Review Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn Retrospective Review

[jiujitsu]

I liked BG's pause and play combat a lot. It was my first rpg, though. So, I'm biased in that regard.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

It was the other way around for me. Encounter boss -> hide and wait for about 10 fucking minutes till his shield spell times out -> repeat until he is out of shield spells -> attack and win.

It's certainly the game's fault that you're too stupid to come up with something more elaborate than this pathetic way to "win" encounters.

Except some bosses have infinite shield time.

Care to name but one? There is not A SINGLE ONE who has "infinite shield time"; whatever that's supposed to mean in the first place.

And some idiots claim it had a good encounter design...yeah, right.

Well, given the fact that you seem pretty clueless to begin with I think it's safe to assume that you don't have a clue what good encounter-design is as well.
Here's an example:

Dragon Age, the derp roads:
- first room: 8 darkspawns, among them 2 mages
- second room: 6 darkspawns, 1 dorkspawn mage
- third room: 8 dorks again, 2 mages
- after 20 rooms you get to a new area and the dorkspawn cycle begins again

Not only do you fight the same encounter again and again, the difficulty and pacing remains constant as well. The result is boredom eventually.

BG2 does it differently, not only are encounters more varied, they also give an opportunity to be solved most efficiently by using different approaches/party members, plus the difficulty and pacing changes frequently from very easy up to pretty hard making the whole affair more interesting. let's have a look at Firkraags dungeon:
- Orks/Bugbears, easy
- shadows, leveldraining, moderate, better be somehow protected from leveldrain
- kamikaze kobolds, r00fles!
- Orks firing arrows at you, you can only reach them by spotting 2 hidden doors and lockpick said doors, actually very easy
- golems, some require certain forms of damage, can be quite hard if an adamantine golem is among them
- vampires, can level drain
- shadows, also leveldraining
- a few more orcs, cannon fodder
- some efreeti, easy if you just prepare one of your party with fire immunity
- an elder beholder, moderate difficulty
- an adventuring party that wants to kill you, can be challenging
- werewolfs/greater werewolfs, easy
- a water elemental
- golems again
- wolfweres
- adamantite golem plus some other golems
- Firkraags lieutenants, easy
- a single high level mage, depends, probably extremely difficult if all you can do is to wait for the "infinite shield time" to expire
- Firkraag himself

Yes, this single dungeon in BG2 has more variety in encounters and difficulty than the whole derp roads combined.

Not to mention the whole "balanced for characters of level 20+" mentality.

Except the game isn't "balanced for characters of level 20+", dimwit.
The first few areas are clearly balanced for a party < lvl10, whereas the majority of areas available in chapter 2/3 are balanced for parties around lvl11-13. Since your party will soon exceed those levels the remaining areas will typically be a cakewalk, safe for certain encounters where additional enemies get added if your level is high enough.

What kind of ridiculous retardedness is that ???

Ridiculous retardedness? Do you have it? Of course you do.
Fear not, BioWare has addressed those problems long since, in our awesome next-gen RPGs all you'll have to do is mash your button and zing! you can watch the next cutscene, play the next dialogue minigame and continue the elven gay romance that makes you so giddy.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

What's with everyone reviewing old games as of late?

Game reviewers are trying to build "street cred" by playing old classics.

Somehow they think that'll result in them being taken seriously.

If there ever was a good game reviewer around, I'm confident he hasn't been in the reviewing business for 15+ years.

 

[Volrath]

Encounter design in BG2 was brilliant, combat itself however was shit.

 

[Quilty]

Isn't there a mod for BG2 that drastically increases the difficulty of the encounters? Ascendancy or something like that?

 

[Melcar]

BG2 Stratagems. The Ascension mod also increases the difficulty and/or changes the boss battles in ToB.

 

[Xor]

It's Sword Coast Stratagems, brah. SCS2 for BG2.

- an adventuring party that wants to kill you, can be challenging

I remember one playthrough where I remembered this group, so I set 10 skull traps in the hallway where they spawn and when they turned hostile they all died instantly. Ah, good times.

 

[SCO]

What's with everyone reviewing old games as of late?

Game reviewers are trying to build "street cred" by playing old classics.

Somehow they think that'll result in them being taken seriously.

If there ever was a good game reviewer around, I'm confident he hasn't been in the reviewing business for 15+ years.

Amiga magazines.

 

[Quilty]

It's Sword Coast Stratagems, brah. SCS2 for BG2.

- an adventuring party that wants to kill you, can be challenging

I remember one playthrough where I remembered this group, so I set 10 skull traps in the hallway where they spawn and when they turned hostile they all died instantly. Ah, good times.

I did something like this to Firkraag with a wand of cloudkill, IIRC. I felt filthy for the rest of the game. I really should go back and replay it. What the codex's opinion on stratagems? I'm looking for a mod that will really whip my ass, I don't want to blaze through the game like I did the last time I played. It would be cool if the game had Heart of Fury mode.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

I did something like this to Firkraag with a wand of cloudkill, IIRC. I felt filthy for the rest of the game. I really should go back and replay it. What the codex's opinion on stratagems? I'm looking for a mod that will really whip my ass, I don't want to blaze through the game like I did the last time I played. It would be cool if the game had Heart of Fury mode.

If you don't pussy out and install it with full options to enhance enemies, e.g.
- enhanced devils/demons with non-interruptable innate casting
- enhanced celestials with non-interruptable innate casting
- enemy casters get fully buffed with long-term and short-term buffs when combat starts
- enemy mages/clerics get HLAs when they have the appropriate level

... you're probably in for an interesting experience.

 

[Quilty]

Cool, thanks, man.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

with "interesting experience" I mean you'll get your ass handed on a silver platter. e.g. a Lich isn't fooled by pro undead anymore and is more likely to drop a Dark Planetar on you immediately. Nothing's more funny than to fight a Dark Planetar who's armed with a vorpal sword while being level 12 or so. You can't flee either because he has teleport without error.

 

[Quilty]

Sounds delicious. :D

I'm not sure what kind of party I should use to take on a beast like the Lich you mentioned. Most of the ones in the unmodded game were pretty easy to beat (I think that paladin dude, Keldorn, was pretty useful against them when using Carsomyr). It's good to hear you can't fool them with pro undead, using that against a creature of supposedly legendary power felt way too cheesy. What kind of party would you recommend? I've never used Edwin or Viconia, though I guess a neutral to evil party might miss out on some important exp, so I'm not sure if I should stray from an all-good party.

 

[Relay]

BG2 does it differently, not only are encounters more varied, they also give an opportunity to be solved most efficiently by using different approaches/party members, plus the difficulty and pacing changes frequently from very easy up to pretty hard making the whole affair more interesting. let's have a look at Firkraags dungeon:
- Orks/Bugbears, easy
- shadows, leveldraining, moderate, better be somehow protected from leveldrain
- kamikaze kobolds, r00fles!
- Orks firing arrows at you, you can only reach them by spotting 2 hidden doors and lockpick said doors, actually very easy
- golems, some require certain forms of damage, can be quite hard if an adamantine golem is among them
- vampires, can level drain
- shadows, also leveldraining
- a few more orcs, cannon fodder
- some efreeti, easy if you just prepare one of your party with fire immunity
- an elder beholder, moderate difficulty
- an adventuring party that wants to kill you, can be challenging
- werewolfs/greater werewolfs, easy
- a water elemental
- golems again
- wolfweres
- adamantite golem plus some other golems
- Firkraags lieutenants, easy
- a single high level mage, depends, probably extremely difficult if all you can do is to wait for the "infinite shield time" to expire
- Firkraag himself

Yes, this single dungeon in BG2 has more variety in encounters and difficulty than the whole derp roads combined.

This. Is why BG2 is still a good game and Dragon Age is a huge piece of Brahmin shit. Everything is a human adventuring party in DA. Dorkspawn are a special case of human adventurers, deep down they still work as Fighter/Rogue/Mage with ugly faces. There's nothing quite like the level draining vampires, the golems that won't take damage without magical weapons equipped and so on. There's nothing like the mindfucking Illithids who, if fought in numbers, can paralyze everyone in your party real fast, or the beholders and their various rays, we can go like forever speaking about combat encounters in many D&D based games but there is nothing to say about DA, it's just keeping the constant BORINGSHIT vibe. It's called "Dragon Age" but even dragons in that game are just boring shit, dumb beasts who aren't much in combat (Ser Cauthrien on the other hand..) and lack self awareness vs Firkraag who has manipulated you and a bunch of paladins into killing each other. I can't believe there's a bunch of dumbfucks who are serving this dumb high lizard and calling it the resurrected Andraste.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

Sounds delicious. :D

I'm not sure what kind of party I should use to take on a beast like the Lich you mentioned. Most of the ones in the unmodded game were pretty easy to beat (I think that paladin dude, Keldorn, was pretty useful against them when using Carsomyr). It's good to hear you can't fool them with pro undead, using that against a creature of supposedly legendary power felt way too cheesy. What kind of party would you recommend? I've never used Edwin or Viconia, though I guess a neutral to evil party might miss out on some important exp, so I'm not sure if I should stray from an all-good party.

I wasn't talking about a specific lich, what I said applies to all high level spell casters. Casters do know about the significance of Protection from Magical Weapons spell though, so don't expect Carsomyr to do wonders. Unless you make it work. As for party formation: considering the difficulty it will become very tough for characters with no arcane protection to survive in ToB.

 

[Lonely Vazdru]

You can also try Tactics which massively raises the difficulty of many BG2 fights. I personally hate this mod but many loved it, so if you want blood... you've got it.

 

[Malakal]

You can also try Tactics which massively raises the difficulty of many BG2 fights. I personally hate this mod but many loved it, so if you want blood... you've got it.

I dont reccomend this. Its ridiculous in what it does, sending epic level enemies against You right from the Irenicus Dungeon (planetars included). This mod expects its players to cheese as much as possible and exploit whatever is exploitable.Its not 'tactics' its simply cheating.

 

[Malakal]

Encounter design in BG2 was brilliant, combat itself however was shit.

Spell variety, enemy variety and item variety was extremely good. Only fighters got the short end of the stick, other classes are fine. So if by combat You meant actual swordfighting or other kinds of mellee then yes, its shit (click and forget). But whole combat in bigger picture is good.

 

[Xor]

It's Sword Coast Stratagems, brah. SCS2 for BG2.

- an adventuring party that wants to kill you, can be challenging

I remember one playthrough where I remembered this group, so I set 10 skull traps in the hallway where they spawn and when they turned hostile they all died instantly. Ah, good times.

I did something like this to Firkraag with a wand of cloudkill, IIRC. I felt filthy for the rest of the game. I really should go back and replay it. What the codex's opinion on stratagems? I'm looking for a mod that will really whip my ass, I don't want to blaze through the game like I did the last time I played. It would be cool if the game had Heart of Fury mode.

SCS2 is like getting raped in the ass on every encounter. I couldn't finish the game with it, having to prepare for pretty much every battle with:
scout attempt and die => reload => prepare spells for that encounter and rest => drink potions => buff => save => do the battle 3 or 4 times before I can win without any deaths.

It got really tedious really quickly. This thread is making me want to try again, though, so maybe I'll try it with just the AI improvements and none of the other bullshit.

 

[Carlos' Bitch1]

What's with everyone reviewing old games as of late?

I would say it is all about people subconsciously realising they have lost something. To be honest though, BG2 just doesn't come up on my radar as being old. Not sure why.

I liked the 'lack of voice acting' comment. If only people realised that is one of many reasons why games are becoming ever simpler.

 

[Needles]

let's have a look at Firkraags dungeon:
- Orks/Bugbears, easy
- shadows, leveldraining, moderate, better be somehow protected from leveldrain
- kamikaze kobolds, r00fles!
- Orks firing arrows at you, you can only reach them by spotting 2 hidden doors and lockpick said doors, actually very easy
- golems, some require certain forms of damage, can be quite hard if an adamantine golem is among them
- vampires, can level drain
- shadows, also leveldraining
- a few more orcs, cannon fodder
- some efreeti, easy if you just prepare one of your party with fire immunity
- an elder beholder, moderate difficulty
- an adventuring party that wants to kill you, can be challenging
- werewolfs/greater werewolfs, easy
- a water elemental
- golems again
- wolfweres
- adamantite golem plus some other golems
- Firkraags lieutenants, easy
- a single high level mage, depends, probably extremely difficult if all you can do is to wait for the "infinite shield time" to expire
- Firkraag himself

Trashmobs with varying visuals and some ability differences, which don't really matter because you annihilate them without using any sort of tactic.

I will concede Firkraag though, especially when you encounter him at a low level and don't use traps, which of course are self-imposed limitations, and should not be taken for granted when talking about encounter quality.

That and some of the party vs. party fights are OK i guess (again only when they happen fairly early).

I think one could even make the case that BG2 boss encounter design is equal(ly bad) as DA:Os.


edit:

- golems, some require certain forms of damage, can be quite hard if an adamantine golem is among them

The beginning of levelscaling

 

[Lonely Vazdru]

you annihilate them without using any sort of tactic.

Now, that's hyperbole.
You could have added "whatsoever" at the end though.

 

[The Feral Kid]

I think encounter design was, generally, better in Baldur's Gate 1 with all the adventuring parties that were out to get you. In BG 2 you mostly fought against hordes of monsters which is kinda boring. With the exception of 2-3 encounters including the Guarded Compound one in Athkatla which is the most memorable (and probably the toughest but also most rewarding) battle in the entire series. Also the abundance of magic items ruined a lot of the fun in BG 2. BG 1 was far more balanced in that aspect.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

Trashmobs with varying visuals and some ability differences, which don't really matter because you annihilate them without using any sort of tactic.

1) My point was that the encounters - even trashmobs - offered variety
2) While most of the encounters I listed are easy, some are challenging too btw prebuffing ie preparing is also a form of tactic

That reminds me of the last time someone explained to me how BG2 combat was generally piss easy. His example was the D'Arnise keep, the room full of golems, he had obviously problems to defeat them so he send in an invisible thief who looted the stuff without triggering the golems attention: see? Piss easy combat derp derp.

I will concede Firkraag though, especially when you encounter him at a low level and don't use traps, which of course are self-imposed limitations, and should not be taken for granted when talking about encounter quality.

That and some of the party vs. party fights are OK i guess (again only when they happen fairly early).

You have a point with those self-imposed limitations, of course you can ruin the experience by using all those cheater methods, spike traps, scrolls of pro magic/undead, the anti beholder shield etc and since "winning" encounters that way isn't rewarding you can then complain. Bio is certainly to blame for even including that shit. But as it so often happens mods can fix it! SCS2.

I think one could even make the case that BG2 boss encounter design is equal(ly bad) as DA:Os.

No, one couldn't.

The beginning of levelscaling

I'd rather call it encounter scaling. The enemies don't scale, there are just more powerful enemies added.

 

[Malakal]

I think encounter design was, generally, better in Baldur's Gate 1 with all the adventuring parties that were out to get you. In BG 2 you mostly fought against hordes of monsters which is kinda boring. With the exception of 2-3 encounters including the Guarded Compound one in Athkatla which is the most memorable (and probably the toughest but also most rewarding) battle in the entire series. Also the abundance of magic items ruined a lot of the fun in BG 2. BG 1 was far more balanced in that aspect.

BG1 offers such gems like endless combat with Xvarts, kobolds, gnolls and other trash mobs. Just read the LP that we have here for accurate description.

BG2 has excellent fights with all dragons, liches (quite plentiful), adventuring parties (less common but included) and demons.
Also challenging enemies like golems and vampires, beholdres and ithlids.

Guarded Compound the most memorable fight? Dont be ridiculous. Twisted Rune? Kangaxx? Firkraag no cheese? Even Irenicus hell version was quite interesting. And all mage duels.