Baldur's Gate The Baldur's Gate Series Thread

[Tigranes]

Not even steal, later on like every other RPG you have millions of monies so you can just buy it back.

That said, you don't need to be spamming wands 50 times per battle to play the game on Insane. The key is that BG/2 offers so many tools to neutralise enemies. If you're getting chaos/confusion ruining your party then you need to find your own way of preventing/mitigating that rather than just trying to put up damage numbers. If you're not on SCS then it's usually pretty simple to alphastrike / backstab / confuse / interrupt / otherwise put key spellcasters out of commission. And you have Chaotic Commands, Keldorn being Keldorn, etc. You need more patience and prep but you don't exactly need any massively clever weird tricks to do it.

Core Rules is just fine I think to have fun for a first timer, though. After several playthroughs my go-to became a 4-man party, Core Rules, SCS, with a few house rules.

 

[hell bovine]

how the fuck do you play BGII on max difficulty? even on normal settings my party gets wiped pretty frequently. though I still don't know how to handle spell casters properly in this game. chaos / confusion / fear destroys me everytime

In the unmodded game: insect plague & Korgan. If cast on a friendly target, like a party npc or summon, it won't harm them, but will jump to the nearest enemy provided they stand close enough. That way you can target even invisible mages or mages protected by spell turning. (Liches are immune to it, but not to creeping doom.)

Korgan's berserker rage protects him from most nasty effects, and he is a tough dwarf in general, which makes him the obvious choice for the insect plague targetting device.

 

[Tigranes]

Coronakorgan. Any effects like insect plague also has the bonus of giving you basically location info on invisible mages, so you can hit them with AOE spells. non-SCS mages aren't always fully buffed up so sometimes a single fireball or even web can disable an invisible mage with lots of spellcasting capabilities.

It's been too long since I went non-SCS, but I think you could also even impact something high level like Twisted Rune just by throwing webs, Inquisitor dispels and Confusion into the distant fog.

 

[Sodafish]

Not even steal, later on like every other RPG you have millions of monies so you can just buy it back.

Yeah I was thinking more of the early chapters where you're skint and saving for trip to Spellhold.

 

[alighieri]

And if you find wands of cloudkill they can be sold to shops, then stolen back (swig some potions of master thievery first) and they will then have 99 charges. For when you really need to bust out the cheese.

Nice hint, hope it still works in the enhanced edition.

Is there a replay value? I did like to play through BG2 again with an all-evil group.

Spoiler

Holy shit why is Jan Jansen such a fucking cuck

 

[smaug]

Just got to Baldur’s Gate City and I gotta say the game is so fun. Whilst playing vanilla it’s not very difficult, I’ve come to love the engine (graphics especially), it’s so flexible and exploitable. I think BioWare really managed to create something quite unique at least compared to D&D games of old.

 

[jackofshadows]

Is there a replay value? I did like to play through BG2 again with an all-evil group.

Not much, you should have been take evil-only dudes in the first place. Well, maybe add to them Aerie and/or Keldorn just so evil guys could obliterate them merciless first.

 

[Tigranes]

The replay value is in the gameplay, not the story so much. But you're playing the game already, you should be able to see for yourself...?

 

[Serious_Business]

Okay so I replayed BG2 for the first time in about 10 years, and I gotta say, fuck me, it is a great game. Perhaps even flawless - the quest design is just so well thought-out, the game flow is incredible. The encounters are all great, and you have that magic system which is incredible. The paintings, in BG1, were pretty primitive, but in BG2 all the environments are fantastical and amazing to look at. I'm being fucking positive here. Also the writing really quite surprised me - it's no Torment but it all just works, it's all very well done. This game does pass the test of time, it really is something else. I don't even mind the RtwP. Loosing edgy status here, but fuck it. I too now am hyped for BG3, which will be a terrible disappointment of course, but hell yeah baby

 

[alighieri]

The replay value is in the gameplay, not the story so much. But you're playing the game already, you should be able to see for yourself...?

I guess so. Right now I skipped a lot due to my party being not right equipped. I think in a second playthrough I will prepare my crew (especially the spell casters) for dungeon exploration and dragon slaying.

 

[jackofshadows]

The replay value is in the gameplay, not the story so much. But you're playing the game already, you should be able to see for yourself...?

I guess so. Right now I skipped a lot due to my party being not right equipped. I think in a second playthrough I will prepare my crew (especially the spell casters) for dungeon exploration and dragon slaying.

The order of things in BG2 is very, very flexible (which is making it a great game, among other aspects). So as an alternative of a total restart you can struggle some more of even beat it first time (maybe I exaggerated lack of replayability, fuck).

 

[Butter]

BG2 is just too damn long. I'm as far as the Underdark in my current playthrough and it feels like work to keep going. I'd have almost beaten BG1 twice in the same amount of time.

 

[smaug]

BG2 is just too damn long. I'm as far as the Underdark in my current playthrough and it feels like work to keep going. I'd have almost beaten BG1 twice in the same amount of time.

BG1 feels to damn long and I just started the city of BG.

But, then again it could just be the shitty pathfinding in tight corridor dungeons and my autism wanting to explore every corner.

 

[Chippy]

Just got to Baldur’s Gate City and I gotta say the game is so fun. Whilst playing vanilla it’s not very difficult, I’ve come to love the engine (graphics especially), it’s so flexible and exploitable. I think BioWare really managed to create something quite unique at least compared to D&D games of old.

How do you find graphics in older games? My nephew and his mates disregard older Disney stuff and cartoons from my time like G1 Transformers because the cartoons look "old". My nephew is ten.

errr...so...

Spoiler

how to post this question without sounding like a paedophile

So how does your generation see the animations in the IE games? For me (currently playing PST) the animations look more lifelike than the ones in the Unity engine. People say my generation is programmed for that stuff - but I just think it looks better.

 

[smaug]

Just got to Baldur’s Gate City and I gotta say the game is so fun. Whilst playing vanilla it’s not very difficult, I’ve come to love the engine (graphics especially), it’s so flexible and exploitable. I think BioWare really managed to create something quite unique at least compared to D&D games of old.

How do you find graphics in older games? My nephew and his mates disregard older Disney stuff and cartoons from my time like G1 Transformers because the cartoons look "old". My nephew is ten.

errr...so...

Spoiler

how to post this question without sounding like a paedophile

So how does your generation see the animations in the IE games? For me (currently playing PST) the animations look more lifelike than the ones in the Unity engine. People say my generation is programmed for that stuff - but I just think it looks better.

I think you’re asking me what I think of the graphics and I think they look fantastic especially the backgrounds. But, yea every game has its own type of graphics.

 

[Tigranes]

The replay value is in the gameplay, not the story so much. But you're playing the game already, you should be able to see for yourself...?

I guess so. Right now I skipped a lot due to my party being not right equipped. I think in a second playthrough I will prepare my crew (especially the spell casters) for dungeon exploration and dragon slaying.

A lot of the stuff you can go back to way later in the game. You can raise that 20k gold, go through a long quasi-linear sequence that takes you away from Athkatla's environs, then come back later at much higher levels for dragons and the lot. You're not really meant to do it all right now as a non-metagaming non-munchkined easy-going party.

 

[alighieri]

Spoiler

what the fuck aerie left my party after I slept with her and now I'm without an cleric. wtf is this shit

 

[Melcar]

Spoiler

what the fuck aerie left my party after I slept with her and now I'm without an cleric. wtf is this shit

Small dick detected.

 

[Nano]

Spoiler

what the fuck aerie left my party after I slept with her and now I'm without an cleric. wtf is this shit

Dude, just save yourself the headaches and get Viconia instead.

 

[Tigranes]

Sounds like a just punishment, really

 

[Lacrymas]

Don't stick your dick in underage.

 

[alighieri]

Somehow I knew it wasn't the best idea to romance someone who resembled my ex-girlfriend

 

[Silly Germans]

And if you find wands of cloudkill they can be sold to shops, then stolen back (swig some potions of master thievery first) and they will then have 99 charges. For when you really need to bust out the cheese.

Nice hint, hope it still works in the enhanced edition.

Is there a replay value? I did like to play through BG2 again with an all-evil group.

Spoiler

Holy shit why is Jan Jansen such a fucking cuck

Playing an evil party can be worth a second play through if you really go through with it,
i.e. going for such a low reputation that you are hunted by the guards. Also picking the evil
answers which typically leads to combat.
That can ramp up the difficulty quite a bit especially if you're playing with scs. Otherwise i'd say most of the
replay value comes from different party compositions and their banter.
The majority of quests don't turn out differently but there are a few quests with evil solutions.
For example killing Adalon for her blood and poisoning the water at the druid shrine.
There are also enough choices and answers that the character can pick that make sense as an
evil character so it is viable and pretty satisfying.
Korgan, Edwin and Viconia are great party members and pretty much the best npcs in their respective roles
which makes an evil party also quite powerful.

 

[Sodafish]

Korgan, Edwin and Viconia are great party members and pretty much the best npcs in their respective roles
which makes an evil party also quite powerful.

Yeah, these NPCs all kick ass. The problem with playing an evil party though (as I've mentioned before) is the shop prices become ludicrous due to low reputation, and there is no game mechanic to compensate for that.

 

[Sodafish]

BG1 feels to damn long and I just started the city of BG.

Nah, it's supposed to be an epic.

You're just too accustomed to modern AAA shite with 4 hours of gameplay. I loved BG2 so much when I first played it, the length didn't bother me one bit. I then played ToB straight afterwards, and loved that too.