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Old 06-11-2001, 09:40 PM   #4
Axterix
Manshoon
 

Join Date: May 4, 2001
Posts: 160
Negatory. Won't work that way.

If your paladin is the guy that the bad guy initiates the conversation with, you get the option of exposing him. It has nothing to do with using detect evil... it has to do with there being a paladin (similiar to other instances where having a druid, a dwarf, a bard, or a female talking to characters gives dialog options not seen otherwise). Try entering the map sometime and walking a character other than the paladin out ahead... However, paladins, due to high cha and being tough, seem to find themselves at the head of the party quite often So if you do want to explore, be sure to use another character to initiate the conversation.

As for why there are so many charges of a useless ability, well, the answer to that lies in Baldur's Gate (BG). One of the biggest improvements in the follow ups to BG is that the follow-ups use info on your party in conversations. Your class, race, and gender can all impact the course of the conversation. BG didn't do that. Matter of fact, it even had a serious crash in one point, where an amazon warrior gal would join your party if a male from your group could defeat her... twas a bad thing to get into that conversation without a male in your party Anyway, without using the paladin's detect evil to impact conversations (by giving additional conversation options), the designers had to find some other way to incorporate this key paladin ability. Their answer was to basically let the paladin cast the detect evil spell. And as you levelled up, you could do it more often. Icewind Dale levels you up faster, providing a much higher number of critters per map, as such, you level much faster than in BG. Additionally, you are pretty much assured to rest at least once per map. Combine these two things (higher level, more resting), and you've got a situation where you won't run out of detect evil uses (not that you ever did in BG either).

Detect Evil was great in BG though. Gave you a bit of a clue as to what was on the map. The normal thing I did when I had a paladin in my party... enter a new map, use detect evil.

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