[SixOfSpades]

Well, frankly, I've never seen any reason to dislike Imoen; her cheerfulness can get annoying after repeated games, sure, but she's not even close to the syrupy cuteness offered by, say, Alora. And between Imoen's soundset and Safana's, I'll take the girl next door over the lame, wannabe seductress any day. And you can't fault her build either: Effective maxima in DEX and CON, great CHA if you need it, and she makes a damn fine Thief->Mage to boot. Well-positioned Thieving points, too. She can't max out in all the Thieving skills by herself (no one can in BG1), but double her with Montaron or Coran and you're all set to kick all kinds of ass.

In BG2, she's only annying in the starting dungeon, but that's only because there's no way to turn off all her stupid interjections that she's blurting out for the umpteenth time. ("Dude, just SHUT UP, Imoen! This is like the 50th time we've been through this dungeon, I don't NEED to hear you talk about how books remind you of Candlekeep!")

Anyway....yeah, the "Continuity Approved" party is pretty solid, given that you've built a kickass Warrior PC. They obviously aren't the best party you can put together, but they'll see you through. The only weak points I can see are Khalid and Jaheira: Khalid's stats won't really let him shine either in ranged or melee combat; in my opinion, he's rendered completely obsolete by Kivan. And Jaheira's spells just plain suck in BG1, but then again, that's BioWare's fault, not hers, for including all the good Cleric spells and none for the Druids. (Tutu should fix this, though.) Then again, Jaheira's stats are nothing to write home about either--I'd like to buff her BG1 stats up to what they are in BG2, or at least average them both together and give Druids some worthwhile spells in BG2.