Party transfer tips & recommendations for RPG series

[KeighnMcDeath]

Damn, I must've forgot to try the Curse to Savage on my c64.

 

[The Avatar]

Baldur's Gate transfer is a good example of how to do character transfer well, but sadly, one of the last series to do so, as for some reason most games decided to stop doing that at the start of the century. You start out a few levels higher in BG2, but will quickly make that up with a new party. You also get to keep a few good items from the first game, but only some of them and nothing too overpowering. Importing gives you an advantage, but not too much of one.

 

[Erebus]

Transfering your characters from Ishar to Ishar 2 is possible and I think that it makes the beginning of the game easier. But it's not very satisfying because the psychology system is even more annoying than in the first game. The fact that your characters have faced countless dangers together in the first game should logically make them a united team in the sequel, but it's absolutely not the case : they'll engage in so much infighting that it'll be better to fire half of them and replace them with more compatible newcomers.

 

[Norfleet]

Most games opt not to continue the story of the previous character and instead start a new character, is why. Otherwise the new game would end up entirely skipping all of the low-level gameplay, as they'd have to offer starting at a higher level.

Level systems are, essentially, toxic to character continuance, although some games, even relatively recent ones, still had it: NWN and NWN2 both continued the main character's story in their expansions, in the latter case, retconning the entire "Rocks Fall, Everybody Dies".

 

[Viata]

they'll engage in so much infighting

Maybe they are just tired of being together. After a whole game, they don't want to see each other anymore. But yeah, it would be better if transfer the party would remove the infighting.

 

[Rincewind]

Great tips so far, keep them coming! I've updated the first post with all the concrete info we have so far (with some minor edits).

 

[deuxhero]

Some more modern examples way later than the OP games:
Golden Sun requires a 100% complete save be transfered to fully complete all the sidequests in the second game (heavy glitches that may be TAS only can bypass this, but not anyway to do it legit). It has no real balance impact since the bonuses only apply after 3/4ths+ of the game is completed anyways.

Dragon Ball Xenoverse has this. It lets you transfer currently equipped stuff from the original game. It greatly reduces early tedium to start with a better ki charge skill, but it doesn't do anything unique as far as I know and 1: the first game is tedious on its own compared to 2 2: the second retreads so much of the original, but better, you're not even missing anything.

Various Armored Core games let you transfer obtained stuff forward, at least within the same sub-series. This ranges from neat, to pointless, to virtually required (Last Raven)

 

[Rincewind]

Some more modern examples way later than the OP games:
Golden Sun requires a 100% complete save be transfered to fully complete all the sidequests in the second game (heavy glitches that may be TAS only can bypass this, but not anyway to do it legit). It has no real balance impact since the bonuses only apply after 3/4ths+ of the game is completed anyways.

Dragon Ball Xenoverse has this. It lets you transfer currently equipped stuff from the original game. It greatly reduces early tedium to start with a better ki charge skill, but it doesn't do anything unique as far as I know and 1: the first game is tedious on its own compared to 2 2: the second retreads so much of the original, but better, you're not even missing anything.

Various Armored Core games let you transfer obtained stuff forward, at least within the same sub-series. This ranges from neat, to pointless, to virtually required (Last Raven)

Cheers, good to see some more recent games have party transfer mechanics. The list is supposed to be about classic Western RPGs on home computers, though; I even vacillated a bit before including Baldur's Gate

There's Banner Saga too, and you can import your char from Witcher 1 to 2, but those are too recent examples for my taste (hence not "classic").

 

[mondblut]

Baldur's Gate transfer is a good example of how to do character transfer well

You mean the "we decided to kill half of your party members offscreen for no apparent reason" Baldur's Gate, right?

 

[mediocrepoet]

Baldur's Gate transfer is a good example of how to do character transfer well

You mean the "we decided to kill half of your party members offscreen for no apparent reason" Baldur's Gate, right?

Yeah, Bioware finally perfected the formula in the Mass Effect trilogy. And there's also the groundbreaking version of importing perfected by Bioware in the Dragon Age series.

 

[octavius]

even the first town is really too brutal for a new party.

Hm, I just grinded level or two just in the inn. Skeleton closet was very useful too.

Let's just say starting as lvl 1 is nice if you want a real challenge.

There's also some difference between DOS and Amiga versions. The DOS version seems to have fewer fixed encounters in the starting town. In the Amiga version, there's one place you always face 3 Men-At-Arms and another place where you always meet several Sludge Beasts, for example. The latter is virtually impossible for a lvl 1 party to defeat, and you are forced to start with lvl 1 characters.

It's possible my own memory is muddled with having played the Amiga version so much and that I overestimate the difficulty. And it's ironic that it's the DOS version which has more level scaling, so you avoid those unwinnable fights.

Anyway the ending of MM1 clearly indicates it's the same party, and the DOS version scales well for a lvl 7 party. The only negative thing is stats being capped, but IIRC it's like 21 or something, which is the maximum a new character can start with.

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

Interesting.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

any tips for importing shepard into mass effect 2 from 1?

 

[koyota]

any tips for importing shepard into mass effect 2 from 1?

Mass Effect 1 has become less of an RPG in the Legendary edition. You can`t import Mass Effect 1 OG saves into the LE.
Finish Mass Effect 1 OG, purchase the original Mass Effect 2 (I bought it for like $1.2 on Key Reseller sites just for this).
Import into into Mass Effect 2 original, then use that save in the LE.

Besides the major choices you made in the game being imported, nothing really effects anything in ME 2 except giving you some extra money.

 

[FriendlyMerchant]

Baldur's Gate transfer is a good example of how to do character transfer well, but sadly, one of the last series to do so, as for some reason most games decided to stop doing that at the start of the century. You start out a few levels higher in BG2, but will quickly make that up with a new party. You also get to keep a few good items from the first game, but only some of them and nothing too overpowering. Importing gives you an advantage, but not too much of one.

Neverwinter Nights 1+2 also did character transfers. The main campaign and expansion campaigns for NWN1 were structured around either creating a new character for each chapter or importing a character exported from the previous chapter.

 

[Pink Eye]

Not a classic RPG but I've always wondered how importing in the Dragon Age games works. I beat Dragon Age Origins and 2 a long long time ago on the xbox 360, but never knew if you could import Origins character to 2. And if you can do that. What does it change? You play as Hawke in the second game in a new city, so I'm not sure if importing will do anything. Reason why I'm asking is because the feature is in Mass Effect so maybe it's in the Dragon Age games too.

Also. What about Dragon Age Inquisition. Is importing supported in that one. I never got to play it cause the idiots who made the game had a bright idea of making you download stuff online. So if you bought xbox 360 CD like any normal person. You needed internet connectivity otherwise your game won't work. That was so dumb cause I didn't have internet and couldn't get my game to work. I was so sad. I wasted about 60 bucks on a broken game. Never bought another Bioware game because they sold me a product that didn't work. Bastards. They deserved all the controversies they got.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Not a classic RPG but I've always wondered how importing in the Dragon Age games works. I beat Dragon Age Origins and 2 a long long time ago on the xbox 360, but never knew if you could import Origins character to 2. And if you can do that. What does it change? You play as Hawke in the second game in a new city, so I'm not sure if importing will do anything. Reason why I'm asking is because the feature is in Mass Effect so maybe it's in the Dragon Age games too.

Also. What about Dragon Age Inquisition. Is importing supported in that one. I never got to play it cause the idiots who made the game had a bright idea of making you download stuff online. So if you bought xbox 360 CD like any normal person. You needed internet connectivity otherwise your game won't work. That was so dumb cause I didn't have internet and couldn't get my game to work. I was so sad. I wasted about 60 bucks on a broken game. Never bought another Bioware game because they sold me a product that didn't work. Bastards. They deserved all the controversies they got.

DA2 is crap so it doesn't really matter.

DAO actually has some decent modules that come with it that I've rarely ever seen discussed but are worth playing. Your character from the main campaign is exported to play those, works like NWN. One of them(Leliana's Song or somesuch) is meant to be played before the main campaign btw.

 

[Rincewind]

Kind of torn whether to remove "classic" from the first post and the thread's title, and include Mass Effect, Neverwinter Nights, Dragon Age, etc.

Hmmm, probably not.

 

[Nifft Batuff]

Kind of torn whether to remove "classic" from the first post and the thread's title, and include Mass Effect, Neverwinter Nights, Dragon Age, etc.

Hmmm, probably not.

Non-indie western RPGs made during the 2005-2015 should be removed from any threads.

 

[Stoned Ape]

It was possible to transfer a character from the C64 version of Curse of the Azure bonds to Hillsfar with an ion stone of dexterity equipped.

This would keep the +1 dexterity increase for Hillsfar, but there were no items in Hillsfar so the fact it was grated by the ion stone was ignored.

When you transferred the character back into Curse, it would keep the dexterity boost, but put the ion stone bonus back on as well.

You could keep importing back an forth until the character's dexterity hit 24.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Kind of torn whether to remove "classic" from the first post and the thread's title, and include Mass Effect, Neverwinter Nights, Dragon Age, etc.

Hmmm, probably not.

mass effect is older now than pool of radiance was when this site was created
these are boomer classics now

ah yeah, mass effect, now that was a REAL game... they just don't make 'em like they used to...

 

[Rincewind]

Okay, made an executive decision to include any western RPG series that has any sort of character transfer mechanism from one instalment to the next. The reason being we're not swamped with such games anyway, so why not try to make the list exhaustive then, regardless of the year of release. Still strictly no anime, though.

Added the following plus made a few minor edits:

• Banner Saga, The
• Dragon Age
• Gold Box: Buck Rogers Countdown to Doomsday → Matrix Cubed
• Knights of the Old Republic (participation award)
• Mass Effect
• Neverwinter Nights
• Pillars of Eternity
• Witcher, The (participation award)

Neverwinter Nights 1+2 also did character transfers.

So does that mean that you could transfer your party from 1 into 2 as well? (in addition to importing your party from one chapter to another within a single game)

 

[Rincewind]

Huh, that's a new "feature"? I typed "a n i m e" in my above post, which got replaced with: anime

 

[FriendlyMerchant]

Neverwinter Nights 1+2 also did character transfers.

So does that mean that you could transfer your party from 1 into 2 as well? (in addition to importing your party from one chapter to another within a single game)

You can't transfer between games. NWN2 is on a different engine and uses the 3.5 ruleset instead of the 3.0 ruleset, and I think the file formatting is different anyways. Completely different graphics and models too. But within the game, you can transfer between modules.

 

[Rincewind]

But within the game, you can transfer between modules.

Is that true for NWN2 as well, or only for the first game?