Favorite Party Size?

[Mahokenshi]

Well, I've returned to BG1 a little sooner than I thought I might. And I figured that I'd play through as a cleric for the first time ever. It seems that, what with THREE Wisdom books it would be a bit of a waste if I never tried it.

Well, actually a Cleric/Mage. Yes, it's lawful good, and yes, I keep finding certain kits of BG2 NPCs so cool I end up making my own version.

Anyway, I've noticed that for my past playthrough I only went for a party of four (PC figthter, Viconia, Minsc, Imoen as a thief 7 - mage.)

Before that, I played through with a party of six, but I found, especially in Durlag's tower and Werewolf Island; that I just plain didn't have enough stuff to protect everyone (I had a a Ajantis, Minsc, Yeslic, and Kivian; and not nearly enough stuff to boost all their ACs to a decent level.) Yes, I know that you can just forge one supertank and then have everyone else blast away from the back row.

But I'm finding that a party of four allows super fast level ups (Imoen can do the 7 - 8 dual in time for Werewolf Island and Durlag's tower!) and it gives me just enough carrying space to loot the larger areas. I also find that my characters fight over equipment far less (you can load 2 warriors, a priest, and a mage-thief to the gills pretty easily by the later stages.)

Right now I just picked up Ajantis, Kivian, and the ever popular force-entry-into-the-party Imoen. I'm about to get Minsc for the Deynar (sp. grr.)quest; but I'm not sure if I'll need them. The BG1 Minsc really needs the dex gauntlet boost pretty much as well as Ajantis. And if I dump the Paladin for Team Boo; then I'll have three wussy characters (ME!, Imoen, and Deynar) my two warriors would need to babysit. And even Kivian really isn't much of a frontline fighter before he hits level 7. With BG1's creakier AI pathfinding, that strikes me as more of a "chore" than a "game."

And dumping Kivian is NEVER an option. At low levels, having him along is like bringing a mini gun to a sword fight. Really, he's probably one of the few NPCs from BG1 that could have gone to the sequal and been competative WITHOUT any stat boosts (just kit him to an archer, and even Mazzy would bow down. Heh heh, pun intended.) Maybe I'll try that G3 mod sometime... .

But I ramble.

So how's about it? What sorts of party compositions do you guys find useful?

[Lord]

I like to play parties of 6, mainly because I like to see the (few) interactions between party members. For some reason, I don't care if two of my party members fight to the death - it's more entertaining than annoying.

Having 6 party members also gives me more room to hold equipment. You can max out the ToTSC XP cap with 6 party members anyway, so leveling up faster with 4 members doesn't give you much of an advantage in the end. I also like to assign specific weapons to each player (certain character only does bow + 1 melee, another will use a staff and darts, etc), and I have more freedom to distribute weapons with 6 members.

BTW, it's spelled Dynaheir. I could never get it right at first either. Plus, if she dies, you can remove her from your party and Minsc will stay, so you can get rid of that wuss on your team.

[Mahokenshi]

"Dynaheir". Got it, thanks! I just spelled it phonetically from what Minsc says if she dies. What he says sounds like "Deynar" rather than "Dyn-a-heir".

Hmm. Perhaps I should give the six another go. It HAS been a while... .

[Roboghost]

I say go with 6 members for a group of single class characters, but 5 or less if you're going to have multi-class and/or dual-class characters (unless dueling early -- level 6 or less.)

Or...{alternate recommendation}

I'm solving the problem now by raising the experience cap [501,000] and changing the area files to have nastier monsters waiting for me. It's much more fun now -- see my thread on this one "harder creatures" if interested in this route.


*** Creature spoil and example ***
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Air Aspects are 70% resistant to missile -- Kivan and Coran combined [using their bows] aren't much help with a pack of these flying devils ; )

[Khayne]

I also like to play parties of 6. 3 male and female. There are some interesting combos to play with.

[ 02-14-2007, 01:23 AM: Message edited by: Khayne ]

[CerebroDragon]

Six is definitely the classic party size for AD&D games, dating back to the glorious goldbox days. Being somewhat of a veteran of them, I tend to aim for an eventual six, but BG has such a wonderful variety of npcs to choose from that it is often constantly changing until I decide upon a new finishing combination. Like Lord, I'm a huge fan of interaction and banter between party members and so change my party each time I play through just to note the different behavioural relationships. [img]smile.gif[/img]

The first time I played BG I actually never used a mage at all - I think I had Ajantis, Branwen, PC Fighter, Jaheira and Imoen. But most games since then, I've always eventually had six party members and have included a mage. There are enough encounters and areas in the game to easily gather the experience and equipment required.

However, with creative roleplaying, you can practically get any combination of npcs to work for you. I'd argue this is the same for BG2.

P.S:
Oh...not to be pedantic as well, but its Kivan. K-I-V-A-N.

Cheers,
CD

[ 02-07-2007, 03:34 AM: Message edited by: CerebroDragon ]

[ZFR]

Most of my games of BG, BG2, IWD, IWD2 were 6 party members if not soloing. I tried some differnt sizes but not much.

Cerebro, how did you take on your first run Jaheira without Khalid?

[Armen]

Originally posted by ZFR: Cerebro, how did you take on your first run Jaheira without Khalid?

i find that a misplaced sense of his own importance combined with the house with the spiders in usually takes care of that problem

if highest number of games is any measure i guess my favourite party size 1 - i often fail to finish party games in favour of solos and have finished both games as solos more often than parties

i'm not proud of it though

[ZFR]

Originally posted by Armen: i find that a misplaced sense of his own importance combined with the house with the spiders in usually takes care of that problem

Yes I know there are ways you can easily have Jaheira without Khalid, but I just found it strange because one does not use them on his first run, when persumably he doesn't know anything about the NPCs.

[ElfBane]

Preferred party size is 8, so you can carry along Khalid and Dynaheir!! Unfortunately there are no mods that allow that yet [img]smile.gif[/img]

[ 02-07-2007, 07:03 PM: Message edited by: ElfBane ]