Icewind Dale The Icewind Dale Series Thread

[FeelTheRads]

Your issues with the combat have a lot more to do with the fact that D&D is a big pile of fail

The only reason the combat in IE games was passable was BECAUSE of D&D. Of course, you have no idea whatsoever about D&D and can only parrot random Sawyer posts.

 

[Erebus]

I have only played pure classes (no multi-classing) in IWD/IWD II.

I usually prefer single-class PCs in D&D games, but it doesn't always seem very necessary/useful for rogues.

 

[Minttunator]

I usually prefer single-class PCs in D&D games, but it doesn't always seem very necessary/useful for rogues.

Yeah, you don't need a full Thief in any of the IE games, I think - a Fighter/Thief dual or a Mage/Thief multi, for example, is more useful.

 

[Roguey]

And yet all the CRPGs with the best combat (Gold Box games and IE games, and I assume ToEE) are all (A)D&D games.

Also some of the worst, like NWN and NWN2. ToEE had more bad than good. There are a multitude of reasons for this, one of the big ones is that a lot of designers are dummies who mindlessly copy D&D so you end up with a watered-down imitation. Also the first and last quotes of my sig.

The only reason the combat in IE games was passable was BECAUSE of D&D. Of course, you have no idea whatsoever about D&D and can only parrot random Sawyer posts.

A large bestiary and spell list aren't D&D. Third quote of my sig.

 

[Average Manatee]

I've done HoW with lvl 1 parties in both games.

IWD1 is pretty fair and balanced in HoF. Just about all classes are quite useful. Of course if you start with lvl 1 you'll need to abuse some silly shit to level up early on, but mid-game you can fight fair and square.

IWD2 is indeed quite the pain with anything other than summon-spam, mostly because enemy AB gets boosted to insane levels which means anyone starting the game with less than 50 AC might as well be wearing 0 AC. It would be pretty fair if someone went through and nerfed every enemy by about 20-30 AB though. You CAN dish out a shitload of damage (1000+) with warriors if you have the right equipment (which you may or may not have if this is your NG+, since lots of drops are randomized).

 

[FeelTheRads]

Third quote of my sig.

Nobody cares to read the shit in your signature.

A large bestiary and spell list aren't D&D.

I didn't mean the bestiary and spell list, and yep, you no idea what you're talking about. Just so you know: Parroting developers doesn't really make you seem smart or knowledgeable.
You're only able to to scratch the surface, like the pleb that you are, and the more you try the more laughable it is.

 

[Roguey]

Nobody cares to read the shit in your signature.

You speak for everybody? Weak way to refute by the way.

I didn't mean the bestiary and spell list, and yep, you no idea what you're talking about. Just so you know: Parroting developers doesn't really make you seem smart or knowledgeable.
You're only able to to scratch the surface, like the pleb that you are, and the more you try the more laughable it is.

Still unable to refute. The Forgotten Realms is a dumb setting, the large efficiency gap between spellcaster and non- classes does no one any favors other than serve as a power fantasy to pathetic nerds who were bulled in their youth, the attributes and base weapon types are terribly balanced, and the armor rules are needlessly all-or-nothing . So we're left with creatures and abilities.

 

[octavius]

]Still unable to refute. The Forgotten Realms is a dumb setting, the large efficiency gap between spellcaster and non- classes does no one any favors other than serve as a power fantasy to pathetic nerds who were bulled in their youth, the attributes and base weapon types are terribly balanced, and the armor rules are needlessly all-or-nothing . So we're left with creatures and abilities.

And yet the best combat cRPGs are AD&D games.
If AD&D is so obviously broken, why the hell has nobody during 30 years and 1000+ CRPGs managed to make a combat system that is better or even eqully good? OK, maybe JA2 (if it really is a CRPG), but I can't think of others.

 

[Infinitron]

]Still unable to refute. The Forgotten Realms is a dumb setting, the large efficiency gap between spellcaster and non- classes does no one any favors other than serve as a power fantasy to pathetic nerds who were bulled in their youth, the attributes and base weapon types are terribly balanced, and the armor rules are needlessly all-or-nothing . So we're left with creatures and abilities.

And yet the best combat cRPGs are AD&D games.
If AD&D is so obviously broken, why the hell has nobody during 30 years and 1000+ CRPGs managed to make a combat system that is better or even eqully good? OK, maybe JA2 (if it really is a CRPG), but I can't think of others.

Serious answer? Probably nobody ever thought it was necessary or desirable. If you wanted to make a "complex" RPG, it was better to just adapt D&D and get a publicity boost from that. D&D was a selling point.

I don't think "systemscrafting" was considered a very important aspect of RPGs back then. In fact, it still isn't. There just aren't many Sawyers in the CRPG industry. Most of them cluster in the strategy genre.

 

[Average Manatee]

whining about fighters being bad

MVPs for IWD2 were a cracked moon the barbarian/fighter and Winterfox the paladin. The more things change, the more they stay the same.

 

[Roguey]

And yet the best combat cRPGs are AD&D games.
If AD&D is so obviously broken, why the hell has nobody during 30 years and 1000+ CRPGs managed to make a combat system that is better or even eqully good? OK, maybe JA2 (if it really is a CRPG), but I can't think of others.

Basically I think that most designers are overly concerned with what's come before when they sit down to write CRPG mechanics. When looking at mechanics that typically go into CRPGs, it's pretty hard to reverse-engineer a plan of intent. The conclusion I'm usually left with is that they wanted the system to "look like an RPG" on a UI screen. They have classes and stats and skills and skill/talent trees and a ton of derived stats when probably not all of that is necessary.

I believe that game designers, whether working in the RPG genre or otherwise, should establish what they want the player to be doing within the world. That is, they must ask themselves what they want the core activities of the player to be. Within those activities, the designer can find ways to allow growth over time in a variety of ways. How they want that growth to occur and what sort of choices they want to force the player to make -- that's what should drive the design of the advancement/RPG system.

Instead it usually seems like most designers sit down and say, "Well what are the ability scores going to be?"

Plus "Most designers really couldn't give two shits about (gameplay mechanics and player experience)."

whining about fighters being bad

That was base game experience, not HoF, and their efficiency had much to do with the buffing and debuffing efforts of the spellcasters. At the higher levels I could have kicked out the weapons-classes and my casters would have been able to progress using summons as tanks/meat shields, save or die spells, and frequent resting; the opposite likely wouldn't be true.

 

[Average Manatee]

whining about fighters being bad

That was base game experience, not HoF, and their efficiency had much to do with the buffing and debuffing efforts of the spellcasters. At the higher levels I could have kicked out the weapons-classes and my casters would have been able to progress using summons as tanks/meat shields, save or die spells, and frequent resting; the opposite likely wouldn't be true.

So what you are saying is that you could do without fighters, but it would be significantly harder and potentially require heavy exploitation of rest mechanics? Sounds like fighters are doing a good job. The whole point of a party-based system is that you can use one class's strengths to cover another's weaknesses.

 

[Edward_R_Murrow]

Your issue, that weapon classes become chumps and spellcasters become gods among men at higher level play, is a problem inherent in all earlier editions of D&D.

For me it's more a Heart of Fury specific issue with me because IWD2's version completely obsoletes Warrior classes due to the absurd amounts of stat buffs dumped upon enemies. No longer are they merely less effective options, but instead relegated to a status of naught but dead weight. You're better off booting a level 15 fighter with end-game (non-HoF) equipment in favor a a level 1 sorcerer/mage. That's a pretty big design flaw.

Even other D&D games don't have this issue at their higher levels. Warriors still serve as useful vehicles for spellcaster buffs, they're still good at mopping up disabled foes, and they can reliably dish out some hard hits in a fast manner. Certainly they aren't as integral as spellcasting classes, but at least they weren't rendered completely worthless as they were in IWD2's Heart of Fury.

Basically Heart of Fury was just the BI/Obsidian-cru exacerbating existing flaws in a system with some boneheaded design. It's a relatively trivial example, but it's one of a very long list they've been writing over time..

Both are filled with filler (especially IWD) but 2 had a lot of unique fights. I went through a great effort to list them all in my official Codex article.

IWD2 is certainly better than it's predecessor in terms of encounter design, but it still is pretty flawed in this regard:

-Some of the encounters are stupid gimmicks. Things like the ethereal fight, the Sherincal stair-slide, and the explosive barrels come immediately to mind. And while I respect the idea of scripting certain foes as "generators" (like in the 4th level of Dragon's Eye in IWD1; an actual standout encounter), spawning Warg Riders or Black Raven Tribesmen behind my party over and over isn't very fun (especially given the fact they already did it "right" in the previous game). The less said about the Filler Squares or the Monastery Trials (mercifully, evil parties can easily skip those by slaughtering the monks) the better.

-Many bosses are too defined by their defensive capabilities rather than their offensive capabilities, making the encounters far more linear than they would be the other way around. Both IWD games loved to stack up tons of powerful resistances and immunities upon monsters as the main challenge. That was pretty much IWD1's entire boss design; "immunity to +X weapons or less" was practically the sole challenge posed by many encounters (which played so well with the randomized loot). IWD2 is a bit better in that it actually branches out into other sorts of "protections", but it still makes for some kind of wonky fights where the fight is a triviality if you have the right tool or a slog/unwinnable if you don't.

For a simple example, take the fight against the Wisps in the Fell Woods. It becomes incredibly annoying if you don't know their weaknesses or have access to said weaknesses, but poses very little threat to the player's party. Just plain annoying. Or try some of the later-game bosses. Take the black dragon in Chult; if you know the one thing he doesn't resist well is lightning (I think) and that, yes, Arrows of Piercing count as +4 weapons he becomes much easier.

As a result of this sort of design, many boss fights not only become linear, but become much more "meta-gamey". In RPGs you can see what the opposition is throwing at your characters and come up with countermeasures. But you can't see an opponent's character sheet and list of immunities (unless the game is kind enough to provide an Analyze skill a la many jRPGs or you're playing KotC) forcing you to rely on trial and error. And it also makes for very lopsided, unsatisfying fights. Turns out the avatar of a god, Xvim, isn't immune to being stunned by an eighth level cleric spell and then hacked to pieces, helpless. I couldn't de-buff him to tone down his melee juggernaut prowess, I had little hope of laying down a barrage of offesive magicks to overwhelm him, but by knowing ONE WEIRD TRICK (DUNGEONMASTERS HATE HIM!) the battle is over with not a whimper following a tough fight, but a gangbang on a helpless opponent.

-Isair and Madae. Fuck that fight. Whoever's idea it was to repeatedly blast the party with a huge alignment hoser...well, I hope they don't think that was good design and have learned from it. When I iron-manned IWD2 with an evil party, that fight was almost as much of a joke as Xvim turned out to be just because Madae's Blasphemy spells weren't stunning most of the party, allowing all their goons to shred the helpless characters in addition to whatever sorcerous abuse Isair would send their way.

-And there's certainly some other assorted complaints I could make, like Chapter 3 being heavy on filler enemies/encounters, the incredibly disappointing white dragon fights, the horde of dumb undead in Kuldahar Vale, and most of Dragon's Eye being a bunch of crap.

Don't get me wrong, IWD2 does a lot of good things. It pushes the Infinity Engine scripting pretty far, and to good effect with certain fights like defending the Heartstone, the siege of Targos, or trying to save the bridge. Some fights like the Holy Avenger scruffle was masterfully done. I liked the way that handling situations in certain ways might change up the encounters in an area (like treating the Selune Priestess poorly makes her bring in a bunch of friends in a lter area to gank you). And I liked how they really tried to add mages/priests into many enemy bands without having them steal the show; goblin, orc, and troll shamans come to mind. But it certainly messed up in a lot of ways.

KotC can be easily broken with crafting spellcasters (and yup, weapon classes become chumps). BG2 can be broken in a million ways. Shattered Lands (with the exception of the final boss) is very easy. D&D problems.

Of course games can be broken. There are very few games that can't. I really struggle to think of any RPG that is unbreakable or doesn't have some terribly imbalanced strategy that overshadows all others. The point is that BI/Obsidian, among other developer-crus, have a habit of making games with uninteresting content that makes it hard to overlook imbalances or broken systems. A simple system, or one that is less than perfect can go far with a game comprised of solid, interesting content. Players are more willing to tolerate some cheese or balance issues if they are constantly presented with well-crafted, unique content. A lot of developers fail at this though, and should be worrying more about their inability to do so rather than constantly trying to reinvent the wheel and find the "perfect" system.

 

[Roguey]

So what you are saying is that you could do without fighters, but it would be significantly harder and potentially require heavy exploitation of rest mechanics? Sounds like fighters are doing a good job. The whole point of a party-based system is that you can use one class's strengths to cover another's weaknesses.

Significantly harder would be the all-weaponclass party. Caster summons are what cover the spellcasters' weaknesses.

-Some of the encounters are stupid gimmicks. Things like the ethereal fight, the Sherincal stair-slide, and the explosive barrels come immediately to mind.

I wouldn't consider these stupid. It's gamey variety.

For a simple example, take the fight against the Wisps in the Fell Woods. It becomes incredibly annoying if you don't know their weaknesses or have access to said weaknesses, but poses very little threat to the player's party.

I just auto-attacked them until they were dead.

Turns out the avatar of a god, Xvim, isn't immune to being stunned by an eighth level cleric spell and then hacked to pieces, helpless. I couldn't de-buff him to tone down his melee juggernaut prowess, I had little hope of laying down a barrage of offesive magicks to overwhelm him, but by knowing ONE WEIRD TRICK (DUNGEONMASTERS HATE HIM!) the battle is over with not a whimper following a tough fight, but a gangbang on a helpless opponent.

I stacked buffs and smashed him with crushing weapons. You're referring to Holy Word, right? I wouldn't call that a weird trick, anyone reading the description can see the immense value in a spell that stuns every evil creature in a 30 foot radius for one round with no save.

Edit: Oh I see you were talking about Symbol of Hopelessness. That could be an oversight, but either way it's a shit spell and the problem is with the system for having something like that.

-Isair and Madae. Fuck that fight. Whoever's idea it was to repeatedly blast the party with a huge alignment hoser...well, I hope they don't think that was good design and have learned from it. When I iron-manned IWD2 with an evil party, that fight was almost as much of a joke as Xvim turned out to be just because Madae's Blasphemy spells weren't stunning most of the party, allowing all their goons to shred the helpless characters in addition to whatever sorcerous abuse Isair would send their way.

Madae casts Blasphemy twice, once at the beginning of each section. It's a one-round stun; with enough protections it shouldn't be that big of a deal. Since your cleric can cast Holy Word, fair's fair.

But it certainly messed up in a lot of ways.

Yah.

Of course games can be broken. There are very few games that can't. I really struggle to think of any RPG that is unbreakable or doesn't have some terribly imbalanced strategy that overshadows all others. The point is that BI/Obsidian, among other developer-crus, have a habit of making games with uninteresting content that makes it hard to overlook imbalances or broken systems. A simple system, or one that is less than perfect can go far with a game comprised of solid, interesting content. Players are more willing to tolerate some cheese or balance issues if they are constantly presented with well-crafted, unique content. A lot of developers fail at this though, and should be worrying more about their inability to do so rather than constantly trying to reinvent the wheel and find the "perfect" system.

Every RPG I've played has had uninteresting content so it's not a BI/Obsidian-specific issue for me.

 

[Shadenuat]

Never underestimate fucking grass you HoF bastards

Damn it's good I had my single class druid and cleric with me. If not for grass, hold person and skeletons I'd probably never left prologue.

 

[Hazey]

Your issues with the combat have a lot more to do with the fact that D&D is a big pile of fail that is unsalvageable without massive fundamental rule changes that would make it no-longer-D&D.

And yet all the CRPGs with the best combat (Gold Box games and IE games, and I assume ToEE) are all (A)D&D games.

Yeah... no.

 

[octavius]

Your issues with the combat have a lot more to do with the fact that D&D is a big pile of fail that is unsalvageable without massive fundamental rule changes that would make it no-longer-D&D.

And yet all the CRPGs with the best combat (Gold Box games and IE games, and I assume ToEE) are all (A)D&D games.

Yeah... no.

The games you mentioned are not better.

 

[Edward_R_Murrow]

I wouldn't consider these stupid. It's gamey variety.

I guess we have a different definition of "gamey". I think it refers to things like how enemy/equipment progression is staggered in games to accommodate a learning curve, even though it often puts a lot of stress on the verisimilitude. Or to keep things solely in the sphere of Infinity Engine games, things like:

-The Demonknight at the bottom of Durlag's Tower leaving his evil mirror where hostiles can easily access it. It doesn't make any sense for it to be there except to allow parties to have an easy out against the Demonknight.

-That Aec'Letec's cultists who die for him have large amounts of health solely to increase the difficulty of the encounter, so the fight requires more than just one area of effect spell to prevent the demon from "resurrecting".

-That dragons in BG2 have absurd spell-like abilities far beyond anything they would have in PnP in order to compensate for the fact that the engine can't deal with the dragons's most fearsome ability: flight. I guess being able to cast uninterruptable Heal spells soothes draconic butthurt a bit.

Those seem like "gamey" things, sure to give simulationists and other psychographics fits, that seem like they can be justified design wise because they add depth or options, and more importantly add quality depth and options. The encounters in IWD2 I mentioned don't do this. Two of them basically reduce to "flip switch, roflstomp the encounter"; it's nothing more than an incredibly cheap gimmick that adds nothing.

I just auto-attacked them until they were dead.

I forget exactly what they resisted, but I remember it being a massive slog my first time through and a total joke on my ironman run. Might have had something to do with weapon choice or random drops.

I stacked buffs and smashed him with crushing weapons.

Edit: Oh I see you were talking about Symbol of Hopelessness. That could be an oversight, but either way it's a shit spell and the problem is with the system for having something like that.

Yeah, Symbol of Hopelessness brought Xvimmy low.

And even if he was the typical D&D-RPG boss, stacked to the gills with status-immunities (including Symbols of X), it is still a relatively uninteresting encounter in that Xvim is little more than a french vanilla, melee-meister. Sure, he hits hard and has some nasty on-hit effects, but all he really does besides that is start off the battle by summoning some garbage devils and maybe cast Sunfire at some point. The main challenge to the encounter is knowing he doesn't seem to resist blunt weapons (of a certain magic grade) for arbitrary reasons.

Kind of underwhelming compared to other late-game "boss" encounters in D&D RPGs.

Madae casts Blasphemy twice, once at the beginning of each section. It's a one-round stun; with enough protections it shouldn't be that big of a deal. Since your cleric can cast Holy Word, fair's fair.

It's more that alignment hosers are kinda stupid, powerful ones are very stupid, and it is godawful design to have one of them feature so prominently in the final boss fight of a combat-centric RPG like IWD2. While it can be worked around, doing so is neither fun nor interesting.

Every RPG I've played has had uninteresting content so it's not a BI/Obsidian-specific issue for me.

Of course, uninteresting content exists in every RPG. The thing is, compared to competitors in similar circumstances, BI/Obsidian have a track record of delivering games with a high proportion of uninteresting combat-related content. And that's why I tend to approach any sort of game they are attached to with a wee bit of reticence, ya dig? Basically, I was quite content to sit on the sidelines of the Project Eternity crowdfunding drive. It could very well be excellent, but certainly not something I'd stake money on.

 

[roshan]

Icewind Dale 2's Heart of Fury mode was dumb. Really dumb.

I suppose the idea was to create some sort of New Game+, where you brought in your original party and played through a scaled-up version of the campaign. The problem is, it scaled terribly. Warrior classes, especially "pure" characters, become practically obsolete in the face of hyper-powered melee enemies. Even Throne of Bhaal didn't kneecap them this badly. To make matters worse for the more mundane classes, monsters that mages could summon had all the beefiness of their HoF counterparts. And since HoF mode was typically played with a carryover party, that's right, you were summoning high level monsters/undead. The game felt like Pokemon: Forgotten Realms Version. "Cold Bones, I choose you!"

All you really get is a ton of increased stats and some powerful magic weapons (that still don't make your Fighters very useful).

Just another example of "lol, Black-Isle/Obsidian combat!"

I don't know about this. My warrior characters could definitely hold their own in HOF. It's probably just how you choose to develop your characters and what equipment you choose. HOF isn't really meant for those who haven't powergamed their characters.

 

[Roguey]

Those seem like "gamey" things, sure to give simulationists and other psychographics fits, that seem like they can be justified design wise because they add depth or options, and more importantly add quality depth and options. The encounters in IWD2 I mentioned don't do this. Two of them basically reduce to "flip switch, roflstomp the encounter"; it's nothing more than an incredibly cheap gimmick that adds nothing.

It makes them feel different from other fights so it does add something. Exploding barrels are a thing to prevent before they're placed or to run away from and/or explode to take out surrounding goblins while dealing with other kinds of enemies. For Sherincal you either switch to ranged weapons and spells to finish the fight or deal with at least one round of having someone preoccupied with shooting the switch. Oria's a gotcha for the inattentive/non-explorers.

It's more that alignment hosers are kinda stupid, powerful ones are very stupid, and it is godawful design to have one of them feature so prominently in the final boss fight of a combat-centric RPG like IWD2. While it can be worked around, doing so is neither fun nor interesting.

I like enemies with stuns and a one-round stun isn't all that powerful unless they're constantly going off, which she doesn't do (at least on normal and hard).

Of course, uninteresting content exists in every RPG. The thing is, compared to competitors in similar circumstances, BI/Obsidian have a track record of delivering games with a high proportion of uninteresting combat-related content. And that's why I tend to approach any sort of game they are attached to with a wee bit of reticence, ya dig? Basically, I was quite content to sit on the sidelines of the Project Eternity crowdfunding drive. It could very well be excellent, but certainly not something I'd stake money on.

I consider IWD2 and BG2 roughly comparable in quality though I'll grant that BG2 is more consistent overall. Bioware had 18 months to make their sequel whereas Black Isle was given 4-then-10 to make theirs.

 

[Lilura]

Warrior classes, especially "pure" characters, become practically obsolete in the face of hyper-powered melee enemies. Even Throne of Bhaal didn't kneecap them this badly.

Nah, warriors can still fill the screen with the chunking gibs of enemies, you just have to power-game and make sure you go two-handed with cleave and all the relevant feats/buffs.

cleric warriors > warriors, though. Such is 3.x

To make matters worse for the more mundane classes, monsters that mages could summon had all the beefiness of their HoF counterparts. And since HoF mode was typically played with a carryover party, that's right, you were summoning high level monsters/undead. The game felt like Pokemon: Forgotten Realms Version. "Cold Bones, I choose you!"

And it was worse before the patch when you could summon OP Festering drowned deads and Apocalyptic boneguards...

 

[deadalcoholnudes]

Haven't played Icewind Dale 2 before...can I get by without a full party of six? Would much prefer 3-4 people; just enjoy controlling less party members if it's possible.

 

[Wyrmlord]

In IWD2 it would be theoretically possible to make a solo level 1 Sorcerer, pick Monster Summoning 1 as one of your starting spells, and then pray your summons can kill the first few goblins, allowing you to level up (experience awards are greatly increased) and continually repeat the process until you get access to enough doomspells to start massacring enemies yourself. Stupid, but that's Obsidian Combat™ for you.

Not just theoretically possible.

I have done it. A sorcerer solo of ID2 in HoF.

But I didn't find it stupid. Playing as Sorcerer meant a lot of thinking about what would be good for short term survival and what would be not obsolete later in the game. And even if you do have high level destruction spells, you have to really ration them given the huge number of enemies and limited number of spells. And you also must plan out the right buffs to keep your sorcerer out of reach of enemy attacks.

The only downside is that you'll be level 30 before you even reach the half-dragon lady. Meaning you play most of the game on the exact same level. Which kills much of the fun eventually.

 

[Lilura]

Haven't played Icewind Dale 2 before...can I get by without a full party of six? Would much prefer 3-4 people; just enjoy controlling less party members if it's possible.

Sure, actually going with a smaller party is easier from a power-gaming PoV too, because your guys will level faster for spell and BAB progression.
Solo is probably the easiest if you are intimate with the game, especially if you exploit level squatting.

 

[deadalcoholnudes]

Haven't played Icewind Dale 2 before...can I get by without a full party of six? Would much prefer 3-4 people; just enjoy controlling less party members if it's possible.

Sure, actually going with a smaller party is easier from a power-gaming PoV too, because your guys will level faster for spell and BAB progression.
Solo is probably the easiest if you are intimate with the game, especially if you exploit level squatting.

Okay cool. Are there any classes you'd definitely recommend if I'm gonna go with a small party of say three members? Oddly enough I'm curious about Rangers in this game so ideally I'd like to have one of them.