Ironman game on insane? Suggestions

[el_kalkylus]

I thought I'd try it, but I utterly failed. I have finished the game two times already I believe, and wanted to try beating it without dying once. Therefore I created 4 powerful characters that I would use: Human Kensai, Human Kensai, Archer and Sorcerer. Yoshimo joined for the thief skills, and at level 13 I planned to dualclass the kensais to mage and thief. Once the Kensai had enough find traps and pick locks, I would dismiss Yoshimo.

It is a good offensive team, not much good defensively; noone to tank with. Of course, I use the sorc most of the times to take hits when surronded, and let the kensais take out single monsters on the side (very fast too). Summoning skeletons and other minions works too. However this team died doing the slavers, mostly because I was sloppy. They also died many times trying to beat the demon in the bridge district (Haerdalis quest) which kept firing some spell that did damage and held my chars. Despite Yoshimo's traps, and good damage from my archer, I was not able to kill the demon and his two elementals until I got a lucky break.

Now I want to try a new team. Dualclassing is fun. I always thought fast-killing is most "safe", cause dragging out a fight will eventually result in too many complications in the long run. More or less, I want to eliminate luck as much as possible. But if I choose an offensive team, my defensive will suffer. Killing monsters fast is part of the fun for me, which gives me some sort of contentment.

Classes I have tried that I know are powerful are: Kensai/thief, Kensai/mage, Archer, Swashbuckler, Sorcerer and druid/cleric. I did finish SoA once with Fighter/Mage/Thief too at one time now that I think of it.

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I want to create 2-4 characters of my own. Maybe 5 even. I need at least one slot open for doing certain quests, like the Jaheira quest where you get a good ring for sorc.

I could do 3 sorcerers, 1 bounty hunter I guess. Anyone tried that? This team would have trouble with clay golems.

So do you have suggestions for me? I want to keep this game as clean as possible when I play it; no cheats excluding pre-knowledge of the game.

[whathuh]

No cheats or no cheese? If you are willing to go the cheese route, try out an assassin dualled to fighter. Dual at 21 for the x7 backstab, then use it as often as possible. Combine that with critical strike and you are in business, seriously. I've done 400+ damage that way. 3 sorcerers is pushing it, I tend to do fine with one. I also suggest a barbarian with flail of ages and defender of easthaven. What a tank! If no tob, then go for an archer and a dualled fighter/thief with any kit you want, swashbuckler gives you lots of boosts to melee and lots of skills early on, but no backstab.

[el_kalkylus]

Hehe, it's ok with a little cheese if you mean by choosing characters. 3 sorces aren't as powerful in the beginning as you might think. You have to pick your fights then. I haven't tried it though. Sounds tedious.

I never actually tried a barb, so that might be a good idea. Dwarven barb maybe for constitution. Need an item to prevent domination and confusion then, that is very important. Assassin is OK. Takes a long time to reach level 21, but I do need the thief skills. I never tried a monk either, but it doesn't really fit in any party I make.

I'm leaning towards this now, a heavy melee party with alot of traps:

Sorcerer
Barb
Kensai(13) - Thief
Swashbuckler or Assassin(21) - Fighter

[mad=dog]

You could wait the kensai until 17 for extra THAC0, TH bonus and TD bonus. I was very impressed at my Kensai(17)->Thief's damage output. Nearly as much as Assasin->Fighter, but you get that sweet -2 to AC and the extra HPs making it a much better tank.
Just remember that between the dual and the Kensai reactivation you have a sitting duck in your party.

[el_kalkylus]

I don't know. Level 17 will also take a long time. And as you said, he will be a sitting duck for a long time. My intentions are to finish the game without dying once (ironman) on insane level, and I am still thinking about if I can do this with this party. When I face sorcerers with stoneskin for example. What is a good strategi for this party then? Go from behind, let sorc cast breach, backstab usually don't work because they use contingency and sequencer. The archer was great taking out sorces.

[SixOfSpades]

Xen, a fellow poster here, enjoys playing Insane, and therefore swears by three very important spells: Stoneskin, Ironskin, and Protection from Magic Weapons. From what I can tell, his policy is to NEVER use any party member that cannot cast at least one of these spells, because on an Insane game, any hit can kill you, so the only way to stay alive is to ensure that you take no damage whatsoever.

Me, I always play Core Rules, and I'm more a fan of Multiclassing than Dualclassing, so my current party is:
Halfling Fighter/Thief (Tank)
Elven Fighter/Mage
Gnomish Fighter/Illusionist
Half-Elven Ranger/Cleric
Elven Fighter/Mage/Thief
Everybody's a Warrior, everybody but the Tank can cast spells (and even the Tank will be able to read scrolls), both sides of the Priest scroll are available, 3 Wizards means plently of butt-kicking goodness, and 2 Thieves means fast specialization and lots of Traps to spread around.

[el_kalkylus]

Ok I don't have ironskin. Hopefully it will work out anyway. I started with this:

Elf Sorcerer - to distract monsters mostly
Dwarven Barbarian for tank. He just got flail of ages +3.
Human Kensai dualwielding longswords
Human Assassin. Nice mage killer so far.

This party also failed, 3 times they died so far.

Death 1: Harper quest, sorc level 10, lightning cut through my sorc.
Death 2: Harper quest, sorc level 11, confusion on my kensai who splattered my barbarian. No way to resurrect.
Death 3: Nalias quest. Confusion again. Assassin backstabbed mage, and her run path got blocked and she got trapped in by a troll. I tried to save her, and ignored snake mage for a while who cast confusion. Once again, my kensai got confused and splattered my assassin to death. No way to resurrect.

I'll keep playing to learn from these mistakes and new ones. I definately need a cleric with chaos command. Okey the barb can handle himself with berserk, but not the others.

[whathuh]

Assassins are your friend. I use a rather cheesy tactic, but get him to drink a potion of speed, and perhaps some other beefs, then shoot mages with a bow, leaving your party in a safe spot a long ways away. As soon as you attack, pause the game and run away out of the enemy sight, then hide and repeat. Great for taking out stoneskins. Once the stoneskins are gone, poison weapon and unlease 3 arrows per round with tuigan. The poison does stack, and I think it actually works better when stacked.

[Assassin]

I'm guessing that

1] Ranger/Cleric (dual class)
2] Assassin/Mage (dual)
3] Fighter/Thief (multi or dual)
4] Fighter/Druid (multi)
5] Mage/Thief (multi and PC)
6] Sorcerer

would be a good shot. 3 tanks, 3 backstabbers (necessary to end some of the more painful ones in one shot), 3 backstabbers, a few thieves, two divine clerics. And, if all goes wrong the T/M can go Mislead and backstab.

[el_kalkylus]

I use that (cheesy) tactic too whathuh. Poison is very nice for disrupting their spells and speeding up the kill. So I am pretty pleased with the assassin choice. The barb is nice indeed too. Not a fast killer like the kensai, but has good resistances.

Assassin, yeah that would be a kick-ass team. However, I am reluctant to having more than 4 self-created members in my team. The more the merrier, but more time consuming as well. I also want to use npc's for certain quests, for example Nalia, Jaheira, Valygar etc. I guess I could use Yoshimo for a while to kill them liches with multiple traps early on. A 4-member team will probably have much more trouble later in the game, and especially ToB. I was thinking of using a cleric/mage instead of a sorcerer. It might not be as powerful as a sorcerer, but this class does get chaos command, negative plane protection eventually and other priest spells are always welcomed.

So I am thinking:

Gnome cleric/illusionist or half-elf cleric/mage
Dwarf barbarian
Human assassin --> fighter
Human kensai --> thief

Gnome for extra intelligence and natural magic resistance but with penalty to wisdom and necro spells, or half-elf for no penalties. I'm actually thinking of specializing in some sort of bow when I dualclass assassin to fighter. Don't want to get my hands dirty. After dualclassing is complete, I would have 2 tanks, 1 "archer" with poison and traps, and a powerful cleric/mage.