Party of 4... Comes to an End!!!

[dplax]

With my partyy of four the hardest fight I had until Arnika, was the one with the crabs at the exit of the monastery. Besides them I only met the ants before the deserted house, and the fixed combat at the chest.

[Starfire]

Just an update for anyone who might be interested lol

I decided on a party of 5 based on the Drizzt Do'Urden series. The party is as follows:

Wulfgar Human Fighter
Drizzt Elf Samurai
Bruenor Dwarf Lord
Guenwyhver Felpurr Monk
Cattie-Brie Human Ranger

I chose a Lord for Bruenor since he was King of mithril hall, Ranger for Cattie-Brie because she used the heart seeker bow mostly in combat and of course Samurai for Drizzt because he dual wielded swords. I had to include Guen since she was Drizzt' constant companion. I am only developing magic for Drizzt and Guen because Wulfgar, Bruenor and Cattie did not use magic at all in the books. Guen was a magical creature so I figured allowing her to do magic made sense. I am trying to keep as close to the book as possible as far as character developement so Bruenor and Guen do not use Ranged combat. Wulfgar's hammer was magic and could be thrown but since there are no hammer weapons in the game that can be thrown I will probably end up allowing Wulfgar to use a sling or some other thrown weapon or perhaps to stay true to role playing purposes I shouldn't allow him ranged combat either?

I am working Strength and Dex for Wulfgar and Bruenor. Trying to max out vitality on a human straight away didn't make sense and I decided he could use the dex more to allow him to hit and penetrate more successfully. I got Drizzt's strength to 55 and now am working on dex and speed. For Guen it is Strength and dex, since she is doing martial arts exclusively I decided she would need high strength to do any decent damage. I can work speed and senses on her later. Cattie-Brie of course I am doing dex and senses first.

They made it out of the monastery at levels 5/6 with very little trouble and even the road to arnika was very little trouble. They only ran into two groups of plant types and two groups of higardi highwaymen and roustabouts (at different times, not all at once) Arnika was a breeze. Very few android encounters. I decided to get the wheel key and head back to the monastery to get demons bane sword and demonstring bow. Met very little resistance there as well. Afterwards I decided to do the Umpani alliance and then head over to the lake to pick up the frost spell book and the few other items lying about there. Bad move that was. I got caught out in the open by 5 metallic slimes, 6 slithering slimes and 2 emerald slimes. There were no niches or crevices to run to so I had to face them head on. In most of my parties I have run this would not have been much of a problem as I usually have at least one or two pure casters in my group. This group however has only Drizzt and Guen doing magic and their magic is not that significant yet. Their stamina isn't great either and I had to keep having them drink stamina portions, which meant they had to miss rounds of attacking the slimes in favor of replenishing their stamina. I ended up trying to run away, which didn't work as none of them had enough stamina to stay conscious, Drizzt, Guen, Cattie-Brie and Vi were killed and I didn't have enough rez powders to bring them all back, so in the end I reloaded and decided to try it again lol

I'm wondering now, if perhaps I should be working Strength and Dex for everyone first? They would do better damage and their chances of hitting and penetrating would be much improved I think. One of the problems I ran into with the slimes was "No penetration" when they hit them and when they did hit, they did very little damage. Any suggestions on how to get around this problem?

I should mention, due to role playing Wulfgar is using a stun mace and hammer (there are no better hammers until about mid game or later I think) I wasn't able to get him two hammers (Antone only had one) Perhaps I should stick to a hammer and shield for Wulfgar until I find a two handed hammer if there is one?Bruenor is using axes. I was thinking getting Bruenor the Bipennis Axe would be better as he could do more damage with that weapon then dual wielding a hand axe and bearded war axe. I have Drizzt using blood lust and the wakazashi (sp) Cattie-Brie is wielding demonstring bow and demonsbane. Are there better hammer's and axes this early in the game? If so where? lol There is absolutely no way these guys can go after diamond eyes lol they would never survive the mountain wilderness at this point.

I suppose I could do a bit of magic training for Drizzt and Guen, but I really dislike doing that, it's so tedious and boring and I haven't the patience for it lol

Any suggestions on better weapons and how to get their damage and penetration to decent levels would be much appreciated lol However due to role playing I am sticking to hammers for Wulfgar and Axes for Bruenor.

Originally posted by Starfire: I'm wondering now, if perhaps I should be working Strength and Dex for everyone first? They would do better damage and their chances of hitting and penetrating would be much improved I think. One of the problems I ran into with the slimes was "No penetration" when they hit them and when they did hit, they did very little damage. Any suggestions on how to get around this problem?

generally speaking, not every class needs strength and dex to penetrate most of the time. the lord and sam could benefit directly, but i find that the monk and fighter have no trouble after the earliest part of the game, because they learn their weapon skills so fast. so for those classes i generally develop strength and speed.

AFAIK there is only one two-handed mace in the game, but you have to kill (or pp) an ally to get it. it's a good one too, though you have to be a male to use it

lots of two-handed swords and axes though.

[Starfire]

I know the weapon you speak of, I pickpocketed it off Chief Gari in one game and gave it to the Lord I was running. It had decent stats and I think +1 to hp or stamina regen, it's been a while since I played that party so I can't remember now.

I have noticed my fighter and Monk seem to hit and penetrate a lot more often then my Lord and Sammy do lol I think I will change tactics for the Sammy and work his Strength and Dex instead of speed and dex. He really needs all the help he can get lol I am already working Strength and dex for the Lord, but the party is young and weak yet so perhaps a few more levels I will start to see a vast improvement. Normally I don't have a problem with the slimes but the last battle with this party and the slimes was brutal! lol

[dplax]

Normally the only slimes I have sometimes problems with are slithering slimes if I run into them in the monastery, because that 50 HP is quite a lot at that stage of the game. Oterwise even with the later slimes they just can't hit mebecause of high AC or stealth.

Originally posted by Starfire: I have noticed my fighter and Monk seem to hit and penetrate a lot more often then my Lord and Sammy do lol I think I will change tactics for the Sammy and work his Strength and Dex instead of speed and dex. He really needs all the help he can get lol

yeah, that's something i picked up from atlus 7's tips. basically, he recommends building str, dex, and senses for lord because they have such rough stats and so many skills to build up. all 3 of those attributes contribute bonuses to hit and penetrate, plus they will help you learn all your combat skills faster. and i believe the same applies for the sam.

for the lords and sams that i've run, i've found it usually takes til around level 14-15+ before they start making any serious contributions as a melee'r.

[Starfire]

Should I be dividing level up points into strength, dex and senses till maxed or just strength and dex to start with? I've had plenty of Lords and Sammies in my party, but I don't think I've ever finished the game with either in a party and I would like to build them to be the best they possibly can be Actually I've only ascended twice and both parties had the 4 pure casters, fighter and bard. I would like to try ascending with the other classes as well now. Fighter, bard and 4 pure casters is getting a bit old lol

I added Regis the rogue to the group 1)because I had no characters able to do locks&traps and 2)because I've never actually finished a game with a rogue as part of a party. I've had rogues in parties that I never ascended, but never went far enough into the game to see how awsome they get.

Everyone speaks so highly of the rogue as a melee'er and I would like to see just how awsome he is myself [img]smile.gif[/img]

[Ziggurat]

Rogues get plenty powerful. I go for speed and strength first. Later on, dex and senses. You may need some vitality but not alot. Also build up locks/traps and stealth. There's much advice out there on developing rogues...

Originally posted by Starfire: Should I be dividing level up points into strength, dex and senses till maxed or just strength and dex to start with?

regarding lord, i would say str and dex to start with, then senses third. you might have to tweak vitality a bit after that. i'd consider having a bard in the pary to speed the lord, too (saving you from putting points into speed at level up).

regarding the sam, i would have the same advice: str and dex first. however, sam's get the mage spellbook, which has some great offensive spells in it. if you dont build intelligence to max right away (to get powercast), you basically lock yourself out of being an effective spellcaster. i'm not saying that's right or wrong, just a consideration.

of course, i should qualify my advice because i've never built a sam i was happy with (not true of lords or rogues, tho [img]smile.gif[/img] ).

regarding rogues, zig's overview is spot on, imo. i think 7 or 8 of the 9 parties i've ascended with have had rogues. everything good you hear about them is true

[Starfire]

Thanks so much for the tips, I might swap out the monk and put a bard in her place. I love the bard and always miss her when ever I don't include one in a party lol I'd like to try all the different classes so I will probably end up having 3 or 4 parties going just so I can do that.

I've put my salvatore party on the back burner for now, because I would really like to try out the Lord, Sammy, Rogue, Valkyrie, Gadgeteer, Monk and Ninja. Those are the classes I have never finished the game with. I won't be able to include them all in one party of course, well I could but I don't want to lol I think having two characters with the divine spell book in one party is a bit of over kill so I'll make another party with the Valkyrie, Gadgeteer and Ninja in it. I actually tried an all hybrid party once but I was not happy at all with it. Level ups come too slowly and they did a lot of dying early on.

I usually end up being unhappy with my Sammys as well which is why I've never finished the game with one. Except for one...I had a Felpurr Sammy once who was pretty darn good right from the start unfortunately my old pc decided to die and I lost everything on the hard drive