DAO vs BG1&2 difficulty

[visions]

I remember 2 handed fighters being useful, but sword and shield fighter were probably the worst class in the game.

2 handed didn't seem much better than sword & shield, I remember switching Alistair for Oghren for the Deep Roads seemed like a minor difference in terms of combat efficiency to me.

Not sure about a dual wielding fighter though. All I know is that my dual-wielding melee assassin/duellist rogue was more efficient than either Alistair or Oghren (sword & shield/2 handed fighters respectively). When whichever of them got knocked out, I was far less bothered than when the same happened to my rogue.

When considering damage output at least, I suspect a dual wielding rogue is much better than a dual wielding warrior as well, because of backstabbing and coup de grace.

 

[sea]

Dual wield fighters have some of the best damage output of any melee class. Once they are hasted they just destroy everything. Two-handed when hasted are surprisingly good as well, and they are more about crowd control than raw damage due to all their disables, knockdowns, etc. Sword and shield have low damage output but they are worth considering due to being able to tank so much better than other warriors, if you want them to be a strictly "bait" class.

Dual wielding rogues with backstabs still have the highest damage of any melee class, but they require more babysitting and will die much faster than warriors.

 

[Stonewolf]

Are you serious?

Dexterity rogue - slap some protection from magic on and almost nothing can touch you in the game after a certain point.

Cunning rogue - shit dies before you can blink, most boss battles become a breeze.

Iit must've changed since the release then, rogues were shitweak compared to mages when I played it back then.

 

[tuluse]

Even still I don't know if it's fair to directly compare enemy variety in a 2D game with much smaller art requirements, and with the benefit of having half its bestiary taken from its previous game, with a fully 3D game with higher art requirements relatively speaking for each enemy, and one that doesn't recycle content from a previous game.

 

[ZagorTeNej]

And how many monsters in Baldur's Gate can't be completely and utterly steamrolled by using the tried and true "2 warriors + haste + all buffs + rest and repeat" combo? What "varied tactics" does that require? And why do Baldur's Gate 2 palatte swaps count as "unique monsters" while in Dragon Age they don't? In Dragon Age, the enemies have just as many distinguishing factors (spells/skills available, equipment, etc.) than most monsters in Baldur's Gate 2 do, with their 1 spell each they spam before bum-rushing you in melee.

Well encounter design in BG1 for the most part pales in comparison to the sequel but yes in that game the majority of encounters could be easily bypassed by same tactics (ranged weaponry and haste once you gets it, though it takes quite some time before you do) but even then you still had some monsters (among non boss/unique mobs) that required you to adjust and apply specific tactics to beat them such as say basilisks and sirines.

However if you look at the whole series or even just BG2 the encounter design and the variety of monsters is significantly better than in DA, you could of course use DA2's (possibly) expanded bestiary in your argument but admittedly I know next to nothing about DA sequel ( I tried the demo, didn't like it and never gave it another go) so I don't know how much that would help your case.

I agree Baldur's Gate 2 is better overall, but people also highly overstate both the variety in tactics and enemy variety. There are just as many monsters that fight identically but have different models/animations as in Dragon Age, just that the aesthetics are more varied.

Yes but I'm not talking about number of different models/animations/palettes/skins etc. both games use but variety of enemies that require you to adapt and use different tactics or atleast modify them to a certain degree in order to prevail.

My last DA playthrough started to feel repetitive quite quickly because the same tactic was applicable in almost every fight (cone of cold, my PC rogue backstabs, my "tank" uses taunt, mana clash for enemy mages and that's about it) while in BG I wouldn't attack a group of vampires without negative plane protection, basilisks without protection from petrification, clay golems without (magic) blunt weapons, mind flayers/umber hulks without chaotic commands etc.

I'm not saying that the game is hard, especially after you've beaten it a dozen times over the years and know the best solution to everything the game throws at you, the difference is in variety of tactics you apply for specific enemies and not having one set of tactics you repeat ad nauseam throghout the game.

And no, if you are talking tactics and monster special abilities, you can't include mods, some of which very heavily tweak the enemy AI scripts, abilities, etc.

Agree, I'm talking about vanilla solely, not strategems, tactics etc.

 

[ZagorTeNej]

Iit must've changed since the release then, rogues were shitweak compared to mages when I played it back then.

In most RPGs other classes are weak compared to mages but rogues were always quite strong in DA if you know how to use them, dexterity based rogues can get pretty broken thanks to sky high defense while with the right talents cunning rogues are the best melee damage dealers.

 

[ZagorTeNej]

Rogues, especially "cunning" Rogues dual-wielding daggers, are the best mundane DPS due to rate of attack, backstab and crit chance.

I like to use stunning poisons, but they're pretty OP.

I normally take Assassin specialization first and go with two haste-capable mages to get stacking haste effect for ultimate rapeage.

Yeah but haste doesn't stack with momentum IIRC (it's bugged) and haste lowers your attack rating (which is already a weak side for cunning rogues), for cunning rogues assassin + bard specialization combo is the best (song of courage gets better with higher cunning and boosts your damage, critical % and attack rating).

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

You're right, I fucked up listing the golems separately vs. individually between the two games..

That's not the only thing you've fucked up. The entire list is a fucked up attempt at supporting your false argument by rigging the "statistics". It starts with the BG2 list being woefully incomplete and ends with the examples I've given.

Succubus in Dragon Age = Desire Demon.

Except you've already listed the desire demon. So not only do you file all devils/demons of BG2 under 1 entry "evil demons" but listed the DA demons one after one, no, some even get 2 entries. Nice try.

Dual wielding rogues with backstabs still have the highest damage of any melee class, but they require more babysitting and will die much faster than warriors.

You really have no clue, have you? Trying to out-volourn the Volourn?
Only someone without the slightest clue would call rogues the worst class in DA or that they die much faster than warriors.
Dual-Weapon-Fighting dagger wielding Rogues with Duellant/Assassin advanced classes are the most powerful and unbalanced imba class of the game.
You end up with a armor rating of ~35 or something as opposed to the 45-50 a warrior in the heaviest armor has (<- lol) and in exchange for those measily 10 points lost armor based damage reduction
they'll have a defense rating so high that they're practically immune to anything but spells. No warrior can ever out-tank a dex-based rogue in DA, because the latter hardly takes any damage at all while the real *tanks* constantly need potions or a healer baby-sitter.
They'll apply damage so quickly that enemies drop like flies, especially when supported by a mage using disabling spells (all paralysation spells for instance), since disabled enemies automatically suffer critical sneak attack momentum-fueled twf baragges.
If the situation ever gets difficult (not very likely) , there's hide-in-plain-sight.

And you know what they have to do for it? Need mana potions? No. Health potions? Hardly. Run out of stamina? Never. Use a lot of abilities? Of course not. All you have to do is enable momentum and duel-fighting. That's it.

 

[sea]

Except you've already listed the desire demon. So not only do you file all devils/demons of BG2 under 1 entry "evil demons" but listed the DA demons one after one, no, some even get 2 entries. Nice try.

That was another oversight, I didn't realize I listed Desire Demon/Succubus as different monsters. The horrors of posting sleep-deprived at 3 AM.

Only someone without the slightest clue would call rogues the worst class in DA or that they die much faster than warriors.

I never said that they are the "worst class." I said that they get raped faster than warriors in melee due to lack of heavy armor, which they do.

Dual-Weapon-Fighting dagger wielding Rogues with Duellant/Assassin advanced classes are the most powerful and unbalanced imba class of the game.

Agreed, in that backstabs > all. But to be honest, dual-wield warriors are not that far behind because you have to sink more talents into passives (including going up to Lethality) than active abilities to make rogues worthwhile. Dual-wield warriors have more versatility than pure DPS and more abilities to call on on average.

You end up with a armor rating of ~35 or something as opposed to the 45-50 a warrior in the heaviest armor has (<- lol) and in exchange for those measily 10 points lost armor based damage reduction
they'll have a defense rating so high that they're practically immune to anything but spells. No warrior can ever out-tank a dex-based rogue in DA, because the latter hardly takes any damage at all while the real *tanks* constantly need potions or a healer baby-sitter.

You're talking absolute endgame, which accounts for 10-15% of the game. Before the point where you get the best gear, have your rogues with high enough strength requirements to use it, etc., you are going to have more trouble. If you want to compare endgame states, dual-wield warriors are near-indestructible and have almost as high melee damage output without needing backstabs. When you get into the expansion, of course, your party is so effective that you can literally steamroll everything on nightmare mode without even thinking, so those small distinctions don't even matter.

Also, dex-based rogue is not the best in my opinion. Best way to maximize damage is to go for cunning + Lethality and then go for minimum requirements for other necessary talents (so about 30 dex and 20 strength). Player character gets way more attribute points than other classes (the Fade gives you like +6 to everything, let's not forget +attribute tomes from DLC and shops); it's a bit more balanced when you don't have 70-80 cunning on top of that, but more like 50-60 as is realistic for followers.

And you know what they have to do for it? Need mana potions? No. Health potions? Hardly. Run out of stamina? Never. Use a lot of abilities? Of course not. All you have to do is enable momentum and duel-fighting. That's it.

Or use Haste and have it applied to the entire party. Haste, just like Baldur's Gate, is probably the number one game-breaking ability and makes Momentum pointless if you have a mage.

 

[Lilura]

Yeah but haste doesn't stack with momentum IIRC (it's bugged) and haste lowers your attack rating (which is already a weak side for cunning rogues), for cunning rogues assassin + bard specialization combo is the best (song of courage gets better with higher cunning and boosts your damage, critical % and attack rating).

I'm aware of that bug, but the fixpack addresses it:

* Fix - Haste Weapon Speed
Fixes the bug where if you drop below 0.5s weapon speed, it will reset to 1.0s.

And yeah I take Bard specialization too and SoC stacks with itself as well.

 

[Mother Russia]

How hard is Baldur's Gate compared to Dragon Age Origins on Nightmare? Will playing DA on Nightmare prepare me for older CRPGs like BG, Fallout, and Arcanum? I know that DA doesn't use DnD rules and has regenerative health and non-permanent death. Would Neverwinter Nights 2 be easier for someone whose only DnD based game he has ever beaten is Planescape: Torment?

If you are playing Bg1 for the first time, it will be MUCH harder than DA:O no matter the difficulty you play DA:O on.

BG1 is a different beast that DA:O. You need to make a paradigm shift in order to 'get' the game, which you will after playing it for a while. For instance, the hardest part are the first couple of levels, where you can be killed very quickly due to very low hp. If you play a mage, it is even easier to die. Also, coming to terms with the face that your mage will only be able to case ONE single spell at level 1, is a big change compared to modern rpgs. (You need to rest to regain that spell) This is due to the ruleset the BG games are based on. Mages are horrendously weak in every way in the beginning.

In BGII however, where you start out at level 7-9 (if you import your character from BG1 you can start at level 8-9) mages are incredibly powerful with lots of spells at your disposal with the ability to wipe out the entire battlefield if you use a lot of spellcasting in a single combat.

BGII is also a very complicated rpg compared to rpgs of today (and dare I say it, even of yesteryear to some extent.) That's because it uses a lot of spells and options from AD&D 2e. Mage duels for instance, which are a lot of fun (though eventually they get old) BGI and II also has summoning spells which add another dimension to combat. Some summons are really powerful.

 

[BobtheTree]

The difference between BG 1&2 and DA:O difficulty is that the BG series doesn't BS you to get harder, like the spider fight in Dragon Age which segments the health of the spider queen so you have to fight different waves of spiders. Scripted fights like that made encounters in Dragon Age artificially harder as opposed to designing an encounter where the player knows what they're up against and can strategize accordingly.

 

[Lilura]

It really depends on how you evaluate power... your example of one spellslot at lvl1 assumes someone won't choose Specialist, like Conjurer, who really have no drawbacks for their +1 spellslot due to their opposition school being loldivination, PLUS every single recruitable NPC that is a mage is a Specialist, even the multi-classing gnome is an Illusionist.
So you really have two castings at level 1 and Edwin starts off with +2 spellslots for a total of three castings per 8 hour rest.

That means at least two castings of Sleep per map, which completely immobilises as many lvl5-and-below foes that you can seduce into the AoE.
Then at level 3 you get the ensnaring Web (three castings for Edwin, two for the other Specialists), which is gameover for almost all foes except spiders and other immunes.

Sure a melee fighter is less squishy and we need them but a fighter takes damage, a fighter needs to be healed.

The ability to make a mob of foes lay down or stand motionless and just wait to die thereby mitigating all damage for the whole party is why I don't consider mages "horrendously weak in every way", even in the beginning. This is AD&D and mages have always been used in key moments to turn the tide, and that is indisputably a strength.

One just needs to know how to use them.

 

[Volourn]

You overrate web so much. It's rather pathetic of you. L0L Sleep is so deadly.. against 2hp xfartz! That is SCARY. lol

 

[Roguey]

The difference between BG 1&2 and DA:O difficulty is that the BG series doesn't BS you to get harder, like the spider fight in Dragon Age which segments the health of the spider queen so you have to fight different waves of spiders. Scripted fights like that made encounters in Dragon Age artificially harder as opposed to designing an encounter where the player knows what they're up against and can strategize accordingly.

Every time you killed a Sendai statute in ToB, a group of drow would spawn from the entrance.

There's also nothing wrong with scripted reinforcements. As long as they don't fall out of the sky or pop up from the ground all the time.

 

[Snufkin]

BG2+ToB is surprisingly hard in first gameplay when you have no clue where traps are and what tactics to use vs monsters. Some encounters require specific equipment, spells or skills to beat. But if you know what you are doing then solo gnome ilusionist/thief will have no problem winning even on hardest dificulty and mods.

 

[imweasel]

You won't get far in BG2 if you don't use hard counters like pierce magic and dispel magic and just try to whack the shit out of everything without being tactical.

But if you know what you are doing then solo gnome ilusionist/thief will have no problem winning even on hardest dificulty and mods.

I've watched BG2 solos on Youtube. Soloing is really isn't possible without a lot of cheesing, so I wouldn't say that it is easy.

 

[Snufkin]

improved haste + shapechange mindflayer + timestop solve any solo problems. Other than that mislead spell + belm + scarlet ninjato + improved haste + gauntlets of greater specialization = 9 backstabbs per round. Ilusionist/thief also lvls up very fast from unlocking doors/chests, scribing/unscribing/scribing again scrolls and disarming traps.

 

[Lhynn]

improved haste + shapechange mindflayer + timestop solve any solo problems. Other than that mislead spell + belm + scarlet ninjato + improved haste + gauntlets of greater specialization = 9 backstabbs per round. Ilusionist/thief also lvls up very fast from unlocking doors/chests, scribing/unscribing/scribing again scrolls and disarming traps.

All of these sound like level 1 abilities that you can get from any class at the start of the game. yep. they sure do.

 

[Kem0sabe]

improved haste + shapechange mindflayer + timestop solve any solo problems. Other than that mislead spell + belm + scarlet ninjato + improved haste + gauntlets of greater specialization = 9 backstabbs per round. Ilusionist/thief also lvls up very fast from unlocking doors/chests, scribing/unscribing/scribing again scrolls and disarming traps.

That's a lot of cheese...

 

[Snufkin]

All of these sound like level 1 abilities that you can get from any class at the start of the game. yep. they sure do.

You start BG2 at 6/7 lvl and melf minute meteors should carry you thru first dungeon very easy. Required exp you need is aquired very fast because of scroll scribe/unscribe (they give 1000-9000exp) quests and locks/disarming.
Also i found that Inquisitor are very good for soloing. Their dispel magic ability and true seeing eliminates worse enemies (mages) in the game without any problems from start to finish.

 

[Lhynn]

You start BG2 at 6/7 lvl and melf minute meteors should carry you thru first dungeon very easy. Required exp you need is aquired very fast because of scroll scribe/unscribe (they give 1000-9000exp) quests and locks/disarming.
Also i found that Inquisitor are very good for soloing. Their dispel magic ability and true seeing eliminates worse enemies (mages) in the game without any problems from start to finish.

Bitch, are you even aware were you are posting BG2 tips, tricks and exploits? Thats not the issue here, having classes or builds that make it easier in RPGs is p. much the norm for rpgs. The issue is that game is exceedingly easy with a meatgrinder, you believe the game is actually exceedingly easy. When the fact is you couldnt possibly do all of this on your first playtrough.
Its still fine tho, the fact the game can be played in so many ways, and that each and every decision you make in your character building can vary the experience so greatly is good, the fact that despite all this the game is still winnable by p. much any character is extremely cool as well.

 

[Mexi]

Baldur's Gate isn't hard, and I'd wager that DA: O on nightmare is harder. The only thing is that BG has a GIGANTIC learning curve. When I first played it, I didn't know how to do shit. It was tough as all hell. I even quit the game for about a year until I came back to it. Once you get past the huge learning curve, it's pretty damn easy.

 

[Mexi]

You won't get far in BG2 if you don't use hard counters like pierce magic and dispel magic and just try to whack the shit out of everything without being tactical.


I've watched BG2 solos on Youtube. Soloing is really isn't possible without a lot of cheesing, so I wouldn't say that it is easy.

Yup, I hate it when people say a game is too easy then they fucking give a guidelines for their playthrough with a fuck-ton of cheesing and fuck-ton of exploits. What about someone, you know, playing the game the way it's supposed to be played?

 

[Snufkin]

How using items, spells and skills that are there in game that developer put them can be cheesing and exploiting? Dont you utilize anything you can to win any game?