have nothing really useful.

If you want the game to be a little more challenging, get Kelsey. Tashia spells when you pick her are really great BTW.

Nightmare · Post by **Nightmare** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 9:09 am

Tashia is supposed to be a bit overpowered. Kelsey is nicely balanced to fit the game.

SP101 · Post by **SP101** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 9:15 am

But her pet is soooooo usefull against liches and powerful mages (Especially at the Twisted Rune

)

Nightmare · Post by **Nightmare** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 9:26 am

I suppose its all a matter of taste and playing style. I personally dislike her pet's immunity to Time Stop, as I don't think ANYONE should have that immunity.

Also, the AI in the game doesn't properly compensate for this immunity, so her pet can attack the mages while they're just casting spells.

Again, just a matter of style. I find it ridiculously overpowered, much like the weapons in ToB, and its not my style of play.

dragon wench · Post by **dragon wench** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 9:52 am

The thing is.. and this goes for many uber items and such, there is *nothing* arm twisting you into using them except your own weak will. Moreover, if you think an NPC is over-powered, you *can* use SK to adjust their ability scores to something you consider more realistic

[rant mode]Throughout these forums there are all kinds of comments about "x" or "y" being too uber. To be honest, I sometimes wonder if some of these statements are more the result of ego, because one implicit meaning behind them is "I'm an amazingly skilled and macho gamer, and therefore I don't need anything special to get through the game..."

I'm not saying, that everybody who vociferously objects to 'cheese' or 'uberness' is in this category, some people are simply purists (or they just prefer more of a challenge), but it is certainly evident in many cases. My feeling is, you do have choice, you do not have to use this stuff. If you really want to, you can equip your entire party with no higher than basic studded leather and ordinary weapons with the difficulty set at insane. The game developers were giving people choice, and obviously they wanted to sell the game, which meant appealing to a broad market, one that extended beyond the purist pen & paper Dungeons and Dragons community. (yes, I know there is nothing immune to Timestop in the unmodded, original game, but this same complaint is levelled against items that are legitimately part of SoA. As I said above, there is nothing forcing you to use this stuff and if you are incapable of resisting temptation that is *your* problem) [/rant mode]

Last night I completed the Twisted Rune with my roughly level 14 party (already been to the Underdark). At first I did use Tashia's pet, and the battle was relatively simple. However, it did not seem especially challenging, so I reloaded my autosave and did it again... I still managed to successfully beat the quest, but it was much more fun

To answer the question though, it really depends on what you want and the sort of characters you want to travel with. Because you do have choice in terms of adjusting 'uberness' I select my NPCs based on personality. Kelsey (from the romance perspective, not sure what he's like outside that) is a friendly, chatty, and entirely believable guy. Tashia (and this is as just a regular, non-romance NPC), is somewhat elusive and a little mysterious. Owing to her story, she has a very real melancholy quality about her; however, she isn't excessively dark and brooding, in fact she has a very pleasant personality.

GNGSpam · Post by **GNGSpam** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 10:24 am

The major issue with Tashia's pet and its time stop immunity is that such an immunity was never conceived of, and therefore not taken into account, by the programmers. Therefore it breaks all the "routines" for all of the battles.

Ideally, if 1 thing had time stop immunity, the first thing a mage with time stop should do is....

Disable the pet/character. But since the game designers never conceived of anything with time stop immunity, no mage is programmed to disable the pet before they cast timestop. They cast timestop as normal and sit there with failing spell after spell

we having fun yet? Considering the awful amount of cheese in the game, do we really need MORE cheese?

But this brings up point two. I love BG2 (no that isnt point #2). But lets be frank here, even IF there were a pet in the original bg2 that was immune to time stop, I doubt many of the battles would be appropiately programmed to combat that immunity (even if the game designers tried). I mean the fact is, there IS a ton of stinky cheese in the game because the AI controlled characters just can't think worth a darn. So to make battles hard designers often resort to cheese of their own, and then it gets into a whose got the bigger block of cheese (whats the cheese count for this thread I wonder?)

So. Ideally, Tashia's pet is total cheese and shouldn't be used. Practically, the game is as ridiculous if not more so in many other ways, so what difference does it really make?

Its kind of ironic in this world of making fantasy more "alive" through computer games and such, you still have to use your imagination and set up rules in your own mind an awful lot to make it all work.

Nightmare · Post by **Nightmare** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 10:47 am

For me, I agree with DW that battles that are VERY hard are much more fun. In my current party, it took me a while and many reloads to beat Firkraag, but I did it without cheese, and it was a feeling of elation.

I remember in the last battle in IWD, I beat the final boss with only one character left alive, and he only had 9 HP left.

Baldursgate Fan · Post by **Baldursgate Fan** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 11:00 am

[QUOTE=SP101]But her pet is soooooo usefull against liches and powerful mages (Especially at the Twisted Rune

)[/QUOTE]

I have been out of the loop for a while now.

Kelsey is the one for me, though I have taken both of them in a mage heavy party. I have absolutely no idea that her pet can be used against liches.

How does it work?

FireLighter · Post by **FireLighter** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 1:48 pm

her pet is good against liches because they are immune to timestop and can interrupt liches from casting gate, and symbols while in timestop.

Thrain · Post by **Thrain** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 2:45 pm

to clear that up, the pet is immune to timestop (an ability NO character should possess)

dragon wench · Post by **dragon wench** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 3:07 pm

[QUOTE=Thrain]to clear that up, the pet is immune to timestop (an ability NO character should possess)[/QUOTE]I agree, but simply don't summon the cat...

Thrain · Post by **Thrain** » Fri Jul 09, 2004 4:29 am

that''s fair enough. but it's still there...

Mr.Waesel · Post by **Mr.Waesel** » Fri Jul 09, 2004 7:11 am

I have them both in my party, and I've only used the cat against really difficlut fights that I can't win otherwise. (and usually it only serves to buy time there)

Ekental · Post by **Ekental** » Fri Jul 09, 2004 11:18 pm

[QUOTE=Thrain]that''s fair enough. but it's still there...[/QUOTE]
I've got Tashia in my party and I noted that the cat was kinda cheap too. Since I noticed that I also noticed that all that I really had to do is NOT use it.... the thing just being there does not require you to use it (if your real curious maybe you use it once just to see what it does)

Thrain · Post by **Thrain** » Sat Jul 10, 2004 6:39 am

not all of us have that self control

say you're trying to beat the draconis for the umpteenth time. he's getting you really frustrated. tashia's pet kinda calls to you, begging you to use her...

SP101 · Post by **SP101** » Sat Jul 10, 2004 11:06 am

I stopped using the cat when I killed Irenicus Dragon without being hurt...

Tashia : Summon her Pet
Tashia : Cast Haste on it
Tashia : Time Stop
Pet & Tashia : Move to the Dragon
Pet : Attack
Tashia : Refresh her time stop every 12 second or so...

Ekental · Post by **Ekental** » Sat Jul 10, 2004 6:38 pm

I get your point, but the forums are where you go if you have trouble and don't want to do something "cheap". I would argue that no matter how frustrated you are, if you are really committed to NOT using Tashia's pet then you wont use it.
Im sure that if you really wanted to beat Draconis bad enough that you would consider using the pet when you made a vow not to use it, then you would also be considering the ctrl-y option or some other sort of cheese.