A couple of questions

[Validus]

Well, like the topic is called, here are a couple of questions for the helpfull to answer.
(caution, there are maybe alittle long winded )

Cheating of not,
well, my first question is rather more of a opinion I guess. I played baldurs gate 1 and Tales of the Sword Coast out with a character I created, a fighter if you should want to know. When I completed the game, my char is being exported and now it comes. I import my character again in a new game, and play threw baldurs gate and tales of the sword coast again, reading all the tomes myself. Gaining higher abilities like you normally should be able to get. So, is this cheating? or a way of cheating, cuase the least I want to do is cheating.

Armor vs weapons,
If you buyed the original baldurs gate (and I suppose the most of you did) and you read the manual completly, you should notice the Table of Armor vs weapons. Now my question is as following, what exactly means this? At first I thought that wearing a particully armour would improve your fighting skills with a particully weapon. But as I progressed threw the game I thought about the possibility that it means that if you were an sort armor that you are less protected to a certain form of attack. If that is true, it would be really shitty for my fighter.

Dual-classing,
Although I know this is more for BG2 players to do, I hope you guys know enough of it. My question is, if you dual class your character, is that the same as Multi-classing? In the description BG2 gave I could find no differences, if that is so, why should duel classing be in it. I mean, it is a great disadvantage that you cant return in level gaining with your former class, am I right?

The Dark Side of the Sword Coast???,
Is this an offical expansion, and if not, Who made it? Where can I but it? what are the new featurs? Are there more expansions that I dont know of?

that was it.... for now..

[J'aran]

Hey there, welcome to IronWorks.

Allright, I'm feeling helpful tonight, so here are your answers.

Cheating.
Hmmm, yes, IMO playing through the game multiple times and reading the Tomes and Manuals multiple times to gain superhigh stats is cheating. If you would play the game at maximum reality (as far as that goes in a fantasy setting anyway) you could only play through the game once. In real life, you can't turn back the clock to get a little bit of extra excercise either. Of course, if you follow this opinion to the letter, even saving and reloading after you died is cheating, but you have to draw the line somewhere.

Armour vs weapons.
It is as you said, certain types of armour don't protect against certain types of damage as good as they do against others. This isn't shitty though. More often than not these are bonuses rather than penalties (remember, for AC, less is better, so -1 is good and +1 is bad). IIRC, leather armour (not studded) and chainmail are the only types of armour that actually give penalties.

Dual-classing.
No, dual-classing is different from multiclassing. You said you couldn't find any differences, but yet you name the most important one: when dual-classing you stop gaining levels in your first class once you dual. As a multiclass character, you split your 'training' equally between both classes, which means you'll end up as a mediocre power in both. As a dual-class, you have complete control over when to switch to your second class, so you can end up as, for instance, a very powerful mage with a bit of fighting skills, if you'd want to.

DSotSC.
This is unofficial, made by TeamBG, and if I'm correct, you can download it for free on their site, www.teambg.com
Other than this, I can't tell you anything about it, as I don't have it myself.

[Lemernis]

Cheating or Not
Yes, that is cheating. It's your game and you may certainly play it however you wish. But that is definitely not how the developers intended for the game to be played. I think you would find it boring anyhow, since you would be so powerful that there would be little challenge for you.

Armor vs. Weapons
You want AC to decrease--the lower it is, the better the protection. However, the modifer system for AC can get a little confusing when it comes to the positive and negative numbers. For example, Studded Leather +2 actually means that 2 is being subtracted from the base AC when you wear that armor: base AC + (-2).

In the tables you mention on p. 142 they show the modifiers in negative terms. So I also find it confusing that in table 8b on p. 142 there is an apparent penalty for leather armor against piercing weapons and for chainmail against bludgeoning weapons. If I understand the table correctly, when wearing these armor types your AC actually increases against those weapons types. I don't see why a penalty should apply there. Why would you be more vulnerable to arrows or spears with plain leather armor? Or to a mace when wearing chainmail? Perhaps in medieval warfare leather actually made arrows more difficult in some way to remove arrows and spears? Or the chainmail links caused additional damage to the wearer when mashed? You wouldn't have a character not wear either of them, I don't think, because you are protected better overall with them than whatever the next lowest grade of armor is. But it is a bit curious.

Dual Classing
The main advantage of dual classing is that you gain higher weapons proficiences when starting as a pure fighter. Generally you would want to dual at around level 5 or 6. (I prefer 5 because it takes significantly less time to regain the fighter abilities that way).

Just as a case in point, I once did a side by side comparison of a dual classed and a multiclassed fighter-mage. I was surprised to find that the multi was actually a substantially better fighter. Even given the dual classed character's higher number of profs, the multi's THACO and attacks per round were better when he maxed at levels 7/7. On the other hand, the dual classed character was able to reach level 9 as a mage.

Dark Side
Check it out at http://www.dsotsc.com

[ 02-28-2002: Message edited by: Lemernis ]

[ 02-28-2002: Message edited by: Lemernis ]

[Lavindathar]

I can only offer my opinion on question 1, as Jaran and Lemernis have answered the rest:

i) Yes, it is cheating. Without a doubt. Indefinately. Is the pope catholic?

Lavi

[JackOfClubs]

Cheating: I agree with the consensus. Playing through twice with the same character is cheating (and boring).

Armor penalties: The theory here is that certain types of armor are not as good against certain types of attacks. Chain mail, since it is not rigid, is bad against crushing weapons. Leather armor, since it is soft, provides some cushion against crushing but is vulnerable to piercing. Lemernis' examples are correct. In my opinion this is unnecessary realism but it goes all the way back to the early days of D&D.

Dual vs Multi: If you are playing with exp point caps, multi-classed characters will be unable to reach the highest levels since the cap is on the experience point total. This is a real disadvantage over dual-classing since you can choose at which level you want to abandon one of the classes.

[Daniel]

quote:

---

Originally posted by Lemernis:
Cheating or Not
Yes, that is cheating. It's your game and you may certainly play it however you wish. But that is definitely not how the developers intended for the game to be played. I think you would find it boring anyhow, since you would be so powerful that there would be little challenge for you.

---

I agree. When I first played BG1 I went through the game multiple times trying to gain all the tomes(I ended up giving up after finishing the about game 5 times - I had mega stats),The first time through wasn't too bad as I wasn't too hard, but once I had imported to BG2 the game was far too easy and ultimatly BG2 was ruined for me. So have a think about it before you do it.

[Validus]

Well, first off thanks for all the replies, I did not expect them so fast.

Cheating
So, I see you guys all say it is cheating, alright, I thought so. The one who said that is was boring after awhile was right. It will get boring, but it is also fun to kill Drizzt.. only with your fearless fighter (I downloaded the cap remover aswell, and after the 10th level or so the amount of exp you need will not double, so easy level gaining). But luckily I saved my first time char when I completed Baldurs Gate.

Armor
Well, thanks, the reason this is shitty for my original fighter (so not the ones where I sorta cheated with, like you guys showed) is that I put the pofincies ,after carefull examinating the armors, on spiked weapons, becuase there attack are of the bludgeon type, and the heaviest armor (full plate mail) has, what I thought, no penalties for the bludgeon type.
But now I know this, I could have given the profincies to Large Sword, instead. So that is the shitty part.

Dual-classing
So, another question about this ability. When you have a multi-classed character, some of your abilities (like spell casting) will be disabled when wearing armor. Is this the same with Dual-Classed character?

If you guys are still in the mood for answering questions, then go ahead, here are some more, and prolly the last that bothered me.

Cursed Items
Mostly, the cursed items you find have all their advantages and disadvantages listed when you identify them. And some (the hand of Kazaroth) have the disadvantage displayed when you put it on. Now, what I wonder is, when you were a cursed item, do you have any other, not-written, penalties?

Baldurs Gate 1 clans
When I search on the internet for them, most search machines only come up with NWN clans, so I decided to ask it here. Are there any baldurs gate 1 clans?
And also about clans, whats the deal with cheating clans? Is online cheating so easy with Baldurs Gate? And why would you creat a whole clan while if you decide to cheat, you can be as strong as a complete non-cheating clan?

Maybe a question for BG2 users, but I am sure most of you know it as well,
A paladin gains the ability to cast priest spells as higher levels, till wich level spells can he go, or can he learn them all?

Thanks in advance

[SixOfSpades]

Paladins start gaining Cleric spells once they reach Level 9, and will eventually be able to cast and Cleric spell from Spell Levels 1-4. Rangers start casting Druid spells at Level 8, and can access Spell Levels 1-3. Even though it's possible to get Rangers to Level 8 with ToSC, spellcasting abilities for Rangers & Paladins are not implemented until BG2.

Paladins & Rangers gain spells at the same rate as Clerics & Druids, just 7-8 levels later. They do NOT, however, get bonus spells for having a high Wisdom.