A mages troop?

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Have anyone tried a troop of 3 (fighter/mage, cleric and mage/thief) and 3 specialist mages? Sounds pretty powerful and fun.

 

I do not think it is a good idea, iceman. A pure tank is essential in the earlier stages of the game while mages grow in power. And you can not find enough spell scrolls for so many mages anyway.

 

I agree with Silverstar. My biggest problem with Mages in IWD1 (and 2 as well) is that you never find enough scrolls to cover an entire party.

I played a 6 character party in IWD 1 and my only arcane casters were a Gnome Illusionist/Thief and a Bard and I was just fine in regards to spellcasting.

YMMV

 

Are you saying that with 2 mages and there aren't enough spells for them to cast. Perhaps later in the game and they have advanced to a higher level ? I just finished the temple of gold and I found it hard to deal with those giant guards+priests combinations. The spells of my 2 magic people ran out quickly.

 

2 mages (or one mage and a bard) are perfectly fine. More mages, and you will have a hard time trying to find good spell scrolls for them.

As for Verbeegs and the priests in Forgotten Temple. A lvl 5 chromatic orb paralyses foes in their tracks, so use it on those big bad giants, they have terrible saving throws. or use Web and hold a whole bunch of them, then aim for the held ones with your ranged attacks. Every attack will auto-hit since they are paralysed and they will fall fast. Ghoul Touch (lvl 2 mage, necromancy) is very nice here too, perhaps the only place in the game that the spell is actually useful. Remember, you must disable the Verbeeg giants, since they are capable of doing a lot of damage! (they have exceptional STR)

Charm/hold person is also useful against those priests. Pelt them with ranged attacks and magic missiles/magic stones to disrupt their spell casting and you will be fine!

 

<quote>2 mages (or one mage and a bard) are perfectly fine. More mages, and you will have a hard time trying to find good spell scrolls for them.</quote>

Uh,I want to have more than one copie(s) of the same spell.

My third troop has 3 mages( a cleric, a fighter/mage and a conjurer ). For now the cleric can use "animate death" to hold the guards; and "grease" from mages helps a lot. At this stage, the arrows are becoming less useful but fire arrows are doing well. I am also planning to use "skull trap" and see what'll happen. I'll definitely try "web".

The alcolytes aren't very hard to kill but they can incapacitate mages if they venture near them.

My third troop consists of:

2 strong fighters with swords ( str, dex,const maxed out).
1 cleric with sling.*
1 fighter/mage with bow.
1 fighter/thief with crossbow
1 conjurer with darts preferably beserker darts.

* I'm not sure about her weapon. I wonder should I let her have a more active role such as using a mace and wondering about healing other members?

Hopefully I will get some summon creatures to use as helpers and tankers.

What is your comment?

 

The party looks cool, but you could also use a ranger, paladin or a bard, they are good character classes as well.

Rangers are not terrible, if they equip a single weapon without a shield they get an extra attack per round, which I find very useful!

Paladins are nice. They have good special abilities such as Pro from Evil, Lay on Hands (instant x2 lvl HP healing!) and Cure Disease (+5 HP and cures disease/poison). And they can use a very nice paladin-only weapon late in the game! They also get +2 to all saving throws, and Smite Evil ability if you have HoW.

Bards...do you have the expansion, HoW? If you have you have to play a bard, they get quite a few new songs which make them very powerful and fun and useful to have around. They are not bad mages too, their casting level increases soo fast that although they cast less spells than a mage, their spells end up being more powerful! They can use any weapon, can pickpocket (very useful in Kuldahar!) and their lore identifies almost anything. And they can use some bard only items in the game.
There are a few bard-spesific mini quests in the game as well!

As for your party:

Cleric is OK with the sling, unless your tanks are in trouble let her stay in the back and throw out spells, healing those who are in need, and using the occasional sling.

Your fighter/thief can backstab. If he is hidden in shadows (armor heavier than studded leather will disabel stealth) or invisible, and attack from an enemy's behind with a thief weapon (dagger, shortsword, longsword, club, staff, etc.) he will do extra damage based on his lvl:very neat for KOing a caster type monster fast. If you have HoW he can now sneak attack:he no longer needs to be hiding!

Conjurer is OK, a nice choice, though if you have HoW he will miss evocation spells. Your support caster can handle this though.

 

Clerics are no mages, so you have only 2 mages in your party. You have 3 spellcasters.

Fighters become extremely powerful once they get their 5th point in their weapon, but since they don't get unlimited profiency points I recommend spreading the weapon profiencies around so that every party member uses a different weapon type, so you can use all the magic weapons you'll find effectively. I'd have at least one of your characters specialize in axes for example.

For flexibility everyone should be able to use both a melee and a ranged weapon effectively.

 

Iceman, do you have the Heart of Winter expansion?

 

I soloed the game with a Ranger so I think they can be very effective.

I'm not sure about this but would it be a good idea to use DC Fighter/Mages and one Thief/Mage instead of MC. You could distribute the scrolls between them more easily.

Or an all-spellcasters party with Clerics, Bards and Druids and a few Mages depending on the number of scrolls you could get. Getting scrolls in that game can be a real pain.

 

That's what I'm trying to say: You won't find too many scrolls in this game.

 

I started to think that selecting a conjurer is a mistake since the summon monster last only a few rounds, they vanished in a blink. I should of stay with the invoker.

 

All spell durations are limited to your caster levels. In other words the higher levels the longer they will last (all spells, not just summon) So just though it up and keep advancing.