Given that the official expansion pack is placed towards the end of the game, I'm going to destroy my saved third party, and start anew. After a lot of thought, I decided to run my kensai/mage, again (having done both a conjurer and sorc, before).

I'd like input from the other obsessives up here about where to put his proficiencies.

More specifically:

Would you go with longsword proficiencies, or two-handers? Katanas--but Celestial Fury is a long way down the line. Last time, I pretty much went with longswords, but I had an evil party (no Minsc or Keldorn), so I pretty much had no tank for greatswords. Korgan, of course, is an axe man. I'm probably going to do an evil party again, however.

And how would you handle the various proficiency bonus categories for two weapons, etc?

A kensai/mage should use katanas because there is one blade D'kons Zerth blade that give you some more spells slots. If you dualwield you don't have to switch weapons all the time, and that is good, because you don't want to loose the spell slots that you had when you were using the Dakons Zerth blade. You should let him/her use it in his/her offhand, and use the Celestial fury in the main hand. About the proficiencies, here is what I think:

From start: Katana+++++ (if you have grandmastery patch), and two weapon style+. If you dual at level 9, you will get one more point, so put it in two weapon style. If you like a little ranged attacks, then don't use Dakons Zerth blade, and go with Celestial fury and rifthorn axe(it comes back to you). In that case: Katana++, axe+, two weapon style+++.

There is no longsword better than Celestial fury.

Calculus is right on this one
Katana's Are the way to go for a Kensai/Mage
Celetrial Fury is the Third best weapon in the game
And Dak'kon Zerth Sword is just great and what is important for kensai it gives AC-1
So i would say go with Katana Dual wield
And after both katana and Dual wield are full
switch to long sword
So you can choose between Celetial Fury and BlackRazor

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http://content.communities.msn.co.uk...&ID_Message=66
The Legend Master Necromancer
Prince Rikard T'Aranaxz of Natri'x
Clanmaster and Mental Father of the OHF
Ramanish of Neathan'Calith
High Priest and son of the Eternal Phoenix
Lord and General of the Army of the West

BTW I would say stat proficies:
Katana: ***
Dual wield: ***
Dual wield full is vital
it will lower both your Thac0's with 2 per *
And dual at level 9
Stay out of trouble let the others handle the Baddies till you reach spell level 4 and you can use Stoneskin

Good Luck

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http://content.communities.msn.co.uk...&ID_Message=66
The Legend Master Necromancer
Prince Rikard T'Aranaxz of Natri'x
Clanmaster and Mental Father of the OHF
Ramanish of Neathan'Calith
High Priest and son of the Eternal Phoenix
Lord and General of the Army of the West

I was thinking, if you have 5 stars in Katana already from the beginning, you don't have to dualwield from start, because this give you the extra attack anyway (grandmastery patch). When you have two stars in two weapon style you can start dualwielding if you wish, but maybe you should wait until your mage reach a the level where he/she gets one more proficiency point. If you don't use grandmastery patch, then Rikards distribution on proficiency points is probably better.

hm
That is true
maybe it's better to start with 5 on katana
get through the low level mage part
And start dualwielding then

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http://content.communities.msn.co.uk...&ID_Message=66
The Legend Master Necromancer
Prince Rikard T'Aranaxz of Natri'x
Clanmaster and Mental Father of the OHF
Ramanish of Neathan'Calith
High Priest and son of the Eternal Phoenix
Lord and General of the Army of the West

Speaking as one totally ignorant on this class..... what about ranged weapons? I like to keep my mages out of range of melee by using ranged attacks. In fact, I make a point of having ALL my team capable of using ranged attack, 'cos sometimes it's a darned good idea!
F.

Are you the same Fable from BG dungeon? If so welcome to the better board http://www.tgeweb.com/ironworks/cgi-...miles/wink.gif

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A fair dinkum laughing Hyena!

If you want to use range weapon, the dual from a normal fighter or a wizard slayer. Kensai may not use missile weapon and berserker can only be proficient in ranged weapon.

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Long live H22A1!!!!!

Oh lookie Accord. You have more posts but less stars than I. Am I the only Avatar around now?

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A fair dinkum laughing Hyena!