What difficulty levels are you guys playing at?

I hear you. If you don't have a lot of time to play, there is no way you want to play on hard. It will take forever. If I want really hard battles, I go with less characters. I can't stand getting lousy hit points, it annoyed me when I played 20 years ago, heh. My dad used to let me have any roll that was 1/2 or more, he let me re-roll low numbers.

In BG1, I must have reloaded 150 times due to HPs, 10 due to deaths. In IWD, I died about 50 times where I needed to reload, Planescape maybe 40, BG2 about 100 in the first half and 10 after I got that cloak of reflection.

I got a wife and kids, plus I play RTS games, so I don't have enough time (or patience) to spend 10 hours on each quest in an RPG.

*gad, I think of how many hours I WASTED on D2 - what a lousy excuse for an RPG*

[Draggor]

I figured I should reply to this as I am the one who started it, well indirectly anway. I'm more interested in plot developments and character interactions than a big challenge so on my second real game without cheats I'm just playing it on novice. After BG1 I got sick of having to reload all the time just because you failed a save or missed one attack. I also have to share the use of the computer and I like to actually get somewhere when I play. Remember too that novice only halves normal damage. spells still affect you fully and you still die just as quickly fighting vampires or Mind Flayers (faster actually as you get less experience during the game). The half damage hasn't done that much for me as I'm barely taking any damage from most fights now except the big ones.

Playing core rules as I am a tradionalist. Next time will try hard/insane as it will be too easy otherwise.

Darklands hooked me into RPG games and I play at core rules. I die alot because I haven't figured out how to use all the spells but my Undead Hunter/Paladin puts out a pretty good punch and that helps me alot. I used cheats in BG1 but have stayed away except for scrolls to identify weapons and armor and the like. Without cheats it is really hard to finish a tough battle without reloading...but I guess that is the point of it...die and learn how to survive for the future.

[The.Relic]

Core..