Party Creation

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oh yes, im not immune to the charm of having a skulking little backstabbing cutpurse among my ranks...80% of the 50 parties ive played had a rogue.

 

I beat the game on normal with a party of

1.human barbarian starting stats 16 str, 14 dex, 14 con, 10 int, 8 wis, 14 char
2.human fighter/sorc starting stats 12 str, 14 dex, 14 con, 14 int, 4 wis, 18 char
3.aasimar paladin of Ilmater, starting stats 12 str, 14 dex, 14 con, 12 int, 12 wis, 16 char
4.moon elf druid, starting stats 10 str, 14 dex, 10 con, 14 int, 16 wis, 12 char
5.drow enchanter, starting stats 10 str, 18 dex, 8 con, 20 int, 10 wis, 14 char
6.half-elf rouge, starting stats 10 str, 18 dex, 10 con, 16 int, 6 wis, 16 char

they worked pretty well in HoF (specifically the druid). It really was for me just pure determination that got me to the end of the game, rather then a good party (the party has almost zero defensive casting and the sorc/fighter is really just an exp leech who's only good for his magic missiles).

 

Geeeeeez, that's a LOT of CHA in that party, IS.

A barbarian with a 14 CHA? Wow!

 

it's sort of my "beautiful people" party and the barbarian is suppose to be the son of a chieftain, so I figure he should have some leadership qualities other then bashing those who don't agree with him.

I figure it's how Hollywood would do an adventuring party, defunct, beautiful and over loaded with personal magnetism so the attention's always on them.

 

party i'm taking to the end:

half-elf Ranger(x)/Barbarian (x) 18, 16, 14, 10, 10, 8
aasimar Paladin (x)/Fighter (4) 16, 10, 16, 8, 12, 18
aasimar Paladin (2)/Cleric (X) 14, 10, 12, 10, 17, 17
halfling Rogue (x) 10, 20, 12, 18, 8, 8
human Sorcerer (X) 8, 14, 12, 14, 10, 18
drow Wizard (x)/Fighter (4) 14, 16, 12, 20, 8, 10


what do you think?

 

Helfling rogue may be lacking. There is little benefit for pure rogues in IWD2, unless you want high level rogue feats and massive backstab, err, sneak attack (yes that's right) damage.

Tell you what, I once had a level 30 rogue, equipped a spear with magically a great reach. He sneak attacked monsters from safety and did 15d6 additional damage! Though he was lacking when the hordes of monsters swarmed us. But he seldom fails a reflex save, and even ,f he fails he still takes half-damage.

So I suggest MCing the rogue. Maybe with some fighter, or mage levels. Ranger may be cool too!

But it seems like you are going to use him as a ranged attacker. He will excell at it, ranged weapons are good in normal but useless in HoF unfourtunately. ANd with his STR he will hardly be effective in melee.

 

Silverstar, ranged attackers are not useless in HOF. You simply have to understand how to use it properly. Archery (using this term to cover all attacks) is best used to pepper spellcasters and to finish off any heavily wounded monsters.

Every character in HOF doesn't have to be some uber-optimized death machine. You can get thru HOF with a party that was balanced for normal mode, as long as you adjust your tactics for the differences in HOF.


I've played that same pure rogue with the 12 Paces spear. He was a great character and very fun to play. A serial backstabber. Was he as good in melee as a true tank? of course not. But as a sneaky backstabber, he was hell on wheels. I'd have him run all around the enemy's flanks, sneak attacking one target then moving on to the next SA target.

And with Improved Evasion, he was often a very useful decoy target. I used my rogue in this role in the Fields of Slaughter against (you know who), when there was nothing else to target. "Betcha can't hit me!!!" He taunted to my party's sorc.


Using a pure rogue only in an archer role is probably not worth the effort, since the real value of staying pure class in rogue is to build up all those sneak attack dice. That said, even a weak, but pure rogue can build up a large sneak attack.

Still, if ranged attacks and theiving skills are the player's primary roles for the rogue, perhaps a Ftr/Rogue or a Ranger/Rogue would be a better build. Ftr/Rogue, if you care more about strong combat skills; Ranger/Rogue, if you care a little more about maintaining strong rogue skills.


The thing about Rogue/Wizzies is that to make the most effective Wizzy requires that you take as many Wizard levels as possible, and fewer rogue levels (hence, the common Wiz X/Rogue 2 build).


I actually think that Maktos' halfling rogue (10, 20, 12, 18, 8, 8) may be too smart for its own good, if he intends it to be a pure rogue. OTOH, if he intends the rogue to become a rogue/wizzy, then the stats are excellent. For a pure rogue, I'd probably suggest dropping the INT to 14 (maybe even 12), perhaps dropping the CHA to 6, then spreading the 6 stat points between STR and CON.

I usually see the primary and useful thieving skills as Search, Move Silently, Hide, Open Locks, and Disable Device. That's 5 skills, thus it could be argued that anything more than 5 SP/level is overkill, for a pure rogue. (Of course, this changes if you happen to want your rogue to also be the party talker.) It's also fairly true for a Ftr/Rogue or Ranger/Rogue MC build as well. Hence, unless you have some other reason to need excessive SP/level, like being a pure rogue *and* talker, or you intend to be a wiz/rogue, it is completely possible to have too much INT in a rogue.

 

Yes since rogues get more points per level up than any other clas already, they really don't have to be that smart at all. Unless you have serious RP reasons, or wanna multi with a wizard ofcourse.

Wizx/rogue2 is nice, but maybe one may want to do different. Maybe wizard7 for useful spells like Miror Image, Strength, Stonsekin etc. and all remaining rogue levels for massive sneak attacks. Just an idea anyway.

Archers are nice to have in HoF as they tend to survive better than tanks, who, in an ambush, act as meat shields and try to survive till the casters summon something. Then it is generally left to casters, and summons. Summons are meaT shields, casters kick some major a**, tanks are just there just 'in case', this strategy works fine %99 of HoF.

Archery may be useful to disrupt spell casters, but they have concentration checks in 3E. And arrow damages are not that great most of the time.

'Sure I can be turned into punchison with all those arrows+5, but I am STILL just gonna cast THIS spell!'

Archery is wonderful for caster types though, using the cast/attack strategy. Doom Bolter/Hell bolter crossbow was extra extra useful. Cast something and then attack in the same round, each additional damage was welcome. And I got a bow which gave +4 CON, which litterally meaned +60 HP in level 30 and +2 fortitude saves, a great boon to any caster! But other than this reasons I really didn'T need archery for actually killing things.

 

Silverstar, I agree that in HOF, archery becomes much less affective at spell disrupting for the reasons you state.

Still, I've always like having a dedicated archer (not a spellcaster) to use as a "fire support" character who I use to kill the nearly dead enemies just that much quicker. And while an archer may not be able to disrupt spellcasters all that well in HOF, the ability to reach out and touch a well behind the lines spellcaster is a very nice thing, IMHO. Just my preference of battle tactics.

Regarding your Rogue X/Wizzy ~7, I've often considered this sort of character. it would be sort of like some kind of semi-magical ninja rogue who could use various minor magics to add a different sort of flavor to the character. Such a character should try to avoid the overly magical attack spells and try to concentrate on things that fit the mystical ninja-ish profile.

Minor MI, Mirror Image, and Invis would be obvious choices. Smoking Cloud would be a good choice as well (a smoke bomb). Grease would be another good choice (a grease bomb). Blindness and Web are a couple other potentially good options.

I've always stayed away from such a character because they seemed a bit on the weak side, since it would require a fair number of mage levels to even get enough spells to be marginally useful. Still, it might make for an interesting build to play.




Actually, in HOF ambushes, my first action isn't to cast summoning spells, but to cast Greater Command or Holy Word (my parties are almost always 100% good) and a Symbol
of Hopelessness. Nothing like stunning a large chunk of the enemy. And a stunned enemy is a nice meatshield as well.

I've found that with this combo of spells, I can often take care of most ambushes without even needing any summoning, or darned few.


I use my tanks in HOF a bit more offensively than it sounds like you do. One of the biggest challenges in HOF that I've noticed is the increased numbers of enemies. I don't mind the challenge. What I use my summons for is to even the odds. I don't use them as nothing more than a meatwall and my tanks as the 2nd rank. My tanks are in the first rank with the summons. My Summons even the odds so that my tanks don't get overrun, surrounded and overwhelmed. I've found that when the odds are more even, my tanks do just fine in most HOF battles.

I should also note that my combat tactics (both normal and HOF) tend to be a bit defensively minded, or perhaps passive-aggressive. I don't have my party charge into battle. I prefer to hold a firm formation, used ranged weapons as the enemy closes on my formation, and doing my darnedest to hold my formation against the attacking hordes. In HOF, I usually like to hold my summons in fairly close as well, with one exception. if I'm summoning an elemental or a demon that requires PfE, I prefer to drop them well behind the front lines, hopefully right in front of any enemy mages. Oh, how I love the havoc of a pit fiend hacking and slashing in the enemy's rear!!!

 

Drop the paladin fighter or the paladin cleric for a bard type. Bard sorcerer or even a bard rogue.

 

Khazraj,
I think that Maktos kinda needs the Pal/Cleric in the party to fill the medic role. Without it, I'd say that the party would be in deep doo-doo.

I suppose that the Pal/Ftr could be traded for a Bard, but frankly, I wouldn't do it. I'm a big fan of having 2 full blown tanks in a party of 6.

If I were looking at Maktos' party and was looking to add in a bard, it would be for his Ftr 4/Wiz X. But frankly, I'd probably keep the wizzy. Still, either should work just fine.

 

The war chant of Sith makes a cleric redundent anyway...

 

I often find that a druid works better then a cleric, but then again I'm very summon heavy. However the high end druid spells are very nice and shapechanging can be very helpful against enemies that rely on elemental damage (or the dire bear if you simply need someone to deal out more damage).

Entangle never looses it's use in the game... EVER.

I find the cleric's defensive spells loose value as the game progresses (defense in general seems to in IWD2, my best tank had an AC of 25 starting HoF), while damage dealing spells, especially in HoF do not.

 

Lots of good points about a druid, IS. Entangle is a nice spell, except when you're inside.

The best thing about clerics is healing.


Khazraj, the War Chant is a nice supplement, but it's no replacement for Heal or Mass Heal in the heat of battle. 2 HP of healing/round doesn't cut it, if you've lost a hundred HP's and you're seriously hurting.

 

While I really like bards they are an optional character while a cleric is not - a bard hardly makes a pimple on a good clerics behind...

And while the clerics healing power may be his most useful addition to a party its certainly not his only one. Between buffing the party to keep them strong or dexterous or charismatic to protecting them from enemy spells and increasing their usefulness in battle or for defense to removing nasty effects that get through anyway the cleric is a huge boost to the partys success and after all that is done he can still wade in with mace swinging or plink away with a ranged weapon too.

Other than a special "theme" or RP party I would never play a party without at least one single class cleric and I prefer to have a second warrior x/cleric 4x build as a tank/back up cleric as well - my favorite for that role being a ghostwise halfling or half-orc barbarian x/Stormlord 4x.

Due to the usefulness of the spontaneous casting of healing spells I would also never play an evil cleric (spontaneous casting of harm) even if I wanted a "non-good" one for RP I would go nuetral...

 

Best HOF anti-caster archer: high-strength sling user (damage bonus = more disrupted spells).
The drawback? No everlast bullets.

 

Yews, but thewrew arew so MANY magic bullets to be found, you could never use them all. Although I never have more than one slinger in my party, since I've found only one great sling in the game.

 

Slings are for sissies, this game is 3E so pick the feat or play as an elf and or fighter to be able to sue cool bows! IIRC, clerics have crossbow proficiency, no no I mean, 'feat' by default so they can make the best of Doom and Hell bolters. I them!

 

@Liuz, actually there is one returning bullet, but I think that it's only a random treasure drop, not a hard-coded treasure. It's a returning flaming +1 bullet.

 

typically get the +1 flaming blot of returning form the Fire Elemental King in the Magma Loop Chamber after you deal with the Abomination Priestess who casts that weird time spell that massively screws up the Magma Chamber.