GameBanshee Forums

After finally finishing my tour of Bioware’s D&D games (BG, BG2, IWD & IWD2) you’d think I’d need a break, right? Nope, I’m diving right into TOEE instead. I’m hoping to experiment with some character classes that I haven’t used yet but do you think they have enough muscle?

1. Human or Dwarf tank. I’ve opted not to use a Paladin in my group so I’m thinking of Fighter 10 or maybe mixing in some Cleric levels for extra color to end up as 8/2 or even 6/4. The Cleric levels would trade 1-2 feats and 1 point of BAB for the spells and domain abilities (luck and travel look useful).

2. Half-Orc barbarian/fighter/rogue with 3 levels of rogue and 2 levels of fighter. I’m thinking of staying in medium armor to keep the extra mobility but building the character with a tank-orientation. I’ve seen differing opinions on the value of mobility though.

3. Pure Druid. I’ve never used one so I’m curious to try. My biggest question here is whether their abilities, spells and companions make up for the limitations on weapons and armor. I started a game and played around with one but its hard to tell at 1st level.

4. Pure Wizard. I loved my sorcerer in IWD2 but I suspect that the party needs the flexibility of the wizard.

5. A bard for my party spokesperson. This character may not be necessary but it looks like bards may actually be quite fun and useful in this game and would force me to start using all the mind-control spells. I’m thinking of mixing in 1 to 3 levels of some combination of rogue, fighter or even ranger.

I am a little worried that I only have one guy in heavy armor though. So I’m guessing that Lord Plothos would suggest making one of the first two guys into a F7/Rg3 tank-spokesperson character and skipping the Bard? Any suggestions or comments about this group would be great!

Thanks again,
ishuman

1. Dwarfs are good tanks. They're slower than most races, but heavy armor doesn't slow them any further, so they can wear plate and carry a heavy load without penalties in that regard. There are also a fair number of giants in the game, so the +4 dodge bonus to AC against gianst that dwarfs get is no small thing. The only thing is, if you fully enchant one kind of armor, and if your dex is high enough, your AC is the same in a suit of light armor as it is in fully enchanted full plate. So you could have a human barbarian with a high dex with the same AC as your dwarf tank that has DOUBLE the movement of your dwarf. He doesn't get the bonus against giants, but he gets an extra feat. So it kinda depends on how you want to wrangle your stats. If you give your guys really high stats, because of the armor available in the game, dwarfs kinda lose a major racial benefit, and as a result are among the less-useful races. (Again, that's IF you give your guys high stats. If high dex isn't happening, the dwarf will have a higher AC, unless you give the human full plate too, in which case he'd have the same movement as the dwarf.)

2. This is a nice build. You get 2 bonus feats, can't be flanked, and get +2d6 sneak damage. Plus you get 40 movement in light armor (and that cool armor I just talked about is light). Even medium armor just drops you back to 30. Movement is not unimportant. It's definitely a big consideration, and one of the coolest things about monks is with high tumble and huge movement they can flit around and help you flank all over the place. The only downside is the confined spaces in the temple restrict movement a lot, and you're going to need tumble to use your movement to full advantage. A half-orc fighter probably won't be seeing much tumble, so you'll want to use your rogue levels to get it, but then you lose out on the chance to make him your spokesperson. With a lowered charisma, he's probably not your first choice for a spokesperson anyway, though, so maybe that's a non-issue. But a human would keep his charisma and get extra skill points, though he'd lose the strength bump.

3. Only messed with a druid a couple times, and didn't find the class all that useful. They're the best person to craft items with, if you have only one, but I always have a cleric and a wizard doing that, so... Anyway, their wildshape is nerfed compared to the pnp version of 3.5, where gear can be worn/used by a dire bear-shaped druid. But they have a decent spell selection and can fight better than wizards, so they're certainly not bad.

4. Wizards are nice because crafting is such a huge issue in ToEE. Also, the fewer spells per day is not a big deal, because resting isn't hard to do, and crafting wands and scrolls is an easy way to supplement their punch. Sorcs are nice, but have too few spells to craft well, and that's a big down-side, IMO.

5. Bards are fun, but I find that the first bard level is by far the most useful one, because you get inspire courage. A bard 1, rogue 3, ranger 6 would be a great spokesperson that could add some nice archery support. But remember that to use a bow effectively you'll need point blank shot and then precise shot and a high dex, which in turn probably causes dex to be higher than strength, making weapon finesse a tempting feat, so you'll probably want to go human here. The extra feat and skill points would fit really well with this level combo.

If you do have a guy that's useful as a spokesperson, like a Ftr7/Rog3, then a pure bard drops very much in his usefullness. Bards in D&D are more useful outside of combat than inside, and with ToEE's focus on combat that reduces bard usefullness still further, IMO. That said, I know lots of people love using bards in ToEE, so maybe I just missed something when I've used them. But 1 level of bard is great.

Finally, don't forget monks. If you're doing high stats especially, monks can have an AC comparable to any tank fighter, and they're really fast. Evasion lets them avoid spell problems, to go with their good saves in all 3 categories. Plus with tumble they can get out of trouble really easy. They're great for jumping in and running around enemies to set up flanking for your fighter/rogues and such, and they wind up getting swarmed, so it's nice that they can survive this (at higher levels). Plus they can trip and stun, and best of all can use the best weapon in the game: the great cleaver (which for some reason is a handaxe). They're hard to keep alive at low levels, but a monk 10 with good stats is going to be one of your strongest, most mobile, and longest-lasting characters. They actually make great tanks. But with lower stats they're not quite so uber, because their AC starts to drop off. (Don't forget: wizards can use mage armor on the monk!)