Icewind Dale The Icewind Dale Series Thread

[SwiftCrack]

hell yeah

 

[hell bovine]

More importantly, what would be a fun and fucked up IWD party concept for someone who's played it various ways? Once you've done no-magic dwarf party I don't know where you go.

I recall a very entertaining let's play many years a go, by someone who had a party of 6 "ninjas" aka 6 fighter/mage/thieves multiclassed.

I'll raise you a party of level 1 gnomes someone did years ago.

 

[Wayward Son]

More importantly, what would be a fun and fucked up IWD party concept for someone who's played it various ways? Once you've done no-magic dwarf party I don't know where you go.

I recall a very entertaining let's play many years a go, by someone who had a party of 6 "ninjas" aka 6 fighter/mage/thieves multiclassed.

I'll raise you a party of level 1 gnomes someone did years ago.

As in he never leveled up!?

 

[Tigranes]

Some cool ideas. I don't know how you'd survive, ultimately, if you never level up, in terms of sheer HP/THAC0 limitations?

Might go with the big and little duo concept (fighter & mage/thief), or some kind of leveling/XP challenge - maybe play four gnomes that only level up once per chapter or something? Not sure what would be the minimum level gain to keep it interesting.

 

[hell bovine]

More importantly, what would be a fun and fucked up IWD party concept for someone who's played it various ways? Once you've done no-magic dwarf party I don't know where you go.

I recall a very entertaining let's play many years a go, by someone who had a party of 6 "ninjas" aka 6 fighter/mage/thieves multiclassed.

I'll raise you a party of level 1 gnomes someone did years ago.

As in he never leveled up!?

Yep, the thread is buried somewhere on the old ironworks forums. I think he finished it on the lowest difficulty.

 

[Tigranes]

This?

http://www.ironworksforum.com/forum/showthread.php?s=2616ee1a7ce5507078a04ba62e6b8ed5&t=23971

I'm intrigued, though one worry on his settings (Level 1, Insane) is the slog; IWD played normally can already be a fair slog due to the sheer number of enemies (e.g. Kresselack Tomb level 3?, Dragon's Eye), but it seems like this would devolve into pulling 2-3 enemies, fighting, resting, rinse and repeat 30 times per level. And of course, later on dude figures out that he can just run in, grab loot and run away from 80% of enemies.

Honestly, I'm surprised that the guy says his gnomes are one crit away from death - by later Dragon's Eye I'd expect it to be one normal hit from certain attacks. It seems unbelievable that according to him it's not that hard compared to HOF etc; maybe itemisation really does make up for it once you get to a certain level?

I might try it, probably not on Insane, and maybe with a couple of level ups along the way. Looks like dude also puts it down to Easy later. But it's an interesting testament to AD&D (& its IE implementations), and the relative lack of mechanics bound to level progression, that you can still expect to, e.g. put Chaos on Poquelin and do him in that way as Level 1. There's no way you can do that with POE, DOS1/2, and all the other RPGs where levelling is the most important and wide-ranging factor in all kinds of number matchups.

 

[hell bovine]

This?

http://www.ironworksforum.com/forum/showthread.php?s=2616ee1a7ce5507078a04ba62e6b8ed5&t=23971

I'm intrigued, though one worry on his settings (Level 1, Insane) is the slog; IWD played normally can already be a fair slog due to the sheer number of enemies (e.g. Kresselack Tomb level 3?, Dragon's Eye), but it seems like this would devolve into pulling 2-3 enemies, fighting, resting, rinse and repeat 30 times per level. And of course, later on dude figures out that he can just run in, grab loot and run away from 80% of enemies.

Honestly, I'm surprised that the guy says his gnomes are one crit away from death - by later Dragon's Eye I'd expect it to be one normal hit from certain attacks. It seems unbelievable that according to him it's not that hard compared to HOF etc; maybe itemisation really does make up for it once you get to a certain level?

I might try it, probably not on Insane, and maybe with a couple of level ups along the way. Looks like dude also puts it down to Easy later. But it's an interesting testament to AD&D (& its IE implementations), and the relative lack of mechanics bound to level progression, that you can still expect to, e.g. put Chaos on Poquelin and do him in that way as Level 1. There's no way you can do that with POE, DOS1/2, and all the other RPGs where levelling is the most important and wide-ranging factor in all kinds of number matchups.

Yeah, that's the thread.

As for crits, keep in mind that IWD (and also, I think, BG) has some weird "low hp" protection mechanics for low level characters. I don't remember the details, but what happens that the very first hit (even a critical) will take away all of their hp, save one. Of course, a character can still get two-shotted, and it's not a foolproof protection.

 

[Tigranes]

Wait, so at level 1 you're immune to 1-hit kills? I never knew this - I guess because one passes through lower levels pretty quickly. So that's what he meant by beginner's luck.

I'll roll and try this when I get some time.

 

[hell bovine]

I think here is a hp limit, above which the protection doesn't work anymore. Also, this mechanics can sometimes fail to kick in, but yeah, even Xan can survive a critical at level one.

edit: found it on the baldur wiki under exploits:
"Level 1 characters cannot die in one hit unless they have 14 HP or higher. Level 1 characters who only have 1 HP therefore cannot die from damage, as the game cannot reduce their HP to any fraction of the total.
This isn't fully reliable, however, and occasionally a level 1 character will die after taking repeated hits."

They are talking about total hps here; if a 10 hp character gets critted for 9 hp, then the next hit will kill them.

 

[Average Manatee]

This?

http://www.ironworksforum.com/forum/showthread.php?s=2616ee1a7ce5507078a04ba62e6b8ed5&t=23971

I'm intrigued, though one worry on his settings (Level 1, Insane) is the slog; IWD played normally can already be a fair slog due to the sheer number of enemies (e.g. Kresselack Tomb level 3?, Dragon's Eye), but it seems like this would devolve into pulling 2-3 enemies, fighting, resting, rinse and repeat 30 times per level. And of course, later on dude figures out that he can just run in, grab loot and run away from 80% of enemies.

Honestly, I'm surprised that the guy says his gnomes are one crit away from death - by later Dragon's Eye I'd expect it to be one normal hit from certain attacks. It seems unbelievable that according to him it's not that hard compared to HOF etc; maybe itemisation really does make up for it once you get to a certain level?

I might try it, probably not on Insane, and maybe with a couple of level ups along the way. Looks like dude also puts it down to Easy later. But it's an interesting testament to AD&D (& its IE implementations), and the relative lack of mechanics bound to level progression, that you can still expect to, e.g. put Chaos on Poquelin and do him in that way as Level 1. There's no way you can do that with POE, DOS1/2, and all the other RPGs where levelling is the most important and wide-ranging factor in all kinds of number matchups.

That's amazing.

With good stats/armor he can probably get his AC on a fighter to the point where plenty of normal or easy mode enemies can only hit on a natural 20, which is a crit, so that's probably what he means. With how fast you take attacks you probably wouldn't be able to survive with much lower AC even with the two-hit protection thing.

The only defensive ability that is level-based (aside from HP obviously) is saving throws, which means virtually every enemy spell would hit. But if you're avoiding most enemies and burning through scrolls like candy for most bosses, I can definitely see how it works (with plenty of reloading). Hard to imagine there's actually enough scrolls in the game to do it all the way to the end though.

 

[Lonely Vazdru]

Level 1 characters who only have 1 HP therefore cannot die from damage

This isn't fully reliable, however

 

[Crichton]

More importantly, what would be a fun and fucked up IWD party concept for someone who's played it various ways? Once you've done no-magic dwarf party I don't know where you go.

I'm currently playing an all-cleric party, three fighter-clerics, one cleric-thief and two cleric/illusionists. The lack of fire arrows and sunscorch makes trolls a pain in the ass, but 6x magic stone crushes undead (literally).

 

[Infinitron]

 

[Grunker]

Yxunomei is actually a very easy name to pronounce (Iks-o-no-maye) in contrast to a lot of Pillars' naming conventions... since McComb is evidently shit at making games and Obs got that covered but is shit at naming stuff, maybe they could offer him a job? :D

 

[Musaab]

I'm about to start a new playthrough.

Fighter
Priest of Tempus
Mage
Assassin
Shaman
Bard

What do you think, fellas?

 

[Zed]

I'm about to start a new playthrough.

Fighter
Priest of Tempus
Mage
Assassin
Shaman
Bard

What do you think, fellas?

ive always enjoyed less-than-full parties more than full parties in my iwd plays, so i'd probably have gone with just mage/thief, or cut the bard, or something.

 

[octavius]

Bard is OP due to War Chant of the Sith, so I personally avoid them.
IWD is one of the very few CRPGs that make the Druid class fun to play, so I always include one.
Overall your party looks rather weak when it comes to melee fighting, so I'd consider a Paladin.

 

[Grunker]

I'm about to start a new playthrough.

Fighter
Priest of Tempus
Mage
Assassin
Shaman
Bard

What do you think, fellas?

Shaman is a pretty shitty class tbh :/

So go with Druid there - they're also really cool in IWD.

I personally like multiclassing and plain Fighter is just boring (go with Paladin leader, there's some nifty interaction there).

 

[ghostdog]

I agree with grunker here, since it's not the first playthrough, go with at least some multi-classing. You get to make a party from scratch, so I always find it fun to mix and match classes.

Points of interest: Contact other plane spell (it comes with the expansion IIRC) can give you some very interesting info, and the Ranger tracking ability is also a fun ability to use to get information about areas.

 

[Baron Dupek]

go with Paladin leader, there's some nifty interaction there).

like that tough fight in the cementary that reward you with p. good sword?

 

[Average Manatee]

go with Paladin leader, there's some nifty interaction there).

like that tough fight in the cementary that reward you with p. good sword?

You're thinking of IWD2, IIRC the Paladin sword in IWD1 is just a freebie near the end.

 

[Tigranes]

Taking suggestions for classes for that level 1 / low-level playthrough. What do you think works for a bunch of gnomes or whatever that try to stay level 1 as long as possible?

I'm not sure yet but this just change the usual equations somewhat, maybe it actually matters to try and get the highest HP pool on char creation? Not sure what gets best mitigated by equipment later, e.g. THAC0.

 

[hell bovine]

Are you talking original or EE?

Also, for that one-hit protection to work, the hp pool can't be 14 or higher.

 

[Grunker]

go with Paladin leader, there's some nifty interaction there).

like that tough fight in the cementary that reward you with p. good sword?

That's IWD2. In no. 1 there are some instances of alignment-based feedback.

 

[Tigranes]

Are you talking original or EE?

Also, for that one-hit protection to work, the hp pool can't be 14 or higher.

Original because I am never touching any EE, and I think the sparsity of original IWD classes will make this more interesting anyway

I guess taking it as close to 14 as possible is the answer. It's been a while since I played IWD1 so I don't really have a working memory of key magical items, etc.