This may be a stupid question, but you know, that you have to click the "Level Up" button on the character screen of the specific character in order to gain a new level?
The main game screen does not provide much information that you can level up one of your characters. A simple text message in the dialogue window (which is often enough quickly replaced by other messages) and a small "+"-sign on the character's portrait is all you get.
Hm, well regarding the mines, I can tell you that you have all the time you need. So you can return to the surface, stock up and heal. You can also rest in the upper levels, which you have cleared out of kobolds.
A good tactic is to scout ahead with your thief to find enemies and traps, and also equip Jaheira with her sling. She does way more damage with it than with her club. Generally, ranged weapons are pretty powerful in BG1.
If you want to grind a little first, I can recommend killing bears. Although they are quite strong, they are slow and you can kill them with you ranged weapons and the give you several hundred XPs.
1000 XP is pretty much DnD standard for level 2. Important to remember that this system was not made for Baldur's Gate - it actually uses the vast majority of DnD 3.0 mechanics.
That said, I don't think the combat in the BG series is very interesting. There's a massive amount of encounters that you can't really handle unless you specifically prepare for them or get lucky, and of course there's always the very real chance of just randomly dying from one good hit or a trap or whatever. The fun is in pretty much everything except the combat.I do completely disagree. I find the combat super interesting with a lot of spells and counter spells and such. Its deep and challenging combat.
That said, I don't think the combat in the BG series is very interesting. There's a massive amount of encounters that you can't really handle unless you specifically prepare for them or get lucky, and of course there's always the very real chance of just randomly dying from one good hit or a trap or whatever. The fun is in pretty much everything except the combat.I do completely disagree. I find the combat super interesting with a lot of spells and counter spells and such. Its deep and challenging combat.
Indeed, there is a quite a few stuff that will kill you outright or will be bloody hard to do without suffering the death to half your party, but reloading and then thinking out a strategy on how to deal with it, preparing your spells and equipment is loads of fun and challenging imo.
There's a lot more to BG's combat than your average rpg that consists of spamming your one all powerful spell or attack.
I don't mind the combat, my only beef is the progression thus far. I'll keep at it and see how it goes.Because at level 1 in BG1 you don't have too much options yet. So the combat may seem rather simple.
I mean it's not super engaging, it's just pausing and tell people what to do, but it's alright for what it does. No worse than fallout or other isometrics from what I can tell.
I kind of prefer turn-based combat but I also realize that turn based can take longer.
And here I have BG:EE on my Steam wishlist. This thread is making me rethink that.Well if you wanna miss out on one of the best RPG experiences out there, go right ahead!
Baldur's Gate is awfully fun at gameplay and balance.Fixed that for you.
I don't mind the combat, my only beef is the progression thus far. I'll keep at it and see how it goes.Because at level 1 in BG1 you don't have too much options yet. So the combat may seem rather simple.
I mean it's not super engaging, it's just pausing and tell people what to do, but it's alright for what it does. No worse than fallout or other isometrics from what I can tell.
I kind of prefer turn-based combat but I also realize that turn based can take longer.
Also, BG is like semi turn based, the mechanics are done in turn base (which is why it may seem like your characters are some times not very responsive, because they are waiting for the next round to start so they can do their action).
The combat is great if you know what you are doing. Which I guess might be considered a fault of the game, requiring you to know some things which if played for the first time, you can't reasonably expect to know. But come on, I completed this game when I was 14 years old, had only a basic grasp of the english language and wasn't using half the great spells because 'why use this when you can fireball instead?' mentality of a dumb teenager.
I expect adults to be able to get through this game with some degree of elegance. I does however require you to think, plan, plot and go about encounters in a smart way from time to time.
Any game in which you're practically required to save scum in order to progress or even discover winning strategies gets a strike against it in the "user friendly" category, as well as the "intuitive balance" category, both of which I consider very important both for grabbing a new player's attention and for keeping it through to the end.Uh, if you have to save-scum every fight, something is wrong.
I do completely disagree. I find the combat super interesting with a lot of spells and counter spells and such. Its deep and challenging combat.
There is no freaking way one can reach Nashkel mines while still being lvl 1. I'm fairly sure it was possible to reach lvl 2 in the starting town if you played right.
Tough, I'd recommend BG1 campaign played trough BG2. Niftier engine and some fixes.
I would have said that the BG1 conversion for the big picture mod of BG2 is the best way to go. You don't even have to import your character, the game goes on almost seemlessly from the ending of bg1 to bg2. How awesome is that?
Thrown in a dungeon with a bunch of random nobodies that I'm supposed to care about/find funny/endearing whateverYes well, BG2 happens to be the sequel to BG1. Those aren't random nobodies to people who have played BG1.
Thrown in a dungeon with a bunch of random nobodies that I'm supposed to care about/find funny/endearing whateverYes well, BG2 happens to be the sequel to BG1. Those aren't random nobodies to people who have played BG1.
Right, go play different games then. BG obviously isn't working for you.
So, if one is just getting into this.... Baldur's Gate original, or the Enhanced Edition?
FWIW I've heard that EEs are a waste of money since both the games have an active modding base that's already fixed most of the issues the EEs address.On the one hand, yes, most of the bugfixes in the Enhanced Editions (not all, but most) were taken pretty much straight from popular "fix" mods. On the other hand, the main reason people get the EEs (besides having those fixes in the base game) is for the upgraded engines. The EEs are still perfectly moddable; most major mods had EE-compatible updates within a week of BG2:EE getting released, if memory serves.
Except for the ****ty railroad plot.
"You are suddenly captured by bandits who appeared out of nowhere and somehow surprised you all! You wake up in a dungeon with all of your stuff gone." ****! Why not just say "Rocks fall, everyonediesis knocked unconscious" and be done with it! :p
I loved BG1 but whoever wrote the plotline for BG2 needs ****ing shooting. While there are some great ideas in there did they have to tramp them through every ****ty D&D cliche? Thank **** they didn't do that for BG1 or it would have been "**** Candlekeep, let's have them all meet in a tavern where a shady guy gives them a quest!"
From a new player's perspective BG2 is even worse quite frankly. Thrown in a dungeon with a bunch of random nobodies that I'm supposed to care about/find funny/endearing whatever and to me it's just a huge wall of dialogue and chat I don't give a damn about.
QuoteFrom a new player's perspective BG2 is even worse quite frankly. Thrown in a dungeon with a bunch of random nobodies that I'm supposed to care about/find funny/endearing whatever and to me it's just a huge wall of dialogue and chat I don't give a damn about.
Isn't that kinda the problem when a protagonsit has established ANYTHING?
PC comes from town X? Well, I don't care about that town, I didn't live there.
PC has a mother? Well I (the player), don't know her, why should I care?
It's bloody hillarius, when people ask for PC's to have some connection to the world, but when when that connection is give, it's is "fake" and "stupid".
Unless they have a few hundered hours worth of content of the PC just living his normal life with his family before the call comes, they will NEVER do it proper justice.
But now all my guys are getting one shot by "Kobold Commandos" with flaming arrows :P sigh. Well the level 1 guys anyway.No surprise there, your characters should be way beyond lvl 2 by that time. It's been really long so I don't remember where the level should be, but I know there's something wrong with the game or you're doing it wrong.
Oh, I often went for the kobold mines when I was lvl 1.But now all my guys are getting one shot by "Kobold Commandos" with flaming arrows :P sigh. Well the level 1 guys anyway.No surprise there, your characters should be way beyond lvl 2 by that time. It's been really long so I don't remember where the level should be, but I know there's something wrong with the game or you're doing it wrong.
"You are suddenly captured by bandits who appeared out of nowhere and somehow surprised you all! You wake up in a dungeon with all of your stuff gone." ****! Why not just say "Rocks fall, everyonediesis knocked unconscious" and be done with it! :p
I loved BG1 but whoever wrote the plotline for BG2 needs ****ing shooting. While there are some great ideas in there did they have to tramp them through every ****ty D&D cliche? Thank **** they didn't do that for BG1 or it would have been "**** Candlekeep, let's have them all meet in a tavern where a shady guy gives them a quest!"
As for going to Nashkell straight off the bat ... I sincerely believe that oldschool RPGs are not designed to take up a quest and then just immediately go and follow it. That's not exploring properly. And will get you killed in 9 out of 10 times. "Oh, I've got this quest to kill a lich named Kangaxx at lvl 3. I should definitely visit him right away!" (If anyone ever played Gothic 3, the first main quest is also the second to last main quest. It is titled "Find Xardas". You likely will be more than 40 hours into the game before even getting near him, although it is theoretically perfectly possible to do so right after the game has started.)
Maybe I'll grab that Minsc guy instead if he's a wizard.HAHAhahahahaaaa...
Maybe I'll grab that Minsc guy instead if he's a wizard.HAHAhahahahaaaa...
/me wipes tears from his eyes
No, Minsc is not a wizard. Thank you for that glorious mental image, however.
Since your party is currently missing an offensive spellcaster (Xzar doesn't count) you should definitely find Minsc and do his quest.
Maybe I'll grab that Minsc guy instead if he's a wizard.
"Magic is impressive, but now Minsc leads. Swords for everyone!"
Haha - Minsc is a classic, but I thought his "becomes leader line" was: "Minsc will lead with blade and bow. Boo will take care of the details *squeeeek*"
(or was that BG2?)
Okay, well I don't think I've met most of those people yet but I'll check it out.
The thief died (the bad guy) and I found some elf guy named Xan in the mine so for the moment he's in my party though, he seems a bit crap. He has some moonblade thing so I tried to throw armour spell on him and have him go into close combat but he gets killed pretty quick. Maybe I'll grab that Minsc guy instead if he's a wizard.
Mandatory Emoen fap post.
Yeah dunno if I'm doing that great with the game. Fought some Black Talon Elites in wherever, Larswood and with half the party dead I need to grind just to afford to resurrect a couple people. Pretty dumb that the cost of resurrection goes up when they increase in levels. And not sure how I would ever afford these 15,000 items that some places have.
Most of the +1 gear I found was just looted.
But yeah 400 bucks for a wizard that can get killed in two seconds by ice arrows or whatnot. A wizard who's greatest contribution is a three magic missiles a day and a few rocks from a sling. I don't get it. There are some decent wizard spells but so far they seem like a liability at level 3 or 4 or whatever she is. Dynaheir. Of she has slots for a couple level 2 spells but I've not found any recently :P I'm thinking of ditching all the wizards and just taking a bunch of fighters with my clerics but I know that a few spells have been great on occasion
Though I've not been to Baldur's Gate yet maybe there's some good stuff to buy there :)
It should also show up on the map even if you annihilated every bandit on the field. You encounter a group of bandits with a speaking leader on each of them. Did you scour the entire maps?
Also, durlag's tower is endgame content, be very carefull when entering :).
Mandatory Emoen fap post.
I figured you for a Vicona man. You've toned down.
You could try killing the cultists first? At least that will keep the demon from respawning.
Anyway, your bigger problem is probably that you're playing Tales of the Sword Coast content which was an expansion to Baldur's Gate and more or less written to happen after the events of Baldur's Gate.
Unless you've already gone through the main quest of BG, you're probably a fairly low level character still and if you think you can beat the game's most powerful bosses with low level party, you're going to have a bad day. You probably don't have powerful enough weapons, fighters, or magic attacks to damage the demon significantly (although magic missile WILL work, technically), and the characters' saves are probably fairly low as well.
"Wait a minute, did you just move a bunch of fields in one turn?"
"Yeah, so?"
"That's against the rules, isn't it?"
"Screw the rules, I have green hair!"
And that's how it happened.
People mostly complain about things that make the game frustrating for them, such as apparently in this case, having a boss that's basically unbeatable without out-of-game prior knowledge or without lots of saveloading to find a loophole to exploit or by essentially just getting lucky.
Some people like the game to be like a puzzle for them to figure out, other people want the game to give them a so-called fair chance, and those things are very different from "easy" and "hard".
I played BG2 first and while the railroad plot didn't bother me as much as it does for some people, I couldn't make heads or tails of the counterspelling system (I tried to be an anti-mage mage without having a clue what I was doing) and I couldn't get half my chars to be effective in combat (Mazzy couldn't hit ANYTHING no matter what I did). I immediately quit upon getting dumped in Bodhi's Dungeon. But a few months later I got intrigued by it again, did some reading on the spell system and hunted down scrolls of Secret Word and Breach as soon as I could, replaced Mazzy and Anomen with Keldorn and Minsc (yes I ditched Minsc my first playthrough, I was young and stupid), switched to a male char rather than the female one I usually play in RPGs, hoping that the better romance plots might make the game more interesting....and this time, I stumbled onto Viconia. Because of her, BG2 is now one of my favorite games ever.I would have said that the BG1 conversion for the big picture mod of BG2 is the best way to go. You don't even have to import your character, the game goes on almost seemlessly from the ending of bg1 to bg2. How awesome is that?
Except for the ****ty railroad plot.
"You are suddenly captured by bandits who appeared out of nowhere and somehow surprised you all! You wake up in a dungeon with all of your stuff gone." ****! Why not just say "Rocks fall, everyonediesis knocked unconscious" and be done with it! :p
I loved BG1 but whoever wrote the plotline for BG2 needs ****ing shooting. While there are some great ideas in there did they have to tramp them through every ****ty D&D cliche? Thank **** they didn't do that for BG1 or it would have been "**** Candlekeep, let's have them all meet in a tavern where a shady guy gives them a quest!"