Baldur's Gate Thoughts

[Chronicler]

In Baldur's Gate right now, playing a single class thief.

Hearing the siren call of the fighter/thief.

"What if this thief could land a hit?"

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Shadowdancer has always sounded really cool to me. Traps are kind of my least favorite thief skill. They give it up and in return they can use stealth spontaneously in the battlefield instead of having to plan ahead with the player's foreknowledge.

But it's always seemed like a pain to go through the initial 4 levels without any backstab modifier.

Seemed like such a big moment when I finally got to level five and could do 2x backstabs. So it felt like a bit of an anticlimax to try it out in the next fight, against an unarmored mage, only to whiff three times in a row before the rest of the partied killed him without my help.

After having some time to meditate on it though I think it'll probably even out a bit as I get some more levels. I'll probably find gear I can use to boost my Thac0. Everybody kind of has a hard time landing hits in the early levels anyway.

The stealth in plain sight is really useful just for aggro management. Keep the hits off you.

Though not perfect. I tried backstabbing a vampire wolf and it just immediately turned around and held me. Can't restealth if you're held.

Moving this into its own thread so I don't clog up the "What Are You Playing" thread.

After playing the shadow dancer a bit more, I think it probably shines more the higher levelled it gets.

Even when I manage to land a backstab, the difference between a x2 backstab modifier and a x3 backstab modifier is honestly pretty huge. These are some absolutely weaksauce backstabs.

But at by level 13 it'll be a difference between a x4 backtab modifier and a x5 backstab modifier, which shouldn't be nearly as profound a difference.

That being said, the shadowdancer doesn't hit x3 until level 9, which is way later in the BG1 campaign than I remembered. I think the shadowdancer might actually just not be all that good through most of BG1.

Though I'll reiterate that hide in plain sight is a god send for aggro management. Such a boon to be able to just pop that steal button whenever a monster starts chasing me instead of getting into a whole yakity sax routine while I try and direct the monster back to one of the fighters.

I've been kind of getting distracted by other runs but I'm trying to keep coming back to this shadowdancer because it's been on my bucket list for so long I've just gotta see it through.

 

[Chronicler]

Wait, I accidentally posted this in the wrong subforum. There doesn't seem to be a button to delete it. Maybe you can't do that with entire threads. Could one of the mods move this to "RPG Discussion"?

Edit: Thank you

 

[JustKneller]

I can't speak for BG (since I don't play EE), but the Shadowdancer made NWN a cakewalk. I was almost always HiPS, pop out to attack, pop back into stealth, repeat until the map was clear. It might have taken longer, but I'm pretty sure I waltzed through the game without taking a scratch.

If I had the EE, I would be tempted to do it for BG because stealth + cloak of non-detection is practically an I-win button if you can stealth again on demand. My favorite use for it would be for wizards (I hate the wizard fights in that game) who cast a combination of protections that essentially make them invincible for the first five rounds on sight. Let them pop off the contingencies, stealth, have a sip of coffee and then get to work (with an elemental weapon and DW/+APR to get through stoneskins).

 

[Chronicler]

I can't speak for BG (since I don't play EE), but the Shadowdancer made NWN a cakewalk. I was almost always HiPS, pop out to attack, pop back into stealth, repeat until the map was clear. It might have taken longer, but I'm pretty sure I waltzed through the game without taking a scratch.

If I had the EE, I would be tempted to do it for BG because stealth + cloak of non-detection is practically an I-win button if you can stealth again on demand. My favorite use for it would be for wizards (I hate the wizard fights in that game) who cast a combination of protections that essentially make them invincible for the first five rounds on sight. Let them pop off the contingencies, stealth, have a sip of coffee and then get to work (with an elemental weapon and DW/+APR to get through stoneskins).

Interesting! Happy to hear another perspective.

Mine isn't quite in "Stealth on Demand" territory yet. I've been splitting the skill points because I need her to handle the locks and traps while Imoen's dualing. Baldur's Gate 1 is also disproportionately outdoors, in the sunlight, as opposed to BG2 which is disproportionately indoors, under cover of shadow, which means pretty frequent penalties to stealth checks.

 

[JustKneller]

I would probably play it the same way, especially in a party. I feel like the SD would shine more as a solo, though, since a party would be more of a liability with guerilla tactics. Like you said, the SD would definitely shine more in BG2 due to fewer exterior locations and tighter maps.

BUT, then again, you possibly can effectively get to the same point with any thief using UAI+SotM (then run off to re-stealth normally). It just takes a little longer to get there. The only thing is that I doubt if the cloak of non-detection supports SotM invisibility to cover an escape. I think the cloak is only good for supporting "natural" stealth.

 

[Chronicler]

I'm honestly not super clear on the mechanics of non-detection, since not a whole lot of enemies in BG1 try to dispel your invisibility. I'm told it's more of an issue in BG2.

I've heard the cloak is super important though, because if you cast non-detection as a spell, then that it itself considered a dispellable illusion. So most things that will dispel your invisibility or stealth will dispel both it and the non-detection in one go.

Where the cloak is undispellable, which in turn will make your stealth undispellable.

 

[Antimatter]

The cloak of non-detection only protects stealth, not invisibility. If you're stealthed, you remain unseen even if an enemy's True Sight/Detect Illusions spells go off nearby. Note that powerful creatures can ignore your stealth, e.g., dragons or liches.

The constant effect of non-detection from the cloak can't be dispelled. Btw, the same constant effect of invisibility from the Staff of the Magi won't be dispelled while wearing the cloak as well.

 

[Chronicler]

Had a bit of a jump scare, when my shadowdancer was fighting the shadow archdruid. Failed a stealth check, and decided to use Shadowstep to make a hasty retreat down the stairs.

When I exited out of the shadowstep, the archdruid was down the stairs with me. Didn't know it worked like that. Lesson learned.

 

[Chronicler]

So, the party I'm running with on my mage/thief is Charname, Imoen, Jaheira, Khalid, Rasaad, Branwen.

The party I'm running with on my shadowdancer is the same but with Neera instead of Branwen.

And Branwen really does make a big difference. A single class cleric is kind of a god send, not just for their magic, but also just having another person in the party who won't immediately fold the second a monster turns in their direction. That armor is worth its weight in gold.

 

[Chronicler]

I was fighting this wizard, and he cast horror on us. Everybody starts running around like chickens with their head cut off.

So I cast "Remove Fear" and it gets everybody back into the fight. Everybody except Khalid, who managed to be tucked behind a book shelf when the spell went off.

Khalid is not beating the accusations.

 

[Chronicler]

There's that quest in Nashkel where the miner's wife asks you to check in on him, and you come back with his greenstone ring to report his death.

Cracking up right now over the option to claim the ring as payment for your services. It's a greenstone ring. It's technically jewellery but it might as well be a ring pop for how much you'll make when you pawn this thing.

 

[Chronicler]

Noralee is hilarious. Potions of Infravision. The most useful items in the game.

 

[Skatan]

Love the commentary! Got a few good chuckles out of it and the level of recognition on your comments about rewards is HIGH.

 

[Chronicler]

So, I play with the item randomizer mod. Which swaps around the locations of about 100 different items in the game.

It has some kind of priority system, where the sweet loot tends to go in places where you found sweet loot in the base game. It's just not the same sweet loot you normally find there.

Anyway, I've had two runs where I was missing a key pair of gauntlets. A shaman who had gotten to cloakwood without finding the gauntlets of dexterity. And a mage/thief who had gotten all the way to the final battle without finding the gauntlets of ogre power.

Lo and behold, it turns out the gauntlets were on mutamin's body in both cases. That insane wizard with all the basilisks who turns people into statues for his personal garden. So I'll have to keep that in mind going forward that Mutamin seems to have some pretty nice items in his pool of potential loot.

 

[Chronicler]

These dopplegangers have gotta stop calling people fleshlings. I don't know how anybody's fooled by them. This feels like a pretty big tell.

 

[Chronicler]

In Durlag's Tower, directly before the Demon Knight, you encounter this man who just saw his party march off to fight the guy and die.

He tells you about the Demon Knight's fearsome mirror of opposition, which creates an exact clone of your party to kill you. He says advises that if you were to kill The Demon Knight probably the only way to do it would be by turning the mirror of opposition on him.

That being said, when I tried using the mirror, all hell broke loose. I found it was actually a lot easier to kill the guy without it. Go figure.

 

[WiseGrimwald]

It's all a matter of the tactics that you use. If you smash the mirror and go invisible the Demon Knight will probably be killed by his alter ego. You can then take on the others a bit at a time making the individual battles a bit easier. There's not much in it IMO.

 

[Montresor_SP]

I wanted to know just how friendly Imoen was prepared to be.
1) Create a new character and make it a Cleric.
2) Memorize Command so you can put her to sleep for a round.
3) Go to the entrance to Candlekeep.
4) When Imoen spots you and comes to talk, cast Command on her, then pause the game and click Gorion to fake-talk him.
5) Agree to leave immediately.
6) Watch cutscene where Gorion is killed by a mysterious armored character.
7) Next morning, Imoen walks up to you as if nothing ever happened and offers to join.

I tried something similar with a Half-Orc fighter who chunked her and then spoke to Gorion. This time, no Imoen!

 

[Chronicler]

I wanted to know just how friendly Imoen was prepared to be.
1) Create a new character and make it a Cleric.
2) Memorize Command so you can put her to sleep for a round.
3) Go to the entrance to Candlekeep.
4) When Imoen spots you and comes to talk, cast Command on her, then pause the game and click Gorion to fake-talk him.
5) Agree to leave immediately.
6) Watch cutscene where Gorion is killed by a mysterious armored character.
7) Next morning, Imoen walks up to you as if nothing ever happened and offers to join.

I tried something similar with a Half-Orc fighter who chunked her and then spoke to Gorion. This time, no Imoen!

Intresting. I would've assumed it would just spawn a new Imoen regardless of whether you'd chunked her.

Especially since the Imoen in Candlekeep has an entirely different character sheet.

 

[Montresor_SP]

Gotta love Lilarcor!